Anime

[TheSnowStorm]

Kaiser Reinhardt disagrees, but acknowledges Kenshiro is a total badass anyway.

^ best dub ever [dnb music!]

Kaiser looks like a manly man as well but I haven't heard of him so I can't truly judge.

I heard the second season of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya is pure shit due to the Endless Eight arc is just a loop. If that's true then that's a shame seeing how well done the first season was.

In fact, what other anime should I watch besides North Star that I might enjoy. I a humor and action kinda guy who also like a great story, character development and great music.

[Malaki-LEGEND.sys]

Golden Boy.

[OverCoat]

IMO' date=' Gundam Wing will always reign supreme as the best Gundam show ever. However, I would put the first season of Gundam 00 right behind it (and SEED close behind that).[/quote']

I neglected to watch any gundam series for a long time, I think the newest one I'd ever watched was Gundam Wing, because I watched that as a kid, and I've seen most of the UC gundam anime out there since then [MSG, 0080, 0083, Zeta, Double Zeta] and god damn was I disappointed in Gundam 00. Right off the bat. None of the characters were likeable except for Sergei and his little loli clonevat soldier sidekick. I did like the mecha designs for the non-gundam mobile suits, but that's about it. After seeing so much UC gundam series I wasn't surprised that half the main characters died at the end of the first season, but I didn't care enough about what happened next so I don't think I'll see season 2. I have more important things to do with my time and there are better mecha shows out there. Macross Frontier, which iirc aired at the same time Gundam 00 did, is a far more interesting anime.

Oh, and Reinhardt there is from probably the best anime ever, Legend of Galactic Heroes

http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/encyclopedia/anime.php?id=1786

If you enjoy scifi anime and haven't seen this yet... oh man. I have yet to witness any storytelling so epic, even in non-anime.

[Winter's Wings]

I think I liked Gundam 00 a lot because it did a very good job of showing the flaws of the pilots and people within the different organizations. Gundam always tries to show how flawed everyone is, but in the end shows how everything works out despite those flaws, and I really like that for some reason. It may or may not have something to do with my working for IT, and feeling like the entire world is collapsing around my cubicle on a daily basis. =P

I also liked how they killed off a lot of the characters in Gundam 00. I *REALLY HATE* shows that don't kill their characters when they need to. Watch Bleach for a fantastic example. It blows my mind that you can have a show based on fighting, and still manage to go entire arcs without killing characters (not even the bad guys). Say what you want about Naruto, but at least the author is willing to let characters go when they need to go.

My only problem with the show, is that they did such a great job setting up for the second season...and then they botched it. On top of that, it appears they've already made their point in the first season (again, haven't watched the whole second season yet though). In Gundam Wing, there's a bunch of themes of conflict, and they're introduced steadily one by one until the end, where it all comes together (and you see the soldiers triumphing over the "soulless" mobile dolls). That's what made it great. Gundam 00 doesn't use its themes well on the whole... I kinda felt like SEED and SEED Destiny were sorta lacking in that area, too.

[Avatar of Justice]

My biggest problem with Gundam 00 is that it pussied out on the issues it presents initially in the show. To me, the whole theme of Gundam 00 was "Is it acceptable to use force to bring about world peace?" In Season Two we are supposed to accept that it is not because we are supposed to just accept that the A-LAWS are bad. Sure, the A-LAWS do horrible shit. But if people had not opposed them, the A-LAWS presumably would not have attacked them. Were the A-LAWs exploiting them somehow? All I saw was idiots opposing authority and being beat down for it which is what it would take to enforce world peace. Setsuna & co. would just babble some nonsense about how they now fight for the future and we were supposed to just side with them. I remember when Billy confronts Sumeragi at the end and lays out why he supports the A-LAWS. I said "You know what? You're right. Shoot that bitch!"

Celestial Being just came off as big hypocrites to me. So, an organization like the A-LAWS that goes around attacking people who fight against world government is bad. And yet, Celestial Being, an organization that is implied to be the big watchdog of the world at the end of the show is the exact same thing. It's members simply have no one in the world government giving them oversight and we are just supposed to trust them. I have no problem with the concept, but I don't like it when the A-LAWS stood for the same thing and are for some reason villains for it while Celestial Being is A-OK.

[Malaki-LEGEND.sys]

Except for the part where A-LAWS kills civilians indiscriminately with excessive force.

[DarkeSword]

My biggest problem with Gundam 00 is that it pussied out on the issues it presents initially in the show. To me, the whole theme of Gundam 00 was "Is it acceptable to use force to bring about world peace?" In Season Two we are supposed to accept that it is not because we are supposed to just accept that the A-LAWS are bad. Sure, the A-LAWS do horrible shit. But if people had not opposed them, the A-LAWS presumably would not have attacked them. Were the A-LAWs exploiting them somehow? All I saw was idiots opposing authority and being beat down for it which is what it would take to enforce world peace. Setsuna & co. would just babble some nonsense about how they now fight for the future and we were supposed to just side with them. I remember when Billy confronts Sumeragi at the end and lays out why he supports the A-LAWS. I said "You know what? You're right. Shoot that bitch!"

