Since April just won’t come fast enough, I’ve decided to start my own feature or two here so that I have something to blog until the new season rolls around. I also figured that I’d need something to fill the gaps in April while I wait for all the shows I’m interested in to come out. With that in mind, I’ve created the “Friday Ramble”.

The basic premise of the FR (as I’ll be referring to it out of laziness) is pretty straightforward. While browsing around the site, I noticed that there are some shows I watch (some of them quite popular) that were either never blogged, or have been dropped by their previous authors. Now, I don’t intend to pick these up and blog them seriously, but it wouldn’t hurt to drop a quick summary/opinion and a couple of screens for them would it? I didn’t think so.

So, in short, the FR is a bulk blog on a few ongoing series, and maybe a few series that I missed but have been checking out recently. Quick, to the point, but just enough to show you that I (kinda) care. This week, read on for: BLEACH, NARUTO, ROSARIO + VAMPIRE, and D.GRAY-MAN!

Bleach 164: Grimmjow Pees a Little

Obligatory Summary: Renji and Mr. Quincy continue their battle against Szayel. Renji goes all kamikaze to keep him distracted while Ishida does some crazy pentagram Quincy nonsense, suprising Szayel and causing him immense amounts of damage. Like usual, the heroes get cocky thinking they’ve won, but when the smoke clears, Szayel is still alive. Szayel then proceeds to chow down on one of his subordinates like he’s a good Subway sandwich, but instead of losing ten pounds, his wounds fully recover from all damage sustained up until this point. If I were him, I know there’d be a cocky “What now, bitch!?” running through my head. After he’s had his fill and recombed his hair, Szayel tells Renji and Ishida that he’s going to go change his clothes because it’d be embarrassing to fight in his torn up attire.

Meanwhile, Grimmjow brings Inoue to where Ulquiorra left Ichigo either dead or pretty damn close to it. Nel crawls out of the rubble of the fight and starts whining. Grimmjow hears my plea and tells Nel to STFU or he’ll blow her into tiny kibbles ‘n’ bits. Inoue has been direct by Grimmjow to use her powers to heal Ichigo because he wants him at 100% so he can kick Ichigo’s ass, and that he wants it done before Ulquiorra finds out what’s up. Right as he utters the words, Arrancar numero 4 shows up and Grimmjow shits his pants.

Afterthoughts: The animation this episode was great (see pic #5 above), and the battle between Renshida and Szayel was pretty intense. Inoue and Ichigo meet face to face again finally, and next week looks like it’ll start the showdown between Ichigo and Grimmjow. I’m loving this arc, but word is they’ll be going into a filler arc sometime next month. Anyone else think Inoue in the whole “I’m a captive” getup (see pic #3 above) is hawt? 4/5

Naruto Shippuuden 50: More of the usual

Episode Overview: Run run run run run run run. Everyone gets tired and takes a nap. Sai draws pictures in his book, homoeroticism is all over the place. Snake-man shows up to stop Sai from hitting on Naruto. Naruto gets mad and tells Sai to go find Sasuke while he “distracts” Snake-man. Lengthy flashback #1. Tree-guy and Sakura arrive to help Naruto distract the Snake-man. Intent on the destruction of emotionless clowns, Snake-man runs off after Sai. Sai finds Sasuke sleeping…oh yes, you know what happens next. Shake well and pour on top of lots of staring.

So here’s a list of things I didn’t see coming this week:

• Running…since when do characters in Naruto run? And for that long?
• Naruto struggling to stand after he trips. I’m mean, I know he probably can’t read or spell, but he should at least be able to pick himself up off the ground without help.
• Sakura saying something involving the words “But” and “Sasuke”. ie: “But I wish Sasuke was my lover! we have to find Sasuke right away!”
• Sai deciding that even though they were desperately trying to find Sasuke before Orochimaru appears, now would be a good time to get out his coloring book. Stay in the lines Sai! You wouldn’t want to disappoint the 0 people who love you!
• Naruto to use two new attacks: Shadow Clones and Rasengan…oh wait…

This wasn’t the worst Naruto episode I’ve ever seen by far, but let’s face it, it’s still Naruto. Why do I watch it? I love making fun of it…and when they do have an actual battle going, it’s pretty entertaining. 2/5

