Daijoubu

I used to check AnimeNano very frequently, but not so much recently. In the meantime all kinds of new blogs and controversies have popped up that I know nothing about. Anyway, what I thought I’d do is click on AnimeNano and see whats there on right now. And then I’ll, like, write about it…

I know that the most recent posts are at the top, so if I start there I’d be going in reverse chronological order, but its the easiest way to do it. So first up is Symphonic Tales Anime Blog on Quick First Impressions: Shikabane Hime Kuro, Akikan, Maria+Holic, Kiss X Sis, and Kurokami The Animation. Ok, I like this kind of post, because it allows you to get an idea of many new shows at one time and decide which might be worth your time. I also like how that image of CC really stands out and makes you want to click on the blog.

OK, next up is one of those blogs known for episode summaries, Subculture Anime Blog. He’s writing about a show called “White Album,” which I think I heard of and at the time thought, “Hey that’s a Beatles Album!” I skip the summary, so as not to spoil anything, and look at the commentary. Oh dear… He doesn’t like it…. While I don’t care about Hirano Aya being in it or not, I might still want to check it out to see if Bungalow Bill or Rocky Racoon show up in it, but I don’t think they will, going by Totali’s comments…

Oh boy… Next is Sankaku Complex and when I see that name I know to brace myself for something NSFW and possibly disturbing. I used to send links of various Japanese school girl-related posts from here to a friend who was teaching English in Japan (Greguto), but he got really offended by them for some reason, so I stopped and just started to avoid the site. Oh well, here goes, and…. *click* OH BOY, dare I “Toggle Visibility of Mature Content”?? Here goes, *click* Bah, there’s not much to this To Love-Ru Onsen Nude Filter post. If you’re gonna do nude, you might as well go the distance, this is not very interesting.

A King of Fighters without Mai Shiranui?…Blasphemy! at Cartoon Leap is a video game post and I don’t really follow those, so on to Manga Maniac Cafe for Moon Child Vol 12 by Reiko Shimizu Manga Review. Not a manga I’m familiar with at all, but I will comment on something: This blog is interesting in having a very plain design. That’s not an insult though, as for a blog of this type INFORMATION and CONTENT (reviewing lots of manga) trumps bells and whistles. Although the fact that these are official manga releases in English and not the latest Naruto chapters from Japan must make a site like this have less of an impact on hard-core internet otaku. Actually, I tried reviewing some officially released manga, but didn’t get very far with it.

OK, here’s one from Ogiue Maniax. I love that there’s a blog with Ogiue in the title. Anyway, I know from the past this blog is a somewhat idiosyncratic one… Today he’s writing about something called Budget Heroes. At first I assumed it would be about buying anime goods on a budget (LOOL), but no, its about animators making the best of their budgets. Seems like a good idea, but I think the posts needs some more development and is really a topic that could be fleshed out with screencap examples.

On to Aroduc of Tenka Seiha on, oh its that White Album thing again… But I like how he does things: lots of screencaps and a well written and often amusing set of impressions, although I won’t read them so as not to spoil anything. I will watch his embedded youtube link of the OP… meh, it’s very un-Beatles-like and both the song and visuals are a bore. Too bad. One other thing, I like when Aroduc writes, “these are just my kneejerk reactions to the first 20 minutes of shows, many of which in genres that I don’t even particularly like, but I do believe in giving every new series at least an episode to at least try and hook me.” That’s very open-minded!

Next is animemiz’s scribblings.. on Ah My Goddess 20th Anniversary Artbook = Love! This is cool. I wish there were even more art book reviews around! And now on to one of those blogs I haven’t looked at before, Anime Chatter. The post is called One Piece: A Modern Day “Epic” In Every Sense Of The Word? and praises One Piece, which we need more of because One Piece is the greatest Shonen manga ever!! It cannot be praised enough! And omisyth (I recognize that name) compares One Piece to the classical epics. One Piece is indeed vast. Perhaps omisyth should consider broadening his comparison by moving on to some other epics, like Gilgamesh, Dante’s Divine Comedy, Milton’s Paradise Lost, Firdawsi’s Shahnameh, Beuowulf, Ludovico Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso and the Finnish Kalevala. Get reading omisyth! Anyway, I actually commented on this post, because One Piece is so great!!

Next up my old friend DiGiKerot of Beta Waffle. He’s actually changed the appearance of his site. Anyway, I enjoyed Unfunny Internet Meme Comics, which I don’t think he’s done in a while. And this one’s about video games, ugh …… and I’ve already had enough Persona 4 babbling from NyaChan on twitter… ^^;

Next up are two posts on Fallen Aizen about ToraDora. I’ve not kept up on this show, so I won’t read these and spoil myself, however its interesting that he’s got the dedication to blog every episode, even if he misses a week and does two together like this.

Next is another blog I haven’t read yet, Tortugas Magicas, but when I click on it it says “Sorry, no posts matched your criteria.” Oh dear…, so I move on to Sankaku Complex again, but this is not a NSFW post, but instead is an example of declining animation quality across three episodes of a series due to budget issues called The Third Episode Curse. The example is a good one and this post shows the unpleasant alternative to the “Budget Heroes” mentioned above.

Oh boy, there’s another Beta Waffle post too! Not a comic but I a post (Speaking of Wrong: MariMite 4th Series)about something I haven’t watched so I have no idea what he’s talking about. So I quickly move on to Anime², another blog I’m not so familiar with yet. Pig Ballet is a brief bit of animation the author did.

Next there’s another manga review: Tiamat (Tiamat is the name of a goddess in the Babylonian creation epic, the Enûma Eliš) posts The Antique Gift Shop Vol 06 – Thoughts & Impressions. This is again a review of an official English language release, in this case of a manhwa.

Then we come to two more posts on White Album: Moyism focuses on just presenting embedded youtube links of the OP and ED Looks like Omo likes the ED. Maybe he’ll sing it at karaoke some time. =P BTW, Omo and Moy are the only two bloggers in this sample who I’ve met in real life. Anyway, Can you Moe? 2nd Season has just a brief impression of ep. 1, which is generally more positive about the show than the other two posts about the first episode, mentioned above. Wow, there’s a lot of Korean text on this blog too.

Ok, our last post is from a blogger whose been around a while, Kurogane. His post is Hayate no Gotoku: “More dream-like than a dream.” and, although brief, his post shows his love for this manga and its girl characters. In its way, this post is a “fan love” post like that one above about One Piece.

Phew, this took a few hours; but refreshing animenano I see that some of them are still on the front page! Looks like I nearly missed commenting on an Ani-Nouto post, hehe. So, minus that dead link one, I looked at nineteen posts from sixteen blogs. Four were about White Album, three were about manga, two were about ToraDora, two were about animation quality, two were about video games, one reviewed an art book, one praised One Piece, one had nudity, one was quick impressions of several things, one I didn’t understand at all, and one was, yes, presenting a Pig Ballet. Is this typical of AnimeNano? Who knows, but it was interesting!