Archive for October, 2009
DtB: Ryuusei no Gemini 04

a.k.a as the budget-saving ‘bridge’ episode. Seriously this was such as bizzare episode I’d almost think they jumped the shark if I wasn’t prep’ed for it over the last three weeks. In any case, poor Shio-, I mean Suou.

“Why so serious? Here, let me put a smile on that deadpan mugs of the both of you!”

“Shake those hips harder!”, says Hei as he trains his personal loli in the ‘basics’.

And this is the reason why people don’t consume expired food that has been kept in dubious circumstances. Like in the freezer of a bankrupt love hotel. Anyways, Contractors are humans too, nothing shameful about getting mild food poisoning. Just don’t hold it in for so long, Suou!

Admittedly, July is probably the single most useful character in the show right now, with Petya/Mao in close second. Good to see he picked up some tips about smiling from Yin!

Is this guy gonna be the joke character of this season? Just like Kurasawa Gai in the first?

And Misaki almost gets ‘it’ from Hazuki. Oooh, yuri rape prospects huh.
Man, this season of DtB is seriously getting out of hand at times. I don’t know if they are trying to be serious or not, just like the Kurasawa Gai episodes in the original DtB. But at least the story is more consistent now that they aren’t using the two-episode format again. I just hope they don’t leave everything to the subtext like in the first season hurr.
©2009 Kurogane's Anime Blog. All Rights Reserved.
Beatroll’ed?

You anime-only watchers sure missed out on some really good shit now that this got spoiled. Seriously, the impact of this part when it hits you in the game is utterly devastating. I’ll admit, the anime art is much more fear-inducing though.

Battler is so going to be the butt of “IT’S OVER ENDLESS NINE!!!!” jokes for a long time to come hurrr..

“You’re gonna get raped!” faces from the Siestas in this episode gave me an involuntary hardon. Goddamnit!

“Flying hamburger“? Fuck you, gg, FUCK YOU.

Once again, the anime art is probably compensating for the rushed-ness of the story with QUALITY such as this.
Seriously, if you haven’t read the visual novel yet, make some time for it. It’ll be well worth the time spent!
©2009 Kurogane's Anime Blog. All Rights Reserved.
A Tale of Geo-Cities
A Eulogy for Geocities…
Earlier this week, GeoCities became officially unavailable, a few months since YaHoo! announced its closure. GeoCities began in the mid 1990’s providing free web hosting and later on, paid premium service. GeoCities was initially organized into “cities” or neighborhoods, such as Tokyo for anime and other Asian topics, or SiliconValley for tech topics. When Yahoo! acquired GeoCities in 1999, they switched from the neighborhood based URLs to a customized ones.
I first learned of GeoCities in high school, around a couple of years after the city was introduced to the World Wide Web. I was fascinated with Yu Yu Hakusho then and I would research about the anime in the Net. Information regarding Yu Yu Hakusho, however, was limited and so I thought of creating my own YYH website. After deliberating which web host to use, I settled for GeoCities. I learned HTML and came up with a crude lay-out filled with marquees and Java applets (they were all the rage then). I couldn’t exactly remember that site’s URL but I think it was www.geocities.com/yyh_profiles.
In college, I collaborated with two my my classmates to create another anime site: www.geocities.com/anime_list. Our site contained categorizations of anime characters such as those with cool hair, or those with cool weapons, etc. Later on, we put up fanarts and also wallpapers for download.
Also in college, I decided to create my own personal blog. I knew of the existence of blogging services such as LiveJournal and blogger but I opted to put up my blog in GeoCities because it offered greater control. My HTML skills have somehow improved and I learned CSS so I wanted to try coming up with my own design. However, since GeoCities had no blogging framework, I had to manually arrange my pages such that the latest post comes first. I also had to use HaloScan for the commenting and trackbacking system. My blog was at www.geocities.com/disruptive_camouflage.
Eventually, I grew tired of having to rearrange my pages each time I had a new post so I migrated my blog to WordPress. In fact, the oldest entries at my WordPress blog came from my GeoCities blog. I still kept the GeoCities site and used it as a file server of sorts.
It’s been almost a decade since I’ve used GeoCities and now, the popular free web hosting site has gone to the far reaches of cyberspace oblivion. It is understandable though why YaHoo! closed GeoCities. With the rising popularity of blogging services and the arrival of social networking sites (which too provide blogging services), GeoCities has fallen out of fashion and its userbase has shrunk. And besides, it’s not making money for YaHoo!, as Rupert Goodwins, editor of ZDNet, said, “I think GeoCities was the first proof that you could have something really popular and still not make any money on the internet.”
The curtain has finally closed on GeoCities and some things will be missed forever. Well, goodbye Geocities! You have served me well.
This wasn’t really talked about much in the anime ’sphere, wasn’t it? I’m sure many of us were born before the ’90s era, basked in the HTML awefulness of Web 1.0, visited and/or created anime shrines at one point in our otakudom lives… right?
Geocities closed down, together with a good number of anime sites that shaped me as a fan. *Looks at all the Geocities sites in Anipike and sighs* With the exception of Hate Sites or Clubs, these sites were the epitome of remembering love for animes and mangas. Even until now I’d look back at those times and wonder just how I can make a shrine out of this blog. Or a museum, as ghostlightning once said.
There was this bishounen files site I was so fond of way back high school, with profiles of bishies from various series, classified into various types: the boy-next-door type (I remember Yuu from Marmalade Boy was one of them), the underdogs (Ryoga), the cross-dressers (Nuriko), the evil overlords (Zagato), etc etc. My memory’s a bit fuzzy but there’s a big chance that it was hosted in Geocities. I doubt I’ll ever be able to find that now, obviously.
Someone ought to rebuild that bishie bio database. Now it’s all about moe and GAR, seme and uke. Boy do I love digressing.

