The parallels are obvious, the patterns as clear as day for anyone to see; the ending of Code Geass: Lelouch of the Rebellion R2 is not an open ending, and I have more proof than mere table scraps that dogs have been feeding off /a/’s table. To look for answers, all you’ve got to do is to look a few episodes back, and the best part about it? You don’t even have to go as far as the first season. The answer’s been staring you in the face, and all you had to do was just look, and not try and make sense out of the immense red herring that was the last few minutes.

Where do I begin? With an old post of Code Trainwreck, and I quote:

But what then was the meaning of Schneizel’s line at the end R2 23? Is there something we’re missing here? Did he think he was covering himself with a mask? Was it irony? Was it referring to Lelouch wearing a mask? Or perhaps it was forced into the script to give the episode title meaning.

Au contraire, miasmacloud. Considering that you’ve been among the 1% that could deliver solid analysis and reasoned points, you’ve come very close, and I commend you for that. It was there as a hint, the hint to the answer to the ending that everyone’s been yelling on the internet about as of late. Here’s a little refresher if you can’t be bothered to boot up your media player and skip to the very end of the episode:

Get it yet? If you do, then congratulations. You’re on the way to getting the answer. This, however, is just the beginning–it goes on to become so much more, and in a previous episode, too. If you don’t, however, just continue reading. I’m sure the vast majority of you–those who spammed “TRAINWRECK” ad nauseum your blogs (almost all of my peers who blogged it are morons guilty of this), forum posts, and IRC channels–need it badly, though, so I’ll go slow on the cretins who need it. Explain it line by line.

Good day, peasants! My name is Owen, I’m an elitist anime blogger, and I hope you enjoy my even more elitist autumn review written in haiku form. None of that filthy commoner prose for me — if the Japanese can convey such great meaning through a 5/7/5 syllable form, so can I! Please enjoy my high-falutin’ ruminations while noting that I go through the same motions at the beginning of every season: toting a sandwich board on the streets while proclaiming that the end of anime is nigh, waxing lyrical about the good old days, and judging every new anime airing as bad until proven otherwise.

What’s that you say, about a well-told story or compelling characterisation? Overrated! Three words: different character designs. I’ll disregard anime critically acclaimed by my peers if the animators so much as dare to draw a female character’s eyes oversize, give her a cup size smaller than a C, or make her appealing to the opposite sex in any way whatsoever. I mean, substance and aesthetics are mutually exclusive, aren’t they? Pretty anime is just that and nothing else. And as for porn game adaptations, well… do people die when they’re killed?

So, without further ado, sit back and enjoy this elitist autumn preview, finely distilled to a pure essence by yours truly, the paragon of good taste. It’s fastidiously facetious!

The rumours of my death have been greatly exaggerated.

You can thank Pontifus for this. I’ve been sucked headlong into that nether realm otherwise known as Real Life ever since my last post, and while this blog isn’t dying any time soon (not when I’ve just been accepted into 9rules!), university and the lack of internet due to an absence of phone lines can only mean that my internet life, what little there was to it, has been unceremoniously cut short.

In any case, what I want to present here is both simple in concept and difficult to grasp: Lucky Star is slice of life first, and comedy second; no matter how you want to argue it, the chances are high that you’ll never enjoy it unless you approach it from that angle, and there’s no exceptions to that rule. It’s the lens by which LS was made to be seen, and if you’ve difficulty in swallowing my argument at this point, well, you’ll find plenty a spoonful of sugar waiting for you after the jump.

since everyone liked the slice-of-life/comedy spectrum so much, I got Roxas to make another, revised version

This post has its roots firmly planted (pun unintended) in this category; present-day incarnations include this recent article by The Anime Almanac, which pushed me to write this post as a result. It’s not like I’m singling the two of them out through my writing of this, — well, alright, maybe I do pick on lolikit a lot, but that’s just due to how far he’s gone — since their opinions are unfailingly pedestrian in their nature that you could pick an otaku, any otaku who thinks that they’re the most intelligent/unique/erudite critic on the internet since Yahtzee or Maddox, and get the same type of reasoned opinion out of them.

