come to irc. we have animal crackers.
Oh, is it already that time of year again?
For reasons I simply can't begin to comprehend, my commentary on the season is back by popular demand. This time, we'll be looking at all the wonderful shows of winter, and all the terrible ones too, that the viewerbase will spend their time curled up
by the fire with!
SUNDAYS:
12/11: My Sweet Umadonna: I'll Be Your Horse (Web)
Character Design: Kouji Ogata (Origin: Spirits of the Past, Brave Fencer Musashiden, Dodonpachi Daifukkatsu, lots and lots of porn)
Writer: Sag Aoyama (Loli basketball)
Animation: Production IG (Oh how far you've fallen)
Early out the gate (har har I kill myself no really I want to) comes this attempt by your friendly neigh-(oh fuck me)... Neighborhood OTB to latch onto moe fans by creating a noseless harem of stable-hand, trainer, and jockey... For your stand-in, an actual horse.
+ Reminds us how good FKMT gambling comics are.
- We may take the creepy fanart crown back from PonyGAF.
1/1 19:30: Mobile Suit Gundam SEED HD Remaster (BS11; also airs on Tokyo MX 1/3 at 22:29 and on a variety of regionlocked Bandai streaming sites beginning 12/23)
Watch Kira offend people with his bad taste in kebab toppings, experience this, and become Jesus, now in glorious 16:9 HD. (No word on whether each separate use of a keyframe sequence will be remastered separately.)
+ In retrospect, better than 00.
- BUT CAGALLI IS CRYING. Bandainamcolive.tv no longer works in the US.
1/8 7:24: Poyopoyo Kansatsu Nikki (TV Tokyo)
Original: Ruu Tatuki (That guy who draws one of the perfectly clean comics that always run in the back pages of porn mags)
Director: Akitaroh Daichi (Fruits Basket, Gag Manga Biyori)
Animation: DAX Production (Gag Manga Biyori) / Studio Deen (terrible shit this decade) / Moebius Tone (brand new, never worked on anything)
Slice of life centering on what's gotta be one of the cutest cats ever put on paper.
+ Seriously, look at that cute little bastard.
+ I bet he's gonna roll all over and even chase his tail.
+ D'awwwwww.
- Deen if you ruin this I will cut you.
fucking already lolnicoleaks: Lagrange -The Flower of Rin-ne (1/8 22:00, Tokyo MX)
Chief director: Tatsuo Sato (Nadesico, Stellvia, Tokyo Tribe 2)
Director: Toshimasa Suzuki (Dance in the Vampire Bund; Monkey and Cat arcs of )
Writer: Shotaro Suga (Darker than Black S1 15-25)
Character Design: Takushige Norita (Break Blade), Chizuru Kobayashi (Pandora Hearts)
Animation: XEBEC (Break Blade, Rio: Rainbow Gate, Occult Academy)
A girl named Madoka makes a contract with, uhh, agrees to pilot a robot called "Vox" to protect her city from alien invaders. Competing for her loyalty are Ran, original source of the robot, and Muginami, who appears to be from a different faction.
+ More hands-on time with the Vox that Nissan's team designed than with the Pleiades stuff from last year's Subaru tie-in.
- Still no sign of Toyota funding a new Initial D season.
1/8 25:35: Aquarion EVOL (TV Tokyo)
Original: Shoji Kawamori (SDF Macross, Arjuna, Macross F)
Chief Director: Shoji Kawamori (Arjuna, Macross F)
Director: Yusuke Yamamoto (B-gata H-kei, Night Wizard, Welcome to the NHK)
Writer: Mari Okada (Fractale, Wandering Son, Hanasaku Iroha)
Theme music: Yoko Kanno (Macross Plus, Macross F)
Animation: Satelight (Macross F, Hellsing OVA 1-4), 8-Bit (Infinite Stratos)
12,000 years later, humanity's last line of defense are the students of the Neo Diva Academy. With men and women forbidden to "combine", or even fall in love, how will they hold off invading extradimensional beasts without the power of the weaponized orgasm?
+ We haven't had Kawamori crack in too long.
