Anime Talk: Sailor Moon Crystal

On the first of the New Year, I finished up the final episodes of the first season of Sailor Moon Crystal. As a fan of the original series, I was psyched to hear that Sailor Moon would be remade but even more impressed with the fact that it would follow the original storyline as portrayed in the manga. Having never actually read the source material meant that I had not idea what kind of changes were about to take place and that made me more excited because it meant being able to see the Sailor Senshi not only as an adult, but from an entirely new perspective as well. 

Sailor Moon Crystal starts out just like the original Sailor Moon series. We have a girl named Usako who finds out that she is the reincarnation of a princess from the Silver Millennium - a race of people that once ruled the moon. When the Silver Millennium fell to the forces of evil, the princess, along with her four guardian warriors were sent to Earth to be reborn as humans. After learning about her destiny from a talking cat named Luna (also from the Silver Millennium), Sailor Moon meets and helps to awaken her guardians - Sailor Mercury, Sailor Mars, and Sailor Jupiter. Sailor Venus was the first awakened guardian, having been found by Artemis, another talking cat from the Silver Millennium, some time before Sailor Moon herself awakened. Joining our cast is a mysterious man who calls himself, "Tuxedo Mask" and appears to help Sailor Moon when she most needs it. 

Anime Talk: Wolf Children

Recently, I decided that I should really watch some of the movies I've been planning to watch for a while now. So, I went ahead and rented a few of them. Most of them are Hollywood movies but there are a few that are animated movies. One of the first ones I grabbed was Wolf Children or, if we go by its Japanese name, The Wolf Children Ame and Yuki. 

I have been wanting to watch Wolf Children for a while now as many of my friends and former classmates have raved endlessly about the movie. I wasn't sure what to expect to be honest. But after settling down snugly in my living room to watch it from beginning to end I TOTALLY GET IT. 

The movie is told from the perspective of an adult Yuki who is reminiscing and relaying the story of her mother Hana. Hana was a young college student when she met Yuki's father, a young man who is very reserved and is attending her college lectures without actually being a student himself. Hana notices that he doesn't have a textbook and offers to lend him hers. This eventually buds into a romance between the two, with Hana slowly but surely, getting past the young man's tough exterior and getting to know him little by little. One day however (it's Christmas if I remember correctly) he arrives VERY late to their scheduled date. He apologizes to Hana and finally reveals his secret - he is a werewolf! The last of his kind, he was raised in the country by relatives who knew nothing about his origins following the death of his parents. He decided to come to the city for work and lives a lonely life, keeping to himself due to his secret. While surprised, Hana accepts him for who he is and they soon begin a family. Yuki is born first and then one year later, Ame is born. 

Anime Talk: Black Butler Book of Murder

Before we get started, just a quick disclaimer: I am a big fan of the Black Butler manga/anime series. So be prepared for a (likely) biased review.

"There's nothing more deceiving, than an obvious truth."

I don't quite remember why I first started watching Black Butler. I think it had something to do with finding out Yuya Matsushita would be in the stage play. Whatever the case, I watched the original Black Butler anime and Black Butler II. When Black Butler: Book of Circus was released in 2014, I watched that too and patiently waited for English subs for Book of Murder. I loved the original Black Butler series, and I quite liked how Black Butler II ended. It was unexpected and I loved that about it. However, I quickly learned that the ending seen in BBII is not the official ending to the manga series; it was just an ending made for the anime only. Well, with great demand, the studio that animated the original Black Butler released Book of Circus, which continues the manga storyline. Book of Circus is my favorite of the 3 series related to Black Butler so naturally, I decided I was absolutely going to watch Book of Murder. Well, without further ado, let's take a look at Book of Murder. 

Anime Talk: Fate/Zero

In an earlier Animediction post here, I reviewed Fate/Stay Night, the first anime in the Fate/ series. As promised, I have now finished watching Fate/Zero, the anime that serves as a sort of "prologue" to the Fate/Stay anime, setting in motion many events that come to fruition in the Fate/Stay night anime. I'll be honest, I started out this anime a bit skeptical, because hey, I didn't particularly like Fate/Stay Night. However, from the very first episode, Fate/Zero captivated me in a way that F/S never did and ultimately, is a far superior anime than its predecessor. 

