Recommending Anime Thread Mark II - Seriously, LOGHorizon is a pretty okay show

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > VEGETA > Recommending Anime Thread Mark II - Seriously, LOGHorizon is a pretty okay show

Mercrom: Jul 17, 2009

OxeHunden posted:

Old stuff I've been watching for the 2nd, 3rd or more time; Hikaru No Go, Hajime No Ippo, .Hack//Sign, Death Note, Baki The Grappler, Neon Genesis Evangelion, Fafner, Planetes and Prince of Tennis +++

If you like sports and quality you should watch Chihayafuru.

My brother who doesn't really like anime but loves Red vs Blue linked me this and thinks it's great. This guy doesn't even like the action in The Raid: Redemption so he's really hard to please. Surely there must be an anime studio out there that can beat the animation and choreography made by this one guy?

# ¿ Mar 26, 2013 11:47

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# ¿ Apr 26, 2024 07:17

Mercrom: Jul 17, 2009

The Black Stones posted:

Okay, do you want a show that just has romance and happy characters? Or you want quirkly and happy, but also with a horribly broken main character? Becuase if it's the second there is close to nothing that I can think of that would fit the bill because that character type and that style of story telling does not go together at all.

The World God Only Knows, Skip Beat, and maybe Detroit Metal City if you substitute "happy" and "romance" with "awesome". Steins;Gate probably fits too.

# ¿ Apr 11, 2013 20:25

Mercrom: Jul 17, 2009

I really liked the first 14 episodes of Death Note. I wanted to watch something else with a magnificent bastard of a main character, so I watched the 3 episodes of Code Geass. It's like everything terrible about anime except pedophilia combined in one gigantic clusterfuck, and so far it is the worst anime I have ever seen. Does it get better or what?

# ¿ Jun 10, 2013 13:26

Mercrom: Jul 17, 2009

Captain Invictus posted:

Is there anything besides Death Note you enjoy? You're probably the most cynical poster I've seen in ADTRW, dude. Lighten up with your posts at least, every single one I've seen reads like an angry rant. Like you came in expecting the Citizen Kane Of Anime, but instead got Deuce Bigelow: Anime Gigolo. Your expectations seem like they're astronomical.

I guess that's just my posting habit. I just don't post something if someone else already has, which means I basically never post praise. All I wanted from Code Geass was to be entertained by some guy making people do crazy poo poo with his mind control powers like I saw in a AMV Hell clip. That's literally it. So far it feels like I've wasted an hour on a Japanese victim complex, technobabble, politicsbabble, robots, high school, and a shower scene. I watched the first episode of Valvrave and I enjoyed that way more.

Tuxedo Catfish posted:

Code Geass has one of the best first episodes in anime, and Death Note is mediocre trash. Sorry. vv

EDIT: In fairness I thought exactly the same thing the first time I tried to watch it, but my opinions back then were stupid.

Can you elaborate? Does the show get better, or did you suddenly learn to enjoy the things I listed?

Also the early parts of Death Note are really good cheesy fun, like the early parts of Dexter. The rest is crap though.

# ¿ Jun 10, 2013 15:31

Mercrom: Jul 17, 2009

Kingnothing posted:

You also can't talk about death note simultaneously being the best thing you've ever seen and "parts are good cheesy fun but the rest is crap" on the same page of a thread.

You are confusing me with someone else.

# ¿ Jun 10, 2013 17:21

Mercrom: Jul 17, 2009

Relambrien posted:

The setting is not unique at all--it's just a city in modern Japan (though unless I'm misremembering, not too modern as it lacks computers and cell phones). The pervading surrealism is actually one of two things the writer/company he writes for is known for. The other thing they're known for is the kind of drama you saw in Angel Beats.

So while Clannad does have the same kind of surrealism and supernatural things going on, it's not at all the primary factor in the show and isn't nearly as prominent. On the drama side, Clannad has it in spades.

If you watch it (and since I loving love Clannad, I'm going to say you should), make sure to watch both the series Clannad and Clannad ~After Story~, the latter being the second season and significantly better than the first.

As an aside, Clannad was originally a visual novel developed by the company Key, and they've also produced Kanon, Air, Planetarian, Little Busters!, and most recently, Rewrite. The main writer for this company was the writer for Angel Beats--it turns out he can't really write anything else but he does what he does pretty drat well

You're forgetting something very important.

I really like comedies where the main character is just being a jerk for no reason.

# ¿ Jun 16, 2013 00:28

Mercrom: Jul 17, 2009

Time of Eve is very well made but the premise and plot are really dumb and ultimately meaningless. They even shoehorned in Asimov's idiotic laws to complete the sci-fi circle jerk.

Madoka Magica's glaring flaw is that it really lacks compelling characters and dialogue, but is otherwise the best written anime I've seen. It's intelligent and actually pretty meaningful. That poo poo's hard to find so I recommend it even if you hate the characters or children in general.

