Yumekui Merry (夢喰いメリー) First Impressions

Just happened to check my post count for my blog since I started blogging 3 years ago and hit a pretty incredible milestone of 300th posts on my last post: Dragon Crisis First Impressions ^^. Not too shabby for myself and I manage to post for that many. Yumekui Merry (夢喰いメリー) is literally translated as Dream Eater Merry and it is based on a fantasy action manga with the same title. The manga is illustrated by Ushiki Yoshitaka and is serialized in Hobunsha‘s seinen manga magazine Manga Time Kirara Forward.

Synopsis

Our main protagonist in this series is Yumeji Fujiwara, your not-so-ordinary high school student and it’ s probably the nth time I started my first impression summary with a similar sentence ^^;;. Unlike others, Yumeji has gained a power to see the aura of other people’s dream and is able to predict what kind of dream they will have the next night due to an incident 10 years ago. Because of the incident, he had started to have weird reams with cats following him for unknown reasons.

One day, on his way back from errands, a mysterious girl falls on top of him and the girl’s name is Merry Nightmare. As her name suggests, she is a dream demon who has been searching for a way to come back in her world. Soon after, Yumeji decides to help her finding a way back to her world of dreams.

Episode Summary

First episode starts with a scene with Merry Nightmare, our heroine in this series, sleeping on a dumpster and she gets waked up by sound of clock tower hitting twelve noon. Meanwhile, our main protagonist, Yumeji, finds himself being chased and attacked by many cats (and no, cats are not always cute ^^;; ). Unfortunately, he gets captured soon after, however, his dream time is up and Yumeji wakes up from his sleep. He has been having the same dream every night.

Next morning, Yumeji goes to school with his childhood friends, Isana Tachibana who is always taking care of Yumeji. It’s pretty obvious that Isana has a huge crush on Yumeji and it could not be helped that she is being teased by her two classmates, Akiyanagi Takeru and Saki Kirishima. At school, Yumeji is well-known as a dream teller and can predict others’ dream as he demonstrates it on his classmate, Saki.

On his way back from school, suddenly, a girl named Merry Nightmare drops on top of him and looking for a way to get back to her world. Yumeji suddenly picks up her hat which was left behind and suddenly he get sucked into the same dream as before, however, this time, he meets with the leader of the cats named , Chaser, John Doe who needs a body/vessel to go outside the dream world. Thus, he is going to use Yumeji’s body as a vessel and go out side by killing him.

As Yumeji being chased down and cornered, Merry appears before him in order to save him or so he thinks. Merry thought that Chaser might know how she can go back to her world, however, her interest is conflicted with Chaser because he wants to get out of the dream world. Soon after, both of them exchanges hand-to-hand blow between each other and it was an easy win by Merry. After Chaser is defeated, Yumeji’s dream is over and he’s asked by Merry to summon Chaser again so she can find a way to back to her world then she passes out due to exhaustion.

Thoughts

The idea behind a dream eater is pretty intuitive and out of the ordinary compare to most anime these days. Yumekui Merry gives more than just your cookie-cutter anime that you usually find. Throughout the first , second and third episode, there’s only one ecchi scene which is on the first episode . At this point, it’s already a good sign that Yumekui Merrry will keep my interest for a while. For those who only watched the first episode may find that the pace of story little bit slow but rest assured that episode two and three, it will pick up.

Animation wise, J.C. Staff lives up to my expectation thus I have nothing to complain about. Beautiful fighting scenes and background especially during the dream mode are done well. Love Merry’s somersault kick on Chaser.

Our main protagonist, Merry Nightmare, has a peculiar personality. She tries to distant herself from others and does not want to get others involved in her problem even though later on, she agrees to have Yumeji helping her since he has his own agenda and Merry does need his ability to help her find a way home. I do hope that Yumeji is not just another useless main protagonist like Ryuji in Dragon Crisis!.

In summary, I think Yumekui Merry is worth watching because three main points below:

1. J.C. Staff – animation quality should be at least decent and consistent.
2. Short series of 12 episodes – good amount of episodes and expect no filler episodes.
3. Last but not least, not so mainstream story line.

