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There's something about this show that's really off. It's like everything is there for an amazing series. An anime original with a quantum physics story, a cast of unique characters, unique art style and designs, really great music, and a mix of intense action with colorful slice of life moments. And some episodes actually have a really good script and with great direction (episode 14 especially, feels like a great standalone episode). But, almost the entire time it feels like the writers don't really know how quantum physics actually works. Most of what happens never gets explained, or has some non existent jargon attached to ... it with no real explanation. When things do get explained, they don't make sense and don't follow quantum law much if at all. There's also a McGuffin that is constantly used in the show to get characters out of situations that is also never explained, which is never a good thing for a show to have. We're supposed to suspend our disbelief with a majority of this show all the way to the end. The characters are unique, but they are either one note, or never become fully fleshed out. The art style is unique and the direction can be good, but it never seems to become captivating or interesting. The music is straight up good though. Melodies are memorable, epic pieces feel epic, and appropriate music is chosen for every scene. I'm not sure what it is, but it feels like the whole series was built on ideas and feeling rather than something tangible and explainable. Some shows can work like that, but this series constantly feels like it's falling short of being great.

For example, Evangelion is a sci-fi that goes full science fiction. It doesn't have any real world science to back up its internal science, or at least not the important parts of it. But, it also makes a point to focus on the characters and what they are going through instead of just the science. So, even when it doesn't make sense or you have to really suspend your disbelief, we know the purpose of it is for the progression of the characters and their growth or lack there of. Or, as in Dark Souls, the whole world is fleshed out and does make sense with its logic, but the keys are not given to us or spread out in the world, and we are left to figure out. I feel like this style works as well because you can feel the world is fully fleshed out, we just don't know why. I feel like Noein's characters are not strong enough in general to fit Evangelion's method, and the world isn't fleshed out enough to fit Dark Soul's method. This in turn makes the production feel like more of a confusing mess than it should, unfortunately. It's like you're watching a lot of intense visuals but there's no clear reasons why they should mean anything.

Noein is kind of like viewing a multimedia project at a museum where there's art, music, and at the center of it all there's a poem. The art is detailed, and the music is evocative and memorable. But, once you read the poem, the actual purpose of the project, it's just okay. It's a bunch of smart sounding words that feel good when spoken aloud, but the meaning is not nearly as profound as the poem makes it out to be. But the other aspects of the piece were so much better, the focus should have been placed on those aspect, rather than the pretentious poem.

If you are confused by the plot and its internal logic and hope that it gets cleared up by the end of the series, it truly does not. Actually, there were some points that when they started explaining the events that were happening I could not hold back my groaning with how pretentious it all was. It sounded like someone during the brainstorming session wanted to put together the most devastating set of circumstances together they could imagine, but have it all happen without a proper follow through other than "Because that's how it is." It's so edgy and unbelievable it's hard to stomach, at least for me. There is some growth with the characters that you can see, but it feels like Noein was cut short before its finish line. Not that it could have made sense, but it could have ended in a more satisfying way with finality.

I'm sure that, like anything, Noein speaks to someone out there. And I hope it does, because it has everything to possibly be someone's Evangelion. And it looks exactly like that to me too, but I just don't react to it. I'm sitting here watching these experiences happen to these characters without feeling much at all other than "that was a neat idea" or "they put a lot of effort in that shot." It honestly sucks feeling like this. After seeing the DVDs for this anime on so many shelves of anime stores for decades, I kind of understand why they don't stay in people's collections.

I must start off by saying I technically spoil this Doujinshi, but there's so little to these chapters there's not much to spoil. It's essentially a teaser for the anime.

If you are a fan of Yoshitoshi ABe's work, or can't get enough of Haibane Renmei, this is definitely worth reading. However, there's nothing new here that you will not get from the anime from these two chapters. It's essentially a detailed storyboard of the first episode before it became an anime series.

