AWESOME ENGINE » Hate Fun?

HATE FUN 2003! Chrno Crusade

Brack — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 10:00:00 +0000

STANDARD ANIME.

It’s the sort of uninspired, inoffensive middle ground stuff that filled ADVs catalogue for much of the 00s.

HATE FUN 2003! Bobobo-bo Bo-bobo

Brack — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 06:00:00 +0000

Fantastically odd manga gets a fantastically odd anime, which then gets a just plain odd English adaptation. In that they didn’t bother doing things like they normally do, like translating the opening credits. I have the feeling that for kids who grew up watching this in the US & UK, Bobobo-bo Bo-bobo will be their Samurai Pizza Cats (except truer to the source material).

HATE FUN 2003! Twin Spica

Brack — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 04:00:00 +0000

Yet more down to earth science fiction about space flight. What was in the water in 2003 that caused this trend?

HATE FUN 2003! Uninhabited Planet Survive

Brack — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 02:00:00 +0000

Another show that had it come out in the 80s would likely have got some European co-production money behind it and would have aired on the BBC. Classy Madhouse/Telecom co-production for NHK about a school field trip that goes badly wrong, leaving a group school children stuck on an uninhabited planet. One of those shows that there is an audience for, but it’s a TV audience rather than a DVD audience. And I’m certain US TV execs aren’t seeing this as being the sort of thing kids would watch (even though they probably would). If Erin is a success on Crunchyroll, it might be worth looking at similar NHK shows from the last ten years like this for streaming too.

HATE FUN 2003! R.O.D. – The TV

Brack — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 23:59:00 +0000

The first 13 episodes are a great TV show, and achieves the “Shoujo for boys” idea that was being bandied around at the time. It switches between being essentially a shoujo story show set in school and the British telefantasy & 80/90’s Hong Kong movie-inspired action of the Read or Die OAV. Episodes like They Shout and In A Grove could have had their plots ripped out of The Avengers and are all the better for it.

Those 13 episodes end on a superb rescue sequence and had it stopped there we’d probably be talking about it as being one of the great series of the decade.

However then the fans of the OAV and light novels got what they had been complaining about being missing from the those 13 episodes and, possibly coincidentally, the whole production went to hell. As broadcast those final 13 episodes were just a mess. While the production problems were fixed for DVD release, the writing, which had been exceptional up to then, was in just as much a mess as the animation, bogged down in exposition and characters on the run for much the time.

An ambiguous final scene (was that dog supposed to represent a Churchillian depression or a creature like Black Shuck?) suggested more was to come, but given the loose continuity between the various ROD projects I’m not sure if they were hoping for a follow up anime or if it was picked up in the light novels.

HATE FUN 2003! Gilgamesh

Brack — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 22:00:00 +0000

A show I certainly avoided due to its character design and general look. Having now read that it was based on an Shotaro Ishinomori manga my interest is piqued a little, but I still think that had it looked more like Ishinomori’s art (below) I’d have been all over this like a rash.

HATE FUN 2003! Gunslinger Girl

Brack — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 20:00:00 +0000

Creepy show about turning little girls into hitmen. The idea is a sound one, and while it should be creepy, it is creepy more due to the mishandling of the concept than something they are going for deliberately. Notable, at least for me, for having a theme tune by Scottish Indie Overlords, The Delgados.

HATE FUN 2003! F-Zero Falcon Densetsu

Brack — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 18:00:00 +0000

Not exactly sure why 2003 needed an F-Zero anime, but you got it anyway.

HATE FUN 2003! Gungrave

Brack — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 23:59:00 +0000

Boring prequel to the videogame. In yet another mind boggling stupid design idea, rather than use the character designs and mecha designs created by Yasuhiro Nightow (Trigun) and Kousuke Fujishima (Ah My Goddess), they decided to go with the guys who’d go on to do Black Lagoon. Now they’re perfectly fine designers, but the look of the anime, once it starts to deal with the prequel aspect, is a real disconnect to what was arguably the strongest element of the game.

HATE FUN 2003! Ai Yori Aoshi Enishi

Brack — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 22:00:00 +0000

More of this now forgotten nonsense.

HATE FUN 2003! Planetes

Brack — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 20:32:36 +0000

Probably the ultimate in 2003’s trend of the everyday tales of space folk, Planetes is about a team responsible for the recovery of space debris around Earth. I’ve only seen the episodes on the first disc, and I probably should get around to watching the rest at some point as I did enjoy what I saw.

HATE FUN 2003! Saiyuki Reload

Brack — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 12:00:00 +0000

More Saiyuki.

HATE FUN 2003! Avenger

Brack — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 10:00:00 +0000

Another Bee Train snoozathon. Do not let the fun fight animation in the OP fool you, this is as ponderous as anything else Koichi Mashimo directed this decade.

HATE FUN 2003! Bottle Fairy

Brack — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 08:00:00 +0000

Fairies learning to be humans. Cute for cute’s sake I’m guessing.

HATE FUN 2003! Battle Programmer Shirase

Brack — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 06:00:00 +0000

A friend who will remain nameless, once put a random episode of this on from a pile of random anime episodes she’d been sent. We didn’t make it through an entire episode before we decided the underage fanservice was just far too creepy to continue with. And I still hated Rizelmine more than this.

HATE FUN 2003! Fullmetal Alchemist

Brack — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 04:00:00 +0000

This thing.