Additional tidbits

Opening theme	Daydream Syndrome by Marina Fujiwara
Ending theme	Yume to Kibou to Ashita no Atashi (ユメとキボーとアシタのアタシ) by Ayane Sakura
Official website	cafe_sto (cafe_sto) on Twitter TBSアニメーション・夢喰いメリー 公式ホームページ 「夢喰いメリー」公式ファンサイト
Animation Production	J.C. Staff
Notable Seiyuus	Nobuhiko Okamoto (Eiji Nizuma in Bakuman, Leicester in Shukufuku no Campanella, Luke in The Sacred Blacksmith, Makoto Kashino in Yumeiro Patissiere) as YumejiFujiwaraKana Ueda (Rin Tohsaka in Fate/Stay Night series, Hayate Yagami in Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha A’s and StrikerS, Saki in Saki) as Chizuru KawakamiAya Endo (Filicia in So-Ra-No-Wo-To, Orsola in Toaru Majutsu no Index II, Sheryl Nome in Macross Frontier) as Engi Three-Piece
Director	Shigeyasu Yamauchi (Casshern Sins, Crying Freeman OAV, Digimon, Xenosaga: The Animation)
Character Design	Masahiro Fujii (Zero no Tsukaima, Mahoraba, Hayate the Combat Butler)
Episodes	12

Rating: 7.5/10

Source: ANN, Wiki

Yumekui Merry PV

Opening

Ending

Browse through more screen shots below

http://www.flickr.com/apps/slideshow/show.swf?v=71649

Dragon Crisis! (ドラゴンクライシス!) First Impressions

Feeling nostalgic about Shakugan no Shana and feels like watching the series ? Look no further Dragon Crisis! is here in this winter 2011 anime season. It is originally a light novel by Kizaki Kaya and illustrated by Akata Itsuki.

Summary

As many anime out there, story revolves around a normal high school boy named Ryuji Kisaragi who has a peaceful life before being forced to an adventure as a relic hunter by his second cousin Eriko. Ryuji’s adventure starts one day when he’s in a class and Eriko barges into his class and grab him with her. She has a leave of absence notice ready and gives it to his homeroom teacher.

Eriko, a relic hunter, creates an organization that recovers Lost Preciouses, the treasures of the world. She tricks Ryuji into become its first member. Like any other organization related to Lost Precioses, it needs to be approved by the Society of International Treasure Recovery and Eriko has been waiting for approval for a while. Since she feels like being ignored, she decides to recover an S Class Lost precious to prove her capability.

Together, they drive to a seaport where according to Eriko, Fang is going to make a trade so Eriko plans to steal it from them at night. While they are talking, four black cars from Fang passes by and without any hesitation, Eriko casts a swarm of butterflies to render them unconscious meanwhile Ryuji grabs the case containing S Class Lost Precious.

Eriko and Ryuji are being chased by Fang members and rained down with bullets. One of the bullets accidentally opens the case and a yellow haired girl comes out from the case and says Ryuji’s name. Out of nowhere, she unleashes a wall of flame and eliminates the pursuers. After releasing such a powerful flame, the yellow-haired girl fell unconscious on Ryuji’s arm. They bring her home and are confused what to do with her since they have no idea who she is, although, for some reasons, she’s taken quite liking at Ryuji and she seems to know Ryuji. The yellow-haired girl turns out to be a dragon since her left hand has a red mark on it.

Ryuji goes shopping for dinner and buy some clothes for yellow-haired girl. As he is about to enter his apartment, he’s stopped by his classmate, Misaki Eto, who is kind enough to bring his bag left at school. Rather than being kind, she has a huge crush on Ryuji and he is totally not aware about it. After dinner, Ryuji decides to name her, Rose, because the mark on her left hand looks like a rose.

Thoughts

One thing came to my mind when I heard Rose’s voice for the first time, I was like ‘OMG, her voice is just like Shana’s in Shakugan no Shana’. I do realize that Rose and Shana are voiced by the same seiyu whom is well-known among us, Rie Kugimiya. In general, I always had a hard time knowing whose the seiyuu for a particular character because even though they might had been voiced by the same seiyuu, his/her voice comes out differently so in a way, it gives a character a uniqueness on his/her own. It’s a shame that Rose reminds us too much and wish that Rie Kugimiya voices Rose differently instead of using her Shana’s voice.

