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louis6578 wrote:

I actually value your opinion somewhat. Utena isn't the masterpiece that people perceive it as (some people say that it takes multiple viewings to truly appreciate, and that's a flaw if you ask me). A more straightforward narrative with symbolism intertwined would be great. Between Tutu, Madoka, and Utena, I think that's why Tutu is my personal favorite.

Princess Tutu is one of the most amazing things it's ever been my pleasure to watch...so yeah. Anime hyper

In terms of........well, actually, everything it beats a long list of other magical girl anime. It may even beat Card Captor Sakura.

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My problem with Sailor Moon is the opposite of why you dislike Utena. Usagi is a little too weak of a person. I keep getting told that it's to make her more relatable, but that would be fine if she outgrew it early on or even by episode 50. Instead, toward the climax of each arc, Usagi becomes brave, strong, kindhearted, selfless, etc. only to reset at the beginning of the next arc. I always found that to be annoying. Granted, I never hated her or strongly disliked Usagi. I just feel like I've seen her character done better with Duck from Tutu and Madoka from... erm... Madoka. Anime hyper

I've always liked Usagi but yes, she is terribly flanderized in the anime compared to the manga for the sake of cheap "lolz" and that pisses me off a lot. Because she matures a lot faster in the manga and she stays that way.

But even if you're not a big fan of Usagi, she's not the only heroine. There are lots of other girls to cheer for and Moonies seem to always find that favorite of theirs. Which is the reason why I think Sailor Moon is so well-loved; huge cast does wonders for shows.....same goes for DBZ.

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Also, I know this is off topic, but I liked how in Tutu, when Duck transformed, her voice became elegant and her behavior was completely devoid of comic relief despite still being weak in a fight. I think Sailor Moon could have benefited from a similar effect, albeit, to a lesser extent.

I agree, that's neat and this has actually been a thing for a while in the magical girl world: the heroine transforms into a more mature version of herself. This carries on into magical idol girls (where I can pimp my favorite anime: Full Moon Wo Sagashite ) More warrior-type girl shows that do this are Nurse Angel Ririka SOS, and Akazukin Chacha. (There are more examples but these are my favorite ones.)

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It's pretty surprising that with all the Sailor Guardians, somehow Sailor Moon is known as a hero in-universe before anyone else, despite her doing almost none of the fighting until the final blow. A bit of MC indulgence, hm?

It's a shame because when I rewatched the entirety of Sailor Moon a few years ago, I noticed something; Usagi DID begin to improve....but as soon as more senshi were introduced, it's like they became enablers for her. Meaning she would have been a whole lot stronger had she been left on her own longer.
Only in the 90s anime though. She does have the most powerful attack; strategically, weakening your enemy and saving the big bang for last does make sense....especially if you play RPGs...and the way the senshi attack is very RPG-like. Anime hyper

I though that Wolf's Rain was a bore. The show just shows a bunch of people living in a horrible world and wandering about in a tragic manner. Felt forced and artificial.

Paranoia Agent was all right. Satoshi Kon's work overall is more popular among English speaking anime fans, I guess because he appeals to their tastes more than Japanese tastes. Overall though it's not something I would regard as great.

@ Chiibi

Well, I do plan on watching Cardcaptor Sakura. It's on my CrunchyRoll Queue. As for Usagi being better in the manga, I heard Sailor Moon Crystal is getting better, so maybe that'll be my chance to see a non-flanderized Usagi. SPEAKING OF MAGICAL GIRL ANIME I NEED TO WATCH... I'm still on episode 10 of Fushigi Yuugi. I gotta get back to that!

[Edit]: removed unnecessary nested quotes. Please read the quoting guidelines. Errinundra.

@Louis6578

Is it really necessary to quote an entire post, rather than write something like "regarding you last post..."? It's essensially double-posting, but maybe I'm the only one who's bothered by it. (If ANN were to replace all longer quotes on this site with ads, they'd make a fortune.) Razz

@Chiibi

I've heard several people speak warmly of Princess Tutu lately. I must really give it a chance, but there's so much else that I haven't seen either. Convince me! Wink

Fixed. I meant to do it sooner, but I forgot. Confused

Night fox wrote:

I've heard several people speak warmly of Princess Tutu lately. I must really give it a chance, but there's so much else that I haven't seen either. Convince me! Wink

Heh......

Well, my dear Night Fox, in my experience, very few things have convinced people to watch this show more than this

......my god, ten years and I STILL get chills.....now that's quality.

