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Ironic. I always liked Hellsing, really liked it. My thing with vampires is, if you're going to make a story about vampires, make it about vampires. Not guns, not technology, not love interests, vampires.(Yes I realize Alucard uses a gun, but when he discards it for his magic I'm in awe of his majesty) While not a major fan, I do very much enjoy a good dark goth story(of which I'd probably do better if I stuck with print), and I've never seen much from anime or movies that quite fit the bill.

I just finished, as in literally 15 minutes ago, the entire hellsing tv series. It has been something like 2 years since I've watched it and yeah, watching it now, the "great" feeling I have is comprised of a lot of nostalgia. Though I don't think it was bad, just done a bit on the cheap and the anime added story fails to really...do much, I did like Incognito however.

I am now watching the first OVA to truly get my blood boiling. The run through the series was for fun since this will be my first time watching the OVA.

As far as Berserk is concerned, I am definitely going to go back and read the manga. It was one of the best anime I've ever seen(minus the whole not even coming to the middle of the entire story). Hellsing I think I'll just stick with the OVA releases and hope they finish out all the manga material. Maybe it's completely normal and tolerated in Japan, and I know there are reasons(like running a series when the manga is popular versus being completely finished), but it still feels like such a bad habit to only tell half a story SO often in anime.

championferret wrote:

Aw, my submission about how much I despise Nymphomaniac Teachers didn't make it. Surely I'm not the only one?

Oh man, I have so much hatred for the Nympho Teacher character, especially if they are drunks as well.
I think the worse case of this would have to be Ms. Shikijou from Mahoromatic. Everything about that woman bothered me, especially her tendencies towards pedophilia. In my mind, there is absolutely nothing appealing, endearing, or humorous about a fully grown woman shoving her nasty oversized ta-tas in the face of her 14 year old student, while she has sexual fantasies about him. Yick.
I liked Mahoromatic a lot, but Ms. Shikijou nearly ruined my enjoyment of that show.
Same for the professor from This Ugly Yet Beautiful World. Simply irritating.
What strikes me as odd is that I hate these characters, yet, I love Misato Katsuragi from Evangelion, despite the fact that she is a drunk, and likes to flirt with 14 year old boys. Maybe the difference is that Misato actually knows when enough is enough, and there is more to her personality than getting wasted, and acting like an ass around children.

Phew. Now that that is out of my system, I gotta say that the last two anime that reminded me why I love anime so much are Death Note, and Higurashi no Naku Koro ni. They were a lot of fun, had great stories, great characters, and I was absolutely hooked, from start to finish.

Last edited by the Rancorous on Fri Oct 24, 2008 1:24 am; edited 1 time in total

championferret wrote:

Aw, my submission about how much I despise Nymphomaniac Teachers didn't make it. Surely I'm not the only one?

You're not; that character type is next-in-line of archetypes that I think should be erased from existence, right after maid heroines and the "I can only speak my own name" types. Wink

Vortextk wrote:

(about Hellsing)I am now watching the first OVA to truly get my blood boiling. The run through the series was for fun since this will be my first time watching the OVA.

Oh you're in for a treat, that OVA does not kick ass, it rips it apart and splatters it all over the walls and then proceeds to slash the tires of the Hurley Jocks' lifted trucks (which are double-parked) while smokin' Camel non-filters. Twisted Evil

I really think the topics of "plot aror" and "Fudged mystical endings" touch upon two really horrible problems with anime and many other stories in General.

Plot armor highlights the ever growing trend of nonsensicalness. Yes we are watching fiction, yes there is some suspense of disbelief...but the problem is this.You are creating your own world, with your own laws of physics. So you MUST create a coherent reason why person A dies and person B lives despite them both facing the same circumstance. It's one thing to create your own world. It's a whole other to create your own laws of physics and then suddenly break them whenever you want. If you make the rules why can't they be consistent?

I hate the idea that any human is magically exempt from damage when they were shown to otherwise have been receptive to it if not for purely maintaining the plot at that point in time. I've said it once and I'll say it again, Consistency, Consistency, Consistency. More of these writers need to be consistent in their execution of this world.

As for the fudged mystical endings. That touches a deeper, even more prevalent trend in anime, non-endings. No other genre is so deeply plagued with series that just...stop, and leave major questions about what happens next or how the hell the conflict is really over. It's absolutely infuriating at times. Since seemingly amazing series like Trigun get hamstrung by the fact that at the end of the series, there really is no resolution to the plot, just a hint that the main character has an idea. I mean, It's one thing to end a series on the eve of a new possible adventure, as Outlaw Star and Infinite Ryvius did. It's entirely another to end the plot without having said that the characters ever reached the end of their current plot. At least EVA was able to resolve this with the end of evangelion movie.

