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Cuticle Detective Inaba The Complete Collection (anime review)

Posted by :Patches On : April 20, 2014
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Cuticle Detective InabaTitle: Cuticle Detective Inaba The Complete Collection

Director: Susumu Nitsukawa

Studio: ZEXCS

Author: Mochi

U. S. Distributor: Sentai Filmworks / Section 23

Release Date: April 29th, 2014

Format: Blu-ray / 12 Episode / 300 Minutes

Genre: Comedy, Parody, Absurdity

Age Rating: TV 14

Overall Personal Rating: B-

Synopsis:

In a world where half-human, half-animal chimeras live and work alongside normal people, there are sure to be a few bad apples in the bunch. Unfortunately, criminals who are only half-human means there are often non-human clues that leave the police stumped. That’s where lone-wolf detective Hiroshi Inaba comes in. He’s literally part wolf and has the amazing ability to extract critical information just by examining or tasting a sample of someone’s hair!

Of course, that ability has also resulted in Inaba having a little bit of a hair fetish, but that doesn’t seem to be a problem for his two assistants. Well, at least the cross-dressing one isn’t complaining much. And it’s nothing compared to the strange tastes of Inaba’s nemesis, the omnivorous, half-goat crime boss Don Valentino, who has an appetite for green legal tender instead of tender young greens!

Inaba’s sworn to cut Valentino out of the criminal flock before the Don can wolf down more ill-gotten dough, but he’s going to have to chew his way through a lot of evidence to get his goat. Can sheer dogged detective work put the baaaaad guys behind bars?

 

Commentary:

In a long line of parody series, Cuticle Detective Inaba comes out of the shoot blasting away with absurdity and parody. The silliness that ensues sticks with the series throughout. The rather odd group of characters that take us through this rather crazy show are at the core of the absurd humor and constantly prove to be over the top at every turn. This over the top approach is both the strength and weakness of the series. With the show being all about the humor I would say that it hits a home run because it is funny. But, on the other side of the coin this pushing the envelop of silliness also makes it very hard to stay with the series for any period of time. I enjoyed it and grew very tired of it at the same time. I know that this seems impossible, but after just a few minutes of the switch back and forth from real world and chibi world along with the change from the plot driven story to just flat out stupidity also tired met out.

As for the quality of the animation, I can say that ZEXCS does their standard fin job of bringing us a visually entertaining show. The look and feel of the animation styles fits perfectly with the series, but as with the writing and series itself the animation betrays the viewer by making it just a little too schizophrenic even with the humor being the star of the show.

Overall Grade: B-

There are plenty of other parodies out there that stand high in their way to both hit the high marks without being overly schizophrenic. If you look back at series like Stg. Frog or Lucky Star you get a good feeling of how this balance is created. Cuticle Detective Inaba brings home the humor so many fans love. So, if you are looking for a good laugh without any real emotional connection this series is for you.

 

Ebiten: The Complete Collection (anime review)

Posted by :Patches On : April 19, 2014
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Ebiten: The Complete Collectionreview provided by Katie

Title: Ebiten: The Complete Collection

Director: Hideki Okamoto

Studio: AIC Classic

Author: Kira Inugami and SCA-ji

U.S. Distributor: Sentai Filmworks / Section 2

U.S. Release Date: April 1, 2014

Format and Length: DVD / 10 Episodes + OVA / 275 Minutes

Genre: Comedy, Ecchi, Parody, Harem, School

Industry Age Rating: 17 and up

Overall Personal Rating: B

Similar Series or Titles to Check Out: Maria Holic and The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya

Sometimes friendship is all about chemistry! And sometimes chemistry is just about blowing stuff up!

Synopsis:

What do you get when you take one group of crazy fan girls with questionable grips on reality, toss out all rules of proper social behavior and mix them together in a basement with more twisted anime parodies and allusions than you can imagine? Besides a recipe for disaster, hilarity ensues when you meet the members of the Astronomical Club where mayhem rules and the wall between the real world and total fantasy crumbles at least once every five minutes.
Commentary:

Imitation is the greatest form of flattery. Or so the old adage says. Ebiten: The Complete Collection takes this concept and completely warps it to something that can only be described as beyond over the top. Parodies are hard to accomplish and are often done incorrectly, becoming nothing more than a mockery of what they intend to pay tribute to. For the most part this is not the case. The story revolves around the adventures of the members of the Ebisugawa High School “Asstronomy” Club. That’s their spelling, not mine. Gotta love Japanese wordplay jokes. It’s a small club that’s not really all that popular, has few members, no budget or funding, an absent teacher adviser, being shoved into a small room in the basement of the oldest part of the school, and has a club president who does not participate, and wants to disband the club for any reason she can find. But all that doesn’t discourage the members from their daily activities.