- No more ICHIMAN NEN TO NISEN NEN. Title unfortunately similar to Ron Paul campaign slogan.
2/5 8:30: Smile Precure (TV Asahi)
Animation: Toei (the last eight Precures)
Two to five girls whose exact details will be simultaneously treated as vital secrets and leaked to every toy shop in Japan to facilitate Monday's sales of Sunday's new gimmick will battle evil, with fight budgets just high enough to make Daddy not switch back to golf and tell Hanako to go read a book.
+ I mean, there are worse time-killers.
- Not gonna be anywhere near as good as Heartcatch, because that's not in the budget.
MONDAYS:
1/2 25:30: Natsume's Book of Friends Season IV (TV Tokyo)
Staff: I'm pretty sure the same as the last three seasons.
More Brains Base, more thoughtful notquitehorror, you should know what you're getting here.
+ Trollcat gonna troll. Only place this season you'll hear Hiroshi Kamiya in a lead role.
- Monday's already a pretty chill night, do I waste the relaxation or wait to watch?
1/9 25:30: Ano Natsu de Matteru (TVA)
Director: Tatsuyuki Nagai (Honey and Clover II, Railgun)
Writer: Yosuke Kuroda (Gundam 00, s-CRY-ed, Please Teacher)
Character Design: Taraku Uon (Please Teacher), Masayoshi Tanaka (HSOTD)
Animation: J.C. Staff (bad Aria, Zakuro, Kaicho wa Maid-sama)
It's an original romcom! Which means basically all we know is that the lead couple will hook up without actually hooking up!
+ Holy shit, it's teacher Yoko.
- Website at Ichika-Ichika will taunt and enrage IS fans.
1/9 26:00: Daily Lives of High School Boys (TV Tokyo)
Director: Shinji Takamatsu (Gintama, School Rumble)
Animation: Sunrise (Gundam. All of it.)
Daily lives of high school boys.
+ If you liked the 9005 shows about daily lives of high school girls, this is probably a sure winner!
- Unless you were just staring at their tits. (This disqualifies about 95% of the viewing audience.)
TUESDAYS:
1/10 25:30: Listen to Me, Girls. I Am Your Father! (Tokyo MX)
Original: Tomohiro Matsu (Mayoi Neko Overrun)
Director: Itsuro Kawasaki (LoLH, Sengoku Basara)
Writer: Naruhisa Aikawa (Negima! live-action, Steel Angel Kurumi, Ape Escape)
Animation: feel. (Da Capo, Kiss x Sis)
An oh-so-cute Bunny Drop clone where a young man takes in three orphaned relatives and--Oh wait. The Wikipedia entry for this includes the excerpt "She is 10 years old... (and) has a preference for guys who are older than her and manly."
+ I don't have to write about it,
- Because I don't want to end up on any more watchlists than this mention already put me on.
WEDNESDAYS:
1/4 25:50: New Prince of Tennis (TV Tokyo)
Staff: Probably repeats!
Hunky boys compete in dramatic tennis showdowns--sadly not presented as a musical here.
+ A good way to meet kinky Japanese women who tolerate animu fans.
- Provided you let them watch while you and your best friend go at it.
1/11 25:45: Another (tvk)
Director: Tsutomu Mizushima (Blood-C, xxxHolic)
Animation: P.A. Works (Angel Beats)
Adaption of a literary horror novel. When middle-school student Misaki dies in 1972, her class denies her death. 26 years later, Koichi Sakakibara transfers to the same school, and meets a girl names Mei Misaki, who sits at a neglected old desk and whose existence is denied by other classmates. As Koichi begins to investigate these mysteries, another accidental death occurs...
+ Writing may actually be decent. P.A. Works are experts in the dead middle-schooler genre.
- fuck Ali Project
1/18 19:27: Little Battler eXperience W (TV Tokyo)
Pretty much everything: Akihiro Hino
Everything else: The same people that were doing it as normal LBX until a week before
Tiny robots continue to fight it out, to entertain you and sell lots and lots of model kits!
+ There's two heroes this time! That means kit recolors, er, I mean, manly rivalries!