The panels are not always super clear as to how one thing led to the next, but if you've seen the anime, it's easy to ... know what's going on. The art truly is excellent. The characters are emotive, cute, detailed, and are very unique to each other. It could be the version I read, but the brown ink used to draw the pages rather than pure black and white like most manga really gives it a unique feel, and fits Haibane Renmei perfectly.

I can't say much about the story because after Rakka shows up and everyone introduces themselves, a couple slice of life scenes, and Rakka's wings sprout, it's already over. Still, the atmosphere, and art style really are top notch. It's worth reading just for that. 

I would personally start with the anime, and if you can't get enough of Haibane Renmei, this would be a nice revisit. In a way, it's like listening to demo tracks of hit songs by popular bands. It's the same song, but you see the vision, feel the personal touch, can see the imperfections, and see the origin of where it came from to what it would eventually end up being. It's a unique experience, but it's not for everyone.

Drowning in the nonchalant pastel surf
Cobalt, Midnight, Sky, Indigo
Blue, the prominent character in this work
Bring a tank of oxygen, if you want to go

No Alarms, and no surprises
Simplicity reigns with all of its guises
No mystery found, neither does it try
A full color piece of diving daily life

... Too short to stay attached to anything
Except Namaco of cerulean glistening
Cobalt, Midnight, Sky, Indigo
Best viewed through blue blockers, even so...

Transient my stay, much like a breeze
I felt no rush, or hurry to leave
Expect little resolve, but view this as a perk
Blue, the prominent character in this work

A bridge between gaps, told in 4 parts
With little else about the contractor arts
A journey about Yin and Hei splitting up
Marginally better than the season 2 rut

The flow is as smooth as it ever was
The Bones of talent still show here
Words on a page are just not enough
Finality like a drifter in oversteer

... Place blame on the promiscuity
Left in the designs of many elite
Fight after fight shown fruitlessly
Defeating influence of this original treat

More could have been from these shackled remains
A nostalgic memory left its illusory stain
I eat my fill like Hei once did
Of these 4 parts as I reminisce

Best viewed after everything else
Another forgotten series on your shelf
As the last harrah from this his dying dream
Tensai Okamura will continues directing

This is definitely outside of my age range. I also never got into Taiko no Tatsujin, so I am definitely not the target audience for this short. But, I have always admired the character designs from the series, and a claymation short is always a good thing.

It's moderately produced, and quite cute. The claymation does come off amateurish in the beginning with mistakes and some awkward transitions. There's usually no moral to the stories being told, they're just random things that the writers thought of to make 3 minute episodes. It's basically a glorified ad for Taiko no Tatsujin, but does it even do ... that? There's no gameplay, and no Taiko music outside of two generically oriental intros and just three random songs towards the end. It's only redeeming quality is that it's claymation and kind of cute. You're basically giving it an A for effort at that point. The claymation and writing do get noticeably better as the show goes on, but by the time it starts to get interesting, it's already over.

You can actually watch all of these episodes on YouTube with subs officially uploaded by the official Taiko no Tatsujin channel. There's a playlist for it if you type 'taiko no tatsujin clay anime' in the search it should be the first that shows up. I would only recommend this for people who love claymation, or can't get enough of taiko no tatsujin. Otherwise, you're not missing much.

This anime, if anything, is a 12 episode exploration of a teenager's nihilistic emotions on his life and future. The thing Sonny Boy accomplishes is expressing these emotions in an artistic visual landscape that is worth experiencing if you're into unique art or psychedelia. However, this is literally an exploration of a teenager's emotions, which means it is just as deep as that as well. This series will feel pretentious, things happen without reason, unexplained emotions, confusion, sexual dissatisfaction, misplaced anger, and immaturity. It's very much like a growing teenager. 

