Random Ramblings LXIX · 4:35am Jul 27th, 2016
IN WHICH I PROMISED ANIME TALK
So Neon Genesis Evangelion wasn't quite succeeding at cheering me up (who knew?), so I've decided to switch to one of my favourite genres – crack-series, perhaps more correctly called "zany comedies". Follow me below the jump for the lowdown, or whatever.
On the docket for the past few days has been Ninja Nonsense, a show I bought years ago and decide to rewatch from time to time. The "story" - if one can call it that - is about a kunoichi who lives with a bunch of useless perverted ninjas, including her master who is a shapeshifting yellow ball. Also, she's probably lesbian for a local high school girl. On the downside, there's a few too many ass jokes for my tastes. On the upside, aside from the glorious fanservice, the ending theme is played on a banjo and consists of stop-motion line-dancing ninjas. Yeah, it's that kind of show and I love it. For better and worse, it's only twelve episodes (they wanted it to be 13 but ran out of time and budget… mostly because they attempted, without success, to make the 90-second intro have 3,000 cels, which is physically impossible), and I'm almost finished with it again.
Once I'm done, depending on my mood, I'll either go back to Eva… or rewatch either Piano (a cute 10-ep. slice-of-life series courtesy of Kosuke Fujishima, creator of Oh My Goddess!) or Midori Days (a bizarre romantic comedy where a girl becomes her crush's right hand, literally). I might could also rewatch Victorian Romance Emma (a romance set in Victorian England centred on a girl named Emma… natch). Those last two are both directed by the late Tsuneo Kobayashi, a man I believe to be one of the best and most overlooked anime directors; he adapted Twelve Kingdoms, which is my favourite anime of all time.
What I really want to do is watch Mermaid Forest, an adaptation of Rumiko Takahashi's excellent horror manga Mermaid Saga. But I want my girlfriend to watch it with me, and she has neither the time nor the desire at the moment. So I'm on my own for a little while longer.