- Media-create threads tell me that the L5 magic is dead, dead, dead.
THURSDAYS:
1/5 23:00: Milky Holmes 2 (Tokyo MX)
Staff: Hope they're all repeats, 'cause I'm lazy!
I don't understand you humans.
+ More awkward first pitches.
- Having to think hard about snarky pedo insults. Animu fans need a wider variety of borderline-unspeakable fetishes.
1/5 25:00: Recorder and Raentzel (Teletama)
Director: Hiroshi Kimura (random Naruto episodes)
Writer: Ryo Karasuma (Morita-san wa Mukuchi)
Animation: Seven (Morita-san wa Mukuchi)
Atsushi, a six-foot-tall early bloomer in fifth grade, and his sister Atsumi, pushing 4'6" at age 16, have body image issues and confuse the shit out of everyone around them.
+ Not bait for creepy pedo guys.
- Looks like bait for creepy pedo girls.
1/5 25:25: Kill Me, Baby! (TBS)
Director: Yoshiki Yamakawa (Hatsukoi Limited)
Writer: Hideki Shirane (bad Aria, Vagina Bones, Potemayo)
Character design: Shinya Hasegawa (Melody of Oblivion, Zakuro)
Animation: J.C. Staff (bad Aria)
Moesuke Sagara stars in that other that other that other Kirara Charat 4-panel: this time, about a schoolgirl assassin, her clinically retarded friend, and ninjas. Why ninjas? Because ninjas. Also features a Kugiloli rejected in casting.
+ Can't be worse than K-On!, and you lot liked that.
- Lady Not Appearing In This Film's name is a lie.
1/5 25:55: Amagami SS+ (TBS)
Staff: Oh hey a repeat I love repeats.
More "not a harem, just six 4-episode miniseries" about a boy and the girls with amazing hair that he loves.
+ Sex hair. Fertile ground for SZS jokes due to cass crossovers.
- Potential for getting roped into spotchecking.
1/12 24:45: THERMÆ ROMÆ (Fuji)
Director/Script: Azuma Tani (Haiyoru! Nyaru-Ani)
Animation: DLE (Haiyoru! Nyaru-Ani)
Noitamina's glorious return; three episodes in which Roman architect Lucius slips through time and space while designing baths and, in experiencing the Japanese bathing culture 2,000 years after his time, illustrates the differences and similarities between Japan and Rome. Among the cast: Solid Snake as the Emperor Hadrian.
+ Quirky, enlightening, and hilarious.
- 3 episodes.
1/12 26:00: Inu × Boku SS (MBS)
Director: Naokatsu Tsuda (nothing of value)
Writer: Saizo Nemoto (Tokyo Majin Gakuen Kempucho)
Animation: David Production (Tiffins)
Like any good Gangan series that isn't Hameln, I've spent 10 minutes staring at the webpage and I can't tell you which gender of teenagers is supposed to be getting hot and bothered.
There will probably also be stylish action involving guardians of supernatural mansions, once the parts responsible for teaching legions of 14-year-olds how to do their own laundry are over.
+ No Schutzstaffel involved.
- Catchphrase: "Make me her dog!". Well, guess we nailed that one down!
2/2 24:45: Black★Rock Shooter (Fuji)
Director: NOT YAMAKAN THANK GOD this Shinobu Yoshioka guy can't be any worse
CG SFX: Hiroyuki Imaishi (Dead Leaves, GL movies, Star Driver ep 25)
Writer: Mari Okada (Jeez! Just ctrl-F! It's not like I'm writing staff credits just for you, okay!?)
Animation: Ordet (Black★Rock Shooter OVA), SANZIGEN (lots and lots of 3DCG)
Eight more episodes of hairdyed Miku postapocalyptic lesbian Space Harrier action.
+ Hairdyed Miku postapocalyptic lesbian Space Harrier action. No Yamakan.
- Thermae Romae could be 11 eps if not for this.
