Nobunaga The Fool

Nobunaga The Fool is a new anime just released this January.  It features a cast of some interesting characters.  Jenne Kaguya d'Arc and Leonardo Da Vinci meet on one planet to meet their destinies on another planet.  Their fates lead them to an interesting young man and his comrades,  Oda Nobunaga (nicknamed 'the fool'), Akechi Mitsuhide and Toyotomi Hideyoshi.

This anime is an interesting mashup of modern and ancient technologies.  The characters also share an interesting fusion of old and new world ideologies.  However, since the characters worlds are unique, all the ideas fit together nicely and their world doesn't feel awkward.

However, will this Noble's son, Nobunaga, be able to bring peace to this feuding world?  And with two worlds full of political alliances and war, will he have an honest chance at falling in love?

For more information about this anime, click here:

Murder Princess - マーダー·プリンセス

Murder Princess is a short 6 episode anime about a country that experiences a coup de tas.  During this event the rulings families princess escapes and literally falls into another strange adventure which changes not only her life, but the fate of her entire country. 

Artistically, there are some really great character designs in this story, which are super fun.  I believe the story could have been fleshed out more, but for such a short series I think the director did fairly well.
 I give Murder Princess a 3.5 out of 5.

For more information about this anime, click here.

Pale Cocoon - ペイル・コクーン

Pale Cocoon is an eerie short anime consisting of only one episode.  It takes place in a modern era after the world has died.  Many people have given up the hope of seeing such beautiful, colorful things the world had to offer.  Until one day...  

Pale Cocoon's anime style and coloring is really well executed and is very beautiful.  Although it's story is short, it's so well executed that it's complete and leaves you yearning to know more.  It's not surprising to find out that it won the 'Best Screenplay' award at the Sapporo International Short Film Festival.

For more information about this anime, click here:

Date A Live - デート・ア・ライブ - Dēto A Raibu

Date A Live is just now heading into it's second season.  The story follows a young man, Shido Itsuka, and his sister, Kotori Itsuka, as they try to save a group of young women who have immense power capable of destroying the world itself. 

The character designs are really well thought out and the coloring compliments the designs well.  The artwork and FX is consistent throughout the anime. The story line is still vague, but we will have to see how it develops in the second season.

I give Date A Live a 3.5 out of 5 at this time.

For more information about this anime, click here:

Infinite Stratos

Infinite Stratos is another high school girl themed anime.  However, the angle of this one is slightly different because all of these international high school girls are considered to be 'elites'.  This gives them the opportunity to use a type of 'mech' called IS or Infinite Stratos.  Other than the robot fighting scenes though, this is a romance themed anime.  All the girls have a huge crush on the only male student to attend the academy and mini battles erupt in an attempt to win his attention.

The artwork is slightly better than your average anime and some of the IS silhouettes are interesting, but nothing ground-breaking.  The story and character development is also good but again, nothing that stands out.  IS is just a fun watch that might be a good choice if you're looking for an anime to appeal to both genders.  However, the anime does lean more to the girly side.

I give IS a 3.5 out of 5.

For more information on IS please click here.

Moretsu Pirates

Moretsu Pirates is a fun anime that is now heading towards a movie release in Feb. 2014! It features both high school girls and young adults, which is a pretty fun mix up.  The main character is a high schooler that gets thrust into the family business of "pirating" when her estranged father suddenly dies due to food poisoning.

I really liked the mashup between historical pirates and space pirates in everything from the sound effects to their futuristic physics mock ups.  It really bridges the gap between hard to understand space travel/ cyborg clone wars and reality for me.  Which was a surprising benefit to this series.  I personally don't usually like space anime/ gundam war type shows.  They are fun to watch but they always feel cold and far from my reality... a little like space.  Mouretsu Pirates did a really good job bringing those lofty ideas back down to earth.

The art and anime is good, but not stellar.   However, I really liked some of the space suit designs.  They actually looked pretty functional like something modern astronauts or maybe some type of athlete could wear.

The character development was not bad and the story does wrap up nicely by the end, but there are some little threads of story that just begin towards the end of the anime...  I thought that worked really well.  They weren't important enough to the story to be considered a full fledged "loose end" but they definitely opened a door to develop the series.

I give Moretsu Pirates a 4 out of 5.

