By my title I of course mean nothing else than the anime series, "Kampfer." This series had me laughing just about the entire time. The dialogue in this anime for some reason is some of the most hilarious I have ever seen in an anime. Even the abridged series created off of this led me to laughing even further, which I didn't even know was possible.
This anime is about a boy named Natsuru Senou who discovers one day that he is apparently a Kampfer. The only issue about Kampfers is that they must be girls. This being the case, Natsuru must change in to a woman in order to use his abilities to fight. Of course, he is far from creative when he chooses his name as a woman and is referred by the exact same title as a woman as to when he is a man. It is a little ridiculous, but practically every girl in school throws themselves on the female Natsuru, falling deeply in love with him.
However, Natsuru is caught in this conflict between himself and the girl he loves, Sakura. He loves her, but she only loves the girl version of him.And of course, all of the other featured characters in this series seem to like him, but the guy version.
Anyways, the plot develops, we see some comical scenes then boom, we got an ending for a very short anime. It was only a half season, but it was a good half season. This series caused me to laugh harder than I ever have in my life regarding an actual anime. I recommend it strongly if you are sad for some reason or just need a good kick to get you up and going again. Story wise, it contained some things that make you feel as though you have seen it before, but dialogue wise, this anime is solid gold.
This by far is up as one of my favorite animes (as well as manga) of all time. I can't doubt that if I ever met Hiroyuki Takei in my life that I would tackle him and give him a huge hug, thanking him for one of the best things he has ever given to my life. What might this be? None other than the lovely anime and manga, Shaman King.
This is one of Hiroyuki's more popular ideas, but it is surprisingly not as popular as I feel it should be. This anime is not mainstream, and I often get very excited whenever I find someone who has at least heard about it.
My history with this anime is that one day my friend was spending the night. She showed me ".hack//Legend of the Twilight Bracelet" and I felt a rage of jealousy that she found a new anime, and I felt that if I obsessed over it, she would get mad at me. Don't get me wrong, I became a fan of it and all worked out well from what I presumed. However, I woke up pretty early the next day and was sitting in my bed, my friend asleep next to me and I was flipping through channels, hoping to find something that I could become a fan of myself.
Lucky for me, I came across a wonderful thing. I flipped to (unfortunately 4kids tv to which I later learned was purely evil, but I was an innocent 5th grader.) this station in which I saw a woman with green hair and a zombie panda on her dress talking to a group of boys. I don't know what it was that hooked me, but I felt my eyes fix on the screen and I was absolutely dazzled and felt my eyes twinkle with joy.
Thus I became hooked to this series. I spent every Saturday morning glued to my television as I waited for this series. I didn't care that I started about 20 episodes too late, I devotedly watched this up until the end, never even thinking about leaving its side. I was loyal to this anime.
The day I discovered that they made a special for it on cartoon network showing a few episodes, I nearly fainted of joy. It was sixth grade and my mother and her boyfriend were going out. They asked if I wanted to go to some place with them and I objected instantly. I would refuse to leave Shaman King's side. There would be four episodes, right there on cartoon network and I was not about to abandon that.
The day I began buying the manga too was glorious. It was the day in which I separated myself from 4kids evil curse and learned the truths about this anime. It made me fall even more in love with it. However, it soon led my youthful self into bankruptcy. I didn't care if I had no money to buy anything else, I would scrounge around for any coins and try and make something up into $8.61 (Yes, I memorized the price with tax by that point) and then beg my mom to take me to HEB to convert the coins to dollars then drag me to the book store so that I could buy the latest volume. Wow...I remember back when I bought the 7th volume. I was so distraught because I had been waiting for so long for them to release it in America, and I only had $5 saved, which wasn't enough and my mother was kind enough to give me the rest, even though she didn't really have the money for it.
In other words...Shaman King in turn kept me happy as a child.
As I grew up, I began to study and memorize many different attributes to Shaman King. I studied the characters inside and out and memorized the plot and any little extra snippets that Hiroyuki included. I ultimately became a fan of this series and I can never leave it now, not that I would want to. I try my hardest at every chance I get to uncover more and more about this anime. When Hiroyuki created Shaman King Flowers, I was incredibly excited, but I was disappointed that Hiroyuki has yet to continue it.
