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Post by Youngster Joey on Sept 13, 2015 21:45:34 GMT -5
picked up Durarara!!
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Post by Hiro the Half-Elf on Nov 21, 2015 20:56:50 GMT -5
I just watched through the first season of Durarara!! last week, actually. I'm up to episode 3 or so of the second season- whenever Shinra and Celty sit down to hotpot with their friends. Now that was a satisfying vignette.
I'm also watching some other stuff- Kyousougiga is super cool if you like fun animation, expressive art, cool Buddhist imagery, and a general love of fun. "It's pretty unfair to pin all your hopes on a child, isn't it?" "We've been betrayed so many times by adults." Before the show came out, there was an OVA episode that set the tone- it takes place about halfway through the show. Crunchyroll has it listed as Episode 0, IIRC.
It's got this really fun omake episode where they travel through Kyoto showing off all the temples used in the show! It's a really loving tribute to Kyoto and Buddhist temples in general... plus there's a giant robot Bishamon, controlled by a cracked PSP. There's so much to love in this show, -and- it's only 10 episodes. Nice!
I watched the first few episodes of the new Fate/Stay Night: Unlimited Blade Works series. The prologue episode and the first episode are a slog! They're both forty minutes long and the first thirty minutes are really slow sequences of the characters walking around and talking lightly to other characters about things- it's exactly the start of the VN but with all the internal dialogue cut out and replaced with... nothing, so there's tons of dead air as they walk through nice scenery and pleasant music plays, but soooooo much could have been cut. Not only that, but the prologue episode takes place concurrently with the first episode so they cover most of the same material from different perspectives. I put this on because I wanted something quiet and boring, and I sure got that...
but then the fight at the end of the first episode was fantastic. The animation is great, and it lives up to the VN without cheapening it, somehow! The third episode is one long, gorgeous fight that doesn't drag out into tedious... after a painfully slow start, it becomes a great watch. Don't know if I would recommend it to someone over the VN, but those fights on the other hand..
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Post by Youngster Joey on Nov 22, 2015 23:38:19 GMT -5
I actually just finished the first season of Durarara!! today (yeah, I'm slow... I only watch TV at the gym, and I've been mixing it up with South Park). Decided I'm not going onto the second season. I don't really like any of the characters other than Shizuo, and the plot is... eh. I really liked it at first, but it's just not keeping my attention. It feels meandering.
Picking up Fate/Stay Zero again instead.
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Post by Hiro the Half-Elf on Nov 23, 2015 16:44:32 GMT -5
I think Durarara's real weakness is that the second half [of the first season] focuses too much on the high school trio, and no one really cares about them. Shizuo, Izaya, Shinra, Simon, the Kadota gang, people like those guys, but Mikado and his friends are squares and the more prominent they are the less anything can happen.
The second season picks up with some new characters and some arcs that aren't so focused on Mikado, which I liked. They introduce more monster characters now that the *channers vs street gang sub-plot is finished. First arc of it has been dense, interesting, and exciting.
Also the music sucks. I like the show a lot, but not gonna forgive how much they play the -worst songs-. Saika's theme is pretty bad, and that one dreamy theme that plays every time the highschoolers are meandering... It's such a shame since the first OP sets the show up for a great audio aesthetic that it just drops the ball on completely.
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Post by Youngster Joey on Nov 23, 2015 17:18:47 GMT -5
Oh, that's actually good to hear. I doubt the show is ever going to redeem itself into something good at this point, but it would definitely help to not focus on Mikado and friends so much. I was having a hard time caring about the plot in part because I just didn't give a damn about most of the characters. They weren't dislikable; they just were boring. Not sure if I'll continue with the show, but good to know.
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Derman
Oracle Knight
I still don't have a knife tag on my golden birth knife
Posts: 194
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Post by Derman on Nov 23, 2015 18:08:07 GMT -5
I could imagine Durarara running for a good 100+ episodes with the pace it keeps introducing new characters. I've really enjoyed the stuff this far, although I got a bit fed up with some of the characters. It's mostly just a mindless entertainment to keep me distracted from the stuff I should be doing...
I watched Fate/Zero and ST UBW during the past few months. Very different shows despite sharing the same universe. Even the few characters they shared were quite different from each other. Does anyone know why Gilgamesh has that weapon arsenal in both Fate and Final Fantasy? I've been trying to dig some stuff up but can't find any satisfying explanation.
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Post by Hiro the Half-Elf on Nov 24, 2015 1:04:51 GMT -5
Gilgamesh states it himself: He is the original Hero. All other Hero myths draw from -his- myth. The King of Babylon plundered whatever riches, took any woman, slew any beast, and felled any forest he liked. He owns all things in the world. The treasure vault of Babylon is filled with dozens of fabulous weapons from the best blacksmiths of the ancient world, including the conceptual prototypes of weapons that would appear in the myths of later heroes.
But in simpler terms: Because he is the King. There is nothing in the world the King does not possess, except immortality.
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Post by Youngster Joey on Dec 6, 2015 18:15:50 GMT -5
Terror in Resonance. Eight episodes down, and still enjoying it. It's refreshing to find anime that's serious and no-BS.
I tried giving Tokyo Ghoul a go, but stopped after two episodes. I'm repulsed by gore, animated or real. Couldn't stomach it.
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Post by Lee Traxin on Dec 6, 2015 20:31:45 GMT -5
Watched through the Studio Deen Fate/Stay adaptation. For all of it's bad arc blending and off dialogue, I still love that fight choreography.
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Post by Phone Master Ion on Dec 11, 2015 14:20:58 GMT -5
The only thing I've had time to stay up to date with this current season is K return of kings. It's so incredibly stylish and never stops being interesting.
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Derman
Oracle Knight
I still don't have a knife tag on my golden birth knife
Posts: 194
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Post by Derman on Mar 15, 2016 11:30:54 GMT -5
I tried watching Parasyte because I saw people claiming it was basically a better version of Tokyo Ghoul, which I found very disappointing. Finished it and I can't say I didn't enjoy it, heck I watched the whole thing in a week, which is scores pretty high in my book. I could go deeper about it's flaws but I think I'll pass.
For some reason I thought it would be a good idea to pick up Oregairu... I think grain mentioned it somewhere at some point and I looked it up back then and it's been sitting on the back of my mind waiting for me to watch it. What a depressingly great show it is D:. I don't think I've ever seen a fictional cast that mirrors real people I know as well as Oregairu does. There are some scenarios that are very similar to where I've been in my high school years that I didn't even really remember before watching the show. I've yet to finish the second season but I can safely say I'm enjoying it a lot more than anything I've watched in the past year.
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Post by Friendly Person :) on Mar 26, 2016 23:39:32 GMT -5
Now that the final episode of Durarara is out, the last shred of interest I had in the show is now severed. I don't know if the LNs are better, but the anime is a wreck at the end. I was excited for season 2 because of what *could* have been. What I got was so poorly done that I wouldn't recommend Durarara to anybody.
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Derman
Oracle Knight
I still don't have a knife tag on my golden birth knife
Posts: 194
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Post by Derman on Mar 27, 2016 6:08:29 GMT -5
I was really disappointed by the last episode, especially with the stuff that went down in the previous one. Overall DRRR felt like wasted potential IMO. If handled better it could've easily been my favorite. The character development, at its core, on Mikado and the character of Izaya were really good. I think I'll read through the Novels if I can get my hands on all of them, I wasn't satisfied with the way the anime handled the stuff. I actually went and bought the first volume digitally from Google play book store since it was only like 6€. We'll see if it's any better.
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