Another week and more episodes to review. I’m not sure what happened this season, but there are a lot of shows with really awesome music. Horizon, Guilty Crown, Fate/Zero and Last Exile have amazing sounds track so far.
Horizon, Episode 3
Awesome Star Wars music. Awesome Ami Koshimizu voice acting. Boring everything else. We get a bit of background story on the main character. The plot doesn’t really advance and, in fact, it is still the same day that Episode 1 started with. Although, we get to meet the antagonists to the story for a few seconds, but they’re suspect. I read one comment online that sums up my feelings about this show: “It’s a train wreck, but can’t keep your eyes away from it.”
Persona 4, Episode 3
Chie gets her persona, lots of crying, cute dogs, and more kuma. This episode followed the same format as the previous one. Rather formulaic, but still enjoyable. There was more fighting, too, and this time it felt a lot more like a video game fight than the last one did.
Chyahafuru, Episode 3
More flashbacks. We discover a bit more about karuta. Looks like there is a team match and a bit of strategy can be involved as well. Also, the kids get split up for high school and are really sad about being able to play together. Well, Arata and Chyaha are, I think that Taichi really only cares about spending time with Chyaha for some reason. I’m still enjoying this show quite a bit despite the lack of action.
Gundam AGE, Episode 2
The first half was really boring, but the second part was better. We learn what the AGE in the show title means. It’s about the AGE System which includes the AGE builder. Your heroic Gundam works alongside a 3D printer! The Gundam gather data and the builder creates, using the evolution principle, new weapons to defeat enemies. It was presented in a really stupid way, I might have actually rolled my eyes while watching. One thing is sure, this show is really cliché. Now, the Diva is interesting, that’s the show’s spaceship (I love spaceships), and the crew looks fun. I still like the main character, but the cheerleaders (romance interest) are starting to be a bit annoying. I think I actually prefer the mysterious captain’s action, as opposed to the mobile suit fighting.
Guilty Crown, Episode 2
This episode is a continuation of the last one; it is mostly used to show how badass the rebel leader is. I don’t like the main character or the fanservice. I like the setting and the animation/design, but it’s not enough to keep me watching. Also, insert songs aren’t fun, well not in this type of show. One more episode until I drop this.
UN-GO, Episode 2
Inga is so awesome! I’m really liking this show. I’m glad I decided to watch this on a whim. This episode was really good, better than the first one. The voice acting work was spot on and the intrigue was interesting. It also has a much better singer than Guilty Crown has for insert songs, and the concept is well used here. On the setup side, I really love how this show mixes detective work with a critic of the information age and governmental manipulation of the media and information. We get another murder, but this time the resolution is a bit more complicated and we get to see the length the government goes to hide the truth. We also get to see that our detective has a few secrets of his own.
One thing I’m wondering is if we will have a full season of “random” cases, or if at some point all the lies are going to come back to bite the Chairman back.
Fate/Zero, Episode 4
Yes, fighting! Most of the episode is Saber fighting against Lancer (Diarmuid Ua Duibhne) and each trying to guess who is the other by identifying their noble phantasm (special skill based on the Heroic spirit past life). We get nice animation here (movie quality nice), but a lot of staring too. Not much happens besides that, except that Rider, who is watching the fight, decides to present himself with a Grand Entrance at the end of the episode. Poor Waver, his Servant isn’t exactly in it for the end prize, he just wants to fight all six servants at the same time in a glorious battle.
Last Exile, Episode 2
Glorious air battle! Amazing music! This episode felt very much like an “ending” to a story, except that we never saw how it started. It also brings lots of drama, death and crazy protagonists. I don’t see how the Ades Federation can be stopped with their agenda either; they have lots of ships. Lots of them. Although, as I expected, the real story hasn’t started yet, we are just receiving information about the world where the events are happening and setting up threads for our main characters to follow. Milia will surely have a character arc now. I expect quite a bit of personality change in store for her, too. There were, again, some strange hints about Fam’s background (Giselle mentioning her name is strange as an example). And I really like Giselle now, she’s quite competent and showed her skill in this episode.
Unfortunately, despite the amazing air battle and music to go with it, there were a few spots with rather bad art (frog faces), but overall it wasn’t too bad. The awesome flying sequence compensated for it. And I mean awesome flying sequence.
I suspect the next episode won’t be as adrenaline-inducing as the first two were. It needs to start new plot threads and maybe add a bit of exposition here and there to explain a few things. People who haven’t watched or don’t remember the first season are going to be a bit lost here.