I spent some time this weekend catching up with Toshokan Sensou, a show I lost all enthusiasm for only a few episodes in, initial interest notwithstanding. Like a lot of people, my disappointment with the show was a direct response to its ridiculous premise. However, having given it a second try, I’ve come to the conclusion that the premise isn’t quite as ridiculous as it seems. Oppressive totalitarian regimes often do have a taste for censorship, and there have been instances in history in which armed resistances have coexisted in a persistent stalemate with the ruling party for so long that they’re eventually recognized as legitimate institutions.

Ultimately, the trouble with Toshokan Sensou is not the premise, but the execution. The politics of Seika Japan are clearly more complicated than the show lets on, and the friendly manner in which the two opposing factions do battle suggests that the author mostly wanted to write a war story without, you know, dwelling on gloomy things like death and destruction (how delightfully Japanese). It’s undercooked, to say the least. But, taken as alternate history, it’s about as believable as any light political thriller that turns reality upside down for flavor, and taken as the coming of age character drama it eventually becomes, it’s about as satisfying as any other anime series of similar form, fit, and function.

In other words, it’s turned into a perfectly enjoyable show now that I’ve stopped trying to analyze and second guess it to death.

The funny thing is, it’s my natural inclination to take anime at face value, and not to analyze it or second guess it to death. Why did I not afford Toshokan Sensou the same benefit of a doubt as I would any other anime series? Why was I so quick to judge it so harshly? I really don’t know. I’m perceptive enough to recognize that I’ve been “down” on anime these past several months, if not “down” on a lot of things in general, so it could be I was simply looking for any reason to drop the show - any show, really - from my regular viewing rotation. Or, it could be I was just horribly depressed to see Aria come to a close.

Whatever the reason, it so concerns me that I would act in such a way that’s so out of character and so antithetical to the way I typically approach anime, that I feel like I need to subject myself to repeated viewings of Saikano both as a penance and as a reminder of what disappointing anime really feels like.

Or, I could just cut the crap and catch up with some of the other shows I’ve been ignoring. Like Itazura na Kiss. And Shugo Chara. And the second season of Da Capo II.

They ain’t gonna watch themselves.

After two relatively dry anime seasons in Japan, the sky has finally opened up and blessed us with more potential gems than there is time to watch them all. That’s my feeling, at least. And the timing couldn’t be any better.

As usual, here are the coming Summer season shows that catch my eye…

Zero no Tsukaima ~Miyoshi Hime no Rondo~ - Even though the second season left me a little disappointed, I’m still a fan of the franchise and its lead characters. If this third season revisits the humor and playfulness of the first season, I’ll be happy. If it tries to take itself too seriously, as the second season unfortunately did, I might not make it to the end. I can be plied with gobs of dere dere Louise, though.

Mahou Tsukai ni Taisetsu na Koto: Natsu no Sora - Not too long after the first Mahou Tsukai ni Taisetsu na Koto TV series ended, I remember hearing rumors that a sequel was in the works. Being such a fan of the show, the news got me to burning, but the “sequel” came in the form of a spin-off manga series that never received the anime treatment. It’s taken five years and an additional manga series for the franchise to return to television, and I’m still burning all the same. And since HAL Film Maker has been hitting one home run after another lately when it comes to slice of life shows, I fear I might set the curtains on fire any minute now.

Telepathy Shoujo Ran - What is it about NHK shows and their uncanny ability to appeal to the nostalgic feelings of aging anime fans, with their tried and true themes, understated productions, and eye for all that is good and right about the medium? These are the sort of shows I’ll be watching ten years from now. I just hope they keep making them.

Chocolate Underground - The premise is so goofy that I can’t resist. Bootlegging chocolate? Just the thought is amusing.

Natsume Yuujin-Chou - My interest in shows built upon Shinto mysticism, both genuine and perverted, has been growing in recent years. It’s such a wonderful construct for fantasy stories. At first glance, this series has the appearance of a Mushishi clone, but I’m also reminded of lighter fare in the same vein. Like Mokke, for example. Perhaps it’s somewhere in between? Sounds like a good place to be.

Nogizaka Haruka no Himitsu - I haven’t watched a good light romance series in awhile, as most of the recents entires in the genre have seemed a little too focused on fanservice and envelope pushing for my taste. This looks pretty good natured, though, and the fact that the female lead is an otaku (of all things) is a nice hook.