Anime Talk: Conqueror of Shamballa

So, it has happened. I have watched Conqueror of Shamballa (to be honest, I watched it yesterday but I didn't want to blog about it right after as it probably would have been an incoherent post). For those that haven't watched it, there are major spoilers in here, so be warned! Back to the movie - I was honestly confused during the first 5 or so minutes, because I seriously thought the first half of the movie was going to be a summary of everything that had happened in the anime series. However, it quickly switched to Ed and Al?? Well, yes, Ed is speaking with Alphonse, but not the Al we all know and love but the Al that exists on the other side of the gate. From there, the movie begins to unfold pretty quickly. While Ed is on one side of the wall, trying to find a way to get back to his world and helping a gypsy fortuneteller on the way, Al is on the other side, studying alchemy and developing an uncanny resemblance to his elder brother. Seriously, you can mistake Al easily for Ed if it weren't for the different bangs. I thought this was a neat quirk as throughout the series, it's Ed that is constantly mistaken for Al due to his stature. And speaking of stature...Ed has grown taller! The topic of Ed's height makes for some great comical moments in the movie as Ed seems to take just as much offense when people mention that he's taller as when he was being teased for being short.

Anime Talk: Fullmetal Alchemist 「鋼の錬金術師」

Ahhhhh!! The time has come. It's time to write of my tumultuous feelings surrounding Fullmetal Alchemist or, as known in Japan, 鋼の錬金術師 (Hagane no Renkinjutsushi). There are a few things I want to say first. 1. I have watched Fullmetal before, but never in any particular order. During my middle school years, I would sometimes watch an episode during my wait for Inuyasha to start (or maybe after Inuyasha ended...I can't remember which aired first). In total, I watched maybe 5 episodes of FMA. I found it entertaining, but didn't commit to the whole series. I decided after my 2012 trip to Japan that I should really watch the series from beginning to end. I now know that there are two Fullmetal animes: the original Fullmetal Alchemist which diverges from the manga storyline into it's own separate story entirely and Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood, which stays faithful to the manga. I opted to watched the original FMA first, and this is the anime I will be reviewing today. Also, another quick thing to note: I watched the subbed version of FMA, meaning that the audio was entirely in Japanese. Due to this, I may slip into referring to FMA as "Hagane" or "Fullmetal", sorry about that in advance. 

Anime Talk: Fate/Stay Night

On this edition of Animediction, we'll take a look at Fate/Stay Night, an anime based on a video game of the same name (also now a visual novel!). Fate/Stay Night is not to be confused with Fate/Stay Night Unlimited Blade Works. From my understanding, Unlimited Blade Works follows the same general premise as Fate/Stay Night but changes key parts of the plot so that the viewer experiences an alternate storyline to the one seen in Fate/Stay Night. 

Now, originally I had planned to watch Fate/Zero, but then I realized that there were two more Fate/ series listed. After some research, I decided to watch the anime(s) in the timeline in which they were released. Therefore, I settled down to watch Fate/Stay Night. 

Anime Talk: Attack on Titan

Giant man-eating humanoids, three walls that protect the nearly extinct population of humans, one boy who possess the key (literally) to stopping them - Attack on Titan, or better known by its Japanese name, Shingeki no Kyojin is a manga turned anime that captured the attention of not only the Japanese audience, but international audiences as well. 

I had heard a lot about this anime, which consisting mostly of people raving about how good it is. However, when it was released, I was super busy with school and work and didn't think much about picking it up. When I saw it at my local Family Video I was quite surprised. I remember thinking, "Wow, it must be really popular to end up here!" And yet, I still didn't watch it. It wasn't until a month ago that I finally sat down to watch this anime. I can sum up the experience in one word: 

AMAZING.

Anime Talk: Believe It! 「だってばよ！」

Once upon a time, a long, long time ago, there was a young girl who loved to watch anime. Cartoon Network had just announced a new anime series that it would begin airing. The show was to revolve around ninjas, and naturally, this perked the girls interest. After convincing her siblings, they would all watch every episode of the original Naruto series together.

Now, at this point in time, the animation production time allowed for a time lapse, in order to allow the original manga (the comic on which the anime was based on) to move farther ahead in the storyline. However, Cartoon Network had pulled the plug on the series.  This was during a time before the young girl knew of the wonder of Hulu, and so she dropped the series altogether. Years later, she would find Naruto Shippuden, the continuation of the original Naruto series online and would sit down to watch the episodes with her brother. They would reach the Pain arc, and decide to give the show a rest, in order to allow episodes to accumulate and avoid any unnecessary filler episodes. However, time passed and the series lay forgotten. Of course, it's pretty obvious that the young girl was me. A few years after watching the Pain arc, I decided to pick up the series once again, largely because I had been hearing things. And these "things" sparked my interest. This is a summary of everything I have experienced since picking up Naruto once again.

Now, when I decided to pick Naruto back up, I decided to go back to the very beginning. That's right, I rewatched the original series (sans fillers, I skipped over those). Watching those again made me realize why I had loved Naruto so much. Kishimoto (the creator of Naruto) did a fantastic job of creating the world of the shinobi. He skillfully adds Japanese lore into the storyline, and at the same time, keeps the series very fresh. I marvel at his entire universe, with shinobi villages serving as the military strongholds of the five great nations, with the political power play between clans, between the feudal lords and the Kage of each village, and between nations as well.