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[Frumple]

FMP totes has manga. I've actually got two physical volumes of it laying around somewhere or another. Hell, there's been like six different adaptations/spinoffs or whatev'.

S'apparently some LNs, too. _{by which I mean it started out as LNs and then shifted into other mediums :V}

[Flying Dice]

More than that, though, I was going for the specific angle of: Unflinching hypercompetent chessmaster who can turn any situation to his advantage with trivial ease who is also outwardly emotionless and aloof, constantly saving the day while trained mooks rush in and die and his friends follow just slowly enough for him to save them, who has a rival-slash-friend on the other side of the war who may or may not be competing with him over the heart of a/the primary girl. Also is a teenaged boy.

Yeah I enjoyed Code Geass too.

Gee willikers, you managed to spot the most obvious comparison. Should I pull out the gold stars?

Also, as you've evidently forgotten, Lelouch wasn't particularly competent as a mecha pilot. Not quite as bad as a mook, but far below just about every other named character in the series who ever saw the inside of a cockpit. So, as I said and you conveniently ignored, around half of that paragraph covers him, just as it does for all the hotblooded aces.

[Hawkfrost]

Do any of you ever have to restrain yourself from interjecting your dislike of certain series any time someone mentions them?

Not lately, but my rage can be infinite where Claymore is concerned. Usually if something's going to be bad, it's going to be bad and that's that; in fact, usually you're going to have so little interest in the genre or type or whatever that it won't even register beyond evidence that the category is awful by definition.

So to really ignite your rage, what a thing ideally wants to do is nearly be good, then swerve hard at the last second into complete shit. It's similar to the uncanny valley effect, in that to really get under your skin, something has to look close enough to register as one thing, but then also be close enough to another to just not fit right.

So for me, that's Claymore. Imagine Berserk + DBZ + some all-girl fighting fanservice thing, only it manages to inherit all of the problems and not a great deal of the awesome from the first two, mutate some additional problems in the process, and then instead of normal porn mostly go for how dark and doomed the poor girls are. Add to that that it's pretentious as all fucking fuck regarding how noble and doomed and teamworky and the most human of us all the titular characters are despite not actually having the balls to kill off any named not-villain characters after the first few chapters since they were introduced, and that the author is a complete fucking hack who EVERY time he tries to explain a previously established mystery confirms the wisdom of that infamous quote about being thought a fool versus opening your mouth and removing all doubt.

Naturally, you've then got the cherry on top of people who actually like it for some reason; every time I hear about it, which is thankfully extremely rarely, it's about how awesome and "underappreciated" the thing is. My jimmies are still rustled about finding "Anybody Can Die: One of the defining tropes of the show!" on TVTropes, and I'll spare you all the page and a half rant I've got as to exactly and with page citations why.

So yeah. Normally pretty cool, but there's at least one I can go fully incandescent on.

Claymore I thought had an interesting setting right up until the setting didn't matter anymore and it turned into a rapidly escalating power game.
Like, the whole "anybody could be a Yoma thing" was good, and I did like the Clare is actually the shittiest of all the Claymores "twist", but then as you said, it turned into Dragonball Z with swords.

I also felt like it didn't really have fanservice until halfway through the manga, and was treating the female cast with a fair degree of respect concerning that angle.
And then the black leather lingerie outfits came out and I facepalmed.

In the "contempt and/or hatred but not enough that I've seen them twice and can deliver entirely too detailed analyses as to why" category, I actively hate Highschool of the Dead and have some contempt for what I've heard of No Game No Life.

Oh, I was only speaking about the gore tryhard shows, if we want to talk overall then No Game No Life is really bad pedo-porn with godawful writing and characters. You think at first that it will be about smart people finding smart solutions to games and winning through wit, but instead they just break the rules due to the writers lack of ability to actually find a way to cleverly figure a way for his chosen protagonists to succeed.
I had forgotten Highschool of the Dead even existed, because why the fuck did it exist in the first place.