Hidamari Sketch x365 - You know, I’m really enjoying this, “let’s make more!” kick the anime industry is on. Shows like Hidamari Sketch deserve all the seasons they can get.

Count me among those fans who find “What ’bout My Star” from Macross Frontier to be one of the catchiest pop songs Yoko Kanno has ever produced. You could have Kelly Clarkson shout the hook in the chorus and sell a truckload of CDs. That’s how slick it sounds.

One reason I enjoy the song so much, I think, is because it’s essentially an extended version of Kanno’s “Going to the Sea” from the Honey and Clover movie soundtrack. I’ve always loved that particular track, but it’s more an incipient song than anything else, only consisting of a quick introduction, a “B” section, and a single chorus. It doesn’t develop any further.

“What ’bout My Star,” on the other hand, takes the same basic musical idea and transforms it into a full song. It’s especially easy to hear in the @Formo duet version, which was featured in part in Episode 5 of the series. That’s my preferred version of the song, by the way.

Of course, it’s just one of many great songs that have graced the series thus far. “Diamond Crevasse” is spectacular, and “Infinity” worked out surprisingly well in show. And then there’s that damn carrot song…

Just so you know, work and the sudden onset of Spring have conspired to suck up most of my spare mental and physical energy these past few weeks. I’ll be out of town on business next week, too, so I suspect the remainder of April is pretty much shot as far as blogging is concerned.

Sorry, but such is life.

Anyway, I’m still in the process of catching up with the Spring anime season. Here are some initial impressions of the shows I’ve sampled thus far…

Da Capo - More of the same. I’m man enough to admit that I have a soft spot for Da Capo. Through good times and bad, it’s always entertaining.

Kure-nai - I had been looking forward to this show for awhile, but I was also apprehensive given its pedigree and the fact I couldn’t quite figure out what genre to place it in. And while I still have a lot of questions about the show, I have to say that the first two episodes were quite good and more than enough to grab my interest. The art is attractive, the direction has style, and the acting is far more organic than what you’d find in your typical anime series. I especially enjoy the dynamic between the two leads. It’s surprisingly warm.

Itazura na Kiss - Who brought the time machine to the party? I’m having flashbacks to Marmalade Boy here. And I mean that in a positive way. Seriously, though, this is old school, traditional shoujo, and it’s just the sort of thing I have a history of getting hooked on. Great OP, by the way.

Kanokon - Kawasmui Ayako needs to talk dirty more often. As for the show itself? It’s funny in much the same way Girls Bravo was funny, and the boundary pushing fanservice is cute, but I see the joke getting very old, very fast. It’s been a blast, Kanokon, but I really gotta go now.

Macross Frontier - Yoko Kanno is in top form this time around. Victor best not be stingy with the soundtrack releases. Other than that, all I’ll say is that this is likely to be the, “damn, I can’t wait for the next episode,” series of the season for me. It’s good. Go watch it, already.

Special A - For some reason, this show has yet to click with me. The humor and writing feels unusually mechanical, and it sucks a lot of the charm out of what should otherwise be a fun show. However, it clearly has potential, and it could very well grow on me, so I’m reluctant to pass on it without watching another episode or two.

One thing I asked myself upon finishing Clannad was, “Of all the recent anime adaptations of Key visual novels, which had the most likable male lead?” After some thought, I settled on Okazaki Tomoya, but it was while evaluating Aizawa Yuuichi’s character that I tripped on something I had never tripped on before: the primary reason why I’m not a big fan of the Melancholy of Suzumiya Haruhi.

When the Kanon remake first aired, there was a lot of talk of how Yuuichi was essentially a clone of Haruhi’s Kyon, given their similarly sarcastic nature and the fact both characters were voiced by Sugita Tomokazu. I saw the similarity as well, but the two characters still struck me as fundamentally different. But why? It’s funny that I didn’t realize it until now, but the reason is quite simple. Yuuichi is likable. Kyon, on the other hand, is not.

Now, I’m sure there are plenty of Haruhi fans out there who will disagree with me, but my impression of Kyon was indeed negative. And since the show was structured in such a way as to emphasize his negative qualities, what with his neverending sarcastic narration and contemptuous observations on the events occurring around him, he grew more and more insufferable with each episode. I’m reminded of a conversation I had with Momotato in which he commented that he would have enjoyed the show more himself had it not been for Kyon’s internal monologue. I think I now understand what he was getting at.

