big bad birtha's suggestion box 2: secret passions unveiled

[Doppleganger]

Originally Posted by Talon87

Never watched Mahoromatic, but I love the character designs in Kiss x Sis. Yes, they're very simple. Yes, they're very moe-geared. But I really love them. You know I have to love them when I'm mai waifu'ing over a girl whose chest is about as flat as a chopping board. That's how much I think the faces are cutely drawn.

I like Mahoromatic's character designs. But Mahoromatic was a tragic romance and so I associate those designs with misfortune.

Originally Posted by big bad birtha

Episode 3 of Madoka is definitely a turning point of the title. I think it's funny how so many people decided to make fanart making fun of that scene (Example: 1,2) It definitely beats crap like "You went Ozzy Ozzbourne on my wife! We're gonna boycott your show!"

Why did I laugh at those? Why?! Am I really a horrible person on the inside?

Originally Posted by big bad birtha

I'm 40 episodes into GaoGaiGar. It's getting more exciting, and they're no longer doing the same thing over and over again each episode. Oh, and how'd ChoRyuJin manage to become the symmetrical Duck King? He doesn't look like a duck to me!

The secret is dinosaurs.

"We'll meet again...in the sea of stars."

...

Made good progress in SnK. I finally me that bastard kid of that rich land-owner. Is my soul really free?

[unownmew]

Originally Posted by Doppleganger

I can't stand Kiss x Sis. There's nothing inherently wrong with the show (since, at least, the sisters aren't b-related) but the character designer worked on Mahoromatic, so I get a vague sense of loss/sadness when I watch it. Kind of like a bad taste in my mouth.

I don't quite understand. How does the fact that the characters were done by the same designer leave a bad taste in your mouth?

Edit: Saw your post above, now I know what you meant.

unownmew reminded me I have the Nanoha movie and //roots to finish, so I got started on Nanoha while grinding through the flashback (originally Bad End?) of Sharin no Kuni. I think approaching 100% completion in Muv-Luv has liberated my soul a bit.

Glad I could remind you.

Though I must confess Nanoha's universe seems a lot more perverse than it did in the TV series in light of playing Muv-Luv and watching Madoka Magica. Not perverse in the, "there's something wrong here" sense, but in the "there should be something wrong here, but since there's not, there's something wrong here!" kind of way, y'know? I'm not seeing sliders or demon ermines running, that must mean they're somewhere in the shadows!

I don't understand.

Well, Triangle Heart to Magical Lyrical Girl Nanoha is the same kind of drastic transition one gets from Muv-Luv Extra to Muv-Luv Alternative, so that kind of adds to the eerie.

Hmm, I've not seen triangle Heart, how is it?

Originally Posted by Talon87

Never watched Mahoromatic, but I love the character designs in Kiss x Sis. Yes, they're very simple. Yes, they're very moe-geared. But I really love them. You know I have to love them when I'm mai waifu'ing over a girl whose chest is about as flat as a chopping board. That's how much I think the faces are cutely drawn.

Oh: and it doesn't hurt that Ako's voice actress has the sexy-cutest voice ever. It isn't sexy seductive like an older woman's, but holy shit is it cute. I could listen to Ako's voice actress on a radio talk show all day long.

Have to agree 100%, simple but beautiful, and Ako sounds amazing, though I don't think I could listen to her on the radio all day. The microphone and static usually distort voices. Or maybe I just have a bad radio?

What is Moe, though? *goes to look it up*

Edit: Wikipedi is no help it seems. Something about "budding" girls, or attraction to something, not nessesarily related to the former.

Edit2: forgot to mention, I also just finished Onegai Twins, and found it quite touching, and entertaining.

[lilboocorsola]

Originally Posted by Doppleganger

But Mahoromatic was a tragic romance and so I associate those designs with misfortune.

Really? I always thought Mahoromatic was a lighthearted series just based off of hearing Mahoro de Mambo from my brother's soundtrack collection. Not that I have any idea what the lyrics or show are even about.

On the night before the final battle in UBW, holding a "strategy meeting" in Rin's room. Saved and quit right after the kiss. I'm heading home for the weekend now, so I'll pick up with the scene later tonight. x-X

[unownmew]

While looking up what Moe was, curiousity led me to looking up Otaku.

