PinkuBentoBox

Once again, blogging Tuesday’s anime that actually screened at sparrowsfart on Wednesday, and by the time I get done unloading this drivel it will probably be Thursday. This time I am pleased to inform you that I am blogging sober. Hopefully this will be slightly more coherent. And by slightly I mean probably not. Anyway, today I’m going to blab about four new shows! Mokke, Myself; Yourself, Night Wizard and Blue Drop.

Night Wizard

Night Wizard at a glance: schoolkids fight fantasy monsters on the moon or something. I have no idea what the shit was going on, and that’s mainly because this is pretty incoherent.

Part of me wants to accuse this of being a harem show, but it’s not really. Moe was definitely considered and employed in many guises in the production of this epic. I had actually originally picked this one as looking like it could be interesting enough to give a watch. I’m stepping back from that declaration right now. It’s not. It’s crap.

The plot appears to revolve around a generic male character and a small harem of girls. Girls who do MAGIC. Because they are Night Wizards. Apparently this is derived from some Japanese Pen & Paper RPG. It sort of shows. So we have our generic male lead, who is repeatedly waylaid on his way to school by a cute girl who lives in a crystal palace and sends him on ‘missions’ that involve killing some of the most uninspired monsters ever, by making him an offer he can’t refuse. Except not like the Godfather, because that would actually be awesome and this isn’t awesome.

So there’s this chick right? She summons a GIANT FUCKING CANNON out of nowhere and then uses it to annihilate a horde of skeletons. They’re pretty shitty skeletons too. They’re all like RAR and she’s like DIVINE BUSTAAAAR!!!!1one except she doesn’t actually say anything and this is the last time we’ll see her this episode because she’ll be ‘rescued’ by the awesome male lead and his fearsome sword skillz.

God these are like what would happen if Fisher Price was to market the monsters from Where The Wild Things Are as toys for five year olds. Amusing side note: when I was a little tyke, Where The Wild Things Are scared the ever-loving god-fearing shit out of me. Especially the one with the huge round eyes. Oh god now I’m not going to get any sleep D:

Sorry, now I’ve gone and terrified myself and I can’t say anything more about this other than that there’s a Miko with a wrist-mounted magical crossbow, and a generic chick who likes to sleepwalk and has a bracelet that likes to collect random gems which I’m sure in episode two will be revealed to be the collection requirement to fulfill the usual fantasy EPIC PERSONAL QUEST.

I forgot to mention that there’s this floaty chick with eyes that burn with an evil yellow fire. I don’t know but I think she might be evil. You heard it first here.

Mokke

At a glance: The bastard lovechild of Mushishi and Totoro.

Going into this I had absolutely no idea what it was about. I still don’t really know yet. What I do know is that in quality terms, this is the polar opposite of Night Wizard. Seriously, saying that it’s like a blend of Totoro and Mushishi isn’t that far off. The main characters are a pair of sisters, though they appear to be a few years older than the Totoro duo. They live out in the middle of nowhere with their grandparents.

There’s not really much to say. And unfortunately not much to make fun of either. The soundtrack has a very similar sound to Mushishi at points, and the younger sister is attacked by a wierd shadow-monster thing and her sister has to drive it off. I’d actually say this is pretty good, definitely worth a look. Hope it won’t languish in unsubbed-land forever. Added bonus: Nana Mizuki. Heart.

By the way, the raw I have sucks. I hope it’s just the raw and the actual broadcast doesn’t look this shitty.

Myself; Yourself

At a glance: dude goes back to his childhood town to gather a harem of childhood friends.

The title is pretty Zen, isn’t it? It sounds like something that you’d hear in a mindfuck episode in Evangelion. I AM THE I THAT EXISTS IN YOUR MIND. Don’t worry though! This is a moe harem show, it probably won’t even approach having a plot that complicated.

So anyway, the main character, Sana, used to live in a town. But he left. Generic Harem Anime Flashback That Runs Prior To The Show Starting we are introduced to his friends. They are not important. What matters is that one of them is totally in love with him and she’s learning a violin song for him and she proceeds to play it then stops half way because she hasn’t learned it all and she promises to play him the rest one day. WHAT THE FUCK. You rock up to what appears to be a farewell party for your friend and crush and you put in a half-assed attempt like that? Luckily he’s Super-Nice Anime Male Lead Guy and he doesn’t care.

So, in a remarkable twist of fate, Sana is coming back to his old town. He randomly takes a trip to a shrine and just happens to notice a girl in a miko outfit starting at him. Of course we can instantly tell that it’s Nanaka, the half-assed violinist from the flashback, but the anime male is a surprisingly stupid beast and he totally doesn’t recognise her. He’s like the anime version of Louis Lane (how she doesn’t notice that Clark Kent is Superman when all he does is take off his glasses…) I mean, she hasn’t changed that much. Besides, it’s a well-known rule that if your childhood friend had a crush on you in the flashback, she will have grown up to be smoking hot.

Anyway, he then bumps into Aoi, one of his other childhood friends. By a REMARKABLE COINCIDENCE her parents seem to own the apartment complex that Sana is going to be living in. Anyway, he’s all being all awkward because in the intervening years she’s developed a formidable rack. Meanwhile, I am there feeling the blood fucking drain from my face. Her voice is unchanged from when she was a kid. And by voice, I mean she has the same fucking voice as Azumanga’s Chiyo-chan. Which is to say the highest pitched voice. Ever. That chick must injest helium every morning or something. The more horrifying moment was when I remembered the last time I heard that liquid sugar voice. It was attached to one of the creepy-as-fuck insane twins from Black Lagoon and oh god Sana make sure you lock your fucking door and sleep with the light on D: Also, Aoi has one of the worst cases of verbal diarrhea I’ve ever heard. Seriously, the girl starts talking and DOES. NOT. STOP. High speed and in that goddamn ear-piercing pitch.

Also, Sana gets bitchslapped for being dense as a fucking bag of rocks and possessing about as much subtlety. Anyway, in the greater scheme of things this was actually reasonably watchable. Certainly far more interesting than Da Crapo II and I’m far more likely to bother watching. Three episode test.

Blue Drop

At a glance: Alien girls totally dig chicks.

I can’t say too much that’s bad about this, as I’m going to end up helping to sub it, assuming that Simoun-Fans follows through and decides to sub the show (and it’s looking like that will be the case). Off the bat: this looks really intriguing and I’m seeing a lot of potential. There’s a few things that bug me though.

Firstly, there’s the main character. Aside from being a bit of a bitch and having a pretty dark past, there was something that was really bugging me about her. Something about the way she looked. It was eerily familiar. Then it hit me.

ZOMG. Anyway, while she’s on the way to her new boarding school full of lovely ladies, she spots a lone figure surrounded by seagulls. This is a FATEFUL MEETING as it’s done in matrix-style slo-mo. Now, as a side note, what is it about yuri pairings? There’s always the youthful, exuberant girl who wears her heart on her sleeve paired up with the elegant, reserved bishoujo. Are there any pairings which don’t follow this? I can only think of ones that do.

Anyway, the other revelation that I want to present is the TRUE IDENTITY of the headmaster. Let’s take a look… resonant voice… luxuriant long hair falling to his shoulders in a wave of silky perfection… 80s porno moustache? That’s right, it can only be one man.

YANNI!