Kuroko's Basketball Season 1 Anime Review

Kuroko's Basketball is an anime based on a manga written by Tadatoshi Fujimaki, which is published on Weekly Shonen Jump. This series is about Taiga Kagami, a talented basketball player and his aim to defeat the Generation of Miracles, a team of talented basketball players. I think I missed something in this short summary.

Teiko Junior High is best known for its Generation of Miracles, a group of talented basketball players whose skills bagged the said school 3 national championships. After they graduated, the five players went on to different schools. But that's not the focus of this series; our focus is on the team's sixth member respected by the five prodigies. He is dubbed the "Phantom Sixth Man" and his name is Tetsuya Kuroko.

Enter Taiga Kagami, a student from the U.S. who transferred to Japan after hearing tales about the Generation of Miracles and his aim is to defeat those guys. This is when everything starts to become interesting, both Kuroko and Kagami joined the Seirin Basketball team and together, Kuroko must beat his former teammates for their school to win the championships. But it will be one long road ahead for our heroes if they wish to defeat the Generation of Miracles one by one.

For starters, I am not a big fan of sports anime because if I will base it on my experience watching that genre, for me to get interested in it, it should be either a) over the top (see Eyeshield 21) and b) has a great balance between drama and sports (see Slam Dunk and Hajime no Ippo). In the case of Kuroko's Basketball, it's a strange mix of both. Some of the basketball moves in the series are a bit over the top and is impossible to pull off by an average human being. By average human being, I mean you and me, not those NBA players; I think they can pull some of those moves seen in the anime.

More on the basketball stuff, what I like about it is that the action is intense and it gets me cheering for the teams. I rarely experience such thrill in watching sports anime and the last time I am cheering on the teams is during the time I am watching Slam Dunk or Eyeshield 21. I feel like I am part of the crowd who is watching the game. My only gripe about the action is that there are times that they make some cuts of the game. Granted, it's for the sake of the series to reach a minimum of 25 episodes but it feels like I am cheated by the producers of the anime. I want to see more basketball action!

Now for the drama bits, it's more focused on the relationships of two key characters per team, with greater focus on Kuroko and Kagami's relationship. Just like most relationships, it didn't start pretty well, but after much interaction and Kagami acknowledging Kuroko's special abilities, the two went along just fine. The growth of their friendship is one of the key aspects of the show that I liked. Their growth of their friendship feels natural and what's great about it is that the two have mutual respect for each other.

One good example is that after they were defeated by one team during the summer cup, they decided to not talk to each other to sort out what went wrong to their teamwork until they are ready to talk about it. The result? Their skills as players improved and with more training coming from their coach, these two are ready for the winter cup. As for the other characters of the Seirin Basketball team, even though most of the time they felt like they are just "there" for the sake of the team to have a team, some of them are interesting characters if you give them a chance to shine. From the team, the only ones that I find interesting are Riko (the coach), Hyuga (the captain) and that guy with a monkey face.

Since I am done talking about Seirin, how about the other teams? The other teams are interesting to say at least, especially how each Generation of Miracle interacts with them. Midorima doesn't mind his teammates, Aomine completely ignores them while Kise; he is the one who cares for them. In short, the only one who has some character development from the five members of the Generation of Miracles is Kise with Midorima coming next since it looks like he is starting to bond more with them.

Overall, the first season of Kuroko's Basketball is really enjoyable. The show has a good mix of drama and comedy, which reminded me a bit of another basketball anime called Slam Dunk and it's not a bad thing. The animation for the series looks great, especially during the actions sequences. Even though Seirin lost, there is still hope for the team to enter the Inter High Basketball Championships via the Winter Cup. With Kagami and Kuroko honing their respective skills, can the duo defeat the three members of the Generation of Miracles that didn't defeat next season?

Special thanks to Random Curiosity for the images.

Mobile Suit Gundam AGE Anime Review – Part 3

For those who missed it: Flit Arc | Asemu Arc

75 years since the start of the war against the Vagan forces, it is time for the third generation of the Asuno clan, Kio Asuno to continue the legacy started by his grandpa after his father, Asemu mysteriously disappeared year ago. Now that Vagan is invading Earth, it's time for Kio to step up and fight the invading forces using the Gundam AGE-3!

This is my second least favorite story arc in Gundam AGE for a lot of good reasons. First is that this arc started really strong and showed us that Kio is one competent pilot, heck, he is more than competent because he is a gifted X-Rounder and thanks to the training he received from his grandfather with a little help coming from a virtual reality console given to him when he is a kid, it feels like that he thinks of war as some game and that the Vagan forces are just enemies he needs to blow up. In short, we see one aspect of Flit's slowly degeneration from the kid we saw in the first arc.

Another reason why this arc started really strong is the crew. My problem with the second arc's crew is that they have pilots, but not competent pilots who can shoot down enemies. The only ones who are competent in that arc are Woolf, Asemu and if Flit is on board the Diva, Flit. In this case, we have an actual competent squad of Mobile Suit pilots, including a veteran from the previous arc who still didn't move on after the passing of his girlfriend. In addition to that, they have an inexperienced captain who has a lot of potential to become one great captain, but for now, she is being thought by Flit on how to become one.