Seems rather unfortunate, it has such a negative connotation, I originally thought it meant someone obsessed with Hentai; rather it simply refers to having exclusive interests, usually relating to computers, games or anime/manga.

Anyway, that lead me to finding Ore no Imōto ga Konna ni Kawaii Wake ga Nai, which looks rather interesting. Since I'm lacking an anime to watch now, I'm going to start that. Anyone seen it before?

[Talon87]

Originally Posted by unownmew

Seems rather unfortunate, it has such a negative connotation, I originally thought it meant someone obsessed with Hentai; rather it simply refers to having exclusive interests, usually relating to computers, games or anime/manga.

お宅 Otaku literally means "house" and is thus comparable to the Western joke about a nerd who "lives in his mother's basement." You're more or less calling the guy "basement-dweller." So right off the bat, the nickname connotes something much harsher than "nerd," a word which would pretty much sum up what you wrote about a hobbyist with hardcore knowledge about and passion for his hobby.

But things get even worse than the simple original meaning of the name itself: because the name has come to be associated with various serial killers from the 1980s and 1990s and as such has driven most Japanese to fear and loathe otaku. It's why you now see the rebounding effect, with otakus coming out of hiding and people who are part of normal Japanese society writing books about them, trying to pass laws which benefit them, etc -- because for the last 10-30 years, they've been an underground segment of society.

If you take a second look at that Wikipedia article, you'll see this:

Originally Posted by Wikipedia

Some of Japan's otaku use the term to describe themselves and their friends semi-humorously, accepting their position as fans, and some even use the term proudly, attempting to reclaim it from its negative connotations. In general colloquial usage however, most Japanese would consider it undesirable to be described in a serious fashion as "otaku"; many even consider it to be an offensive term.

A sign of how much times have changed is the fact that Taro Aso, then a parliamentarian and later the Prime Minister of Japan, proclaimed himself to the public as an otaku, expressing (among other things) an avid interest in Rozen Maiden. That move would have been political suicide in the 1990s, but in the mid-to-late 2000s, Aso used it, he had hoped, to his advantage in trying to secure the otaku vote.

Originally Posted by unownmew

Anyway, that lead me to finding Ore no Imōto ga Konna ni Kawaii Wake ga Nai, which looks rather interesting. Since I'm lacking an anime to watch now, I'm going to start that. Anyone seen it before?

Y'know, you should really probably make use of UPN's search feature. You'll be surprised just how much we've all seen. Yes, we're all familiar here with OreImo. BBB even watched it all, so if you'd like to talk to somebody about it, I'd start with him.

Then again, maybe the fact that you've raised viewership questions (one about Kiss x Sis, the other about OreImo) means one of two things:

1. People need to update their Seen Anime lists more. (And you need to check 'em! )
   Or
2. We need to get back into the habit of making individual threads for series instead of just chatting them up in a general-purpose thread.

I don't know which if either is strictly necessary, but since twice in one day you've had trouble finding this information, it makes me wonder ...

[Talon87]

No FSN progress. May make some here in a second.

I have made progress on School Rumble. While I'm still two chapters away from completing Volume 4, in the anime front I'm already through Episode 21 of Season 2. I should finish the series up some time in the next week, if I had to guess, and then I'll have to either drag my computer monitor close to my bed (so I can read manga from bed ) or else I'm going to have to get up off my lazy butt and read the manga from my computer desk. T_T The manga's already tons more difficult to follow the clear-cut anime, so why does it have to be a physically less pleasurable experience too!?

Anyway, the second ending themesong for Season 2 has been stuck in my head today. It's not the greatest song ever, but I really like the cute chorus (1:04~1:22).

Man, though: that Scramble! It's such a good song, it even sounds awesome when it's in 8-bit form! Man, this takes me back to my childhood. I can only imagine, though, how awful a School Rumble game for the NES would have been!