It’s been a while since I heard Ho-chan singing (unlike zenical from zotaku.com ^^) but expected no less than great for the OP since I really like it a lot. On the other hand, ED is sung by Momoiro Clover whose voice should be familiar to anyone who watched Yosuga no Sora last Fall season anime. It’s just another one of those cute songs.

Characters wise, I found that Rose is cute and adorable in the beginning but after hearing her saying Ryuji all the time, I found her super annoying and wish I can tell her shut the hell up. It baffles me how Ryuji can keep his sanity dealing with her and hearing her calling his name all the time, thus, she definitely stands out in my eye and hope she will be less annoying in next episodes. As for our main protagonist, Ryuji, he is your typical loser kind and felt like he has not fulfilled his roles as the main protagonist. Yes, I do realize that it’s only the first episode but I expect that protagonist and heroine stand out.

Looking at the animation, I have no complaints since it’s done really well except Eriko’s body proportion. I am not sure if it’s just me but it looks like her breast is in the middle of her body. It might have been the way she wears her tank top but unless someone pays close attention to, her breast is little bit too low ^^;;. Another important to note, animation quality tends to drop after first couple episodes so we will see if they can keep up with the first episode’s quality.

Dragon Crisis!’s story is really appealing to me since I have never watched any series with dragon related theme before. I would give 2-3 episodes a try before deciding to continue to watch this series or not but based on first episode, I believe the story is quite promising.

Additional tidbits

Opening theme	Immoralist (インモラリスト?) by Yui Horie
Ending theme	Mirai Bowl (ミライボウル?) by Momoiro Clover
Official website	『ドラゴンクライシス！』 ＴＶアニメ化決定!!｜スーパーダッシュ文庫 (Japanese) ドラゴンクライシス！ (Japanese)
Animation Production	Studio DEEN
Notable Seiyuus	Hiro Shimono(Akihisa in Baka to Test to Shokanju, Ayato in Rahxephon, Keima in The World God only knows) as Ryūji KisaragiRie Kugimiya (Louise in Zero no Tsukaima, Shana in Shakugan no Shana series, Nagi in Hayate the combat butler) as Rose Yui Horie (Naru in Love Hina!, Ayu in Kanon, Yuki in Vampire Knight) as Maruga Yukana (Ai Nanasaki in Amagami SS, Testarossa in Full Metal Panic series, Cecilla Alcott in Infinite Stratos) as Eriko Nanao
Director	Hideki Tachibana (H2O)
Original Character Design	Masashi Ishihama (ROD, Speed Grapher, Welcome to the NHK)
Episodes	12

Rating: 6.5/10

Source: ANN, Wiki

Dragon Crisis! PV

Opening

Ending

Browse through more screenshots below

http://www.flickr.com/apps/slideshow/show.swf?v=71649

Gosick (ゴシック) First Impressions

Gosick is based on a light novel series Kazuki Sakuraba with same title. It was published by Fujimi Shobo which specializes in light novels, manga, role playing games and collectible card games. Gosick is set in 1924 in a fictional European country of Saubure.

Summary

Story revolves around Kazuya Kujo, the 3rd son of Japanese imperial soldier, who just transfers to St. Marguerite Academy. It’s known for its urban legends and horror stories among students. There he meets a mysterious yet beautiful and brilliant girl named Victorique who always skips classes. She spends her days by reading the entire content of the library or helping her brother, Grevil de Blois, who is a local detective by solving mysteries.

Being a transfer student, Kujo has a hard time blending with his classmates and not to mention that he’s nicknamed as Dark Reaper. Cecile, his homeroom teacher, tells him that there are many ghost or horror stories related to this particular school. One of them is a story about Spring Reaper. Curious about those stories, Kujo goes to school library to find out more about horror stories.

Accidentally, he finds a garden on top of the school library where he also meets a beautiful and mysterious girl named Victorique who dresses in gothic lolita style. Apparently, she is one of Kujo’s classmate but she never attends any classes.

