I hope you’ve enjoyed the abundance of good anime there’s been this year, because next week it comes to a juddering halt.
BAMBOO BLADE is a show written by R.O.D creator Hideyuki Kurata based on a manga by Masahiro Totsuka and Aguri Igarashi that runs in Young Gangan magazine. It appears to be about teenage girls and kendo. Looks like this is the director Hisashi Saito’s first directorial project, and animation is by AIC A.S.T.A. (Godannar, GUNxSWORD). Looks like typical shallow trash aimed at male teenagers and college kids.
BLUE DROP is a manga adaptation by Masahiko Ohkura (Yukikaze) from the manga by Akihito Yoshitomi (Eat-Man, Ray). Though apparently the original concept it Ohkura’s. The pair of them are doing the writing on the anime too. I will likely check this out as I enjoyed what I saw of Yukikaze, and it seems that there’s a creative intent towards creating this anime, rather than doing a work for hire adaptation intended to sell more copies of the manga.
CLANNAD is based on a moe visual novel. It’s animated by Kyoto Animation. Softy Walter’s can rejoice. I would rather have my eyes removed with a rusty claw hammer.
DRAGONAUT wins the prize for title you can’t believe has been used before. The bad news is that it’s a GONZO series. Mamoru Hosoda cohort, Tadashi Sakazaki, is the Chief Animation Director so I may check out the start of series for the animation before the inevitable spiral into patchiness.
ef – A TALE OF MEMORIES is some more moe romance shit from the production studio I wish would away from the darkside of otaku orientated crud and do a good show for once, SHAFT. To be fair that suicidal teacher show toys with being good, but is still too mired in whats become the stagnant late night anime genre. This looks considerably worse than anything they’ve done before.
Softie Walter? Is that a Dennis the Menace throwback? Obscure English colloquialisms or no, the force of the trash radar is strong with you.
Though, they aren’t to be completely disregarded. As a fan of Lovely Complex I’m sure you can understand. They can light a warm flame in the cockles of your heart in a way that no other genre is able to. Every now and again a Kanon or Host Club is just what you need. And aside from that, if you sit your woman down for a marathon of your favorite Softie Walter show they’ll just be putty in your hands.
Anyway, keep the previews going!