Weekly Review #12 – Naruto, Kenichi

Posted by Neko Kyou in Weekly Review on September 30th, 2007

Naruto Shippuuden Episode 29 – 30 (1 hour special)

History’s Strongest Disciple, Kenichi Episode 48 – 49

Naruto Shippuuden

Episode 29 – 30: Blast Him into the Next Dimension! Naruto Shippuuden Special!

Rating: 7/10

Naruto Shippuuden Episode 29 - 30

If you do not mind another 8 minutes or so of repeated scenes of Team Gai’s battle, as well as another few minutes of watching them as they watched their clones dissolve slooowwwly into whatever elements they were made from, you might find this episode to be rather good. By Shippuuden level, anyway…

The animation team loves to waste time by showing us things we don’t need to know, nor things we should care about. Like Sasori’s original puppet body being sealed to wall and his dead puppet body lying on the ground.

The first highlight of the 1 hour special is of course, Kakashi’s Mangekyou Sharingan. The effects weren’t as dramatic as Itachi’s Tsukuyomi. But even so, it’s probably the best most of us could hope for.

With Kakashi’s new ability, he managed to force Deidara to lower grounds where he got ambushed by Naruto and his kage bunshins. After so many episodes of chasing, he had finally retrieved Gaara.

But it wasn’t over yet as Naruto ambushed Deidara a second time, furiously turning Deidara into a punching bag. Naruto gave Deidara the Rasengan treatment, only to find that Deidara had performed Kawarimi and replaced his body with clay.

Naruto Shippuuden Episode 29 - 30

And here we have the second highlight of the 1 hour special. Naruto going Kyuubi mode. Even though I already knew what would happen and how Naruto would look like in Kyuubi mode, I couldn’t help myself to stop laughing when what appeared to be red coloured fart came out from his ass.

Other than Naruto’s lips transforming to one that eerily resembled the Kyuubi, it was pretty cool. Especially the tail, after it’s been fully formed and no longer look like fart gas.

(oh, anyone noticed Anko walking pass the shop where Jiraiya was warning Kakashi about Naruto going Kyuubi?)

Deidara watched the whole thing as Naruto Kyuubi mode wrecked destruction and even tried to attack Kaakshi. Kakashi managed to return Naruto to normal using a seal given to him by Jiraiya. When Deidara tried to retreat, he was greeted by Team Gay Gai thanks to Neji’s Byakugan. I swear Deidara is probably one of the very few who faced a Sharingan (a Mangekyou Sharingan at that) and Byakugan user while handicapped and still live for a long time. Oops.. Did I just say that? XD

Well, I suppose any battle where there are only one Team Gai is a good one. Although I can’t understand how they managed to defeat their clones one on one but couldn’t catch an Akatsuki who had no arms with only a single kunai in his mouth.

Deidara tried to take them all out ala Cell (Dragonball) by blowing himself up. Kakashi must have had the same idea as Goku and transported the exploding Deidara into another dimension. But unlike Goku, Kakashi didn’t have to sacrifice himself to do it. Therefore, Kakashi > Goku. (Nah, j/k… Maybe… Nah…)

Naruto Shippuuden Episode 29 - 30

Apparently Naruto still hasn’t given up hope on Gaara and tried to have Sakura to check up on him. But when Sakura couldn’t do anything to help, Naruto started to go emotional and tears began to flow out faster than water can flow out of a pipe. Despite that, it was a pretty emotional scene and even I shed a tear or two.

Chiyo looked very surprise when he saw Naruto in that state, which seemed to have toughen her own resolve to finish what she had set herself to do.

No new Naruto episodes until the 18th. Rescue Gaara’s arc would finally end and we’ll finally get to see Tobi and Yamato. If only Sai didn’t have to be part of the story.

History’s Strongest Disciple Kenichi

Episode 48: Summit showdown! The man who carries the spear of legend

Rating: 8/10

History's Strongest Disciple Kenichi Episode 48

The final showdown finally began between the two leaders. As expected, the battle of the two Seikuuken were magnificent and graceful. Halfway during their fight, Odin ordered Ragnarok to crush the rest of Shinpaku Alliance so that Kenichi could no longer concentrate on his own fight.

Fortunately, Elder dropped off Siegfried in time to save Hermit from being hit by a hammer, and immediately after that the rest of the Shinpaku Alliance and Kisara’s team appeared to join the battle.