And now I'm looking for anime songs in 8 bits ... here's what I've found worth sharing:

• Elfen Lied's "Lilium"
  Makes for a great song at a cathedral. Someone else said it'd be a great Game Over screen song. I could see that.
• Cowboy Bebop's "Tank!"
  This would have to be the opening song to the game it was in. But what an opening song it'd have been in the NES era! Or I suppose it could have been the stage theme song for any stage set in a Vegas-like city with bright neon lights and cars driving by and stuff. Like, I dunno, a Turtles In Time-style stage in Sonic the Hedgehog's casino-themed zones?
• Azumanga Daioh!'s "Soramimi Cake"
  This is perfect. So recognizably the show's song, and yet so, so video gamey. But someone points out that it's too clean-sounding for 8-bit, and I think he may unfortunately be right. So ... SNES, perhaps?
• Sailor Moon's "Moonlight Densetsu"
  This particular remix is impressive because it actually managed to produce intelligible Japanese lyrics despite being 8-bit. O_O; Just ... wow. Something which even Squaresoft couldn't pull off with Celes's Aria di Mezzo Carattere in FF6, this person managed to pull off exquisitely.
• And one last one (for now ) ...
  Here's Neon Genesis Evangelion's "Cruel Angel Thesis" ...
  ... from an actual game!

[Talon87]

AHAHAHAHA!

If I had been drinking milk, it would have proverbially squirted out through my nose just ten seconds ago when I read this comment about OreImo:

Originally Posted by a disgruntled fan on Youtube

There's no way my little sister can be this much of a bitch.

Hahahahahahahaha.

[Doppleganger]

Originally Posted by unownmew

I don't understand.

Madoka Magica takes the idea of Nanoha and adds a dark, adult element to it. When you watch Nanoha, you don't have any reason to suspect the characters are hiding sinister intentions, or that the creators of the anime are trying to deceive you. After being exposed to that, I have a harder time accepting Nanoha as what it is - a straight magical girl story.

Originally Posted by unownmew

Hmm, I've not seen triangle Heart, how is it?

I haven't either, but I know it to be an H-game, starring Nanoha's brother. The dichotomy between an H-game and a magical girl story set in the same universe parallels Muv-Luv's.

Originally Posted by YUKI.N

Really? I always thought Mahoromatic was a lighthearted series just based off of hearing Mahoro de Mambo from my brother's soundtrack collection. Not that I have any idea what the lyrics or show are even about.

Mahoromatic is tragic simply from the premise - Mahoro learns that she's running out of power, and wants to devote what time left she has to serve the orphan son of her old boss. At the end of each episode, we're given a counter that says the number of days Mahoro has left until she deactivates. The viewer is constantly reminded that these carefree, happy days where Mahoro brought light back into Suguru's dark world are not going to last.

The tragedy isn't because Mahoro deactivates, though. It's because her past goes back to haunt her, and it eventually draws in Suguru and destroys his life as well.

Mahoromatic isn't one of my highest rated titles, but it was easily one of the most memorable I've ever seen. Although I don't use it here, the catch-phrase I use abroad is エッチなのはいけないと思います！

Originally Posted by Talon87

AHAHAHAHA!

If I had been drinking milk, it would have proverbially squirted out through my nose just ten seconds ago when I read this comment about OreImo:



Hahahahahahahaha.

Tsk, BBB's been saying that all the time! Kirino is an awful character and everyone hates her.

Also, here's an 8-Bit to add to your assembly, Talon - Sengoku Rance!

[Talon87]

Why are you tsk'ing? I know that. It's because of what BBB's said that I can find the Youtube comment funny at all in the first place.

[big bad birtha]

Originally Posted by unownmew

Anyway, that lead me to finding Ore no Imōto ga Konna ni Kawaii Wake ga Nai, which looks rather interesting. Since I'm lacking an anime to watch now, I'm going to start that. Anyone seen it before?

It's okay I guess. The anime seems to be more of a taste of the light novel than anything. The characters (other than Kirino) are all interesting, but the show ends before anything can be done with them. I could see it becoming pretty good if they continue on, but nothing beyond pretty good.

I will say it definitely isn't good enough to fill Comiket with doujins of it!

________________________________

I hate making quotes from more than one different post, so I'll just comment. About Triangle Hearts 3, I'm under the impression that it's just a generic harem visual novel. I've been meaning to watch the OVA to atleast look at Nanoha's roots, but I've never gotten to it.

________________________________

Before I left for work, I finished episode 44 of GaoGaiGar. Good lord was it HNNGGG-worthy.

Spoiler: show

I'm referring to the episode where Hana confronted Mamoru about his identity.

Other than that, I've encountered nothing else I'd like to bring up.

SYMMETRICAL DUCK-KING!