First encounter with HTML and Photoshop
I was never inspired to make my own site, lazy as I am, not until 1st year college when it was required by our professor. The year was 2002, back when Neopets was all the craze, and CometZone was still hip and trendy; back when I was still addicted to Ranma 1/2 (I remember using Ranma and Akane’s Ballad as my site BGM lol), YuYu Hakusho, Fushigi Yuugi, Rurouni Kenshin, and Card Captor Sakura. And still into fanart-ing.
I visited my homepage one last time before the D-Day, and a wave of nostalgia came over me as I was looking through my image gallery, most of which were scans of my fanarts and the Newtype magazine I had since 2nd year high school. A walk down memory lane here we go~
(Click on the thumbnails to view the larger image in an overlay window, won’t work through a feed reader)
Low and behold, my first scans, from my first Newtype magazine. Ever.
First impromptu color fanart (woke up in the middle of the night and thought, “I feel like making a fanart of my beloved Kurama-sama, so let’s do that”)
First raburabu fanarts <3
First CG attempt and FAIL
First CG semi-success; first fanart submitted and featured in a local manga-zine. Culture Crash, anyone? Microsoft will so sue me for using that Windows wallpaper for my background.
*cue Winter Sonata’s Memories BGM*
This one’s for you, Geocities:
But you put on quite a show, really had me going.
But now it’s time to go, curtain’s finally closing.
That was quite a show, very entertaining.
But it’s over now…
Go on and take a bow.
Or as SDS says, “Shine On, Geocities. Shine On… Forever”
It was my 2nd year in highschool and I was 16, constantly running away from Britney’s “Oops!… I Did It Again” in those eternal summers of youth. I managed somehow, rocking out to Neon-Genesis Evangelion’s intro by swapping multi-(floppy)-disk zip archives with my friends, and discovering this thing called Anime(lol!). It was either that or dial-up Hyperterminal, downloading it yourself from some random site in Anipike.com or trying your luck in Napster.
So we got techie, learning about the freedom in mp3’s and the internet boom helped us along, albeit slowly at 56kbps, until one day, instead of just visiting Anipike, we thought we’d try our luck with our own tribute/shrine/whatever. My sister was taking Computer Science at the time, and there were plenty of HTML resources online, plus Geocities(God bless his soul!) was offering free hosting with your yahoo mail, so we tried our hand in that.
Mine was called “the Grandstand” to commemorate the bleachers my friends and I usually hung out in. There, along with some game and personal stuff, I also built an anime corner. In hindsight, it was the anime corner that grew the most, housing a menial collection of Fushigi Yuugi pictures, random midi’s(Misato theme!) and large amounts of painstakingly coded HTML code. By code I meant secret links in length marquee’s, thorough use of the tag, and a small banner proclaiming “Proudly made in Notepad” to spite all those perky, oddly-colored, Frontpage users.
We expanded by joining the roster of sites included in Anime-rings’ random links. We also linked to each other–and always href-ed their site at every mention of their name–and signed guestbooks prolifically. All the while, religiously monitoring our daily visit site-counters. And then Google happened, and Blogger/Livejournal was born, and Anipike sorta fizzled out and we found out about going outside.
But I stop by ever-so-often. And though I have to jump through the Wayback Machine because geocities got tired of hosting me, the nostalgia and the indomitable optimism of those teenage years will always be online.
Share your Geocities story and we might just unleash a torrent of nostalgia right here
Further Reading
SDS’s eulogy posts for Geocities, where a number of people also shared their stories.
AstroNerdBoy reminded us to archive old GeoCities anime sites back when the news came about.
princetrunks also shared his Geocities tale, which explains the Web 1.0 look and feel of his site.
toonleap showed his geocities sites before, though unfortunately we can no longer access them. Except maybe through the Wayback Engine.
Reminiscing the Analog Otaku Life Days
Related posts:
Negima! 268