For more information about Moretsu Pirates, click here:

Blazblue Alter Memory

Blazblue Alter Memory is a strange anime to me.  The story starts by dropping you off in the middle of the story, which is fine.  However, there are a lot of characters with vastly different backgrounds and the explanation as to what they are doing, what their motives for doing it and how they came to be doing it are extremely slow in coming out.  This is a new release, so there are only 8 episodes out thus far, but I'm really hoping that this anime is going to be more that 12 episodes, because I can't see anything important to the story being concluded in only four more episodes.  There are definitely some interesting ideas at work in the story, but right now it seems a little more like a jumbled mess.  I'm really hoping that the concepts can get ironed out so these ideas can start to make an interesting tapestry.

As for artistic development, I find a number of the character silhouettes to be quite strong, as to be expected from an anime developed from a video game.  However, there isn't a lot more that distinguishes the look of this anime.

My fingers are crossed that this anime is going to be longer than 12 episodes and that the story is going to come together.  For now, I'm giving Blazblue Alter Memory a 3 out of 5.

For more information about this anime, click here.

Kyousougiga

Kyousougiga is one of the most strange and inventive anime stories I've seen to date and that is why I absolutely love it. :D  It's story is about a half human, half fox monk who lives by himself in the mountains.  He was driven to live in the mountains, by the other monks of Kyoto, because of his unique ability to create anything by drawing it.  With a little help from buddha, the monk creates an entire new world and his very own family, but no family is without it's problems.  

Like I said, this is a very messed up story that has logic to it so you can follow it, but it's nothing like I have ever seen.  I really have very little understanding of what is actually happening which is great because I can't figure out what what's going to happen next.  All I can do is sit back and enjoy it's strangeness and unique sense of beauty.

I really hope that the story wraps itself up well.  In the mean time, I give the story 4.5 out of 5.

For more information about Kyousougiga, click here:

Galilei Donna

Galilei Donna is an anime about a family which is 'under attack', so to speak, from both the inside and the outside.  The three daughters, all descendants of the Italian inventor Galileo, tend to all excel in vastly different areas of life.  Can these three possibly save their family and possibly the rest of the world?  It's a pretty big problem that maybe, just maybe three young genius women can solve.

One part of the story that stands out to me, that I just have to mention here, is the spaceship that the youngest daughter designs.  It's a giant goldfish that ends up being named Galileo.  I really love the flying fish and it's fun AI.  The artwork, appears pretty standard for recent anime productions but it's not lacking in anyway.

Since I don't know if the story is going to be wrapped up or not by the end of the anime I'm going to give Galilei Donna a 3.5 out of 5 for now. :D  However, I'm hoping that the story will pleasantly surprise me so I can raise it's grade. ;)

I found this Wiki's plot line to be slightly incorrect but you're welcome to see for yourself here:

For more information about Galilei Donna, click here:

Eden of the East

Eden of the East is an anime about creating a better 'Japan'.  It has some strange genre mash-ups but it does tend to all make sense at the end of the story.  It reminds me a little of a cross between James Bond, The Princess Bride and some kind of super AI computer.  Like I said, very strange mash up, but the lead character is so strangely down to earth and strange at the time that he holds the blend together relatively well.

Likewise the art has a little more grungy realism to it's design and I think it's a very good choice for this story.  I think it's subtlety is something that makes it work so well.

I really liked the originality of the story and the fact that I couldn't figure it out in the first three episodes.  I would have liked to have seen some of the extraneous loose ends tied up a little bit better at the end of the story though.  All in all, I think this is a fun anime worth watching and I give it a 4 out of 5.

For more information about this anime, click here:

Akira

Akira is one of Japan's most well known and loved anime.  Originally released in 1988, Akira still holds it's own in its design, illustration, music compositions and rich story line.

All of the characters go through significant development as the story progresses.  The story is also developed enough to carry significant symbolism that are common amongst great literary works but not as common in anime.

The conflicts in Akira are large and affect the characters personally as well as their world.  Every aspect of the story is relevant and well thought out.  It allows the viewers to enter Akira's world with ease but also allows for them to think of the presented ideas in the context of their own life.

It's easy to see why Akira is considered a hallmark of Japanese Anime.  I give Akira 5 stars out of 5.

