time to come and post dumb shit: apparently some people really like the F originals:




also Akira Kamiya.
also also, Lenonjayce is the best name ever.

edit:

Neat

I'll be maining Yomiko Readman.

I wonder if they're popular in Japan because there's no real rhyme or reason to the selection.

I mean oh my god, Orphen? Who even remembers that show. Jaysus.

Well, it's got ROD, Slayers and Darker Than Black. That shall suffice for me. Even if it is the crappy TV series for the first and the second season for the last.

OnePixelJumpMan said:

I just watched the first episode of Mazinkaiser SKL. It's beautiful.

I should really watch that, do you know if all the episodes are out already? I do not want to wait for a new one.

BrokenMagnum said:

Its been done for a while, and its out on dvd in the US which is crazy for a robot show that isn't very good.

OMG, I didn't know it was out. WTF Daryl Surat, why did you tell me about this on your twitter posts! :O
Also, where is the blu ray version?

I am interested in hearing in detail what you thought of it as I did not care for it.

BrokenMagnum said:

I am interested in hearing in detail what you thought of it as I did not care for it.

I liked it overall, but I can see why you wouldn't like it. I like the whole "heavy metal super robot" thing for style. The first episode's action is so good, the animation flows so well except for the CG that the fight at the end completely enthralled me. That's why I came in with, "I LOVE THIS SO MUCH FANBOY FREAKOUT," but I jumped the gun on it.

The second episode is pretty bad. A lot of the action would have been good, but so much was reused from the first episode, so it was infinitely worse. Also, they decided to try some backstory and plot, but it's just bad. There's no justification for it, it's bad.

The third episode was better about the fight animation, but it still wasn't as good as the first episode. Also, while there is precedent for Mazinkaiser to have some of those weapons, there wasn't within the context of the show, so the final fight felt like a power ass-pull extravaganza. It didn't bother me that much at first, because they were cool looking, but it's not like the original Mazinkaiser OVA final battle where Kouji struggled even after getting the Final Kaiser Blade. So it's cool, but far less substantial.

So, the first episode was a really good first episode, but it doesn't really do much with that. Plots for super robot stuff usually aren't spetacular, mind blowing stuff, but this one is mostly nonexistent and what is there is mostly nonsensical. I'm not entirely certain why most the characters did anything they did. It's just that I liked certain action parts of it so much that it carried the show for me, and because it's short, there's not that much to carry. It occupies a similar space as New Getter Robo to me, though that I like for some of the same and some difference reasons.

If you didn't like it because the plot was awful, I understand, though if you didn't like the action, at least in the first episode, you don't have to tell me why, but I'd like to know what you consider good action so I know where you're coming from. Also, did you like Shin Mazinger? I didn't like Shin Mazinger, so I'm curious.

"Who even remembers that show?"

...and that's how they picked which ones they used, because the popular shows already *have* RPG tie-ins. (otoh they could go meta and use .hack)

I thought the third episode was ok. The fight between Iron Kaiser and Mazinkaiser was mostly all right, though it has hiccups. The problem with the plot is that it doesn't exist. The second episode pretends that it exists, but it's lying. I think SKL would have been better served had it been a 50 minute OVA instead of a three episode one because then they could have some basic establishment at the beginning, then let the characters go to town.

I still like it better than Shin Mazinger. As many cool moments as that show has, and as much as I like the themes by JAM Project, the plot and characters, other than Pygman and sometimes Kouji, were so awful that I just couldn't do it past a certain point. Maybe that's the case for you and SKL. That's fine. They exist on exactly the opposite parts of my critical spectrum, so it's easy to see how some could feel the opposite way.

I agree about the pacing, but the characterization is my problem with it. Characters that should be main characters, Kouji specifically, though also the whole of the Photon Power Labs team, feel like they're secondary characters because of how much other characters are built up. For Dr. Hell's minions, that's fine to a point. Baron Ashura was always just someone to shake a fist at angrily when it did something evil, and characterizing it beyond that was nice.

