Ghost Hunt 23-24 (AKA: "Ghost Hunt is last season's dark horse")

I haven't got much time to write this; because my new Nintendo Wii beckons me, you'll have to excuse the lack of witticism and gay jokes, temporarily. Sorry.

I've just finished watching GH eps 22 and 23, and this new case kicks so much ass, it's as if it's ass-kicking foot has four other legs attached. And a Tong Po-like fist wrapped in glass shards.

Not only have they managed to consecutively up the stakes each time, leading to what looks to be a perfect climax for the series, Naru is incapacitated allowing Bou-san to take center stage and be all manly, telling these dumb broads to make him some protections charms and a hot plate of waffles for after he's done "solving this motherfucka."

If they make a second season, they should ditch the bishi-tsunderes and go 110% GAR.

As an aside, Mai is a little slow on the uptake. I woulda blackjacked those kids over their melons and locked them in a dark trunk the second I saw them.

Lacking an intelligent segue-way, I'll say that I didn't really think a whole lot of Ghost Hunt when I first watched it... in fact, the first case they did was overly drawn out and rather dull. But my patience actually appeared to pay off pretty damn well in this case (say, unlike with D.Gray-Man) and I was rewarded with much goodliness. Yay me.

Anyway, look forward to next episode where Mai realizes how awesome Bou-san is and gives him a blowjob.

Editorial/Rant: I'm an elitist dick.

American Anime Industry: Put your hands up, and calmly step away from the mainstream. This is an order.

Not to be a jerk, but I'm really against anime gaining any more popularity than it currently has. Don't get me wrong, I want Bandai and ADV and Akamatsu Ken to eat as much as the next guy. Give em your money and the TV ratings. Just not so much that they start buying diamond studded yachts and private islands to hold exclusive Battle Royale's with midgets.

I may be a dick, but I'm also not one of those guys that expects you to read a seven page missive with no pictures put in between paragraphs.

And it's not because I want dirty peons invading my "special" club. Trust me, I want the whole world to know the awesomeness of loli-in-a-bag and stupid memes like "DattebayoUguu~FYGDesu" more than you can imagine. But it's not to be.

And I'll tell you why.

The problem herein lies is that when things get popular, some people start seeing $$$.. y'know, like this: $_$ (imagine KA-CHING! sfx when you read that). People that are just going to get in there and fuck things up because "hey, this Jap shit is too weird and adult to market to our target demograph: being every single living person who owns a thumb."

Hello 4Kids. Hello Illumitoon. Who's next? FOXanime?

I suppose more success = more licences... but it's not gonna be your Haruhis, Honey & Clovers, or Ourans making the big bucks. Noone's sitting in a boardroom saying, "shit, let's licence Bartender and make us some real money!" Hell, it probably wouldn't even be a Death Note or Code Geass breaking out. Oh, they'll make some money... but not the kind that gets corporate fatcats salivating over newborn Jewish babies. And this isn't even getting into the pitfalls of potential rising licencing fees... I don't see a whole lot of benefits for Obscure Cultural Reference Anime Series X just because of Bleach blowin' up.

Manga has the same problem.. and perhaps it's already in deeper than anime, since they seem to have a more inroads with the "regular" young folk. I'm not going to get too into it, but generally I think the difference in quality between an anime DVD and volume of manga is telling. With manga the translations are looser, and the end product is more prone to mistakes and an overall impression of less attention paid to details.

We'll always have fansubs (or will we?) but I like to buy stuff on a shiny disc, kept in an amaray case with pretty pictures on it. None of us like to see anime sodomized (except for the ones with "those" scenes).

At the end of the day, I'm just saying that I want my wallet to stay relevant to the companies licensing this stuff. When us nitpicky geeks aren't buttering the right side of the company's bread anymore it's gonna mean trouble.

Hopefully we're not already there.

Note: If this rant reads ill-thought out, well, it's because I basically freestyled it off the top of my head (y'know, like Eminem in 8 Mile. I'm pretty cool like that).

