Anime Megathread III and Cartoon Megathread I!

The sense of impact and momentum in the manga is top notch, and the Titans look much better in it than they do in the show. The show had a strong opening before they proved that they weren't at all prepared for the task of animating the series. Episode 21 had a 3 minute recap in the beginning and was still missing some scenes that had to be covered up. I feel it's gonna get even worse and this is the part of the manga that needs the most attention. Plus the big punch (that sent the FT flying) in episode 21 didn't look nearly as awesome as the manga's shot. They should have stylized it a little more to match.

I guess I'm in the minority but if I had to pick I wouldn't hesitate to choose the manga over the anime.

I've only watched the first 3 episodes of Monogatari Second Season, but as far as I can tell Shinobu has to be near him at all times, that's why she lurks in his shadow.

As for Blood Lad, next week's tenth episode will be the last one.

You guys could always read the manga

With this summer season being so great for me so far, I just hope the fall can be as good.

The only show so far I'm looking forward to next season right now is the next season of IS (Infinite Stratos), but not by a whole lot.

My guess is that she has at least a slight idea about what her brothers and father will be doing to get elected and it will not be a nice thing.

Nope! Anime all the way yo!

Damn right! The last time I've read the manga to see what's going to happen in the anime, I ended up reading every single chapter. Never again.

@superwristbands: manga is better than anime in 85% of all cases (ex sasameki koto was a terrible anime but a fantastic manga)

also

I'm going to start simoun unless someone in this thread tells me it's really bad

@animasta: I liked the Sasameki Koto anime so :p

Also, a quick search on wikipedia tells me the president of Yuricon and ALC Publishing named Simoun "best Yuri of 2006", so hey, it's the best of 2006.

@superwristbands: the sasameki koto anime stops just before the best parts of the manga.

@animasta:Never seen it but is Simoun that anime where all the young characters are genderless female, pilot mech type things, and get their gender given to them through some sort of coming of age ritual?

yes, and that's about all I know! and there is yuri involved.

If you read the manga then obviously anything that happens isn't going to have the same impact because you know what's going to happen. People who are only watching the anime are super hyped with episode 21 almost being on levels of episode 5. You are tainted. I should know because when I read the manga of something the anime always falls short in specific parts that didn't meet my expectation of how I imagined it would be animated.

Except my complaints don't have anything to do with the impact of scenes I've already read? My problem is with the completely bungled production. Dragging out scenes that didn't need to be dragged out just to pad time, airing episodes horribly unfinished, spending 3 episodes on something that should have been 1 1/2, scenes missing and replaced with panning shots or stills. This is before getting into the fucking godawful vocal tracks that ruin every scene they're used in.

I do also have some complaints about the actual directing in the show, not related to pacing, but that is in honesty a manga vs anime complaint.

The fact that you can even make comparisons is because you have read the manga. People can't guess what's filler and what isn't or when a scene is being lengthened. We wouldn't know if its the anime padding some scenes or if its the manga itself slowing things down to provide exposition. We also wouldn't know about missing scenes.

Issues with the vocal tracks being awful is of course a subjective thing. This is the first time I heard anyone say anything negative about the music. I hear praise all over the place.

Isn't this only 26 episodes? if so wouldn't things be paced at the certain rate to make sure at ends at a good enough spot?

What? No. I've seen numerous complaints all over about the really obvious padding and shitty pacing from anime-only viewers. There's been very little actual filler.

I don't think you know what I mean by missing scenes. I'm not talking about manga scenes not included in the anime, there hasn't been anything really bad in that regard (just a bit of Eren's thoughts from an episode or 2 ago that really should have been included, and a kinda important bit from the training parts), I mean anime scenes they didn't finish animating before airing and covered up with still shots or panning shots of the city. Episode 4 or 5 was the first one, but there was a recent one that was really bad (13?), with numerous scenes covered up while you can still hear the action/dialog. This has nothing to do with the manga, and is completely about the anime's poorly handled production. But I'm more disappointed than angry about it. It's clear that this show should have been a summer show but I bet they wanted it to air as soon as possible, regardless of whether Studio Wit was ready.