Not a bad show by any means, but everything good about the story, it took from the manga, and everything bad, it added itself. Which meant it peaked halfway through the series.

So what’s good? The characters that came straight from the manga all stay strong even when put through events that are unique to the anime and, outside some animation set pieces, that’s the strongest element of the show. Also there’s two tragic events taken straight out the manga that happen in the first half that really hook you into the series.

What hurts it I think are two significant differences to the manga. The first is the change in the way alchemy works, specifically in relation to the homunculi. In the manga, alchemy feels like it’s had the same origins and development as it had in the real world, enhancing FMA’s world as being an alternate version of our history. Changing that really hurt the world building in my eyes. It took it too far from being a pseudo-science and into magic.

The second difference is related to that, but it’s more specific. It’s the character of Wrath in the anime. He is the Scrappy Doo of FMA. He’s supposed to be this tragic, important figure, but he is just annoying. I can barely remember any of the second half of the series as my main memory of watching it is being annoyed at Wrath.

He annoyed me to the point that I’m probably one of the few people who actually thought the movie was an improvement on the ending the TV series had, as Wrath barely played a part in it.

They’re currently airing an adaptation that is truer to the manga, though I’ve not seen more than the first episode as yet, so can’t really compare the two.

HATE FUN 2003! Godannar

Brack — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 02:00:00 +0000

While it may be overly knowing in its execution, it’s clearly a labour of love on the part of Yasuchika Nagaoka and crew, and that shows through. And what it loves is giant robots and busty women. And busty giant robots.

It has its tongue in its cheek, most obviously in the taking the obvious sexual metaphor of combining robots and hitting you over the head with it, but at the same time it’s not mocking super robots. More an OTT homage than a spoof of the genre. And it may be the only show that had had to put out a dojin in order to get funds to finish the story.

HATE FUN 2003! Ikkitousen

Brack — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 23:59:00 +0000

It’s Romance of The Three Kingdoms in high school. With some of the genders swapped. At this point it’s probably not a surprise that this isn’t the only anime in the last 10 years that is the Romance of the Three Kingdoms with genders swapped.

Slayers’ Takashi Watanabe directs this adaptation Yuji Shiozaki’s manga, and to be fair to Watanabe the weakness lies mainly in the source material, which not only relies on titillation as a crutch but is also derivative of other manga like Tenjo Tenge.

Future series would be handled by the man that gave us MD Geist – Koichi Ohata. And more notably, ARMS rather than JC Staff on production. ARMS’ history in high-end pornographic animation (Another Lady Innocent, Mezzo Forte) makes them a much better fit for this sort of titillating material (though not to say they didn’t get some odd mismatched projects too – more on that later).

HATE FUN 2003! Cromartie High School

Brack — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 22:00:00 +0000

Hiroaki Sakurai (Digi Charat) adapts Eiji Nonaka’s absurd high school manga in a pretty effective series. Personally I find Sakurai’s delivery of jokes a little slow, something Digi Charat suffered from too, and I think Akitaro Daichi would have made a better series for my tastes. That being said, comedy is subjective, and I still found it pretty funny and some episodes are classics. The Ningen Nante episode for example.

HATE FUN 2003! Full Metal Panic Fumoffu

Brack — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 12:00:00 +0000

Something I actually liked.

The Full Metal Panic franchise is taken from Gonzo’s hands and passed to some Kyoto Animation, with this their first production of their own. Stripping the drama from the Full Metal Panic world, you are left with a clever variation on the so called magical girlfriend genre popularised by Urusei Yatsura. A military boyfriend show if you will.

In much the same way that Lum doesn’t understand human culture and uses alien technology in a way that disturbs the lifestyle of the humans around here, a similar culture clash occurs with child soldier Sousuke Sagara’s interaction with the students of Jindai High.

For something that’s been done to death for decades, it was impressive to see a new twist, and I think it works much better stripped of the more serious baggage of the FMP story proper.

HATE FUN 2003! Please Twins!

Brack — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 10:00:00 +0000

Spin-off from Please Teacher! This time: incest!

Again, I know a lot of people liked this and again I had zero interest.

HATE FUN 2003! Shadow Star Narutaru

Brack — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 08:00:00 +0000

This anime adaptation of Mohiro Kitoh’s manga was a lot of English speaking people’s first exposure to Kitoh’s somewhat bleak world view. Deliberately, deceptively cute this is a stronger adaptation in terms of writing to the later adaptation of Bokurano: Ours, probably in part due to Chiaki J. Konata’s presence on staff. Visually though, it wasn’t particularly gripping. While true to Kitoh’s visuals, it just felt a little flat to me. At least in the episodes I saw.

HATE FUN 2003! Tsukihime

Brack — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 06:00:00 +0000

Oh for crying out loud! Another flipping erogame adaptation. And another one that people REALLY love. It’s something to do with vampires and very dull character designs I think.

HATE FUN 2003! Rumbling Hearts

Brack — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 04:00:00 +0000

Will it ever stop? (SPOILER: NO) It’s another watered down erogame adaptation. This time dealing the sexy world of post traumatic stress disorder. Seriously. This was beloved at the time, and generally well received. By people I know, no less.

But you know what? There’s a word for people who like this sort of cartoon. THE ENEMY.