Rosario + Vampire 09 & 10: It finally gets pretty badass

I was looking around to see if some of these shows already had bloggers, and I noticed that Calawain was blogging R+V, but dropped it around episode 4. I can’t blame him for that, the only thing that kept me from dropping it was the fact that I couldn’t get enough of “Moka-san…Tsukune…Moka-san…Tsukune…Moka-san…Tsukune…Kappachu!” So I’ve sat it out through the formulaic episodes hoping that maybe, just maybe, the show will go somewhere. Enter episode 9…

If you dropped this show, or don’t know whether or not watch it…at least go watch episodes 9 and 10. Holy crap they were badass. The group takes a summer trip to the human world and encounters a crazy witch. Amongst the beach scenes and camping scenes, there’s a TON of action, everyone gets their moment to shine, and Moka doesn’t just 1-shot everything with a kick. The production value is insane, and…seriously, I was NOT expecting anything remotely on this level from this anime. 5/5

GO WATCH NOW! Warning: if you don’t appreciate made crazy action sequences or panty-shots, don’t waste your time.

D.Gray-Man 74: Lenalee is tasty

I’ll admit, there was a point in time where I dropped D.Gray-man…episode 25. How’d I make it this far? A combination of episode summaries and IRC downloads. I skipped episodes 26-51, reading the episode summaries from various sites so I wouldn’t be totally lost, then picked the show back up at episode 52, where the real action started to kick in. 52+ is like watching a whole new anime. Everyone powers up, the plot actually gets pretty serious, and people start dying left and right.

Right now, there’s a massive showdown going on between The Earl/Noah and the remaining exorcists in Edo (Tokyo). Allen has achieved 100% compatibility with his Innocence and finally arrived in Edo to throw down against the Earl. At long last, we get to see Allen actually do something in his Crowned Clown King form, and we no longer have to worry about Lavi trying to mack on Allen’s woman. Hah! 4/5

Wow, it’s amazing how long first posts take. Especially something like this where there are so many different ways to do things and so many different ideas to sort through. I know this post is long, but it’s made with the idea that you’ll only read the segments you’re interested in. If you read it all, that’s your fault.

Please, give any feedback you can. What you liked/didn’t like, which image style you liked best, etc. The Friday Ramble is an ongoing experiment, so expect constant change…it’s my way of working out new ideas for the regular posts I’ll be doing come Spring.

T_T indeed Yukari-chan . . . T_T indeed

I’m really not one to post big negative posts or rants, but sometimes you just can’t help yourself. First, I must apoligize to Hinano for alas, after the first 2 episodes I was hopeful that this show would be fun and not totally blow ass. However, after the third and especially the fourth episode I smashed my head onto my desk hoping that it was just a bad dream and that I would wake up. More on the wonderful world of Gonzo fillers and other rants and musings after the jump.

Episode 3

To be honest they introduced Yukari-chan, the loli witch, similarly to the manga. That really wasn’t so bad, but as a staunch opponent of all things annoying and loli she is my least favorite member of the harem. Hell, they even gave her panty shot time. As a character she really isn’t anything special, genius loli witch girl who is lonely because she is smart and an outcast. The basic summary is this, first everyone teased her growing up because she is smart so she uses witch magic to play tricks on them and becomes even more isolated. However, she falls for Moka right away and walks around school grabbing onto her boobs. Then she pisses off Tsukune but later gets in trouble when jealous guys from her class confront her. Moka goes to defend her and eventually so does Tsukune, and they save her and she falls in love with Tsukune too. Thrilling I know.

Like I said before it wasn’t that the episode was particularly bad or anything, just really bland, like her character. I giggled when her classmates were pissed because they thought she said “desu” a lot to get the attention of the lolicons. Otherwise it was pretty zzzzzzzz throughout. It was to the point where I just couldn’t bring myself to blog the entry due to lack of motivation.

Episode 4
Where do I start? First this is a filler episode where the basic idea is that Tsukune is mopey and they all think he wants to go home. Let me spoil you, lol it turns out he just wanted to send some letters home, it was a misunderstanding. Haha so creative! Anyways, as for the rest of the summary, when Tsukune is off alone he is confronted by a godawful imitation of girl’s defense forces. There’s one for each in his harem, and they are pretty fucking stupid looking. I guess they were trying to be funny and make fun of the defense forces in shows such as Shuffle!, but they failed miserably. I couldn’t even laugh at them, let alone with them. There is such a thing as the art of parody, there are shows this season like Kimiaru and Koharu Biyori that take character and situational stereotypes and cliches and make fun of them. Those shows are hilarious, the writers there actually understand the art of parody. Yet this was the complete opposite, it really had little humor at all.