I don't have a problem with the regular music because I never hear it anyway, what little I've paid attention to sounded alright, but anytime a vocal track comes on it pulls me out of the scene so hard I almost get whiplash. Like a few episodes ago when everyone decided to say fuck off to the Recon Corps after Erwin gave his "recruitment" speech, the vocal song that played during the blue walking away scene was so laughably bad I thought maybe the series was mocking itself with its own soundtrack.

God this season still sucks, fewest number of shows I can enjoy ever. Only rozen maiden and kamisama no inai nichiyoubi; I'd probably like the season of bakemonogatari but never went through the trouble of digging up whatever's come before now.

I simply assumed that those panning shots and still images that should have been animated would get taken care of in the blu ray release.

people in the thread, what are the best (your favorites I MEAN) anime OST's? out of all I've listened to it's probably madoka (the ost is the best part about it) and FMA: brotherhood. I like stein's gates too but most of that was from the game anyway.

That's pretty much always the case, but usually with bluray fixes it's just art or perspective fixes, but a LOT of work needs to be done on Titan. Which is more manpower than they can probably spare. Volume 1 had a number of art fixes (faces, clothes, etc), but the really apparent issues didn't crop up until episode 4 and beyond. So we shall see.

Have you seen the credits for any episode? They usually have like 2-4 times the amount of animators than most anime, and yet everything is such a mess and stuff is still aired unfinished. Whether you enjoy it or not, whether you've read the manga or not, the Titan anime is a complete and utter mess on the production standpoint. And now they're planning on airing the final episode in theaters before on TV? That just sounds like even more pressure being put on an already over-stressed studio.

And when AoT gets greenlit for another season, which is definitely will with just looking at the sales of volume 1 and 2, I can only hope they fucking learn from this and are able to do things in a way that won't overwork all the employees to death. But that won't be for a while, since there needs to be another year or 2 of manga chapters for another 25 episode series.

Like I mentioned in an earlier post, I never pay attention to the soundtracks when watching something. Which just hurts when I download an OST and listen to it and can't place any of the music, which kinda kills some of the enjoyment.

But the soundtrack to the Battle Tendency arc from JoJo's Bizarre Adventure from last year/this year is fucking AMAZING. Some of Taku Iwasaki's best work. I can almost understand why he was so upset about how it was used in the show that he threatened to quit doing anime music altogether, although I still think he was being a big baby about it. Plus he's doing Gatchaman Crowds so whatever (stuff I've heard from that is pretty good too). Although I can't stand dubstep and his JoJo dubstep doesn't make me a believer.

Overdrive (warning: Lotus Juice)

Awake

Welcome To The World (warning: more Lotus Juice)

Small Soldier

Burning Colosseum (aka Holy Wubstorm)

Elephant Talk 2 (I guess this is also dubstep?)

I have no problems with the direction (there's only so much the director can do if there's no money to make anything other than stills) or with the pacing but with the quality of the animations. There are numerous examples of that posted on the internet and it's not just about reused shots like this one:

And yes, these are getting fixed in the Blu Ray release. Just a couple comparison shots:

But even like this, I think the show still looks better than the manga.

@animasta: Madoka's OST pretty much shits all over everything else. Hirasawa Susumu has a special place in my heart though.

As someone who is not enjoying the story or characters as much as anyone else in this thread even I have to admit it gets totally awesome sometimes. Personally I come to the show for the horror aspect and not necessarily the silly shounen action all-story of a premise. To me it's become a fun teen slasher flick of a cartoon in the sense that I can't wait to see these annoying anime archetypes die in the most horrible ways imaginable.

I've even read some of the manga but eventually stopped reading when the story was getting too dumb. I've stuck with the show passed the point I was with the book and I'm seriously glad I waited. The animation is slicker than every Spider-Man cartoon ever made and well worth your time. I'd recommend going with the anime on this one. The color, sound, and motion add a lot to the experience Patience is the key.