Unlike many series that take the artsy approach to their storytelling, they want to have their ... viewer explore their world and find meaning in each of it's referential iconography. However, Sonny Boy is not like this. It will often throw us imagery and situations that seem to represent different emotions and situations a teenager may be in. But, all in an abstract, confused, and often jarring way. I believe there truly is nothing deeper to the experience of Sonny Boy other than confusion and apathy throughout most of its run time. If you try and piece together what's happening, you will not get many answers, if any at all. 

The resolution of Sonny Boy may leave you dissatisfied, but considering what it's trying to tackle, has anyone ever been satisfied with their teenage transition into adulthood? It's often not at all what you're imagining it to be, not much different than you just were as a teenager, and possibly lacking. Usually embarrassing, guilt riddled, full of emotional failures, hurt or damaged relationships. Most people think "Things will get better once I'm older." or "I'll figure this out someday when I'm an adult." However, you still have the same questions, and then some, once you're an adult. If you don't face reality and choose to run away from your issues, your future, your questions, your mistakes, you can end up in you're own world that cannot resolve those issues. If you've had any of these feeling before, that's Sonny Boy.

If you watch Sonny Boy as Madhouse's artistic exploration of the above without expecting anything deeper, it will be a wild ride.

This is my second time watching this series. I remember being blown away by its ending and remembering it fondly after first watching it (10 years ago). However, now I feel conflicted with Penguindrum.

The voice cast in general is very good, except for Himari's voice actress (Japanese subs). She is constantly under-delivering her lines, and sounds really monotonous in an uncharacteristic way. Every other character, Shouma, Kanba, Ringo, Yuri, and more are all great for who they play.

By the end, some of the problematic themes make more sense, but the almost incestuous love between many characters in this series comes off as strange on the ... writer's part. Despite what we know in the end, it's the framing that makes me feel weird. Without going into spoilers, even if the idea that you're in love with your underage sister isn't actually being represented in the series as fact, it's still framed and intended to be viewed that way before any kind of reveal. It's just a strange thing to put focus on.

Even though this series is shorter than Utena, it still feels too long. There are a lot of (cleverly) reused scenes and animations. I believe the themes of immaturity and maturity are supposed to be like this, but the contrast between literal child like behavior and imagery with gratuitous sexuality and familial responsibility feels almost like hammering a point over your head or is even garish and tacky at times. Yes, we all know adults can act like children, but most of the time it just feels a bit too childish with its representation. Though, the visuals and presentation are usually extremely creative and well put together (Brain's Base is often excellent). The last 7 or so episodes really over uses flashbacks, to the point that it's distracting. Despite the series feeling like it could have been 18 - 20 episodes, it still feels rushed towards the end. It's strange. Some themes and topics, despite the garishness, are handled beautifully and maturely, especially Yuri's childhood.

Slight spoilers in this next paragraph:

I do want to address the elephant in the room that is this series' use of bomb's on trains. AKA, a not so subtle reference to the Aum Shinrikyo 1995 attacks in Tokyo. The reason why this is an odd choice to me is that throughout the series these events seem like they are integral to the plot. However, almost nothing of substance is done with it. It may be limiting to say that any kind of attack on a train in Tokyo is in reference to this, but the way the attacks were framed, the cultish presence of the parents, even their ideals reeks of Aum Shinrikyo. But, it almost feels like the use of it in Penguindrum is just set dressing for the topic of fate, and children paying for their parent's sins. When you think about it, it feels kind of tacky by the end of the series to use such a blatant reference, especially with the way the ending transpires related to it. There are no overall views presented about cult activities. In fact, it feels like this series almost praises the parent's ideologies. The only thing criticized is the methods they chose to deliver that message. Maybe the intent was to make people feel uncomfortable? There are a lot of topics, scenes, and images that seem like it's full intent is to make you feel uncomfortable, well done or otherwise. Like eavesdropping on a conversation about someone's private life.You know you should keep to yourself, but they're loud enough for you to hear, and it's difficult to ignore. Like trying to look away from a train wreck.