Ebiten: The Complete Collection’s story mostly revolves around Kyouko Todayama, the unofficial head of, and most outspoken member of the club. Her only check is Hasumi Ooba, club vice president, and she really only intervenes when Todayama goes too far. But that scale is full of blurry lines and undefined limits that nearly don’t exist. And with little adult supervision, since the teacher sponsor, Shouko Oomori is more interested in ‘pursuing’ her love life, and her lover for that matter, than doing her job, she leaves her cat Oomori Neko Sensei in charge, and of course, the cat rubberstamps everything with a “nyan”, the adventures get quite crazy. Followed by Rikei Hiromatsu, the quiet and obedient member with a strange fetish, Hakata Kanamori, the club’s ditzy cosplayer, manga and dojinshi collector, and easy target for jokes and fan service, and freshman member Itsuki Noya, the story revolves around the club’s atypical activities, which has little to do astronomy, minus a small reference from time to time. Throw in Izumiko, aka Elizabeth, an unexpected visitor from a different school, Yuka Iseda, the unsupportive club president, and member of the student council, and the poor unsuspecting man Shouko is stalking, and you get Ebiten: The Complete Collection.

Though the story is a bit off the wall, chaotic, changes from a bit from one episode to another, and kinda seems written as they went, there was lots of humor to be had. Of course the story line was second to the parodies, and had to change a little to match what they were doing a parody of. Each episode parodies a different anime, and some of the parodies followed the characters themselves. When watching it, I found myself more concerned with trying to figure out what they were doing a parody of, than how consistent the story line was. Ultimately I did find it difficult to pick out a few of the animes they were doing a parody of, because at least half of them never made it here, or are old and have been forgotten, having been out of print since the 90s. At one point I had to look it up online to find a few of them, but for some reason I enjoyed doing all that. Normally if you have to work to understand something, they are doing it wrong, but not in this case. I have to mention though that I am old enough to remember most of the older animes they parodied, so I did have that advantage, and it added even more enjoyment, remembering the early days of anime, before it was cool, mass produced, or easily obtained. Also I need to note that there was fan service, quite often just to have it, but it’s nothing really excessive or over done.

Extras:

Ebiten: The Complete Collection includes Heart Throb Hot Springs, Japanese commercials and promos, music videos, clean opening and closing animations, and Sentai Filmworks trailers as special features.

Overall Grade: B

Ebiten: The Complete Collection will make you laugh with all the parodies they use in each episode. You have been warned.

MM! The Complete Collection (anime review)

Posted by :Patches On : February 8, 2014
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MM!review provided by Katie and Andrew

Title: MM! The Complete Collection

Director: Tsuyoshi Nagasawa

Studio: Xebec

Author: Akinari Matsuno

U.S. Distributor: Sentai Filmworks / Section 23

U.S. Release Date: February 11, 2014

Format and Length: Blu-ray / 12 Episodes / 300 Minutes

Genre: Comedy, Romance, School, Ecchi, Harem, Parody

Industry Age Rating: TV-MA 17 and older

Overall Personal Rating: C-

Similar Series or Titles to Check Out: Okami-San and Her Seven Companions, Mayo Chiki! and Haganai: I Don’t Have Many Friends

 

Synopsis:

Taro Sado has a problem. He just realized that he actually likes being made miserable and knowing that only makes him more miserable. Then it turns into a viscous cycle. Desperate to break the cycle, Taro volunteers for a special club where he can hopefully work through his issues, but he soon discovers that the other members have equally complex issues to deal with. There is the club president who believes herself to be a god, a girl who is terrified of men, an adult who forces other people to perform cosplay, and a compulsive cross-dresser. Will Taro be able to get over is problem or will it take over his life?

Commentary:

MM! The Complete Collection is a strange anime to say the least. The main character, Taro Sado, is a hard core masochist. He seeks the help of a club called the Second Voluntary club to help him turn back into a normal person. However, the club president is a sadistic girl named Mio Isurugi, who believes she is a god. She loves to hurt him and he loves the pain. That is basically the entire plot of the series bar a few episodes in the beginning that had some romantic feeling.

