Since I brought it up briefly in the last review lets look at Gravitation.
Shuichi Shindou, and his band, Bad Luck aim to be Japan's next big music sensation but during the writing of the band's next song, Shuichi encounters a stranger with blonde hair who dismisses his lyrics as garbage; upset yet intrigued by this man, Shuichi stalks the stranger as it turns out to be Eiri Yuki a famous romance novelist, the rest is history as he tries to gain help from Eiri to be as good as his idol Ryuichi Sakuma while of course falling in love with him.
This will not be a big review I'm afraid, and again I don't like this one and again not because of the subject matter but at least this Anime isn't as bad as Fake. My issue with this one is Shuichi himself, so utterly annoying and childish that it makes the dub unwatchable and that's a shame because the foundations set in place are great, really well done characters, great comedy moments, music so good that I bought the soundtrack and just the general feel of the animation and atmosphere create one of the best looking and sounding Anime for a long time; pity it's ruined by an annoying brat who throws himself on people for attention.
Final Verdict: There's a great series hidden in this Anime it just needs to either tone down Shuichi or get rid of him completely to achieve that.
Not all Shojo is about pretty sparkles and copious amounts of pink, the Japanese make a genre known as Yaoi or Boy Love which is aimed at women who want to read smut without making it look like that they want sex and for my first ever Yaoi review we look at Fake.
Fake is about two gay detectives named Dee and Ryo who solve mysteries using the buddy cop formula but that's the manga, the story the anime chose is Dee and Ryo taking a vacation in England only to discover that a string of murders is taking place, during this trip Dee is trying to bed Ryo in as many hilarious ways as possible since they insist on throwing in jokes about the situation with increasing amounts of confused looks from the audience and a few angry fangirls demanding more smut. Anyway the victims are all Japanese and it takes a few uninvited guests turning up until they figure out who the murderer is and stop him from killing Ryo.
Next to Gravitation which I find annoying, this was my first experience with Yaoi and I'm not that impressed, not because of the subject matter but because it's really poorly made, I can't get invested in the romance since Ryo is such a wuss, the original Japanese actually makes the plot unworkable and you need to watch the dub for it to make sense and even then it's poorly dubbed, they throw in supernatural elements with no reason to even use it in the first place, and the annoying tag-a-long characters are so irritating, in fact the only thing I can take away from this anime which I found insanely awesome is Dee's Dynamic Entry on the Motorcycle to save Ryo.
Don't get me wrong, Fake isn't a bad series, but the story they chose for the Anime is terrible and to be honest, I demand more smut especially when the art style welcomes it.
Final Verdict: Wasted a perfectly good series by picking one of their worst stories to animate, I'd just buy the manga and only watch the Anime for something to take the piss out of on an Anime night with friends.
Next on Shojo Week is Italy's most successful cartoon franchise Winx Club. *Puts on Sunglasses*
TOO MANY SPARKLES!!!!
The story revolves around Bloom who one day discovers she's a fairy as well as a lost princess, upon this discovery she ends up in Fairy School and befriends other fairies forming a friendship group called the Winx Club. From there Bloom starts piecing together her past while fighting off evil witches, dark wizards and various other assorted enemies.
Remember yesterday that I mentioned that Italians loved shojo? Well this is what they call a Magical Girl show over in Italy, and for a series that is so obsessed with super thin waist girls wearing gaudy super colorful sparkly fairy costumes with about as much personal development as Barbie liking a color other than pink, it somehow managed to click with a world audience and is played in as many countries as more well known cartoons like the Simpsons and Tom & Jerry. In fact Winx Club is easily accessible here in the UK yet a number of popular Magical Girl shows aren't, it's actually quite baffling that this is easier to find than Sailor Moon.
I think the secret to Winx's success is being able to grab the audience with color and fashion, a technique well used by the Japanese in all their current shojo series, not to mention every season adds different transformations to keep the show fresh.