Out of nowhere, a man with a weird hairstyle appears before Kujo mumbling random nonsense. The man with a weird hair style called himself , Grevil. He is a self-claim detective who works with local police to solve criminal cases. More often than not, he asks Victorique for help in solving those criminal cases. This time, Grevil comes with the same intention and asks Victorique for help. Victorique does not spend much time on this case and she already knows who the culprit is.

Next morning, Kujo reads the news about Grevil being awarded a nice yacht and a kiss from a granddaughter of killed peramal. Not accepting the fact that Grevil takes all the credit, he rushes to police station and requests some explanations about what happens. Gervil is worried that people might find out that he gets helped from Victorique, he quickly closes Kujo’s mouth and brings him to his office. In order to keep Kujo silenced, Kujo is promised a ride in his new yacht. Hearing this news, Victorique is really excited and starts packing already even though it’s not until that weekend.

At the day of the trip, Kujo is speechless when looking at amount luggage she has. Feeling unhappy and unreasonable, Kujo goes through all Victorique’s luggage and starts sorting through all her items. At port, Grevil already waits for their arrival and as they are about to sail away, a police officer runs toward Grevil in a hurry and says that the suspect for the murder case that he solved yesterday has escaped. Kujo was told to wait in the yacht until Grevil is back meanwhile Victoriqu already goes inside the yacht and found an invitation letter addressed to Roxanne, the fortune teller that got killed by her maid.

Victorique and Kujo decide to board a ship using Roxanne’s invitation letter to unveil new clues to the case.

Thoughts

Victorique and Kujo remind me of Sherlock Holmes and Watson from a classic detective story. It’s most likely because the pipe that Victorique uses in some scenes imitating Sherlock Holmes. Even though, Kujo is introduced first as main protagonist, I feel that Victorique, our heroine, will be the one that carries the whole episode. Her appearance no doubt stands out and she is the only one who wears gothic dress among her classmates. Despite of being in high school, occasionally I couldn’t help but think that Victorique is just a little girl due the way she behaves, for example, rolling on the floor back and forth while waiting for Kujo to come.

OP and ED are pretty good in term of tunes and animation. I like the ED more than due to gloomy/dark theme but OP has a better animation and I particularly like how most scenes are drawn in water colour style; nice additional touch by BONES.

Story wise, the first episode is quite well done and it is enough to cause me looking forward to the next episode with a nice follow-up for next episode. In addition, I couldn’t help but wonder why Victorique is prisonned in garden above library, why the school is filled with so many ghost / horror stories. It’s not my usual genre of anime but the first episode intriques me enough to watch few more episodes

Additional tidbits

Opening theme	“Destine Histoire” by risa
Ending theme	“Resuscitated Hope” by Lisa Komine
Official website	GOSICK―ゴシック― テレビ東京・あにてれ ＧＯＳＩＣＫ－ゴシック－
Animation Production	BONES
Notable Seiyuus	Aoi Yūki (Mina Tepes in Dance in the Vampire Bund, Ichigo Amano in Yumeiro Pâtissière, Toshiko Tatsuno in Soredemo Machi wa Mawatteiru) as Victorique de Blois Hidenobu Kiuchi (Hei in Darker than Black, Kenzou Tenma in Monster) as Grevil de Blois Miyuki Sawashiro (Mint in Galaxy Angel, Shinku in Rozen Maiden series, Saeko Busujima in High School of The Dead) as Cordelia Gallo
Episodes	24

Rating: 7/10

Source: ANN, Wiki

[poll id=”51″]

Trailer

Opening – “Destine Histoire” by risa

Ending – “Resuscitated Hope” by Lisa Komine

http://www.flickr.com/apps/slideshow/show.swf?v=71649

Rio – Rainbow Gate! (リオ レインボーゲート！) First Impressions

Summary

Rio, main protagonist, works as a dealer at Howard Resort casino. Unlike any other dealers that work there, she is known as Goddess of Victory by everyone at Howard Resort. This nickname was bestowed upon here since her existence always brings a great amount of luck and reduce tension to anyone who visits Howard Resort casino or any other casinos. You can say that she has some kind of aura of her own. She is so well-known such that even a Hollywood actress, Rosa Canyon, can’t even match Rio’s popularity.

