Anime/Manga Aficionado's Lounge! II

[Nik Hasta]

And by god Claymore has gotten boring.

This entire chapter was literally just talking heads.

I mean, I don't mind talking heads. GANTZ did talking heads with the whole torso Hitler space god guy and it was really engaging but this was just... man...

I can't believe the guy who wrote the brilliant Angel Densetsu wrote this stuff.

[Siriel]

K, Episode 5

Welp. This is going to take some explaining in the future.

And Yashiro's "Me? ...I'm just a normal high school student." claim falls apart more and more with each episode.

Why, spoilers:

he's not even a student at all!

end of spoilers

[FarBeyondC]

K, Episode 5

Welp. This is going to take some explaining in the future.

And Yashiro's "Me? ...I'm just a normal high school student." claim falls apart more and more with each episode.

Why, spoilers:

he's not even a student at all!

end of spoilers

I haven't gotten that far yet, but I wouldn't be at all surprised if his whole life turns out to be a lie by the end.

[Siriel]

I haven't gotten that far yet, but I wouldn't be at all surprised if his whole life turns out to be a lie by the end.

spoilers:

Homra members have asked pretty much everyone in school if they know him, including people who talked to him like an hour ago. Nobody did. Looking him up in the school files gets no result either. So there's either a schoolwide conspiracy or he has some sort of "Forget me" effect. Given the whole "Colorless King" deal, I'm guessing the latter.

end of spoilers

[FarBeyondC]

spoilers:

Homra members have asked pretty much everyone in school if they know him, including people who talked to him like an hour ago. Nobody did. Looking him up in the school files gets no result either. So there's either a schoolwide conspiracy or he has some sort of "Forget me" effect. Given the whole "Colorless King" deal, I'm guessing the latter.

end of spoilers

spoilers:

I doubt he himself has a "Forget me" effect, unless the effect works on him as well.

end of spoilers

[Robotech Master]

So, adding fuel to the fire of the theory that the Rebuild of Evangelion movies are some kind of alternate repetition of the same universe from the tv series...anyone notice that in the new trailer for Rebuild 3, the scene with the Nerv logo on the wall that is riddled with bullet holes is the *original* Nerv logo?

[SSJLuffy]

The Yu Yu Hakusho manga started off pretty sub-par, but right now I'd be lying if I said I wasn't enjoying it! Just finished the Rando arc. I love the anime and so far the manga isn't disappointing... the pacing just seems like its a lot faster, well besides the first two volumes which felt like mostly filler.

[KingofPie]

So Dragonball Kai will be adapting the Buu arc after all, though apparently it's only coming to the US for now. I love the Buu arc and it's goofiness, so I'll probably catch it at some point. I fear the censorship it'll get though.

[Yun Lao]

So Dragonball Kai will be adapting the Buu arc after all, though apparently it's only coming to the US for now. I love the Buu arc and it's goofiness, so I'll probably catch it at some point. I fear the censorship it'll get though.

Speaking of Dragonball, I just discovered some spin-off involving Bardock called "Dragonball: Episode of Bardock".
Holy crap, I've read fan-fiction back in the days that were better.

[KingofPie]

Speaking of Dragonball, I just discovered some spin-off involving Bardock called "Dragonball: Episode of Bardock".
Holy crap, I've read fan-fiction back in the days that were better.

Yeeeeeeeah. Shame they felt the need to take away the impact of the original Bardock special and make something as mindbreakingly stupid as BARDOCK DIDNT DIE BUT HE FELL THROUGH A WORMHOLE BACK IN TIME OH AND HE'S THE FIRST SUPER SAIYAN.

[FarBeyondC]

Speaking of Dragonball, I just discovered some spin-off involving Bardock called "Dragonball: Episode of Bardock".
Holy crap, I've read fan-fiction back in the days that were better.

I still found it more entertaining than GT...

Yeeeeeeeah. Shame they felt the need to take away the impact of the original Bardock special and make something as mindbreakingly stupid as BARDOCK DIDNT DIE BUT HE FELL THROUGH A WORMHOLE BACK IN TIME OH AND HE'S THE FIRST SUPER SAIYAN.

...at least, until I remembered the original Bardock special.

Now, it's not that entertaining at all...

...which still makes it more entertaining than GT.

[Dark Soul # 7]

Baby Steps 138: People react to Mauro and Natsu's announcement that they're dating now, and everybody reacts normally.

But now Mauro has to face a guy who could very well be the main character all on his own. This is going to be a tough match.

[Dark Soul # 7]

Speaking of Dragonball, I just discovered some spin-off involving Bardock called "Dragonball: Episode of Bardock".
Holy crap, I've read fan-fiction back in the days that were better.

Yeeeeeeeah. Shame they felt the need to take away the impact of the original Bardock special and make something as mindbreakingly stupid as BARDOCK DIDNT DIE BUT HE FELL THROUGH A WORMHOLE BACK IN TIME OH AND HE'S THE FIRST SUPER SAIYAN.

...at least, until I remembered the original Bardock special.

Now, it's not that entertaining at all...

...which still makes it more entertaining than GT.

Speaking of that other Episode of Bardock

[Nik Hasta]

Two new chapters of Zetman came out and the chaos continues.

Though this was a high point for me:



Haitani may be a massive jerk, but by god he is one stylish motherfucker.

[Nik Hasta]

Huh...

Kateikyoushi Hitman Reborn ended...

Well, I guess I should have seen this coming given how final this recent arc seemed so I suppose it is time to reflect on this series as a whole as is my wont. So let's get down to it and take a look back on this series overall.

As I have often said to people Reborn is kind of a tough sell. The manga is very dull for around the first 63 chapters, sticking to one shot storylines and establishing a kind of boring world with honestly quite dull characters. I persevered because I could see potential and I had been told by a friend that it was worth ploughing through.

So... I was rewarded for my efforts because the first two major story arcs are quite fun. Pretty standard shonen but you have fun villains and they finally start to make use of the potentiality of having a supernatural gangsters setting. The series really hit it's stride with the third story arc, which was incredibly strong. It had really high stakes, a big but acceptable spike in the power curve and a big change to the setting that really engaged me. It was a long arc, greatly expanded on the supporting cast and had a lot of excellent moments for all the heroes. It was really enjoyable and was only slightly spoiled by a ridiculously anti-climactic boss fight.

So... then as with every good arc, it's always hard to follow up with something good. The fourth arc was okay but... somehow a little lacking in places. It just didn't reach the heights of the previous arc and introduced a lot more lore than I thought was necessary. Then we hit the final arc and that was... fun because the author clearly just through every character they had into the mix and went for something really big scale.

But... it just didn't quite deliver. The final boss was taken out annoyingly easily, the strong supporting cast got very little to do and battles felt short and kind of pointless and everything was resolved through a kind of deus ex machina.

So... on the whole I can't fully recommend it. When Reborn is good, it's very solid and has a lot of ideas at work. The trouble is, those ideas are often then abandoned or not executed properly or just weren't that good in the first place.

In short; It's worth a look if you can make it through the tedious opening because there are some very good bits in there to be had but it's generally a lot weaker than it should be.