[lilboocorsola]

Originally Posted by Talon87

Anyway, the second ending themesong for Season 2 has been stuck in my head today. It's not the greatest song ever, but I really like the cute chorus (1:04~1:22).

I also thought the chorus of this song was super-cute and catchy. The lyrics themselves are bittersweet and capture the true essence of School Rumble, IMO.

I came home to a power outage last night, so I didn't get a chance to finish UBW. ^^; Will try to do so today.

Comments I didn't get a chance to post yesterday:

Spoiler: show

First off, I am officially GAR for Lancer. Don't ask me how that works.

That being said... CURSE YOU KOTOMINE. How dare you force my favorite character - let alone Servant - so far to suffer such a lame death as impalement by his own spear?! Gr... At least he got back up and stopped the priest from killing Rin (not to mention Shinji from raping her!). So at least his death wasn't in vain. It was still cheap though. T-T

The Archer vs. Shirou fight was cool, though I was hoping for Shirou to learn how to summon his own Reality Marble at this point so a scene like in the 2nd animé OP could take place. Archer particularly annoys me now since I have my own vision of becoming a superhero, so every time I feel like his words are testing me as much as they are his younger self.

[Doppleganger]

Originally Posted by Talon87

Why are you tsk'ing? I know that. It's because of what BBB's said that I can find the Youtube comment funny at all in the first place.

Ohhh.

...

Saw an "interview" at AnimeExpo with Hideaki Anno on Gunbuster. It's short, brief, and very funny, in my opinion -

Originally Posted by AnimeExpo

On Gunbuster's alternate future -- is it dominated by Russia?

ANNO: There's a Japanese Empire. In the year 2000, the U.S. and Japan had a war, and Japan occupied Hawaii. Sorry.

That's what I call Japanese pride!

...

I'm finished with the Nanoha movie. It was nice, but was filled with a lot of empty action sequences, which I didn't like in A's. I was pretty easily bored. I did get sort of excited when Nanoha pulled out this absolutely HUGE Starlight Breaker, though. I was also surprised the movie concisely summarized the entire first season of Nanoha. I would surmise the second movie would be A's, and the third StrikerS? It was cool to learn Lindy Harlaown is voiced by Remember11's Utsumi Kali, and I did raise an eyebrow when Ever17's "Karma" began to play at points in the latter part of the movie. The ending forgiveness scene was pure yuri, I'm sorry - it's the kind that gets guys hot in the chest and sweating bullets.

Now that such a hurdle is over and done with, gonna polish off Sharin no Kuni and the ML review. A fair diversion, this was.

[Talon87]

Ended up advancing on School Rumble this weekend and playing zero FSN. Not sure how I feel about that, but what's done is done.

School Rumble:
I've only got one episode left of Season 2 of the anime and I'm at the beginning of Volume 6 of the manga. It looks like up through around Volume 14 is what the anime covers, so I'll (hopefully) be able to breeze through these volumes since they'll all be review for me -- review of material I've just re-watched in the last month, no less -- and then take it slower with the new material covered by Volumes 14 through 22.

I did sneak a peek at a random page in Volume 18, though, and would you know it: I saw this:

Spoiler: show

Yakumo telling Harima that Eri-senpai likes him.

So I don't know what to make of that, but I will still hope hard for Harima x Eri and will press forward to see how things play out. The spoiler makes it seem less likely, though, since for the relationship to work out, the spoiler would have had to have happened in, say, Volume 20 or 21, not all the way back in Volume 18.

Fate/stay Night - Heavens Feel:
Looking forward to making progress on this. Worried, indeed certain that Lil' Blue will lap me on this one. But no matter: I'll go at my own pace. Still at the first bit of the (first?) Shirou x Sakura sex scene, though. The last thing I read still being Sakura asking Shirou if he thinks she has a dirty body.

[Talon87]

Finished the School Rumble anime, not counting the final OAVs which cover the very end of the franchise. Halfway through Volume 6 of the manga.

Found this image moments ago while searching for videos on Youtube of Ein the Welsh Corgi. I'd never seen this particular Cowboy Bebop image before. It's very good! I liked it a lot, saved it instantly, and wanted to share it with you guys in case you also would like to keep it.

Seems like we're all doing different things, except for me and Lil' Blue both playing through Heavens Feel right now. April -- and Kaiji Season 2 -- can't come soon enough!