I just spent a couple of days reading all of the Attack on Titan manga to date. Not as impressed as I was expecting to be. For starters, I was under the mistaken impression that the story was done. There are some great twists, but they're coming further and further apart. There's only so many poignant flashbacks and lectures on heroism and duty I can take anymore. It's got maybe one more tankobon of awesome reveal and action if it would just drop the needless exposition and get to the point. Fuck they mentioned all will be revealed in his father's cellar 40 chapters ago and we're still waiting for them to get there even though it's less far away than they've already ventured to do some other random shit and now they went and got themselves fucking kidnapped!

I just spent a couple of days reading all of the Attack on Titan manga to date. Not as impressed as I was expecting to be. For starters, I was under the mistaken impression that the story was done. There are some great twists, but they're coming further and further apart. There's only so many poignant flashbacks and lectures on heroism and duty I can take anymore. It's got maybe one more tankobon of awesome reveal and action if it would just drop the needless exposition and side stories and get to the point. Fuck they mentioned all will be revealed in his father's cellar 40 chapters ago and we're still waiting for them to get there even though it's less far away than they've already ventured to do some other random shit and now they went and got themselves fucking kidnapped!

@alexandersheen said:

His fights and Titan art are leagues better than the anime, though. (episode 21 safe but spoilered anyway)

@rubberluffy said:

@alexandersheen said:

His fights and Titan art are leagues better than the anime, though. (episode 21 safe but spoilered anyway)

That deformed Eren face is like nightmare fuel.
I've been thinking about episode 21 and I think what really struck me is how the show punched the "power of friendship" concept in the face. Eren went against his instincts and listened to everyone else go on with the whole "believe in us" cliche and it caused everything to go to shit. I'm trying to scan my mind for other instances in anime where a character's "bad choice" resulted in serious consequences, but nothing comes to mind.

Despite all the fantastical aspects of the show there is some really good stuff that people can relate to. Who hasn't been in a situation where they could've, would've, should've, but didn't because other people convinced you not to trust yourself?

They are siblings BTW...

@ilikepopcans: Without context I can't really tell what is going on in that picture, other than crying guy having a fake golden shower.

This Space Dandy teaser (From Shinichiro Watanabe) looks amazing.

@ilikepopcans: Yeah, I need some context too. That just looks like a strange picture with no meaning to me!

I finally found the full anime version of the best ending theme ever!

Not to say I was looking that hard, but you know.

hananananananananananana

sorry

@recspec: It kind of reminds me of Space Adventure Cobra from the early 80's. I am intrigued.

@ilikepopcans:

How would that even work for a girl? The GIF makes sense, but the still does not.

@ilikepopcans: Oh okay. Now it makes sense.

Is it cool if I ask for recommendations here? If so, iust know that I haven't watched anime other than the big shounen animes over the years, so while I wouldnt mind recommendations in that genre, I'd love more varied styles.

Just caught up to the latest episode of Watamote what a strangely pleasant yet uncomfortable anime. When my friend recommended it to me she described it as take Konata Izumi from Lucky Star and give her the love life of Tsukamoto Tenma from School Rumble and make it 10x more terrible. I haven't followed the anime scene quite as much over the past few years but I got to say this is one of the few series I've seen that I've quite enjoyed.

Ro-Kyu-Bu! SS

Loli basketball FTW

Anyways, are you wanting more recent animes, all time classics, do you want more serious or more funny? When someone ask for recommendations, I feel like they are never specific enough.

Yeah Watamote is a unique show because it it is trying to be funny, but the main character is SO realistic sad that its had to laugh. I don't think I enjoy the show, but I keep coming back to it for some reason.

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure (2012 tv series) and Hunter x Hunter (currently airing version, not the '99 tv series).

Steins;Gate is easily recommendable if you like time travel and/or insane protagonists

Sorry about that. I would prefer more recent stuff since classics are probably easy enough to find out about. And again, I have a huge blind spot in terms of variety so probably more funny stuff. I'm not at all picky, so I'll give anything a shot no matter art style or weirdness in general.