The plot was interesting and funny until they began parodying older animes. Then the storyline got silly, and not in a good way. They used the parody to fill in spots of the plot that were dragging along. I know I counted at least three animes that were parodied. Of the three, I recognized two off the bat and thought they were not used in the right way. But that is neither here nor there. Then they decided to have Taro’s mother and sister try to have an intimate relationship with him and that was just not right. At least Taro tried to run away or yell at them each time they tried to start something. Things got very interesting when Arashiko Yuno showed up at his house one day because his mother and his sister were very jealous and hilarity ensued.

The character development was nonexistent in MM! The Complete Collection. The characters seem very one dimensional and only have one interesting quality, their “complex” issue that they each have. Mio Isurugi is the president of the Second Voluntary club and is a sadist. She also believes she is a God and is also afraid of kittens. Arashiko Yuno is Taro’s classmate and she is afraid of men. She will attack any men who touch her and whenever Taro touches her, he is assaulted and he loves it. Michiru Onigawara is the school nurse who loves to make people dress up and perform cosplay and take pictures of it. She is a sister figure to Mio. Finally, we have the compulsive cross-dresser Tatsukichi Hayama who is also Taro’s closest friend. Sadly, each character does not grow or change any during the series.

I think I would have enjoyed MM! The Complete Collection more if Taro had learned to control his hard core masochism or if any of the other characters changed at all. There was a lot of fan-service because of the cosplaying that was used to torture Taro. The opening theme kept my interest but I found the ending theme boring. If you like fan-service heavy animes that are of the harem genre then you will probably love MM! The Complete Collection.

Extras:

MM! The Complete Collection includes commentary with voice actors, Japanese promo and TV spot, DVD commercials, 10 short stories, clean opening and closing animation, and Sentai Filmworks / Section 23 trailers as special features.

Overall Grade: C-

MM! The Complete Collection is a good anime for what it is however; I usually like romantic or harem animes that have a better plot line and more character development. If you are strictly seeking a perverted comedy then I suggest you watch this, but if you want comedy with some romance and other things then watch either of the animes suggested below.

“In The Radius”:

I recommend the following animes: Okami-San and Her Seven Companions, Mayo Chiki! and Haganai: I Don’t Have Many Friends. Haganai is has a similar plot line, however it was better written and much more enjoyable.

Excel Saga Volume 27 (manga review)

Posted by :Patches On : January 30, 2014
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Excel Saga 27Title: Excel Saga Volume 27

Writer: Rikdo Koshi

Publisher: Viz Media

U. S. Release Date:  Jan 14th, 2014

Format: Manga / Paperback

Genre: Action, Parody, Sci Fi, Comedy

Age Rating: T+ for older teens

Overall Personal Rating: B

 

Synopsis: 

 

Excel, who had seemed back to her old self, is now a stranger once more after making contact with something – or someone – beyond the forbidden portal. Will she be the captive in the end of a tragedy that happened so long ago? There is but one power that can prevail over all the mysteries of human knowledge: namely, the power of Excel’s ego. You didn’t think she’d ever forgotten about world conquest, did you?

Commentary:

The Final Volume of Excel Saga gives just what we expected from the strange quirky series that pokes fun at the world it lives in. Now that it has reached the end you would think it would become easier to understand and that the pacing would contain some regularity, but alas Excel Sage proved to all that it is a odd as ever and following along can be a genuine task.

As much fun as it is to see the finally come into full blossom for the superbly odd story I found it a little flat at times and wondered that maybe Rikido Koshi had begun to loose focus. These flat rather lackluster parts didn’t last ;ing but did find their way into the story more often thanI would have liked.

What I did appreciate was the way it was wrapped and the twist that just kept coming as we got there. The move at the end is not completely unexpected, but in many ways didn’t pull of the surprise I was looking for.

Overall Grade: B

As much as I enjoyed watching this bizarre tale come to an end I also felt a little let down by the lack of odd parody that flows through so much of the series. I realize that this plot line was developed from the very beginning, but the way this final volume obsessed on the out come felt a little unnatural for the series. With all of the other slow rather unimportant pacing throughout the rest of the volume I just came away a little disappointed. Don’t be discouraged, there are still plenty of twist and plot devices that seemingly make no sense that are trademark for the series and also keep it fresh enough to drag you kicking through the rest of the story. When there are so few manga that are just strange enough to be funny and funny enough to keep you coming back for more, Excel Saga stands out among them as one of the best. All I can really say is that if this is world conquest bring it on. It is still a crazy story and I know that all the Excel Saga fan out there will be happy with the book, but sad to see it go.