So what went wrong along the way? The first eight episodes of this story arc are strong and started the build up for the final battle thanks to the introduction of the EXA-DB and the relationship between Flit and Asemu after Asemu was declared missing by the Earth Federation. I find this interesting because of Asemu's later philosophy about war, all he wants is to balance the tides of war and take a neutral stand. He doesn't want either the Federation or the Vagan to win after discovering that each side is as dirty as the other. The only time he sided with the Earth Federation is during Kio's rescue mission.

This my friends is where the show started to take a downward spiral. I love that they showed us one of the Vagan colonies, but what I don't like is that it doesn't make sense why they still stayed in Mars. Here's the thing, if they have this kind of technology to create a colony and have a couple of their officers stay in the Earth Federation colonies, why the heck they didn't formulate a plan where they slowly send Vagan refugees to those colonies so that they can save themselves from the Mars radiation? Heck, they even developed a medicine to extend their life due to the effects of the radiation and they can take cold sleep to extent their life so that they can finish their research or something!

But no, they focused on this "Project Eden", which can be basically summed up into "we Vagan will conquer Earth as our own and will revive its original beauty that mankind has destroyed", you know the usual utopia plan made by the bad guy. To put it simply, they tried to make the villains sympathetic in the last few episodes of the show. To be honest, it's not a bad thing but if the bad guy is well, Ezelcant who ordered the destruction of one colony for this sort of utopian project and his soldiers killed a lot of innocent people in the process, how can I feel sympathetic for his situation? It didn't help that they pulled the "I only have a few months to live" card during Kio's time he was captive by the Vagan and the "dead son looks like protagonist" card.

Even if that's the case, some events of the last few episodes of the story arc are really touching. Kio's meeting with Lu and her brother, Deen. Kio just wants to make Lu happy that he doesn't care if he gives Ezelcant some classified military information just to save her life only for her to die in the end. To put it simply, even though his moments with Lu are touching and cute, he basically screwed the entire Earth Federation. Oh, and Asemu rescuing his son is one cool scene, especially how it ended in space.

That Clanche man.

Now to some of the technical stuff, the Mobile Suits introduced in this arc are really amazing. AGE-3 is one good looking mecha and same goes with its alternate forms, too bad that AGE-3 Orbital is pretty much useless in this story arc. The music is still superb and that the characters introduced in this arc are really interesting and have a lot of potential to become awesome characters in the show, just give them the right moment for them to shine. Now that Kio has seen life in a Vagan colony, what will be his decision? Will he continue to fight the Vagan or stop fighting them?

Chuunibyou Demo Koi ga Shitai! Anime Review

Chuunibyou Demo Koi ga Shitai! (Official English Name: Love, Chunibyo & Other Delusions) is a 12-episode anime series based on a two-volume light novel series written by Torako with illustrations by Nozomi Osaka of the same name. The series is about delusions and reality and how our characters face it.

Yuuta Togashi is a boy who once have an 8th grade syndrome aka chuunibyou. It is a kind of "syndrome" wherein someone who is into anime, manga, games and other kinds of fictional material ends up thinking that he or she is part of some kind universe and he or she thinks that he or she is something special powers. In this case, Yuuta here thinks that he is the "Dark Flame Master". After realizing that this alter ego of his is kinda embarrassing, he starts to drop it and decides to start a fresh life free from delusions starting in high school... that is until he meets Rikka.

Rikka Takanashi is Yuuta's classmate and knows that he is the Dark Flame Master! To make it worse for Yuuta, she is a chuuni! Now that they are kinda stuck together, what is next between these two? Will it develop into some kind of a deeper relationship or that Rikka will be forever stuck in her delusions and not face the reality surrounding her life and much later, her past.

When I first watched the show's first episode, I easily dismissed it as some entertaining moe blob anime churned by Kyoto Animation to get more money. It didn't help that its source material only has two volumes in it and that it ended before the anime started! If my memory serves me correctly, most light novel adaptations these days at least adapt an on-going series. But after watching a few more episodes, I started to realize that this show is more than just about the adventures of a delusional high school student, it is also deals with some psychological stuff like coping up with the loss of someone.

In the show's earlier episodes, they are hints why Rikka's sister is concerned about her having delusions and such. At first I thought that she wants her to act normal in public. A few episodes later, we are introduced to Rikka's extended family and learned more bits about her life. As it turns out, her being a chuuni might be just a coping mechanism about accepting the death of her father. Thus it makes sense why Rikka's sister and her family want her to stop doing that and face the truth or the reality like what some people will say.

Rikka's search for the "'Ethereal Horizon" might be just her way to think of a possibility that maybe, just maybe, her parents are out there somewhere and that they will return once she finds this place. It is sad when you think about it but this is when Yuuta comes in. He acts like Rikka's support every time she did something. Yuuta kinda acts like Rikka's gateway to "reality", an ideal that Rikka abandoned some time in the series. That is why it is no surprise that after some persuasion, which is more like a talk about accepting the harsh reality, Rikka dropped the chuunibyou act and start living normally.

