Chatterbox - Anime & Manga

It starts in the second episode of the second season and runs for a little over half the season. It is really good though. I honestly never imagined that particular science fiction idea could be played seriously.

Yeah. Whoever had the brilliant idea to turn that setting into a Slice of Life show was a fricken' moron. It simply doesn't have interesting enough characters to pull that off. I hope it wasn't the original author.

edited 10th Aug '16 11:20:17 AM by CDRW

Tck. Those were the best parts of Railgun. I liked that alteration of big serious action plots and slice of life drama.

I would have liked the alternation aspect, if I had felt like the characters were more than cardboard cutouts and they still fully used the setting. Even Misaka, the main character, doesn't have much personality unless she's being pushed to the brink.

edited 10th Aug '16 11:32:29 AM by CDRW

Director's fault.

As far as the filler goes it might have been tolerable if the characters had been better. Kuroko gets hit the worst with this by losing all depth in favor of cringe inducing psycho lesbian jokes and way too little clothing, but Saten and Uiharu were also really dull in all the padding and filler scenes.

By FMA original, did you meant FMA 03 or FMA:B? Because FMA 03 does pushed the boundary of shonen anime more.

I mean '03. Brotherhood could have been really enjoyable, and I'd wanted to see the "actual" storyline anyway, but the pacing in the first episodes was so badly done that I never developed an emotional connection to the characters. I got a lot farther in my second try at the series, but I just didn't care enough to continue even though there was some really cool stuff going down.

That's good to know. Maybe I should check out the light novels.

edited 10th Aug '16 11:47:08 AM by CDRW

You mean the first half wasn't bad filler?

^^ It's a manga and yeah, it's good. Best part of the Index franchise, though to be fair that's not hard.

^ Well, it's the first arc of the manga, so no, it isn't filler. I think there's bad filler in it though! Does that count?

edited 10th Aug '16 11:49:20 AM by Arha

The first half had bad filler, but it wasn't all bad filler. The Level Upper Arc is actually pretty cool.

Though I suppose it doesn't actually qualify as "filler", just boring.

edited 10th Aug '16 11:52:15 AM by CDRW

Longform adaptations of battle shounen tend to be less than stellar, honestly. Tons of still/off-model frames, poor animation, padding in the form of flashbacks, low quality filler material so the anime doesn't overtake the manga, etc. The Naruto anime has that exact same problem.

The manga recently finished and...well, even just going by the manga it isn't really a great series in the end, so you aren't missing out on anything imo.

Oh yeah, how is the Accelerator manga? When I watched the Sisters Arc, 99% of the comment section was people squeeing at his appearance.

Yeah. I couldn't even get into One Piece, and that's supposed to be the good one of the Big Three.

edited 10th Aug '16 11:57:58 AM by CDRW

Not a clue. I'm not interested in Accelerator so I haven't read it.

the best shounen adaptations i've seen are brotherhood (barring the rushed beginning) and Hunterx Hunter 2011. the latter especially is arguably a better experience than the manga thanks to its excellent and consistent animation and amazing soundtrack. i watched it with my brother and we loved it.

One Piece's reputation as 'the good one' is mostly from the manga, not the anime. The One Piece anime has been pretty poor for the past 7 years, possibly longer.

Hulu has officially ended all free streaming services (they will only be paid from now on), while newly-bought Yahoo is launching its own anime streaming library.

edited 11th Aug '16 8:40:21 AM by kyun

Well now we know why Hulu ended a lot of anime streaming.

What series are Yahoo streaming?

Here.

One Piece takes a while to get into, the first few dozen episodes are almost filler quality (but they aren't, so you gotta watch them) and then the series grows the beard either around the Arlong Arc (eps 31-45, chapters 69-95) or during the Whiskey Peak arc (chapters 106-114, eps 64-67) - depending on opinion. Some say it doesn't take off until the CP 9 saga, but that's pushing it IMO, Alabasta and Skypeia were both great, CP 9 just takes it up a notch.

Part of the problem with One Piece is that if you don't go a few dozen episodes or a few volumes into it, you really aren't giving it a fair chance. It starts off slow, and part of its appeal is how much time it takes to build the story up. Honestly, I'd recommend just reading the manga, you'll get through that rough early spot all the quicker. That said, the anime is at its best at the start and during the first few sagas. Just have a guide to avoid the fillers.

I get where you're coming from, but it's a bit much to expect anybody to spend that many episodes or chapters waiting for the good stuff to start.

I disagree about the early episodes. They're not tightly paced, but if you marathon, they're good.

Rewatched FMA 03, this time in English dub. I've seen accusation that Vic Mignogna's, um, questionable behavior changed certain things that played out in the first two episodes and the last few episodes in comparison to the Japanese dub, but it is still one of the best English dubs.

I heard that Otakon's apparently supposed to come to Washington, DC. Anyone know when that is or if I missed it already? I figure I owe it to myself to go to at least one con, even if I can't picture myself being remotely comfortable at one.

Hate to break it to you, but I believe Otakon's this weekend.

next year then, i guess

@nasa: You know for a second or six hundred I thought the questionable behavior was the response to the backlash against his Free! related statements. Whewps.