Subscribe11:59. Happy new year. :D Good bye old year.
I’m doing this by presenting title and how I would categorize them, only listing shows that really stick out in my mind (as a result, there may be a bias towards writing more about recent shows versus stuff that aired earlier in the year), trying to keep it limited to stuff that finished unless I can’t help it (hi KnK).
The High
Favorites from the year. Favorites specifically because they’re personal favorites but not what I would call the best.
This picture is titled “性姦飛行” and also read “Seikan Hikou” like Ranka’s Macross Frontier song but the kanji translates to “Sexual Rape Flight”
Detroit Metal City
Categories: Comedy, OVA
I didn’t expect to enjoy this ’cause I thought it would be like a bunch of metal music scene in-jokes that would go over my head. Turned out to have a bunch of juvenile jokes about rape and violence, but that wasn’t really where the funny came from. Instead of focusing on more industry and scene-related stuff, the real humor came from Negishi’s double life and from DMC’s obsessive fans. It was a total riot seeing this soft spoken guy who likes pop music and sings a song about eating cheese tart’s transform into a metal demon who is rumored to have killed his parents. Aikawa’s obliviousness was pretty amusing, she seemingly never caught onto Negishi’s double life even though he repeatedly slipped on hiding his Krauser side from her. The most obvious example being when he travels back and forth between the store where he’s giving an interview as Krauser and the restaurant to meet with her. The behavior of the DMC fans was something that also made the show for me. They’re reflective of how a real fanbase acts, even though the fans and the band are fictional. The Krauser-tan part in particular, and the concept of a Detroit Moe City hits close to home.
Does being reminded of something you do make something better? Not particularly better, but I think it can be more enjoyable, and it can be something besides just another joke in the anime if it’s something you both get and have experienced. I guess I feel the need to bring this up particularly about DMC because I thought I would be excluded from the appeal thinking it to be about the music scene instead. My only complaint is that DMC was short. When you add all the mini-episodes together, it was as long as 6 normal episodes of anime. But that might be part of its strength too. Perhaps I didn’t think the style ever got old because it was only that long?
Kaiji
Category: Gambling, Suspense, ZAWA ZAWA
I can’t write about this very well because I finished watching it back in April. I’ll take the easy way out and use bullet points. ;_;
- Kaiji is a pretty normal guy.
- …well, maybe more like pathetic.
- Kaiji was not trying to do anything grand, he was trying to gamble like fuck for his survival.
- Survival needs like food/water/money/shelter are pretty basic needs.
- He turned the need for something as basic as survival into what I thought was an intense, suspense 26 episode gamble.
- I didn’t find the GAMBLING IS SERIOUS BUSINESS to be over exaggerated because it was the extent of the universe presented. Kind of like Skip Beat and show business being serious business.
- Part of what made Kaiji intense was that he was in the lower end of things, and I wasn’t sure if he’d success or not the next week.
- He did fuck up a lot on his way to the end. The fact he definitely went through trial and error, nearly falling deeper into despair than he already was, made the ending satisfying. His victory didn’t feel empty or cheap.
- SEASON 2 WHERE.
- Art style not very fabulous visually pleasing.
Kara no Kyoukai
Categories: Action, Fighting, Soundtrack, Visuals, Movie(s), Mystery, Strawberry ice cream
I rather like Kara no Kyoukai for the sensory experience: The visuals, the music, the choreography of the fight scenes. All of the animation is well done and there has yet to be a QUALITY moment. Considering the circumstances that ufotable hasn’t done anything but animate KnK for a while, and they have a larger company backing them, it might be a moment of “Well duh hurr”. But that’s assuming that another studio would be able to churn out the same kind of work with the same conditions. Can we prove that? 
Unfortunately the story leaves a little to be desired. 1-3 each involves a murder mystery tale around the town. The flow of these movies gets repetitious because the stories are only moved forward by the murders and investigating them. There’s also this “It’s a small world” feeling to how the characters are all connected. I find the coincidences almost comical. Kokutou just so happens to meet Kirie because she just so happens to be at the same hospital as Shiki, Fujino just so happens to be Ayaka’s school mate, Kokutou just so happens to be the guy who Fujino was obsessing over. Etc. The “relief” for this repetition in movies 1-3 came from the 1mo pause in between each release. Then movie 4 comes along, and it’s not linked by murders but rather a personal experience of Shiki’s and the character connections seemingly get made fun of with Touko being Shiki’s speech therapist on purpose. There’s still movies 5-7 left to be released, and I hope that the pattern break of movie 4 was not the only break.