HATE FUN 2003! Yami to Boushi to Hon no Tabibito

Brack — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 02:00:00 +0000

Yes. Another erogame adaptation with the ero taken out, this one is apparently about lesbian witches.

HATE FUN 2003! Popotan

Brack — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 23:59:00 +0000

Yes. More erogame adaptation hell.

This time you had the nudity, but not the sex. Which is probably for the best, given the age of one of the protagonists. Unsurprisingly, that auteur of moe, Shinichiro Kimura is on hand to direct and SHAFT provide their usual slick visuals. It’s tripe, but it’s polished tripe.

Of course the actual legacy of the Popotan property is that a loop of a section of the game’s opening animation was used in the Caramelldansen meme.

HATE FUN 2003! Da Capo

Brack — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 22:00:00 +0000

More erogame adaptation nonsense. This is pretty much straight up homeopathic porn, having had the tell tale watered down console versions as well as the TV anime. Apparently this one involves girls and a magic tree.

HATE FUN 2003! Green Green

Brack — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 20:00:00 +0000

I remember the otaku crowd loving this at the time. While it’s another erogame watered down for TV, I think it avoids an accusation of being homeopathic porn because it’s not under any pretence that it’s anything other than about ogling cartoon girls, whereas something like Comic Party clearly thought that its story was the main attraction.

You only have to look at that opening sequence to see what’s at the forefront of the creators’ minds and wikipedia tells me they eventually put out an unaired TV episode that contained actual sexual content, rather than Carry On film level smut. Which may make it the most honest of the torrent of erogame adaptations we’re about to get to…

HATE FUN 2003! Rumiko Takahashi Anthology

Brack — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 18:00:00 +0000

Another show that languishes out of print on R1 DVD, though I think you can find the individual R1 discs pretty cheap (the boxset is another matter). I’ve only seen the first episode, the one about having to look after a penguin, and while it was pleasant enough, there wasn’t really anything that suggested it needed to be animated.

HATE FUN 2003! Divergence EVE

Brack — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 16:00:00 +0000

Just as Satoru Akahori had done with Mouse, his occasional collaborator Hiroshi Negishi brings what was already looking like a 90s throwback approach to anime with this tale of angular, busty women shooting things in space.

HATE FUN 2003! Dokkoida?!

Brack — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 14:21:10 +0000

Smart, fun comedy from the once promising ufotable studio. Though looking back now, I think it was just the manga they were adapting and the fact they had Jun Shibata working for them that was their appeal.

Impoverished university student Suzuo Sakurazaki gets a part time job as a field tester for a toy company. Unfortunately the toy company is from outer space, and he’ll be testing a power suit. And unbeknownst to him, he’ll be sharing an apartment building with the field tester for a rival company AND a collection of super villains. Comedy ensues. There’s an element of satire running through it, as well as a degree of sadness (all the villains have a tint of tragedy to them), but the series has a big enough heart that never seems exceptionally mean or dwells in melancholy.

And what points it loses in using the well worn “alien can’t cook human food gag”, it makes up for having a character look like dog-eared, disturbing 70s puppet Hartley Hare.

One thing I really liked about this show was the ED animation, which reminded me a little of how the old Paddington Bear cartoon used to look:

HATE FUN 2003! Happy Lesson Advance

Brack — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 14:00:00 +0000

More teacher/mother fetish in this Happy Lesson sequel.

HATE FUN 2003! Saint Beast

Brack — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 02:00:00 +0000

Well, this is a bit odd in terms of it’s genesis. It’s a spin-off from a harem show (Angel Tales). Which isn’t that surprising, except this is a bishounen themed show aimed at girls. The characters maintained their popularity enough through mixed media to spawn a TV anime sequel years later.

HATE FUN 2003! Cinderella Boy

Brack — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 23:59:00 +0000

Early 80s Monkey Punch manga gets the anime adaptation that no one asked for. I enjoyed it, mainly because it’s Monkey Punch and there were Rockford Files references. It tells the tale of detectives Ranma and Rella who after dying in an accident, mysteriously find themselves sharing the same body (though they aren’t aware of that at first). They switch between Ranma and Rella at midnight (hence the Cinderella reference) and the central gag is that each will find themselves transforming in the middle of the others case and have to solve them from scratch.

HATE FUN 2003! Ultra Maniac

Brack — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 22:00:00 +0000

Has there ever been such a gulf between title and actual content?

Another twist on the magical girl genre, specifically the traditional girl from magic kingdom comes Earth variant. Adapted from Wataru Yoshizumi’s manga, its unique selling point is that the magical girl isn’t the lead, instead her best friend takes that role.

HATE FUN 2003! Submarine Super 99

Brack — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 20:00:00 +0000

Your recommended dose of Matsumoto.

The Japanese save the world from an underwater empire using, of course, WW2 era technology (the 99 of the title refers to not just the titular submarine but also the Type 99 rifle). Compare the now near cookie cutter Matsumoto visuals of the anime to the original 1970-72 manga:

Obviously the Matsumoto look is pretty much a brand in itself, but I can’t help this would be a lot more fun if the show was in that looser style.

HATE FUN 2003! Texhnolyze

Brack — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 18:29:01 +0000

I think the weight of expectation killed this show for me fairly quickly, I watched the first episode with a degree of excitement, probably wanting my world to be shaken the same way Lain had done. It wasn’t and I didn’t watch any more of this. Maybe I should give it another chance, but there’s plenty of other shows that I’d like to watch first.