This allowed Kenichi to once again fight at full concentration, and he went back to the very basic, the evasion move first taught to him by Miu. With that, he was able to throw Odin to the ground and demanded that Odin remove his spectacles.

Odin asked Kenichi whether he truly wanted him to remove his specs, and when Kenichi continued to insist, he gladly obliged. Without his specs, Odin could no longer see properly, but instead, he gained a far more frightening ability. The true reason behind his title of Odin. The ability to read your opponents move to accurately dodge everything and land every hit.

Actually, the best part of the entire episode was really the next episode preview. It had me laughing so hard, I knew episode 49 would be a really good one.

Episode 49: The strongest transformation! Ryouzanpaku’s rythm!

Rating: 9/10

History's Strongest Disciple Kenichi Episode 49

As I said before, I knew episode 49 would be a good one judging from the episode preview alone. I was not disappointed.

Odin’s ability of foresight and his Gungnir attacks which never misses its target proved to be way beyond Kenichi’s capability to attack or defend. He went on about how he was like before he met Ogata before continuing his assault. No matter what Kenichi tries to do ends up being useless.

Siegfried then revealed to Kenichi that Odin’s secret is that he had already memorized Kenichi’s rhythm. That was also the reason why Odin didn’t start off directly with this move. He had not caught Kenichi’s rhythm at the start of the fight. Sieg then told Kenichi to use his special thrust that he had used to defeat Sieg before.

After struggling a bit, he managed to get into the position and launched his deadly thrust. It probably would have knocked Odin out, if he hadn’t blocked in time. Kenichi continued to get beaten around until his body was shaking.

In a move that reminded me of Sakuragi Hanamichi (Slam Dunk), he knocked his head hard on the metal pipe he and Odin were fighting on to stop himself from shaking. The knock must have some real impact as he suddenly started to imitate each one of the Ryouzanpaku master’s moves.

This is probably my favourite scene in Kenichi so far. Since Odin had already picked up Kenichi’s rhythm, Kenichi would just change his to that of his masters. And right before Odin is able to analyze the new rhythm, Kenichi would switch again to another master.

History's Strongest Disciple Kenichi Episode 49

Apachai Mode and Sakaki Mode

History's Strongest Disciple Kenichi Episode 49

Kensei Mode, Shigure Mode and Akisame Mode FTW!

History's Strongest Disciple Kenichi Episode 49

Elder looks so proud (for the wrong reasons…)

From Apachai to Sakaki to Kensei to Shigure to Akisame. It was so cool and hilarious at the same time, I fell on the floor rolling with laughter. Literally.

I seriously can’t see how Kenichi can top this, but seeing how Odin finally pulled out his trump card, Kenichi would need to find another strategy once more that is more effective than his mimicking his masters.

What does Shigure say about this episode?

History's Strongest Disciple Kenichi Episode 49 Kousaka Shigure

Hurrah for Kenichi!

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Weekly Review #11 – Naruto, Kenichi, Lucky Star

Posted by Neko Kyou in Weekly Review on September 16th, 2007

Been stuck playing Luminous Arc on my DS this week instead of watching anime 😛

Naruto Shippuuden Episode 28

History’s Strongest Disciple Kenichi Episode 47

Lucky Star Episode 20

Naruto Shippuuden

Episode 28: The Resurrected Beasts

Rating: 6/10

Naruto Shippuuden Episode 28

An entire episode of Team Gai vs Evil Twins madness. Nothing really exciting happens here. Even the way they finally figured out how to defeat their clones was… lame to say the least. No Naruto Shippuuden next week, but we’ll have a one-hour special the week after that. From the preview it seems like the rescue Gaara arc is coming to an end.

History’s Strongest Disciple Kenichi

Episode 47: The genius’s weak point! Hard work overcomes talent!

Rating: 8/10

History's Strongest Disciple Kenichi Episode 47

A showdown between my favourite former 6th Fist, Hermit and the 2nd Fist Berserker. When Kenichi heard that Berserker had taken out most of the Shinpaku Alliance, he charged at Berserker, but was interrupted by Hermit. He told Kenichi to stay out of his fight, and that Kenichi’s true opponent was the 1st Fist, Odin.

