Nopy's Blog

I’m sure you’ve seen a few of these posts around by now, but if you haven’t, du5k from One Minute of Dusk has come up with a blogging carnival with the topic of “What Makes a 10/10 Anime?”

A 10/10 rating can mean a lot of things to a lot of people, but here’s a rundown of how I use the 10 point rating system:

Score of 10: perfect

Score of 9: could’ve improved in at least 1 area

Score of 8: overall great

Score of 7: enjoyable

Score of 6: average

Score of 5: meh

Score of 4: bad

Score of 3: waste of time

Score of 2: caused me to rage

Score of 1: should not exist

What we’re focusing on today is what exactly is “perfect”? I’ve thought about this for a while, and I’ve come up with this short list of what the perfect anime needs:

• decent production values
• likeable characters
• constant attention

Sounds simple, but lets consider each item separately.

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Back in 1997, visual novel producer Leaf released their third visual novel series, To Heart. The title proved to be extremely popular, and two years later on April 2, 1999, the To Heart anime adaptation was aired on Japanese TV. This was the beginning of a brand new genre in anime: the school harem.

While there were already plenty of love triangles in anime, To Heart was the first to introduce 11 different girls in a school setting with which the main character could end up with. The sheer number of girls vying for one guy’s affection and the fact that it all takes place in school was what led to the term “school harem”. The golden age of school harems can be considered as the years from 1999 to the mid-00′s, and ended at the start of the moe boom. Popular school harems include To Heart, To Heart 2, Kanon, Da Capo, Shuffle, and Clannad.

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Everyone goes through the “newbie” phase when they start anything and it can be a very discomforting experience, especially if you’re a newbie to anime. With words such as “kawaii”, “moe”, and “otaku” to name a few, learning the anime lingo can seem just as hard as learning a new language, and that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Unfortunately, there is no comprehensive guide to help you figure out what exactly defines a character as “moe”, why there’s so much hype over some pieces of plastic, or why anime characters have such big eyes. Well, Tsurugiarashix and I aim to change that, but we need some help.

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Last year I decided to rank my top 10 anime girls of 2010 and I am once again ranking the top 10 anime girls of the year, after all, it’s more interesting than the top 10 anime of the year. As before, any character appearing in anime that aired this year are qualified, and they are ranked by how much I liked them (which can factor in anything from cuteness to personality).

10. Inori Yuzuriha (Guilty Crown)

I’ve always liked pink-haired characters, and when I first saw Inori in Megami Magazine, I knew she’d be more than just looks. Not only can Inori sing, she knows how to use a pistol and can take out a pair of guards in a heartbeat.

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Since the end of Mawaru Penguindrum, I’ve seen a lot of people say things along the lines of, “this anime sucked, there was no real story and no explanation whatsoever.” OK, comments may not have been that extreme, but you get the idea. I actually thought that the story was great, and no great story holds your hand through the end. With that said, it’s understandable that there would be some confusion with regards to Mawaru Penguindrum. To try to dispel some of that confusion, I have outlined some of my observations and conclusions here. It is by no means complete and I can’t guarantee it’s what the writer had intended, but it’s how I viewed the series and why I enjoyed it.

I have structured this post so that observations and explanations of small details are listed first. In the conclusion I explain how I viewed the series, and you can just skip to that part if you aren’t interested in the details.

Warning: Do not read further if you have not completed Mawaru Penguindrum (or Revolutionary Girl Utena). The topics that I cover below will spoil the entire series and assumes that you have seen every episode at least once.

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Few anime are as weird or wonderful as Mawaru Penguindrum, just think of the number of series you’ve seen with rockets, teddy bears, a pink stairway, penguins, and a girl in a cool costume all packed into a minute and a half with moe-fied rock music playing in the background.