Now that I have finished my rewatch, I don't know what I thought I saw over 10 years ago with thinking the ending was insanely epic. Do not get me wrong, It is a good ending for Penguindrum, but it also doesn't make much sense to me, viewing it now. Maybe my changing views on the world changed my opinion of this series? I do not at all believe in fate or destiny like I used to. Who knows. All I do know is that this series is extremely creative, well animated, well directed, promiscuous, tacky, uncomfortable, and pretentious. If you're at all into what I just said, I highly recommend it. Otherwise, I would look elsewhere for your anime fix. It is, however, and Ikuhara production. It's one of a kind. This series truly could only exist as an anime too. Creativeness, garishness, and epicness and all. Maybe your first time really is more impactful? There seems to be diminishing returns.

I have seen the whole series, including the OVAs and films. I want to say up front, that if you do not like iyashikei, do not like moe, do not like the progression of this series by Hitotose, and do not like the characters, the films and ending of this series will not change your mind. Do not sit through all of the series just to get to the last film, because it really hinges on you already enjoying the series and its characters. I will not spoil anything that happens in this series through this review. All I talk about is what to expect ... from the series and what I found personally disappointing and well done.

My main issue with the moe in this series is it undermines the character growth. So many scenes are just each character doing their moe character trait which makes the characters feel one dimensional, despite the actual character growth there is in the series. The way Maon just whistles when she should be speaking, how Kanae repeats the same words twice (especially in the films), how Fu adds ‘node’ at the end of sentences for no reason, how Chihiro cries in every scene she’s in (Don’t even get me started on the duo that is Suzune and Takumi in the films), how the only trait of Sayori is she sucks at driving. I actually think Kaoru is the only normal character in this series, even though her and Norie literally act like a Japanese comedy duo. Many of the comedy scenes are just these character traits being displayed with little to no jokes or actual comical scenarios over and over again. Honestly, when there's no story progression I feel like I am watching the same scenes being played out in different ways. I'm quite baffled by the writing of the humor in this series. Junichi Sato has done amazing comedy in many series before this one, but it's almost comical in itself how one dimensional the humor is in Tamayura.

Another issue I have with this series is the way it tackles the subject matter of photography. I have seen slice of life series that tackle subjects where you can actually learn something from the subject here and there. I’m not talking about a lecture, but just tips and terminology thrown in to get the audience to understand, learn something, or look something up. Everyone has a smartphone now, not everything needs to be explained within the series. Tamayura does not do this outside of a couple scene transitions where you can tell they were talking about photography, but not to the audience. They even have an episode where a character is brought in and tries to talk about the technicalities and he’s told to be quiet. They do not talk about focus, exposure, lenses, ISO, Composition, aperture, depth of field, rule of thirds, etc. These are just some extremely common things. They don’t even bring up red light rooms once. If the series did not focus so much on using professional cameras, having characters who are supposed to be professionals, and submitting to professional contests, I wouldn’t be mentioning this. But it seems to take photography seriously without even talking about why photography is worthy of being taken seriously. The camera in this series is more of a tool to capture moments and is just a background element to the characters in this series. If I had not seen anime do all of these things (character building, humor, drama, romance) and teach its audience about the actual intricacies of its subject matter, I would not be so critical. However, I have (Honey and Clover, Nodame Cantabile, Big Windup to name a few), and the way photography is tackled in this series just seems amateur at best. It’s like making the focus of a series about bungee jumping, but only ever seeing bungee jumps right after they happen, and skip out on all of the safety and intricacies of it.

The music in this series is quite good, normally. There’s nothing particularly wrong with it. It’s fitting, its focus on mostly solo piano fits the setting and pacing of the show. However, if you have watched the series, you will know what I mean when I say they over play the Tamayura theme. I swear, every episode plays the main theme at least 3 times. If not more. The composer really should have created some more melodies, or changed the key, or made simpler versions, but I was getting sick of hearing this one melody and it’s multiple instrument arrangements half way through More Aggressive. You will be hearing this same exact melody, they don’t even arrange it in a different key. I am not sure why Junichi Sato was okay with this, I have never felt this way about anime he has directed before.