This is when the true theme of the series comes into play. The series is more than just about how to cope up with the harsh realities, but it is about being yourself in whatever you do. Rikka's coping up with her father's death is just being her all this time, and not some game of pretend like what most people think. Heck, even Yuuta's Dark Flame Master persona is something that he created because of his addiction to fiction! At the end, the series boils down to one harsh reality that most people can't accept, and that is how people cope up of "you" being "you". That is why I love how the series ended; it didn't end in a sad note but in a really fun note like how the series started.

Now that I am done talking about the plot, it is time to talk about the characters. The main cast of characters are great and the support casts, especially Touka (Rikka's sister) brings out the best from them. The other side characters might come annoying at times or have this impression that they are just placed there so that they can have more cute characters (and I was right about some of it), but it all depends on the viewer on how they receive them. In my case, I kinda hate some of them because they didn't contribute anything to the plot's progression.

The animation is something that I expect Kyoto Animation has, the animation is fluid, solid and sometimes, very realistic. What I like about it is how the director showed us the difference between what's happening in reality and what is happening in the delusion world. I just love how they animate the delusion world like some cool sci-fi or magical anime and later showed us what is actually happening... which is not really that fascinating compared to the real world. Some might say that this kind of thing is unique but I already saw it in Unofficial Sentai Akibaranger once, but they never had a chance to expand it.

Overall, Chuunibyou is one fun anime series. Even though the show's strongest point is its comedy when it comes to the delusional fights of our characters and why they think that they are doing is something that is kinda badass, surprisingly, this show can have some emotional and heart-warming scenes that can even make you teary eye from time to time for a TV show that is about the delusional lives of our characters. More than that, this show is more than just how to escape reality, but it is about accepting it by being you on ways to accept the harsh reality. Though their methods is something most people frowned upon, but that is their choice. They are being themselves when they delude themselves to their delusions.

Ore no Imouto ga Konna ni Kawaii Wake ga Nai Anime Review

Ore no Imouto ga Konna ni Kawaii Wake ga Nai or simply known as Oreimo is an anime based on a light novel series written by Tsukasa Fushimi. The anime lasted for 12 episodes, with 4 more episodes released online labelled as the show's "True Route", giving this show a total of 16 episodes, including an alternate version of the show's 12th episode, leading to the events of the show's True Route.

Kyosuke Kosaka is just your average high school student who doesn't get along with his sister, Kirino. Everything changed when he bumped sister, causing her to accidentally drop a DVD. Kyosuke then discovers that the content of the DVD is a copy of an eroge (adult game)! That night, Kirino brings Kyosuke to her room, and learned that her sister is an otaku, has an extensive collection of magical girl anime and younger sister-themed eroge! Problem is, she can't reveal her hobbies to other people, including their parents, and thus, Kyosuke ends up becoming her secret keeper and Kirino's life counselling advisor.

When I first watched Oreimo years ago, I just only find the series entertaining, there is nothing special about it and find it as your average anime featuring incest implications. I decided to watch it again just to prepare myself for the show's second season, and during that time, I played at least two eroge titles namely, Fate/stay night and Katawa Shoujo. Much to my surprise, I ended up liking the series more. I guess this is a result of me better understanding Kirino's hobbies now that I tried playing it.

The reason why I started to like Oreimo more is that Kirino is like most closet otaku, she has a life that you can consider as "normal". In Kirino's case, she is the perfect role model student and she wants to maintain it. If she starts talking about eroge or just anime in general in her school, chances are that she will be stereotyped with the rest of the school's geeks, destroying the image she created. This is when Kyosuke comes in, he is the only person that she can talk to about her hobbies and the first person who suggested that she should try to find friends online that has the same hobbies like hers. As a result, she gained new friends where she can act like herself.

Because she made otaku friends, there are chances that she might end up meeting some of her "normal" friends from time to time and we see it happen in one episode. The episode where Kirino confessed that she like her hobbies, and at the same time, like her best friend who thinks that her hobbies are poisoning her mind is one of those rare scenes in the series where Kirino actually stands up for herself, and not let Kyosuke do most of the job. Though Kyosuke pulled some strings in the process by showing proof that there is nothing wrong with Kirino's hobbies, it is one of those times that Kirino did most of the effort.

Even though Kirino is the star of this anime series, this series is more focused on Kyosuke and how he tries his best to be the supportive older brother. Though he doesn't act like a brother who is willing to go to the ends of the Earth just for his sister, he willing to do everything just for her. Heck, there is one point in the series wherein he lied that he owned Kirino's collection of eroge so that Kirino can still have her collection... even if it is the cause is part of his dignity. At the end, it is how Kyosuke handled the problems Kirino have that made me not drop the series, during the times I want to drop it.

