Sora wo Kakeru Shoujo

Thoughts: Imagining Lelouch as an eyeball is pretty amusing.
Blogging?: No
First off, the episode itself wasn’t bad. It’s just, I don’t think I could stand blogging this show for more than 2 episodes. It’s a very unique show, and I don’t mean that in a bad sense. Anyways, the best part is that Jun Fukuyama (Lelouch of Code Geass) was also doing the voice for the robotic eyeball named Leopard. That was the major source of comedy in this episode. Otherwise, the potato robots that were hanging around the humans were pretty lame. The female lead wasn’t that interesting either. The cat-eared character looks like they could have some potential in the next episode. Though, I will keep watching the series since it has Jun Fukuyama and it could get better.

Zoku Natsume Yuujinchou

Thoughts: Nyanko-sensei never gets old.
Blogging?: Yes
The first episode was amazing. The OP and ED scenes dazzled me and I got excited to resume watching this series again. I do like how the OP and ED portray winter, since we’re in the winter season of anime at the moment. The comedy is still fresh and it looks like the side characters will possibly play more important roles now that we’re getting further into the story.  We’ll see even more interesting spirits pop up around Natsume in a few episodes I bet. It’s also nice to see that the character designs seem a bit better too.

White Album

Thoughts: This series has the best music out of the entire winter season.
Blogging?: Yes
The characters were portrayed with a lot of emotion focused on them. I’m glad to say that this doesn’t look like just another romance story. The plot looks like it has an actual direction to go in, rather than some other series that start off randomly at some points. It looks like it could be a bumpy ride from what Touya’s dream has shown about Yuki’s decision to become an idol. Yuki has a lot of potential to grow and become a good character if done correctly, and it’s important to have her become more decisive. Having Nana Mizuki helps this show out a lot I’d say. The OP and vocal song sung by Rina were fantastic. Hopefully we see good results from Yuki.

Thoughts: Two Nyanko-senseis are double the trouble!
Overall Rating: 9
This series really turned out to be worth the wait. Many other series just do not make me laugh like this one does. The sequencing of the scenes in the opening song were well done. The music fit perfectly in with everything, and I asked myself if this was the same Natsume Yuujinchou I had watched before in the previous season.

We start off with Natsume getting hit in the head with a soccer ball while he’s laying on a wall. After falling over, a demon crawls out from the bushes and chases him. Natsume runs into a similar seal that unsealed Madara from his prison in season one. A black version of Nyanko-sensei pops out and follows Natsume home. Gotta love Nyanko-sensei laying right next to his counterpart. The black cat snatches the Book of Friends and Natsume and Nyanko-sensei chase after it. Natsume runs into a spirit named Beniya, and it turns out that she knew Madara. She helps disguise Natsume as a spirit to let him mingle with the demons in the festival in order to find out where the black cat went.

This episode stayed true to the first season, in that it had some comedy mixed in with the usual spirit and demon encounters. The pace of the episode went pretty fast considering it was just episode 1. It makes me wonder how much plot development we’ll see in the next couple episodes. I do hope that Natsume opens up about seeing spirits to a few of his classmates. It would make the story much more interesting.

Thoughts: A lot of emotion was in this episode.
Overall Rating: 9
I didn’t think that this would be such a serious series right off the bat. It was also nice seeing a lot of different side characters introduced in just one episode. It really helps keep you interested in what their connection was to the main character. I was stunned by the OP song. Nana Mizuki really did a great job on it. It’s my favorite opening of the season so far.

White Album starts off with the main character, Touya, having a dream about his close friend Yuki. In the dream, Yuki becomes an idol and won’t be able to stay with Touya any longer. By the looks of it, this will be an important plot device for future episodes. They’ll probably make Touya keep thinking of this dream in order for him to get more motivation to ask Yuki out seriously. The thing I didn’t like was that Touya was basically a lazy bum and spaced out quite a bit at times. His apartment was a mess, and he got fired from his part time job for being late. I understand it’s just the first episode, but I’m still tired of seeing lazy bum character meets pretty girl.

Eventually, Touya meets up with Yuki at the school and only gets a couple minutes to actually talk with her. It’s obvious he needs to be a little more assertive. He meets up with a few acquaintences and one helps him get a job at the store Echoes. It was pretty nice to see that his friend had a crush on Misaki and hasn’t asked her out for 5 years. I’m hoping we see more of them in the future.

Ogata Rina looks like a really interesting character. I’m curious to know how Yuki knows her so well. Maybe they grew up together or went to the same school. Yuki also needs to get some confidence in herself. Her character has potential, but I just hope she won’t be a useless character for the entire series. It’d be nice if Rina and Yuki were the ones who rang the doorbell at the end of the episode. I can see the second episode being possibly funny if Rina is introduced to Touya. Overall, the episode was really top-notch with great character designs. The music and vocal song Rina sang were very good. I can’t wait to see if Yuki sings in the later episodes.