However, I only realize I’m quite harsh on this series while writing this out. It almost feels like I don’t like it. However, I believe I am so harsh because the parts this series gets right are really good. The way it tackles grief and loss through Fu is handled realistically. No one gets over a death in one day. It’s a gradual process that takes time through many small moments of acceptance. This series does a great job at tackling that specific scenario really well. The way people are tip toeing around the loss of her father, how they want to say something but cannot, and how sometimes others also do not feel ready to talk about his loss either. It’s sad, because this part of the series is by far and away more mature than the humor and moe character traits. As I am writing and finishing up the series I realize why I am so torn over it. All of the scripts for this whole series feel like they were written by two different people. One side is the focus on realistically tackling grief and coming to terms with it. The other side is a moe iyashikei with high schoolers that act like they’re in middle school. If you do not like iyashikei and do not like moe, you will NOT like this series. However, anyone who is not bothered by those traits (they are prevalent in this series), and are possibly dealing with a loss in your life, Tamayura will be an excellent series for you to help you through that process. It tackles these subjects very well and with maturity.

The entire series gets a 6/10 from me, not just Hitotose.

Most OVA specials relegated to a Blu-ray purchase are either some kind of fan service episode, hot spring episode, some self indulgent filler, or anything you can imagine that would have no consequence to the overall story. That is not the case for this OVA.

This OVA feels like a (much needed) missing episode to the series. It has all of the iyashikei you would expect from the series, but the subject matter is much more potent and emotive than your typical episode in Hitotose. It's honestly a better ending to Hitotose than the original, in my opinion.

All I know is that if I knew ... I was getting a bonus episode when buying the Blu-ray to this series, I would be very happy with what I got. Actually, maybe a bit upset, because it feels like this should have been a part of the series all along rather than relegated to a Blu-ray disc only a few people bought.

If you liked Tamayura, do not skip out on this one. Unlike most Blu-ray specials, this one really is special.

Blue Seed walked so stories like Inuyasha could run. This series is almost entirely episodic until about episode 19. The manga was only 2 volumes long, and it really shows, because it feels like this entire series stretched out a few threads of story with its episodic nature. Some people may like this narrative choice, but for me, it really dragged the pacing down to almost a crawl.

The tone of the show is half serious, half 90s comedy. If you want to watch this for its nostalgic 90s direction, humor, music, and animation, it definitely has that going for it. Some episodes are much ... more violent and sexual than others, it really feels like a “90s OVA” at times in those respects. It’s odd, because the story and romance almost feels childish in comparison. It does not mesh very well with the gratuity. Almost all fight scenes are anticlimactic. Most fights start and end within a few seconds with not much build up. Despite the episodic nature, this show is best when it is either joking around, or focusing on its romance with Momiji and Kusanagi. Which is cute, but moves along very slowly.

I really find it hard to believe Momiji had no idea about her twin sister and seems to have very little interest in knowing about her as a sibling. It’s obvious everyone misses her and cares about her. I think the story would have been much more impactful if she also missed her with everyone else.

The tone of the show starts extremely seriously which suddenly turns into a light comedy battle series until episode 19 where the tone goes back to being serious. It feels like two different shows put together. When the ton shifts, it feels like we’re getting two different sets of characters. Especially with characters like Kunikida. And not in a Trigun sense where Vash is trying to be positive and hides his true feelings and nature. It just feels like two different writers wrote the characters from about episode 3 – 19.

I personally feel like this series would have done much better if it was 13 episodes. Cut down on the episodic nature, keep the first few episodes and last 7, throw some character building episodes in the middle, and the show would have felt much more cohesive and tightly written. Not that there’s nothing here. If you’re a stickler for 90’s animation and overall aesthetic, this will definitely scratch that itch. It’s a product of it’s time that stretches a simple story with monster (Aragami) of the week pacing.