Fallseason 2011 anime watchlist part b

After part a, here is part b of my anime watchlist from the very good Fallseason of 2011, I don’t watch all these shows at a weekly pace, but when I have time and don’t fall asleep I watch them.

Sorry for the lack of figure reviews in these last few months, but please bear with it a few weeks more, by the end of this month new figures should be released and arrive here soon.

In this post I will talk about Persona 4, Last Exile – Ginyoku no Fam, C³ – Cube x Cursed x Curious, Mashiroiro Symphony: The Color of Lovers and Shakugan no Shana III Final.

Persona 4

I never played any of the Persona games so far, but I wanted to try this anime adaption.
Main character Yuu transferred from Tokyo to the calm town Inaba. Despite acting a bit strange on it’s first day at the new school, he soon finds two nice classmates, the funny Yosuke and the upbeat and talkactive Chie, all three befriend quite quickly and start to hang out with each other.
In Inaba some mysterious suicides(murders?) occured, it is said that all victims appeared on the “Midnight Channel” that only airs around midnight, it is an urban legend of the town.

httpvh://youtu.be/8zodwdgV8E4

One day Yuu realizes that he can enter a tv screen just by touching it,his newly made friends, they want to see it for themselves. They went to an electronic store and with the help of Yuu they can enter a different dimension which resembles Inaba. The Inaba in this dimension is a lot more creepy and full of fog. As the trio is attacked by ugly monsters Yuu’s newly gained powers awake and he can summon a fancy dressed giant called “Persona” which works like an extension of his own body. He slayes the attacking monsters and saved the day. With the help of Kuma, a weird but somehow cute bear like resident of this dimension they can go back to their own world.

Later it is said that people who enter the other dimension are attacked by the manifestation of the dark sides of their personality. As the trio enters the dimension again, Yosuke and also Chie are attacked by the manifestations of their dark side. The manifestations try to kill the real Chie and Yusuke. Yuu tries to protect them with his Persona and also with encouraging them. When both accepted their dark side, the alter ego dissapears and both get their own Personas, like Yuu.

I don’t know if Persona 4 is close to the game since I haven’t played it, but so far I really like this show. Yuu, Yusuke and the lovely Chie are a nice group of friends, it’s really enjoyable to see how they interact. The youth culture spirit of this anime is very nice, untroubled and funny dialogues and characters with believable personalities. The animation style looks quite different than in most other animes, a bit more on the realistic side, it is a pretty nice look. This seems to be promising.

Last Exile – Ginyoku no Fam

Earlier this year I stumbled over the announcement of another anime inside the Last Exile universe, in 2003 there already was a Last Exile anime, which I really liked, it was one of my first animes. The main protagonist is Fam Fan Fan a bubbly and adventurous girl who lives and works together with the sky pirates, she pilots a tiny vanship with her friend Giselle as her navigator.

httpvh://youtu.be/bi2Ak_alllk

The story is not that clear after just 4 episodes, but the main setting is the following, the Ades Federation is on a large assault to conquer the whole world, they captured the princess of Turan to use her for activating their secret weapon. Fam who rescued the princess and her younger sister in the first Blitzkrieg attack of Ades can only save the younger princess Millia in the end and escaped to the area of the sky pirates, Ades doesn’t care for small flies like them. From what I’ve seen so far, these two animes seem to be a bit connected, this new one takes place after the events of the first Last Exile anime. So far there was a reunion with the charismatic mad man Dio, the tough Tatiana Wisler as captain and Alister Agrew, my hidden crush from the first Last Exile.

Nice to see that studio Gonzo is back with a very promising show, the animations in Last Exile are simply (jawdrop) stunning. The anime features a nice Range Murata like charakterdesign and beautiful environments, also these Steam Punk design elements and the pretty ships are a nice aspect of this anime. You shouldn’t ignore this show, it is really good so far, well picking it when all episodes have aired is also an option, but don’t miss Last Exile – Ginyoku no Fam.

