Top 10 Anime Episodes 2009

 

A bit late, but I still want to write down my list of the most outstanding TV episodes of 2009. The reason why I make a list of single episodes and not whole anime is due to the fact that full series hardly reach the same kind of perfection because of the largely different staff working on the individual episodes (which leads to varying quality). It’s usually talented staff that makes an episode stand out from all the others, but also other factors like time – that’s why first and final episodes have generally more polished animation. Below are 10 episodes of 2009 that impressed me in one way or another (in no particular order):

Rebuild of Evangelion 1.0 – FX animation

 

If you are looking for great effect animation in recent years, then there is absolutely no way around Rebuild of Evangelion. The first two movies brought some of the best FX animators ever together, even the overall director Hideaki Anno himself is a master of this field. Besides animators like Takashi Hashimoto, Masayuki and Takeshi Honda it’s particularly the “special effects director” himself that is responsible for the incredible effect animation in the first two movies, namely Shoichi Masuo. One of my favorite FX animation scenes ever is the bit in Evangelion 1.0 where Ramiel fires with full power at the mountain after Shinji failed to destroy the angel’s core with the first shot. When I first saw it I was stunned due to the power and intenseness of this cut, it’s so short yet very impressing. Masuo did lots of incredible stuff in the past, but this one is a real masterpiece. The look at the key animation and time sheet of this cut shows us its complexity and sophistication which is far beyond most other FX animation I’ve seen in key animation books (most Japanese animators are doing explosions and such in one or two layers). The featured key frames and artwork of this single cut take up over 10 pages of the Eva 1.0 KA book (more than any other presented cut), and the corresponding time sheet reveals that it consists of 16 (!) different layers, from layer A to P (he even had to add a “P” column by hand because the standardized 15 columns weren’t enough for this almost crazy endeavor). It’s hard to imagine how much work it must have been to plan this scene and not to lose the overview over so many different drawings.

 

 

Seiken no Blacksmith #10 / Kouichi Kikuta

 

Now that I have finished watching this rather generic series, I want to point out the only episode that is a real achievement in my eyes: GoHands’ #10.
Overall, Seiken no Blacksmith suffers from the typical problems of most light novel adaptions as it neglects proper storytelling in favor of ridiculous otaku-centric plot devices, it’s simply hard to take anime with little girls in major roles seriously. The story and the behaviour of most female characters are consequently coined by otaku taste, but it admittedly had some fun bits here and there and I didn’t expect much story-wise anyway – yet I’m still disappointed to see a series of that kind from manglobe. With Michiko to Hatchin they introduced so many great characters – also one of the most mature little girls I’ve seen in anime – but that was from a different director and writer and above all – an original project.

 

 

Anyway, Episode 10 has noticeably more dynamic animation and interesting posing as well as solid layouts and some nice bits of background animation, all in all comparable to Princess Lover #1. Unsurprisingly, the three key animators of PL #1 – Shingo Suzuki, Hiroshi Okubo and Kouichi Kikuta – were also involved in Blacksmith #10 (among some other GoHands animators). Okubo and Kikuta handled most of the exciting action sequence of the second half which convinces through the power and impressiveness of Okubo’s parts (great camera motion and background animation) and Kikuta’s fancy drawings and framing. Latter has a very obvious style which reflects his past as gif animator – his drawings may be rather rough (reminscent of other gif animators like Shingo Yamashita) but his morphing of the designs into interesting shapes and offbeat proportions make the actual movement turn out very satifying. Kikuta’s approach to timing and layouting is similarly interesting, he tends to move the characters quite a lot within the given frame and often moves the backgrounds/camera to achieve a more dynamic effect (even if there’s sometimes a bit too loose connection of animation and the BG art), apparently Kikuta attracted some attention with his interesting layout style since he was entrusted with creating the layouts for Princess Lover! #2 and #8. In 2007, he created a short for the online contents site GyaO! [youtube] which provides some information about his style (and also regarding his liking of yuri…). Below some cuts which were animated by him (from Princess Lover! and Seiken no Blacksmith):

 

 

Staff list of Seiken no Blacksmith #10:

 

Screenplay: Masashi Suzuki
Storyboard: Masamitsu Hidaka
Episode Director: Yuuichi Sugio
Animation Director: Jun Nakai
Key Animation: Shingo Suzuki, Hiroshi Okubo, Kazuaki Imoto, Makoto Furuta, Kouichi Kikuta, Hidemi Kanazama, Yuki Terano, Takayuki Uchida, Yuuichi Sugio, Ai Ishimori

Winter Season 2010 Anime preview

 

Compared to the last few winter seasons the number of new anime has noticeably gone back and, sadly, more than half of them seem to be the usual cheap cookie-cutter stuff that dominates modern anime, though there are still a few promising series in the lineup.

 

High Expectations

 

♦ Durarara!!

