天下制覇

That sounds immensely unhygenic.

Just for the record, this broadcast was delayed 25 minutes because of the usual Japanese stuff. In addition to making my life more ‘fun’ by compressing today’s 7 shows into about a 2 hour period, it also meant that Crunchyroll once again ‘simulcast’ a show before it actually finished airing. Still better than calling a 6 day delay simultaneous though!

Impressions:

I know I say this every season, but can’t I just say Yet Another noitaminA Show^tm and call it a day? Okay, maybe with Guilty Crown and BRS lurking in recent memory that won’t fly. A noitaminA noitaminA show then, with a teenage boy struggling to find his way in life in a world that doesn’t understand or accept him until he finds his One True Friend and is engulfed in the light of heaven and the sound of chimes the moment their hands touch. They then immediately share a bond and even though one of them resists it, the other will follow him to the ends of the Earth, teaching him the true meaning of friendship. Subtle or new, it is not. Of course there’s also a female that sends him into a catatonic state when she calls him by his name. GASP. Another formulative moment in his compelling tale of growing up.

Production’s… okay, I guess. It did get significantly worse as the episode went on. There’s a lot less general focus on music than I expected and it’s not helped by the horribly nasally OP either. Since I’ve started paying particularly close attention to it lately though, the musical direction is at least purposeful instead of randomly slopped in, but most of the time it’s still very minimalistic and often there’s nothing at all… which would be okay if you removed all the maudlin sad-sackness from Kaoru and the long pauses everywhere where Captain Clueless stares in blank surprise. Still, about a third of the ‘songs’ are just drum solos. I’m pretty sure there was at least one actual jazz track in the episode, but I’m not sure I’d be willing to say that there were two.

At least he did a pimp jazz walk at the end. That was easily the high point.