Finally the anime's True Route, unlike the previous 12 episodes that aired on TV, the last 4 episodes aired online with True Route's 12th episode basically the same as the TV 12th episode with some changes at the episode's last minutes. If there is one thing I noticed with the True Route is that it is more focused on Kirino's friend who ends up becoming Kyosuke's junior, Ruri "Kuroneko" Gokou. Even though there is a lack of Kirino in the show's True Route, the fact that it is focused on the introvert Kuroneko and how Kyosuke influenced her to start opening up to other people made this route worth watching.

Even if there is too much Kuroneko in the True Route, it is still about Kirino. Heck, the final episode of this arc is Kyosuke flying to America after he received a strange message coming from Kirino! Even though she only appeared in the last episode, you can still feel her presence in the episodes she is not in even if most of the episodes are about Kuroneko. Kirino's motivation on why she barely talked to the ones she care the most is something that I didn't expect Kirino to have. At the end, Kirino finally returns to Japan and it seems that Kuroneko developed feelings for Kyosuke.

Overall, Oreimo is one fun and entertaining series. If I can sum up the show's strong points, it would be how they depicted a closet otaku and the problems it faced. Thankfully, Kirino has Kyosuke who is forced to be supportive to his sister's hobbies. Now to some of my problems in this series, this show has a lot of implied incest thanks to Kirino's love for little sister-themed games. Heck, there is one point while watching the series that it feels like Kirino likes Kyosuke more than just her older brother! Another problem I have with the series is that they never bothered explaining how Kirino ended up playing eroge at the age of 14, heck maybe earlier! Hopefully, they can explain it in the second season.

Bakuman Anime Review

Bakuman is a 75-episode anime divided into three seasons and is based on a manga written by Tsugumi Ohba and illustrated by Takeshi Obata, the same team who created the very popular and very controversial Death Note series. This series is about Mashiro Moritaka and Akito Takagi and their dream to create a manga series, which will eventually have an anime adaptation because of a promise Mashiro made to a girl.

Well that is basically the gist of the series and here's a rather lengthy summary of it. Mashiro Moritaka (aka Saiko) is a boy who once dreamed to become a manga artist like his uncle, Tarou Kawaguchi that is until he died because of overwork. Because of this, he stops dreaming about it and just hoped that one day, he will get a decent desk job. Everything changed when Akito Takagi (aka Shujin) discovered his notebook filled with some of his illustrations and offers him to create manga with him. Akito will write the story while Mashiro will do the illustrations.

At first Mashiro sorta declines the offer that is until Akito forced Mashiro to become his artist because he is planning to tell Miho Azuki, Mashiro's crush about it. With that, a dream is forged. Mashiro will do the drawings, Akito will write... and Azuki will voice the heroine of the manga once it is adapted into an anime. But it doesn't end there as Mashiro made a confession of his feelings for Azuki. If the manga ends up having an anime adaptation, they will eventually get married! Much to their surprise, Azuki agrees with Mashiro's proposal, and thus their gambling in manga to fulfill their dreams begins.

Also the way, they earned rivals in the industry, which later end up becoming their friends and help them improve their craft a bit more. There are also trials they faced when it comes to their career as manga authors, heck, even their own personal issues are also brought up in the process! But the question is, is the anime adaptation of this Ohba & Obata work worth sitting in? Much to my surprise, this series is worth watching.

Because the series is divided into three seasons, I will talk discuss each season one by one. The first season is slow when it comes to pacing as it feels more of like your average middle school drama rather than a series about two guys trying their best to fulfill their dreams. For at least 4 episodes, this anime is about the personal issues about Mashiro's parents being afraid that he will end up like his uncle before they went into the interesting stuff. As time went on, they slowly drop the school setting and the only time we see it are during the scenes when they are brain storming ideas, or in times when the authors are reminding us that they are still in middle school as they have problems when it comes to girls or when one of their classmates insult Saiko's art.

The series becomes interesting after the introduction of Akira Hattori, the man who would later become their editor when they finally signed the contract with Shonen Jump, or should I say, Shonen Jack. If there is one thing that I am bothered with the series is why the heck change Shonen Jump's name to Jack? I mean, this show keeps on doing manga references and has posters of One Piece, Naruto and Bleach, which were animated by different studios so why censor Shonen Jump? Does it have something to do with copyright issues?

The earlier works of Mutou Ashirogi as seen in the show's first season

Anyway, Hattori became a pivotal character in the growth of our duo who would later take the pen name of Mutou Ashirogi as he is the one who point out the problems of their earlier works. Like how their first work has too much dialogue, the problems with the art, which the two try their best to improve. The introduction of rival characters such as Eiji Niizuma and Aiko Iwase helped improve the two when it comes to their craft. Though Iwase was forgotten in the first season, she makes a comeback in the next season, giving Shujin a legitimate writer rival in the process.

