I was looking for something on the various data discs that Root had passed along to me (many in unimaginable multiplicity), and went and rewatched some old anime, and watched some stuff that I never got around to. Here\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a brief summary:<\/p>\n
Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou<\/strong> \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Root has been a fan of Ashinano Hitoshi\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s original manga since it started in the mid nineties. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve never actually read any of it, but after seeing the two old and the two older OAV\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll probably track down the tankoubon at Book Off the next time I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m in Japan. The inevitable comparison is to Amano Kozue\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Aqua\/Aria<\/em> works, both in style and general \u00e2\u20ac\u0153feel\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and pacing. The only thing that bugs me about\u00c2\u00a0the very well-crafted setting is the mysteriously still-functioning infrastructure, like the street lamps that even function in the submerged former Yokosuka and Kamakura alongside traffic signals. I guess somewhere out there, there are still people maintaining these and keeping the powerplants running. I realize these elements are there for sentimental effect, but still\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 The original OAV\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s are great examples of traditional cel animation. Those are definitely worth a watch. The second OAV\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s are marginal in animation quality, and seem to be more of a marketing tie-in. The various characters that appear don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t get enough screen time for any kind of development, so it comes across as a series of cameos.<\/p>\n Momoiro Sisters<\/strong> – Fabio gave me this a gazillion years ago. I originally heard rumors that it was scandalous for its time. Whee. No. Maybe I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m just jaded. The controversy stemmed not from any graphic content, but from some of the frank discussions amongst the characters. I guess back in the 1980\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s nobody wanted to hear that 16-year-old High School girls were thinking about sex and OL\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s plucked their pubes to maintain the perfect V<\/em>. If you are some rabid Momose Tamami fan, you should probably watch this (if you haven\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t already), but otherwise, relegate it to its rightful place in anime history \u00e2\u20ac\u201c so obscure that nobody bothered to machine-translate the Japanese Wikipedia page and slide it over into the English site.<\/p>\n Doujin Work<\/strong> – This has gotten a legit USDM release, so destroy all those fansubs! As an anime, this ends up as a dull refelction of previous otaku-related works like Genshiken<\/em>, or Comic Party<\/em>. The original manga looks much more compelling (if you can manage sitting through yon-koma<\/em> stuff). The characters are supposed to be in college, but look extremely loli<\/em>. The animation quality and general artwork quality are marginal at best.\u00c2\u00a0 Still, if for some reason you were compelled to sit through this whole thing, go marathon Potemayo<\/em> and get that dull taste out of your mouth (or melt your brain \u00e2\u20ac\u201c whichever comes first).\u00c2\u00a0 The only reason to get the USDM release would be to see the\u00c2\u00a0live-action\u00c2\u00a0components that filled the last 10-minutes of the half hour TV spot after each 14-minute episode… that and the dancing bloomers in the end credits.\u00c2\u00a0 Wait for the cheap complete set that is inevitably released if you feel you need this in your collection.<\/p>\n Darker than Black<\/strong> – This is another property that has a recent legit USDM release. The only reason I went back to look for this was because I was rereading Chikyuu Misaki<\/em>, and I remembered that Iwahara Yuuji did the original character concept art for this property. The animation character design was adapted from Iwahara\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s designs by animation director Komori Takahiro, so the characters unfortunately don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t really look like they stepped out of an Iwahara manga. This is not unlike Uon Taraku\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s original character concept designs versus Chiba Takahiro\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s animation character designs for Kamichu!<\/em> – the Kamichu!<\/em> characters don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t look like they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re from the Onegai<\/em> universe. I will probably give this a rent at Collector Maniacs someday.<\/p>\n See what happens when it is too rainy to ride MTB!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I was looking for something on the various data discs that Root had passed along to me (many in unimaginable multiplicity), and went and rewatched some old anime, and watched some stuff that I never got around to. Here\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a brief summary: Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Root has been a fan of Ashinano Hitoshi\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s original […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[3,13],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paJYlx-Hu","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/studionewmedia.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2696"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/studionewmedia.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/studionewmedia.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studionewmedia.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studionewmedia.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2696"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/studionewmedia.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2696\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/studionewmedia.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2696"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studionewmedia.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2696"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studionewmedia.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2696"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}