HATE FUN 2003! Gad Guard

Brack — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 06:00:00 +0000

Quirky mecha show that I feel that I should have liked more than I did. I probably should revisit it some time given how many animators I like worked on it in one form or another. Does it hold up, or is it another Gonzo fizzle out situation?

HATE FUN 2003! Tantei Gakuen Q

Brack — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 04:00:00 +0000

More detectives? Really? Did you think you stood a chance against Detective Conan? That’s HIS genre now, so you better bring something better than a school for detectives.

What’s that? You did pretty well in the ratings and you got a live-action adaptation too. Oh well, maybe a school for detectives was a decent idea after all.

HATE FUN 2003! Ninja Scroll TV

Brack — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 02:00:00 +0000

OTAKU PASS REVOKED! PART TWO!

I’ve never seen the original Ninja Scroll anime.

But I have seen some of this somewhat silly TV follow up.

I’m sure that must be against the law in the UK.

HATE FUN 2003! Scrapped Princess

Brack — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 23:59:00 +0000

More bagpipes!?!

Based on a light novel that is probably most noted for the involvement of noted Rei Ayanami “enthusiast” Mogudan, this Bones anime seemed to me at the time as being a pretty bog-standard fantasy. Having now read the plot twist on wikipedia, there might be more to it than I gave credit for. Even if that twist has kinda been done before, including earlier in 2003.

HATE FUN 2003! Kino’s Journey

Brack — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 22:00:00 +0000

Can’t find an opening video so make do with a trailer:

Good grief that VOICE OVER OF IMPORT totally made me want to avoid this even more than I did before. I know people love this, and again, it’s a show that I’m sure I’d have loved 10 years ago, but if I wanted to watch something about a traveller discovering episodic tales about human nature, I’d watch Galaxy Express 999.

And if I wanted something with a talking motorcycle I’d watch this:

HATE FUN 2003! Last Exile

Brack — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 20:00:00 +0000

I believe it was the point at which the annoying moppet they had to protect showed up that my interest for this show got up and ran out the door. Which was a shame, as I was enjoying it up to then.

HATE FUN 2003! Di Gi Charat Nyo

Brack — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 19:07:48 +0000

Are you sick of Di Gi Charat yet? A complete reboot this time, with all the sharp edges now pretty much removed from the franchise. Lasted a year and then Japan’s brief love affair with the alien cat girl had ended.

Or Brocolli/Gamers had run out of money to fund these vanity projects.

Probably the latter.

There was one more OAV in 2006 and that was that for Di Gi Charat’s anime career. Well apart from the occasional cameo…

HATE FUN 2003! Dear Boys

Brack — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 06:00:00 +0000

Given that it preceded Slam Dunk, it’s odd this similarly long running basketball manga full of pretty boys took so long to come to the cartoons. Apparently this is the Initial D of basketball anime, being made by the same production house, similarly low budget and full of Eurobeat. It was released in the US as Hoop Days.

HATE FUN 2003! FireStorm

Brack — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 03:00:00 +0000

Sadly not the anime spin-off of the Harrison Ford film where he jumped out of the plane and was shooting back up at them while he was falling. No, this was the anime based on a concept by Gerry Anderson (yes, the puppet man) and John Needham.

Unsurprisingly it focuses on a team of do-gooders who have a load of neat vehicles. Also unsurprisingly, it’s not very good. I saw the first boring episode, lent a few episodes to a workmate who was heavily into his Anderson, and while he found it interesting, it was a more as a curiosity than anything he wanted to follow.

Maybe they should have made an anime version of Rochelle, Rochelle instead.

HATE FUN 2003! Sonic X

Brack — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 23:59:00 +0000

I’ve not played a Sonic game since Sonic 2. I have no idea who all these other anthropomorphic animals are supposed to be. And where’s Scratch and Grounder? And Coconuts for that matter?

HATE FUN 2003! Croket!

Brack — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 22:14:41 +0000

Curiously Viz have an English language page for this kids adventure show, but don’t appear to have done anything in the way of releasing it. Can anyone shed any light on that? And are there other series in a similar situation?

HATE FUN 2003! Astro Boy

Brack — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 21:21:20 +0000

The 2003 version of anime’s favourite robot son. Naturally this featured on TV Asahi’s 2005 Top 100 anime and I wrote about it over here.

HATE FUN 2003! Zatch Bell!

Brack — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 23:59:00 +0000

I wrote all about this here. But that’s a really vague entry in that Top 100 anime series of posts, so here’s some more.

Looking at the crew, there was a bunch of talented people who passed through the project, and I’ve seen plenty of clips crop up in various key animator clip videos, most notably that of Takaaki Yamashita who frequently collaborates with Mamoru Hosoda. The look of the show is down to Ken Ootsuka, who also shows up on Hosoda projects. Takuya Igarashi (Soul Eater) directed the second movie.

If I had the time I’d go through the 1998-2003 Toei shows and see where various staff ended up, because I think they’ve produced some strong talent and continue to do so. Obviously not everyone is gold, but I think the fact I’m seeing about one One Piece episode a month now that amazes me (normally Naoki Tate’s eps), tells me they’re doing something right.

HATE FUN 2003! Wandaba Style

Brack — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 22:00:00 +0000

Another space flight show? What was up with 2003 and rocket science?