^ Well, I'm sold, the art looks amazing and who can resist Nanne Grönvall? Wink

But damn, I like to finish what I've started and I've still got 40 eps left of LotGH. I suppose I could alternate between the two, watching 3 eps at a time then switch. Anime dazed

I just finished Tenchi Universe, and I'm not sure what the general consensus is on it, but I thought the first half is almost totally skippable if you saw the OVA already, and Mihoshi is pretty damn annoying throughout. Even the first bit of the second half is kinda fillerish, but the final disc (The last six episodes) were pretty good. I'd say it's a "good" on our rating system and worth your time. Um... so if people dislike Tenchi Universe for the most part... I guess I disagree.

@Night Fox: DO EET. Surprised

louis6578 wrote:

I just finished Tenchi Universe, and I'm not sure what the general consensus is on it, but I thought the first half is almost totally skippable if you saw the OVA already, and Mihoshi is pretty damn annoying throughout. Even the first bit of the second half is kinda fillerish, but the final disc (The last six episodes) were pretty good. I'd say it's a "good" on our rating system and worth your time. Um... so if people dislike Tenchi Universe for the most part... I guess I disagree.

WOW you watch anime fast. Anime hyper

Yeah, I like the last arc.....and I also like the Alternate Universe arc. Other than those arcs.......it's not spectacular but it is a fun watch. I thought they made Aeka 10 times more bitchy. Kiyone's pretty great though; love her dub actress. Anime hyper

Have you watched the movies?

^ Oh yeah. I got the thing on DVD and I usually watch a disc per day when I'm able. This time around, stuff started happening near the end of disc 2 (the main plot kicks off then) and I just wanted to get it done.

I have not seen the movies, but I might sooner or later. Right now, Ryo-Ohki 3 is on my list and right next to my blu-ray player! I hope it's good.

^ Yes, Tutu is a thousand times better than Madoka, if only because it doesn't beat you over the head with how "daaaark" and "creeepy" it's supposed to be. It just does what it wants to do. Honestly, Utena has a lot of the same problem as Madoka... I hate feeling like the author of a thing is sitting next to me, telling me how to feel about the story. That's how that style of direction comes off. It's annoying.

My unpopular opinion, about Love Live: NicoMaki, RinPana, NozoEli, and second-year OT3 are all my NOTPs. I ship HonoEli, because they're not awful to each other. I also ship MakiPana just to get them away from Nico and Rin, who are immature and mean. They're my least-favorites, but not enough to ruin the show, until people start shipping them with better characters.

I find it really cringeworthy the way Rin talks to Hanayo. She's possessive and condescending.

^

I might have to disagree with you on WHY I think Tutu is better than Madoka. Madoka was just a bit too short. It should've been 24 episodes long. The same dark twists could've happened, but we needed more time between them to avoid becoming apathetic. Look at Urobuchi's two other critically acclaimed works, Fate/Zero and Psycho Pass. If you halved their lengths, they simply wouldn't have had the same effect because the first half of the story is spend developing and getting to know these characters, while the second half is spent putting these dark twists and horrible plans into motion. Imagine watching Kiritsugu's flashback episodes (or even episode because it would've been shortened) on episode 7 of Fate/Zero with only 4 or 5 episodes to go. It would be jarring. Imagine Kayneth and Lancer's end being in episode 6. Not quite the same effect. The same motions could happen, but it becomes less "Kiritsugu is a heartless machine!" and more "That one guy with the guns sure screwed over the guy with the big spear and the blond-haired jerk man."

Spoiler territory! Madoka hits you with some huge plot twist or dark turn every episode or two after the second episode.

spoiler[Episode 1 - The concept of Magical Girls is brought up and offered to the girls
Episode 2 - The girls find out a little more about witches and familiars and how they affect normal people
Episode 3 - Mami dies
Episode 4 - Characters mourn Mami and Sayaka makes a contract
Episode 5 - Kyoko is introduced
Episode 6 - Walpurgisnacht is revealed by Homura, Homura allies with Kyoko, Soul Gems are revealed to be their literal souls and life batteries.
Episode 7- Sayaka gets really hurt and betrayed over the fact that Soul Gems are souls (-.- srsly?). Kyoko's backstory is revealed. Hitomi reveals her feelings for (the totally one dimensional and still existing as only a plot device for Sayaka) Kyosuke. Sayaka believes herself to not be good enough for Kyosuke because having a soul gem as a vessel for your soul apparently makes you a monster (sorry, letting my own feelings enter in here, but I think that's kinda dumb). Sayaka sinks into depression.
Episode 8 - A LOT happens. Madoka is almost convinced to become a magical girl to fix Sayaka, Homura kills Kyubey and Madoka gets brief hints of her relationship with Homura from alternate timelines, Kyubey reveals that he can easily use another body to come back. Sayaka becomes a witch, dropping arguably the biggest plot twist of them all, Magical Girls become witches.
Episode 9 - The girls try to pull a "I know you're in there, fight it!" on witch!Sayaka. It fails. Kyoko does a murder-suicide with Sayaka (I think that's how that went down anyway... but Kyoko didn't really have much of a reason to give everything up to die with Sayaka, and killing her without dying was totally doable for her. It seemed more selfish than anything to me since she barely spent any non-antagonistic time with Sayaka and Homura needed help with Walpurgisnacht, but oh well).
Episode 10 - Homura flashback (arguably the best episode in the whole show).
Episode 11 - Homura and Madoka talk. Homura lies about being able to handle this herself. Madoka is told of her relationship with Homura by Kyubey. Homura fights Walpurgisnacht. Madoka has a final scene with her mother (one that I feel I should've been more invested in but wasn't) and finally appears in front of Homura, ready to make her wish with Kyubey.
Episode 12 - Madoka retcons the concept of Witches and becomes Godoka. That's... essentially it, but it's a pretty epic scene/episode.]