Code Geass R2
Categories: Multi-Genre cesspool, Pure entertainment
I’ve already said a lot about Geass and I have this tendency to just ramble about it. To recap and keep it brief, Geass was a one time watch because part of what made the experience was the fans. This explains why I feel like I do about the fans from DMC. It had Schneizel, there was fabulous, I got trolled, everything is BRIGHT. Uhhm… see this.
Kaiba
Categories: Adventure, Sci-Fi
I find myself stuck on what to say about Kaiba. It’s not like Kaiji where I finished watching it so along ago that it’s just not as fresh in my mind, it’s that I genuinely have no fucking clue what to say that properly expresses why I consider this a high point. Kaiba is “different, but not in a bad way” as in it’s not different just to be different and it doesn’t remind me of that picture of the bent fork that says “Just because you’re different doesn’t mean you work”. Kaiba is one of those pretentious as fuck shows where everything is obfuscated and the phrase acid trip will be used about it. Then there’s some moral question about how far is too far in technological advances, raised by the universe’s use of memory storage and body transfer. Then body transfer will raise questions about questioning your personality and who you are. And all of this technology and body transferring will make you question what death means.
Kaiba is a love story.
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The Mid
I have pretty stupid reasons for these leaving any “impression” on me and I have no problem admitting this. Arguably this would be the low point because of the word shallow, but I’m using low for disappointments instead.
Junjou Romantica
Category: Guilty pleasure, Yaoi 
I’m a yaoi fangirl and I watched Junjou Romantica with my brain turned off. If there was really a plot or stuff resembling real relationships and character developments in this anime, don’t talk to me about it because chances are, I don’t remember it at all.
Chi’s Sweet Home
Categories: Kittens are cute, Slice of life
I like kittens, they’re adorable, I go surf Kitten War frequently, Caturday is love. This was mini-104 episodes of pure d’aaaaw for me. It’s just about a kitten getting lost and being taken in, then it turns into this slice of life about kitty playing around the house and just doing things that might really piss you off but are still just so adorable that ALL IS FORGIVEN.
Tales of the Abyss
Categories: Fantasy, Adaptation improvement, Knowing how things turn out is strangely satisfying, Joy to fansub
Tales of the Abyss is the only adaptation I’m watching where I was familiar with the original when I started watching it. After witnessing the adaptation decay of Nodame Cantabile, and also re-watching the heavily adaptation decayed Magic Knight Rayearth anime, I feel like I have to praise the TotA anime for improving upon something I thought was bad in the game: Travel time and the world map. Those were fucking horrible and the anime gets a free thumbs up for improving that. (I don’t think any rpg to anime adaptation would “adapt” over the fucking travel times too. :p But lol this is the blatantly shallow section.) In addition, knowing how things will end is strangely satisfying. This might be a side effect of being trolled by Geass every week. And lastly, TotA is quite pleasant to fansub. Nothing is particular difficult about working on TotA. Japanese sometimes has hinted or obscured context. In another show might be confusing, but with TotA it’s easy to guess.
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The Low Point
Disappointing.
Spice and Wolf
Categories: Fantasy, Economy
Spice and Wolf I had the first impression was a fantasy setting that was trying to deviate from the normal fantasy topics by focusing on more normal, every day things like religion and economy. In the end, I don’t think it did this well. Edit: Let me rephrase this. Horo and Lawrence had good chemistry imo, but if the show was also about stuff like economy and also religion then I didn’t notice it over their dynamic. It’s like everything besides them was a little mundane.
Nodame Cantabile – Paris
Categories: Adaptation decay, Second season letdown, School
S2 lacks the character dynamics of S1 and you can tell they were cutting corners with the pacing. The show itself was not horrible and unwatchable nor did it commit crimes against mankind by just existing, it was just really a letdown. I would say it was one of the worst anime I watched in 08 because being disappointed by something I had more faith and expectations in to begin leaves more of a bad impression than being disappointed by you had little to no faith in. I guess the workings behind that is like another topic on its own.
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So, my dear srs readers, what were the high and low points of anime in 08 for you?
Jaka 
Smerpy 
Ginnodangan 
aers 
風の谷の名無しさん 
theflow 
Whocares 
Sakagami 
fddf 
noob 
someone 
Lawl 
Aww, you didn’t write a giant wall on Geass, I’m terribly disappointed. And I thought you were on the west coast for some reason.