Spring 2013 TV Anime notes 2

[GeoffC]

Spring 2013 Anime Notes 2

Karneval:
A lot of flashy supernatural action involving a bishie boy being seduced
by a spider-woman, his rescuer, a kidnapping on a train, explosions, and
a couple of agents from a mysterious organisation called 'Circus'. Do I
care what happens next week? Not much.

Hataraku Maou-sama:
The devil is expelled from an alternate world by a vengeful army of
heroes. He flees to our world with his sidekick, where they find their
magic does not work. The scenes of culture shock, with the devils
speaking their alien language, are well-done. However I felt the pace
dragging after the devil got a job in a burger restaurant, to the point
that I got out of my chair to check how many minutes of the episode were
left. I'm also not keen about the devils being shown as sympathetic
characters. Another character from the alternate world arrives in the
final scene. I might watch the next episode.

Photokano:
The main character, Kazuya, is given an expensive digital camera by his
father as a hand-me-down. Camera in hand, Kazuya finds that he is able
to interact well with various pretty girls, and soon attracts the
attention of the Photography Club president. It turns out that the
Photography Club members are lechers solely interested in taking
fan-service photos of the female students. The rival, all-girl Photo
Club, which takes scenery pictures and official school photos, also
tries to recruit Kazuya, but he decides to join the boys.
The animation features many still fan-service shots of various girls. I
found this all rather dispiriting. Is a fan-service picture gallery the
best Japanese TV animation can manage? Drop.

Aku no Hana (The Flowers of Evil):
School student Kasuga prides himself on reading quality foreign
literature, unlike his friends who seem to read porn comics. He has a
secret crush on pretty, clever, and sporty classmate Saeki. There is a
strange incident in class as the teacher returns the results of a maths
test. Saeki gets 98%, while a big-boned girl, Nakamura, gets zero,
having returned a blank answer sheet. When the teacher tells her off,
she calls him a piece of shit, to general shock. Going back to the
school to retrieve has Baudelaire (The Flowers of Evil), Kasuga is
tempted to steal Saeki's sports kit. Guess who finds out, and blackmails
him.
The animation looks strikingly different from the usual anime, and both
backgrounds and figures appear to have been traced from live action
(rotoscoped). Hence facial fatures and bodies appear (most unusually) in
their natural proportions. The way the characters move, and chatter
inconsequentially, is also very realistic. I did wonder why it had been
made as an anime at all. The show seems to lack a sympathetic main
character, but you should check out at least one episode for the
animation style. I'll watch more of this.

Oreimo/ Ore no Imouto ga Konna ni Kawaii Wake ga Nai (My little sister
can't be this cute) 2:
Second season of the popular series. Kirino has returned from America
and is reconnecting with her friends. Kyosuke is disapointed to find
that Kirino is brushing him off, as does Kuroneko who was showing him
some affection a day or so earlier. Kirino drags Kyosuke on a monster
shopping trip where she buys a vanload of anime and game goods. later
she can be heard getting unhealthily involved with one of her purchases.
Viewers not familiar with the full run (12 Tv +3ONA episodes) of the
first run are unlikely to be impressed by the first episode of S2. (If
you want to catch up, it's about a youth who has a difficult
relationship with his pretty, sporty, talented and popular younger
sister who is also an otaku.) It assumes that viewers know who these
characters are and what they were last doing. It also seemed a bit
lacking in the acute observation of otaku and other behaviour that
characterised the first series, leaning more towards slapstick. Since I
liked the first series, I'll watch some more of this to see if it gets
back on course, but...