Just got to the Baroque Works arc in One Piece, the episode where Zoro fights everybody. Nice to finally see an episode where he has the chance to shine. One of my favorite episodes so far.

Anime is just as popular as the Kaiju genre, if not more so. As such, here is a list of my top 10 favorite anime series thus far.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFrGN42gtFU

Wrath of the Ninja: The Yotoden Movie - I try to find the original three part OVA series and I could not find anything. So I deiced to watch this movie instead last night. To be honest this anime movie was bad and nothing too special. I found this anime to be boring to watch and the first act of the movie felt like a chore to sit through.

I didn't care for the characters and I didn't think there was any growth with the main character at all whatsoever. Not to mention the story didn't make much sense with the whole three mystical Demon Blades. Everything felt poorly put together and you also have characters that pop out of nowhere. This movie will have ninja characters with powerful attacks pop out of nowhere to fight. The villains in this anime are dimensional stock bad guys. They are boring and flat. I didn't like any of them.

The English dub for this anime is pretty bad. Not so bad it's good like Angel Cop, but just plain bad. It's so hammy that I felt like none of the voice actors at Central Park Media even try to put any effort into this anime. Wayne Grayson is probably the only voice actor in this anime that puts some level of effort into his character. The music score in this anime movie is nothing too special. Some decent tracks, but nothing that I will remember when I look back at this anime.

For the positives that I can say about this anime is that the animation is well done for a 80's anime. Everything is nicely detail and the character designs are pretty good. I do like how monsters in this anime are pretty cool looking too. The animators did a really good job on picking the right choices of darker colors for the dark atmosphere that this movie is going for. All of the action scenes are pretty fun to watch and blood & gore have some nice graphic detail to them.

I guess my opinion on this anime will change if I see the three OVA's because I feel like so much was cut of the story when watching this movie. Overall, Wrath of the Ninja is a average movie at best. The only good thing about this anime is the animation and the decent fight scenes. Do yourself a favor and watch Ninja Scroll (The movie, not the TV series) instead. Grade: D

Episode 4 of Daimidaler: Prince vs Penguin Empire.

I started watching this series with friends about a year ago and thought it was hilarious and stupid. We didn't get very far though, so when I saw that a dubbed version was released I started it back up again. I'm actually thoroughly enjoying it. There's tons of fanservice, but it all has something to do with the plot. The comedy is all pretty hilarious, and the action is good. The plot is fun and doesn't take itself too seriously. I actually really like this show.

Episode 3 of Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney.

There was so much tension in this, that is there was a lot of tension in this until the villain started speaking:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0GQ0cKufTDU
I legit could not stop laughing.

Just finished Daimidaler. I really, really enjoyed that. The mech action was great, the comedic elements were hilarious, the parodies of mecha tropes were also great, and the fanservice never really felt that out of place (though it bordered on excessive). If you're in the mood for a 70s and 80s inspired super robot show with tons of comedy, parody, and ecchi elements, then check it out.

I finished Mirai Nikki. Pretty abysmal show. The last few episodes had the potential to be interesting, but they were kind of banking on me caring at all about the protagonists, which hahahahahahahahahahahahaha. Lol. Just lol. The characters were just total ass.

But anyway. "Glad" that's over with, I guess? I just can't find it in me to care either way. But at least I won't have to suffer through it anymore, so yeah. Glad that's over.

I also started watching Arakawa Under the Bridge a bit ago. It's fun enough. I can definitely see where the humor in Saint Onii-san comes from. And it's got that good Shaft weirdness. It's alright.

I'm gonna be starting Cowboy Bebop at long last soon. Darn series has been in my to-watch list for some 3 years now. About damn time. I think at this point it's just that, NGE and Xros Wars that I haven't gotten to from my original list from 2013. I sure wasn't in any rush, I friggin guess.

edit: oh yeah, some more spring shows. Sakamoto is good. Kiznaiver is good. Flying Witch is fun. Everything except Mayoiga so far seems decent at worst.

But damn, Mayoiga. It just isn't doing anything for me. And here I was hoping I could go one season without a bad series.

Just watched Cyborg 009 vs Devilman dubbed on Netflix...

Please tell me this has a dvd/bluray release.

Watch it now. NGE is my favorite anime of all time and I don't see it ever losing that spot. I can't praise that series highly enough.

Anyways, started My Hero Academia. Got two episodes in before I couldn't load any more episodes. There's only 3 currently, right? That means it's a 13 episode series...I feel like there should be more. Anyways, it's pretty cool so far. I guess I don't really have much else to say.