Does that seem well paced to you guys? I know I'm probably alone here, but I would've personally had each of those plot twists I mentioned happen more separate from each other. They needed more time to sink in properly. This show has a similar problem to what Angel Beats had, but not many people harp on it at all. It's the sort of show where, if you know the plot twists ahead of time, they lose almost all impact. Someone can know a lot of the plot twists in Fate/Zero, but the scenes in them still feel impactful. For instance, Fate/Stay Night already pretty much says that no one is getting out of this alive besides Kirei, Kiritsugu, Waver/Lord El-Melloi II, Saber, and Gilgamesh. All the other characters in this series have predetermined deaths, yet even if you know how they die, who kills who, etc. the way it looks when on screen, the emotion behind the death, and even certain other predetermined scenes spoiler[such as Kiritsugu destroying The Holy Grail near the end] are all a spectacle to behold.

This is all because Gen Urobuchi had time to make these characters matter to you. Sure, most of them were going to die, but he waits until halfway through to make these deaths happen. I checked, and there's pretty much a major death in each episode from the halfway point onward, yet it never feels like it's bashing you over the head with too much darkness. Why does Madoka? Because in the end... it kind of is just "little girls dying." I think spending more time with these girls prior to them becoming magical girls would've benefited us as viewers. Giving Kyosuke more personality and giving Sayaka a better reason for believing herself to be an inhuman freak unworthy of love would have been great. I personally would have had Sayaka save Kyosuke from a witch, but her powers combined with the witch attack lead him to believe she is the witch, thus making him call her a monster and outright refuse her. That would've been better than having her just... give up and sink into depression because she was too much of a coward to give love a shot.

Ugh... I'm getting sidetracked. Should you watch Madoka? Yes. Is it well-written? Of course. Is it well-paced? Erm... I personally think it isn't, but I'm sure I'll be lynched tomorrow for saying that something is wrong with the show. Is Madoka the only Magical Girl show worth watching if you're not particularly interested in the genre? Heck no! There are many other deconstructions that are arguably better than Madoka!

Because of how rushed it feels, Madoka is a rare sort of anime where, if one of my friends wants to watch it via the recap movies of it, I don't stop them. Really, the recap movies are around the same amount of time as the show, and they don't leave out anything important. You might as well watch them instead, which is kind of a shame.

Night fox wrote:

But damn, I like to finish what I've started and I've still got 40 eps left of LotGH. I suppose I could alternate between the two, watching 3 eps at a time then switch. Anime dazed

If you mean you're on episode 70-something, then you have way more than 40 episodes of Legend of Galactic Heroes left to watch. Laughing

BodaciousSpacePirate wrote:

If you mean you're on episode 70-something, then you have way more than 40 episodes of Legend of Galactic Heroes left to watch. Laughing

From what I've seen so far I'll likely end up giving the show a Good rating, unless they screwed up the ending somehow, so the 54 prequel episodes and movie are not really a priority at this point.

The universe is big, but I'll settle for a galaxy. Wink

Chiibi wrote:

Night fox wrote:

I've heard several people speak warmly of Princess Tutu lately. I must really give it a chance, but there's so much else that I haven't seen either. Convince me! Wink

Heh......

Well, my dear Night Fox, in my experience, very few things have convinced people to watch this show more than this

......my god, ten years and I STILL get chills.....now that's quality.

Dang...That was a scary good AMV.

Also reminded me how much I loved Rue's character design. If I hadn't just finished watching it a few weeks back and didn't have 10+ series on my Watch List, I'd be going and re-watching it right now.

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