For original characters, or at least original to Mazinger, it's unacceptable. This does not feel like a Mazinger Z show. It feels like a "Mazinger Z vs. The Kurogane House" crossover where Mazinger Z exists only to have exciting action moments while the Kurogane house gets all the plot and characterization, and those characters all suck except for the cyborg guy and maybe Django. The samurai chef and fast old woman don't really have characteristics beyond describing them and their unflinching loyalty, the guy with a bomb in his stomach was annoying and committed the worst offense to "let the bitch die" I have seen up unto this point, and Tsubasa is a self-insert fanfiction character. I actually really wanted, and kinda still do, to like Shin Mazinger, but remembering those characters and the plot points that come from them and their preferential treatment stops that desire dead.

IAmZim said:

>>
I think the problem is that because its so stretched out and slow its only towards the very end of the series that you become attached to characters like the Kurogane House and Baron Ashura (who's arguably more of a main character than Kouji) But as someone who finds the cast of Mazinger pretty milquetoast, I don't blame him Imagawa for switching it up.

You're missing my point, I think. I may be misreading you, but anyway: Mazinger Z is the story of Kouji Kabuto, the Photon Power Labs, and their fights against Dr. Hell and his minions. If you don't want to make a story about those characters, first, don't make a Mazinger show, and second, don't pretend the show is about those characters when it clearly isn't. I have no issues with the development of Baron Ashura. My problems with the Kurogane House and Tsubasa specifically are rooted in that this isn't supposed to be about them, but they steal the show from who the show is telling me is the main character, Kouji. If they were in their own show, possibly with some robot action but not necessarily, I could go with it even if I do think that Tsubasa is, well, Mary Sue is the only term I know for it. Black Jack, Golgo 13, and frankly, most Mazinger robots are just like that, but they're not using those traits to steal the focus from who should be the main characters.

If you want to make an original Mazinger story and retain the old characters as secondary characters, then do so, but don't pretend the show is about those characters and then give all the focus to completely different characters because then you're lying to the audience. To me, it's like if you made a Superman origin story, then made it take place in Gotham and had the GCPD having all the character development and made Harvey Bullock extremely knowledgeable about Krypton, Superman's powers, overly equiped to deal with superbeing threats, then halving a story about a memento left to Supes by his parents or something so the remaining time can be dedicated to Harvey's past as to why he has all that knowledge, and fights between Supes and characters like Bizarro or Brainiac that are only shown a bit to make more time for Harvey thumbing his nose in Lex face about how he's known about his plans all along and is fully prepared to counter them.

Anyway, I don't know if anyone is sick of reading this discussion, so I want to create an out if anyone wants it.

Things doing rocket punch that shouldn't be able to do rocket punch is awesome. And yes, it was cool in Shin Mazinger too.

Yeah, I was wondering if that would get my point across because once I'd written it, I thought, "Actually, I would be into a police procedural show about the GCPD."

Gundam EXTREME Vs coming to PS3. For context Extreme Vs is the latest game in the Gundam Vs series of which Federation vs Zeon was the first.

here's a trailer/the attract screen of the Arcade version.

Dave said:

I mean oh my god, Orphen? Who even remembers that show. Jaysus.

I remembers Orphen. I actually prefers the Orphen Revenge (second series) over the original become it less serious. So instead of being just a mediocre fantasy show, It's become a mediocre Slayers show.

Slayers have a good joke here and there.

That's probably why. There's nothing outstandingly wrong with Slayers, it's just middle of the road so hard.

That's probably why for me personally. I can't really speak for anyone else, but I think western fantasy is pretty boring, and the anime version even more so.

Shows like Slayers and Lodoss war are so milquetoast with really fucking dry gags (in the case of the former) or really fucking dry characters (in the case of the latter). They are both so goddamn bland it surprises me that anyone can like them, because they are not even so bad that they're entertaining. They're just exactly middle of the road.

Both are better than Orphen, of course.

Other than Berserk, though, what D&D-style "high fantasy" anime would you suggest? Legend of Lemnear? ;)

Does it have robots in it?

Robot wizards?!? What hath god wrought?