People keep demanding that anime be considered seriously, but then they wank off about all these shows that are borderline illegal underage porn and wonder why everyone considers anime watchers to be creepy pedophiles. How about instead we give credit to, and elevate, the serious shows with good writing and mature plots.

So far this season Death Parade has been the only show worth talking about, and yet everyone ignores it to go watch pandering bullshit instead; the only times I've seen people even mention it around the internet has been either "it's okay" or "it's pretentious". I guess average people really can't hold interest in things if explosions aren't going off constantly or if the show actually wants you to form your own opinion about how you feel about something, instead of just TELLING you how you are supposed to feel.
Subtlety is dead, ect.

On your end, have you seen PMMM? I'd be curious what you don't like about it. I haven't seen the movie yet, though. :x

Something about the way Gen Urobuchi writes ticks me off; something that is hard to put my finger on. It's a combination of straightforward lifting of things he liked from other series/literature, and then adding needless melodrama and "2edgy4me" shallow "darkness". Recently I've been seriously struggling with deciding my stance on Madoka.
I hated Madoka herself as a character for being one of the most completely passive protagonists in an anime, but I came to the realization when thinking about it about a week ago that he was just playing it straight to the source material.

Spoiler: This is all spoilers. (click to show/hide)

Madoka is useless because she is Gretchen.
What is Gretchen's role in Faust? To die, and serve as the catalyst to Faust's journey of self reformation and the entering of his spiral into darkness and despair. He realizes too late what he really cared about, what was important to him.
And ultimately, when he reaches the end and the Devil is about to win his prize, Gretchen is the one who comes forward to save him and bring his soul into the light (foiling the plans of Mephistopheles).

I was frustrated with the plot and character development until I realized the truly obvious and blatant thing that I somehow managed to miss the significance of;
Madoka is not the main character, and never was. Homura is Faust, Homura is what the story is about, Homura is the one who goes through all the struggle and change, and Homura is the main character of the show and always was.

Spoiler: Movie stuff. (click to show/hide)

The problem is that Urobuchi then throws away all the significance of this by being EdgelordEXtreme and suddenly and inexplicably changing Homura's entire character to be the final villain, because he wanted to be shocking and come out of left field. Except it really made no sense, and was completely out of character and solely happened because the Edgelord needs to cut everybody due to how edgy he is.

In short, the third movie had one absolutely fantastic fight scene, a lot of dumb out-of-beat songs, the least impressive transformation scenes, and at the end just feels unsatisfying, weak, and contrived. I didn't come out of it feeling shocked, I came out of it nonplussed and with a much worse opinion of Madoka and it's writer than I had before.

I don't think Urobuchi is a good writer, and it doesn't help that so far I can directly trace back all of his "inspirations" quite clearly.

[Bauglir]

I have some very strong feelings on Rebellion, which I will outline below. The short version is, everything was extremely in character, but the movie's pacing and overall construction make that very much non-obvious. Whether that's good or bad is a matter of taste. If you like analysis, you're in the right place. If you think that being needlessly obtuse is a bad idea, you're not. The series was kind of misleading because it had something to offer people of both persuasions.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Okay, so Homura's basic motivation is that she will do whatever she thinks she needs to in order to protect Madoka. That never changes. Rebellion is basically the story of Homura taking that defining characteristic to its tragic extreme. You can pinpoint the exact instant during her conversation with Madoka in the flower field when her hamartia shows up - she changes her mind about how she ought to have behaved at the end of the series. She does this because she mistakenly explains what happened to Madoka - and so Madoka replies with an answer to the wrong hypothetical. In truth, Madoka won't never see anybody again, so the foundation of Homura's belief that Madoka never really wanted her wish is flawed.

Later, she realizes what Kyuubey is doing. Apparently, these guys are threats to Madoka. Now, the immediate danger is over, and if Homura dies then the only link the Incubators have to try and control Madoka is gone. But what if there's another way? Homura's in mid-witch freakout mode at this point - she's in no position to think rationally, and moreover has very good reasons to expect the Incubators to keep trying. It'd be odd if she didn't get paranoid that the Incubators might figure something out - and then she finds that she has some vaguely-defined opportunity. She can apparently interfere with Madoka.