Shikabane Hime Kuro

Thoughts: We finally see Oori starting his training to become a contracted priest.
Blogging?: Yes
Let me first start out by saying, I was very disappointed by the lack of new OP and ED scenes. Sure the ED song is different, but it doesn’t really fit the scenes very well. Overall, the episode was good and showed how Oori is now working towards supporting Makina. The new Shikabane Hime introduced ruined some of the seriousness this episode had with some fan-service shots. I think they’re showing her off as a foreigner with an accent? Her contracted priest also reminds me a bit of Keisei, since they both obsess over anime girls and figurines. I’m sure the next episode will bring more depth to the story, since this one was more light-hearted.

Akikan

Thoughts: A can that transforms into a girl. What more is there to say?
Blogging?: No
I really thought that this series might work, since it was somewhat creative and could have been very funny. However, I quickly changed my mind after seeing how bland the characters are. This seems like a horrid attempt to make something like To Love-Ru. The male lead practically did nothing besides go to school and drink melon soda. I did find a few scenes to be funny, but it wasn’t enough to change the quality of the show. Which to choose, a melon soda can or a real girl to fall in love with? Seriously… I’ll keep watching to see if it picks up though.

Maria+Holic

Thoughts: A girl who wants to find her destined love at a school? How corny!
Blogging?: Yes
The lead character is a girl who gets hives after coming into contact with a boy. At first, I wasn’t very interested in this show. However, when I learned Maria’s secret near the halfway point, it became much more interesting. The maid was a very nice addition to keep the conversations funny. The dorm mistress’s appearance was a surprise to me. The character designs are not that bad either. Overall, the show has a lot of potential, but it’ll depend on how they develop Maria’s relationship with Kanako in the future. Kanako isn’t that interesting of a character at the moment, and there isn’t anything I particularly like about her. It’ll be interesting to see where all this goes in only 12 episodes.

KissXSis

Thoughts: They went overboard with the whole sister thing.
Blogging?: No
The first few scenes at the beginning ruined all hope for this show to deliver anything but fan-service. Our male lead lives with his two stepsisters who have fallen deeply in love with him. Sharing the same bed right at the start of the episode was odd enough as well. He wasn’t even the slightest bit disturbed. The whole concept doesn’t even sound interesting. The second half of the episode picked up and became more emotional. But, I doubt there will be anything else in this show to keep me interested. Man, where did all the good shows such as True Tears go?

Kurokami The Animation

Thoughts: Finally a decent looking action series.
Blogging?: Yes
This show was much better than I expected. The ED music was a pretty nice touch too. The plot seems interesting with something much bigger going on. There are some mysterious deaths and people who have doppelganers walking around. The show somewhat reminds me of Shakugan no Shana, and I really enjoyed that. The character designs and graphics were also nicely done. My only fear is that the main character may end up doing nothing while Kuro does everything for him. I’m hoping the next episode might reveal more about what’s going on behind the strange deaths.

We’re finally at 2009! The new series that will air look very promising with shows such as Shikabane Hime Kuro and Birdy the Mighty Decode 02. Shikabane has already aired and is still in the process of subbing, so I’ll wait for that to start off the new season. I’ll have a more detailed list when better previews or episodes come out.

Looking forward to:
Shikabane Hime Kuro: The first season was brilliant and I can’t wait to see how Oori develops.
White Album: It looks promising with the nice artwork. Hopefully the plot is interesting enough.
Maria†Holic: This show starts off with a not-so obvious trap. Could be interesting.
Zoku Natsume Yuujin-chou: Season 1 was amazing. The plot really captured me. I have no doubt season 2 will do the same.
Kurokami: I love the music. I just hope that the main character isn’t a jerk like in the manga!
Birdy the Mighty Decode 02: I don’t know what the creators plan to do now that season 1 is over.
Chrome Shelled Regios: The graphics look fantastic and I am hoping for a good plot.
Higurashi no Naku Koro ni Rei: Not too sure what this one is about but I’m looking forward to it.
Kodomo no Jikan Second Term: This could be a major failure or actually turn out to be entertaining.

Not Looking Forward to but will watch:
Akikan: I still can’t get over a can turning into a woman.
The Tower of Daruga ~The Sword of Uruk~: I never really got into the first season and the plot seemed all over the place.
Hajime no Ippo: Not really my cup of tea. Never really liked sports anime besides One Outs.
Asu no Yoichi: I just hope it doesn’t turn into another harem anime with 4 sisters. I’ll give it a chance though.

Here’s the anime schedule for Winter 2009 if you want it to keep a look out for the new airings.

Image Source