Shrinking Optimism – Just some random thoughts
The following post first appeared on my old blog: Chibi no Nothing
As I sit here I think to myself, “What to do?” The television bleeds out an endless stream of useless sounds and images meant for entertainment, but it fails at that. AVAST!!!! Apparently, my virus database has been updated. Oh, I’m so bored.
For the most part, I’ve found myself settled into a repetitive cycle of work for pay, pay for work (school), pay for play, and anime. I’ve been watching some of the popular series Claymore, Zero no Tsukaima, Idolmasters, and Hayate no Gotoku!. They are all very good, but the only one of the group that has a plot with any complexity is Idolmasters. As far as that is concerned, the point of interests is trying to figure out how they are going to get a teenage girl and a 50 meter tall mecha into the sack by the end of the series.
Those shows are fun to watch. They’ve got love, blood, violence, mecha, fights, swords, magic, lolis, humor, and meido just to name a small sample of the attractions. It would appear to be a well rounded diet. I still feel hungry though.
There are some shows that I’ve simply stopped watching. These series at first peaked my interests, but then there was a huge drop in enthusiasm on my part. I can’t help but feel that I’m missing out by not continuing.
A perfect example is Romeo x Juliet. I was very excited about this one. I really was hoping for a dramatic love story with spurts of comedy, but I just lost all interest in the series. I haven’t thought about this show for months. Perhaps, the story has made a turn for the better since I stopped watching it. Or, perhaps, the show has finally moved away from the meandering plot that didn’t seem to go anywhere. I love character development. The problem is that RxJ seemed to push the same character traits with each episode. In the end it was probably just my overenthusiastic cheering of the series before it got off the ground that hurt this for me.
Then there was Denno Coil. The odd thing about Denno Coil is that it is a good show. I’ve only watched five episodes, but I’ve liked every single one. It just doesn’t have a lasting flavor. I forget about Denno Coil as soon as I’ve stopped watching it. That means that when I have time to watch something it isn’t the first thing to come to mind.
Then there is School Days. I admit, I don’t know much about the plot or the characters. I’ve only watched the first three episodes; so, I’m commenting on that and the random comments from online people. Still, I just can’t get into it. Of course, I like the setup. It has all the usual stuff that make a good school drama such as the inept male lead, the best friend that is in love with the male lead, the shy girl who is in love with the male lead, the jealous third part group of girls that do no like the shy girl, a school that is full of girls that potentially love the male lead, and apparently–if online comments read correctly–a male lead that the viewers seems to like hating. Actually, I’m not sure why I’m not watching this.
Much of what I currently watch is coming to an end, which means that I may pick up where I left off with these shows. At the very least I want to know how Romeo x Juliet ends.
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Sometimes, I think my humor is too subtle.
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Be sure to finish School Days. It’s very unusual. Soldier on. Watch the whole thing.
If it’s your kind of thing, it will be a unique experience.
If it’s not your kind of thing, well, it’s only 12 episodes long. But the overwhelming majority seem to think it’s an unusually well-done series.
I don’t know how to explain my feelings on the ending…
I started watching anime about a year and a half ago, and each show has left me with a different feeling. Some, like Gundam SEED or Ghost in the Shell, made me feel like “OK, it’s over. Neat show.” Death Note made me long for another series of comparable intellectual quality. Some, like Honey & Clover and Planetes left me feeling satisfied, but wanting more details on how the characters continue after the show’s over. Elfen Lied left me disappointed with the lack of a proper ending with at least SOME loose ends tied up. Air made me say out loud “What a bloody waste of time! What the hell WAS that?!” ;)
School Days… it’s like a lesson. It should be shown in school. It leads you by the hand to a conclusion, and then throws a wrench in it. Was the conclusion you were led to really the right one? Who is right, who is wrong, who is justified, who is unjustified, and who is/are truly at fault?
In School Days at the last episode the secondary character kills the main character and the other secondary character kills the character who kills the main character. The other secondary character holds the main characters head on a cruise (it was cut off).
@ anonymous – I haven’t heard any really bad things about the show. I figure I’ll watch it eventually. As I had mentioned, the show seems like something I would like.
After a while, watching anime becomes a little repetitive. The common-denominator stuff gets pumped out constantly (harem comedies, mecha, lolis, etc). I think a lot of us have our preferred genre, but also we all want something new and different.
@steve – I heard that something happened in the last episode that caused a delay. There were to reasons floating around the internet. One was that there had been an event at a school in Japan that caught national interest before the show was to air. The other was something about the episode being too violent for the time slot.
I don’t necessarily agree with anonymous that School Days was well-done as a story, but it is certainly unusually memorable. It broke a lot of expectations and conventions and taboos. But it can certainly be understood as a lesson, indeed. Oh boy. I’ve never seen a more, um, graphic illustration of the dangers of that deadly sin called lust!
Mike, the more I hear about the show the more I want to finish it. I just wish I could make some time to do a marathon of the reset of it.