Arika-hime! 。・゚(ノД`)゚・。 。・゚(ノД`)゚・。 。・゚(ノД`)゚・。 。・゚(ノД`)゚・。 。・゚(ノД`)゚・。


Bastards, that whole bloody council. All of ‘em!


Arika-hime! 。・゚(ノД`)゚・。 。・゚(ノД`)゚・。 。・゚(ノД`)゚・。 。・゚(ノД`)゚・。 。・゚(ノД`)゚・。


Goddamnit Nagi! That might be the ‘proper’ choice but is it the ‘right’ one?

Arika-hime! 。・゚(ノД`)゚・。 。・゚(ノД`)゚・。 。・゚(ノД`)゚・。 。・゚(ノД`)゚・。 。・゚(ノД`)゚・。
God, Arika-hime’s story is more heart-wrenching than I thought. I find it truly saddest that people misunderstand good intention and sacrifice of others for the gain of their own self-deceit and glory.
Nagi better save Arika-hime in a Crowning Moment of Awesome next chapter!
©2009 Kurogane's Anime Blog. All Rights Reserved.
On The Japanese Etymology of ‘Katol’
Fellow Filipinos, remember this?
This sure is one timeless commercial, oh [in]famous Dragon Katol. The line “Dragon kung umuwsok… leymowk seyguradong teypok!”1 never gets old. So… katol.

If only she had Dragon Katol, tsk.2
Katol is the Tagalog word for mosquito coil or mosquito incense, and apparently, it was adopted from the Japanese word 蚊取 [katori], its Japanese counterpart (literally it’s “to get [取り] mosquito(es) [蚊]“). Discovered this by accident, as I came across 蚊 [ka] (mosquito) in the Kanzen Master kanji book I’m using for my JLPT1 studies, which eventually led me to 蚊取 [katori]. One little Google search was all it took to confirm my hypothesis: Mosquito incense = katol, so katori = katol?
“Katol is one of the few Japanese words that have entered Filipino vocabulary, although most do not know of its origin.”, according to the Tagalog Lang site. True enough, almost all of my officemates didn’t know this, and neither did I. Do you?
Makes me wonder if there are any other Japanese loan words in Filipino. Perhaps suka (vinegar) is one of them… 酢 [su] = vinegar => su-ka? *ba dum psh* In any case, feel free to share what you know about them Japanese loan words, may it be in Tagalog or other languages, it’ll make for a real fun discovery
Further Reading
On the Etymology of Arigatou, where I managed to confuse the heck out of people with all the kanji talk.
Fellow chef absolute0 also talked about the Etymology of Mouryou back when he was still blogging
Notes
- Translated as: “Smokes like a dragon, mosquitoes are surely exterminated!”, done in the stereotypical speaking-Tagalog-with-an-American-accent way. Otherwise that line would’ve simply been “Dragon kung umusok… lamok siguradong tepok!”
- The image became even more punny when 蚊噛み came to mind, something I made up on a whim. 蚊[ka] (mosquito) + 噛み[kami] (bite) = Kagami. Get it? Okay you may laugh now.
Related posts:
Princess Robot Bubblegum
I might actually watch this if there was a Japanese audio track. Note, “might”.
©2009 Kurogane's Anime Blog. All Rights Reserved.
GA: Geijutsuka Art Design Class music palette

