Panty and Stocking 10 – So Awesome, I Feel the Need to Blog Again and Even Make a New Poll
That's a picture of my brain in it's current state 
Before I get to the awesomeness, I feel the need to get a little meta.
A quick look at the previous post’s title shows that I haven’t written anything for The Null Set in roughly 3 weeks. This was entirely unplanned and was the result of several factors falling into place at exactly the wrong time. The first was a general sapping of enthusiasm towards anime brought on by looking forward and discovering that the next season just looks appallingly abysmal. (The new series by Gainax and Shaft will probably turn out good and that’s probably it.)
Second, many of the series this season, both great and not-so-great, haven’t really played-out in a way that I feel like I have something to blog about. The sequels to Arakawa Under the Bridge and Sora No Otoshimono have gone the way I wanted them to (focus on Nino, explore the story behind Synapse) and I’ve really been satisfied with them. If they had failed or gone in an interesting direction, I’d have something to talk about; instead, all I got is saying that both sequels do justice to their respective franchises. Shows like The World Only God Knows, Amagami SS, Shinryaku! Ika Musume, Yosuga no Sora, Soredemo Machi wa Mawatteiru, Samurai Girls and Otome Yokai Zakuro have ranged from watchable to pretty good but have done so without creating waves. For example, Ika Musume is a decent comedy about a squid girl that shows up with the intent to invade humanity and really sucks at being an invader. This description more then adequately explains all 9 episodes of the show that I’ve seen so far; there’s nothing else I need to add. Soredemo turned into a fairly standard Shaft/Shinbou series and most anime fans already know where they stand in relation to Shaft/Shinbou. (That makes it cool in my book.)
There’s been a few new standouts this season – Milky Holmes (one of the best shows this season and one of the best comedies of the year) and Panty and Stocking (Gainax doing what Gainax does best) – but there is a limit to how often I’m willing to repeat myself. And other awesome shows like Jellyfish Princess that’s already getting tons of coverage. The third reason for the lack of blogging is the ol’ real life excuse, you know the one. In my case, suffice it to say that nothing horrible happened and it mainly dealt with getting ready for Thanksgiving and/or Christmas. (For example, my family’s iron-clad tradition to have one’s Christmas tree up and decorated before Thanksgiving, even when it’s near impossible to find a tree farmer/seller that’ll open before Thanksgiving.)
Now onto the tenth episode of Panty and Stocking.
I haven’t been the only person to realize that the really awesome Part B half-episodes seem to be matched with very weak Part A half-episodes. I’m starting to think it’s done on purpose; either Gainax is stuck using the weak ones and figured they’d do the least damage when paired up with a great half-episode or Gainax is purposely making a few poor half-episodes because they just feel like it.
So upon finishing the disappointing Part A to episode 10, I hoped and guessed the pattern was going to hold and it did. Before hitting the pure awesomeness, the show took a detour through a middle mini-episode that was rather odd until I realized what Gainax was doing. The entire 3 part Chuck mini-episode was to set a joke up involving the final scene, namely, a literal mind screwing to cap off a figurative mind screw mini-episode. I got a good laugh at the slyness of Gainax in acknowledging their own often mind screw type endings.
The highlight of the episode was the final mini-episode, the animated music video for one of the insert songs that Gainax has been using in Panty and Stocking. This is a field that Gainax has been exploring over the last couple of years with Gurren Lagann and I’m glad to see Gainax is starting to do the same with this show. It was probably the most awesome 5 minutes of anime this season will see and quickly becomes one of the highlights of the year. Screenshots to follow with a poll at the bottom.
The parodies were awesome and this was just some of them.
The poll question deals with the following screenshots.
American edition
Indian version
Australian version
Russian version
Spanish version
Greek version
Japanese version
And because Stocking is my favorite character:
GAINAX, as it has been said for sometime on Twitter by others now, is just showing that the plot is not necessary to make a good series, what matters is the execution. I mean look at the show – someone put it well when he said that GAINAX is just doing it because they can. And this episode’s music video definitely shows that very well.
PSG OST needs to be out right now. 29th December is just too far away. :\
The first was a general sapping of enthusiasm towards anime brought on by looking forward and discovering that the next season just looks appallingly abysmal.
It’s your chance to catch up on some anime shows that you haven’t gotten to yet.
26 episodes of Heroic Age. Two seasons of Code Geass. The Third Aoi Hitomi
I’m at episode 9 of Imouto and judging by other comments on the show, I get the impression it was designed for a demographic of 24-34 year olds. That’s basically the cut off. Too old and it’ll feel too creepy. Too young and it’ll feel like a downer full of teen angst.