The battle between Hermit and Berserker was a battle between a true martial artist and a street fighter. Both had talents to begin with, but it was Hermit’s extra effort and dedication in his training that gave him the edge in the end. Although he struggled at first, Hermit totally owned the match towards the end. Berserker was no match at all against the former 6th Fist.

Odin is now the only Fist left and its finally time for the re-match between him and Kenichi.

Lucky Star

Episode 20: How to Spend Summer

Rating: 8/10

Lucky Star Episode 20

Konata starts off by going on about how you would never be able to get the figurines you want if you do not shake and weight the box and try to tell from there, and how professionals are able to find the rare cards and secret figures among the many boxes.

In school, Konata went on about how otaku guys prefers otaku girls especially on forums but you never hear about otaku girls preferring otaku guys.

At dinner a fly came buzzing around Konata which pissed her off. As she was complaining, her father mentioned about Miyamoto Musashi who had could catch flies with chopsticks. Konata’s reaction was that she feels sick that someone would actually do that with eating utensils. Strangely enough (or not), that was my exact thoughts when Soujirou said that lol!

After dinner it was the mosquitoes that came out to bug the Izumi family. Konata showed off her mosquito smacking skills which I’m sure is some reference to something… I have no idea what, though. Soujirou then demonstrated how you can trap a mosquito on your arm by clenching your arm muscles when a mosquito lands. And if you clench it even harder, the mosquito would explode. However, as Konata points out, he has already been bitten… So, there’s really no point to it is there. I wouldn’t even bother to try…

The Hiiragi twins visited Konata during the weekends and while Konata was playing a H-game as usual, Kagami started asking some questions such as why the main character is so unconditionally popular and why all the cute girls in the game are never attached. Now, wouldn’t we all like to know the answers to those…

Cousin Yui came over to visit Yutaka and every time she goes into Konata’s room she’s either playing games or reading manga. Yui commented that Konata never seems to do any studying but Konata tried to counter that by saying Yui always pops in whenever she is taking a break, which really just means that she takes a lot of breaks. Hm.. now that’s something I can easily relate to… happens to me at least a few times a week XD

Miyuki was spotted sighing to herself during one summer class that prompted Tsukasa to ask her what’s wrong. As usual, it had something to do with dentist appointments. How many times does this girl needs to go to see the dentist anyway!? Well.. maybe not that often, if she would stop running away at the last moment. Tsukasa mentions how parents usually gets too involved when you ask them for help in doing projects and they end up completing the whole thing for you. She even won a prize because of that and her dad was happy about it, although Kagami noted that parents would normally be angry about it.

OMG, Haruhi commercial! Is it just me or are her boobs bigger and bouncier in here? Hm…

Konata tells Kagami through the phone that she plans to start her homework early during the holidays instead of rushing everything when school is about to start. So she tells her that she’ll be coming over about once a week, starting tomorrow. Kagami should have seen that one coming.

After the first session with Konata and Tsukasa, Kagami went to Ayano’s place with Misao. Misao brought some ice-cream and told the others to choose first. Then she wondered why is it that you always end up wanting something that another person took. Misao mentioned how she was inspired to go for Tokyo U. after reading a manga (Love Hina?) but Kagami shot her dream down with no mercy.

The following gathering was at Konata’s place. Yutaka came into the room asking for some advice. Her friend from middle school had just got a boyfriend and was wondering what to get him for his birthday. I just couldn’t stop laughing at the expression the 3 older girls was making as Yutaka awaits for an answer in the awkward silence.

Konata found out that the festivals near the Hiiragi’s place was already over. Konata was upset because they didn’t tell her about it and Miyuki suggests that they all go to the festivals near her place. At the same time, Yutaka and her friends also happened to be planning to go to the very same festival as well.

The day of the festival came and as the 2 groups went about to meet up with their friends in the area, they finally realized that Miyuki’s neighbour was really Iwasaki and that Miyuki’s friend’s younger cousin was really Yutaka.

Lucky Star Episode 20

During the Lucky Channel segment, Akira seems happier than usual. Minoru is nowhere to be seen since he’s somewhere in Mt. Fuji’s forest and taking his place was Ono Daisuke, famous for his role as Koizumi Itsuki in Suzumiya Haruhi. The conversation about the dog and crow between Akira and Ono was a reference to Air, where both Ono Daisuke and Hiromi Konno (Akira’s seiyuu) had a part in.

