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REVIEW: Shuffle! DVD 1


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Leebo



Joined: 14 Nov 2005
Posts: 660
Location: Somerville, MA
PostPosted: Wed Apr 02, 2008 11:23 pm Reply with quote
Seems like a fair - even forgiving at times - review of a decidedly lackluster series. I like romantic harem-dramas or whatever you want to call them, and Shuffle definitely does tread the lines of stupidity far too often.

Though I liked "innocence" more than "You".
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the Rancorous



Joined: 08 Feb 2006
Posts: 2248
Location: Hunting the Dragon in Gransys
PostPosted: Thu Apr 03, 2008 1:47 am Reply with quote
Quote:
Kaede behaves so much like Rin's wife that he feels a bit guilty about “freeloading,” but she never seems fazed when other girls keep coming into the picture. Sia and Nerine, although they should be bitter rivals for Rin's affection, get along like best friends,...

And, for inexplicable reasons, the girls rarely do much to discourage or stop this despite the fact that their love is in apparently mortal peril,...


glad to see that I'm not the only one who was bothered by this. A harem without conflict between love interest gets boring quick.
I'm also liking how you included that super-cheesy line as the opener of this review Wink . I'd like to add that I also felt the teasing dialogue was far too simple and straight-forward; "Hey, you guys' kissin' over there? With tongue?" Rolling Eyes They could've come up with something more clever and funny than that.

I'm stickin' with what I said in the recent Shelf Life column; I prefer Magikano! Twisted Evil
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PantsGoblin
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Joined: 27 Jun 2005
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PostPosted: Thu Apr 03, 2008 2:15 am Reply with quote
From what I've heard (from practically everyone I know who has seen all of Shuffle!), is that the series does not get good until about the second half. And when it gets good, it apparently gets really good. My thoughts about the first few episodes are the same as the review, but I may end up buying the series anyway because I've heard too many good things about the later half of the series.
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the Rancorous



Joined: 08 Feb 2006
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Location: Hunting the Dragon in Gransys
PostPosted: Thu Apr 03, 2008 2:45 am Reply with quote
PantsGoblin wrote:
From what I've heard (from practically everyone I know who has seen all of Shuffle!), is that the series does not get good until about the second half. And when it gets good, it apparently gets really good. My thoughts about the first few episodes are the same as the review, but I may end up buying the series anyway because I've heard too many good things about the later half of the series.


"It gets better..."
If only I got a quarter for everytime I've heard that when it comes to anime Razz .
OKay, to be honest, I do plan on renting more of Shuffle! before I completely decide if its disposable or not. But what I can say is that my personal preference for harem shows are ones that do not take themselves seriously much at all.
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Sarukah



Joined: 13 May 2006
Posts: 160
PostPosted: Thu Apr 03, 2008 3:01 am Reply with quote
PantsGoblin wrote:
From what I've heard (from practically everyone I know who has seen all of Shuffle!), is that the series does not get good until about the second half. And when it gets good, it apparently gets really good.


I saw all of Shuffle and honostly, the series does get a little better by the second half, but anything that could have made the series great by it is quickly ruined by it all running back to the same way the series started again. Sure it gets interesting, but its just not worth it, and I felt like I wasted my time.
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Zalis116
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Joined: 31 Mar 2005
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PostPosted: Thu Apr 03, 2008 3:17 am Reply with quote
Quote:
but [Kaede] never seems fazed when other girls keep coming into the picture.
Well, not yet, anyway...
Quote:
It strolls along cheerily with the kind of synthesized and orchestrated light numbers that might be heard backing a dating sim game...
Not surprising, since Shuffle! was based on such a game.
Quote:
Based on its first volume, Shuffle does not have what it takes to succeed even within the low standards for harem romantic comedies and shows little potential for improvement.
I can't say I disagree. Given that I normally go out of my way to see any anime with "based on a bishoujo game" in its description, I didn't even start watching the fansubs at first because the description sounded too cheesy. And indeed, these first four episodes (and to some extent, the next four as well) are cheesy, saccharine, too full of "tender childhood encounters" (made me kick myself for not being kinder to girls when I was seven), and just too over-the-top with the harem antics. Whether or not "it gets better later," I'll leave to future reviews, but I do hope that people interested in drama/romance with a supernatural (and sometimes psychotic) twist will give Shuffle! a chance and stick with it.