I have much less hope for the other, poor series, who ended on absolutely nothing other than "yup, that's a wrap, we're done. Why? Because!"

I usually don't email an answer, but this time I did. So I won't give reasons as to why these two series that I recently finished were extra-exciting for me... but at the same time, I doubt if I have to. But Fullmetal Alchemist and Haibane-Renmei were both ultra-fantastic and yeah. I wrote up a lovely little email and hopefully it sees the light of day.

Fallout2man wrote:

As for the fudged mystical endings. That touches a deeper, even more prevalent trend in anime, non-endings. No other genre is so deeply plagued with series that just...stop, and leave major questions about what happens next or how the hell the conflict is really over. It's absolutely infuriating at times. Since seemingly amazing series like Trigun get hamstrung by the fact that at the end of the series, there really is no resolution to the plot, just a hint that the main character has an idea. I mean, It's one thing to end a series on the eve of a new possible adventure, as Outlaw Star and Infinite Ryvius did. It's entirely another to end the plot without having said that the characters ever reached the end of their current plot. At least EVA was able to resolve this with the end of evangelion movie.

I have much less hope for the other, poor series, who ended on absolutely nothing other than "yup, that's a wrap, we're done. Why? Because!"

Seconded BIG time. One of my biggest pet peeves with anime in general.

Fruits Basket is my mortal enemy in this regard. I only saw it all based on a friend's recommendation that the ending was very good and almost brought him to tears! I thought, "okay, we're in business!" I dove in....

spoiler[You have that vague "confrontation" between Akito and Tohru (if you can even call it that), you have a shot of Tohru looking at the house (wearing different clothes? What the...), and then it's basically over with no explanation or plot resolution to anything but the "dramatic" story arc begun only one episode prior. (A two episode story arc? Would that be more like an "arclet?")
]

Suffice it to say, I gave him no end of crap for his terrible advice and no longer listen to him for anime suggestions.

Best counter-example possible: see Nadia. It not only has a conclusion, but an EPILOGUE showing what became of all the remaining cast in the following years!

Another counter-example that comes to mind is the first season of Sailor Moon. Even though a second season was inevitable thanks to the success of both manga and anime, they still stuck with a season ending that would have functioned very well as a series finale. If Sailor Stars didn't have such a darn good ending, I would say ignore the rest of the series completely after that point.

Kenneth Thornhill wrote:

The one cliche that should be erased from the minds of all writers in not only the anime genre, but all writers in general? AMNESIA. Do I even have to explain why?

Yes, because I forgot Wink

Sylvia Sakura wrote:

One subject they bought up in "culture differences" was incest, a marriage between two cousins.

Which in Japan, afaik, is neither illegal nor looked at through the same "banjo-playin'" lenses as it is in other regions. Strange and uncommon maybe, but it's not that bad. This brings to mind the voice actor commentary in Sakura Diaries, which features a cousin romance. One of the VAs related a story where some other VA had freaked out about Elfen Lied because of the cousin romance in that series. Her response: "Of all the things in Elfen Lied, you're getting worked up over cousin loving??"

Neil Ford wrote:

Then there's Rahxephon, Scrapped Princess, Texhnolyze, and of course EVA, plus probably some others I've forgotten. (Oh, Lain, of course, but that's a "special" case.)

RahXephon I can certainly agree with. Texhnolyze was so messed up to the point that anything else could've happened, and it would've made no more or less sense than the actual ending. But I thought Scrapped Princess's ending, while a little on the rushed side, was consistent with the previously established magic and technology up to that point. Now, Gasaraki, that's one of my top candidates for fudged mystical endings. After spending most of its runtime doing a decent job of making giant mechas as believable as possible (with a touch of mysticism involved), it resolves the major military/political conflicts in the penultimate episode and goes completely off the deep end in the finale.

Daniel Koehn wrote:

I mean, at least in Love Hina, the girls all hated Keitaro for a while before warming up to him--the girls in Magikano try to bed the poor guy from episode one!

I didn't see Magikano as making any efforts to set up romance. For instance, the "main" girl gets a plot-based / magical-curse reason for wanting to get it on with the male lead. At least with her, they don't try to give her any "real" reason to be attracted to him. It's more of a "sit back and watch the carnage" than an "enjoy the gentle romantic comedy" series. Now, I can see where Koehn is coming from on series like Sekirei, where a typical shy college exam flunkee (like Keitarou Urashima, but lacking the aforementioned heart) quite literally has a girlfriend fall out of the sky.