No way! A look at Kanon 24?? (AKA "Neon Genesis Evankanonian")

I won't waste your time other than to say Kanon was great overall, Mai~i rocks, Clannard looks spiffy, and I'd sorely been missing "Ahaha~" from my diet. Oh, and I'll leave you with this picture.

Gathering Witch Yuki Nagato preorder GET!

For those of you Haruhi nuts who just can't quite seem to spend your money fast enough, the beautiful witch Yuki w/guitar is now available for preorder at e2046 through their fucking expensive Gathering line of figures.

Don't let the chance pass you by like the original black bunny suit Haruhi did me T_T

GO SPEND MONEYS, MONKEYBOY

Kenichi 11: (AKA "Aw man, but drawing is such hard work...")

*Previously on Kenichi, Kenichi dodged a blazing punch, with the powuh of GUTS AND TRAINING*

Okay look, I've said before that I love this series in spite of how by-the-books and cheap looking it is. But this is just pushing the limits. Does the whole fighting genre catch such a bum deal when it comes to animation? Not that I watch a slew of them, but Kekkaishi is the only one I can think of that looks consistantly decent.

This episode I had to sit through close to seven minutes of "previously on"—not including the opening credits—and they still managed to throw in some flashbacks to other episodes during the fight!

Previously on ASX, Crayotic posted a picture of Kenichi dodging a punch...

Not only that, right at the end someone must have spent the weekly budget on sake because they were forced to switch to character sillouettes when Miu started whipping everybody's collective asses. I say forced, because this is not the kind of show which makes an effort to get points in artistic merit, believe it!

Ah well, I still hope it runs for 800 episodes and a bunch of craptastic movies.

Previously on ASX, Crayotic posted a previously on ASX that was a picture of Kenichi dodging a punch...

Mahou Sensei Negima (manga) sorta-news!

News stolen from AICN anime section stolen from Comipress and direct to you!

Ken Akamatsu's Mahou Sensei Negima! Part 1 (First Semester) ended in the latest issue of Weekly Shonen Magazine. According to Ken Akamatsu's online dairy (2/27 entry), Part 2 (Summer Break) will begin within a few weeks (possibly in Shonen Magazine issue 16, on sale 3/21).

Ken Akamatsu also mentioned on his dairy that a Negima-related surprise will be announced in April regarding "a plan that has never been done before."

I can't believe that that, what, 15-16 volumes was only the first semester?! Not that I'm complaining. I'd give my right testicle for this series (and I only happen to have one as it is). It's that awesome.

This plan better not be something weak like drawing manga with his feet, either. Tell me it's closer to the Mahora Festival being done by KyoAni followed by a Negima x Guilty Gear crossover 2D fighter and I'll spooge.

ANN on why AIR and Kanon coming stateside is troublesome

The quick summary is that they're overpriced licenses and the audience who would buy the DVDs are a bunch of annoying fags like you and me.

>>Anime News Network SOURCE<< (you'll have to scroll down)

You manage to do a pretty good job summing up why shows like AIR or Kanon are unlikely to be licensed for release in the States, actually. From what I've heard speaking with various and sundry industry folk involved in such things, the licenses for those shows are pretty overpriced - especially so considering the nature of those series, which would have a very limited audience here. The Japanese license holders are overestimating the profit potential, I'd wager.

[...]

Those nitpicky mega-otaku who see vast depth and meaning behind every utterance of "UGUU~" are the only people who would potentially buy these shows; they're the target market, and as you described, they're pretty particular about what they want and generally are happier with the fan translations, living under the notion that fansubs are "always" more accurate than official subs. That "stupid otaku stuff" is precisely what attracts a certain (small) portion of the population to these shows, and if there's any discrepancy between the fansub and the official release, they'll likely cry foul and call for a boycott. It's lose-lose for any company looking to actually make a buck off the license.

That last jab seems kinda dick'ish.. but then perhaps that's because it is also partially true. I probably would complain if my subtitles were dumbed down.

