Summer 2012, It'll be shit

Didn't seem to do Lucky Star or Basquash too much harm.

Did you even watch Basquash?

I suppose Lucky Star can be an exception, except that the best parts of it were either from the manga, or from something in the Yamakan episodes.

See also: that shit guy from Gurren Lagann that did episode 4. Mr. Anus breather. The series recovered fast from his departure (but he was like an exec so maybe that's not the same thing).

Yea, that guy was not the director.

I'd like to see someone trace all of Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas as an anime with magical girls

to re-rail the thread, I actually did more than skim the titles this time.
Sort of interested in that P.A. Works thing, Tari Tari. I dunno, they did Hanasaku Iroha and Another, so you know, I might give it a whirl based on that.
OVAs:
Two Code Geass OVAs? Yes please. (didn't see the second one.)
High School DxD: This series was seriously lol. OVA? sure, why not.
Movies: nanoha A's. Movie 2nd. Or some shit.

Mediocre season overall though with some bright spots, beware my first impression reviews below may include light ~spoilers~.

TariTari,
Sword Art Online,
Muv Luv,
Moyashimon Returns,
Rakugals.

More or less the only genuinely "good" shows, my reasoning below:

TariTari: Inoffensive, kinda the same sort of formula has "4-5 girls doing stuff" but mixes it up with some dudes who aren't just there to be dudes and manages to mix a degree of humour and depth that provides a pedigree of interest to an otherwise trite formula. Wien in particular, as the Japanese returnee from Austria I find particularly interesting. Rather than have a "funny foreigner" character who is "obviously foreign" who talks in a condescending accent (Kate for a good example, dude from Karin for a bad example) but otherwise speaks perfect Japanese and doesn't mix up homonyms or common idioms. We instead have a "Japanese" person who actually legitimately mixes up his Japanese, repeats himself, asks others to repeat, and otherwise gets much of Japanese culture wrong but right because he studied it from books.

Like in real life among JETS/ALT's or whatever. Only issue I have is that they resolved the central conflict extremely quickly so I'm wondering where they will go from here.

Sword Art Online: Dueling title with Accel World (same author, hah) for the Mumurpurger themed anime, impressive for having potential for a deep stylistic storyline and interesting themes. People are caught lord of the flies style ala Infinite Ryvius inside a Tera Online like MMORPG where if they die in the game they die in the real world. Accurate usage of terminology, a good understanding of social and game mechanics of real life mmorpg's along with strong basis for conflict makes this a compelling entry in my "top 5" list for this season.

The beginning was a little clunky with its heavy emphasis on exposition but barely noticable if your a MMORPG player so you'll actually take an interest during the infodump rather than turned off as they go about explaining the basics of the game world before the plot kicks in. Having Nanba Mutta's from Space Brothers voice actor as the older quasi newbie Clyne is more or less my hook as I like the guys voice. He lends a certain melancholic depth with his presence.

Muv Luv: I have not played the Visual Novel but as of the second episode I think I'll go hunt it down to play once I'm done with Tsukihime and Fate Stay Night.

It mixes together several pet guilty pleasures of mine inside a single little ball for my to consume greedily; alien invasions in a military thriller ish setting (Transformers? Starship Troopers?), grimdark mass genocide of humans in the gradually losing struggle for the survival of our species (Ender's Game, Warhammer 40k, Halo) and of course giant "Real Robots" (Fullmetal Panic), and alternate history (World War series and Timeline 191 by Harry Turtledove) together while throwing in chicks as the principle cast.

I'm assured that this will likely to be a gravity defying emotional rollercoaster and will definately stick through this until the end, even if just to see if someone other than Gen Urobuchi can pull off that same kind of genius as in madoka Magica or Saya no uta.

This series obviously is not without its stumbling blocks and teething issues, the first episode makes "exposition heavy" seem endearing and is as clunky as the TSF's the characters pilot. It sets ups numerous characters only to kill them off in such quick succession that we cannot really care about them; a character development arc to flesh them out that should have taken three to four episodes was done in a span of five minutes. All of this contributes to a poorly based opening act and while the Three Episode Test is entirely ubiquitous among more serious anime fans the opening act is crucial to "hook" in your audience of more casual fans.

Why should we care about nerdy eye glasses wearing walking stereotype number 4? Oh She has a boyfriend in Kyushu who we never meet and of course he dies off screen so she cries, I don't care. Just hurry on to something more interesting already. We need to see these characters as relatable human beings so that their inevitable deaths have meaning, so we care all the more about those who survive and reject extinction.

The first and last episodes are crucial and already there's accidents and mistakes, I am optimistic but only cautiously so. I worry I'll mostly derive enjoyment from the gorn, mecha military scifi porn and the premise than what actually "happens" per se.

Moyashimon Returns: Microbiology is just an excuse to brew alcohol, what more needs to be said? The first season was great and this seems virtually no different continuing where it left off.

The character designs have been updated and streamlined, while makes it at first confusing as Mutou and Hasegawa look kinda similar in a labcoat not helped by their predisposition to wear eachothers clothes its a net benefit. Sawaki comes off as far more youthful instead of simply short, Yuuki is more attractive looking and Oikawa's design is more awesome with the animation being better flowing in general.