Celestial Being just came off as big hypocrites to me. So, an organization like the A-LAWS that goes around attacking people who fight against world government is bad. And yet, Celestial Being, an organization that is implied to be the big watchdog of the world at the end of the show is the exact same thing. It's members simply have no one in the world government giving them oversight and we are just supposed to trust them. I have no problem with the concept, but I don't like it when the A-LAWS stood for the same thing and are for some reason villains for it while Celestial Being is A-OK.

In the 2nd season, CB realized they did more harm than good.

And the A-Laws committed absolute atrocities in the name of "preserving order." Memento Mori, anyone?

[relyanCe]

you'd think after this many gundam shows people would start to realize that protagonist doesn't mean good guys. It follows the gundams because it's called Gundam, but that doesn't mean the morality is black and white and the gundam pilots are doing the right thing all the time. Before the Memento Mori, I was leaning toward the A-LAWS despite their harsh methods.

[I-n-j-i-n]

That is before the A-Laws decided to kill millions with a press of a button. A bit silly that they'd do that considering they had the upper hand...

As for an anime recommendation in general, I'd say Genius Party is a must watch if you ever need a reminder why anime is typically considered the tops in the animation genre and maybe in any media as to showing wonderment in audio-visual form. Some of them are literally eyepopping and unfortunately, they don't have a domestic DVD of it yet. But plucking it off of Tokyotosho is so worth it. Get it any way you can. Can't go wrong with a bunch of 15 minute shorts based off of the theme of 'birth' that just goes to every types of storytelling extremes you can think of.

[Bleck]

I've never seen a Gundam show that had a plot that made sense or was really deep

if you want giant robots, you watch a Gundam - if you want an interesting plot, you watch The Big O or RahXephon or Space Runaway Ideon

[I-n-j-i-n]

For the story and not just for the sexy boytoys, Gundam Wing had some pretty interesting and unique ideas about war. A lot of weird plotholes and convenient 'super explosion didn't kill a boy (albeit superpowered) when he detonated it right next to him' stuff though.

00 also came close to being pretty innovative because they were following Wing's storyline for most of the first half. Then the second half made a tragic mistake of copying Zeta, which is a total nonsensical emofest, and that ruined almost everything. I hope the movie returns to the Wing-esque storytelling.

[Avatar of Justice]

you'd think after this many gundam shows people would start to realize that protagonist doesn't mean good guys. It follows the gundams because it's called Gundam, but that doesn't mean the morality is black and white and the gundam pilots are doing the right thing all the time. Before the Memento Mori, I was leaning toward the A-LAWS despite their harsh methods.

As someone who loves moral ambiguity in story telling, I don't have a problem if 00 had actually managed it. However, the main characters of the show just seemed like what they were fighting, except they babbled vague nonsense about how they have to change and the future. Moral ambiguity is no fun if one of the sides doesn't have a good point.

[Gollgagh]

I don't know about anyone else but I'm loving the timeloop thing in Haruhi 2

[Thin Crust]

*SPOILER WARNING*

The thing I hated most about 00 was also in the second season. The first thing that got really annoying was the nonsense with Saji and Luise. They just wouldn't stop whining. People have already talked about this so I won't go into it any further.

The second thing was the innovators themselves. They were so annoying and went on and on about how they were the superior beings whom all peoples should bow down to. Even though they were getting beaten left and right. And in addition, no matter how many times they got beaten, they just ejected and came back.

But this is the thing that really got me. The innovators kept pulling supersuit after supersuit out of their arse. Where do they keep getting these superior mobile suits? If they keep getting better and better, why didn't they just use the more advanced models in the first place instead of waiting until the other ones were defeated?

And the last thing that I didn't like was that it followed almost all the other gundam shows in the way that technology skyrocketed near the end. Let's look at Gundam Wing. At the beginning of the series, there were only Leos and Aires suits. Later the water models: Picies and Cancer were added. Before long, the mobile doll Taurus was invented, which required an upgrade to the gundams for them to be able to fight them. And finally, the Virgo suits were introduced as the ultimate fighting machine. These 4 suits comprised everything that the armies possessed. And the Leos were present during the last and final battle. Contrast this with 00 and see how everything just blew out of proportion. Even with respect to the advanced models in GW, there were only the 5ive gundams, the Tall Geese and the Tall Geese rebuilt, Epyon, and Wing 0. (I don't count the Mercurious and Vey8)(SP) But in 00, you just couldn't keep track of all the new suits that were released every episode. I don't like when they do that and it's what GW did very well.

Now that I’m done with that, I want to bring up another popular gundam series called Code Geass. I don’t care what anyone says, it is a gundam show developed by the same people, having the standard 50 episode requirement, and having the required recap episodes that sums up everything in the series that occurs in every gundam show.