[Doppleganger]

The Sakura H scene was kind of...animal, I felt. A big turn off, though different from the stupidly awkward scenes of the earlier routes.

I spent some of today rewatching Kaiji, but I felt I remember it too well to get all that riled up. I mean, back in the day I'd rewatch each episode like 10 times until the next one came out, so in sum I've probably seen the series like nine or eight full times already.

I need to put in some study time, gonna start at 20:00 hours, but I plan to finish off this latest Index and see if I can polish through Sharin no Kuni.

Anyone heard of an anime called Narutaru?

[lilboocorsola]

No hotlinking from danbooru, Talon. *tsk tsk*

Rest assured, I'm planning on saving the rest of HF for spring break. Now that I'm back at school, even if I'm tempted to play between now and then I won't progress past the H scene. So your status is safe for now.

[Talon87]

Yes, I have heard of Narutaru before, Doppel. I have heard it's very weird, but the people who have seen it all seem to belong to some sort of perverse brotherhood of men who can claim to have seen Narutaru. So, uh, I dunno? Maybe you'll want to see it so you can join them? But having never seen it myself, I can't tell you what it's like. I just know that they're always like, "Ugh, don't see Narutaru ... kusukusu" and they laugh amongst themselves and cite memorable scenes from the show.

I never use Danbooru, so I had no way of knowing that they disallowed hotlinking other than testing the url myself. And since it worked at the time I posted, I figured all was well. Little did I realize that it was just reading it from my browser cache. Sigh. Well, let me try to relink you ... here is the generic HTML page for the Cowboy Bebop picture in question. Stupid Danbooru: all they do is mirror select Pixiv images, anyway.

Speaking of Pixiv, I decided just now (while writing this post! ) to search for 沢近 (Sawachika) to see what sort of fanart I'd get. Sadly, not much. But I did get this: what I presume is a fantasy scene wherein Eri dabs Harima's wounds with a cotton ball and disinfectant. Awwww.

[Doppleganger]

Pixiv is such a great place! I was able to find my lovely Erythrocyte-tan avatar there after I'd lost the original image.

As for Danbooru, remote hot-linking is only disallowed from webforums or webpages it seems. Copy and paste the link into your browser and it'll work just fine.

I brought up Narutaru because people are saying Madoka is similar to it. It's tickling my curiosity, though I'm not exactly one who craves constant subversion of established anime archetypes.

Talon, are you going to read the SRZ manga, or just hold off in the hope/prayer than an anime adaption might come out between now and World's End (2012)?

[Talon87]

I was planning on reading it. I doubt Kobayashi Jin will get another anime any time soon. He didn't get School Rumble Season 3 (as it should have been), he didn't get Natsu no Arashi Season 3 (period), and he hasn't written anything else. Even if he does decide to crawl back to School Rumble and to transform Z into a long-running sequel series (which I don't even know if he can do, having neither finished School Rumble nor yet touched School Rumble Z), I doubt it'll get animated in any reasonable span of time.

Long story short, should Harima pair up with Eri or Yakumo, I will be expecting Harima x Eri or Harima x Yakumo epilogue goodness in spades in SRZ and will not want to wait for an anime that may never even happen. And should he not pair up with either of them? Then I may not even bother with SRZ other than to see if he learned the error of his ways and retconned whoever he did pair Harima up with. (If it's Tenma, why I oughta ... )

[big bad birtha]

For Danbooru, all you have to do is drag the link to your tab and it'll open fine. I give links from there all the time.

I finished the main series of GaoGaiGar. I was gonna talk about it after finishing final, but it seems like I'll have a different opinion of final, so I'll just talk about that later. Overall, I really enjoyed watching this. It had some pretty big flaws, such as: repetition at the beginning, really really lame insert music, character cloning, and people not dieing when they're killed. However, when I hear Link screaming his god damn head off, all those flaws just disappear. I almost cream myself every time I hear him screaming "HIKARI NI NARE!"

Later on, watching to see how they go through every challenge presented by the bad guys was actually really fun to watch. Sure, they all ended the same way, but that end was always "HIKARI NI NARE!" so I'm fine with that. The seemingly lame first 26 episodes also got me into the characters, so the things that happened to them actually mattered to me. I thought the ending was pretty powerful too.

