Perfect Blue September 14, 2005
Another great anime, Perfect Blue. Thriller at its best, but in very Japanese style. I didn’t really get in the end who’s criminal? But it’s ok, i can guess. Very psychological thing with powerfull animation, direction, story…
Stanton August 11, 2005
The following article was originally published on Animeondvd.com. At the very end of the essay, after the sources are listed, I have added a response that I had written on the aodvd’s message board shortly after this was first printed.
This article has been reprinted with the permission of its author, Robert Stanton.
Boogiepop Phantom is an animated series based upon the acclaimed written work of Kouhei Kadono. Set somewhere in common, urban, contemporary Japan, the dark science fiction premises of the show quickly take over and distort any traditional elements of culture or knowledge. In fact, one of the series’ mantras is “In this world, anything can happen, and everything does happen all the time,” indicating the bizarre twists and turns of fate that will happen to the characters and the world they reside in during a certain amount of time. Over the course of twelve episodes, the viewer witnesses not only the biographical development of a wide cast of characters, but also the way that each of their individual lives manages to effect or coincide with others’. This is successfully accomplished by the use of straightforward character narratives and flashback sequences that force the viewer to make sense out of the series’ use of time in order to piece together what actually happened. The show stresses that flashbacks are concepts of memory and not necessarily truth, and that time is a relative concept dependent in which order sequences are experienced or viewed. [...]
Хронологія подій
Following is translation of the page THE ILLUSION OF MEMORY — CHRONOLOGY in Ukrainian.
Відновлена пряма хронологія подій в “Бугіпоп-Фантом”
(Курсивом вказано епізод і сцену, в яких подія зустрічається в серіалі, жирним виділено персонажів та важливі місця)
СІМ ЧИ БІЛЬШЕ РОКІВ ДО СТОВПА СВІТЛА
Народження Ехоса (Ехос — так я перекладаю Echos (Відлуння). Причини: японською воно теж звучить іноземно).
Смерть Сеїчі Кіріми.
Джоноочі Хісаші — герой в очах своїх однокласників в Початковій школі.
Епізод 02, сцена 02. [...]
Genshiken August 4, 2005
I’ve just finished watching Genshiken (現視研、げんしけん) and i’m so impressed! It’s just great! My favorite thing now (besides… ;-)). It’s about some otakus (more in japanese way otakus, hentai-, doujinshi-oriented otakus), their club (genshiken), life style, cosplaying, anyway, synopsis can be found on the net… But what hook you up the most is all that atmosphere made up by art, humour, voices and all.
By the way, i’ve finished also Planetes i wrote about before, and i have to say it’s not all that good as i thought it would be based on the first episodes. It’s still good, but… predictable or something. Why do we like anime anyway? Partially for its japanese style of storytelling which is so different from that western cliches we’re fed up of. You know, “good is good and bad is bad”, “love”, “peace”, “superhero”, all that stuff (we better like theirs: “big robots”, “almighty girls”…). As for japanese storytelling, i mean that moments when you see absolutely western-type situation and then bang!.. protagonist’s dead and his fiancee marries demon. Something unpredictable and often idiotic, but very refreshing for the most part. With Planetes all was good, except that unpredictability. It has some moments although when you think “can it be?”, but in the next episode it makes it almost in hollywood way. But drawing is great! And, man, it all the way better than Bebop! (And i like Bebop). As for Genshiken, here we have true masterpiece. Complete with Kujibiki Unbalanced (anime in anime). Must find out who made it up…