Been reading the manga for My Hero Academia and it's pretty good. I do plan to watch the anime when it's finish.

I'll get to it. The order in which I watch things is determined by a carefully and unnecessary constructed set of rules, and NGE just isn't in the cards for a little while. Running some simplistic calculations it's not up until some 230 episodes of some assorted series from now. But I want to get through my entire plan to watch list by the end of the year, so hopefully it doesn't take very long.

With NGE, just skip the last two episodes and watch End of Eva. The TV ending will make you angry.

Watch the TV ending, but watch EoE as well. The TV ending is notorious and even if it's not fulfilling, it's something that needs to be experienced. At least so you can know what people are referring to.

This. The TV ending is an experience. To disregard it is to disregard all the (for better or for worse) philosophy and experimenting Evangelion was doing. And if you're going to disregard all that, you shouldn't really be watching it in the first place.

One of my coworkers was nice enough to give me some of his anime DVD sets, including the first 2 seasons of Soul Eater and Fullmetal Alchemist!

Because I hate myself, I added all of the DBZ, One Piece, Naruto, Bleach, and more specials and movies of series I've watched to my watch later list on MAL. As if it wasn't already becoming out of hand and hard to read haha. But I did actually get started on it with the first OP movie and a few DBZ ones.

Watched the last Code Geass Akito movie the other week. I do wonder what watching them all back-to-back would have been liked, but in general I'll be remembering them as just not very good at all.

Started Hunter x Hunter. Watching it dubbed on Toonami so will clearly be taking my time. Don't feel the urge to binge it yet.

Thinking of picking up a few of the shows from this season. Re:Zero and Kiznaiver being at the top of that short list. Not too far in so wouldn't take me long to get caught up.

I hope it gets a blu-ray release. I still hope for Cyborg 009 and Devilman crossovers. I would love to see a OVA of Cyborg 009 vs. Android Kikaider.

If anyone is looking for a new anime to watch I highly suggest Kabaneri of the Iron Fortress. It's like Steampunk Vs Zombies and has kind of an Attack on Titan feel to it. 2 Episodes have aired so far.

Phoenix Wright ace attorney episode 4.

I'm gonna miss Redd White, his bad english was truly a blessing.

There's gonna be a new WIXOSS anime this fall.

Hell friggin yessssssssss. I thought Destructed would be it and I was fine with that, but I'm down for more sad card people any day of the friggin week. Bring on the WIXOSS.

In other news I watched the first episode of Cowboy Bebop the other day, it was pretty good. I think I'm gonna have fun with that one.

So I started reading the One Punch Man webcomic the other day. I thought it was pretty funny but stopped because I couldn't help but think the manga would be better. I started the manga and while I appreciated the better art, it kind of lost the goofy charm of the webcomic. I decided to read the webcomic and then watch the anime after. Unfortunately, I can't find chapters 4-27 of the webcomic anywhere, so I just started the anime anyways. Definitely dug the first episode.

I really like One Punch Man as well. But I coun't help to enjoy other superhero series like Tiger & Bunny better. I really like the characters and writing in Tiger & Bunny better than One Punch Man.

I like One Punch Man because it's a parody series. It takes a lot of standard Sentai tropes and turns them around. For example, when Saitama got stuck in the ground and Genos had to fight the armored gorilla, you think "oh crap" because in One Piece, DBZ, etc. Luffy, Goku, etc become incapacitated and everybody else has to fend for themselves until they show up. Nope, he just climbs out of the ground like nothing happened. I love it.

That being said, I also started My Hero Academia, which is also pretty good but sticks closer to the standard Shonen tropes, and Tiger & Bunny is on my list.

What are some other superhero anime? The three I mentioned above, Samurai Flamenco...what else?

Gatchaman Crowds! You'll never see a superhero series with less superheroing, but it's pretty good.

Especially the second season!