The series is about 80% science about the awesomeness of microbiology and food sciences and some 20% plot with Itsuki's infodumps about the wonders of fermentations taking up significant screentime but as a Sheldonesque nerd I have no complaints. The show is described I feel erroneously but whatever floats your boat as a "non-anime anime" by others with much of its humour based on the interplay of the characters instead of dense Japanese puns.

Certainly an excellent series, check it out.

Rakugals: Kinda... At a loss for words, I mean really, a Kuril Islands joke!? Holy shit. This series is written by the mangaka for Sayonara Zetsubo Sensei and has the same kind of humour, Japanese as fuck humour on puns, wordplay, and passive aggressive ironic observations of Japanese cultural mores entirely taking the medium of Seinfeldian Conversations about nothing reaching far reaching conclusions "wildly different from the starting topic."

Many of the jokes are extremely ~Japanese~ and so won't likely be as funny to a westerner without significant woolsification, but enough work on absurdist principles that you should be able to get a good laugh at least some of the time, while maintaining an interest just from the ridiculousness of the conversations.

The anime is frighteningly frank in its premise (half ironically I'm sure) of being simply about a bunch of cute girls talking about nothing, so if Lucky Star and SZS weren't your thing this likely won't be either, but give it a shot I say, aren't we all most into anime for the foreign experience?

Shows that I consider inoffensive, tolerable, or interesting, but not objectively good.

Dakara Boku wa H ga Dekinai: Bleach with fanservice and that's saying something. Nipples. Same seiyuu as the perverted protagonist from BakaTest and Bento here pretty much reprising the same damn role as the previous two. The fight scenes look like there's some budget to them and I find it interesting that the protagonist has nothing remarkable about him other than his extreme lewdness even by anime standards. Some people watch Game of Thrones or The Tudors for the sexyness so why can't I derive some guilty pleasure from this as well?

Koi Senkyo to Chocolate: Might be good, or it might be utterly terrible, too soon to tell. I kinda like how they seemed to freshen up the tired cliche archetypes and mix them around a little. I also don't mind Overly Powerful Student Council shenanigans and taking it to its logical conclusion as being just as dangerous and high stakes as the Presidency of the United States seems like it could be interesting. Time will tell.

Binbougami ga!: Tom and Jerry ~anime style~. Kinda funny, same seiyuu as the Black Rock Shooter girl, the plant girl from Blue Exercist, Mayuri from Steins;Gate, etc etc she's good and has range. I'm not really a fan of this kind of humour though so this may be a YMMV type of show.

Oda Nobuna no Yabuu: Okay, another guilty pleasure show, genderflipping historical figures yes I am a huge fan of Type Moon and FSN and seeing Oda Nogunaga as a girl I find inherently interesting; it helps that this time she actually looks and acts the part of a Japanese daimyo if a bit tsundere-ish; I like that they're trying to be historically accurate barring a few acceptable breaks from reality and that this time the Protagonist is taking advantage of being a Toyotomi Hideyoshi stand in for all its worth.

My hope is that they actually abruptly break from history and Japan goes to conquor for itself a maritime empire from the Europeans running around the south pacific at this time with their unprotected gold convoys. Oda also looks a LOT like a genderflipped Edward Elric, eerily so in fact, *could* also become extremely trite and terrible very fast so a word of caution for the wise.

Honorable Mentions who didn't make the Top 5:

Utakoi: 100 Poems adaption as a literal adaption of each poem, cashing in on Chihayafuru's success I guess? Josei Romance/Comedy period drama thing.

Natsuyuki Rendezvous: Joesi Romance, I think on noitamina? Looks like a solid series but Romance isn't really my thing; nice that the adults actually are realistic and responsible and it isn't being padded out to ridiculous lengths.

DOG DAYS: Really should've made it my top five, adventures of Cornwall's finest in HNNNNRRRRG animal people land is incredibly cute and very Nanohaish albeit with a magical boy protagonist instead of a girl, (though there are girls as well in that role) so even though I haven't watched it yet because I need to rewatch the last few episodes of the first season I think I'll enjoy this as well. Very much YMMV though.

YuruYuri/Sway n Shake: 4koma sketch gag comedy aimed at the girls love crowd. (Which is surprisingly mostly girls? What is wrong with Japan!?) I opted to see this instead of Nichijou to fill up my small sketch gag quota and not regretting a thing.

I really need my own webshow for this.

e: Oh, and Humanity has Declined is really really good, I don't know why I didn't put it up there in the top 5, or changed the rules and made it top 6; could probably replace Rokugals or TariTari.

Absurdest, surrealism overlayed with some black comedy and a satirical take on corporate, modern materialistic culture. Almost Dilbert-like in its juxtaposition of cultural satire and dark nihilistic humour underscoring the pointlessness of Humanities continued existence only on the cruel sufferance of an uncaring fate by virtue of our competitors being more incompetent relative to our own. The Mediator's [Watashi] dead eyed blank stare while she performs the motions of "dancing" in the OP sums up the tone and themes of the series perfectly.

Humanity has Declined, we must step aside and end our conga-line of humiliation so that those more worthy may take up dominance of the world, but "they" [other species and neohumans] are too stupid to do so, and we too pathetic to finally die a deserving death by starvation as a just reward for our terminal complacency.

ED and OP sung by the same person who does the OP for Azumanga Daioh, which is interesting.

This post has been edited by Raenir Salazar on Jul 14 2012, 01:46 AM