FRIDAYS:
1/6 11:00: High School D x D (AT-X)
Director: Tetsuya Yanagisawa (Shattered Angels)
Writer: Takao Yoshioka (Queen's Blade 2, Wagnaria!!`)
Character Design: Junji Goto (School Days)
Animation: TNK (Kannazuki no Miko, School Days)
If the AT-X airing didn't clue you in, maybe the official website being haremking.tv will! Expect tits and maybe more tits.
+ 2 to bust size.
- is the shape of the glowing white bars.
1/6 23:00: Senki Zessho Symphogear (Tokyo MX)
Director: Tatsufumi Ito (Shugo Chara Party)
Character design: Dan Yoshii (Ontama), Satoshi Koike (also Ontama)
Art staff: Outsourced to France
Animation: Encourage Films (Ontama)
The show that no one else can fucking spell (seriously guys 姫 has more than one reading look it up sometime.) Music battles with yuri harems! Gee guys I wonder if this gets a grimdark twist
. On the plus side apparently other people have heard of Ontama and now I know I didn't hallucinate it.
SATURDAYS:
1/7 6:00: The Knight in the Area (TV Asahi)
Director/Writer: Hirofumi Ogura (Black Butler II)
Animation: Shin-Ei Animation (Crayon Shin-chan, Doraemon)
Two brothers, one talented and one not, both pursue their soccer dreams and relationships with a childhood friend until tragedy strikes in this show that's apparently far less of a Touch ripoff than I'm making it sound like.
+ We are all
Zero.
- Competing with Prince of Tennis -and- Inazuma Eleven for the elusive ~sweaty little boys~ dollar. Market may not support them all.
1/7 8:30: Familiar of Zero Final
Staff: You guessed it!
Jesus, you two, just fuck already.
+ It's over.
- Ba... Bakainu!
1/7 17:55: My Ordinary Life (NHK-E)
Staff: This is just a new edit.
KyoAni either fumbled a show in development or paid for a -really good- "massage parlor" trip for a bureaucrat, because suddenly they've got a primetime slot on national public TV and nothing to put in it except their pretty but commercially radioactive gag comedy.
+ If you thought it was boring before, now there's only half as much!
- If you thought it was boring before, that's still about 11 eps too much.
1/7 24:30: Bodacious Space Pirates (tvk)
Director/Writer: Tatsuo Sato (Nadesico, Stellvia, Tokyo Tribe 2)
Animation Director: Hiroshi Takeuchi (Big O, iDOLM@STER Xenoglossia)
Character design: Akiman (∀ Gundam)
Animation: Satelight (repeat again~)
Marika, a normal young girl, is descended upon one day by a pair of supsicious space pirates who insist that her late father was their captain--and that, as his heir, his ship now belongs to her.
+ I'm pretty sure this is the best title for an anime I've ever seen.
- Not enough material for straight-up self-parody; we may be too serious now for Nadesico's occasional wholehearted embrace of its targets to go over.
1/7 26:00: Brave 10 (Tokyo MX)
Original: Kairi Shimotsuki (SenBa comics adaption)
Director: Kiyoko Sayama (Skip Beat, Vampire Knight)
Writer: Mamiko Ikeda (Emma, Maid-sama)
Character design: Yukiko Ban (Psychic Detective Yakumo)
Animation: TMS Entertainment (shitloads of stuff I'm too lazy to go through for relevance)
Saizo Kirigakure, a ninja, rescues the shamaness Nami Isa from Tokugawa assassins, and is drawn into Yukimura Sanada's core circle of ten brave ninja as the battle of Sekigahara draws closer.
+ YUKIMURAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
- No OYAKATAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-SAMAAAAAAAAAA. Looks like it's taking itself ~seriously~.
---
Personally, I'm hyped as fuck for Thermæ Romæ, and looking forward to Poyopoyo, Natsume, and Aquarion. Might pick up Rin-ne, Symphogear, Another, Bodacious, or High School Boys depending how they turn out. It still seems like such an empty season, though; maybe Spring will have that something that's missing here?
(As a note: Dates and times are not necessarily the first airing, but are the first airing that will reliably make their ways to us. Simulcasts and the like to be filled in as they're announced; it's still a liiiitle early for that.)