Finally, the overall plot of the first season, it is about how the duo find their own style as manga artist. From what they discovered, Shujin can write "dark" and deep storylines and is more analytical when it comes to writing hits. In Mashiro's case, his art keeps on evolving. For most of the duration of this season, Mashiro is learning how to improve his art by becoming an assistant, while at the same time, building up the friendly competition between the Shonen Jack artists. In Shunjin's case, we see him get frustrated on what story to write for most of the time, while at the same time, struggling with his love life.

By the time the first season ended, Detective TRAP is finally serialized, but the season didn't end just that. The season ends with a cliffhanger revealing that there will be a change of editors. In the second season, Miura is in-charge, and unlike Hattori who is a supportive kind of editor, Miura likes to shove his ideas, thinking that it's the best idea. With that in mind, Shujin learns how to write comedy, which he incorporate in TRAP while they are trying to legitimize the series as a proper detective manga.

But when the series is reaching the height of its popularity, this is when Saikou was confined in the hospital because of overworking. This arc is the highlight of the second season. For once, the series is reaching its popularity, and Saikou wants to continue his work even if the doctors advised him not to. His determination to continue to the series while he is in the hospital bed is quite admirable and it is one of the rare times wherein he meets Azuki. This is also one of those rare times that I feel like the editorial department is the villains of this series. Even if their reason why they want to put TRAP in a hiatus is understandable, but the reason why they want it to last till the authors graduate from high school make them sounds like they don't support their authors.

At the end of this story arc, TRAP resumes its serialization only for it to be cancelled because of low rankings. Their next work Hirameki Tanto is a series that it feels like they are forced to write it thanks to Miura's suggestion that they should write a gag manga. Though it help them grow as authors to write something different, but that is not Ashirogi's style that people are most familiar of. The only thing interesting with Tanto's creation is that it fired up the Ashirogi-Niizuma rivalry that the authors themselves requested to cancel the series so that they can create a series worthy to rival Niizuma's CROW and +NATURAL.

PCP is the result of this gamble, and it beat CROW and +NATURAL in the rankings when it first debuted. But since this a gamble between Ashirogi and the editorial department, they need to make sure that the series will be successful or else it will be cancelled. At the end, they succeeded as the series lasted for more than a year. But before talking about its fate in the show's third season, I'll talk some of the general stuff about this series before I will forget about it.

First are the assistants, the second season introduced them and as time went on, some left, some stayed and some were added. Their interaction with Ashirogi is quite minimal, but some of these assistants are quite interesting. At least two of them ended up becoming manga authors, and even had a chance to have episodes focused around them, with Shiratori having his own story arc. Another interesting assistant is the guy who thinks that manga is art, and that the reason why his story is not serialized is because it is too deep for other people.

That said there are some times they discuss if they should create manga just for the sake of selling something to the public, or to create manga just for the sake of creating a masterpiece. This topic is something that the third season of this series handled in a very sloppy manner as there is no balance between the two sides, and it ended up with Ashirogi's desire to create a masterpiece winning. The only time we realize the importance of creating manga just for the sake for it to sell is during the times there is a serialization meeting or we hear editors talking why the ending of a certain popular series right now is disappointing.

Second is that the rivalry between authors is something that is properly brought up in the last two seasons. Giving some of the editors character focus episodes made the series more interesting as we learned that unlike Niizuma who is basically a genius, some of them are struggling just to create their work. Or in Hiramaru's case, his editor is so evil that he tries his best to run away from work if he can! This is when Team Fukuda comes in, a group created by Fukuda, which is composed of authors who will change Jack. The group made some decisions that affected the course of the magazine and at one point, frustrate the editorial department.

Though they are members of the same group, they are still rivals, especially when it comes to survey results or there is an event in Jack that they all participate. And since they are part of the same group, it is kinda expected that someone will develop feelings for a certain member. This is what happened to Aoki and Hiramaru, and their love story is one of the reasons why the show's third season is fun to watch. With the amount of authors and editors in this series, there are times that the anime tends to forget some of them. Thankfully, the show's epilogue still remembers them.

Third is how they distinguish the art of each author. Though there are times that the art styles of all the authors look the same, I give credit to the manga's illustrator, Takeshi Obata for trying his best to make each art style look distinct. Speaking of which, I like how they distinguish manga and anime in this series. When I read the manga, I was expecting that the fictional manga in this series are adapted into anime form in the anime, instead the fictional manga are presented in motion comic book form, wherein we see the panels of the manga and hear some voice overs. It's interesting and is basically a statement that manga and anime are different mediums and they have their own presentation and that we should respect the said presentation of the material.

The third season of the series feels more focus on how Ashirogi can create a manga series that can have an anime adaptation. Though PCP one successful series, the problem with it is that the editorial department doesn't want this series to have an anime because this manga is about creating perfect crimes, and they don't want kids to imitate most of the stuff coming from it! I understand the concern of the editorial department about it, especially when there is a story arc concerning about people copying the stuff from the PCP manga. They were able to resolve it thanks to the authors pointing out the difference between PCP and the fake PCP crimes, the only problem I have with it is that it was resolved in a single episode as the arc lasted for 1.5 episodes.