This is wacky moe rocket science. I caught a couple of episodes at the proto-Amecon thing at Leicester University (unsurprising given that their anime society seems to be controlled by some sort of rocket science mafia) and recall laughing. The gag is that a pop group of 4 singers of diverse styles are going to be sent to the moon by a 13 year old boy genius. And that it fails each episode. I recall finding the dippy folk singer character amusing, and the over excitable manager, but nothing else sticks in the memory.

HATE FUN 2003! Mermaid Melody Pichi Pichi Pitch

Brack — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 20:00:00 +0000

Magical Mermaid Show. For some reason I though it came out later than this. Created by the prolific anime screenwriter Michiko Yokote. One of Kazunori Ito’s disciples she broke in on Patlabor and wrote a number of the Patlabor novels. In this decade she started working as Head Screen Writer on a variety of shows, just from this year you’ve got her on this, Airmaster and Haré+Guu. I think her best work is when she’s working with Haré+Guu’s Tsutomu Mizushima. Or rather his best work is when he’s working with her. But more on that later.

HATE FUN 2003! The Mythical Detective Loki Ragnarok

Brack — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 18:00:00 +0000

Not very good Detective Conan-a-like, this time the spin is that it’s occult investigations. And when I say not very good, I just mean mediocre. That’s the thing that really strikes me is that considering the sheer amount of anime produced in the last 10 years, very little is truly dire or utterly inept across the board. There’s just this low level hum of the uninspired and unambitious.

HATE FUN 2003! Tank Knights Portriss

Brack — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 09:00:00 +0000

Japan/South Korea co-production with weird cannon nosed designs. Apparently there is a popular online game that spun off from the show in Korea.

HATE FUN 2003! The World of Narue

Brack — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 06:00:00 +0000

This seems so generic I can’t be bothered to form an opinion.

HATE FUN 2003! D.N.Angel

Brack — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 03:00:00 +0000

Leaden shojo series from the creator of Rizelmine. See how slow and boring that opening theme is? That’s pretty much how the show feels too. Also I get it mixed up in my head with Masakazu Katsura’s DNA², because I suspect that was something of an influence on Yukiru Sugisaki in the first place.

HATE FUN 2003! Pluster World

Brack — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 23:59:00 +0000

A show I was totally unaware of. Appears to be some kind of Pokemon clone where the humans merge with the monsters to turn into some kind of superhero type beings. As far as I can tell the anime came first, but they had plenty of tie-ins to the point you have to imagine it was a calculated multi-media blitz.

HATE FUN 2003! Kaleido Star

Brack — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 21:00:00 +0000

It’s that man Junichi Sato again! At this point he may just have been making shows for Junichi Sato otaku, as the ratings for it seem quite poor, but it spawned multiple sequels on OAV (once moved to a Saturday morning slot it did better though). And as he had been ploughing a personal furrow through the shojo genre since Sailor Moon (or maybe even Goldfish Warning), I can see that he would have built an audience for his work by this point that the DVD sales would be enough to keep this project buoyant.

Storywise, once you remove the individual trappings of the show, this is very much a back to basics girls comic story, one that not only would you have seen in Japanese girls comics, but also in British girls comics during their peak. Namely that of a young girl striving to fulfil her dreams in her sporting or performance activity of choice.

HATE FUN 2003! Stellvia of the Universe

Brack — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 18:00:00 +0000

Tatsuo Sato’s last project before falling out with XEBEC. Interestingly upbeat post-apocalypse show, set almost two centuries after a massive environmental disaster, it shows mankind’s recovery after it and attempts to prevent a worse disaster occurring. Yet again it’s another space show from this year that avoids the conflict space anime normally has, and instead focusses on life in space.

HATE FUN 2003! Airmaster

Brack — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 15:00:00 +0000

Fantastic piece of trash, elevated above the source material by some incredibly well choreographed fight scenes. I shall be writing more about this over Xmas!

HATE FUN 2003! E’s Otherwise

Brack — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 14:01:43 +0000

What little I saw of this, probably the first couple of episodes, reminded me of the X-Men somewhat. But thinking about it, it’s probably because it’s drawing from the same well of sci-fi stories about ESPers and mutants being feared by normal men (i.e. PKD’s The Golden Man). Or possibly it was just another X clone.

Regardless, I didn’t watch any more, and I can’t recall much about it now.

HATE FUN 2003! DigiGirl POP

Brack — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 06:00:00 +0000

More like DigiGirl POP will itself, as here we have a show which is clearly influenced by Powerpuff Girls, which was obviously influenced in part by anime in the first place. Which wouldn’t be so bad, except this was clearly built on a shoestring budget and that kind of makes the cannibalism show all the more (was it the first of the ultra low budget Kids Station shorts?).

HATE FUN 2003! Ashita no Nadja

Brack — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 03:00:00 +0000

Faux World Masterpiece Theatre show with a few of the trappings of a Magical Girl show (easily merchandisable jewelery and the like), seemingly aimed at the children of fans of that other faux WMT show, Secret of Blue Water. It’s all carefully calculated to fit a well worn formula, but what I saw of it was well executed. Young orphan runs away to join the circus and find her mother, the usual sort of tale of pluck, courage and romance in turn of the century Europe.