Oh, is it already that time of year again?
For reasons I simply can't begin to comprehend, my commentary on the season is back by popular demand. This time, we'll be looking at all the wonderful shows of winter, and all the terrible ones too, that the viewerbase will spend their time curled up
alone
SUNDAYS:
12/11: My Sweet Umadonna: I'll Be Your Horse (Web)
Character Design: Kouji Ogata (Origin: Spirits of the Past, Brave Fencer Musashiden, Dodonpachi Daifukkatsu, lots and lots of porn)
Writer: Sag Aoyama (Loli basketball)
Animation: Production IG (Oh how far you've fallen)
Early out the gate (har har I kill myself no really I want to) comes this attempt by your friendly neigh-(oh fuck me)... Neighborhood OTB to latch onto moe fans by creating a noseless harem of stable-hand, trainer, and jockey... For your stand-in, an actual horse.
+ Reminds us how good FKMT gambling comics are.
- We may take the creepy fanart crown back from PonyGAF.
1/1 19:30: Mobile Suit Gundam SEED HD Remaster (BS11; also airs on Tokyo MX 1/3 at 22:29 and on a variety of regionlocked Bandai streaming sites beginning 12/23)
Watch Kira offend people with his bad taste in kebab toppings, experience this, and become Jesus, now in glorious 16:9 HD. (No word on whether each separate use of a keyframe sequence will be remastered separately.)
+ In retrospect, better than 00.
- BUT CAGALLI IS CRYING. Bandainamcolive.tv no longer works in the US.
1/8 7:24: Poyopoyo Kansatsu Nikki (TV Tokyo)
Original: Ruu Tatuki (That guy who draws one of the perfectly clean comics that always run in the back pages of porn mags)
Director: Akitaroh Daichi (Fruits Basket, Gag Manga Biyori)
Animation: DAX Production (Gag Manga Biyori) / Studio Deen (terrible shit this decade) / Moebius Tone (brand new, never worked on anything)
Slice of life centering on what's gotta be one of the cutest cats ever put on paper.
+ Seriously, look at that cute little bastard.
+ I bet he's gonna roll all over and even chase his tail.
+ D'awwwwww.
- Deen if you ruin this I will cut you.
fucking already lolnicoleaks: Lagrange -The Flower of Rin-ne (1/8 22:00, Tokyo MX)
Chief director: Tatsuo Sato (Nadesico, Stellvia, Tokyo Tribe 2)
Director: Toshimasa Suzuki (Dance in the Vampire Bund; Monkey and Cat arcs of )
Writer: Shotaro Suga (Darker than Black S1 15-25)
Character Design: Takushige Norita (Break Blade), Chizuru Kobayashi (Pandora Hearts)
Animation: XEBEC (Break Blade, Rio: Rainbow Gate, Occult Academy)
A girl named Madoka makes a contract with, uhh, agrees to pilot a robot called "Vox" to protect her city from alien invaders. Competing for her loyalty are Ran, original source of the robot, and Muginami, who appears to be from a different faction.
+ More hands-on time with the Vox that Nissan's team designed than with the Pleiades stuff from last year's Subaru tie-in.
- Still no sign of Toyota funding a new Initial D season.
1/8 25:35: Aquarion EVOL (TV Tokyo)
Original: Shoji Kawamori (SDF Macross, Arjuna, Macross F)
Chief Director: Shoji Kawamori (Arjuna, Macross F)
Director: Yusuke Yamamoto (B-gata H-kei, Night Wizard, Welcome to the NHK)
Writer: Mari Okada (Fractale, Wandering Son, Hanasaku Iroha)
Theme music: Yoko Kanno (Macross Plus, Macross F)
Animation: Satelight (Macross F, Hellsing OVA 1-4), 8-Bit (Infinite Stratos)
12,000 years later, humanity's last line of defense are the students of the Neo Diva Academy. With men and women forbidden to "combine", or even fall in love, how will they hold off invading extradimensional beasts without the power of the weaponized orgasm?
+ We haven't had Kawamori crack in too long.