I’ve got to ask, am I the only one who hated that show? The black knights never win. They always run away and somehow, their ranks grow despite that. I could go on a long rant about all the things that were wrong with that show, and how the author did some really weird things in order to manipulate the story to his liking. But I’d rather not go into all that.

[Avatar of Justice]

Yeah, one nice thing about Wing is that it IS pretty easy to keep track of the enemy suits. I think a lot of it has to do with the logical progression of the suits and the fact that there are less of them (and that they don't all look really similar). Original Gundam and Zeta Gundam just constantly throw new suits at you and they just don't seem that different besides maybe being a different color. 00 suffered from that too.

[Arrow]

I don't know about anyone else but I'm loving the timeloop thing in Haruhi 2

In terms of storytelling, it's a very interesting ride, but it's also kind of frustratingly boring to have to watch essentially the same episode over and over again with minor variations eight times.

It's amusing seeing how many different ways Haruhi can almost murder Mikuru with a beach ball though.

[Gollgagh]

well I loved it in the novels as well so seeing it played out with every single episode completely reanimated is kind of a treat for me

[TheSnowStorm]

I just gonna wait until the whole Endless Eights shit is over. I do not wanna watch the same damn episode with minor adjustments or a different viewpoint from each characters.

Fuck and I also need to watch Fist of the North Star.

[Malaki-LEGEND.sys]

Here's to hoping that Kyon finally figures out that there isn't some kind of space time vortex outside that restaurant and actually follows Haruhi out this time.

[Gollgagh]

I just gonna wait until the whole Endless Eights shit is over. I do not wanna watch the same damn episode with minor adjustments or a different viewpoint from each characters.

that's the point

I think I'm the odd one out that's actually enjoying it

[TheSnowStorm]

that's the point

I think I'm the odd one out that's actually enjoying it

You do however, gotta give credit to the writers of Endless Eight seeing how they trolled a fanbase like it was nothing. Seriously, you put a popular anime on hold for a few years, finally come out with a new season only to write the episodes to the point that it is the same deal for every last one of them so far.

Seriously, you can not tell me that is some amazing trolling.

[Geoffrey Taucer]

So does avatar count as anime?

I just finished the series and thought it was brilliant. Definitely one of my favorite series.

[relyanCe]

Now that I’m done with that, I want to bring up another popular gundam series called Code Geass. I don’t care what anyone says, it is a gundam show developed by the same people, having the standard 50 episode requirement, and having the required recap episodes that sums up everything in the series that occurs in every gundam show.

I’ve got to ask, am I the only one who hated that show? The black knights never win. They always run away and somehow, their ranks grow despite that. I could go on a long rant about all the things that were wrong with that show, and how the author did some really weird things in order to manipulate the story to his liking. But I’d rather not go into all that.

Code Geass was retarded for many reasons but the biggest one for was because it either vilified or killed off any (and i mean ANY) sympathetic characters. And if ANYONE calls Kallen a sympathetic character I'm going to shoot him in the fricking face.

*SPOILER*

Lellouch's poor poor mother who was murdered for no reason? Part of the evil plan to mind rape the world

Nunally, Lellouch's poor poor crippled sister? Nuked millions of people because, well... I don't even know why she did it

Lellouch? Please. There's a reason his fan nickname is Le Douche.

Shirley? Shot by some psycho FOR NO REASON.

Kallen? I mean seriously, she was basically a fangirl with a giant robot who had no idea about anything and had was less loyal than fricken Starscream when the chips were down.

And Suzaku. Don't get me started on Suzaku.

*END SPOILER*

The only character I could really sympathize with was Euphemia, because her death was such a pathetic piece of idiot-writer feces.

anyway, anyone know when Slayers Revolution/Evolution-R's gonna get an English dubbing and American DVD release?

[Hector]

You watched through 50 episodes of an anime and you hated it that much? I hope that you were at least getting something else out of the anime.

I myself liked Code Geass, the first season more than the second. I like it when characters die and heroes do things they shouldn't--at least in an action anime.

But I was wondering, does anyone else get sick of flying mechas? I don't mind when they fly for a little while, but I can't stand it when they spend most of a battle flying. It makes me wonder why they bothered putting legs on the things if they aren't going to use them.

[relyanCe]

the 'splosions n' flyin' robits were cool, but i finished it mostly because i always finish animes that i watch at least 6 episodes of. I dunno why. It's the reason i won't watch berserk, cuz i know I'll hate the ending. I don't really mind killing off characters and moral ambiguity, but the number of fridge-stuffings was ridiculous in CG. Also, the writers couldn't seem to write Lellouch consistently at all.

I get tired of flying mecha too, but what irks me most about "real robot" mecha animes is how the hell do you make it kick, punch, hell, even shoot properly with a couple joysticks?