Nanamine in a nutshell

This is the problem I have with the final season of Bakuman, the fast pacing. The pacing is so fast that there are some story arcs lost their impact, like the fake PCP arc. Another problem I have with the final season is the introduction of another rival character in the form of Nanamine. Compared to other rival characters this series introduced, he is more of an antagonist rather than a friendly ally. He is basically the closest thing we have for a villain in this series, and to be honest, he is one bad villain. Granted, his methods are a stark contrast like that to Ashirogi, but he barely managed to beat the duo.

At the end of his story arc, he was basically forgotten in this series. There is supposed to be another story arc featuring Nanamine but it was cut out due to time constraints, and to be honest, I am fine with it because this story arc basically threw out all of Nanamine's character development out of the window. Because they cut this story arc out, most of the focus of the third season is more on the Niizuma and Ashirogi rivalry. After CROW ended with a really high note, it is also around the time Ashirogi created Reversi and after much debate, it ended up getting serialized in Shonen Jack, and PCP is transferred to a new magazine.

This is when the rivalry becomes more interesting after CROW ended and the next thing we know, the editorial department is debating on who will get an anime adaptation first! After this, the series has reached its climax as it is now more focused on Azuki and Mashiro, and after all the trials that they faced, at the end, their dreams are fulfilled and they live happily ever after. No seriously, that is basically the summary of the climax of the series. If you want a longer analysis, you can check my review of the third season's episodes 22 and 23.

If there is one thing I learned from watching this series is that the ending determines if the series is a masterpiece or not. Considering that they ended the Death Note manga in a really bad manner, and one of the characters said this kind of line, so I expect that the anime will end in a really great manner, and it did. Compared to its manga counterpart, the last episode tried its best to fix some of the loose ends that the series left when they started focusing more on the Ashirogi-Niizuma rivalry and the Mashiro-Azuki love story. It's one neat and short epilogue scene, but it did the job perfectly.

Overall, the anime adaptation of Bakuman stayed faithful to the original source material even though there are some cuts such as the manga references made by the characters in the original manga. Though the pacing started a bit slow, it improved as time went on and there are even times that the pacing is too fast that it feels like some story arcs or character developments were ignored during the process. So the big question is, is Bakuman worth watching? Answer is yes, though it is not the best anime masterpiece around, the tale of two kids pursuing their dreams in a world that is basically one big gamble is really interesting. As a bonus, we even have a look on the process in creating manga, and some of the inner politics in an editorial department.

If there are some disappointments, most of the characters introduced in the series felt irrelevant after the introduction episode. In addition, some of the characters introduced were forgotten or even didn't have the chance to grow. There are so many characters but the writers don't know how the balance the screen time of the recurring ones. And lastly, my only minor nitpick in this series is the removal of some of the manga references, I know it has something to do with copyright but come on, they were able to manage to do some non-Shonen Jump manga references in some episodes, why can't they adapt all of it?

Nyarko-san: Another Crawling Chaos Anime Review

Nyarko-san: Another Crawling Chaos is an anime series based on a light novel series written by Manta Aisora. This 12-episode anime series is inspired by H.P. Lovercraft's Cthulhu mythos, and to make it more interesting, it has too many anime, manga and tokusatsu references.

The anime is about Nyarlathotep or simply known as Nyarko, a formless deity of chaos who takes the form of a silver-haired girl. Her mission is to protect a boy named Mahiro Yasaka from aliens that are sent to Earth to kidnap him. Did I mention that Nyarko has this uncontrollable crush on Mahiro that she will do every means to have him? Later in the series, they are joined by Kuko (Cthugha) and Hasuta (Hastur) who ends up becoming freeloaders in Mahiro's place.

To be honest, I have no interest watching this series at first because the first visuals I saw gave me this impression that this will be one generic harem anime. I mean, the protagonist looks plain and the lead female looks hyperactive. Then I saw some of the first images of those who watched the series online. The lead female character likes to do Kamen Rider references, but still, I am not interested. I mean, a lot of shows do Kamen Rider references from time to time so there is nothing special in it. That is until I saw my brother watched a stream of the show's 2nd episode. If there is one thing that made me interested in this series aside from Kuko's "intimate moment" with Nyarko, are the Kamen Rider V3 and Den-O references.

Since the show still has Kamen Rider references in its 3rd episode, guess it is part of the show's concept then, so I decided to give the show a try. Much to my surprise, I enjoyed it. The amount of random Japanese pop culture references is the best parts of the show and how can Nyarko "force" Mahiro to fall for her. It's so fun that you can say that it is really addicting that I ended up marathoning the series in just one day! Even with the amount of anime, manga, tokusatsu and Western sci-fi references this show has, how about the show's plot? For 12 episodes, it seems like most of the major plots of the series all lead up to a rather bizarre ending.