Hitotsu~♪ hitotsu~♪ hitotsu~♪ hitotsu~♪
Hitotsu~♪ hitotsu~♪ hitotsu~♪ hitotsu~♪
*Sigh* It’s gonna be stuck in my head for days now. Hitotsu~♪ hitotsu~♪ hitotsu~♪ hitotsu~♪
Seriously, whoever hasn’t watched this charmingly delightful show should really do it now. I personally can’t wait for the OVA to come out next Spring. Hurr
©2009 Kurogane's Anime Blog. All Rights Reserved.
Kobato 04

A.K.A the Wish OVA.
Seriously, they just did this episode so that they could animate Wish proper, amirite CLAMP?

Also, plot. Moving very fast. Ushagi-san appeared this episode already lolwtf. I have to say, they are creepy as fuck. Hell, even their BGM sounds eerie too.
©2009 Kurogane's Anime Blog. All Rights Reserved.
Kimi ni Todoke: From Around The ‘Sphere to You
The fangirls, fanboys, and otherwise, have said it. Kimi ni Todoke is the show of the season. Some curmudgeons remain curmudgeons, but oh well, such is life. What I’m about to show here are a portion of what bloggers have to say about Kimi ni Todoke (mostly first impressions), all for the sake of having a warm and fuzzy circle-jerk~ I can’t help but feel like a post scraper with this post though…
(Oh and all links open in a new window)
Anna-sempai talks about the charm that sets apart Kimi ni Todoke from other shoujo series:
I think the best part of Kimi ni Todoke is how it’s taking its sweet time. Sawako obviously has feelings for classmate Kazehaya, and vice-versa, but there’s no need to rush things. It’s really cute to watch these characters go through the awkwardness, the stumbling and blushing of young love. [...] High school is tough enough, but Sawako faces her situation with this matter-of-fact attitude: this is what I am, and if I keep trying and put myself out there, maybe people will warm up to me. Being a good person doesn’t hurt, and even the class mean girls recognize her good heart.
issa-sa tells us why Kimi ni Todoke ROCKS, and I could only heartily concur:
What sets Sa
dwako apart from the other hopeless shoujo protagonists (who conventionally could never end up with the lead male but in due course does so anyways to please the readers/viewers) isn’t her horror-film-esque aura (done before, and not even as well), but her own resolve in improving herself for the sake of generally being liked by the people around her who unjustly shun her for her outward appearance, and not specifically to be liked by the guy of her interest.
miz mentions her fears, but remains optimistic:
She better develop a backbone, and accept the friendship before tearing or getting shy all over the place. However, this may be the metamorphism of her character from a shy caterpillar to a butterfly, so I will be watching this series with a keen eye.
f3licity throws in her two cents and shows us More Reasons to Love Kimi ni Todoke:
Getting into a plot that focuses in great depth on the growing relationship between the main character and her female friends this early is a pretty unconventional move for a shoujo title. Regrettably, most of the time “friends” aren’t too much more than plot devices or comic relief in romance manga (of the non-magical girl variety at least). Yet another reason I love Kimi ni Todoke.
jeanniex1 thought some moments were cringe-inducing (obligatory shoujo scenes, anyone?), but quickly gets over that and points out one of the major reasons behind this anime’s current success:
As I’d hoped, I think I’m going to be liking this more as it goes on. And you KNOW that about 75% of the reason I’m watching it is because PRODUCTION IG is so awesome. I can’t say it enough. They are in a completely different league. I love them.
Of course, let’s not forget Ryan’s little blurb which brought quite a eureka! moment to a whole lot of people:
Subtle, is that which renders From Me To You my season gem.
I know Hinano thinks From Me To You is a rather f*cked up translation, but I guess we can quickly get over that
Minnie seemed to be one of the first few people to point out the similarities of Kimi ni Todoke with the jdrama Nobuta wo Produce, and both Ryan and jeanniex1 thought so too. I wasn’t exactly keen on watching Nobuta wo Produce, despite the positive responses I’ve seen, but now my interest is perking up++