As for "rekindling"-type series, I'd have to go with Vandread (+Second Stage), which I recently saw. It's got everything that makes anime "awesome," even if not technically great. Outlandish science & technology? Check. Giant combining robots? Check. Endless flashy CG fight sequences? Check. Fanservice? Check. Romantic comedy that runs the gamut from sweet to raunchy, sometimes simultaneously? Check. Epic space fight sequences with massive fleets and lasers being charged? Check. "Hot-blooded"/inspiration speeches (rivaling Gurren-Lagann in this case)? Yet another check. Maybe not Masterpiece material, but still solid entertainment all the way through.

Megiddo wrote:

Quote:

Wait.... was this the same Chobits I was watching? 0_o

Chobits was uber complicated.

Not really, I was being sarcastic^^

spoiler[The whole talk about Chi not being able to do things that people could do, was become intimate with Hideki, because well, that is where her reset button was don't forget. In order for her to become 'a real girl' there would be no problem them. But, Hideki decided to love and be with her anyways]

How this could be confused with Pinoccio and becoming a flesh and blood human, is beyond me (unless the person was refering to it as non literal? 0_o)

In response to what Neil Ford said regarding "Fudged Mystical Endings" or as I've sometimes heard them called, "Non-Endings," I can wholeheartedly say I agree with you.

While I haven't seen many of the anime you mentioned, (only read Chobits) what you highlighted about them really hit home for me. I've had issues (to say the least) with Non-Endings/FMEs since I learned of their abhorrent existence, and I would literally jump for joy if/when the day ever comes that they are wiped from this planet.

While I know it's not of authentic anime origins, the movie-esque series finale of Avatar rushed to my mind when I read your Answerfan. Now, don't get me wrong. There were absolutely fantastic portions of the finale that I loved, but when all was said and done, I was grossly disappointed with the "shortcuts" taken in the plot, after what seemed like such a carefully thought out and paced series.
spoiler[After placing so much importance on Aang's unlocking of all his chakras, and thus, mastering the Avatar State, Bryke seemed to just throw all logic out the proverbial window and have a Turtle Lion come out of nowhere with some last minute writing blob and voila! All of Aang's emotional growth and coming-of-age work since the beginning of the show means nothing, since he can just take the naive way out and take the bad guy's powers away instead! I mean, for the love of gawd... I still can't wrap my brain around that piece of hackneyed mush.]

My other complaints are mainly of a more personal choice. And yes, this is a shipper's complaint. You have been 'warned'. spoiler[After staying with the most respectful, in-depth analysis of the possibility of Zutara turning Canon, and indeed that outcome being planned every step of the way (not simply and magically triggered by the Cave incident), I was outright heartbroken when I watched the finale 'til the end and saw the pairings' outcome. It wasn't just that the Canons were ones I personally did not prefer, but that they were finished off in such a thrown-together-at-the-last-minute fashion, it was sickening to me as a fan, not merely as a Zutarian. If anything, I believe that regardless of your pairings preference, every fan's potential Canon deserves to be treated with dignity, which I do not believe was done at all.] *sigh* But alas, it is as it is. And so, I'll leave it at that.

In the last volume of the Chobits manga, spoiler[Freya explicitly says, "We do not have emotions."

"If something not human has emotions... then it would be considered sentient -- alive, just like a human. If it's the same as a human, it wouldn't be wrong to love that thing. It wouldn't be a sin."]

... so is the ending of the Chobits anime really different to the manga on this point? I haven't seen the anime...

spoiler[ Unless Neil Ford was talking about "Chi's heart is real. It beats inside of [Hideki]." But that's somewhat different to Pinocchio becoming a real boy.]

Quote:

My pet peeve is the pilot of a mecha who knows how to pilot it no matter what.
We've seen it in many mecha series, evangelion, gundam, rahxephon, anything with a super robot.

uhm, huh?? Shinji did not know how to pilot his mecha. He wasn't even able to walk, fell flat on his face and then got beaten up pretty badly until EVA 01 ran amok. But I certainly wouldn't call this "knowing how to pilot no matter what". And I think even before his second fight we see him doing some training - so do not complain about Evangelion Wink

I like to call it bad anime ending syndrome myself but.....

... the ending to the inuyasha tv series really cheesed me off...