On to the idea of Shaman King however, I now have 30 of the manga and practically praise Hiroyuki's work. I scramble to get a new volume each time one comes out, but it is practically a commute for me to obtain them. You see, my town's book store neglects re-shelving the books and it can go for months at a time before any series is updated. Pathetic really. This being the case, it is when I happen to visit some book store from outside of town that I see new volumes of Shaman King and I unintentionally buy them when I mean to save my money.
A prime example was when I went to New York in summer's past, I was running through a Barns&Nobles, freaking about how excited I was to find the manga section. I darted through all four levels till I found it through the aid of an employee. My mother of course followed me, complaining as to how, "I could find these anywhere else and it was pointless to buy them here." But come on, it was Shaman King and it was New York City. How could I resist?
This being the case, I bought one of them. However, I somehow managed later when we were walking around Greenwich to convince them to go into another book store. (I was not with just my mother, I had a friend and my mother's friend as well) During this time, my friend got caught up in reading, and I said I would be right back. My mother and her friend stated as to how they were going to look around, so I found what level they were on and made sure to avoid them. I darted to the manga section and grabbed two of the Shaman King manga and darted for the register downstairs. I can't doubt that I looked really suspicious when I stuffed them in my purse. I made sure that the security guard saw that I bought them as I held the receipt out obviously as I stuffed the manga in the plastic bag right into my purse. It was then an adventure trying to hide behind shelves trying to avoid my mom seeing me. I soon got back to my friend, exhausted and collapsed to the ground.
These are the levels I go to for Shaman King.
When I found out that Shaman King had video games, I think I stopped breathing momentarily. Over time, I acquired two GBA games and one PS2 game, but I never beat any of them. I lost the PS2 game and am desperately trying to find it, and I got stuck on both of my GBA games. I have never been more depressed about nerdy stuff aside from the time I could not buy the Mnemosyne DVD box set. (Which will be explained on another day.)
Anyways, it is about time that I start explaining as to why I gave the post the title that it has.
Well you see, Shaman King is a story based around a young shaman named, Yoh Asakura. He is originally from Izumo where he has been trained his entire life to fight in the "500 Year Shaman Tournament" that is hosted by the Patch Tribe in which Yoh is to become Shaman King (The title given to the winner). The reason that the Asakura family is placing such high priorities on his shoulders is because the antagonist of the series, Hao, had been reborn in to the Asakura bloodline, so thus it was their fate, along with many others, to prevent him from becoming Shaman King so that he doesn't destroy the Earth.
This is pretty much narrated through Manta Oyamada, who becomes best friends with the main character, Yoh. Although the story follows Yoh, all of the explanations and deep seeded moments are displayed through Manta's point of view.
Once Yoh left Izumo, he was sent to Tokyo upon which he was set to live near Funbari Hill with his fiancee, Anna Kyoyama. Anna is essentially in charge for preparing her future husband for the tournament by sending him through back breaking, unrealistic forms of exercising that no human could truly live day to day performing. In all honesty, Yoh simply wants to be able to live a carefree life once he is Shaman King, and Anna wants to become his queen.
Anna gives off a very harsh impression that radiates through everyone that gives her the title as "cruel." However, Anna is tsundere if anyone has ever cared to notice. She is in fact very tough, mean, and acts as if she doesn't care, but on few occasions, it is seen in which she shows a bit of compassion. In actuality, she does love Yoh, she admits it to Manta on several occasions. Above the boys complete idiocy, she still cares for him, it is just never seen. They in turn have a child named "Hana" upon which the series, "Shaman King Flowers" is based upon.
Anyways, over the course of the Shaman Tournament, Yoh develops strong friendships with those he meets along the way and unintentionally teaches long lasting life lessons that he never figured would influence people quite the ways it did. The guy is good as giving friendship speeches that don't make you go, "Ugh...shut up about the friendship already." It probably could be that Yoh in general is such a lovable character.
The final episodes leading up to the finale of Shaman King had me at wits end. I almost felt as if I couldn't wait the grueling weeks for them to add a new episode. Those last few weeks were the most torturous moments of my childhood. I felt as if Hiroyuki Takei was just toiling with my mind and I was about to lose it. They way the episodes ended, I had to know what was next. Unfortunately for me, my laptop at the time played no videos (since it was very old) and I had no knowledge of anime streaming sites.
He pulled one of the biggest plot twists that had me grabbing my television screen while sobbing and shouting, "Why? WHY?!" Imagine that sight. An awkward sixth grader begging a television set for answers. However, every time I awoke on a Saturday I received more answers, only to spawn more questions.
