I've found the time to sample a few series over this last week or so.
Normally I would aim to watch 3 episodes as a sample, but I'm so far behind that I only watched 2 episodes of these to help me make some inroads. Not that I've watched a lot of stuff, just that I've been having a go.
Seitokai no Ichizon
I wasn't really sure what to make of this. It seemed... I dunno - insubstantial?
The basic idea seems to be sort of a bit like Haruhi. In Haruhi, you've got quite a clever idea whereby Haruhi is interested in aliens and time travel and anime tropes like that, and she's surrounded by characters who are those things, yet she never realises.
In Seitokai no Ichizon I think it's supposed to be playing with the idea of Harem and Moe tropes, but to be frank, it just doesn't work as well. It kept falling into its own clichés and while I think this was deliberate, it's just not as well done as Haruhi. Plus it doesn't really help itself by skimming on the edge of being a "whacky" comedy and so not being very funny.
I guess it's the sort of show I could watch if there weren't a million other (better) things and I wouldn't really remember it after it was over.
Hanasakeru Seishounen
This is essentially what I believe is called a reverse harem show, which essentially means that instead of a male protagonist surrounded by gorgeous women, there's a female protagonist surrounded by gorgeous men.
As far as that sort of thing goes, this seemed like a perfectly okay show, but to be frank, it's not really my cup of tea. I mean, although the focus is on romance, rather than boobs as it would be in a harem show, they're not generally a particularly realistic genre. Not that normal harem is, but at least there it's feeding me fantasies that I can appreciate.
Sasameki Koto
Sasameki Koto seemed quite good. It's one you need to be in the right frame of mind for, though, I think.
The story is one of unrequited love, I guess you would say. The main character is clearly in love with her best friend and her best fried is an 'out' lesbian, but the problem is her friend likes cute girls and she's not very cute. Weirdly, the main character actually fits more into the mould of those strong women you get in girls animes that all the other girls fall in love with. She's very tall and athletic and clever.
The reason it's one you need to be in the right move for is because it's very melancholic. The friend keeps falling for all sorts of other girls and the main character never tells her how she really feels - that sort of stuff. So it's sad, but well done.
Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood
I guess this show highlights just how far behind I am with watching anime - Brotherhood started airing in April of 2009, so in a few weeks it'll be a year old and I'm only now sampling it.
I'm also pretty new to FMA full stop. I've never seen any of the previous version of the anime and although I've bought all the manga, I've only read the 1st volume, with the other 20-odd sat in a big pile awaiting my attention.
I believe Brotherhood is a re-telling of the original anime that's closer to the manga, but as I say, I've not seen that, so I can't really comment. What I would say is I really enjoyed these first few episodes I sampled and I can definitely see why it is/was so popular.
One thing I have been doing is continuing to read manga. I find it a lot easier to keep manga reading going, as I can easily stop half way through chapters, or only read for 10 minutes. And I can read it at breakfast and lunch, of course. I can't really do that with anime - episodes don't work well if you only watch a bit of them and I have to sit and watch them on telly.
Also, I tend to always feel I need to watch a full disks worth when I watch it, which is part of the problem. Doing that means it's going to be an hour and a half of my time (4 episodes on a disk, on average) and when I start thinking like that I start thinking stuff like "I don't have the time, I'll do X instead".
Anyway, one of the manga was a new series:
Sunshine (Hidamari) Sketch
I picked up Sunshine Sketch because I enjoyed the anime adaptation. It turns out the manga is one of those 4 vertical panel jobs. Really I should have guessed from the anime, which is staged like a series of short vignettes, which is a common approach when adapting these types of manga.
The manga is pretty good. It's very Japanese, though. There's one of those translators notes sections at the back and it's written in tiny font with loads of stuff crammed in. I also get the feeling they've deliberately tried to keep it to one page and there's plenty of stuff that could also be explained.
However, unlike with something like Sayonara Zetsubo Sensei, this doesn't really matter. There's the odd strip that you need the notes to understand, but overall you should be okay, especially if you have some general knowledge about Japan from other anime and manga.
Otherwise it's pretty good. It's quite light in tone and is a slice of life type show. The main character Yuno is attending an Arts based high school and once she's there it actually becomes something of an ensemble piece, focusing on all the girls who live at the Hidamari Apartments with Yuno.
The big box I need to tick this weekend is getting my hair cut. With the weather and holiday I've not had it done in ages, so it looks bloody awful.
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