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Japanese Title: To LOVEる
Genres: Comedy, Romance, Science Fiction, Shounen
Episodes: ??
First Air Date-Time: Some time in April (spring 2008)
Producers: Xebec
Source Material: Manga
Official Site: http://www.j-toloveru.com/, http://www.tbs.co.jp/anime/to-love-ru/index-j.html

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Popularity: 4% [?]

Rating: 8.3/10

Impressions:

For once, I had thought that an anime focused too much on the bigger picture than the individual character. For many shows, it’s a matter of finding a balance between the too. When too much focus is placed on the overall story, character development and character empathy is lost. However, if the individual character is prioritised too much, the lack of an underlying flow brings the whole show down as well. For drama, slice-of-life and school life shows, these two aspects are often one in the same. But for more ‘complicated’ shows, those that have tertiary factors such as fantastical or science fictional properties, tend to fall to this problem more often.

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Popularity: 3% [?]

Rating: 7.5/10

Impressions:

This episode covers almost two chapters of manga, with some inserts of minor filler material. Due to all the talking and focus on a single area, this episode feels really slow to me. The problem with Bleach now is, if it continues with a relatively fast pace (2-3 chapters per episode), it will be forced to produce fillers in due time. But going a slow pace like it is now destroys the intensity and excitement of the manga material anyway. I think I’ll just place my faith in the manga for now, and start expecting more when we get to the real fights. Hopefully there won’t be a massive filler arc before ‘reinforcements’ arrive.

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Popularity: 5% [?]

Rating: 8.2/10

Impressions:

I’m sure that those who don’t read the manga were positive that Suman would live. This IS a shounen after all, and all signs pointed to him surviving. But D.Gray-man proves true like it did with the very first arc, and killed Suman off. In the manga, he’s never a significant character, but in both versions, I can say this part has been pretty heavy and emotional. But now it looks like Allen is going to face up against Tyki Mikk. This episode covers the two chapters of 53 and 54. The next few episodes are going to be dead serious, and I hope the quality can stay up (at or above the quality of this episode at least).

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Popularity: 4% [?]

Rating: 7.5/10

Impressions:

An Aisha development episode…I can’t say her character appeals to me much—her robotic nature isn’t easily liked by others. However, she makes an interesting development in the show, and because of her, it seems like we’ll be finding out a lot more about Otoha’s past, and perhaps her brother as well. Still, this episode is too light for my liking. I’m beginning to think that the show is just going to end with the WORM factory’s destruction, without developing any kind of continuous plot at all. The beginning and end of every little mishap is contained within an episode, giving the series a disjointed feel, and there are only six episodes left…

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Popularity: 3% [?]

Rating: 9/10

Japanese Title: マクロスF
Genres: Drama, Mecha, Science Fiction
ED: “Ai, Oboete imasu ka” by Megumi Nakajima
Producers: Satelight
Relations: Macross 7 (prequel)
Official Site: http://www.macrossf.com/

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Popularity: 6% [?]

Rating: 7.5/10

Impressions:

It was mentioned during the beginning of the series, and now it has come to light again—Otoha’s unusually high synch rate. There are probably a number of possibilities as why this is so, such as a similar ‘origin’ to Aisha, a ‘better’ DNA structure, or another outside influence, which may have occurred during the disappearance of her brother. It’s about time for her to step up now; it has been too long since she last showed excellence in combat and piloting abilities. Aside from that, it looks like Aisha will be piloting a Sonic Diver as well. Either that the eye catch artists simply wanted some more drawing material…

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Popularity: 3% [?]

Rating: 8.2/10

Impressions:

Ah, so apparently, Allelujah simply developed his split personality as a result of some kind of defect in his ‘programming’. This means that all the duplicates of him that we’ve seen were all probably just hallucinations, or visual representations of his inner turmoil. Either way, it looks like this recent development arc aimed at Allelujah is now over, so I wonder who’ll be next to take the spotlight. Setsuna had his a few episodes ago if I’m not mistaken, but if he’s the main character (like it originally appeared to be so), more should come in little pieces. I’m still waiting for his potential girlfriend. =) Or when Marina discovers Setsuna IS a Gundam Meister—that will be fun.

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Popularity: 2% [?]