The reason why young people would get depressed from watching it is because the main protagonist isn’t very buff and cool. He’s literally taking responsibility above and beyond the call of duty. That’s not a concept your average high schooler or even college student knows anything about. Which is why I find it hilarious. He gets all these hits on him and it’s just funny the way she treats him. It’s like a comedic act. I don’t get bothered by it because the protagonist isn’t bothered by it. Then there’s the whole sub-plot joke about eroge and little sisters. I found Chaos;Head hilarious precisely because it was a satire and joke on otaku culture and people’s reactions to it. Half of the time I wasn’t sure whether I was laughing at Kirino playing eroge or laughing at me watching Kirino in an anime play eroge on a pc game, while I’m watching on a pc to see whether Kirino’s anime show launches. Where is the 4th wall here again?
People that are too young will generally get hit hard by the societal rejection phase Kirino goes into, plus the family pressure. Teenagers know very well how that works. So they see it in an anime and it just feedbacks into their direct experience. It’s not a story like Naruto or Bleach where the hero overcomes odds through willpower and personal power.
Imouto also targets young adults that actually have sisters. For those individuals, the impact value will be much higher. It’s not as funny as Arakawa at times, since it also satirizes slice of life shows. The time taken up there feels like things are going slow like a slice of life, but things are All wrong lol. At times, I wasn’t sure if they intentionally botch jokes or was it an intentional mistake just to make whoever is watching as uncomfortable as the people in the scene. As a form of entertainment, I must say it is rather broad spectrum and very exciting, at the least. Because I also laugh at grim humour or jokes on violence, that’s also part of my positive reception.
Otome Yokai Zakuro has some interesting character interactions. Don’t want to go into any detail here, though. Suffice it to say that the romantic relationships are rather well done in terms of development. I like how much is communicated through body language. Something I usually don’t see often in movies that focus on the action and not the characters.
@Panther : Ditto that, I want the OST now. Seeing it get licensed, given a high quality dub and show on American television would also be awesome but I don’t think that’s very likely.
@ymarsakar: I do have a few series squirreled away that will probably come out in the winter but I do need more. Code Geass has been a series I’ve always meant to get back to but haven’t so far. Maybe it’s time is coming up.
Otome Yokai Zakuro seriously needed to be 24-26 episodes long. That’s the length that the non-comedies of J.C. Staff seem to work best at. I too have been enjoying the character interactions but I know they can do much better with story and plot development and character development.
Little Sister, Oreimo, has been a real oddball for me. Parts of it, mainly the interactions between the siblings, get it right (for instance, most of my younger sisters have no qualms about punching me in the shoulder, back, etc. several times a day when their around me) and are enjoyable because it is done so well. Then there’s Kirino’s life and hobbies. It seems just way to implausible and makes it hard for me to stay focused on the show and not derailed into figuring out how she has the time to do everything that she supposedly does, for example.
out how she has the time to do everything that she supposedly does, for example.
His brother probably wonders about that too. A little bit of his true historical feelings leaked out when he was negotiating with the anime studio.
Hopefully, you didn’t try watching the second season without finishing the first of Code Geass. Kind of big spoiler there. On the other hand, if they had used the start of 2nd season for the ending of the first season, that would have been horrible. I can very well see American companies doing that just to pull people’s heartstrings.
Code Geass is sort of like a super Greek tragedy. So be prepared for some emotional rollercoasters. There are only a few school slice of life comedy episodes to break up the pacing. I guess for winter, it’s a fitting tribute to humanity’s darkest season and most depressing one at that.
The ending of it all was bittersweet and well done. Even for me, someone that goes out of my way to research guerilla warfare, revolutionary wars, and different styles of government, I could see no glaring inconsistency at the end to muddy my head around. As the True Ending (FIN) came nearer and nearer, I worried that they weren’t going to be able to hold the story’s internal consistency together with so many characters and crazy events going on. The ending episode was truly magnificent though. I rewatched it numerous times. Worthy of the best Japanese visual novel stories. As you neared the FIN, the rollercoaster ride that is Code Geass starts cresting the mountain and then you see an almost vertical sheer drop, free fall, of almost a mile coming up. That fear of the coaster (series) not making it gets rather thick.
I wonder if your tendency to prefer more variety than marathoning shows, has to do with your difficulties in suspending disbelief for Imouto.
Correction: her brother.
I too have been enjoying the character interactions but I know they can do much better with story and plot development and character development.
I wonder why they gave the game away with the main villain. I mean, he just looks like a main villain. What’s the point of hiding his identity if the character design just makes him look evil? I mean, was that an intentional in joke or was it a real blunder.
Addressing episode 10 of Imouto:
Kate: Starry Night
Undistributed Blade Works
That was too much. Had to pause the video for about 30 seconds before I could stop laughing.