Owner of Howard resort casino, Howard, got a visit from an old friend of him, Mr. Clark, who has a grand daughter named Mint Clark. She always carries around her teddy bear named Choco. Since her grandfather loves casino so much, she does not have much being dragged into Howard resort casino. Wandering around in the casino, she gets bored to death until she hears about Goddess of Victory. Curiosity gets the best of her and she follows around Rio trying to meet this mysterious Goddess of Victory.

Oppai #1

Later on, Howard officially introduces Mint to Rio and ask Rio to take care of Mint during her stay at Howard resort. On their way to Mint’s room, they get attacked by a group of people whose their target is Mint. Well, it’s not exactly Mint but rather the teddy bear that she carries all the time.

Panty Shot #1

As if it’s a fate, Mint and Rio meet again the attacker from last night. He introduces himself as Orlin Dunhill and challenge Mint to a duel for her teddy bear. Since Mint is in trouble, Rosa suggests that Rio should replace Mint in this duel. If Rio wins, Orlin has to tell them why he is after Mint’s teddy bear and leave this island. On the other hand, if Orlin wins, Rio needs to take her clothes off. Howard, the owner, does not miss this chance and he gets his film crew ready in case Rio looses and it will be used for some sexy commercial.

More oppai. Yoko-pai to be exact

Weaing a wedding gown, Rio duels Orlin in a closed poker where each player will get five cards and will have a chance to trade cards. Orlin, known as a Queen Killer, trades all his four other cards and keeps his queen heart because he believes that he will get the other three queen. Unfortunately, his luck is not that great against Rio and Rio won with a pair of two

Thoughts

Title certainly did not give me much detail and it’s going to be just another mahou shoujo type or so I thought. The idea behind it is unique and extra-ordinary and not to mentioned that it’s been a while since I watched a similar genre anime. Saki first comes to mind.

Unfortunately, it lacks of appeal that makes me wanting the second episode. The main character, Rio, is known as Goddess of Victory in casino where she works but there is something about her that’s missing from being a main protagonist. Usually, the main protagonist stands out in term appearance and his/her behaviour. Her battle of poker with the Queen Killer was not interesting enough for me and was dragging myself to watch the rest of episode.

Ending song are just plain boring. It’s your standard happy, fast beat song -_-;;. The first episode does not have an opening song so I cannot speak for its quality.

Animation is done by Xebec. Their work is mediocre and nothing amazing of some sort. Background art of casino and resort are pretty well-done but I feel like it’s trying to hide how bad the animation is in particular character animation (or maybe just my eyes were deceiving me ^^;)

Lastly, my pet peeves about recent anime is fan service. It seems that Rio’s oppai, breast, mune or whatever you call it and her oshiri, butt, bottom are the center of attention in this anime. It has some panty shot here and there but it’s not overly done in anyways.

I doubt that I will be watching episode 2 and so on and even if I do, it’s due to sheer of boredom on my part ^^.

Additional tidbits

Opening theme	“Sekai to Issho ni Mawarou yo! (世界と一緒にまわろうよ！)” by Love Roulettes
Ending theme	“Miracle☆Chance (みらくる☆ちゃんす)” by ULTRA-PRISM
Official website	アニメ「Rio RainbowGate!」公式サイト
Animation Production	Xebec
Notable Seiyuus	Marina Inoue (Yoko in Gurren Lagann, Rei in Highschool of The Dead, Natsuru in Kampfer!, Alicia in Valkyria Chronicles) as Rio Rollins Ayana Taketatsu (Azusa in K-ON, Kirino in Oreimo, Mio in MM!) as Mint Clark Chihara Minori (Yuki in Suzumiya Haruhi, Nanaka in DC II, Aya in Tenjho Tenge) as Dana
Director	Takao KATO (Busou Renkin, Over Drive, Rockman EXE, Pandora Hearts, To-Love Ru, Zoids)
Episodes	12

Rating: 4/10

Source: ANN

[poll id=”50″]

Trailer

Does anyone have this series in their watch list this winter 2011 season ?

http://www.flickr.com/apps/slideshow/show.swf?v=71649