The show is another example that Toei was/is still nurturing talent, as this was a show directed by Takuya Igarashi (Ouran Host Club, Soul Eater) before he went freelance. Toei seems to be a place you can learn the skills needed as a director, and possibly in the case of Mamoru Hosoda, the skills needed to create feature films. But there does seem to come a point where you can’t do any more there. Igarashi’s work at Bones has been visually more ambitious, but while fun, it’s still adaptation work. I’d love to see him on an original series or ideally a feature film in the next 10 years.

HATE FUN 2003! Crush Gear Nitro

Brack — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 23:59:00 +0000

Unsurprisingly, the sequel to Crush Gear Turbo! If you’ve not read that post, go ahead, it’s one of the meatier of these Hate Fun posts, in that I go on a big tangent about what makes a good toy/videogame adaptation.

HATE FUN 2003! Someday’s Dreamers

Brack — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 21:00:00 +0000

Hey kids, magical realism!

I definitely think there is a thread of these sort of series weaving through not just this decade, but the history of anime & manga. However I do think that in this decade we started seeing quieter, less OTT series like this one emerge, both in this genre and others (a lot of the space flight themed shows of 2003 strike me as having a similar sensibility).

That being said, I like my cartoons loud and cartoony, so I’ve not seen this.

I did catch some of the second Someday’s Dreamers series due to who the director is and it takes the realism part of magical realism even further, particularly in the actual animation. Whereas this looks like bog-standard anime in its presentation.

But more on that much later.

HATE FUN 2003! Transformers Armada

Brack — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 18:00:00 +0000

Transformers franchise rolls on. I’m sure I’ve seen some of this. I recall none of it.

HATE FUN 2003! Panyo Panyo Di Gi Charat

Brack — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 15:00:00 +0000

Not entirely sure who this was aimed at, as it went out on Animax so I couldn’t find airing times easily. But it feels like the Di Gi Charat franchise retooled as a straight up kids show. Technically a prequel, it stands on its own perfectly fine. One of the better Di Gi Charat spin-offs in that it still has plenty of slapstick, even if the misanthropy is gone.

HATE FUN 2003! Mouse

Brack — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 12:00:00 +0000

Satoru Akahori dusts off the formula that served him and the anime industry so well during the 90s to deliver this fluff about an art teacher turned thief, assisted by his three attractive assistants.

If your anime is going to deliberately invoke Lupin III in its opening, you probably want to be better than this show is.

HATE FUN 2003! Nanaka 6/17

Brack — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 09:00:00 +0000

Teenager suffers from head bonk amnesia reverting her mind to that of when she was six years old. Another show that I had in my head as being totally different than what it actually appears to be. Hiroaki Sakurai (Digi Charat) directs.

HATE FUN 2003! .hack//Legend of the Twilight

Brack — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 21:00:00 +0000

Another Bee Train show I actually quite liked. Unlike .hack//Sign, this show actually resembled an online videogame as I knew it, with a lot more happening in the game itself, and players actually interested in playing the game. The two leads are still as boring as Sign’s (with an added creepy incest vibe) and the ending is straight out of Zu Warriors from the Magic Mountain in it’s “fuck we don’t have an ending lets just get psychedelic” approach.

But, despite those flaws, I think there’s enough to like in the writing, characters and the music, that made it an enjoyable watch.

Or maybe it was just that it was half as long as //Sign?

HATE FUN 2003! Licensed by Royalty

Brack — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 06:00:00 +0000

What was I saying about shows influenced by UK telefantasy? Wikipedia mentions this showing owing a little to James Bond, but there’s more than a little of The Persuaders to it too. Jack Hofner and Rowe Rickenbacker, the show’s heroes, can be seen as equivalents to Lord Brett Sinclair and Danny Wilde of the Roger Moore/Tony Curtis vehicle. I dismissed it at the time, but watching the opening again now, I think I might be tempted to check it out if I can find it cheap. Which may be tricky as it’s out of print following the Geneon USA closure. On the other hand it was so overlooked, there may be loads of DVDs clogging warehouses unsold…

HATE FUN 2003! Gunparade March

Brack — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 03:00:00 +0000

Videogame adaptation that I’m sure I get mixed up in my head with something else. Takeshi Mori brings the first space flight as work rather than adventure show of the year, though like his earlier Vandread remembers to fill it up with girls so as get the audience that want that in too. I knew the name, but until I just looked it up, I thought this was a completely different show. That was still filled with girls, mind you, but more militaristic than blowing up comets and meteors.

HATE FUN 2003! Machine Robo Rescue

Brack — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 23:59:00 +0000

I’ve some fond memories of the old Robo Machine toys and the strip that ran in UK comic the Eagle as a kid. This revival of appears to be some kind of combination of Thunderbirds and Robot show, with kids as the leads. Which I’m sure must have been done before, as that seems like such an obvious good idea for a kids show.

And now to make you (and me) feel old, I bring you the following comment from youtube courtesy of Paperyoshi65

This Show is So OLD SCHOOL
i watch this SINCE I WAS 5

Yes, 2003 is now “old school” to 12/13 year olds. Though should you be allowed to use the phrase “old school” while still at school?

HATE FUN 2003? Wolf’s Rain

Brack — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 21:00:00 +0000

Probably the first show I followed weekly via fansubs, as it was coming out in Japan. Great looking post apocalypse show about four wolves, that quickly seemed to loose it’s way and become a more overly complicated and less interesting sci-fi/fantasy show. Then during broadcast it hit production problems and had to put out a month of recap episodes, and that killed my interest entirely.