For more details about Akira, click here.

Shining Hearts -Shiawase No Pan

Shining Hearts - Shiawase No Pan is a fun anime that mixes up the science fiction and fantasy genres.  What makes it more fun is that all of the characters find themselves in a strange land with no memory from whence they came from.  As they struggle to make a new life for themselves they find new friends and meaning.

This anime feels like a small window into a big story.  Although the main story does wrap itself up neatly it obviously needs more seasons to complete it.  The character development is very shallow, largely because the character themselves don't remember who they were.

The artwork is lovely and the designs are very well done, which is to be expected from the game development process.  The colouring and animation is also very well done.  As a side note, I'll also mention that Shining Hearts has a very cute soundtrack.  Their composers did a great job.

The main conflict in the story is really hard to put in context for both the characters and the viewers because no one knows the back story.  Our only clue is the allusion to the idea that there are more episodes to come which will explain everything.

Shining hearts -Shiawase No Pan is very cute but with such limited character and plot development I give it a 2.5 out of 5.

For more details about Shining Hearts, click here.

Mai Otome

Mai Otome originally premiered in 2005 and it features a group of girls and women that with the help of nano machines become superior fighters that keep the peace in their world.

The three central characters do go through a fair amount of development, however, the details of that development are glazed over.

The artwork and animation is clean and complete but some of the design and colour choices feel older in style to me.

The conflicts are both relevant to the story and to young viewers as the story touches on school bullying amongst other things.

Overall, the story at this time feels incomplete to me.  I've read that it was purposely left open ended to allow for more story development.  Although I did enjoy watching Mai Otome, until the story is more complete I give it a 2.5 out of 5.

Cautions: There are a few concepts in this story that could be unsettling for Western viewers, such as the two young teenager girls falling in love with a middle aged man.  Please use discretion before watching this anime.

For more details about Mai Otome, Click here.

The Scrapped Princess

The Scrapped Princess is an interesting story because of it's mash up of genre's.  The story is resolved within it's 24 episodes but the resolution changes the world to such a degree you can't help but wonder a bit about the end of the story.

The main story is very simple.  It's about a young girl and her step brother and sister and their struggle to find a life free from danger.  However, as the story progresses you start to learn that there is so much more to the story that the characters can not even understand or contemplate.

The artwork is a little older with muted colours but the designs are still very good and the animation is very polished.

Not all of the characters develop in the story which I think makes the story just a little flat.  However, a number of the characters within the story do develop to different degrees.

The conflicts are essentially fairly easy to understand but towards the end I feel like both the characters and the viewers are confused to greater and lesser degrees.  It does explain everything in a way that the viewer will understand, but at the same time it's just a tip of the iceberg type of understanding. The explanation suggests a much larger story that is not explained in much detail.

Overall, I give the Scrapped Princess a 3 out of 5.

For more details about the Scrapped Princess, click here.

Attack on Titan - Shingeki No Kyojin

I'm starting with my favorite anime to date, Attack on Titan.  Attack on Titan is definitely NOT for children, so if you have any little ones, be sure to watch this after they have gone to bed.

Attack on Titan is an amazing anime that excels in all areas.  It's artwork, design, storyboards, colouring is all first rate.

The story is also large, complex and often very unpredictable.  What makes it even more interesting is that all of the main characters in the story also don't know what is going on... everyone, including the viewer is racing to find understanding.  However, despite having a large, complex story, at this point in time, the story is extremely complete.  Everything appears to be well thought out and every detail has been accounted for.  Even though many of the ideas are very foreign to us, everything is heavily grounded in a form of realism allowing the viewer to follow along and drawn into the story with ease.

Attack on Titan features a large number of characters, which is to be expected from such a large story.  Their crisscrossing relationships and ideals make this world all the more compelling and complex.  It also begs the question that even if they solve the major issues with the titans, will their world, like our own be any more stable and or safe?

Although the conflict in this story is truly unique, it's also completely relatable.  How do relate to our fellow peers? How do we overcome fear?

Perhaps by watching Attack on Titan, not only are we being entertained, but we can explore the same questions from the safety of our homes.

As this is my favorite anime to date, I  give Attack on Titan a 5 out of 5.
I'm eagerly awaiting season 2.

For more details on Attack On Titan, Click here.