I believe I actually recorded the last episode...that way I could forever watch it's beauty. With the last episode, I was completely in it. Nothing could drag my attentions away from wanting to view the last spectacular moments of this anime. The way it ended however...
It only led me to more questions...
I was so confused...
My mind didn't know what to think. I kept rewatching it and rewatching it. Trying to understand if that truly was the end...but my heart got a little excited about it.
The moral of this is however, I am obsessed with Shaman King. I am not necessarily sure if that is a moral, but it is the point of this post. I literally have a mini heart attack any time that I see anything that is relatively similar to Shaman King. In my world history class when my teacher asked what a shaman was, I instantly raised my hand and explained it in full detail. (Yes, it is explained in the manga.) This being the point of the title: I want to go to Izumo one day because Yoh is from Izumo. Yes, that is truly the actual reason I wish to go. I could lie and state it is some other reason, which there are some, but that is honestly the true reason I wish to pack my bags and spend hundreds of dollars just to go to a place in Japan.
Hopefully you can tell that I am being completely sarcastic about my title. However, on my real point of this, I just finished watching "To Aru Kagaku no Railgun." Little to my knowledge though, I was unaware that this is simply a branch off of "To Aru Majustsu no Index" which I now feel compelled to watch.
Fortunately, I have high hopes for the actual anime itself that this series is based. After watching this anime, I found that it was very interesting and definitely had a plot that was worth sticking around for. I fell in love with each of the characters and felt that you really got a grasp for each of them.
For those unknowing of what I am speaking of, "To Aru Kagaku no Railgun" (Translated into English as "A Certain Scientific Railgun") is based off of the anime, "To Aru Majustsu no Index" (Translated into English as "A Certain Magical Index") in which it follows the character Misaka Mikoto to whom which is a level 5 esper.
She, along with other students reside in a city called, "Academy City" which is comprised of 80% students and is said to have technologies approximately 20 to 30 years beyond modern society. This city was built to help children essentially better their esper abilities. The students are based on a level of 0 to 5 as to how well they can use their abilites, 0 being a non-ability user and 5 being a very advanced ability user. Clearly however, there are not many who are level 5s, so that is what makes the main character, Misaka, ever so popular and praised.
Which ties in to my reasoning for the title. I believe this was actually mentioned in one of the specials. Anywho, Misaka's ability is essentially to control electricity. Now, I don't mean to demean her in any way considering I loved her character, but she really looks like a Pikachu when she uses her abilities for most of the series.
On a different note though, I must say that they do a good job at create epic scenes. At the mid-season battle, you really got a feel for the character, Harumi and it led to a great weave of the plot that would soon be carried out into the actual finale. You essentially get to know that she is considered a "good evil" in a way. She in turn is bad by her actions, but they are for a legitimately good purpose.
Upon which I must comment that the finale of Railgun made me feel such an array of emotions. The creators really knew how to pull out every bit of emotion you could feel. During a huge battle in which Misaka was fighting on a car made me incredibly pumped and super excited, then the next scene made me want to claw my desk and jump in the anime itself and take out the character leading to a scene that had me sobbing that all led up to a spectacular ending in which I felt satisfied. This anime really knows how to pull it's audience in and let them feel completely like the characters feel.
But the fan service! Not that I object to it, but my goodness it appeared as if they had no clue what to do next. After the mid-season battle between Harumi and Misaka, it appeared as they thought, "What do we do next?" "Until we come up with something, let's just put them in swimsuits and let them prance around for an episode. That won't lose us any ratings." And my goodness, it surely could not. Why? It essentially became this:
Two girls from the swim team whose names I never learned: "Hey, we need some people to pose for swimsuit modeling."
Misaka and Kuroko: "Sure."
And then it somehow turned into eight or so girls running around in swimsuits for about twenty minutes. But wow, they could not have made it any better. Seeing a Tsundere prance around in a ruffled bikini is one of the cutest things I have ever laid eyes on. However, they even still had that appeal to an older audience in which Mii came out in this swimsuit with her amazing body to comment, "There aren't any larger ones, but this will do" and a swim team girl states, "Must be nice..." Yes, men all around Japan were dropping their jaws at that moment.