Now, this is where that flawed reasoning from earlier takes over. From Homura's perspective, she's taking on a burden so that Madoka won't have to anymore. She's protecting Madoka from the Incubators by taking enough power to do it. She's willing to sacrifice anything for this, even their continued friendship, because she's convinced that she knows what's best for Madoka. Even better than Madoka, herself, does. Sure, she winds up hating herself for it - but she's willing to offer up even her conscience on the altar of Gotta Save Madoka. Look at the way she describes herself as the Devil, and her Clara dolls' behavior - Homura is the edgelord here. I mean, I'm not disagreeing with your assessment of Gen's tendency toward Grimdarkness, but there actually did seem to be some merit to this development.

And all of it is rooted in the one immutable aspect of Homura's character that we already had - her need to protect somebody, and refusal to trust anybody else to get it done. There are tons of problems with the movie, but I gotta say, this one wasn't - it's probably the movie's chief virtue.

[Darvi]

I found the movie to be a neat deconstruction of fix-fics.

[AlleeCat]

Dunno if it counts as anime, but I just binge watched all of season 3 of Legend of Korra. I feel like that series as a whole is an improvement in every way to AtLA, except for maybe the fact that in Last Airbender there was more of an overarching villain, whereas in Korra they just sort of bring in a new one each season.

[Furtuka]

We general put Avatar in the western animation thread

[Frumple]

... y'probably welcome to talk about it here, too, though. S'pretty anime.

[Hawkfrost]

I have some very strong feelings on Rebellion, which I will outline below. The short version is, everything was extremely in character, but the movie's pacing and overall construction make that very much non-obvious. Whether that's good or bad is a matter of taste. If you like analysis, you're in the right place. If you think that being needlessly obtuse is a bad idea, you're not. The series was kind of misleading because it had something to offer people of both persuasions.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Okay, so Homura's basic motivation is that she will do whatever she thinks she needs to in order to protect Madoka. That never changes. Rebellion is basically the story of Homura taking that defining characteristic to its tragic extreme. You can pinpoint the exact instant during her conversation with Madoka in the flower field when her hamartia shows up - she changes her mind about how she ought to have behaved at the end of the series. She does this because she mistakenly explains what happened to Madoka - and so Madoka replies with an answer to the wrong hypothetical. In truth, Madoka won't never see anybody again, so the foundation of Homura's belief that Madoka never really wanted her wish is flawed.

Later, she realizes what Kyuubey is doing. Apparently, these guys are threats to Madoka. Now, the immediate danger is over, and if Homura dies then the only link the Incubators have to try and control Madoka is gone. But what if there's another way? Homura's in mid-witch freakout mode at this point - she's in no position to think rationally, and moreover has very good reasons to expect the Incubators to keep trying. It'd be odd if she didn't get paranoid that the Incubators might figure something out - and then she finds that she has some vaguely-defined opportunity. She can apparently interfere with Madoka.

Now, this is where that flawed reasoning from earlier takes over. From Homura's perspective, she's taking on a burden so that Madoka won't have to anymore. She's protecting Madoka from the Incubators by taking enough power to do it. She's willing to sacrifice anything for this, even their continued friendship, because she's convinced that she knows what's best for Madoka. Even better than Madoka, herself, does. Sure, she winds up hating herself for it - but she's willing to offer up even her conscience on the altar of Gotta Save Madoka. Look at the way she describes herself as the Devil, and her Clara dolls' behavior - Homura is the edgelord here. I mean, I'm not disagreeing with your assessment of Gen's tendency toward Grimdarkness, but there actually did seem to be some merit to this development.

And all of it is rooted in the one immutable aspect of Homura's character that we already had - her need to protect somebody, and refusal to trust anybody else to get it done. There are tons of problems with the movie, but I gotta say, this one wasn't - it's probably the movie's chief virtue.