I still don't like it, considering that I usually let a lot of this stuff pass, Winx doesn't offer anything new other than style, the substance is the same thing every season and nothing really evolves, at least Pretty Cure had new characters every season, Winx Club just drowns you in sparkles until you vomit glitter and rainbows.
Well two shows in and it's not looking promising. *Still blinded by the sparkles*
Writer's block has been annoying me lately so lets dig up a theme to use this week as I bring you Shojo Week; every show reviewed this week is aimed at a female audience with a mixture of pink, fluffy and more grown up works. Not all of the shows will be anime and not all of them will be good so sit back and enjoy as we start off with Magical Angel Creamy Mami.
Ten year old Yu Morisawa was just an ordinary girl until she discovers a spaceship, after helping the friendly alien, she is granted a magical wand which allows her to transform into a sixteen year old at any time for one year.
However when she enters the public eye in her sixteen year old form she gets scouted to become an idol singer, now Yu under the stage name Creamy Mami must endure the ups and downs of being an idol while trying to keep her magic a secret from her suspicious friends.
The premise of this show sounds exciting, Akemi Takada's designs along with her art books are beautiful and really bring to life the maturity and grace hidden inside Mami and this was well before Barbie dolls covered the entire girls spectrum of interests and well before Disney Princess was a franchise. So why is this 32 year old franchise so boring?
Well the industry itself is boring, as exciting as being an idol singer is, the so called ups and downs get swept up in all the politics with all the secondary characters within the show often leaving Mami as a plot device rather than a lead character as her actions move the story but aren't always centered around her, this is why Idol Densetsu Eriko is even worst than this and why this show isn't more celebrated today, it didn't help that Studio Pierrot made so many of these shows in the 80s that there wasn't even an alternative to choose from. It's a shame it had to be this way, especially with such a good artist on board but nothing about this show other than the concept is memorable as it's been done by better anime.
There's no dub, in fact the only American release quickly finished and discontinued without a trace; there's a wide release in several European countries especially Italy who love Shojo shows.
Final Verdict: A well designed anime that's too boring to be remembered in the modern age.
Now for my next review who this week is celebrating his 75th Birthday, he's cartoon royalty it's Bugs Bunny!
Bugs Bunny as a concept started in 1938 where a rabbit outwits Porky Pig in the cartoon short Porky's Hare Hunt. The concept was played around a bit until they came to the short Elmer's Candid Camera in 1940, which starred Elmer Fudd who was previously known as Egghead before hand and still going through several designs. From that short they settled on Bugs Bunny as a character with Tex Avery changing many characteristics to the ones we know today, with a voice a mix of a Brooklyn and Bronx accent along with trademark white gloves and personality of a Karmic Trickster. The cartoon was so successful that Bugs would not only become Warner Bros most successful show but also become the company mascot, in 1943 Bob Clampert would alter the design to the most recognized version that would last a whopping 67 years before a modern simpler design was used but the official Warner Bros mascot is still the iconic version. So how has he managed to remain such a great character?
Well Bugs Bunny says it best himself with this quote from Bob Clampert written in first person.
"Some people call me cocky and brash, but actually I am just self-assured. I'm nonchalant, imperturbable, contemplative. I play it cool, but I can get hot under the collar. And above all I'm a very 'aware' character. I'm well aware that I am appearing in an animated cartoon....And sometimes I chomp on my carrot for the same reason that a stand-up comic chomps on his cigar. It saves me from rushing from the last joke to the next one too fast. And I sometimes don't act, I react. And I always treat the contest with my pursuers as 'fun and games.' When momentarily I appear to be cornered or in dire danger and I scream, don't be consoined – it's actually a big put-on. Let's face it, Doc. I've read the script and I already know how it turns out."
That pretty much sums up Bugs Bunny, when minding his own business he's harmless, when he's dragged into a situation he fights back using the funniest way possible making a fool out of the ones who pursue him for food or simply get rid of him. Even now you can play a classic Bugs Bunny cartoon and you wouldn't believe it was from the 1940s. That's how you do timeless.
