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ファイト／ステイナイト 
This is a rather light episode, which includes Days 38 and 46 of the manga as well as a storyline that is similar to the one featured in Days 76. Thankfully, despite its filler nature, this episode is an improvement over the last one. It has a lot of comedic moments, most of which come at the expense of Takamizawa. Because of this though, the one character development the writers managed to give to Takamizawa in this episode ends up destroyed at the end of the story. Interestingly enough, just like episode 4, this episode once again shows the darker side of anime/manga fandom. At any rate, it's kind of amusing to see this particular episode using the Midori hand-doll as a base for the story, especially given the fact that said hand-doll is actually on sale in Japan at the moment. Does that make this episode a cross-promotion attempt for the doll or an ironic take on the merchandising part of the series?
I am a bit bored with this series at the moment. The jokes seems to be quite similar from episode to episode and there aren't many development happening to the characters. I supposed this is the same problem I had with Azumanga Daioh. In both cases, I like the characters well enough to keep me watching until the end but there will always be times when I wish that the series has a stronger story that drives each episode. I think this episode is especially problematic because I don't find the short scenarios that the characters are involved in to be that interesting.
More suspense is the order of the day for this series. I actually think that this particular episode looks and feels a lot like one of those suspense/horror films where one wishes that the character didn�t go into a certain room. Maybe I have an overactive imagination but for some reason this particular episode manages to make me aware of how crept out I'd be if something similar actually happened to me. The episode also brings back Detective Lunge (Runge). I think he's actually an interesting character but so far I have no idea if he is supposed to be a clever character or a presumptuous and ego-driven one. So I'm not sure whether I should sympathise or loathe him. Sometimes his actions and mannerism make me think that maybe he'll figure out the whole thing somehow. But the character then disappoint me by looking as if he's obsessed with catching Tenma for the crime that he thinks Tenma has committed.
Now, this is more like it! The show finally moves to a more interesting direction, abandons its so-called 'character development', and focuses more on the mystery that surrounds the two main characters. To be honest though, the revelation is not as shocking as it could have been. Probably because most people already discussed the possibility to death before the series itself moves in towards this direction. At any rate, it's better to be late than to never explore the theme at all. This episode also did a better job in trying to show how life or the world can be 'beautiful' and 'ugly' at the same time. There's simplicity in the 'slice of life' scenes that they show in this episode that makes it work better than the previous episodes. Plus there's a possibility that Mari's creepy obsession for her own cousin may eventually brings Dark Hikari's wrath. I will definitely be on the lookout for that one.
Noooo. I can't believe that they ruined Midori's character development from Days 21 and turned it into this mish mash of a small part of that said chapter, plus an entirely new story and a little bit of dialogue from Days 72. It's bad enough she hasn't got her own episode up until now. But when she finally gets one, this is what she got? I know that the anime writers probably want to incorporate Seiji as often as possible in the series. But the strength of Days 21 is the fact that it is mostly about Midori trying to deal with her shyness on her first school day. I can't believe that they end up making normal-sized Midori acting all cute and noisy in this episode when she's not like that in the manga.
After watching this episode, I doubt that Days 21 will ever be completely incorporated into the anime since some of the dialogues that appear in that chapter have been used in this episode. What is worse is that despite its attempt to inject some humour, this episode is very boring in comparison to the more serious Days 21. The Chibi-Seiji element of this episode has its moments but at the end of the day, it feels repetitive and unnecessary. I think the animator should not attempt to make every episode comedic especially when the original story didn't have many comedy elements in it. And especially not when it is forced and ends up making the episode feels as dry as this one.
After the hectic episode fifteen, these three episodes seem to be comparatively slow and non-eventful. Having said that, it does give the series an opportunity to explain some of the plot points that it has created thus far. I am especially glad to know that the series actually make an effort to explain the perspective of the Peacemakers. Admittedly, their action and reasoning are hard to swallow from our perspective given the fact that we are humans ourselves. Having said that, there are a lot of truths in their arguments and the series does a good job of illustrating this fact throughout the entire series. It's also great to see some of the supporting characters being used efficiently in these episodes. I think in general, the series has done a good job in the development of the characters.
This turns out to be another impressive episode for the series. I feel that the writers have somehow managed to find a way to make each new episode more intense and interesting than the one before it. I do wonder if they can keep it up in the future though, considering that this is supposed to be a 70+ episodes series. But if every episode is as good or at least equally on the same level as this one, I don't think I'll have problem following this series down to the very last one. It's unfortunate that I've never read the manga beforehand or other Naoki Urasawa's work. But right now, I'm really tempted to purchase 20th Century Boys, which according to some people, is even more interesting than Monster.