C³ . Cube x Cursed x Curious

I remember that I said that I just wanted to watch the Blockbuster anime in this season, I failed and picked C³ XD. The setting is the following; the dad of high schooler Haruaki sends his son a mysterious cube, inside this item lives a cute blue haired and upbeat loli named Fear. She starts living at his house. At first she is unconsciously causing a big mess in Haruaki’s house, but what first appear like a simple yet funny, cute and lighthearted “not another love triangle, please” comedy show, very soon turns into a much more darker toned and violent story, this girl named Fear was actually a tool for torturing and killing people in the past which she regrets a lot now.

httpvh://youtu.be/4BGcF26s_dE

When Fear is extremely pissed she turns into a scary and evil person who can wield a lot of cool weapons, which are named after existing torturing tools from the past. She is feared of loosing control of herself, when fighting but there are a few enemies, she has to fight. She gets support from Haruaki, his childhood friend Konoha and the student council president Kirika, both also aren’t what you would consider to be exactly a human being.

My expectations after the first two episodes have increased after the 3rd episode, I hope there will be more of scary Fear in cube. The fights in this show are action packed and the scary heroine Fear in insane mode is great too watch ther should be more yandere heroes in anime ^^.
In my opinion the look of this anime is quite creative, well a bit too cute and there are a lot of unnecessary pantyshots, but putting that aside, it looks quite interesting.

As big fan of Tamura, Yukari Im really happy that she gave her voice to Fear, with a very cute and also surprisingly sinister voice, you have to hear her performance in espisode three. And she is also performing the opening theme “Endless Story”. The story is a mix of funny comedy and some dark parts with some bloody action. This anime may turn out as entertaining trash or a entertaining and also interesting story between all the Blockbusters from this very good season.

Mashiroiro Symphony: The Color of Lovers

I was quite happy as this adaption of this visual novel was announced, I’ve played the game, well I’ve only played a few minutes of it because the translating tool only gave me crappy translations, that is why I gave up to play it any further :(. In the setting of the story a few specially selected students of a mixed private school will be transfered with the local girls private school.

httpvh://youtu.be/8gH4J6Vd9q8

The main characters are Shingo, his stepsister Sakuno and Airi. In the first episode they had a beautiful atmospheric scene together, but as they’ve met again in the new school, Airi ignores the nice meeting from the day before and also loses her temper to shows what she really thinks of bringing boys into an girls only schoo. After this “warm” welcome, it takes some time before boys and girls get used to be in one school, but soon even Airi stops being a venomus tsundere and gets friendlier torwards the male lead character Shingo. This visual novel anime adaption is quite different, than other shows of this genre it has nearly next to zero fanservice and has a very modest flair. Ok in the 6th episode Shingo and Airi end up in the same bath tub, but it is not presented in a silly “Kyyyahh” way.

Well, like in every visual novel there are a lot of cute girls and in Mashiroiro Symphony they are especially cute; Sana, Miu and Sakuno have an very appealing look and, with these cute long sleeved school uniforms they looks so lovely, just *o*.
This anime has a very nice animationstyle, characterdesign and the backgrounds are everything looks nice and pretty. The story isn’t very exciting or dramatic so far. The characters are all kind and friendly. The interactions between them create a cozy, calm and happy athmosphere.
It’s nice, simple and has nice characters, I will keep watching it.

Shakugan no Shana III

As a big fan of the two previous Shakugan no Shana Seasons I also started to watch this eagerly awaited third Season, which should conclude the whole Shakugan no Shana Saga.

httpvh://youtu.be/ktULsmiQWBw

We learn, that the end of Season II was a lie there was no merry meeting of happy Shana and Yuuji this day. He vanished from Misaki city and his whereabouts are still unknown. While Yuuji is away people like his mother acts as if he never existed and the ones who remember him care about their own problems. Shana is sad without him, but nevertheless she developed a new attack, lets call it Fist of Fire. The leader of Bal Masque appeared from the abyss in the realm of the Denizens and somehow he looks like Yuuji and sometimes speaks with his voice.

Most likely Yuuji became the Bal Masque leader named Snake of the festival, he is after Shana, but not because he wants to kill her. No, he wants to change her fate as Flame Haze. It’s just a feeling, but I think the plan of the leader and the old Bal Masque team might collide one day.

This third season starts a lot more serious, darker and reflective than I had expected, backflash scenes are used quite often, so there’s no real need to rewatch the old seasons in advance.
in my opinion the first episodes felt quite disarranged with Yuuji’s “split personalities” and the character overload, watching these episodes at a weekly pace wasn’t very entertaining for me.
I think I will rather watch it at a slower pace with one episode per week I won’t be saitisfied.