Category Anime

Dec 21 2016

First Impressions: Yuri!! on Ice episodes 1 – 9

 

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Plot

After graduating college and was greatly defeated at the Grand Prix finals, Yuri Katsuki returns home. Due to his lost at the Grand Prix, he questions himself on if he should continue as a pro figure skater or not. As he visits Yoko, his childhood friend, at an ice skating rink, he mimics a skating routine that his idol, Victor Nikiforov, had performed.

 

The next day, Yuri discovers that Yoko’s daughters had secretly recorded his performance, and had uploaded it to the internet. The video catches Victor’s attention. After watching it, he decides to travel to Japan, and becomes Yuri’s coach.

 

My Thoughts

I have to admit that, when I first hear of the title of this show, I thought it was going to be about lesbians since “yuri” is used to describe anime, manga, and other entertainment media that deal with attraction between women. However, when I read the show’s summary, I realized that was about male figure skating.

 

With that said, I normally don’t watch a lot of sport anime since I’m not really into sports. In spite of this, I decided to give this show a shoot since I don’t recall any anime that centers on figuring skating. And it isn’t that bad. In fact, I found myself enjoying it, and laughing at some moments.

 

The characters, in my option, are what really steal the show. Each character has a few goofy moments. Even the serious ones get a few. When they do get silly, I can’t help but laugh. Now, I don’t normally ship characters together. However, I really want Yuri and Victor to get together. They have a good chemistry. Also, I believe they help bring the best out of each other. An example of this is that Victor, in his own way, helps Yuri gain some self-confess while Yuri had inspired Victor to be a coach.

Jul 24 2016

First Impressions: Servamp episode 1

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Summary

Shirota Mahiru is a teenager who likes simple things, and don’t like difficult things. One day, he takes in a black stray cat, and names him Kuro. After hearing from a friend that there is a vampire attacking some people, Mahiru finds a guy in his home. It turns out that this guy is the stray that Mahiru had taken in. To top it off, Kuro is a vampire who turns into a cat when he’s in sunlight. When Mahiru says Kuro’s name when he’s in his human form, it cases a temporary contract between the two. Kuro finally explains that he’s servant vampire – servamp for short.

 

My Thoughts

What can I say about this episode? No, seriously. What can I say about this episode? Sure, it does an okay job of setting up the premise for the show. Besides that, it’s just okay. There’s nothing that stands out, but there’s nothing wrong with it. It might take me a few more episodes to see if Servamp is really my type of tea.

Jul 22 2016

First Impressions: Berserk (2016) episode 1

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Summary

Taking place sometime after the Eclipse, Guts finds himself being hunted down by demons due to the brand on his neck. On his journey, he encounters Puck, a fairy who begins to follow him. Puck soon witnesses first-hand the horrors of Guts’ life when a monk and his daughter accompanying them become victims to the undead.

 

My Thoughts

I was excited to hear that Berserk was getting a new TV series especially when I heard that it wasn’t going to cover the Golden Age arc since there was already a TV series and a movie trilogy that covered it. Now that it has started airing, how was the first episode?

Let me start with what I didn’t like about this episode: the CGI. It feels like it belongs in a PlayStation 2 game instead of an anime. Also, in my opinion, it feels out of place when it’s being used like whenever someone does something, or when a CGI object or person is in a hand drawn environment.

So, what did I enjoy about this episode? The first thing is that it aspects its viewers to be already familiar with this franchise. For someone like me who have read the manga and/or have seen the 1997 TV series and/or the movies, it’s nice to not have to sit thru some explanations for those who haven’t.

Another thing is the traditional animation. It’s like they took the art style from the manga which I really like. I do wish that they just use this type of animation throughout the episode instead of using CGI half the time.

As for the voice acting, I didn’t have any problems. Hiroaki Iwanaga, who voiced Guts in the movies, has reprised his role as Guts. There is one thing that I hope will happen when this series is release on DVD and/or Blu-Ray here in the US which is that it comes with bloopers. The reason for this is that I really enjoy the bloopers in the 1997 TV series.