Nonetheless, thank you for not insinuating that anyone who likes this series is a creepy otaku fanboy loser who can't get girls in real life.

The KKK thing I'm sure couldn't be worked around because the letters are emblazoned upon members' shirts -- it'd be inconsistent to have the dialogue say one thing and the visuals say another. Making that work would requre an hfilish amount of editing. But overall, I thought Funi put together another winning dub...the added humor made the first few episodes a bit more bearable. Plus, it's written by, directed by, and starring Carrie Savage, so how could it go wrong? Cool

But for those out there who think "this moe harem crap with spineless males will be the death of anime," allow me to quote:
On the AoD forums, FuniRepRed wrote:
The sales for the first volume are starting out pretty well and if V1 and V2 sales are pretty good the higher ups said they'd be on board for letting us do an ender box with Volume 6 for this show.
I guess "Which girl would YOU choose?" sells.
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walw6pK4Alo



Joined: 12 Mar 2008
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PostPosted: Thu Apr 03, 2008 3:29 am Reply with quote
It's just a generic harem anime, what's the big deal?
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tasogarenootome



Joined: 24 Feb 2007
Posts: 593
PostPosted: Thu Apr 03, 2008 3:29 am Reply with quote
Zalis116 wrote:

But for those out there who think "this moe harem crap with spineless males will be the death of anime," allow me to quote:
On the AoD forums, FuniRepRed wrote:
The sales for the first volume are starting out pretty well and if V1 and V2 sales are pretty good the higher ups said they'd be on board for letting us do an ender box with Volume 6 for this show.
I guess "Which girl would YOU choose?" sells.


What's an ender box?

Glad to see Shuffle's paying the bills for Funi, (unlike some lazier licenses out there). I couldn't really get into this series - I really liked the theme song and had heard great things about it (a lot of Shuffle fans I know really like to play up spoiler[Kaede's "character development" that supposedly comes later on]), but she and most of the rest of the cast grated on my nerves in these first few episodes. If it shows up On Demand or something, I may give it another shot though.
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Zalis116
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Joined: 31 Mar 2005
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PostPosted: Thu Apr 03, 2008 3:32 am Reply with quote
walw6pK4Alo wrote:
It's just a generic harem anime, what's the big deal?
I'm not seeing what you mean by that. Forgive me for writing a little more than a one-line response (you know, since the rules don't allow one-liners). The question is, how much of it have you seen to make that statement?
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Miho



Joined: 01 Dec 2006
Posts: 95
PostPosted: Thu Apr 03, 2008 3:58 am Reply with quote
tasogarenootome wrote:
What's an ender box?

An artbox that comes with the last volume of the series, I'm guessing. Though for now I'm just going to wait for the boxset to be released, just in case they don't end up releasing the artbox with volume 6.
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Elisian



Joined: 23 Dec 2007
Posts: 74
PostPosted: Thu Apr 03, 2008 5:04 am Reply with quote
I consider this show to be a bit of a guilty pleasure. It is stupid, and cliche', but it is also extremely funny. I laughed my butt off. I can't honestly try and convince anyone that it is a good show though. Just funny.
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alifemde



Joined: 25 Aug 2006
Posts: 38
PostPosted: Thu Apr 03, 2008 7:55 am Reply with quote
Leebo wrote:
Seems like a fair - even forgiving at times - review of a decidedly lackluster series. I like romantic harem-dramas or whatever you want to call them, and Shuffle definitely does tread the lines of stupidity far too often.

Though I liked "innocence" more than "You".


This is why I absolutely ABHOR disc-by-disc anime reviews... They only see the first 1/6th of something and aren't rating it fairly. What if a movie reviewer only watched the first 1/6th of a movie, or hell, even just the first half? Their review would not capture anything close to the full experience of the thing. The same can totally be said of this Shuffle! review.

Yes, the opening episodes are a bit lame. I'll be honest and say that up to episode 9 this thing is cookie-cutter anime... But then it turns into something very interesting and fun, and its ending is fantastic!... But no, the first 1/6th was average. Bash the s**t out of it, reviewers! Yay!