This episode is still entertaining as the one before it. However, after a while the series does fall into some rather predictable patterns. For example, almost in every episode there will be scenes of Kobayashi being obsessed with her appearances or money, Mika-Sensei becoming the target of Kitagawa's affection, and Kudo trying to make a move on Suetake. Thankfully, so far the writers have managed to create new situations that somehow make the patterns feel less repetitive. But I sometimes wonder if this show wouldn't have been benefited from a stronger storyline than the one it currently presents each week. Oh well, at least the characters are funny enough to carry the series. And even though the humour may seem juvenile at times, it has so far managed to illicit a good amount of laughter out of me.
Thankfully this episode is a bit better than the last one. The supposedly wacky hijinks part of the episode is actually funny unlike the ones that were shown in the previous episodes. Having said that, I still think that so far the series has failed to show me what is 'beautiful' and what is 'ugly' about the world that these characters inhabit. To me the world that the characters inhabit looks very bland and fake. If I compare the 'slice of life' part of this show to the one from another show, I'll say that NieA_7 does a better job in showing how a simple life can be both beautiful and difficult. Oh well, at least there are some intriguing scenes and questions scattered all over this episode. It especially helps that Evil Hikari rears her pretty head again. She is definitely the reason why I watched the show to begin with and why I still keep up with it now.
Well, after almost half a season full of fillers, the main stories start coming out thick and fast in these four episodes. That does not mean that there are no more filler in these episodes. The difference is that the filler is actually used to advance the main plot of the series. I think this is what this series should have done right from the start. Especially since by the look of things, the anime version seems to take a rather different route from the manga. At any rate, these episodes give a rather heavy focus on the relationship between the characters. The writers have also wisely decided to shift all focus of the story into Nina, who becomes more and more interesting with each episode. Unfortunately, this does leave Ayu with not much of a story apart from her relationship with Kaji.
Unfortunately I don't have any comment on this episode that does not in some way includes spoiler, so I think I'll use this space for a little trivial fact. Every time I watch the opening of this show, I can't help but noticing the monorail tracks that are featured in it. I've always liked monorails and I think the use of this method of transportation helps to differentiate the setting of this show from other anime out there. I also noticed that the monorail seems to be a peculiar kind but it's definitely not a futuristic design or anything like that. It's actually a French Safege system type of monorail. So, I decided to google the term to see if there is such monorail in Japan.
The search yields two places that have similar monorail to the one on the show. The first is the Shonan monorail while the other is the Chiba City monorail. The Shonan monorail runs from the Ofuna rail station to the coastal area of Enoshima, which is 20km from Tokyo. The Chiba monorail connects the suburbs in Chiba prefecture to the downtown main rail station. Between the two, I think the one in Chiba prefecture is closer to the design of the monorail in the series, especially with its dual beam design. Anyway, if you're interested, you should check out the official site of Shonan monorail and Chiba monorail.
This episode feels a bit jarring to me mostly because I'm not very sure how some parts of the story go from point A to point B. Admittedly, this kind of story telling gives the show a rather mysterious atmosphere towards it. This, however, requires the audiences to develop a good amount of attention and patience while watching the show because sometimes the answer will be revealed at a point where the audiences don't expect it the most. At any rate, I really like the fact that the show doesn't use the standard villain character that other shows normally use. The villain in this show is not the usual ugly looking, come from the lower social economic background type of character but rather a good-looking, well-mannered type of person. The motivation of the said villain in committing some of the crimes is also quite interesting. Although this episode mentions one possible answer for the killing, there seems to be another reason for this character to commit at least 4 murders throughout Germany.
There are so many game news this week thanks to E3. So I thought I'll summarise some that I'm interested in. The first one will have to be the release of a new trailer for Resident Evil 4. This trailer shows more game footage of Leon getting caught up in different perilous situations. The trailer gives the impression that the villagers are infected with some kind of 'disease' that turns them into this 'controlled puppets'. They are still alive and definitely show traces of intelligence. Some of them will duck or evade your gunshot, some will try to use your colleague (the president's daughter) as a shield, and the others will come up with ways to capture you either alive or dead.
Dear Gainax,
In case you guys haven't realised it yet, you have spent half of this series' episodes mostly on fan service and only a small portion on the actual plot. Now, maybe this series doesn't have that many stories to tell, to the point that the plot has to be stretched thin so that it'll last until episode 12. Or maybe it's because the series has been green lighted for more episodes and therefore you can develop the story at a more leisurely pace. But at any rate, I'm begging you to actually give the story more priority. This episode is as bad as episode 2 in the sense that it doesn't tell me anything much. Something is definitely wrong when the plot is given less time than the trivial matters within the episode. I really think this series has a lot of potential and I'm disappointed to see that so far none of it has materialised.
Yours, sincerely
My friend just forwarded me a rather creepy gameplay test (WMV, 2.6 MB) of Silent Hill 4. It looks like the new game's storyline relies heavily on the use of a paranormal hole that is used by the main character, Henry Townsend, to get himself out of his cursed apartment. Unfortunately, the hole first transports him into various alternate worlds which are filled with freaks of nature. Judging from the gameplay test, it looks like this game will be quite action-oriented.