HATE FUN 2003! Ga-Ra-Ku-Ta: Mr. Stain on Junk Alley

Brack — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 06:00:00 +0000

Oh hey it’s that thing that I ignored every time its trailer came up on my Lupin Specials boxsets.

HATE FUN 2003! Stratos 4

Brack — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 03:00:00 +0000

Takeshi Mori delivers the first of this year’s science fiction as slice of life shows. Of course he then fills it up with female characters, as that worked well for him in Vandread. It was successful enough to generate 3 OAV series after the TV run was complete.

Neither the premise or the design interested me so I paid it no mind.

HATE FUN 2003! Lime-iro Senkitan

Brack — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 23:59:00 +0000

Ah, more porn-to-tv adaptations. This time ELF’s pornographic take on the alternate history genre (Sakura Wars and Virgin Fleet) gets turned into a cartoon, and the porn removed. Bewilderingly this got a second series and an OAV, where presumably they could be more sexy.

I expect to be writing variations on that paragraph a lot over future posts…

HATE FUN 2003! The Big O II

Brack — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 21:48:53 +0000

A really big indication of where anime was in America was that this second series was part funded by Cartoon Network following the original 1999 series’ success on Adult Swim. Its mix of social science fiction, Batman and giant robot fights was a winning combination and the design work had a crossover appeal lacking in more “anime” looking shows. I’ve seen the original and enjoyed it, but haven’t had the chance to see this sequel/conclusion.

Let’s note that just as the original theme was a fairly blatant (and awesome) homage/rip-off of Flash by Queen, this theme does likewise with the theme to Gerry Anderson’s UFO. It’s not the first anime to take it’s cues from UK “telefantasy” and it won’t be the last (there’s a more obvious example later in 2003).

HATE FUN 2002! The ones that got away part 3

Brack — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 20:53:00 +0000

Imagin
Douga Tairiku

Don’t know what these are, or if they really exist (I’ve spotted some genuine errors in the list I’m using in the main). May be the names of blocks rather than a show.

UFO Princess Valkyrie

Couldn’t find the OP clip.

Boukensha

Now this was the really curiosity. It exists, it’s about Christopher Columbus, it aired on NHK and it appears to slipped down the back of history’s sofa.

HATE FUN 2002! Barom 1

Brack — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 13:00:00 +0000

Golgo 13 creator Takao Saito’s superhero manga Barom 1 got a revival as a satellite anime this year (previously it had been a live action show in the 70s). Let us note that Barom 1 has Wolverine’s haircut years before it was seen in Marvel Comics.

HATE FUN 2002! Weiß Kreuz Glühen

Brack — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 12:00:00 +0000

The assassin/flower shop juggernaut continued with the third anime series of the multimedia shojo franchise.

HATE FUN 2002! Pocket Monster Advance Generation

Brack — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 11:00:00 +0000

The second Pokemon series, this time covering material from the Ruby, Sapphire, and Emerald games.

I’ve said before on this site that I believe Pokemon to be one of the few videogame adaptations that truly succeed in capturing the flavour of the game on screen. This continued that success, marred perhaps only by the inclusion of a little brother character for the Misty replacement, May.

HATE FUN 2002! Kikou Sennyo Rouran

Brack — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 10:00:00 +0000

Again I’m puzzled why you have Toshiki Hirano directing but not doing character design. Particularly as Naomi Miyata’s designs, the heroine especially, are Hirano-like, recalling his Iczer-1 designs.

HATE FUN 2002! Piano

Brack — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 09:00:00 +0000

You know what, in sharp reflection to this bore-athon, K-On doesn’t seems such a bad idea. In the wake of Azumanga, it seemed that a lot of people were falling over themselves to declare themselves fans of “slice of life” anime. I recall this being one of those shows that those people were liking.

The fools!

HATE FUN 2002! Tsuri Baka Nisshi

Brack — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 08:00:00 +0000

I suspect anime fans who’d be interested in fansubbing this fishing anime don’t have time as they are “busy” fishing. Based on Jūzō Yamasaki’s long running manga (1979 and still going). There’s also been 20+ live action films starring Toshiyuki Nishida, better known in the UK as Pigsy from Monkey.

HATE FUN 2002! Shin Seiki Den Mars

Brack — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 07:00:00 +0000

Watch Shin Seiki Den Mars episode 01 vf in Animation | View More Free Videos Online at Veoh.com

The third time for Mitsuteru Yokoyama’s Mars to be adapted. It had an fairly loose TV adaptation in the 80s, followed by a more faithful OAV, though that too had a severe visual redesign. This version is reportedly the most faithful, the one I’m most interested in seeing and so the one that has been paid next to no attention by English speaking folks (the first episode was fansubbed earlier this year).

Many of the mecha and character designs will be familiar to fans of the Giant Robo OAV, where they were used in various forms.

HATE FUN 2002! Duel Masters

Brack — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 06:00:00 +0000

Card game manga gets anime. Typical “me-too” production hoping to ride Yu-Gi-Oh’s coat tails.

HATE FUN 2002! Haibane Renmei

Brack — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 05:00:00 +0000

Another Yoshitoshi ABe show that I felt didn’t really capture the charm of his art and writing, despite the fact he was writing this time. I still enjoyed the first few episodes I saw, but once I saw the dojinshi, I lost the inclination to watch any more as that had usurped the anime version in my mind.