Fate: Stay Night
Unlimited Blade Works
Is what it was satirizing. The art promo was pretty funny too. FSN was originally a visual novel slash eroge. It turn turned into an anime. And then they reproduced it for tv by shortening it. Then they made a movie on Tohsaka’s route, which was called Unlimited Blade Works.
It’s a great story, although anime adaptations had some logic consistency issues due to the amount of stuff they were compressing. They got the highlights, especially after they learned from Fate. Fate, after all, was only 1/3rd of the story. Stuff was intentionally left out, so it didn’t really make for a complete anime, even if they had done things 100% right. Which they didn’t, of course. It’s one of the side effects of NOT having the author compose the series for you. Other people just don’t know the author’s world and plot events as intuitively and intimately as the author or a author that was a fan. Unfortunately, most authors have no idea how to compose a series for anime. Unfortunately. Tow, the creator of the story for Heroic Age, wrote the original story (he’s an up and coming SF writer) and composed it. And it ended up great. I wish I could see of that kind of cohesion.
The American equivalent would be michael J, the creator and director of Babylon 5. Or Firefly’s creator, which as the same as the creator of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
A note on some recent episodes.
In Arakawa 2X 10, the level of suspension of disbelief far exceeds anything relating to Kirino’s hobbies in Imouto for me. That’s why I don’t find it a problem to reconcile plot events consistently with each other.
Reading some of the English translation of the Ore Imouto Kawaii ja nei novel, it’s told from Kyousuke’s point of view and there’s often internal dialogue and comments you don’t see in the anime. That has an interesting effect as it covers up a lot of Kyousuke’s real motivations for his actions. So while his behavior looks externally one way, internally he’s doing it for different reasons than you might guess just by watching him.
It became quite clear to me in a very short time that Kyousuke has a sort of inferiority complex inside the internal family dynamic and prefers peace and quiet, much like that guy in Ore no Otoshimono. That is motivated by a sense of risk. If you don’t go out of your way to reach for a dream, then you won’t get hurt if you fail. Kirino, on the other hand, is a completely different existence. The anime only hinted once or twice at this, but the novel confirmed my suspicions.
Logically, that infers that Kyousuke’s reactions in episode 11 is motivated by something rather deeper and more complex than has been reviewed by the anime so far.
To quote from chapter 4, Volume 1:
“Oh yeah, I was getting excited and got off topic. Let me get back to it. Yeah, I did help my sister yesterday. I convinced my father and let him accept her hobby.
But you see, I didn’t do that to be thanked by her. I didn’t do that wanting something in return. I’m not repeating some famous person’s line but…
I just did what I wanted to, the way I wanted to. All selfishly, I just meddled with things.
As a result, what I obtained is something within myself, and not something I get from another. ”
What’s it called, jigoku manzouku? Something like self-satisfaction. For a person that has striven to live a long and non-ambitious social and school life, taking risks and additional responsibilities is… perhaps exciting or risky or dangerous or fun.
This is why I like flashback + internal dialogue episodes. It’s a great way to bundle together interpretations of people’s actions without trying to fit them in for every episode as they happen. If you skip them, you can still compress a pretty hefty chunk of internal monologue impressions into one episode if you chain them all together using the images to tell character/time/event location.
In Cross Game, the repetition of this person’s wishes, even though she isn’t active in the baseball plot, makes you feel that she is still around and having an active role. It’s a good device to contrast internal tension without showing it as part of a plot event that requires the interaction of other active characters.
Kyousuke’s voice actor, Tomoya in Clannad, certainly did get the expressions right. It’s just as funny in print as on screen. I would have preferred that they had spent some of the slower episodes on flashback internal monoogues for Kyousuke, so that he could comment on the various plot events that had unfolded. It would have helped the audience see what was going on from his perspective.
And there’s plenty of stuff going on with Kyousuke. Almost as much with Kirino with her top 5 scores in the prefecture, sport clubs, modeling part time job, and so on. From Kirino’s perspective, Kyousuke has basically ignored her for her entire life. He didn’t even know that she had top scores or which clubs she was in. That’s an interesting relationship to overlay all this other stuff on top of it. I re confirm my judgment that this isn’t for the normal high school demographic age population. It’s much too complicated. I think people might actually feel worse knowing that Kyousuke has a sort of grudge against Kirino yet still goes out of his way for her benefit. There’s no resolution to this issue in the beginning. Maybe there’s one at the end, though.
Well obviously the new series by Gainax and Shaft will be good, lol.
Augh! Everyone’s ranting about PS+G…and it’s Gainax…man I need to watch it…haven’t had any time lately…can barely keep up with Arakawa…@,@