In addition to Henry, there are also 2 female characters who Henry will encounter throughout the game. The first one is Eileen Gavin and the other is Cynthia Velasquez. Eileen seems to be Henry's next door neighbour who lives in room 303 (Henry's room is 302) while Cynthia seems to be a cipher-type of character similar to Maria in Silent Hill 2. The game will be released to the Japanese public on the 17th of June this year and I can't wait to see what gamers think about it.
I just found out that for the time being, Midori no Hibi will only be a 13-episodes series. If this turns out to be true, then I can understand why there have been major attempts to cover as many manga chapters as possible ever since the first episode. This episode does not exempt from the attempt either, although thankfully, they have done some minor editing to make the episode flows better. If I remember correctly, I think this episode combines the beginning of days 8, while modifying the story in days 19 and 27 to make the story shorter. But unfortunately, the episode also features Shiori in many scenes. The problem is, she's one of the less interesting supporting characters in the series and quite an annoying brat to boot. Thus, she ends up making the episode a bit grating at times. I'm also surprised that they still haven't given Kouta an episode considering that he is more important to the plot of the series and that he's a funnier character as well.
It looks like my theory about Katsuya's motivation is completely wrong. I still think he's a bit 'off' somehow, but it seems the only 'secret' he possibly kept from Kyoko is simply a matter of his own health. This bothers me a little bit because the entire Katsuya and Kyoko story ends up not being any different from what Tohru said before in the earlier chapters. It feels as if the manga is being stretched out thin when there is no need to do so. Oh well, at the very least, this story will provide some insight into Kyoko's struggle in rising Tohru on her own. But if there is something that I really want to see coming out of this mini-plot is the knowledge on how Kyoko gets to know Kyou Sohma when he was a little kid. From what I've read so far, it looks like Kyou knew her for quite a while so I wonder if she also knew the other Sohma family members.
I never thought it is possible, but the mood of the series has gone from dark to darker. At one point during the show, I tried to imagine what it feels like to live in a place like Luchs but quickly realised that this is not such a pleasant thought to have. The city looks like the pit of hell, where never-ending misery and madness happen over and over again to the characters. What is worse is the fact that inevitably, the characters are slowly begin to change for the worse due to the unfortunate circumstances that happen to them. Because of this, it's really hard for me to sympathise with any characters in the series except for Ichise and Ran. It is rather depressing, therefore, to also see these two slowly unravelling and changing possibly not for the better either.
Well, this episode is not as funny as the last two episodes but it still has some laugh out moments. The limitation of the animation also starts to become a bit noticeable in this episode. There are instances where the voice acting sounds really good but unfortunately it's not matched with an equally good animation. For example, there is a scene where Matsumoto-Sensei screams in shock when Mika-Sensei ends up drowning in a pool. The delivery of the Japanese voice actress is spot-on hilarious. Unfortunately, the expression on Matsumoto-Sensei's face is not as funny as the way the way the voice sounds. As a result, what could have been a really funny scene is somewhat neutered due to the limited animation. Having said that, this is still an entertaining series and I'm glad to see that it continues on providing theme-based storylines as opposed to presenting random scenes that are thrown together into one episode.
Well, it looks like the series is a bit better this time around. I actually get the feeling that the plot starts to move a little bit. It also has the same amount of philosophical discussion as the last two episodes although it feels a bit preachy this time around. I do think that Hikari has become slightly more interesting now that it is implied that there are two personalities which co-exist together within her body. So it's a bit more complicated than if she's simply an evil entity who puts on an innocent mask. I am also glad to know that the comedy elements have been toned down a little bit. Never the less, I still feel that the remaining comedic elements feel misplaced somehow. It looks like the series tries to be funny and sinister at the same time but failed to pull off the right balance between the two.
This is probably the first episode that I don't like thus far. I think the episode feels busy and convoluted due to the amount of manga chapters that are included in it. The '3 manga chapters per episode' format worked quite well back in episode 2 and 4 because there weren't many sub-plots or characters inside the chapters used by those episodes. On the other hand, chapter 7, 9, and 16 of the manga are some of the most hectic chapters in the series. As a result, the combination of these three manga chapters makes the episode feels convoluted and all over the place. It also doesn't help that they tried to insert additional mini-plots involving Ayase and Takamizawa into the episode. I am also disappointed that the emotional scenes in chapter 7 and 9 of the manga end up looking less important in the anime because there are too many plots that they need to cover in this episode.
Yeah, I know I'm cramming it all into one entry but there is no other way for me to catch up with this series unless I do so. And besides, I think I'll be frustrated by the tension that this series create during episode 2-3 if I hadn't watch the fourth episode right away. Anyway, tension aside, I've been very impressed with the show in general. The series has done a good job of showing human's propensity to become 'Monsters' and emphasising the importance of our words and our decisions. As these episodes demonstrate, humans can easily hurt other humans just by uttering a few words or by making a simple decision that affects others. And in some ways, even the good-hearted Dr.Tenma is not exempt from this flaw.