They also try to be funny with scenes such as having Moka and Tsukune looking lovingly at her saying “Moka-san….Tsukune…..Moka-san…..Tsukune” with pink bubbles all around, and then she comes up and bites his neck. Yeah once again I’m really not laughing, I’m yawning or facepalming. Basically, this was a complete departure from the tone and setup of the manga, one of the most horrid episodes of fillers I have ever watched. Please, employees of Gonzo, for proper creation of a filler episode please see episode 10 of Hayate no Gotoku! or episode 5 of Genshiken 2.

My other major problem with this episode is the mere fact that it was filler, beyond the content. It lies in the fact that the episode count for the show is announced at 13. Warning slight manga spoilers ahead. The problem is after four episodes we have yet to introduce the last member of the harem, Mizore (granted she appears in like chapter 18 or something, but she needs to appear soon for this to work). Also, there has been no discussion of the newspaper club that they all belong to. Couple that with the fact that for this show to be any good they have to get to the Witches Ranch and Outcast Arcs because otherwise it’s just monster of the week business. Once they get past the first chunk of monster of the week chapters the manga gets really really good. However, with this pacing I don’t even see how they are going to get out of silly harem hijinks, panty shots, and one monster per week. That’s fine to a certain degree, but all the meaty, emotional action and drama come after that. Oh, the next episode looks like a filler too, OH BOY. End slight manga spoilers.

So, after all of that I am quite disappointed as to how things are going so far to say the least. They really have emasculated Tsukune, he was pretty GAR and manly in the manga, and now he blushes all over the place and just kinda acts like a sissy most of the time. And they should have picked a better seiyuu, no offense but he sounds pretty girly.

As a result it is unlikely I’m going to continue covering this show unless it makes some miraculous turnaround. It’s kinda funny that none of the blogs I normally frequent is covering this show either, sadly funny actually. After all of that, I will leave you with some screenshots of the new ED. Episode 4’s content does not deserve any screenshots, but sexy vampire Moka definitely does. The animation quality is really well done, you don’t see many fully animated EDs these days, especially ones like this with a lot of action. The content of this show may be horrible but the production values are definitely top notch. Is Code Geass airing yet?

Know your place

This week’s episode covers chapter 2 in the manga, the introduction of the second member of Tsukune’s harem, Kurumu, the boob girl. It stuck pretty close to the manga once again this week, just adding some extra boob effects on top of the smushing Kurumu usually takes part in . Oh and for those of you that are panty averse there are only a handful of panty shots for you to freak out about. Summary included this week as well as the normal impressions after the jump.

After the OP Tsukune is walking to school when Moka notices him and runs up for a glomp, to the ire of the other male students nearby. They are watched nearby by a female student with blue hair. Moka has a bit of breakfast a la drinking Tsukune’s blood, and he runs off into the eerie woods in a panic. There he sees the blue haired girl Kurumu on the ground in a weakened state, and she asks for his help getting to the infirmary after she pleasantly assaults him with her huge breasts. On the way there she stops him and glomps him a bit more, and then asks him to look into her eyes using her “charm” ability to, you guessed it, charm him, in a way only a proper succubus can. As a result of her spell, when Moka appears he walks off with Kurumu saying that he won’t wait for Moka because she only wants him for her breakfast. In class, before he can apologize to Moka, she leaves the classroom and is confronted by Kurumu. She announces to Moka that she is a succubus that is planning on turning the entire male population of the school into her love slaves but that Moka is interfering with her plans. As a result she plans on stealing Tsukune from Moka to accomplish her goals.

Kurumu and Tsukune go to the infirmary and while Kurumu gloats over stealing Tsukune away from Moka, outside Moka’s rosary speaks to her (in the voice of the sealed Moka) telling her that Kurumu is controlling Tsukune with her charm ability and that if Kurumu kisses him he will be permanently under her control. Back inside the infirmary Tsukune is struggling to resist Kurumu’s charm as she comes onto him and tries to kiss him. At the last moment he fights it off and in the process sets Kurumu off. She gets so angry she says she will destroy everything related to Moka, and assumes her succubus form and assaults him. Moka arrives just in time and knocks her out the window, but Kurumu pulls them both out with her. Moka asks Tsukune to pull her Rosary off to fight Kurumu but he is unable to initially and they desperately try to evade her attacks. After Moka declares that she spends time with Tsukune because he is her friend and not just food, Tsukune grows some balls and realizes that he is not a burden to Moka and wants to protect her. As a result he is finally able to pull the Rosary off, and ass-kicking Moka is unsealed. She proceeds to throughly whoop Kurumu’s ass and moves in for the kill. However, Tsukune steps in front of her and says that he doesn’t want her to kill Kurumu because she didn’t have any malicious intentions and he just wants to be friends with everyone. Moka spares her life as a result, and the next morning Kurumu catches up to Moka and Tsukune walking to class and declares that Tsukune is her destined one and the harem begins.

