I think it’s about time I stopped thinking about all those old series I want to watch, for the simple reason that they’ve all been licensed by now anyway and that means I can’t watch them at Crunchy Roll (sad face). However, because Japan creates roughly 70% of all animated television in the world, there is bound to be a new-ish series out there for me, that would also give me something to follow besides Bleach and Death Note until Naruto resumes. So, I quietly scowered a few anime related blogs and came across a few series that were also available on Crunchy Roll. Let’s see what I thought of them …

D. Gray Man

Episodes Watched: 1-2

This shows SCREAMS Full Metal Alchemist from the get go, but since that was such a brilliant show, this may be as enjoyable as that. For now, it seems that the story concerns Exorcists, a clan or guild of them, who deal with demons known as ‘Akumas’, which are evil paranormal ‘beings’ made by an cleverly named demon known as the ‘Manufacturer’… though, as if to ruin the wit of the name, his true name is the ‘Earl of the Millenium’, which is truthfully quite a good sound bite.

From only two episodes, I am already pretty interested in this series. What looks like the basic premise has already been set out, but I have an itching feeling that there will be plenty of twists just judging by the effort that has gone into the impressive visuals. You always get the feeling that a classy looking anime will have an effective story for that genre.

Gintama

Episodes Watched: 1-2

This shows is certified insane. Some of the stuff in the opening 5 minutes is either cringe-worthy in it’s un-funniness or had me cracking up (the giant white cat gnawing on someone’s head was especially potent).

But seriously, this show can perceived in two ways: firstly, as trying to be too funny, like those kids at school or keep trying to crack different jokes to no avail after the 6th attempt, or as a very funny show, filled with in-jokes about other anime and subtle and sharps gags aplenty. Luckily, I haven’t watch too many ‘humour’ anime, so my view falls under the latter. This is a great show about some freelance samurai, yet set when advanced aliens have invaded Edo-era Japan (I know, I know … ), and basically follows the story of their strange and wonderful clients and the adventures they take. The main character, Gintoki is dressed seriously snazzy and all the dialogue is fantastic written, whether it is funny or not, even though the one-liners delivered by Gintoki are classic ( to a bunch of teenage kids sitting around: “What’s going on? You guys going through puberty?”).

A great find, I just managed to see this under the recent additions on the Crunchy Roll, and at the moment, again from two episodes in, it seems like great fun.

Busou Renkin

Episodes Watched: 1

Two concepts really stood out here: Alchemy and Homonculus. The knowing and critical glance this creates will be vivid in all those that know what I am insinuating, but theres no need to worry, this series is pretty nifty in itself.

In “Busou Renkin”, Homonculus are basically monsters created my alchemy, who inhabit and devour humans, and there are chosen humans who have an ability to combat these creatures, using something called a Kagukane. Guess what: the lead character, Muto, happens to be one of them, though only after a series of unfortunate events. The storyline seems involving enough at the moment, and the characters and dialogue containing the right mixture of laughs, reality and plotline to make 25 minutes I’ve watched highly enjoyable even by ‘first episode’ standards. The powers that the Alchemists have are happily different from what you would expect i.e. FMA-style, and instead favour something more akin to a metiallic Poapei from Houshin Engi. What really stands out here though is the animation. Even on the relative low quality found on streaming anime, you can immediately tell that this stuff is gold dust, and really adds to the already evolving and absorbing story.

Hmm…

Seems I’ve got three anime series to follow now, on top of Bleach and Death Note. Unfortunately, I neither have the time to do this, nor the brain capacity at the moment, so I think I’ll follow …

Busou Renkin. Maybe it’s because I’m a lightweight for alchemy related series, or the fact that it’s slightly better animated and mature than D. Gray Man, but this will be the one I’m following from today. Just got 15 episodes to catch up with now!

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 23rd, 2007 at 12:29 am and is filed under Anime. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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