(This is an on-going pet peeve of mine, it's not just focused on Shuffle!, though it's most obvious here. Such a shame... Many people will be turned off of this fun series because the first few episodes [which I thought were silly fun at least] aren't fantastically new and fresh, even though its ending is... "Oh!" you gasp! "But then the reviews for those later discs will show this if true!" Doubtful. Most reviewers out there rarely stick up for later discs in a series when the pace picks up if they've already mocked the first few discs... Like it ruins their cred or something. Disc-by-disc ratings need to die.)
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Ranma824



Joined: 17 Feb 2005
Posts: 456
PostPosted: Thu Apr 03, 2008 8:33 am Reply with quote
alifemde wrote:
Leebo wrote:
Seems like a fair - even forgiving at times - review of a decidedly lackluster series. I like romantic harem-dramas or whatever you want to call them, and Shuffle definitely does tread the lines of stupidity far too often.

Though I liked "innocence" more than "You".


This is why I absolutely ABHOR disc-by-disc anime reviews... They only see the first 1/6th of something and aren't rating it fairly. What if a movie reviewer only watched the first 1/6th of a movie, or hell, even just the first half? Their review would not capture anything close to the full experience of the thing. The same can totally be said of this Shuffle! review.

Yes, the opening episodes are a bit lame. I'll be honest and say that up to episode 9 this thing is cookie-cutter anime... But then it turns into something very interesting and fun, and its ending is fantastic!... But no, the first 1/6th was average. Bash the s**t out of it, reviewers! Yay!

(This is an on-going pet peeve of mine, it's not just focused on Shuffle!, though it's most obvious here. Such a shame... Many people will be turned off of this fun series because the first few episodes [which I thought were silly fun at least] aren't fantastically new and fresh, even though its ending is... "Oh!" you gasp! "But then the reviews for those later discs will show this if true!" Doubtful. Most reviewers out there rarely stick up for later discs in a series when the pace picks up if they've already mocked the first few discs... Like it ruins their cred or something. Disc-by-disc ratings need to die.)


Smartest idea I've read here in awhile. Manga reviewers are already reviewing properties two or three volumes at a time, they should adopt the same practice for anime too. Especially since ANN reviewers tend to catch shit-storms for a particular volume more then anybody else. Plenty of other sites do single volume reviews; it'd be nice to try something new.

My only gripe is the gratuitous use of the word "harem", which I completely disagree with in regards to Shuffle! But I'm just wasting my breath here...
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Furudanuki



Joined: 29 Jul 2006
Posts: 1874
PostPosted: Thu Apr 03, 2008 8:57 am Reply with quote
The review was pretty much what I expected. The first volume is primarily character introductions and place setting, and the "fan clubs" almost killed the series for me when the fansubs were first making the rounds. Fortunately, they seldom appear after the first few episodes. Just one comment about a specific item in the review:
Quote:
Sia and Nerine, although they should be bitter rivals for Rin's affection, get along like best friends

Not really that surprising, since spoiler[they are first cousins: Nerine's father's sister is Sia's mother. Sia and Nerine have known each other since childhood, and they actually are best friends.]
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funkapotamus



Joined: 22 Feb 2008
Posts: 7
PostPosted: Thu Apr 03, 2008 9:51 am Reply with quote
I agree with the reviewer that the first few episodes of Shuffle! are utterly derivative harem crap.

*HOWEVER*, once you get past the first four or five episodes the show ratchets up the fanservice a notch to levels rarely seen in quality (not quantity), and past episode nine or so it doesn't even feel like you're watching the same series. Right around the halfway point Shuffle! changes gears, and it totally blows away any preconceived notions you had about the show.

I think what's unique about the series is that it sets itself up so the audience expects it to play out a certain way, then pulls a 180 and goes against the expectations of the genre. If you're willing to get past the first few episodes of the admittedly bad domestic chores, grating fathers, and ridiculous fanclubs, you're in for a great emotional rollercoaster with exceptional fanservice.

As for the fanservice in question, it's not hugely prevalent like in say Ikki Tousen, but when there are fanservice moments later on they're damn good.
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