For superhero anime, I suggest these:

8 Man (The first cyborg theme superhero in anime and manga. If the original 1960's TV series is too dated for you, check out 8 Man After which is a OVA series from the 1990's)

Android Kikaider (I found the anime adaption to be pretty underrated. I think it's worth watching even if you never seen the live action show)

Casshern (There is three anime versions of this character. One from the 1970's, 1990's and recently from several years ago. It can go either way on what version you want to watch)

Concrete Revolutio (A pretty recent anime series and it's a lot of fun too)

Devilman (A very dark and violent series. If you want something dark and violent, watch the OVA's and read the manga. The 1970's series is much more tamer and feels pretty similar to Ultraman at times)

Guyver: The Bioboosted Armor (A bit different than your normal superhero anime and manga, but it's still good. The series seem to be inspired by some themes from Kamen Rider)

Skull Man (Based on a manga from Shotaro Ishinomori and would later inspire Kamen Rider)

Tekkaman Blade or the original Tekkaman: The Space Knight

Zetman (Another more darker theme superhero series)

I thought Skullman was dreadful.

Tekkaman Blade, on the other hand, rocked.

There's a Skullman anime? I've been wanting to read the manga, but only because of its significance to Kamen Rider. Plus, I like old school manga.

Speaking of manga...can we talk about manga in this thread too, or is there a separate topic for it?

Just for relevancy, I just started episode 77 of One Piece.

I wouldn't say that. It may have faded into obscurity now because no one's licensing it and it was made by a pretty no-name studio, but in general it's held in pretty high regard.

The original anime anyway, the 01 OVAs not so much.

Yes in 2007. It was made by Studio Bones, the same animation company that work on Fullmetal Alchemist, Space Dandy and Eureka Seven. From what I can remember, the 2007 anime series is based on the remake manga and not the 1970's manga.

Still, I need to watch that.

Anyways, watching One Punch Man episode 4. Mumen Rider is pretty clearly a Kamen Rider parody, but I doubt many people in America realize that...

Caught up with 3 shows from this season - Kabenari of the Iron Fortress, Re:Zero, and just now Kiznaiver. Been quite a while since I was watching so many.

Venus Wars - Venus Wars was one of the first anime titles I ever watched, and my memory of it is almost non-existant, other than the motorcycle scenes. I was like at least five years old when I first saw this anime on the Sci-Fi channel as a kid. So 20 years later, I saw the movie again and I really like it.

It was pretty solid. Great action, good drama. The movie is not on the same level as Ghost in the Shell or Akira, but I feel like it's almost close. The animation is fantastic. The whole film was very nicely detail and beautiful. The everything felt so fluent that made all the action scenes look and feel fantastic. The atmosphere was fantastic too. Yoshikazu Yasuhiko, who work on the Gundam series did the character designs in the film and directed the film. He really did a fantastic job on creating a big sci-fi film with gritty, suspenseful epic action sequences.

The story was pretty good too and I did enjoy our main character in the film. I like how he went from an unlikable asshole to someone who end up caring over other characters in the movie. The other characters may not be the best written characters, but I still found them enjoyable and I did care about them in the movie. For a plot that is pretty simple, it was really well done. The movie still had a solid story from start to finish.

Venus Wars is a solid underrated anime film. Discotek also give this movie a fantastic Blu-Ray release here in the US. It's a very good movie from start to finish. I recommended this movie to old school anime fans or sci-fi anime fans. I feel like watching it again for the second time. Grade: B+

I bought the first book of Tokyo Ghoul about two weeks ago and finally was able to sit down and read it. Overall, I enjoyed it, but it's something that I think would work a lot better in anime form. However...I've heard the anime is pretty bad. Like, everything in vol 1 is covered before the second episode ends. I can't even imagine that. Should I bother with the anime?

Season 1 is all manga material while Season 2 is a filler arc. However, from what I have been told, they have made it so Season 2 doesn't ruin anything from the manga so they can just loop right back into the next manga arc with Season 3.

Oh, and I believe Season 1 covers the first 6 or 7 volumes, which is how a series should be adapted.

From what I've heard though, they cut out a lot of the character development and just jumped straight into the action, completely changing the feel of it and making the plot confusing.

just want to remind people if any thing manga we have thread for manga only stuff.

Who said that?

Well it was me debating whether or not to watch the anime, so I figured it'd fit in here.

Most reviews I've read of the series/a couple of people I've talked to that have both read and watched the series.

Anyways, just watched a couple of episodes of RahXephon. 20 and 21 I think. This show is so freaking confusing, and it doesn't help that I haven't watched it in a couple of months.

Watching Gurren Lagann & Blue Exorcist. Both at Episode 11. Enjoying Blue Exorcist more but Gurren Lagann's still a nice little niche anime.

Really hoping I can finish Tiger & Bunny. Currently at Episode 18. Loving the entire series. God I wish there was more to it. Also wanna start Digimon Adventure Tri soon. Probably after I'm done with one of these 3.