However, it isn't the only bit of fan service that this anime contained. There was in fact an entire episode in which Misaka was a maid, and then in a dress playing violin. But that is a completely other story.
When I got to the specials however, I couldn't help but think that the writers thought this: "We are out of ideas and they want some specials out of us...what do we do?" "Why don't we call up the animators and voice actors and just let them...improvise?" And thus, the animators and voice actors just kind of derped around for eight minutes at a time. They were funny, but it was obvious that they just needed something to fill the time.
Aside from it's flaws however, "To Aru Kagaku no Railgun" definitely was an interesting and very funny experience. I would recommend it to anyone who wants to essentially get worked up in an anime and see school girls essentially be school girls that from time to time actually serve a purpose. However, it does contain a great amount of side stories that weave excellently into the plot which allow for some good character development.
The name of this was taking from the manga, "What A Wonderful World" which translates into "Subarashii Sekai" in Japan. For those wondering as to why I chose this, I found the manga to something of a rather interesting tale.
For those who do not know, "What A Wonderful World" is a manga that was created by Asano Inio. The plot of this two volume series is essentially taking you through the life of several characters in Japan. It allows you to get an experience as to how they live and the hardships they face and whether or not they can overcome these difficulties. All in all, it ties to the title that each of them wish to live in a wonderful world.
Over time, you some how find yourself just falling in love with the characters despite the fact each may be featured for no more than two or three chapters. Strangely, Asano somehow manages to connect you very quickly to each of his characters. They each carry their own personalities that make them unique while you still acquire this idea as to how people actually live and act in the real world and the thought processes in their minds.
One of my personal favorite stories within this manga is the chapter entitled, "The Bear From the Forest." It is the tale as to how a school student gets kidnapped by this man who wears a bear suit. He threatens her to do certain tasks for him while he stays in hiding. The reason being is that he himself is being chased by a far more criminal group of people than himself. He tells the girl that if she does all of his tasks, he will let her go and give her X amount of dollars. She of course, not having much other choices, does the tasks for him.
Over time however, it is clear that the girl develops a sense of Stockholm Syndrome for this mysterious masked bear man. She in turn gives him a little synopsis of an event that happened to her, one that completely turned her life upside down, and he counters by doing the same. She tells of a time when she was in love with her teacher and he got her pregnant, and he tells of a time in which he and his wife fought to a violent level.
All in all, after they shared these tales with one another, it was when they had been discovered. The bear man insisted that she leave but she demanded that she stay, she had wanted to be with him. However, he grabbed her head and held it close, explaining to her that he knew what it was like to be in a situation like hers. He told her that in life there are the good and the bad, and that she should aim for the good in life and not end up like him.
He managed to get her out alive. At the last second tossing her the briefcase with all of the money, then willingly accepted death from the group that was after him.
But that is the thing about "What A Wonderful World", it has these beautiful stories that don't quite work out the way you hope for. They work out with reality. (To an extent. There are a few magical themes in there.) You actually get a feel for "If I was in this situation of normal life, this is how it would actually be." It isn't just a mix up of some unreal fantasy that you see in most other story plots. (Not that I am stating I dislike them, it is merely nice to see a change every so often). All in all, it gives the reader a good way to connect to the tales depicted on a more realistic level.
Not to mention, I much enjoy the art style. The drawings in "What A Wonderful World" really allow us to see a different style from the norm. Not that I am dishing on other styles, but this art never seems to be very popular in the manga and anime genre. It is a great change to see an art style like this and personally it is one of my favorites.
All in all if I had to state, I feel like I would definitely give this a 4.5 out of 5 stars. The story line, art, and character developments really tie in well together while give you something from the standard school girls and magic you see so often.
But back to this being my first blog post. The above is the reason that I entitled this blog, "Subarashii Sekai" for it is a wonderful story that I fell in love with. Granted it is not my favorite, but it is one of those that fall up in some of the best manga I have come across in my lifetime.
To those curious as to what this blog will be, I hope to center it around discussions of anime I have watched and manga I have read throughout my lifetime. It may stray every so often, but it will essentially contain those roots. I hope to review, suggest, and strengthen your minds about the good, the bad, and the unique ideas that creators come along with as well as maybe a few snippets about my life. And as a closing, I leave you with this video. Since "What A Wonderful World" has no anime adaptation I know of, I will leave you with the spectacular video of Chatmonchy's song, "Sekai Ga Owaru Yoru Ni".