Did anyone notice Char Aznable’s mask on the penguin in Konata’s room?

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Weekly Review #10 – Naruto, Kenichi, Lucky Star, Blue Dragon

Posted by Neko Kyou in Weekly Review on September 9th, 2007

I watched the entire Midori no Hibi series earlier this week but the reviews for individual episodes will be separate instead of being in this weekly review. (Update: Midori no Hibi episodes reviews are out.)

Naruto Shippuuden Episode 26 – 27

History’s Strongest Disciple Kenichi Episode 44 – 46

Lucky Star Episode 19

Blue Dragon Episode 2

Naruto Shippuuden

Episode 26: 10 Puppets vs 100 Puppets

Rating: 7/10

Naruto Shippuuden Episode 26

Naruto Shippuuden is finally picking up some speed as we reach the climax of the battle against Sasori – the final showdown between Chiyo-baa’s 10 puppets and Sasori’s 100. I had originally predicted that this part would only appear after episode 30 at the rate the story was moving at the start of the battle but I was relieved to find out that my prediction was wrong. Sakura, Chiyo-baa and Sasori threw out everything they had and just when Sakura and Chiyo-baa thought they had won, Sasori re-appeared and took them by surprise.

Episode 27: The Dream that Couldn’t Come True

Rating: 6/10

Naruto Shippuuden Episode 27

Quite a bit of flashback again, but this time they were pulled off appropriately so it didn’t really feel as if the story was being dragged longer. Well… not that obvious anyway. Chiyo-baa finally figured out Sasori’s secret and attacked his one weakness, the piece in his chest, although it was later revealed that Sasori should have seen it coming but he chose not to avoid it. She also used her forbidden jutsu to revive a dying Sakura at the cost of her own life energy.

As a parting gift, Sasori revealed to Sakura about a meeting with one of his spies that he had planted in Orochimaru’s group. Just as the episode was about to wrap up, Kakashi unveiled his new ability – Mangekyou Sharingan. You would probably expect the next episode to be Kakashi showing off his new skill and pawning Deidara but from the episode preview it looks like we might have to wait slightly longer. Next episode would focus on the conclusion of the battle between Team Gai and their clones.

History’s Strongest Disciple Kenichi

Episode 44: Shinpaku Alliance crumbles! The mad fist draws near!

Rating: 6/10

History's Strongest Disciple Kenichi Episode 44

The 2nd Fist, Berserker, makes his move against the Shinpaku alliance and Kisara’s team. He made easy work of the two allied teams who were having a gathering. However, because the leaders of the groups were having a separate meeting, so Berserker began to hunt them afterwards. He met up with Takeda and Ukita, who proved to be no match against the 2nd Fist. Nijima puts his escaping skills to the ultimate test by going up against Berserker in an attempt to trap the Fist in an elaborate trap. At the same time, 3rd Fist Freya appeared before Miu and Kisara.

Episode 45: The blow of separation! Kisara dance!

Rating: 7/10

History's Strongest Disciple Kenichi Episode 45

Just when Nijima thought he’s a goner, Siegfried appeared to save the day. Siegfried put up a great fight against Berserker, but as he himself admitted, Berserker’s fist style is his counter-attack styles weakness. In the end, he tried to sacrifice himself by taking Berserker down with him, but his plan backfired and was rescued by Akisame and Sakaki.

The highlight of the episode was the battle between Kisara and Freya. Kisara’s kicks seemed like they were no match against Freya’s staff and was beaten to the ground many times. Then she realized that Miu had managed to take care of the Valkyries without a scratch and tried to copy her movement. Miu noticed this and shouted out some hints which helped Kisara to overcome Freya’s staff.

Episode 46: Farewell! Nijima – The sally of decision

Rating: 8/10

History's Strongest Disciple Kenichi Episode 46

I had expected this to be a boring episode but I was wrong (again!). Loki had Nijima and Matsui surrounded and trapped. After forcing the duo out of the warehouse with molokov cocktails, Loki had his men attack Nijima and Matsui. (Surprisingly, the warehouse stopped burning hmm….)

Kenichi received a strange mail from Nijima and begged the Elder to return to town. The Elder agreed and they began to make their way back to town, with Kenichi hanging for his dear life on the Elder’s shoulder as he ran top speed on top of power lines towards town.