HATE FUN 2002! Kiddy Grade

Brack — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 04:00:00 +0000

The point at which Keiji Gotoh stopped designing and I stopped being interested.

Instead he has his wife Megumi Kadonosono doing the design work, and he’s now in the director’s chair. Like Hirano, is there some unwritten rule about directors not doing design work, even if that’s what they are famous for?

This show was super popular at the time among UK fans, and I imagine US ones too. Ostensibly another girls with guns show, from the outside looking in it appeared to be a po-faced take on the Dirty Pair, with a typically 00s sensibility. And so I was not interested, thank you very much.

A sequel, Kiddy Girl-and arrived this year.

HATE FUN 2002! Gravion

Brack — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 03:00:00 +0000

Is this Masami Obari’s biggest success as a creator?

The usual angular design is toned down heavily by the intervention of Junichi Takaoka & Makoto Uno, but there’s elements in there that are obviously Obari. Namely missile-like breasts on one of the characters and drills. I sometimes think Obari’s ideal woman is Aphrodite A given how he draws women.

Anyway, usual robot protecting Earth hijinks here.

HATE FUN 2002! Galaxy Angel A

Brack — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 02:00:00 +0000

Yes. More Galaxy Angel.

HATE FUN 2002! Pecola

Brack — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 01:00:00 +0000

Japanese/Canadian co-production from the geometric mind of Naomi Iwata (Gregory Horror Show). It aired on Cartoon Network in the US, not sure if we saw it over here in the UK.

HATE FUN 2002! Shin Megami Tensai Devil Children Light & Dark

Brack — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 23:59:00 +0000

Sequel to a spin-off anime of a spin-off video game!

I’m doubly willing to bet this isn’t very good.

HATE FUN 2002! Gundam SEED

Brack — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 21:00:00 +0000

The first episode infuriated me so much I refused to watch any more.

Too deliberate in it’s invoking of elements of the original Gundam series.
Cheap animation
Repetitive character design

Despite all that, Mitsuo Fukuda & Chiaki Morosawa’s revamp of the Gundam franchise was a big success. Unfortunately that success meant that the backlash they got for the follow up all that much more great. But we’ll get to that later.

HATE FUN 2002! GetBackers

Brack — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 18:00:00 +0000

From writing synopses for this back in the old job I think this is about a pair of superpowered repo men.

HATE FUN 2002! Platonic Chain

Brack — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 15:00:00 +0000

Oh this terrible thing. By trying to be the future you’re going end up look incredibly dated a few years later. This is pretty much the equivalent of all those cheapo CG animated shows that came out everywhere else in the world around this time. And looked like they were made in Poser.

HATE FUN 2002! Naruto

Brack — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 06:00:00 +0000

Let’s ignore the writing for a moment. Has any other TV anime show managed to contain such extremes of animation quality?

In the episodes I’ve seen, probably the first 100 or so, you’ve the highs of some excellent Norio Matsumoto animated fights to the lows of elementary animation cock ups like having Naruto on the screen running upside down. The level of inconsistency in what Studio Pierrot produced was astounding. And infuriating.

But that’s not why I gave up on it. No, it was the writing.

Here’s the real problem Naruto had, the manga didn’t divide up neatly into arcs in the same way that Dragonball or One Piece did. There’s other problems with manga’s writing, but that’s neither here nor there, for the purposes of animating it.

That lack of breaks in the story meant that they struggled to pad out the story. You ended up with both repetitive recaps and then the long tract of sub-par filler episodes that people just hated. It’s not the only show that’s had that problem, but it’s certainly really noticeable when seen against the success of One Piece and Dragonball, and may have ultimately hurt the property. Certainly kept me away from it for years.

But outside of Japan it’s probably been the hit of the decade. Some may wonder if it’s deserved, but to really put the current success of Shonen Jump properties like Naruto, Bleach, One Piece, Gintama & Reborn into perspective I suggest looking at what else is running in Shonen Jump at the moment. It’s mostly terrible. Toriko and Bakuman are good, and I’d guess would be hits if animated. Bakuman I expect will be, Toriko might not, probably for reasons that have nothing to with the actual strip.

Every other non-gag strip that’s not been animated yet, feels either highly derivative or just clumsy. Naruto’s success in the US/UK is fueled by the manga, and that is head and shoulders above a lot of what’s in SJ, even if it’s not really my cup of tea. It is very good at what it does. Not the best ever, not the best now, but certainly better than the majority of shonen manga and anime.

HATE FUN 2002! Sister Princess Repure

Brack — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 03:00:00 +0000

More Sister Princess. Apparently this is even worse than the first, in that it’s truer to the terrible moe light novels that spawned it.

HATE FUN 2002! Bomber Man Jetters

Brack — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 23:59:00 +0000

This was lacking in what I wanted from a Bomberman cartoon. Namely massive amounts of explosions.

HATE FUN 2002! Heat Guy J

Brack — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 21:00:00 +0000

Ridiculously cheap boxset in the UK, that like a lot of DVDs I’ve bought, I’ve not actually got around to watching yet. It’s a Kazuki Akane (Escaflowne) project so really should get on that. Though its tale of manly robot policing does inadvertently remind me of this: