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Stark700
Joined: 30 Jan 2012
Posts: 11762
Location: Earth
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Posted: Sun Jun 22, 2014 4:33 am
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Idk why but the song in episode 11 was quite pleasing imo.
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dandelion_rose
Joined: 12 May 2012
Posts: 657
Location: Kuala Lumpur
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Posted: Sun Jun 22, 2014 10:33 am
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Oh my gosh the ending. SO MUCH FEELS.
And this is from a series that I already experience a lot of feels for.
I was iffy about having the Summertime Record ending but now I want it. Forget Kuroha -- the idea that Shintaro and Ayano are reunited after so many lifetimes is just so moving.
Please don't troll us Shaft please don't troll us
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Student no.0
Joined: 02 Apr 2014
Posts: 170
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Posted: Sat Jun 28, 2014 3:44 pm
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It's like the majority of SHAFT's budget went to giving Ayano a pretty face for a few seeconds near the end. Wow.
I'll still pick up the manga and light novel. The anime was just a guilty pleasure for me in the end. The kind that questionably makes me a masochist as an anime fan. Unless I see that SHAFT really stepped up big time with the BD/DVD to the point where it surpasses Madoka in terms of comparison and adds extra footage that properly clears up any unanswered questions, I'm not sure I'd pick it up if AoA gets to releasing it.
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leatherhead333
Joined: 15 Aug 2013
Posts: 1187
Location: Kansas
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Posted: Sat Jun 28, 2014 3:48 pm
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Well I guess we can chalk another one up for having a completely rushed and unsatisfying ending this season. It's rather disappointing considering that up until about episode 9-10 the way the episodes were presented was fine to me. Gah this season is making me lose faith in anime.........
You've failed me again SHAFT
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Student no.0
Joined: 02 Apr 2014
Posts: 170
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Posted: Sat Jun 28, 2014 3:55 pm
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It's thanks to experiences like these that help me keep my expectations to a limit just because I see some well-known names attached to the product from now on.
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Stark700
Joined: 30 Jan 2012
Posts: 11762
Location: Earth
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Posted: Sat Jun 28, 2014 3:55 pm
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Heh, I just took this show for what it was trying to be. I do follow the light novel and manga but never was a fan of the songs yet. To me, it was a so-so series. It had a few episodes that I enjoyed while there were a few episodes where I was staring at the timer.
The finale was one of those where I was kinda starring at the timer. Nonetheless, Ayano was pretty and seems like the show's visual budget from Shaft dropped the ball.
Oh and I spotted Kuroha. That's interesting. The episode felt rushed though imo.
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Student no.0
Joined: 02 Apr 2014
Posts: 170
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Posted: Sat Jun 28, 2014 6:52 pm
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Stark700 wrote: | Heh, I just took this show for what it was trying to be. I do follow the light novel and manga but never was a fan of the songs yet. To me, it was a so-so series. It had a few episodes that I enjoyed while there were a few episodes where I was staring at the timer.
The finale was one of those where I was kinda starring at the timer. Nonetheless, Ayano was pretty and seems like the show's visual budget from Shaft dropped the ball.
Oh and I spotted Kuroha. That's interesting. The episode felt rushed though imo. |
Just to be sure, the anime, LN, manga, and music videos all follow different stories right?
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Stark700
Joined: 30 Jan 2012
Posts: 11762
Location: Earth
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Posted: Sun Jun 29, 2014 2:12 am
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I'm not sure about the music videos since my knowledge on them isn't very clear but it does follow some parts of the LN and manga.
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shiranehito
Joined: 27 Dec 2011
Posts: 793
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Posted: Sun Jun 29, 2014 5:32 am
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Last episode is... mmh.
I don't know. It felt so rushed and I bet the anime-only viewers would likely to scratch their head and "What the..." because there are too many unexplained things. Even I (who follows the music videos, manga and LN) am confused and definitely not satisfied with this adaptation.
We don't really get what happened, why Ene suddenly got her body back, what happened to the members after Marry activated her "Queen" power (It's implied that she didn't reset the loop this time but I wonder how the snakes hosts are still alive), how Ayano and Hiyori can return to the world, what happened to Mr. Tateyama (I can't tell if he's alive and his wife revived, or he just joined his wife in heaven).
Also, the art in this specific episode is really bad, horribly bad and I mean totally bad. Inconsistent art quality throughout the episode and the only one I think pretty is Ayano near the last scene.
I guess I'll score this series 6/10 because it's pretty terribly written, the art is so inconsistent (sometimes it's too damn gorgeous and sometimes it's damn bad I don't even want to look at it) and it doesn't provide me enjoyment at all. The voice acting sometimes feels bland even though I don't hate the voice actors at all. The songs are catchy and I guess that's the only plus point for this series.
As a fan of Kagepro I am rather disappointed. I don't blame SHAFT though. Nor I blame Jin or any other production committee. I think maybe it's just too soon and not very well planned.
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dandelion_rose
Joined: 12 May 2012
Posts: 657
Location: Kuala Lumpur
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Posted: Sun Jun 29, 2014 9:08 am
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Final episode was a letdown. For this particular episode, the blame almost fully falls on Jin, although Shaft's lousy animation is also no win (but can still be forgiven if the script was strong).
Even as someone who has played and re-played the Kagepro songs over and over again, I felt that the way Kuroha was introduced and then killed off to be so anti-climatic.
You should never introduce the main antagonist in the final episode and then kill him off in that same episode.
Really, so many things I can complain about the last episode -- how Kuroha / serpent entity basically blurted the whole plot out to everyone without any provocation -- here is my GRAND MASTER PLAN THAT YOU CANNOT DEFEAT IN ANY WAY EVERYONE, how the showdown that results in the Summertime Record ending is basically Haruka shit-talking Kuroha into non-existence (okay I'm exaggerating but still). Oh and what is that bubbly death of Kuroha.
Anyway --
I'd thought that Kuroha was a separate entity from Haruka, but I never thought of Konoha as a separate entity -- it makes me sad to think that Konoha goes too.
Some general impressions of the entire show --
Basically Mekakucity Actors is one of those things with a really good concept and so-so execution. From the beginning I expected there would be major pacing problems; fitting a story about nine major characters into twelve episodes is a really tough challenge.
The only really exceptional thing going for it is Shaft's style, which was beautiful when it worked well but horrible when it didn't. I really like Akiyuki Shinbo's constant use of perspectives (especially in episode 11) and how he uses the backgrounds to march the featured characters' inner turmoil. I don't like the weird body movements that much, although in some characters (Ene, for example) it worked really well.
As for script, apart from the pacing problems one of the weirdest things about Mekakucity Actors is how it lost a lot of the quirkiness in the song lyrics and novels when it became a script. I don't know why, but a lot of the characters' catchphrases disappeared ('oh my dirty', 'welcome to my womb' and 'may soda be eternal'). I wonder if it's because these lines don't sound as quirky in Japanese as they do in English.
Despite my disappointments, I'm still going to support Mekakucity Actors. I really like the concept, I like Shinbo's style (though I don't consider myself a big Shinbo fan) and I like the characters. It's just the execution that was flawed.
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Ohoni
Joined: 10 Jun 2003
Posts: 3421
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Posted: Sun Jun 29, 2014 9:14 am
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What the hell was that?
I found the first episodes of the series intriguing, bringing up all these different plot threads and then weaving them together, looking good so far, and then absolutely nothing was done with most of them. I have absolutely no idea what was going on with the last couple episodes. They could have just ended it on episode ten with a black screen and the words:
"And some of them lived happily ever after?"
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DuskyPredator
Joined: 10 Mar 2009
Posts: 15502
Location: Brisbane, Australia
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Posted: Sun Jun 29, 2014 10:15 am
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Episode 12 (final)
This will probably be hard to rate, because this was a bad, bad episode. Sure we got a happy ending, but there was no proper work up for what it is that happened in the end, it was a mess. Animation was unimpressive, plot points were vague or revealed in a way that did not feel clever, hinted at, or properly coherent, and it felt super cheesy. The super cheesy bit is important because it felt like it suddenly decided to try to pretend it is an action anime, or in general an anime it is not and came across super not genuine. Like we were meant to think what Ene did was cool with taking out henchman no colour, but the pacing of that scene was totally off, did not properly convey what they waned, and again was cheesy that I would not expect to come from SHAFT.
I got the gist of what happened, NEET was able to keep some small memories from past repeats, which eventually lead to getting the plan of having what's her name use her ability of showing her feelings to little miss Medusa, which stopped her from repeating, breaking bad serpent's hold. Problems include that the situation really did not feel as threatening as they wanted that she would have to repeat, and there was really no clarity that the other world stopped, the people released, or did some people die. Even all the character interaction just felt wrong.
A shame as I rather liked early episode for their use of style felt like a good idea of how it was used in SHAFT's other airing show, Nisekoi. Actually first episode was probably the best, and when it decided to give a coherent full plot it was alright unlike places where it really did seem to not explain what was happening, although I do get the general idea. What was happening in that episode where time kept repeating it did not give a definitive answer. I can't but say it is another example of SHAFT often wasting time and not letting characters just interact.
Based on this episode and bits of the last fitting into this series as a complete story, I might rate it So-so, but even if they managed to fix this episode's animation and fix the atmosphere that just did not work it would have made this end much more enjoyable. Taking into some episodes and good ideas in here, I think I put it up to Decent, for example Ene herself was enough to push the series up a little. Pretty much meaning the end was not grabbing my attention, but positive aspects made it not waste of time.
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