Tsukihime, Planetes, and more.

[If you wonder why I'm posting now, it's because I promised myself an episode of anime if I finished my sets before 3.]

So I'm slowly finalizing the list of current anime I'm going to follow. Kimi ga Nozomu Eien is definitely there. As nowhere says, it went from high school romance to mature drama. It's not something I usually watch, and not something I'm particularly passionate about, but it's an enjoyable, interesting series. It's fluffy . . . in a serious drama sort of way. I mean, it takes little brain power to watch and all.

Still on the trial list are Tsukihime, Planetes, Avenger, and Yami to Boushi to Hon no Tabibito. My sister recommended Tsukihime and Avenger, and although Yami to Boushi to Hon no Tabibito is based on a hentai game -- which I think Tsukihime and Kimi ga Nozomu Eien are as well -- it has a very interesting-sounding premise, so I'll give it a try.

Planetes is another low brain-power sort of series. It slowly develops the characters in an episodic manner, focusing on something seemingly trivial. But each episode has that really sappy climax that makes me think it's not so bad after all, although sometimes it can be a bit blah. From the example of King of Bandits Jing, though, it seems I can only take this episodic, humorous stuff for so long before I began to demand a more unifying storyline, so I don't know how long it will hold my interest.

Tsukihime is yet very blah. The main character is one of those annoying guys who has no emotions except shock, who kind of wanders through his life in a daze, is very lost and confused as to what is going on, gets dragged into something big and complicated against his will, freaks out a lot, makes his friends concerned about him . . . it's a really typical pattern. They have potential if they grow up, which is usually the point of the series, but until then, you just want to smack them. Hard. I would drop the series except that Arcueid is rather fascinating, and I like what she's pulled Tohno (the guy) into, though hopefully he'll get over the "Aaaah! *cower*" stage quickly. [I really hope there doesn't exist two series in which the main character never matures, and continues to be useless the entire series, Alien 9 being one.] So, yeah, I'll give the story maybe another two or three episodes to deepen, since it's already revealed some complexity, so that I don't start feeling like all I watch is shallow.

I haven't watched Avenger yet. Anime Blog Muyo! gave it a bad review, but my sister seems to really like it, although the premise is apparently hard to describe. Neither have I watched Yami to Boushi to Hon no Tabibito. I will probably make the time to watch both this weekend.

And that should be the end of my trying new series; after that it will just be evaluating whether I really want to keep watching the ones I've already chosen.

Yami to Boushi to Hon no Tabibito.

It's fairly obvious that the series is based on a hentai game, but not obvious enough for me to drop it. I mean, there's a lot of fanservice, and quite a bit of groping, but it's not very explicit, and it has some interesting (non-H) situations. I'm not sure if I want to keep watching yet, but it definitely has my attention.

The beginning, though, made me think, "So the point of this series is . . . yuri?" But it pulled back from that rather quickly. The first episode was total confusion, and ended on something that should have felt like a cliffhanger, but somehow didn't. There were a bunch of flashbacks, in non-chronological order, all very cryptic, and then suddenly it was somewhere else, in media res, of course, and I was lost all over again. By the end of the second episode, though, most of the small things, the plot points within the arc, had been explained sufficiently, and I was happy. The larger storyline looks to be interesting, although it would help a lot if they would bother to show the time that obviously lapsed between the first confusing part and the second. The gap makes it so that the main character knows a lot more than we do, whereas at the beginning she knew nothing.

Speaking of the main character, she really reminds me of Mai from Kanon. At first it was just the way she threatened the yellow thing with a letter opener, but then she started carrying around a sword, too. She's really emotionless and serious, and she has the motivating blond-haired, kind-hearted friend, too. (Very interesting, having a mute character that spoke in sign language; too bad she went away so soon.) I don't like her as much as I do Mai, though, whom I like best among the Kanon girls. Hatsuki just seems very selfish, and has emotional issues that just don't move me at all.

By the way, is there something in Japanese or general folklore about the oversized hat with an eye on the front? It's a lot like Bebedora's in Arc the Lad: Twilight of the Spirits, and Lilith seems to be the same kind of outwardly empty-headed but actually very dark and possessing of much black magic type of character. At least I hope so, because if she's really just empty-headed, I will be pissed. Again, I like Bebedora much better, but that's because she was more whimsical than empty-headed.

Anyways, with the basic story being about having many worlds, each in its own book, things might often be disappointing because there are such interesting characters you meet in each arc, never to see again. At the same time, there are way too many names to keep track of. And who opens a series by introducing you to a Hatsuki and a Hatsumi at the same time? That took me ten minutes to figure out.

But yeah, in general, there's some silliness, and some gratuitous ecchi-ness, and then some interesting plot-ness, so I'll see how it goes. [I always say that. It's part of being indecisive.]