And that all makes sense, but for some reason I can't imagine Urobuchi himself put that much thought into it. I probably didn't pay attention enough when watching Rebellion (But I am not and never have been particularly interested in the series). Lastly, I'm still left with the feeling that the whole thing was a rather unnecessary Gaiden that breaks flow quite sharply with the rest of the series. I get it, they wanted to keep going with the story; But did they really need to? Is there enough content in Rebellion to make it worth making?

It's a bit similar to stuff like old game expansion packs. "You have defeated the Lord of Terror, Diablo... But now here's Baal! Looks like more shenanigans are going down!"

Dunno if it counts as anime, but I just binge watched all of season 3 of Legend of Korra. I feel like that series as a whole is an improvement in every way to AtLA, except for maybe the fact that in Last Airbender there was more of an overarching villain, whereas in Korra they just sort of bring in a new one each season.

Season 3 was on par with TLA, seasons 1 and 4 were not, and 2 was terrible in my opinion.

[Leafsnail]

Gee willikers, you managed to spot the most obvious comparison. Should I pull out the gold stars?

Also, as you've evidently forgotten, Lelouch wasn't particularly competent as a mecha pilot. Not quite as bad as a mook, but far below just about every other named character in the series who ever saw the inside of a cockpit. So, as I said and you conveniently ignored, around half of that paragraph covers him, just as it does for all the hotblooded aces.

I don't understand what you're trying to prove here, I was just making a joke about how that paragraph is pretty much the plot of Code Geass.

[ToonyMan]

So far this season Death Parade has been the only show worth talking about, and yet everyone ignores it to go watch pandering bullshit instead; the only times I've seen people even mention it around the internet has been either "it's okay" or "it's pretentious". I guess average people really can't hold interest in things if explosions aren't going off constantly or if the show actually wants you to form your own opinion about how you feel about something, instead of just TELLING you how you are supposed to feel.

Death Parade is good.

Dunno if it counts as anime, but I just binge watched all of season 3 of Legend of Korra. I feel like that series as a whole is an improvement in every way to AtLA, except for maybe the fact that in Last Airbender there was more of an overarching villain, whereas in Korra they just sort of bring in a new one each season.

Season 3 was on par with TLA, seasons 1 and 4 were not, and 2 was terrible in my opinion.

I miss Avatar. I didn't like the first season of Korra at all.

[IronyOwl]

* Zangi likes Claymore and found No Game No Life entertaining.

* Zangi feels the need to interject his like/acceptance of certain series after someone expresses their dislike.

Regarding the acceptance bit, I do try to avoid ragging too hard on the fans of things I dislike, as it's usually dickish and unproductive. I don't have a beef with people enjoying things, I just think some of the things people enjoy are highly questionable.

So uh, if that's all you wanted to say that's fine, though I'm always up for raging at you over Claymore if you'd like to get into particulars.

Claymore I thought had an interesting setting right up until the setting didn't matter anymore and it turned into a rapidly escalating power game.
Like, the whole "anybody could be a Yoma thing" was good, and I did like the "twist", but then as you said, it turned into Dragonball Z with swords.

I also felt like it didn't really have fanservice until halfway through the manga, and was treating the female cast with a fair degree of respect concerning that angle.
And then the black leather lingerie outfits came out and I facepalmed.

This whole thing could also be summed us as "but even then." Yes, anybody could be a yoma... but that reinforced the "if you're not a claymore lol get rekt nub" thing, they never bothered to define the yoma well beyond being pathetic mooks, etc. The twist was amusing, but but but, and the lack of physical fanservice just meant they never ever shut up about how doomed and sympathetic the claymores were. And, now that I think about it, may have been responsible for or a cause of the difficulty in telling most of them apart save by hairstyle. At least with your usual "have a milf, girl next door, and loli" bullshit you don't tend to end up staring blankly at them wondering who the fuck they are.

Subtlety is dead, ect.