But then I also think, if companies can put series like Pani Poni Dash! and Ichigo Mashimaro (top of my head) out there, keeping the nuances and cultural stuff pretty much intact and make money... well, AIR and Kanon (and let's just throw in Rozen Maiden--"desu" anyone?) can't exactly be rocket science to translate.

Thoughts?

You're too pricey, bitch!

Cheap Recap: Chocotto Sister 11 (AKA "Boo hoo hoo, I like girls with zero personality")

*Chitose can't believe Kawagoi would rather get pedo wit it than handle her dirty pillows*

Choco, her brother, and the hot apartment manager finish up their pervy weekend. Kawagoi thinks he sees Ayu about to suicide herself, and then starts acting like a bitch-made chump.

This is a too-often seen trend in anime, where you have a light hearted fluff series.. and then suddenly, they throw in a high-stakes dramatic arc out of left field (usually approaching the finale) for no reason other than to pretend they're working on an important piece of televised history.

It's completely ridiculous and I don't like it. No sir.

Not to mention that it's a little hard to take serious when even the writing staff can't stick to the memos. I mean, you have the big heart-warming moment where Kawagoi has to embrace Choco to stop from himself from breaking into tears, and everyone gets nice fuzzies...

So what's the natural thing to do after that?

Well, if you answered: "upskirt shot of Choco-tan's pantsu with camel toe" you win a free R Kelly CD. If you also said, "shortly followed by vibrator gags" you get the bonus gift of being able to juke the votes in Lolitron's complete Ichigo Mashimaro boycott loli tournament.

The only way this show can get worse is if Santa-san wants Choco returned to the North Pole or it turns out that Kawagoi actually has Urotsukidoji powers and will destory humankind (yeah, I'm looking at you, Magikano).

However, there was a monkey in this. Monkeys are great.

Stock Report: Bleach 118 (AKA "Kanako Ohno would definitely fap to this")

Shiny.

Rukia gets pwned, animation levels go up, and Kubo Tite attempts to write Ikkaku as more than "that bald guy who got punked ages ago."

Investors were quite pleased with Bleach's performance this week, after a surprisingly weak-sauce outing last Friday. Analysts cite the abundance of sword clashing and manly-man talk being key factors into BLCH gains.

However, there were many who found it a stretch to buy into this Ikkaku v2.0—despite a major PR push—when the last time active, he was busy being the second guy in Soul Society to job-out to Ichigo (and at least the first guy had big gimmicky axes).

Some suggest that perhaps he got more fleshed out in the fillers, which would be nice and sufficant... except for the small issue that they donut exist to the almighty Crayotic Rockwell.

Analysts also wonder "what is up" with the Vaizard? It seems apparent that they have some interesting part to play in the company's immediate future, but as of writing, their entire introduction to the arc seems rather redundant.

(and it doesn't really help when ostensibly, the only difference between them and the Arrancar is that one takes their mask off, and the other puts it on)

BLCH fought back to win a nice 2 point rise for investors.

Cheap Recaps: Naruto Shipuuden 4 (AKA "Who got sand in your vag'?")

Grrrr

A lot more Gaara action this episode as it focused on his fight with the bubblegum hands guy, with the conclusion to Kakashi's test taking more of a backseat.

It was very liberating to see that I have exactly the same weakness as Kakashi. So I guess that means I = Awesome? Probably so... probably so.

And is making kamikaze origami all that Akatsuki guy can do? Because that's not exactly l33t by any stretch. And the more important question: Can he give himself a blowjob with his hands? WELL CAN HE??

Unfortunately the animation quality seemed to take a bit of a drop... Mainly the stuff with Naruto, but some of Gaara's movements seemed kinda funky and NHK'ish (which is sorta inexcusable considering how little movement the guy actually makes).

Lots of characters suffered from Barbra Streisand syndrome, too.

For more details go check out Average Asian Anime Blog, as that sums it up much better than I: Naruto Shippuuden 4 - Awfully “Awesome”

Friday saw a drop for shareholders of Naruto Industries.
Analysts blame poor packaging.