Before all of that, however, have a colour bar (click for larger version).

I’m quite amused to hear that suspension of disbelief still becomes an issue nowadays. What, you want realism in a medium where oversized eyes are a norm, saving the world is perfunctory, and girls develop mysterious terminal diseases that require a guy (who also conveniently pops out of nowhere)’s love to cure? Surely you jest. That’s really weak reasoning, especially when it’s used as grounds for why an anime fails.

Library Wars, for one, seems to be the target of things like these: It’s not believable enough, it doesn’t make sense that there are autonomous militias fighting over books, why aren’t they going for the publishers instead of the bookstores, and so on and so forth. My response? Wow, just shut up and enjoy the show, seriously. Trying to over-analyse the premise while suffocating the show through the paralysing grip of Reality isn’t going to make things any better, and who cares if it’s not believable? The same could be said of any other show.

omg the sunlight is conveniently blinding her from looking at his face even though there wasn’t any a minute ago in the fluorescent lighting this is so UNREALISTIC!!@`123

A long long time ago, in a place far far away, I made a deal with the devil bateszi to watch four episodes of Shigurui and write about it if he would do the same for True Tears. Or maybe it was the other way around, because like Faust, I’m wondering what I got myself into. It’s fortunate that I’ve got an absurdly high level of tolerance for gore and its ilk (to the extent of being able to read a work of Shintaro Kago’s and not be too disgusted), for while I’m not about to go retching into a bucket just yet, the visceral, primal nature of it has floored me.

About the title/post excerpt: I’m referring to how things can be put into perspective so easily, give or take an episode. The wandering samurai with an X-shaped scar on his face doesn’t seem all that glorious anymore, but such is the fate of romanticisation; while Nobuhiro Watsuki might have made the era of the samurai out to be something you’d want to leap headlong into given the chance, what Takayuki Yamaguchi has done here is priceless — for once, I was glad I was on this side of the screen, watching from the comfort of my living room.

It’s the antithesis of entertainment. Blatantly atmospheric, with an intent to make you squirm more than smile; all flinch and no fun. Yet why do I find myself wanting to watch more and more of a show copiously laced with brutality, sex, and the occasional bit of brutal sex? Shigurui shimmers with realism like a mirage in the desert, an almost-there apparition that isn’t at the same time, yet is. It’s too bad that being what it is, not everyone will be able to stomach it, for if there was one anime in the world right now that I wish everyone would have seen, it would be this one.

And now for something completely different.

• Dasaku.net lives. Formerly Ikimashou.net, Randall’s relaunched the main site to be a lot more functional than it was before — if you’re one of those people like me who can’t afford hosting, a domain name, or both yet want your shiny anime blog, this is the place to go to. Aside from listing dasaku.net’s members and how to contact him, there’s a snazzy application form over at the Apply page that you should look at if you’re interested in a blog that ends in dasaku.net or oniichannoecchi.com, and if you’re wondering about the “rubbish” and “worthless” taglines? Don’t be too bothered — it’s just a play on words, “dasaku” being the pun in mention.

This episode proved to be an outstanding one, with exceptional expositional dialogue that made me grin triumphantly when I realised where everything was headed halfway through; it was one of those Eureka, feel-good moments that you can’t help but pat your back for. It’s a niche, to be sure — different people will value different things, but what I value the most above all is good writing. Show, not tell. Never spoonfeed the viewer. Don’t assume that your audience is mostly dense (even if they are), because there will always be those who will get what you’re trying to say, even if you’re not saying it through normal means.

character designs like this would have robbed the show of its seriousness

Naturally, I was one of those who got it.

Word is on the street that the non-moe faction is rejoicing this season, if only due to the fact that the number of shows with moe in them aren’t dominating for the first time in so long. I was thinking of a theme by which to group the anime in this post under while writing this, and it occurred to me that none of the characters in the shows featured here have eyes the size of tennis balls, or irises the size of ping-pong balls.

this automatically becomes non-moe because Duke Togo is in it