Spring 2012 Impressions~ Part III

The 3rd part of the Spring'12 impression does not include Sengoku Paradise, Bakugan, Jewelpet and Pretty Rhythm.

First on the list is Recorder to Randoseru Re ♪. It is the 2nd season of Recorder to Randoseru Do ♪. I have been watching it since the first season. This is a short 5mins comedy and it is a Slice of Life as well. You will feel 'how I wish it could last longer' most of the time after watching. This is also one of the best short production of this season in my opinion. 
It is about the daily life of Atsushi, an overgrown elementary school kid and her sister, Atsumi, an underdeveloped high school student. It gets more hilarious over at Atsushi side as he often get mistaken for a lolicon when walking home with his female classmates. 
This is quite an amusing series for a 5mins production though a little pity for the shortness. My score for the series is 6.8/10.

Next is Acchi Kocchi. Before watching it, I thought that it would be a totally random series with the usual gags and probably just your average series overall. After watching, I completely fell in love with the series. The genre of the show is Comedy, Romance and Slice of Life. Though it is still totally random in each episode, I enjoyed watching every second of it.
The main characters includes Io Otonashi - a composed Ikemen who does not realize the true feelings of Tsumiki towards him, Tsumiki - a tsundere (not so much of a tsun) who grows these irresistible nekomimi whenever she blushes, Hime - a pure and innocent girl whose nose will burst out fountain of blood whenever she witnesses mushy scenes especially that of Tsumiki and Io, Mayoi - a prankster and friend of Tsumiki and Hime who will often tease Tsumiki and Io and lastly Sakaki - friend of Io and another prankster that works hand in hand with Mayoi. I will skip the episodes summary since it is a Slice of Life.
In my opinion, if you are into moe characters, 'blushing scenes' and laughter & enjoyment in watching a series, this is for you! Also, I personally feel that the strongest point of the series is not the comedy but the characters.
My rating for the series is an 8/10!

My friend once told me about the Sankarea manga before it got adapted into the Anime version. The manga have quite decent reviews on the web though I did not watch it. It is a series about Zombies and Romance, so you can expect some supernatural element as well.


In episode one, the protagonist, Furuya was introduced. He is a zombie lover and is totally obsessed with everything zombie. Around him are Jogorou - his grandpa(probably a zombie), Doon - his dad(head priest), Mero - his sister, Baabu - his pet and Ranko - his (hawt) cousin.

Baabu passes away right after the character introduction. Furuya who couldn't accept it decided to try out one of the old resurrection books he took from his relatives place that was suppose to be donated to a archive in the area. After a couple of failed attempts, he saw a girl screaming into a well nearby.

She noticed him and later requested that he do not tell anyone about what he had saw. They soon calm down and chatted. Furuya told her about Baabu and surprisingly she doesn't seem that shock. Knowing that Furuya likes zombie, she asked him a strange question, 'Will you take responsibility if I become a zombie?' after requesting to be his experimental subject. Though it was rejected by Furuya.

More about the mysterious girl is introduced in the second episode. Her name is Sanka Rea and she is the 'princess' of the Sanka's Girl School(correct me if I am wrong) and her family is rather unique. Her father will do a photo-shoot of her every year clothless to record her 'so-called' growth rate.(He is obviously a pedobear!) Also, when someone gets too intimate to her, her father will do whatever possible to destroy them. As for her mother, she treats her like a stranger due to the father's obsession. A very tragic life she must have been through if you ask me.

For the rest of the episode, Rea and Furuya was continuing with their attempt to resurrect Baabu. The pair tried all sorts of poisonous flower as stated in the recipe but none worked. Rea suggested hydrangea which is indeed poisonous. (Furuya mentioned that his grandpa will often chew them like sweets - This suggest that the grandpa is dead!) Just as about Furuya was going to feed Baabu the potion, Rea took a little of the potion. Nothing strange happened after that and Furuya decided to bury Buuba for real tomorrow.

They made a promise to meet at the same place for the burial and Furuya sent Rea home. However, Rea's dad spotted Furuya and decided to ground Rea for life(she is now not even allowed to attend school). Rea decided to commit suicide and drank the potion that she took before.

The next episode continued with Rea's failed suicide attempt. A while later, the head butler whispered something to Sanka's father and she was told to leave the hall. She eavesdropped on their conversation and realized that her father has asked the butler to locate Furuka and castrate him. She sneaked out of the house to find Furuka.

At Furuka's side, Baabu have successful been revived into a zombie. Apparently the potion they made previously worked. Baabu then ran away and Furuka and Ranko gave chased. Baabu lost them in a long and narrow sewer duct. Ranko was stuck(see what i meant by hawt? She's too hawt for the sewer duct!) in there and Furuka continues to give chase.

Furuya later came to a graveyard and she saw Rea up a cliff. Rea's father soon follows after the butler informed him about Rea sneaking out. He tries to take Rea back but Baabu jumped up the cliff and walked towards her father. Her father was disgusted by Baabu and took his belt to try and hit Baabu but Rea stood in the way. He misses, hit Rea and she fell down the cliff and died. However, she later came back up again as a zombie.

