Trying to find the time to watch the Toradora English Dub. On episode 8 right now. God, it's just so much more enjoyable now that they actually speak like us kids in the US.

Mobile Suit Gundam F91: Imagine you are trying to make full season of Gundam but production issues keep it from being completed, now imagine that instead of dropping it it gets crammed into a 2 hour film.
Yeah, it's not pretty.

At the later stages of the UC conflict breaks out between the Federation and the Crossbone Vanguard, a bunch of civilians are caught in the middle, one of em, Cecily, turns out to be part of the aristocracy governing the Vanguard, while Seabook ends up piloting the Federation's prototype since his mother aided in it's design.
The other civilians? They are pretty much pointless.

And what we get is a movie with terrible pacing, a lot of concepts that aren't explained, and enough cuts to destroy a Mobile Armor.
F91 has interesting ideas, the Crossbone Vanguard is likeable, especially when paired with the dowright stupid Federation of this era, Cecily has the hints of a great character, Iron Mask can be creepy, and Seabook at least gets a somewhat coherent character arc, but other than that it's a convoluted movie, in which you can appreciate the potential but not the result.

The animation is good though, the F91 is a fun to watch mech, expecially when the MEPE kicks in, the characters are well done, and the initial escape segment is really eyecatching.
Likewise the music is enjoyable, Eternal Wind is simply lovely, but as it's been pointed out many times, the music takes a little bit too much "inspiration" from Star Wars.

F91 can be genuinely painful to sit through, and I wouldn't reccomend it, but it has enough good ideas for me to get excited about Crossbone.

So my intersted in Cross Ange just vanished insntatly.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JxbnEvEGV1k

This opening is literally shot per shot the opening for Gundam SEED, just with a majority female cast and some…more than questionable decision making.

I know I shouldn't judge a show based on the opening alone, but just listening from people's reaction to it it sounds like I'm not missing too much.

Well, there's not too much variation you can do for the opening of a mecha anime. Have some characters stand around some action, some weird aymbols. But you are right, about half of it looks like it follows the same structure as Seeds opening.

Another thing, I honestly don't get why Gundam Seed is so popular in Japan. It's shit. The designs are shit, the art is shit, the plots are shit. But it sells like crack.

It's a shame too because the song accociated with it is pretty kick ass, I love Nana Mizuki's songs.

I just….don't really have high hopes for this series, which I'm hearing is baically Valvrave levels of nonsensical and stupid.(For the record, I actually enjoyed Valvrave and had fun with it through it's run)

Eh, I'll still give it a shot but I might just stick with the two Gundam shows and GARO this season.

Same reason why Japan loves Kamen Rider Wizard a lot, their enjoyment is different from others outside of Japan.

That naked people float is as SEED as you can get.
Nothing against SEED mind you.

Still gotta give the first episode a try, just for fairness.

Okay, do you guys remember how Valvrave ran almost exclusively on shock value? And do you guys remember episode 10?
That is more or less episode 1 of Cross Ange.

It's downright mean spirited, predictable, undeniably generic and the last segment made me wonder if I was actually watching a hentai.

No hints of dragons so far btw.

*edit: In other news Disk Wars Deadpool is delightfully over the top.

Well I tried my best to watch Cross Ange, buuuut I just found the series boring and uninspiried.

I sense that heavy handed fanservice is gonna be a running theme in this show, and…it just seems very unessicary IMO.

Was looking forward to Cross Ange because the music, voice cast and whole thing with mechs vs. dragons...I'm done after the first episode.

It feels like Valvrave and that's not a good thing. Ange's confrontation with the mother of the Norma child made her come off as pretty unlikable. That and her instant karma are examples of the extreme cases of prejudice that were super-apparent in Valvrave. The sudden twist in the origin story came out of nowhere and the final scene of the episode felt EXTREMELY unnecessary and like it was only there for shock value.

Could it change over time? Probably, but I wouldn't bet on it. It annoys me when bad anime gets top-notch treatment in the quality department. Always feels like a waste.


And then on the flip-side, the Deadpool episode of Marvel Disk Wars was fantastic. And probably one of the better animated representations of Deadpool we've gotten.