- No more ICHIMAN NEN TO NISEN NEN. Title unfortunately similar to Ron Paul campaign slogan.
2/5 8:30: Smile Precure (TV Asahi)
Animation: Toei (the last eight Precures)
Two to five girls whose exact details will be simultaneously treated as vital secrets and leaked to every toy shop in Japan to facilitate Monday's sales of Sunday's new gimmick will battle evil, with fight budgets just high enough to make Daddy not switch back to golf and tell Hanako to go read a book.
+ I mean, there are worse time-killers.
- Not gonna be anywhere near as good as Heartcatch, because that's not in the budget.
MONDAYS:
1/2 25:30: Natsume's Book of Friends Season IV (TV Tokyo)
Staff: I'm pretty sure the same as the last three seasons.
More Brains Base, more thoughtful notquitehorror, you should know what you're getting here.
+ Trollcat gonna troll. Only place this season you'll hear Hiroshi Kamiya in a lead role.
- Monday's already a pretty chill night, do I waste the relaxation or wait to watch?
1/9 25:30: Ano Natsu de Matteru (TVA)
Director: Tatsuyuki Nagai (Honey and Clover II, Railgun)
Writer: Yosuke Kuroda (Gundam 00, s-CRY-ed, Please Teacher)
Character Design: Taraku Uon (Please Teacher), Masayoshi Tanaka (HSOTD)
Animation: J.C. Staff (bad Aria, Zakuro, Kaicho wa Maid-sama)
It's an original romcom! Which means basically all we know is that the lead couple will hook up without actually hooking up!
+ Holy shit, it's teacher Yoko.
- Website at Ichika-Ichika will taunt and enrage IS fans.
1/9 26:00: Daily Lives of High School Boys (TV Tokyo)
Director: Shinji Takamatsu (Gintama, School Rumble)
Animation: Sunrise (Gundam. All of it.)
Daily lives of high school boys.
+ If you liked the 9005 shows about daily lives of high school girls, this is probably a sure winner!
- Unless you were just staring at their tits. (This disqualifies about 95% of the viewing audience.)
TUESDAYS:
1/10 25:30: Listen to Me, Girls. I Am Your Father! (Tokyo MX)
Original: Tomohiro Matsu (Mayoi Neko Overrun)
Director: Itsuro Kawasaki (LoLH, Sengoku Basara)
Writer: Naruhisa Aikawa (Negima! live-action, Steel Angel Kurumi, Ape Escape)
Animation: feel. (Da Capo, Kiss x Sis)
An oh-so-cute Bunny Drop clone where a young man takes in three orphaned relatives and--Oh wait. The Wikipedia entry for this includes the excerpt "She is 10 years old... (and) has a preference for guys who are older than her and manly."
+ I don't have to write about it,
- Because I don't want to end up on any more watchlists than this mention already put me on.
WEDNESDAYS:
1/4 25:50: New Prince of Tennis (TV Tokyo)
Staff: Probably repeats!
Hunky boys compete in dramatic tennis showdowns--sadly not presented as a musical here.
+ A good way to meet kinky Japanese women who tolerate animu fans.
- Provided you let them watch while you and your best friend go at it.
1/11 25:45: Another (tvk)
Director: Tsutomu Mizushima (Blood-C, xxxHolic)
Animation: P.A. Works (Angel Beats)
Adaption of a literary horror novel. When middle-school student Misaki dies in 1972, her class denies her death. 26 years later, Koichi Sakakibara transfers to the same school, and meets a girl names Mei Misaki, who sits at a neglected old desk and whose existence is denied by other classmates. As Koichi begins to investigate these mysteries, another accidental death occurs...
+ Writing may actually be decent. P.A. Works are experts in the dead middle-schooler genre.
- fuck Ali Project
1/18 19:27: Little Battler eXperience W (TV Tokyo)
Pretty much everything: Akihiro Hino
Everything else: The same people that were doing it as normal LBX until a week before
Tiny robots continue to fight it out, to entertain you and sell lots and lots of model kits!
+ There's two heroes this time! That means kit recolors, er, I mean, manly rivalries!