Speaking of resemblances, Sawako also reminded k1y0 of Yamato Nadeshiko Shichihenge, a series which I have yet to watch. Someday perhaps, as with all my backlogs *sigh* k1y0’s probably one of the few fangirls out there in the ’sphere who could go KYAA and still churn out coherent and thoughtful posts on various series and an array of other topics. And to highlight a bit of her blurbs on Kimi ni Todoke episodes 2 and 3:
It’s been so long since a romance series make me squee like a little girl. One can’t help but cheer Sawako on when she tries to make friends with others, and feel their blood boiling when she gets discriminated against due to mere rumors.
As mentioned in the show, though Sawako feels that it is all thanks to Kazehaya, it is really all due to Sawako’s efforts and determination. [...] And I’m really thankful that this is not one of those romance series in which the lead characters are always agonizing needlessly over minor misunderstandings.
and yes, Peach Girl be damned.
kanzeon disses the Skip Beat anime adaptation, but sings a heap-load of praises to Kimi ni Todoke, so all is forgiven.
Like Cidz, I also loved the internal monologues of both Sawako and Kazehaya. Yummy yummy stream-of-consciousness *omnomnom* N-n-not like I have a f-f-fetish for it or a-anything, ok?!
Epi the shoujo fanboy swoons for KnT:
The fact that Sawako is known as ‘Sadako’ makes for a lot of fun jokes, and I hope that this aspect of the show doesn’t go away soon. I think it keeps things from being TOO mushy which can be overwhelming sometimes [...] by keeping things a bit lighthearted.
ETERNAL wasn’t WOWED, but felt the heart of the show, awakening his inner fluffy fangirl, as Choux puts it. Schneider hasn’t mentioned about it in his blog, but I’m sure he felt this too. :3
This series has awakened my inner fluffy fangirl, she’s not about to go away any time soon.
Even the first episode resonated with Author, who might have just met his inner fangirl. I can only hope he stands by it till the end:
Swayed by the exhalting posts, I gave Kimi ni Todoke a good try and giggled maniacally non-stop through the first 15 minutes of the episode. Also, squeaked “OH NOES SHE’S CHANGING COLOR” and such. No idea if this is my internal fangirl or what, I’ve never met her before. [...] As far as the story, too early to tell. Characters seem sympathetic, but again the dude is a big question mark. I’m not even certain I’ll stick with the series in the long run, but it was a good ride at the start.
Julius_Firefocht sees through Sawako’s inner and outer beauty and shows us why ota-Haruka pales in comparison to Sawako:
If I had to choose between Nogizaka Haruka or Sawako as the better Noto-voiced female lead, I would choose Sawako without batting an eyelid. Haruka is too “perfect” so to speak, while Sawako is a normal girl that is sweet and endearing. I felt more for Sawako in 2 episodes than I did for Haruka in 15 episodes, which is saying something.
Sawako wins the heart of comrade Crusader, and whereas I fail in showing my love for Noe, he succeeds just about every time:
Despite the lack of my kind of mecha it seems that I get a very promising shoujo series this season. Sawako is just darling as a little generator of fear forcing cowards to flee for the hills at a mere glance. Unfortunately she’d rather make friends with these cowardly types than cast them off a precipice of annihilation, but different strokes for different folks I guess. [...] Sawako gets a bit weepy now and then, but at least she is selfless, though at times overly selfless, so I can forgive Sawako’s True Tears for Noe likes them too.
ghostlightning thought Kimi ni Todoke wasn’t meant for him, but found it refreshingly nostalgic nonetheless:
What makes the show engaging to watch for me is how this world of high school love seems nostalgically ideal. [...] I wonder if there’s some dreadful twist that happens along the way. [...] But for now, I can’t imagine anything else but the slow days of growing love and self-discovery that plays out in this little show. Episode two gave us sunbeams through the trees, rain, and the colors of dusk on a wet landscape. The after school sun gives the world orange hues. Why worry about grades and the future now? It’s kind of the time for love.
Shinmaru falls in love with Sawako Kuronuma (who wouldn’t?!) and also talks about the gorgeousness of the 1st episode:
