天下制覇

Girl on girl makes it silly!

Season Premier Disclaimer:

I like to check almost every new show out. The value of a show is in its execution, not its premise. That said, my tastes are mine and mine alone. Some things bother me, some things don’t. I will attempt to be as cogent as possible as to my complaints or compliments for each show, but be aware that my views skew heavily towards the center. Nothing is perfect, nothing is irredeemable. That said, my tastes and my opinions are mine and mine alone and should not be construed as fact or, god help us, some kind of erudite critical analysis of the entire series based on the show’s first 20 minutes. Feel free to leave your own thoughts on the show if you’d like, but invective and similar will be mocked or deleted depending on which amuses me more at the time.

Impressions:

AAAAAAAAAAARGH. I know that studios love their CG vehicles and I already knew about the city’s CG windmills, but the CG soda can with CG soda? Come on. I could still be a bit riled up from Bantorra’s abuse of CG, but I doubt it. Unfortunately, the removal of Touma and Index is kind of a mixed blessing for this show so far. Sure, the exposition and a lot of the magical nonsense is gone, but with it goes any notion of a plot. This episode was dull to the point of tedium until the last two or three minutes. The school takes an ESP test, Kuroko gropes Mikoto in the shower (okay, that part wasn’t that dull), and then they go out for crepes because Mikoto wants a frog charm. Damn you, JCStaff and your bloody detestable frogs. The direction in general was pretty weak all around, although I did find the crotch cam and the subtle messages clusmy enough to laugh at. That’s something, I guess

Production was more or less the same as the first season of Index otherwise, although there were a few minor shifts in art style. The music a bit better and we didn’t hear the weird techno themes at all, thankfully. The fight at the end was also decent, but it was still on par with what Kampfer did, just for about two minutes instead of closer to a third of the episode. And involved many different spinning CG items. Sometimes a coin, sometimes a car. At least Kuroko was very Nightcrawleresque in her teleportation martial arts. That certainly doesn’t forgive the other 95% of the episode for being as dull as dishwater, but it at least jolted me out of my stupor just in time for the ED/OP credits to roll.

Well, I guess I prefer it over Bantorra, but I’m not about to go singing its praises just yet either. Maybe if they can get a plot moving in the next episode, things will get a little more engaging. They’ve got the pieces here to make a good ol’ sentai show in either the vein of ZKC or I’d even settle for a Burn Up, but if this episode is indicative of the rest of the season, then I’m probably going to opt out early.

Preview:

Kuroko has more delusions.