It’s basically the same constellation of people who created the outstanding Baccano!, strictly speaking it’s based on a light novel series written by Narita Ryougo with the well-attuned team of Noboru Takagi (series composition) and Takahiro Omori (director) handling its adaption into animation. The animation is once more produced by studio Brains Base, but Omori’s projects attract all kind of artists so I’m sure we’ll see some talents doing great work like in Baccano!. Takahiro Kishida, who is also a regular on Omori’s works, created the wonderful character designs, haven’t seen anything better for a while. I’m pretty sure that Durarara!! will be the highlight of the upcoming season (which isn’t that difficult to speak the truth), can’t wait to see what Omori intends to do with this one, his imaginative and intense directing style that reaches out into every aspect of the production promises some enjoyable time.

 

 

Medium Expectations

 

♦ So-Ra-No-Wo-To

This is the first anime of the so-called “Anime no Chikara” project which is a collaboration of TV Tokyo and Aniplex to create original anime with talented creators. Mamoru Kanbe is directing it so I expect a half-way decent result, and besides it’s rare these days that a scenario sounds as interesting as this one (even if there’s a bunch of assumedly stereotypical bishoujo’s involved). It’s an A-1 Pictures production which commonly means averaging quality if there aren’t the right people involved, but Toshifumi Akai’s participation as chief animation director (who aquired some renown through his work on Kannagi, or more specifically his animation supervision of #10 and key animation on several episodes) makes me hope that the animation could turn out pretty good. The eye-catching resemblance of Akai’s character designs to K-ON! respectively Yukiko Horiguchi’s style is of course no coincidence as he obviously likes K-ON! (like he wrote on his blog) and Horiguchi’s work. The PV reveals some convincing animation which even comes close to Horiguchi’s lively and rich animation at times, though I suspect that they can’t keep it up… anyways, I’m curious if Ordet will be participating too since the designs are of their lineage in some way.

 

♦ Hanamaru Kindergarten

Gainax and Seiji Mizushima do indeed sound great, but despite the reputable director I doubt that Hanamaru Kindergarten is a high-priority project for them. That said, I’m glad to see a new comedy series by Gainax and the trailer certainly caught my interest through the usual overdone Gainax humour. If anyone can make something really worthwile out of this source material, then it’s without doubt Gainax.

 

♦ Katanagatari

After Shaft x Shinbou’s Bakemonogatari, Katanagatari is the second anime adaptation of NisiOisin’s work, this time by White Fox and Keitaro Motonaga (School Days, Akasaka, etc.). It’s interesting that the anime will air over a period of a whole year with one 60 minutes episode per month (so one for each novel volume), this should allow for some additional polishing of their animation work. I really liked the style shown in the PVs and the animation wasn’t that bad either, but hardly surprising as there are some talented people attached to White Fox (like Naoto Hosoda, I’m sure he’ll do some work on Katanagatari). Since it’s based on novels by NisiOisin, it’s probably not on the low standard of most other light novel adaptations, but let’s wait and see what the director (whose former works weren’t particularly creative) does with the material.

 

 

Low Expectations

 

♦ Ōkamikakushi

I’ve wanted to see a Ryukishi07 work adapted into anime by another studio than Deen for quite a while as his stuff is actually interesting and entertaining and deserves something better than such an awful mixture of still-images and trite directing, but this combination (Nobuhiro Takamoto and AIC) isn’t too promising either. I fear that it won’t be anything more than standard fare with some decently interesting storyline, though quality-wise probably a notch better than the extremely bad Deen stuff. If the first two episodes manage to catch my interest, then I’ll watch some more of it for the sake of Ryukishi07’s original scenario. The setting is certainly reminiscent of Higurashi, and Ōkamikakushi seems to be the same twisting and blending of various genres and concepts that make the “When they cry” franchise so remarkable.

 

♦ Dance in the Vampire Bund

This season’s new Shaft x Shinbou anime, apparently presented in a more violent and darker fashion reminiscent of Petite Cossette and Soul Taker. It’s Shinbou so I expect a halfway decent result even with this generic sounding source material.

 

♦ Seikon no Qwaser

While the content seems to be nothing more than an extremely fanservice-y version of the usual fantasy/school stuff, it could surprise on the technical side of things since some interesting staff is involved. Director Hiraku Kaneko is a good choice for this kind of anime as his (nice) work as animator is equally coined by fanservice, the same goes for Hiroya Iijima (chief animation director) who did a lot of work on adult animation, though he concentrated more on TV anime in the last few years. Remarkable are also the two relatively new companies Taki Corporation and Hoods Entertainment that handle the (animation) production, latter is another offspring of Gonzo, to be exact mostly of the section which worked on Linebarrels of Iron. The promo shows some decent animation quality, though if the scenario is as ridiculous as I heard from various sources, then I won’t bother with it.

 

♦ Baka to Test to Shōkanjū

So Shinbou’s protégé (Shin Oonuma) is directing a series at Silver Link? They recently worked on some Shaft shows so it’s far from being a surprise, but it won’t be anything too outstanding even with Oonuma directing, it just doesn’t strike me as interesting at all, much less as something meaningful like ef ~ a tale of memories.

 

 

I left out all the unbearable and insignificant cookie-cutter stuff as well as the sequels like Nodame Cantabile Finale, Hidamari Sketch and Gag Manga Biyori+, even if some those follow-up series probably rank among the better anime this season.