# ¿ Jun 28, 2013 16:37

Mercrom: Jul 17, 2009

Captain Invictus posted:

By his own admission, he tends not to make "positive posts" like saying how good something is, so basically he is a 100% all the time big fat debbie downer who looks like he doesn't like anything.

I don't agree that being critical is the same as being a downer though. I find it easier to enjoy something when the flaws are scrutinized and accepted.

In the show's favor, it is so well made that the fact that I hate the premise didn't make me hate the show in the end. It's a standard but very well made drama but with a thematically messy mix of slavery and sci-fi tropes. The robots can't ever be used as an analogy to anything in real life because that would be horribly offensive, so it just becomes a meaningless bit of fluff best ignored like orcs and goblins in LotR.

(USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)

# ¿ Jun 29, 2013 01:48

Mercrom: Jul 17, 2009

ViggyNash posted:

I disregarded your entire statement at this point.

Do you realize how prejudiced and close-minded this sounds? It sounds like you already have a set definition of what a robot is and should be, and therefore how one should be portrayed. It seems like your problem with the show is that it portrays robots in a way that is entirely contradictory to your image, and so you see it as being objectively wrong.

The entire show is a "what if" scenario. What if androids become indistinguishable from humans both physically and individually? How do we differentiate one from the other? Should we even be trying to differentiate one from the other in a setting as casual as a small coffee shop? If we can't, then what does it mean to be human?

Get over whatever drat bias or prejudice you have and watch the show again. Seriously, don't post about Time of EVE until you actually attempt to understand it open mindedly.

Aside from rare, hard sci-fi cases, sci-fi isn't meant to be taken literally. Time of Eve is very far from hard sci-fi, and not a "what if" scenario. It is a character drama about people acting like people around other people and all that entails. The only thing that really sets them apart from humans is their enslavement.

Funnily enough, a better representation of a "robot" is Kyubey from Madoka Magica. If you make a creature that instead of emotions has a set of rules to live by like "don't actively hurt people" and "don't actively lie" you probably get something close to him. But that's not what his character is about because you aren't supposed to take him literally either.

# ¿ Jun 29, 2013 03:33

Mercrom: Jul 17, 2009

ViggyNash posted:

Then you are reading the term "robot" in a classical, literary sense? As an autonomous, but emotionless, mechanical object bound structurally by a set of rules?

That isn't at all what a robot is in sci-fi. The ideal robot is a humanoid entity guided by strong AI.

An ideal robot is both. There is no reason to create strong AI with human emotions just to enslave it other than pure sadism. There is no reason to make a creature that you enslaved look and sound exactly like humans, other than sadism. The entire premise behind a "hard sci-fi Time of Eve" rests on the notion that everyone is comically evil and just decided to create the closest thing to human slavery possible.

Admittedly I'm not interested in sci-fi AI since I think most of it is dumb. In reality the invention of an actual "hard AI" as we define it just means humans won't have a reason to do math, science, engineering or much of anything anymore. It's just kind of depressing and wouldn't make for an exciting story.

# ¿ Jun 29, 2013 04:47

Mercrom: Jul 17, 2009

I watched the first two episodes of Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex and I found them really uninteresting. I've heard it's a really intelligent show though, so are there episodes I could skip to that deal with something other than body swapping and other transhumanist fantasies?

# ¿ Apr 18, 2014 10:28

Mercrom: Jul 17, 2009

Oh well. I guess I'll stick with Psycho-Pass for now. I just really prefer it when the fantastical stuff acts as a substitute for something that already exists.

# ¿ Apr 18, 2014 12:33

Mercrom: Jul 17, 2009

Drifter posted:

What do you mean about the fantastical stuff acting as a substitute? As opposed to what?

I think the fantastical should be an exaggerated version of something that exists, to provoke thought about real issues.

I only watched a bit of Psycho-Pass but it seems pretty good in that regard. Any society is built on conformity of values and morals, and laws demand it. Social engineering and psychology has just evolved to something far more advanced and reliant on technology in that show, but its basis is the same. Nothing in the real world is remotely equivalent to concepts like brains in jars though.

# ¿ Apr 18, 2014 14:34

Mercrom: Jul 17, 2009

jonjonaug posted:

GITS can get pretty "unrealistic" if you're looking for hard sci-fi, I suppose, but I'd advise you to hang on until the Laughing Man arc gets off the ground.

Whereas the films and manga tend to be much more fantastical in their plot and themes, a lot of Stand-Alone Complex is about how the more things change, the more they stay the same. The first film is about merging with a computer and becoming the internet or something I don't really remember, while in Stand Alone Complex the main plot is essentially just how difficult to impossible it can be to deal with government bureaucracy and corruption. If you still don't like it by the time "Chat Chat Chat" rolls around feel free to drop out, but there's some things in your post that make me think you'd like SAC once it gets going.

