The summer Anime season is winding to an end, and three clear winners have caught my attention. Gate remains my favorite, with the action and international espionage in the Special Zone and Japan torquing up with every episode. I really hope they are planning a second season of that one, there is a lot of story yet to tell in that universe. Charlotte kicked into high gear in episode 9, when the introduction of a new power completely changed the nature of the story. And while it still reminds me a lot of Attack On Titan, God Eater is very definitely its own story, and quite an exciting one. At this point those are the shows I am watching as soon as they become available, often checking several times during the day to see if they are ready yet.
There are some real interesting bands out of Japan; Hitorie is one of them! The first track is Talkie Dance from their 2nd mini-album released this July, the second is 2013’s Rula Rula from their first full album, and the third is Senseless Wonder from 2014.
This is about a terminally kawaii game called Mice and Mystics which Wil Wheaton brought in and showed on his program Tabletop!. Not being content to let it stop there, he also brought in some family members, specifically Anne Wheaton, Ryan Wheaton, and Nolan Kopp to demonstrate how the game should be played. Or maybe he was trying to show us how his family plays simple but interesting games together, which quite frankly reminded me about how my families gaming sessions go. This is the TableTop Season 3 finale, or at least the first part of it, and if you haven’t been following from the beginning this episode should make you realize why you want to go back and binge-watch the entire season. And then maybe the 2 before that. And if you have missed this, perhaps the channel the program is on might have snuck past you in the darkness; Geek And Sundry is a Felicia Day project that has gathered together some of my favorite people on the planet and given them a platform to prove to the rest of us why they are fun folks.
My favorite Anime series this season was GATE, and it pretty much still is. But now Daisuki has an exclusive on a new truly kick ass show that has caught my attention: God Eater is an amazing project, using edits and camera work normally reserved for the better live action programs, and almost never seen in animations. The animation quality itself is also far better than normal, with a lot more attention to detail. I should mention that by “Exclusive” I don’t mean they are the only service that has it, but it looks like they do have any given episode a good 4 weeks ahead of the competition. So if you find this one as worthy of attention as I do, that is an excellent reason to sign up for a Free Daisuke Membership, and maybe even consider getting a premium/paid membership, if you like what you see there well enough.
The core story line is also grittier than the other offerings, but seems to be extracted/stolen directly from Attack On Titan; giant god-like creatures are breaking through the protective walls humanity is hiding behind, and eating everybody they can catch. While they are doing all the parts of it so much better than we have seen before, it is sad that they didn’t come up with their own plot line, but only swiped someone else’s story. Of course, the people that read the original Manga might argue with that interpretation, but that is how it appears to me.
Pretty much my favorite band out of Asia for the last few years, ONE OK ROCK has the chops, the attitude, and the skill set to own the rock world while based out of Japan. They started out around 2005, proving yet again that it takes about 10 years to become an overnight sensation in the music business. The first live track is called Decision, the second is Mighty Long Fall, then the official studio version of the latter song follows those. The live tracks are both from their recent Mighty Long Fall at Yokohama Stadium release, their 5th live DVD which they posted to their You Tube Channel. You have been able to get these tracks and others from them on iTunes for your permanent collection for a while now. But they signed with Warner Bros. Records recently, in a deal that includes releasing their work on CD and DVD in the US, starting with “35xxxv Deluxe Edition” in September. All songs will be in English, and the US version of the album will include two bonus tracks not on the Japanese version. They will be doing a North American tour in support of that release, with stops including Chicago, New York, Toronto, Silver Spring, and Houston.
Previous ONE OK ROCK posts, with music embeds: One OK Rock: Cry Out, Against The Current, More One OK Rock, Please!, One OK Rock: Taka!, Still More One OK Rock!, More Alt J-Rock, More J-Rock, and One OK Rock.
Associated: Rurouni Kenshin 3 trailer (movie), My First Story (band), RUROUNI KENSHIN 2 trailer (movie).
One of the more amusing Anime’s this season is Actually I Am… , in which Kuromine is a high school student who supposedly cannot keep a secret. I know that doesn’t sound like much of a premise, but the writers take it and run with it, with quite funny results. This is about all I can say without needing to post a Spoiler Alert: A bit over the half way mark through the first episode he discovers the girl he has a crush on, Yoko Shiragami, has a secret. She will be yanked out of school and he will never see her again if her dad learns that anyone knows about her, so he spends the rest of the episode going to great lengths to help keep her secret. Things just keep getting funnier from there, episode after episode, at least through the first half dozen of them. I have no idea if they can keep up the momentum and the humor all the way through the series, or first season, or however long it ends up being, but I really like the show so far. Check it out and see what you think.