If that video didn’t give you an idea of what Penguindrum is about, here is the plot summary from MAL:

Three siblings, twins Kanba and Shouma, and the in-and-out-of-the-hospital Himari who’s in poor health, live together at the Takakura home. One day, when the siblings are out on a trip to the aquarium, Himari collapses. The doctors state that nothing can be done for her anymore, but then, a miracle occurs…

The series was written and directed by Kunihiko Ikuhara (creator of Utena), produced by Brains Base, and consists of 24 episodes. Mawaru Penguindrum is one of the most complex anime that I have ever seen. It deals with various themes such as family, revenge, incest, yuri, and most importantly, fate and destiny. Coupled with extensive use of symbolism and metaphor, Penguindrum proves to be a highly abstruse anime for those not familiar with classical literature.

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With Mawaru Penguindrum coming to a close this week, I thought it would be fitting to write a review of Revolutionary Girl Utena. Some of you are probably asking what Revolutionary Girl Utena is and what it has to do with Mawaru Penguindrum. Back in 1997, under director Kunihiko Ikuhara and J.C. Staff, Utena revolutionized the (anime) world, earning several awards in the process for its mind-blowing presentation. Ikuhara did not direct a major project again until he created Mawaru Penguindrum.

In order to discuss Revolutionary Girl Utena, you will need to know what it is about, so here is the plot summary from ANN:

Just after Utena’s parents died she was consoled by a prince who gave her a ring with a rose crest on it. Utena was so impressed by the Prince that she vowed to become one herself one day. A few years later Utena is attending Ohtori Academy where she gives all the teachers headaches because she dresses in a boys uniform so she can be like the prince she met long ago. After Utena’s friend is insulted by a member of the Student Council, Utena fights in a duel for her friends honor. Utena’s rose crest allows her to enter the dueling arena where Utena wins the duel and becomes engaged to the Rose Bride. Unknowingly, Utena is pulled into a series of duels with other members of the Student Council for the possession of the Rose Bride. As she becomes fond of Anthy, the Rose Bride, she must fight to keep her friend safe and to discover the horrifying secret behind Ohtori Academy.

To say that RGU was brilliant is an understatement. Watching the series challenged my ability to not only remember everything I had learned about literature, but to analyze it in detail. The complexity of the series can only be grasped with an understanding of classical Greek plays, Jungian archetypes, and literary techniques such as extended metaphors. I will touch on these topics below.

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Following Kiddtic’s call for submissions of ani-bloggers’ top anime of 2011, I thought it would be a good idea to participate. While it may not be entirely fair to rank anime that haven’t finished airing yet, I think I’ve seen enough of them to make a call. My list will follow the original rules of ranking the top 3 per each season, followed by the best overall.

Winter 2011 (January – March)

3rd Place: Kore wa Zombie Desu ka?

Unlike your typical harem anime, this series not only has a bunch of cute girls, but zombies, masou shoujos, vampire ninjas, necromancers, chainsaws, cross-dressing zombie masou shoujos with chainsaws, and Dyson air multipliers. Ridiculous and funny are the two words that best describe this series.

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There was once a time when the majority of online anime was obtained from XDCC bots in anime channels on IRC. All of that changed when Crunchyroll entered the scene in 2006. I absolutely despised this group back then. With the extraordinary rise of Youtube in a matter of months, Crunchyroll saw an opportunity and tried to duplicate their success. The problem was that they didn’t own any anime, so they got it the way everyone else did, through fansubs. Now, if you were watching anime 10 years ago, you will surely remember 2 disclaimers that were present in nearly every fansubbed anime episode and went along the lines of:

“This is a FREE fansub. If you paid for this, you were ripped off!”

and

“Stop distribution and delete this anime when it becomes licensed in your region.”

This is what old anime looked like.

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One of the interesting things that I’ve noticed about anime from the last several years is how many of them passive-aggresively promote brand name products. What do I mean by passive-aggressive promotion? Just think back to some of the anime that you’ve seen recently that take place in the actual world. I’m sure there’s at least a few scenes of characters eating in a restaurant or using some electronic device. Now, have you ever taken a closer look at the names of those restaurants or the labels on those devices? If you have, you might have noticed that they say things like “Parasonic”, “McDymaid’s”, and “Sudohbucks”, and I’m sure you can make out what real-life brands those are supposed to be.

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