Natsuki Takaya's Fruits Basket manga volume 19 debuted at #112 on USA Today's list of America's top 150 best-selling books for the week of March 10 to March 16 — even though Tokyopop did not officially schedule it until March 18. Fruits Basket last appeared in November, when volume 18 reached #67 at its peak. Masashi Kishimoto's Naruto volume 28 dipped slightly from its all-time series high of #17 to #26 this past week. Ken Akamatsu and Del Rey's Negima volume 17 dropped off the chart after debuting at #115 the previous week.
The X Button - Bullet Heaven This week: ESPgaluda II's shooter excellence, Sony's new toy, Tail Concerto's sequel, the second-best Castlevania game, and an overlooked corner of Dragon Ball Z.
2010-03-17
Anime News Nina! - 2010-03-17 It's the 100th Anime News Nina strip! Bust out your party hats and sparkling apple cider!
2010-03-17
RIGHT TURN ONLY!! - Sebastian the Combat Butler Who would win in a fight: Hayate the Combat Butler, or Black Butler's Sebastian? Find out in this column! Or just chill out with Lucky Star. That works too.
2010-03-16
Shelf Life - Sands of Time The secret to weathering the recession? Running your own "we do anything" agency.
- Glass Mask pt. 1
- Rin ~Daughters of Mnemosyne~ complete
- Sands of Destruction complete 2010-03-15
Now Streaming: El Cazador De La Bruja 1-4 (d) With a name like El Cazador, this show should really be in Spanish... But English will have to do. Here's the first 4 episodes dubbed.
2010-03-15
Ghost Hound Sub.DVD 2 After taking a familiar premise and making something alien of it, the series unfortunately lapses back into conventionality at its end, defeating by a razor margin its aspirations of greatness.
Bleach GN 30 The most memorable fights are often not the ones of brute strength, but the ones where the heroes must conquer the villains in their heads. It's a principle that is exemplified in this volume of Bleach.
Yozakura Quartet DVD Complete Collection Super-powered youths struggle to protect a town where demons and humans peacefully coexist in this run-of-the-mill offering. Though not bad and at least mildly entertaining, it is a little too bland and underdeveloped to leave much of an impression and is not as sexy as advertised.
Baka and Test Episodes 1-4 Streaming Just waiting to charm the pants off of anyone who stumbles upon it. Or at least those among them that can stomach the occasional stinker of a rom-com cliché.
Neo Angelique Abyss Sub.DVD Those who are easily distracted and entertained by pretty things will quickly feel like a cat trapped in a room full of catnip-stuffed mice, and the cover price of these two DVDs is almost worth it based on animation quality alone.
Eureka Seven GN Collection 1 It's not just a recitation of giant robot battles and alien adventures, but an honest tale of love, friendship, and growing up, set against the backdrop of an epic planetary struggle.
Arata: The Legend GN 1 What's going on around Arata seems interesting, yet it's hard to care when he spends the vast majority of his time whining about how betrayed he feels.
Claymore BLURAY The Blu Ray version of this dark, graphic fantasy series about blond female warriors wielding big swords offers very little that the original DVD releases did not. Though the series shows pronounced shonen influences, it is still, at essence, a very human story, and that makes all the difference.
Dragon Box Z Set 2 Does post-Vegeta-arc DBZ bog down like a fat-bottomed tourist in quicksand? Will cool power-ups and guys putting fists through each other save it anyway? Is it all worth buying yet again? Find out this and more on today's Anime Review Z!!
Case Closed: The Phantom of Baker Street DVD It's about action-packed sleuthing, which this movie does decently at the end ... but fumbles through a painful beginning and poorly paced middle to get there.
Jinki:Extend DVD 3 This volume marks the end of the show's dual timeline structure, and provides answers to many of the show's nagging questions, but try as it might, the series can't completely resurrect the appeal that it lost when it choked on its self-imposed complexity.