It's got nothing to do with hard sci-fi. In the first two episodes the only thing that seemed really implausible was the major's outfit. I generally don't like fiction that focuses primarily on science and technology. I have non-fiction for that, like Cosmos.

I might revisit it some day but from what others wrote about it it doesn't seem like it's for me.

# ¿ Apr 19, 2014 04:50

Mercrom: Jul 17, 2009

Brasseye posted:

Do either of the Gurren Lagann movies change the part of the ending where Nia disappears? I always found that part of the ending unsatisfying because the whole show is about achieving the impossible, breaking through the heavens and so on and Simon is fine with ripping apart the fabric of space and time to rescue Nia from the anti spiral, then just rolls over and accepts it when she fades away.

That's not what the show is about though. It's got problems but it's not stupid. It's a struggle for freedom above all else, not a struggle to become gods. Live Free or Die, the anime.

I thought the show got dull towards the end so I'll check out the movie.

# ¿ May 7, 2014 20:41

Mercrom: Jul 17, 2009

A lot more time in the show was spent on things that weren't necessary in any way.

It was completely justified if only because it at least partly retroactively negated the whole "save the princess" aspect of Simon's struggle, which was really, really, incredibly dumb. But the intent was probably just to make the show end on a more somber tone and making Simon's sacrifice bigger so that he seems more heroic at the end. Regular storytelling stuff, not just ~drama~.

Mercrom fucked around with this message at 21:39 on May 7, 2014

# ¿ May 7, 2014 21:35

Mercrom: Jul 17, 2009

A teenager said bad things to his mom and another teenager got in a fight? :captainpop:

It's kinda ridiculous sometimes but the writing is decent, and it's the best rom com anime I've seen. It manages to be funny without just being fluff. I've enjoyed other romantic comedies like Lovely Complex, Nodame Cantabile and I even kinda enjoyed Kimi ni Todoke, but those things are just 100% pure unadulterated fluff.

# ¿ Oct 25, 2014 01:36

Mercrom: Jul 17, 2009

Are there any anime comedies as well made and well directed as the second season of Working?

I don't just mean funny. It's not nearly as funny as Nichibros or DMC, but the quality is much higher. It took something really boring and made it enjoyable through sheer execution, unlike the pretty awful first season.

# ¿ Nov 17, 2014 00:15

Mercrom: Jul 17, 2009

The Devil Tesla posted:

Monthly Girls Nozaki-kun is a great, funny manga with an excellently made anime.

It was pretty funny and had some great characters but I wouldn't call it excellently made. It's about what I'd expect from a gag comic adaptation. There's not much sense of place or continuity. I meant something more cinematic.

Paracelsus posted:

You mean aside from Servant x Service?

What little I saw from that show was incredibly lazy tsukkomi jokes repeated over and over with no style whatsoever against flat backgrounds. It's the perfect example of what I'm not looking for.

# ¿ Nov 17, 2014 12:01

Mercrom: Jul 17, 2009

I started with the original and didn't like it, but the dub made Dandy sound less like a irredeemable rear end in a top hat so I went with that.

# ¿ Nov 26, 2014 02:42

Mercrom: Jul 17, 2009

I'm watching Psycho-Pass right now and it seems pretty good. It's pretty far from the futurist wank fodder of the few episodes of Ghost in the Shell I saw anyway. It's about society and the nature of laws and the effects of their enforcement, not robots and cyborgs.

# ¿ Dec 6, 2014 09:19

Mercrom: Jul 17, 2009

Rinkles posted:

What's wrong with futurist wank fodder?

Nothing. I like futurism, I just have never liked it in fiction.

# ¿ Dec 6, 2014 10:03

Mercrom: Jul 17, 2009

Captain Invictus posted:

A ton of people loved it for its absurd premise and shockingly good mix of high energy action with slice of life fish out of water comedy. It was the poster child for "there is seriously no reason this should be even a tenth as good as it is".

But it's not as good as it should have been. The premise was good but the show pretty much squandered it after the first two episodes in favor of serious plot and setting up a harem. Also people actually liked the action in it? The fight scenes that were just the main character suddenly activating his Gary Stu powers and winning?

I'd been on board if it was more katsu-doom and less blushing tsunderes in need of rescue.

# ¿ Dec 6, 2014 13:25

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# ¿ Apr 26, 2024 07:17

Mercrom: Jul 17, 2009

icantfindaname posted:

So how good is Madoka? Is there any skeevy poo poo involved? I'm hesitant to watch that kind of magical-girl-for-adult-men stuff, but I understand Madoka is supposed to be very good?

I have never watched another magical girl series and don't intend to. I don't find it the most entertaining show to watch but the writing itself makes it the show I value having seen the most.

Also the first two movies are better than the series imo.

# ¿ Dec 11, 2014 05:43

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > VEGETA > Recommending Anime Thread Mark II - Seriously, LOGHorizon is a pretty okay show