Not sure how differently it has been adapted from the manga, but I believe it is a good production. I really like the character art of Rea and i think all the Seiyuu did a great job in voicing their respective characters. My only worry is that it would probably end without an ending as it is only 12 episode.
My rating for the series would be an 8.4/10!

I believe that Natsuiro Kiseki will be a beautiful series. It is a Drama Comedy though it is mainly the drama that attracted me. It is about four best friends, Natsumi, Saki, Yuka and Ringo.

In the first episode, Natsumi and Saki had a fight. They then started a cold-war and refuse to talk to one another. Yuka and Ringo decided to do something about it and faked an emergency to get them out. In the past, the four of them would stand by a guardian rock with their hands on it and then make the same wish.

Yuka and Ringo decided to call them there. They then discussed about the past and decided to do it once more. They all wished to fly and it is just then, a miracle happened. The four of them flew up into the sky. They had the shock of their life after it and just can't believe it.
 

The next episode continues with Saki and Natsumi still refusing to talk to one another. Ringo and Yuka accidentally made a wish. They made a wish to make Natsumi and Saki stick together until they reconcile with each other. Natsumi and Saki then literally got stuck to each other. They realized it was Ringo and Yuka who caused it and chased them all around town. They caught them after sometime and quarreled but soon reconciled right after.

In episode 3, apparently Natsumi's brother's friend witnessed Natsumi and her friend floating in the sky. He tells Natsumi's brother but he did not believe it. He kept insisting and their friendship soon crumbled. In order to help her brother, Natsumi told her friends and they decided to show them once again.

Saki decided to act as a witch since she is moving soon and told him to bring Natsumi's brother along to where he first witnessed it. Unsure of how the rock guardian actually work, they made the same wish, "to fly" again but to no avail. Saki worrying that the two may broke out into a fight again ran to them and explained everything and they are back as friends again.




The unique thing about the series is that all the four protagonist are voiced by members of the girl band, Sphere. The ED and OP theme are too performed by them. I have never seen them voice the same series before so I am really excited. I must say that they really did a good job in voicing their respective characters. My favorite character in the series is currently Yuka(in terms of appearance) who is voiced by Aki Toyosaki and Ringo(Overall main favourite because she is voiced by Tomatsu Haruka) if you are interested.

My score for this awesome series is a 8.7/10

Accel World is another of my anticipated series beside Korezon. This is a Sci-Fi Action series by Sunrise so it should be good. I find it unique in the sense that the series protagonist is not your usual Ikemen(or at least average looking) but a short and plump male. It is kind of rare to see such protagonist or should I say, in my years of watching Anime, I have NEVER saw such protagonist.

For episode one, it is actually a 1hr-special which means it is episode 1 and 2. for that episode, it introduced some of the important characters, Haruyuki - Main protagonist, Chiyuri - Haruyuki's childhood friend, Takumu - Also Haruyuki's childhood friend and Kuroyukihime - the female protagonist. It also introduced the settings and the main battle system.

Kuroyukime brought Haruyuki into the Accel World. In the Accel World, only those with the program "Brain Burst" will be able to move in the accelerated world by having their mind sped up. Kuroyukihime also told him not to connect to the global network no matter what.

The next day, as Haruyuki was going to school, he accidentally connected to the global network and was brought to a strange place. His avatar became a silver robot kind of character named Silver Crow and was hunted by another guy. Being an amateur and completely unknowing of what is going on, he was knocked out within seconds and lost.

It was later revealed by Kuroyukihime that the place Haruyuki was at before was a stage and there, he have to battle another Brain Burst owner in order to gain points for each use of the acceleration ability. There are 100 points in total and if one loses all their points, they will lose the accelerating ability forever. He later worked with Kuroyukihime in a plan to get revenge. They managed to track down Ash Roller who have unexpectedly level up after crushing Haruyuki previously and after some intense battle scenes, Haruyuki won.

The plot was elaborated more in episode 3. The user's avatar is actually based off the color chart including black and white and there are a total of 7 level 9 users known as Kings. The higher the level, the purer the color of the user. The point of the 'game' is that when one leveled up to 10, they will be able to meet the game creator. As none of the kings want to lose their accelerating ability, they set up a truce and each created a territory to rule over. Kuroyukihime also mentioned that she was the Black King and as she really want to meet the creator to find out the main point of this game, she destroyed the Red King causing an uproar with the rest and is now hunted.

She also mentioned that she was recently attack in school(where no one other than him and Haruyuki was suppose to be a Brain Burst user). Together with Haruyuki, they went to research on the identity of the attacker, starting with a suspect, Chiyuri.




I kind of like how the 'system' is based off the color chart -Blue, Red, Yellow, Green, Purple, White and Black and the purer the colors means the purer in that field of ability. Though still quite confusing, but I am sure things will be much clearer as the series continues.

My rating for the series is a 7.2 currently but I believe the story will develop much more interestingly therefore my score is will probably increase in the future.

パートスリー！