.... I mean they literally said we'll continue our adventures in the manga >.<

and im like I jsut wasted my time watching the show for *that* ending?

and about this weeks topic on "reconfirming your faith in anime".... Macross Frontier. it has loads of action, a great soundtrack, throw in some comedy, suspense, drama, a little political intrigue.... oh and a love triangle too....

and pet peeves in anime.... yeah the guy jumping into a giant robot and automatically beating the crap outta people always gets me.... it irks me so much I'm writing a parody song about it lol (although I'm sure someone's already done something to that effect)

.. and the dog is cute.

Sadly, I'm going to have to disqualify myself from actually sending in a reply for the current answerfans question, since mine is such an odd series for a strange reason.

I finally admitted to myself that I have been in an anime burnout for the last several years. Any series that I thought I was truly excited for wound up fizzling out within a few episodes. Gundam 00, though I still plan to buy it, lasted 10 episodes before I just stopped following it.

But the one show that will continually excite me for some strange reason is One Piece. I am nowhere near caught up with this series and I started watching it almost two years ago now. But everytime I do watch it, I end up watching it in huge chunks. I just finished watching all 50-some episodes of the Jaya/Skypiea arc in the last 12 days. I know some "fans" claim to watch entire 26 episode series in a day or two, but I'm an adult with a real job and bills to pay, and I don't have that kind of time. What I like about it is the simple fact that the characters don't randomly run off and get stronger like in other shounen series. They simply keep fighting and fighting until they figure out a way to overcome their enemies. They already have the strength and power they need to win, they only need to figure out how to use that power to achieve victory.

At this point, I'm not quite sure if my burnout is due to not liking anime as much as I used to, or if it's just because everything coming out in the last several years is the same, reused tripe over and over again, with so little changed from earlier incarnations that I just don't find it interesting, or if there just aren't as many good stories being written anymore.

The last actual new series to really grab me was Gurren Lagann. One of very few anime to ever grip me through the entire run, as I didn't start watching it until there were 25 episodes out. Needless to say, waiting for those last 2 was almost unbearable.

What, no love for the RahXephon ending?

The ending of the RahXephon anime series is actually one of the endings of an anime series that I can rather clearly remember watching for the first time and being emotionally affected by for the first time. I think it's because of the emotional state it put me in. It affected me quite deeply. It struck a chord in both my heart and mind, moving me to tears with its succinct beauty. A wonderful sense of completion settled over me, tinged with a bit of sadness because the show was over. It was as if I'd just finished a delicious feast.

For me, it's one of my most favorite, and most positively memorable, anime endings. I love it.

Perhaps some anime creators are influenced by the zen idea of finishing a story in such a way that readers/watchers must be the ones to complete the story. And perhaps some just struggle with how to end a story. Constructing the end of a story can be extremely difficult for some, while it is easy fun for others.

The last anime I saw which restored my belief in the existence of good anime was TENGEN TOPPA GURREN LAGANN. And I am not even into mecha anime. Actually I am quite the outsider of the mecha world: I've seen EVENGELION but the ending was quite disappointing, GunXSword... I prefer to forget I've ever seen such a show.

Anyway, when I first heard about this series I thought to myself: 'Another mecha, full of Mecha clichés, complicated syncronizing procedures, and who knows, problematic personas'... how could I ever dare to think such garbish of the anime that climbed to my top 3?!?!?

I must say that GURREN LAGANN not only pumps anyone up with its awesome combats, great charaters, great OST, and the scene timing; but it also has BRAINS behind it.

Yes, BRAINS... GURREN LAGANN not only offers amasing extreme fighting power scenes backed up with flabergasting art, but it has a solid story, which has a beguining, a development and an END.

This anime also burned down to ashes some shounen and mecha clichès: for example, Death! Complicated issues like this are usually carefully avoided by anime shounen directors. However Hiroyuki Imaishi and Kazuki Nakashima had the guts to not avoid it. And, while it makes you cry, it adds seriousness and in my opinion also respect for this series: I though that I wasn't watching an anime like the others shounen-types! This one was different.

The storyline evolution is also amazing. Like a frequently shouted phrase during the anime '...it reaches for the stars'. The storyline does not take it's sweet time.. no! It evolves SPIRAL-like. In the first episodes one might watch in terror the faced-mechas, or to screem in pure scare of the beings that pilot them while thinking: is this a kids show? But do not fear, fellow anime-viewers, give it a few more episodes, wait for episode 8, and be in AWE! Also the reasons behind EVERYTHING are carefully revealed, and you will think: yeah, It couldn't be other way.

When I finished watching this anime I felft contentment. After the contentment I felft sadness because I know deep down that another anime with such quality, energy, name it, will not be created so soon.

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