But even if the story is relatively basic right now, the episode makes up for it by being confidently directed and downright gorgeous. When Sawako describes to Kazehaya why she likes summer evenings, while the cicadas chirp in the background and a breeze flits through when Kazehaya stares up at the stars, it makes me want to go outside, sit on the grass and stare at the sky for a few hours.
He also tosses in his two cents on Kazehaya, and hopes he’ll become an even more interesting character later on. I hope so too! He makes me go KYAA, but it’s because he’s a wish-fulfillment character (as maAkusutipen also said) more than anything else. Apart from Sawako’s shadow, he’s not quite as… sparkling.
And what better way to show the said gorgeousness but with the actual lovely lovely eyecandies. Let Misu show you~
Hanners also falls in love with Kimi ni Todoke, JUST AS KEIKAKU.
There’s really a lot to be said for the way this series takes a lonely, borderline bullied girl, and turns it not into a depressing tale of misery and woe but into one of hope and positivity… [...] This, coupled with Kazehaya’s influence, leaves you rooting for the main characters right from the off, and as I observed last episode that’s quite unique in itself these days – A far cry from the Itazura na Kiss’s and White Album’s of this world. In fact, I can’t think of the last time a series like this left me with a constant smile on my face, and you know what? I really love Kimi ni Todoke for doing just that – Long may it continue.
QFT.
And while here we are racking our brains trying to figure out what sets Kimi ni Todoke apart from other shows, Mike of Anime Diet just blows us away with his insights — personal, thoughtful, insightful:
A lot of anime, maybe most these days, is wish-fulfillment for the socially awkward. What else is a harem show than a fantasy for the otaku who has a hard time finding any dates, let alone three or more? Kimi ni Todoke falls squarely in that camp; it’s hardly the brutally accurate emotional portrait of an Onani Master Kurosawa, Welcome to the NHK!, or Honey and Clover, at least not yet. The plotline so far is simple [...] It’s not the general premise that makes the show work. No, what sets Kimi ni Todoke apart is the exactness in its portrayal of both the social awkwardness and the ways the longings of such a person are fulfilled.
(This is an excerpt, please go to the post to read the awesome article in its full glory lol)
This, together with animewriter’s insights on the masks we wear makes me want to write my own personal account of Kimi ni Todoke, but I’m afraid I’ll end up spilling too much emo sh*t again. Anyways, here’s an excerpt from the said post:
Throughout our lives, we all wear masks of one form, or another. [...] As we meet people and interact with them, we slowly let our masks slip a little as they let their masks slip a little revealing to each other the whole person. The people who we allow to see fully under our masks become our friends, lovers, and spouses, but before that can happen, we have to have the courage to let our masks slip a little and let people into our lives.
Somewhere around the globe, Kimi ni Todoke also reaches Neomoonline:
A rather simple plotline, but here it doesn’t matter; the show succeeds all on its own. The characters, the school, the town, the score, right down to the poor little Sawako and the adorable man-moe Kazehaya. Also noteworthy, the anime is made by Production I.G. A show not to miss.
Seems like Kimi ni Todoke brought back polymetrica’s faith in weekly anime watching too.
It’s also interesting to see a number of people who aren’t exactly into this genre but still ended up warming up to the series. Like Noirsword, who was wowed, even though “school-life romance shoujo aren’t his thing”.
Someone doesn’t seem too happy with the way the anime is going, and longs for more conflict in the series, though it turns out to be a misunderstanding that has now been cleared up. I’d still say he’s being tsuntsun about Kimi ni Todoke though, lol.
Ahh, the ’sphere is a wonderful place to be~ ^_^
Related posts:
Sora no Exploding Pantsu 04

Tomoki is a man amongst men. This episode pretty much speaks for itself. Man… just when I thought they couldn’t top the manga… they did it again. Goddamnit. I’m glad pantsu robot made it in to the anime.

BTW, Mikako is evil but exceedingly hawt at the same time. Goddamnit.
Looks like Nymph is gonna make her appearance next episode. Expect sudden changes of atmosphere.
©2009 Kurogane's Anime Blog. All Rights Reserved.