Of course, complicating matters further is the fact that Haruhi is a somewhat unpleasant character herself. Perhaps that’s why Hirano Aya’s voice grates on me so much nowadays? That’s another topic all together, I guess.

Anyway, just a thought. I suppose it might be worth rewatching the show some time soon, just to make sure I’m not being unfair in my assessment.

Regardless of one’s opinion of True Tears, it’s hard to deny that it was a unique take on an otherwise tried and true formula. I suspect it’s for that reason that reaction to the show has generally been positive, bitterness on the part of Isurugi Noe fans notwithstanding. Typically, you would expect a show of this nature to have no shortage of ankle-biting detractors, but I’ve heard genuine praise for True Tears from even some of the most jaded and hardened anime fans I know. That’s pretty impressive.

But why all the good vibes? Nishimura Junji’s excellent direction is notable, to start. His work on Simoun has garnered him a lot of attention as of late, and I think that helped to drive interest in True Tears for a lot of people, myself included. Of course, Nishimura-san has been working in the anime industry for a quite some time now, having been staff on Urusei Yatsura and Director for Ranma 1/2, to name just a couple of older, high profile series. However, his work on True Tears was in many ways most reminiscent of his work on Simoun, be it in his careful use of background music to bridge one scene to the next or in his cuts to highly stylized freeze frames at crucial and climatic moments.

The anime directors I respect most typically leave these sort of calling cards in the shows they work on, to the extent their involvement is instantly recognizable from watching only a single episode. That’s not to say they’re one trick ponies. Rather, I think it’s evidence that they so consistently stray from the ordinary and generic as to be more than “just another anime director.” And, let’s face it: there are a lot of “just another anime director” types in the business.

An anime director is not an island unto himself, however. True Tears also benefited from some surprisingly smart writing, especially given its standard premise. For all of the show’s dramatic cliffhangers, there was no shortage of subtlety and misdirection in both story development and character dialogue. So much in the show was not as it seemed, and it wasn’t until the very end that the story’s theme and purpose came into focus. Even then, it kept me guessing. When Shin’ichiro fell to his knees in anguish in the final episode as Noe slowly limped away, his heart wavering, so did mine. Did the show have one final plot twist up its sleeve? Would it stay the course? I didn’t know. I thought I knew. But, the truth is, I didn’t know anything.

Very few shows can maintain such a high level of apparent unpredictability to the very end without resorting to jarring and implausible plot twists, like a race car driver griding the gears to get ahead one moment, only to fall behind the next. “Exactly as planned,” unpredictability is uncommon in anime. True Tears, on the other hand, had it in spades. I think that’s a pretty clear indicator of how carefully conceived and planned the show was from the very beginning.

Of course, the show’s good points aren’t limited to just the contribution of its Director and the strength of its writing. It’s no secret that the quality of the animation was beyond what you would typically expect from a television series being produced by a previously unknown studio. But, then again, I seem to remember a little studio by the name of Kyoto Animation being relatively unknown when they first burst on the scene a few years back, too. Moral of the story? Pay attention to new animation studios.

And, you know, for all the talk about how this past anime season was a little on the weak side, I have to admit that the combination of True Tears and Aria was more than enough to sate my appetite for good anime through those long and dark winter months. A chicken in the sky is worth two in the coop, I guess.

It may have been a cold and gloomy day with snow flakes flying, and I may have destroyed a hard disk the day before, and I may be thinking, “you know, a vacation sounds nice right about now,” but the news that more Clannad is on the way makes me smile all the same.

Not that it comes as much of a surprise, of course. I haven’t watched the final two episodes of the first season yet, but based on what I’ve heard, it ends in fairly ambiguous fashion. And given that the anime series didn’t even acknowledge a full third of the original game’s content, it only stood to reason that some sort of continuation would be in the works. After all, Kyoto Animation was relatively thorough in its adaptations of Air and Kanon, so I would expect the same for Clannad.

Personally, I’m as happy as can be about the news. I really have found Clannad to be an engaging and enjoyable show, and because the pacing of the story has been very slow and very deliberate, it’s only gotten more engaging and more enjoyable with time. I’m not ready for it to end. No way, no how.

My condolences, of course, to the Melancholy of Suzumiya Haruhi fans out there still waiting for news on a second season of that particular series. It’s no secret that I’m not the world’s biggest Haruhi fan, but I still look forward to a second season of the series because, one, it’ll probably be a fun watch, and two, people will finally shut up about it.

I’ll take more Clannad first, though.