During an extremely busy period for personal, professional and even recreational reasons, the fall anime season has snuck up on us here at Couchbound. I had intended to do an intro to this season during the first week like last season but life sometimes have a habit of changing your plans. Nevertheless, we have been trying to keep up with the new shows and here are some of my early impressions. This will not attempt to cover all the new shows but instead the ones I have been interested in
Fate Zero: Pretty much my most anticipated show this season. This is the prequel to the extremely popular franchise, Fate Stay/Night. Based on the game by Type Moon, who also created Kara No Kyokai and Tsukihime. Many who know me, know that I love this series and especially the figures as I own dozens of characters related to this series. The basic story of the original is that 7 sorcerers (Masters) summon 7 familiars, (Servants) based on historical heroes, to do battle in the Holy Grail Wars. The winner will get any wish they desire. Our main heros was Shiro and his servant the swords-woman, Saber. In Fate Zero, we follow the story of Shiro’s adoptive father as well as parents or relatives of other characters in Fate Stay/Night during the previous Grail War. The first episode was an extended episode coming in at 48 minutes. For those of us who don’t follow all the games and novels, there is a lot of backstory to absorb. I have high hopes for this show that combines action, drama and historical references. This show is being streamed on NicoNico with english subtitles with each episode available for 7 days.
Guilty Crown: This is another show that I was excited about. Beautiful character design and animation, music provided by Supercell and a nice mix of comedy and sci fi action places this high on my list. The first episode shows us a singing idol, Inori, who is running away from the government who has taken control of a dystopian Japan. A High Schooler, Shu, finds her injured and she gives him a package to deliver before she is taken away by the military. As he delivers this package, he meets up with the resistance group Inori is a part of. He ends up rescuing Inori, and the “King’s Mark” appears on Shu’s hand and he is now able to reach inside Inori and extract a weapon, saving the day. Again, I’m expecting good things from this series and will be keeping up on it. This show is available for streaming on Funimation.
Yuno loves you! Yuno will protect you no matter what!
Mirai Nikki: This is one of the shows I’m a bit torn on. I have read the entire manga and loved it so I am in the rare position of hoping the anime doesn’t “screw up the story” for a change. Normally, I watch the anime before reading the manga or playing the game its based on. I do recommend this show, especially if you have not read the manga. The story revolves around Yuki who is a loner in school. He has no friends and his only hobby seems to be recording everything in his cell phone diary and relating those events to his imaginary friends. One day his diary begins to foretell the future and he discovers he is a participant in a “game” where 12 contestants with similarly special cell phones attempt to kill all other contestants with the sole survivor becoming “god”.
This show is similar in feel to Deadman Wonderland in it’s gritty and gory depictions of battles and death and it’s overall tragic tone. Yuki is pretty much your typical clueless protagonist but the most interesting character is Yuno. She is one of the best examples of the Yandere character type, someone who loves you so much they are willing to kill anyone else to protect you. Yuno is the perfect crazy, stalker girlfriend you didn’t even know you had. In fact, she is so infatuated with Yuki, her cell phone tells her what is happening to Yuki at all times. This makes facebook stalking look like nothing. I will be watching this show but I won’t be as frantic about keeping up each week.
C3: Cubed X Cursed X Curious or C Cube: Now this show has thrown me for a loop. I decided to watch it just to see what it’s about since I only knew it was about a cursed girl coming to live with a guy who is immune to curses. The character design itself is nice and cute but rather simplistic. The overall look of the show is pretty nice with lots of light effects making for a very surreal look. I would say it is very similar to last season’s Itsuka Tenma no Kuro Usagi. For this post I am trying to only talk about the first episodes of shows and basic storyline but this show required episode 2 to draw me in so I will talk about it a little. The first episode shows our protagonist Haruaki getting a black cube sent to him from his dad. The cube turns out to be 1 form of Fear who is now in human form as a young girl and explains she is cursed and that the cube form was the easiest to travel in. The rest of the episode shows Fear interacting with people including Haruaki’s neighbor Konoha, setting up a love triangle/harem situation.
Episode 2 starts in a similar fashion with Fear interacting in school and was about to lose my interest as a simple harem comedy until the 2nd half. From there, its revealed Fear is a cursed weapon who’s killed thousands of people and there are people trying to destroy her. Not only that, Konoha can turn into a weapon and Haruaki is also a skilled fighter and the show transforms into a magic and martial arts based action story with Fear apparently going crazy seeing Haruaki getting injured. This was a surprise to me as I did not read the novels or manga this show is based on. I will be keeping up with this and hoping it stays more action than romantic comedy.
Ben-To: There must be an unwritten rule that each season needs at least 1 WTF show. This is a very simple show but the combination of comedy, fighting and food has me hooked so far. As the name implies, bentos, japanese boxed meals, are the star of this show. Yo is the unlucky high school freshman who unwittingly finds himself locked in combat over 1/2 priced bentos. He’s beaten up so badly he loses his memory of the time he spent at the market and the beating he got. He only remembers that he woke up in a hospital bruised and battered. He soon learns there is a battle each night at markets around the city as the bentos goes on sale. There is also a club at his school dedicated to training for victory in these battles. Yes, this is pretty much as absurd as it sounds and yet it is pretty damn funny and entertaining. I think this is my guilty pleasure show of the season.
Kyoukai Senjou no Horizon: This is another really weird show. So in the future humans leave earth but due to conflicts, return to earth and attempt to recreate history from 10,000 BC until they reach 1413 AD when wars break out. Our protagonist Tooru who has a permanent smile, and reminds me of Irresponsible Captain Tyler, is trying to deal with the death of his friend years ago and plans on confessing to his dead friend and going to war with the world for causing her death and to try to regain their homeland. Oh yea, Tooru and his friends live on a floating spaceship which is their whole country because they have no land to call their own. Honestly, I don’t fully understand the story yet. I hope I will someday but its not right this moment. This is based on a series of “light” novels that make the LOTR books look like a series of pamphlets. These books could fill an entire shelf by itself. There is a good mix of comedy, action, mechs and magic in the first episode so I will try to keep up with the show.
The novels Kyoukai Senjou no Horizon is based on.
Other shows: This season also has many shows which are continuing from last season or even from previous years. Mawaru Penguindrum is still on-going and has taken a very dark turn. I hadn’t realized this was a 24 episode show and was wondering how the story would wrap up at the end of ep 12. I was actually freaking out a bit thinking it was a cliffhanger season ender until I found out it was still ongoing in the fall. The story is still amazing if a bit aggravating at times with characters breaking the fourth wall only to taunt us about info we aren’t allowed to know yet. This is still one of the shows I’m dying to watch and find out the next bit of storyline. Working!! is back for a second season with its crew of crazy workers at a family restaurant. I will watch this eventually after I finish watching the first season of the show from a year ago. Ika Musume is also back with to try to take over the world for all squid-kind. I really enjoy this show but a lot of the humor is lost in translation due to its crazy wordplay and punny goodness. Of note, episode 4 of this show has most of the cast speaking english. A hilarious new angle in the subs vs dubs debate. English by japanese voice actors! Another show I need to finish season 1 before watching. Shakugan no Shana III is the long awaited 3rd season. I have to catch up on seasons 1 & 2 before watching this one even though I own a few figures form this series.
There are many more shows this season of course but these are the ones that caught my interest. Honestly, I dont know how I’m gonna have time to do anything with so many shows on top of all the big game releases this fall. Guess I can give up on sleep yet again. Leave comments if you’re watching any of these shows and let me know what you think of them so far!
