The more I read To Aru Majtusu no Index the more impressed I am -- the setting is pretty damned interesting. It starts out as a seemingly super generic shounen-ey series, but as it progresses characters are introduced who are downright callous, and killing is increasingly common. It definitely starts out feeling like a shounen series made for a seinen audience, but somewhere along the way it's transitioned into full-on seinen.
The series' protagonist, Kamijou Touma, hasn't even been mentioned yet in the book I'm on -- and I'm nearly 100 pages in. The focus on side characters is really fascinating, and they're a good deal more interesting than Kamijou. Kamijou reminds me a lot of Shirou -- he wants to save everyone, he won't kill, he does anything to protect his friends, but I suppose that's basically the archetypal shounen hero. What made Fate/Stay Night interesting was that Shriou was this typical hero, but the world was incredibly grim -- not everyone could be saved, and sacrifices were necessary. Index has a similar feel, but Kamijou hasn't had to compromise on his ideals yet. He's also amazingly weak as a protagonist, often surviving through sheer luck or coincidence, and regularly has his ass saved by people much more powerful than he is.
Still, the juxtaposition between Kamijou's "I'll save everyone!" and the other characters' unrepentant murdering is refreshing. The series definitely takes a while to really get going, but it's probably one of my favorite 'battle' series. That said, the battling isn't particularly frequent; while it's often the means to revolve the plots, the story (at least in the later novels) is focused much more around political intrigue, with secret government organizations backstabbing each other, performing assassinations, and trying to start wars. Most of the characters are just pawns, and we while some grand overarching gameplan is beginning to come together, it's revealed at a very deliberate pace.
I usually dislike characters like Kamijou, but for some inexplicable reason, I'm finding that I actually really like him. Tsuchimikado and Accelerator are both more interesting, but Kamijou is a great protagonist.
Rewatching the anime made me realize holy crap anime have a lot of exposition, especially when adapted from wordy light novel source material. They spend 6 episodes on the first book alone. The entire first season, all 24 episodes, adapts the first 6 novels. The second season, also 24 episodes, adapts the next 8. There's another 8 left in the main novel series, and then 4 more in the sequel novel series (which is still ongoing). Altogether, there is a hell of a lot of To Aru Majtusu no Index to read, and the fan translators are nothing if not prolific, usually translating new releases in well under a month. I actually really want to hurry up and get caught up on Index so I can get back to Nasu stuff, but there's so damn much.
But yeah. Enough about Index. Hyouka, KyoAni's new series, is mouthwateringly beautiful. The art is amazing -- film-quality, really. The story doesn't seem bad, either -- they're pretty good at doing slice of life stuff. I wasn't a fan of K-On, but Hyouka has definitely caught my eye.
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Topic: I like anime, do you like anime? (Read 3135848 times)