Here's how most story arcs of Nyarko are: some big problem arrives, MC tries to solve it, the reveal is something that has something to do with Earth's entertainment and by Earth entertainment, and I mean video games, to be more specific, visual novels and Japanese comic books. Yep, our main character places his life on the line just for the sake of yaoi doujinshi, alien game consoles and in the last story arc, some alien butler who doesn't want his ward to discover his love for eroge because his ward is a minor.

So yeah, the series basically poked fun on big plot developments and lampshades it at the very last part of the story arc... and I like it! I mean, having some big reveal like X wants the MC because he is the chosen one thus they must destroy him before he master his powers is getting too overused. The series lampshades its story arc build ups for something so ridiculous that you just can't help but laugh because it's so stupid... and you need to laugh out your frustration, especially the first big revelation this series had.

Dai... Henshin!

As for the characters, they are all entertaining, to be more specific, Nyarko, Kuko and Mahiro. Some of the secondary characters that appeared in the series from time to time are fun to watch as well, especially Mahiro's mom. Seriously, every time she appears, I can't wait what Kamen Rider catchphrase she will say to her enemies before fighting them. Speaking of fights, they are fun to watch, especially Nyarko's Space CQC. Lastly, can this series stand on its own without the pop culture references? To be honest, the references are what make the series so fun to watch. Without it, the show becomes that generic harem anime series with a love sick female protagonist. Speaking of which, I can't wait to see the second season as it goes Double-Boiled Extreme!

Sword Art Online Anime Review

Sword Art Online is an anime based on Reki Kawahara's original web novel series turned light novel series. The series is about a beta tester named Kazuto Kirigaya aka Kirito who ends up getting stuck in an MMO called "Sword Art Online". The only way to log out in this game is to finish the game and death means death in this one. Can Kirito survive in this game? Also, is this series good? All I can say is, it is entertaining.

The anime adapted the first four volumes of the light novel series written by Reki Kawahara. These four volumes can be divided into two arcs: Aincrad and Fairy Dance arcs or those who haven't read the light novel nor check the Wikipedia, it's the Sword Art Online and ALfheim Online arcs. The problem with the anime adaptation is that these two arcs can last for at least 25 anime episodes but instead, we have 14 episodes for Aincrad and 11 episodes for Fairy Dance, causing the anime to cut some corners just for the series to last 25 episodes.

There is nothing wrong with compressing 4 light novel volumes into 25 episodes, the only time it is considered wrong is that the setting of both arcs requires a lot of world building in it. Cutting corners will lose the aspect that Kirito is in some massive MMO and that some important technical terms that made the online game unique is lost during the process. I will go into detail about it once I will talk each arc individually.

The Aincrad arc is what makes Sword Art Online, Sword Art Online. The danger of getting stuck in some virtual MMO and the only way to escape from it is to finish the game has this kind of danger in it that makes the series engrossing to watch. It didn't help that once you die in the game, you will die for real. The problem with the anime is that it is too focused on building the world of Aincrad that it forgot to build the world outside of the game. The only time they remembered it was when this arc is on its last two episodes. Thus in the process, there are some instances that I forgot that they will die for real once they die in the game.

Making us remember about it are the player killers in the game who thinks otherwise. For starters, these guys have a point, I mean, we are not sure if the game's creator, Akihiko Kayaba is just messing around when he made the announcement. In addition, the news articles might be shopped just to convince the ones stuck in the game that they will die if they die in game. Aside from PKers, players who decided to live their peaceful lives in the game is a reminder that there are some players who are afraid to die, they rather wait for someone to finish the game for them.

The protagonist of the series, Kirito is the standard smart shonen anime protagonist, he will do what it takes to survive this "death game". It didn't help that he is the game's beta tester and thus, he has the knowledge on the best hunting spots to level up, earning him the "Beater" nickname. As the series progressed, he meets other players that made him learn more that there is nothing different with the virtual world and the real world. The pinnacle of it is when he joined a guild for the first time and not being honest with his skills end up causing the death of most of the party members, including the girl he promised to protect.

Asuna is one tough female protagonist who is hiding her true feelings for most of the time. She is scared in the inside but thanks to Kirito, she starts to loosen up a bit. At the end, she fell in love with Kirito and got married. She then becomes more motherly after her meeting with Yui and less tomboyish. But for some reason, it becomes a low point of her character since she ends up becoming powerless in some occasions. Guess I am seeing it like that because we don't have an episode focused on Asuna, on why she was given the nickname of Asuna of the Flash.

Technical wise, like I said in my first episode review of the series, the concept of a world without magic, only weapons in an MMO is really unique. The leveling system and the Sword Skill system of the game is one thing that other MMOs have. As for the additional extra skills such as Dual Wielding and maximum defense and offense, it is something that other online games have but the way to obtain these skills is something unique. I mean, the need to acquire some game conditions to earn a special skill? That is something unique.

More on the technical aspects of this arc, the compression of this arc in 14 episodes affected this arc. The 3rd episode felt like it should lasted for 2 episodes and that the 13th episode should at least last for 2 or 3 more episodes with the first episode focused on the preparations and the explanation on what happened to the players and two episodes focused on the battle with the 75th floor boss. If the show's 14th episode is an indication, the major highlights of the boss fight were cut off just to focus on the final battle between Kirito and Heathcliff.