- Media-create threads tell me that the L5 magic is dead, dead, dead.
THURSDAYS:
1/5 23:00: Milky Holmes 2 (Tokyo MX)
Staff: Hope they're all repeats, 'cause I'm lazy!
I don't understand you humans.
+ More awkward first pitches.
- Having to think hard about snarky pedo insults. Animu fans need a wider variety of borderline-unspeakable fetishes.
1/5 25:00: Recorder and Raentzel (Teletama)
Director: Hiroshi Kimura (random Naruto episodes)
Writer: Ryo Karasuma (Morita-san wa Mukuchi)
Animation: Seven (Morita-san wa Mukuchi)
Atsushi, a six-foot-tall early bloomer in fifth grade, and his sister Atsumi, pushing 4'6" at age 16, have body image issues and confuse the shit out of everyone around them.
+ Not bait for creepy pedo guys.
- Looks like bait for creepy pedo girls.
1/5 25:25: Kill Me, Baby! (TBS)
Director: Yoshiki Yamakawa (Hatsukoi Limited)
Writer: Hideki Shirane (bad Aria, Vagina Bones, Potemayo)
Character design: Shinya Hasegawa (Melody of Oblivion, Zakuro)
Animation: J.C. Staff (bad Aria)
Moesuke Sagara stars in that other that other that other Kirara Charat 4-panel: this time, about a schoolgirl assassin, her clinically retarded friend, and ninjas. Why ninjas? Because ninjas. Also features a Kugiloli rejected in casting.
+ Can't be worse than K-On!, and you lot liked that.
- Lady Not Appearing In This Film's name is a lie.
1/5 25:55: Amagami SS+ (TBS)
Staff: Oh hey a repeat I love repeats.
More "not a harem, just six 4-episode miniseries" about a boy and the girls with amazing hair that he loves.
+ Sex hair. Fertile ground for SZS jokes due to cass crossovers.
- Potential for getting roped into spotchecking.
1/12 24:45: THERMÆ ROMÆ (Fuji)
Director/Script: Azuma Tani (Haiyoru! Nyaru-Ani)
Animation: DLE (Haiyoru! Nyaru-Ani)
Noitamina's glorious return; three episodes in which Roman architect Lucius slips through time and space while designing baths and, in experiencing the Japanese bathing culture 2,000 years after his time, illustrates the differences and similarities between Japan and Rome. Among the cast: Solid Snake as the Emperor Hadrian.
+ Quirky, enlightening, and hilarious.
- 3 episodes.
1/12 26:00: Inu × Boku SS (MBS)
Director: Naokatsu Tsuda (nothing of value)
Writer: Saizo Nemoto (Tokyo Majin Gakuen Kempucho)
Animation: David Production (Tiffins)
Like any good Gangan series that isn't Hameln, I've spent 10 minutes staring at the webpage and I can't tell you which gender of teenagers is supposed to be getting hot and bothered.
There will probably also be stylish action involving guardians of supernatural mansions, once the parts responsible for teaching legions of 14-year-olds how to do their own laundry are over.
+ No Schutzstaffel involved.
- Catchphrase: "Make me her dog!". Well, guess we nailed that one down!
2/2 24:45: Black★Rock Shooter (Fuji)
Director: NOT YAMAKAN THANK GOD this Shinobu Yoshioka guy can't be any worse
CG SFX: Hiroyuki Imaishi (Dead Leaves, GL movies, Star Driver ep 25)
Writer: Mari Okada (Jeez! Just ctrl-F! It's not like I'm writing staff credits just for you, okay!?)
Animation: Ordet (Black★Rock Shooter OVA), SANZIGEN (lots and lots of 3DCG)
Eight more episodes of hairdyed Miku postapocalyptic lesbian Space Harrier action.
+ Hairdyed Miku postapocalyptic lesbian Space Harrier action. No Yamakan.
- Thermae Romae could be 11 eps if not for this.
