天下制覇

Budget where it counts, I guess. Speedlines notwithstanding.

Logos is pushed to the back of the queue because A.) continuing series and B.) I don't like it much. Lupin is pushed to the back as well because its broadcast was delayed almost an hour and a half due to rugby. Yeah, I see where we stand, Lupin.

Impressions:

If the whole thing was animated as well as it is in very brief spurts, it'd go a long way to making the blobby figures look a little better and a lot less like their mouths and eyes are slowly being sucked into their noses. It'd also give me a little more hope for the future since the OP and ED are basically all about the helium-filled little girl instead of lancing or knighting. Sure, that's the direction I expected, but it would've been nice to be surprised, especially since they did show at least a few glimmers here that they have an idea how to direct and animate action scenes. That makes the 80% of the episode that's barely animated and completely by the numbers sting a little bit. Also somewhat mystifying is the flamenco music that kicks in whenever it's time for heroics. It might fit better if the scenes were lighter instead of a lot of grunting and giant lances, but alas.

I think comparisons to Hayate the Combat Butler are probably inevitable, but this is trying to take itself more seriously and be less of a gag, despite the 'joke' that the kid is oblivious to his identity even though he's even worse than Superman at hiding it. It's also full of a lot more simply blank space in general. Humor that falls flat is obnoxious, but this filled its empty spaces with largely unneeded background exposition, like it feels the need to get all of that spat out up front or people might not be able to fill in the gaps themselves. Gaps like it's sad to have dead parents and now she's found a hero and a friend all but stamped on the audience's face. Also not tremendously welcome is the rest of the harem, in particular the horse and girl 'comedy' duo who are there for maybe about 45 seconds of the episode but spend their entire screen time shrieking at the top of their lungs.

It was a very token and unambitious opening episode, and not particularly interesting in and of itself. It does more to roll the eyes with bad cliches and over explaining than anything else, although does show a glimmer of effort very rarely. A glimmer that I expect to be completely gone by possibly as early as next week.

Next Episode:

Blondie and the horse.