Where are my answers?!

Lastly, how the arc ended, it left a lot of questions like Kayaba's motivation in trapping 10,000 players inside the MMO that he created. Though he vaguely answered it by saying that he forgot about it, it's one of those aspects in this arc that made me scratch my head. Guess the only closest theory that I can think of behind Kayaba's motivation is the same motivation every player of The Sims games have, to build a world and see it evolve in front of his eyes while tweaking some things in the process. Trying to kill your Sims in the process can make things a lot more interesting for a player and I guess that's what is running on Kayaba's mind when he remove the logout button.

The Fairy Dance arc is just an extension of the Aincrad arc and if I were the producer of this series, I want this arc to be the second season. I mean, ALfheim Online is a different MMO and that the story is more focused on rescuing Asuna from an online game were PK is encouraged and that you can respawn as many times as you want, it has a different feel in it compared to SAO. To put it simply, having this arc as the second arc of the anime made it inferior to the first arc, even though it features magic, respawning, flying, fairies and all of the good stuff your average MMO has.

But what made Fairy Dance a bad arc is that the strengths of the first arc, such as world building and focus on the technical aspects of the game are watered down just to focus on the Kirito and Asuna love story. Some of the viewers eat it all up but for me, I am not buying it. I am watching a shonen anime, not some shojo anime. If I want a love story anime, I can just rewatch Yamato Nadeshiko Shichi Henge because I am a sucker for romantic comedy, heck, even Toradora! whose love story almost made me cry when I watched it years ago!

Asuna's character in the second arc in a nutshell.

Granted, shonen anime has some love stories, but it is not the main focus of the series, it's the action. Speaking of the action, this arc has the most number of bad animated action frames in the entire duration of the series. It's so noticeable it hurts. Heck, Eugene's death scene is the main highlight on how bad the animation of this arc is! The only thing good about this arc is how they made us feel that even though Kirito has a stat boost thanks to his data from SAO mixing with his ALO data, he can't defeat the World Tree Guardians alone.

More on the love story aspect, what irritated me in this one is that Asuna was reduced to a damsel in distress kind of character who waits for his prince to save her from the evil king. The only time Asuna has her own spotlight in this arc is when she attempted to escape and discovered Sugou's secret human experiments. Speaking of which, it's the one of the interesting in this arc aside from flying, the concept that each race has its own set of pros and cons and Leafa.

The friendzoned fairy dance.

Leafa is one interesting companion and making her Kirito's sister made it more interesting. To begin with, Kirito's sister is someone who doesn't play video games according to Kirito but I guess Kirito's experience in playing SAO made Suguha (Leafa's real name) curious on why his brother loves playing video games so much. What's more, he got addicted into it in the process! The only thing bad about Suguha's character is her crush with Kirito. It's a bad thing because it is the cause of a lot of bad drama in the series. It is so bad that I want to scratch my head out of frustration! Thankfully, she got over it later on.

Even though she died in the previous arc, Yui played a pivotal role in this arc. She is a great support character that helped Kirito when he is the tight spots of the game. She is one pivotal character as her program made it easier for Kirito to access high level admin security that is necessary to save Asuna. Sugou is just that crazy and insane villain. He is pure evil and you can easily hate the guy, also he is creepy. All I can say is, he is one bland villain compared to Kayaba since I can just describe him in just two sentences.

Technical wise, the concept of having multiple races to choose from before playing the game is something that other games did. That being said, ALO is not a unique MMO since they just get concepts from other games. Heck, even the leveling system is the same leveling system Final Fantasy II has! The weakest of the technical aspect of the series is the world building. I mean, the game has at least 9 races and they only explored one territory and focused on 4 races in the story! Heck, we only learned only the general concepts of at least 3 races! The magic concept is interesting since the players need to chant their spells, which required memorizing if they want to cast the correct spells. It's interesting and something I see game developers will do in the future.

Lastly, how the arc ended, it is satisfactory compared to the previous one. It is satisfactory and it didn't left any unanswered questions and instead, answered the questions left in the previous arc. As for Kayaba, he redeemed himself at the end of this arc by giving Kirito the item called "The Seed", which basically revived the dying MMO genre. The epilogue scene is something that I expected and that closing the series with the Aincrad castle made the finale really good and put the series into full circle.

Overall, Sword Art Online is just one entertaining series to watch. It is not the best anime of 2012 but it has some interesting concepts that I feel like some other show will do it better. The music in this series is fantastic since it feels like I am listening to video game music and not your standard anime music. The animation, the characters and the story are the weakest parts of the series. Yes, these aspects have their own moments but overall, these aspects can range from worse to great in terms of quality.

There are a lot of better shows based on an MMO like Ragnarok the Animation and shows that featured people playing an MMO such as the .hack franchise (which I want to watch). If you like this anime, I should recommend that you try these titles if you have the time. SAO is not the only MMO anime around for starters.