FRIDAYS:
1/6 11:00: High School D x D (AT-X)
Director: Tetsuya Yanagisawa (Shattered Angels)
Writer: Takao Yoshioka (Queen's Blade 2, Wagnaria!!`)
Character Design: Junji Goto (School Days)
Animation: TNK (Kannazuki no Miko, School Days)
If the AT-X airing didn't clue you in, maybe the official website being haremking.tv will! Expect tits and maybe more tits.
+ 2 to bust size.
- is the shape of the glowing white bars.
1/6 23:00: Senki Zessho Symphogear (Tokyo MX)
Director: Tatsufumi Ito (Shugo Chara Party)
Character design: Dan Yoshii (Ontama), Satoshi Koike (also Ontama)
Art staff: Outsourced to France
Animation: Encourage Films (Ontama)
The show that no one else can fucking spell (seriously guys 姫 has more than one reading look it up sometime.) Music battles with yuri harems! Gee guys I wonder if this gets a grimdark twist
I will bet both testicles it does, and I know it will be better for it.
SATURDAYS:
1/7 6:00: The Knight in the Area (TV Asahi)
Director/Writer: Hirofumi Ogura (Black Butler II)
Animation: Shin-Ei Animation (Crayon Shin-chan, Doraemon)
Two brothers, one talented and one not, both pursue their soccer dreams and relationships with a childhood friend until tragedy strikes in this show that's apparently far less of a Touch ripoff than I'm making it sound like.
+ We are all
sewn together from bits of
- Competing with Prince of Tennis -and- Inazuma Eleven for the elusive ~sweaty little boys~ dollar. Market may not support them all.
1/7 8:30: Familiar of Zero Final
Staff: You guessed it!
Jesus, you two, just fuck already.
They're not gonna.
+ It's over.
- Ba... Bakainu!
1/7 17:55: My Ordinary Life (NHK-E)
Staff: This is just a new edit.
KyoAni either fumbled a show in development or paid for a -really good- "massage parlor" trip for a bureaucrat, because suddenly they've got a primetime slot on national public TV and nothing to put in it except their pretty but commercially radioactive gag comedy.
+ If you thought it was boring before, now there's only half as much!
- If you thought it was boring before, that's still about 11 eps too much.
1/7 24:30: Bodacious Space Pirates (tvk)
Director/Writer: Tatsuo Sato (Nadesico, Stellvia, Tokyo Tribe 2)
Animation Director: Hiroshi Takeuchi (Big O, iDOLM@STER Xenoglossia)
Character design: Akiman (∀ Gundam)
Animation: Satelight (repeat again~)
Marika, a normal young girl, is descended upon one day by a pair of supsicious space pirates who insist that her late father was their captain--and that, as his heir, his ship now belongs to her.
+ I'm pretty sure this is the best title for an anime I've ever seen.
- Not enough material for straight-up self-parody; we may be too serious now for Nadesico's occasional wholehearted embrace of its targets to go over.
1/7 26:00: Brave 10 (Tokyo MX)
Original: Kairi Shimotsuki (SenBa comics adaption)
Director: Kiyoko Sayama (Skip Beat, Vampire Knight)
Writer: Mamiko Ikeda (Emma, Maid-sama)
Character design: Yukiko Ban (Psychic Detective Yakumo)
Animation: TMS Entertainment (shitloads of stuff I'm too lazy to go through for relevance)
Saizo Kirigakure, a ninja, rescues the shamaness Nami Isa from Tokugawa assassins, and is drawn into Yukimura Sanada's core circle of ten brave ninja as the battle of Sekigahara draws closer.
+ YUKIMURAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
- No OYAKATAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-SAMAAAAAAAAAA. Looks like it's taking itself ~seriously~.
---
Personally, I'm hyped as fuck for Thermæ Romæ, and looking forward to Poyopoyo, Natsume, and Aquarion. Might pick up Rin-ne, Symphogear, Another, Bodacious, or High School Boys depending how they turn out. It still seems like such an empty season, though; maybe Spring will have that something that's missing here?
(As a note: Dates and times are not necessarily the first airing, but are the first airing that will reliably make their ways to us. Simulcasts and the like to be filled in as they're announced; it's still a liiiitle early for that.)