Next Episode:
Next week looks to be the introduction of harem member #3, the loli witch Yukari. I’m sure Impz is already excited.

Impressions:

Kurumu is one of my favorite characters in the series and probably my favorite girl in the harem, so I definitely enjoyed this episode. It’s no surprise that she is a succubus, I’m sure even to those that haven’t read the manga, due to her devious behavior in the first half of the episode. She is really not a malicious person as we find out, and just really doesn’t know any better. I like her character because she is upbeat and says whats on her mind, but she also has a devious side. She has a natural conflict with Moka over Tsukune, although at this point it doesn’t appear that Moka sees anything in Tsukune aside from a friend and source of tasty meals. Kurumu is definitely head over heels for him now though since he saved her life by standing up to the unsealed Moka who was about to kill her.

The animation quality was solid this week from what I can tell, this show in 1280×720 resolution looks great and I really like the color scheme. Some may dislike all the bright colors and the school uniforms but I like them, I don’t watch that many shows that look like this (perhaps because they are mostly in shows not aimed at males heh =/). The lovey-dovey and harem imagination scenes were done with really bright pink and served to emphasize the exaggerated comedic nature of the show.

For those of you who were disturbed by the multi-tude of panties last week there were few this time around. Instead we are treated to the well-endowed Kurumu’s antics. It’s fairly similar to how it was handled in the manga, but with the added jiggles that is only available in the animated format. The show overall is not shy about it’s over-the-top fanservicey nature, and that’s part of what makes this a guilty pleasure for me. You really can’t even take the drama seriously in this show due to the setup and comedic nature of most of the show, and that’s fine with me as well.

They seem to be following the manga pretty close so far, but there is one more member of the harem to introduce and in the manga she doesn’t really appear until chapter 18. And at this pace with one chapter per week I assume they are going to pull hers ahead of that, but it shouldn’t create too much of a story gap. We shall see how they handle it, since the show is only slated for 13 episodes and she is listed in the voice credits (Rie Kugimiya) and appears in the promotional poster.

As expected, this episode shows several improvements from episode one and one of them is the change of the fanservice. There is way less panty flashes from Moka but instead you have boob rubs from Kurumu. Maybe it’s a result from the critics surrounding the 1st episode or just the exploiting of Kurumu’s natural qualities (this is a euphemism to say she has huge knockers) but whatever the reason, it means the producers are keeping in touch with the community. We have several moe moments worth to be mentioned, from the blushing of Kurumu and her boob bouncing to the lovely-dovey stare of Tsukuna and Moka.

This episode also introduces the show’s OP and ED (the 1st episode had a temporary Ed with the real OP’s song. “Cosmic Love”~and “Dancing in the Velvet Moon” are sung by Mizuki Nana, who is the current seiyuu of Moka and has made other famous roles such as Fate in the Nanoha animes and Hinata in Naruto. Both songs depict well her powerful voice and fulfill their roles perfectly; too bad the animations paired with them aren’t the best, specially the op animation who recycles several scenes of the anime, including the dreaded 3d stairs…The ED animation is more pleasant, with neon design depictions of the main girls but overall it’s too simple.

As Calawain said, they seem to be following the manga very close with great retouching skills to adapt the scenes to anime. But the biggest issue is Mizore, the 4th girl that shows on the promotional posters (there is a 5th girl, Rubi, who will supposely appear on the last eps of this season).
Mizore apears really late in the manga and her intro arc is long compared to the other girls arc, which mainly last only one episode. The 5th girl arc is the ideal to be the season’s end but Mizore’s manga arc only appears after. How will she interact and affect the anime plot during the parts she isn’t supposed to be there according to the manga?

Anyway, next episode we have a flat chest loli with odd tastes…won’t reveal more to not spoil the episode’s surprising ending.