The following post first appeared on my old blog: Chibi no Nothing

I had been planning to watch Toki wo Kakeru Shoujo (The Girl Who Leapt Through Time) for a couple of weeks. To be honest it was the name of the movie alone that drew me to it. I watched the first few minutes of it a week ago, but I was caught up in some other activity that I do not recall, which made me put off watching the show for a while. I finally got around to sitting down for roughly ninety minutes in order to watch the movie.

I don’t watch many feature length anime. This has to do with both availability and time. It is a lot easier to sit for twenty or thirty minutes indulging in a little procrastination while not feeling too bad for the experience than it is to sit for ninety.

For that matter, there is only one reason that I actually managed to watch the entire show. I have plenty of things that I should be doing, given that school is about to start again soon. However, the movie starts out showing the main character Makoto who is plainly a fun character in general.

I’m not too concerned with the technical merits of the voice acting. I’m not speaking for the character design either, which seem to be rather ordinary. The animation quality was impressive. That did not sway my opinion very much as I have come to expect better quality in feature length anime. I simply liked this character. She was fun straight forward and easy to grasp. Those are not necessarily adjectives that I would generally give as positive attributes. In the context of the story it was exactly what was needed. She gains an incredible power that allows her to leap through time, and she uses it to achieve relatively mundane tasks.

Watching her realize that she had the power to fly back in time then seeing what she did with it was done perfectly as far as animation and story telling go. We could see her mind working as she comprehended the situation. We could also see how she totally missed the incredible depth and vast potential she had at her disposal.

What I liked the most was exactly that she did not use her time leaping ability to save the world or change the destiny of all man kind. Her outlook was entirely superficial at first. At its peak it only extended to her friends at school. She was in ever sense of the word a “kid” about the whole thing.

The movie had its less light moments. They worked in a little drama and romance toward the end of the movie. The message, “time waits for no one” seemed to be appropriate. Throughout the movie Makoto tried to change aspects of event to get a desired goal. There just was no way for her to create the perfect history. It would seem fate was the real message.

I would have really liked to take this post on some type of emotional diatribe about how time can both heal and cause great distress. It just doesn’t jive with the movie. I simply wasn’t too moved by it. Please do not misunderstand me on that last comment I thoroughly enjoyed watching it.

My one thought while watching Toki wo Kakeru Shoujo wasn’t about time travel or changing fate. I couldn’t seem to shake the thought that I would really like to see a show based on Makoto just being Makoto all day and nothing more.

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About the person in the lab room: I think it was Makoto who was in the lab and pushed herself.

Also, I’m trying out bloggers new polling widget. Please vote, if it isn’t too much trouble. It’s on the right side near the top.

The following post first appeared on my old blog: Chibi no Nothing

A while back I wrote about how I wasn’t too pleased with the fact that Code Geass was going to be more than one season. Then briefly after Euphie became the Murder Princess I wavered in my opinion.

Then Euphie died. I returned to normal.

After watching episode 24 and 25 where are we? Do we know more about Lelouch? Not really. Lelouch’s motive and actions have not changed much over the course of the first season. Of course, one can always say that he has become a tad bit more evil. Let’s face it, Lelouch is a “bad guy.” It’s just that we have a natural tendency to side with the lesser of two evils, and Britannia just doesn’t seem to have any redeeming qualities aside from cute princesses who like to go on murderous geass infused rampages.

How about Suzaku? Sure he murdered his dad, but he seems to only really feel bad about it in conveniently short periods of crippling emotional turmoil.

To be fair, Lelouch and Suzaku do get some flashbacks of childhood moments.

How about C.C? C.C. is perfect, and I’ll kick anyone who says otherwise. Actually, C.C. seems to get a good dose of development. It’s all character development in the form of her personality. We get very little, if any, historical context. This is unlike the history we are show with Lelouch and Suzaku. We don’t know exactly what she is, where she has been, what she is doing, why she had green hair, what’s with the pizza, what is that thing she wears it looks like a straight-jacket, I used to have some of those trick hand-cuffs that magicians use, and–oh yeah–pepperonis is yummy.

What about everyone else? Not very much, that’s what. Code Geass is full of mostly static characters. That’s not to say that they are uninteresting or uni-dimensional. It’s saying that the story wasn’t a progression. It’s as if the pieces were set in place and the game started while we watched. There was little setup. We were only told what was needed in order for us to understand why the characters were acting a certain way. Also, it provided a means to understand what was guiding their actions. For me this creates a detachment between my feelings towards the characters and the plot they are embroiled in.

Perhaps that is what was intentionally the intention of the ones that intended to deny us an extension of emotional context for the characters. There is a big difference between seeing the emotional reaction of a character and understanding that reaction. It takes time for an audience to develop an intimacy with the characters. This is time the Code Geass has had and still has. That time that was had, has been wasted. Wasted on what? Explosions, that’s what.

I like explosions too, though.

Okay, I’d better stop it here. Let’s just say that I still think they could have wrapped it up in one season. Now, we all have to wait.

This type of waiting is like sitting in a dark room. The night sky, illuminated by the hollow moon. She sits across the expanse waiting for that sound. She is waiting for a message. Waiting for sweet words from that which she holds dear. The hours are upon her, but she dares not sleep. Wait. . .was that a ring.

[ see? What the hell is going on here? Damn cliffhangers!!!!! ]

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“grok” – google it.

edit: 12:21 – made some corrections, nothing special

The following post first appeared on my old blog: Chibi no Nothing

The first thing I would like to point out is this. Yes, 30 people offered “user ratings” for an anime that does not exist. I’m going to chalk that up to misreading the title so that I don’t lose my faith in humanity.

If you’re like me BGC 2040 was your first exposure to the Bubblegum Crisis universes. I picked up ADV’s boxset years ago. I think I watched that series about four or five times before I found something else to occupy myself. For some reason I had neglected the original OAV even thought I’ve had plenty of chances to view it. It may have been the dated animation style, which doesn’t bug me now as much as it would have bothered me years ago. For that matter, I find the style a bit nostalgic now when watching the show.

Hair has always been used as an identifying attribute of characters in anime. Here we have hair that more mirrors the hair styles of the time. We see Priss with the huge mushroom hair. It seems to mirror the hair styles of late 80’s in the US. Big hair was big in the US back then. I’m making the assumption that Japanese women were doing the same with their hair, but I don’t really know for sure.

The thought is more than a little amusing.

I was tempted to do some type of compare and contrast on the OAV and 2040, but then I thought about it and realized that no one really cares. Besides I’ve only watched the first two episodes in the OAV.

Finally, where is the BGC 2041 sequel to BGC 2040. It’s been five years!

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The 80’s were so awesome.

I’m currently watching the remastered version that was released by AnimEigo in 2004.

The following post first appeared on my old blog: Chibi no Nothing

Everyone gets dragged along to Nagi’s grandfathers estate for no apparent reason other than to continue the randomness of the show.

Hayate learns that he is even more worthless than we had thought. Maria gives a little bare shoulder fan service. Nagi yells. Nagi blushes. Nagi yells some more. Hayate shows that he is filled with determination to protect Nagi from her aggressors. Nagi blushes.

This is all pretty much SOP for this show, but there is one scene that made this episode particularly good. Basically, Nagi will inherit her grandfathers estate. However, her grandfather has set a condition on which anyone who makes Nagi cry and apologize will get everything.

Why? Who knows, it’s just some more randomness.

Methinks I enjoy this too much.

Such a divergent contrast…