I just hope Final isn't bad. It seems to be mass cloning the characters, and taking away the meaning from alot of the things from the rest of the show.

[Doppleganger]

From what I know of Z, it's more like something he had to do given how he ended SR. I'm not even sure if he wanted to do it, but it does settle everything.

A fair read: http://kenjiharima.blogspot.com/2008...ima-kenji.html

Originally Posted by big bad birtha

I just hope Final isn't bad. It seems to be mass cloning the characters, and taking away the meaning from alot of the things from the rest of the show.

While the concensus online is GGG TV is great, people are really split over FINAL. I was one of the more vocal anti-FINAL talking heads because the entire thing was really dark, the TV series themes were kind of perverted and the bad guys were really poorly written. Oh, and the stupid fanservice really took away from the serious atmosphere.

There is some legitimately good ideas in FINAL, but very little unique to FINAL (Renee and Chausser came from the audio dramas) is good, and nothing pertaining to the villains is good. TV implied Mamoru would be hunting new Zonder species, which tied into Betterman's theme of humanity evolving (the Zonders would naturally evolve too, as is the nature of all living beings) but FINAL completely scrapped that.

And while I fully intend to buy the $1,000 Perfect Fusion GaoFighGar GFG was actually my least favourite Brave Robot. Instead of fighting threats to humanity, it was doing menial police work. Then came FINAL 02, which horrified me. Worst episode in the entire franchise.

Good stuff in FINAL (don't read until you've finished):

Spoiler: show

GENESIC GAOGAIGAR (my long-time UPN avatar before I got Yuni)
GOLDION CRUSHER
G-STONE AND J-JEWEL SYNERGY
J-PHOENIX
Kaidou finally went home to his mother (him dying in TV was really tragic) ;_;
Mamoru returning to Hana
The Grave for Gutsy Galaxy Guard

[lilboocorsola]

I've only grown familiar with Danbooru's "no hotlinking rule" through stalking animesuki's Haruhi image thread. The only other place I usually go for pictures is the SOS dan imageboard. Though I don't care much for art of other series, I've been meaning to check out Pivix since I recently heard about it from friend.

On a related note, I think I just died upon seeing some of the new game art for The Reminiscences of Haruhi Suzumiya for PSP/PS3. Some of the KyoAni C79 artbook images I've been waiting for have recently been scanned too, though up close many of the facial structures look terrible. I can't stand this new K-ON/Haruhi fusion style. It makes me want to stab something.

As for that Eri pic you posted... Well, you'll see, Talon.

[big bad birtha]

I just finished GaoGaiGar Final. Haah... I had a bad feeling about this ever since I saw the Nanoha Optimus Primes and the female Guy clone. It wasn't terrible, but so many things were just really really silly. Some things would include everything involving Mikoto (way WAY too overdramatic in everything she does), how the characters are shown being shattered to pieces, then they're perfectly intact a few seconds later, and how Genesic GaoGaiGar was made. It seemed like they pulled a lot of their ideas out of their asses at the last moment or something.

Despite all that, I can't say I didn't enjoy it a little bit. Sure, I was very disappointed, and often shook my head at some of the lame things that appeared, but it was the same cast as the television series, so I couldn't bring myself to dislike it. The ending wasn't bad either (I SO called what would happen at the end too!)

For what I'll do next. I'll either start watching Gundam Wing, or play Yume Miru Kusuri. I still haven't decided which.

[Doppleganger]

Studying, but I've got to chime in that I am REALLY satisfied with how Chapter 4 in SnK is going. Thus far, it's the smoothest ride I've had with this VN. The sad part is I think the chapter is almost over.

Originally Posted by big bad birtha

and how Genesic GaoGaiGar was made.

You mean how Mikoto activated the Program Drive?

Originally Posted by big bad birtha

For what I'll do next. I'll either start watching Gundam Wing, or play Yume Miru Kusuri. I still haven't decided which.

Why Wing? Because of SRW?

[big bad birtha]

That's a yes to both of them.

Mikoto shooting off into space and hitting that G Crystal thing for a program drive was just silly as hell.

I also forgot to mention. I usually dislike cloning characters, but I forgave the Chinese Optimus Prime clones, because China's always ripping off ideas.

For Gundam Wing, SRW is pretty much the main reason. Duo and Heero are two of my main reals, so I figured I might as well blow some time watching the series they're from.