Careful now, don't go full old person on me.

Something about the way Gen Urobuchi writes ticks me off; something that is hard to put my finger on. It's a combination of straightforward lifting of things he liked from other series/literature, and then adding needless melodrama and "2edgy4me" shallow "darkness".

I'm not familiar with his work in general, so I'm afraid I couldn't comment on his writing style. I did like a lot of the grim bullshit in Madoka, though I can admit some of it didn't necessarily flow very well.

Spoiler: Series-Only Spoilers (click to show/hide)

For instance, Blue's BFF snubbing her. Why'd that happen? Was it a misunderstanding? Did he not find a connection between her telling him about it and his arm getting better? Was he a prick? It's never well explained, so "because it's edgier lol" is probably a valid interpretation.

Red's noble sacrifice was similarly "but why?" Like, I get that she had gotten fond of Witchy and was very sad, but she didn't seem attached enough to commit suicide over it, and it didn't seem to serve a purpose otherwise. Nobody'd needed to leave a girl behind to get out before then.

But for the most part, I enjoyed the darkness. I'm not sure how similar that is to saying the darkness was well done in this case, and they certainly could have made the series without it; though I'm not sure this exact, micro-story-loop thing would have worked as well.

Madoka is not the main character, and never was.

That's the beauty of it, though. She was the main character, just not in anything we saw. Madoka, and moreover Puella Magi Madoka, was instrumental in setting current events into motion... but as you say, by the time we tuned in she was basically the hero-turned-hermit-mentor backstory figure, and it was Homura's turn to strike out and save the world.

Which is also nice because it means the series name is incredibly apt on multiple different levels. Imagine if Zelda was Old Link, the Deku Tree, the Sages, and the Triforce, but everybody went into it assuming she was Link just before he went out adventuring. Trolled hard, but trolled fair.

I get it, they wanted to keep going with the story; But did they really need to? Is there enough content in Rebellion to make it worth making?

It's a bit similar to stuff like old game expansion packs. "You have defeated the Lord of Terror, Diablo... But now here's Baal! Looks like more shenanigans are going down!"

That is one of the few issues I have with Madoka, actually. The story is great, but it's not as compelling a world; similar to how LotR tends to be much more constrained than Star Wars. There's some works you can just kind of ride off into anywhere, and there's some where it's kind of done and imagining another sequel makes you wince. Madoka is definitely in the latter camp, though again I've not actually seen how the movie turned out.

If you like analysis, you're in the right place. If you think that being needlessly obtuse is a bad idea, you're not.

...I'm probably still going to watch it eventually, but thanks for the doubts. :I

I found the movie to be a neat deconstruction of fix-fics.

Isn't a deconstruction just a hatefic in the first place, though? I guess hatefics of fixfics of hatefics forms an angry nice cycle...

[Frumple]

To that last bit... no? A deconstruction can involve a lot of love and very little, if any, hate -- really good ones kind of have to, because you can't (effectively, anyway) deconstruct what you don't understand, and it's hard to understand what you don't, to some extent, love. Often doesn't, but it's not necessarily a hatefic type of thing.

... as to claymore, all I really recall of it is that the manga had some fairly pretty pictures. Fairly alright aesthetic, from what I remember (which is admittedly fairly little, as it's been several years since I read any of it). I still specifically remember that one scene with the lion dude about to get obliterated by funky-shape main-character thing. It was nice.

[Darvi]

Deconstruction is all about taking a concept and showing how it would in actuality fail to meet expectations (and not necessarily in a dark and edgy way) e.g. taking Pokémon and handling the mon thing like real life cock fighting, or Reed Richards using his genius to raise worldwide standard of living.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

In the case of the movie, it starts off with what looks like a parody of your usual fanfic, and then part-way reminds you that it doesn't work in this setting.

[Spehss _]

I feel like subjecting myself to the horrors of romcoms. Anyone got some suggestions? Already seen Teen Romantic Comedy SNAFU and Oreimo.