Fall Anime review
In between stressing about grad school, I'm trying to take breaks and watch anime from time to time. This unfortunately leads me to desire silly and non-sophisticated anime as a stress reliever. Here are the guilty pleasures I'm indulging in this time around.
To Aru Kagaku no Railgun (とある科学の超電磁砲)
This show's title translates roughly in English as "A certain Scientific Railgun. I don't exactly know how I heard about it but I'm sure it was the title that caught my eye. It takes place in a near future or alternate universe (not really addressed) version of Tokyo in which super powers exist and over budgeted communities of highschools are devoted to training the use and control of these powers. One of the main characters (Shirai Kuroko) is a pervert who routinely tries to seduce her roommate (Misaka Mikoto). Mikoto has the ability to control electricity and can use it to accelerate metal objects (like suspiciously magnetic coins). The reason this show is a shameful secret love of mine is because it's fast and loose play on gender roles and high society. It is heavy on the Japanese association of "More European" = "More Elite". Kuroko's antics are blushingly full of fan-service and saved by her other persona of being the volunteer school police to fight the monster of the week. I have a strange hope that the show will get more complex.
Gundam00
It's Gundam Wing with slightly less silliness. (slightly) If you didn't like Gundam Wing, you'll probably won't like Gundam00. If you like seeing psychologically screwed up pretty boys promote a heavy handed message of peace through the use of indestructible robots, then you'll like this show. If you like making up relationships between underage boys, then you'll like this show. Without telling too much, Gundam are back, and they want to solve complex geopolitical strife by destroying both sides of any major military conflict. Essentially making the cost of engaging in military action too high and nations must resort to less violent negotiations to settle their problems. I like how there is at least a nod to topical ideas of geopolitical strife in our day like terrorist bombings, corrupt peace keeping forces, child soldiers and the power vacuum created by first world nations. However, there are quite a few silly things that for the most part don't matter, but bug me just because I'm me. The sniper specialist on the team seems not to understand what sniping actually is. He seems to use the verb whenever he shoots anyone. For example, standing in an open dessert plain in a giant green robot and shooting aerial fighters is not sniping, running up to other mechas and shooting them in the face with a pistol is not sniping, or sitting still in a pinned location shooting anything that comes at you is not sniping. At the very least, he's not a good sniper. One of the thing I do like about this series is how it doesn't just focus on the main characters and has small stories from all three major first world nations, the future UN, and these two students observing the whole thing. It breaks up the perspective of the narration and allows a refreshingly worldly view of things in this world. We are not just seeing the world from the perspective of our crazy jailbait freedom fighters.
Well, these are the things I'm watching now, if anyone has any suggestions for more things I should be seeing, I'm all ears.