Just as Nijima thought he was doomed, former 7th Fist Thor appeared to save the day. He wasn’t the only one, though. Hermit, too, came to pay his debt to Loki.

Odin and Berserker came out to stop Loki’s assault. Loki took the chance to reveal his plan, to recreate a new Ragnarok with him as leader. But it quickly backfired as Berserker remained loyal to Odin and made quick work of Loki and his new team.

Thor tried to create a path of escape for Nijima by going up against Odin, but he was no match at all. Odin was about to finish Thor off when Kenichi fell from the sky, landing in between Odin and Thor. The next episode promises to be a good one with the showdown between Hermit and Berserker.

Lucky Star

Episode 19: 2D has substance

Rating: 8/10

Lucky Star Episode 19

Starting off with discussions about the various Gundam, Konata went off saying that she’s already XXX years older than Amuro. Plenty of “censored” words here lol. After Tsukasa told Miyuki about how she tried to stay awake at night to do her homework by watching horror movies (which didn’t work – she was too scared to do anything after the movie), Miyuki went on about how those who says they hate watching horror movies ended up watching more than those who likes them.

Yutaka is about to discover the ugly truth of reality as she tries to approach Konata and Yui to help her with her homework. Konata then asked Yui if she knows how to solve her own homework and immediately commented that she probably doesn’t know how to. Yui came back by telling Konata why ask if she already knew the answer. Konata’s father got depressed because Konata never goes to him for help.

Kuroi-sensei seems to feel the same way as Konata’s father. She got real happy when Konata finally came up to her with a question, but that didn’t last long when Konata’s question was related to a game instead of academics. Kuroi-sensei also owns a Wii! *jealous*

Yutaka asked Tamura about the types of manga she draws, which was difficult for her to answer. Later on she showed some of her newer drawings, one of which is Housuke Odoroki from the Nintendo DS game Gyakuten Saiban 4 (BTW, Gyakuten Saiban/Ace Attorney is one of my favourite game series on the DS :D) The other character looks strangely familiar as well.

And Akira finally sent Minoru away on a trip to Mt. Fuji’s forest to bring her a bottle of the famous Mt. Fuji forest’s water (whatever that is…).

Did you notice… Miyuki’s mom was holding a copy of Ju-On and Yui was holding a book with Fate/Stay Night on the cover. Yutaka, Iwasaki and Tamura saw 2 people cosplaying as Full Metal Alchemist characters – one as Edward Elric and another in a Federal Alchemist uniform.

Blue Dragon

Episode 2: Blue Power

Rating: 7/10

Blue Dragon Episode 2

Shu’s awakened Blue Dragon went on a rampage and had to be stopped by Jiro’s Minotaurus. Zola indirectly tries to convince Shu to join her group by pushing him into a corner. Shu hesitated at first but after the village was attacked once more by Grand Kingdom, he decided that he would follow Zola whole Kluke decided to follow Shu. I’ve always wondered why people would let the enemy mech to merge before attacking, and Zola exclaimed that the world isn’t as forgiving, attacking the combining enemy mech as they tries to merge into a single unit.

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Weekly Review #9 – Naruto, Kenichi, Blue Dragon

Posted by Neko Kyou in Weekly Review on August 19th, 2007

Slow week due to final exams. I’ll try to elaborate more since there’s only 3 episodes.

Naruto Shippuuden Episode 25

History’s Strongest Disciple Kenichi Episode 43

Blue Dragon Episode 1

Naruto Shippuuden

Episode 25: Three Minutes between Life and Death

Rating: 7/10

Naruto Shippuuden Episode 25

After last week’s episode, almost any half decent Naruto episodes would start to look real good. Fortunately, this week’s episode wasn’t half bad. No Team Gai – BIG plus there. Not much time wasting either – at least Kakashi is doing something different other than jumping from around trying to get Naruto to slow down. This episode was actually quite speedy compared to the drag we’ve been treated to the past few weeks.

Sasori finally shows his true self, which explained why he didn’t look a day older than he did when he left the Sand all those years ago. He had turned himself completely into a puppet, the strongest of his arsenal. The next episode promises to bring the battle a lot closer to an end, although based on experience, the actual meaning of “10 Puppets VS 100 Puppets”.

The Akatsuki discussion segment at the end of the episode was quite entertaining as well. I find it the most interesting segments compared to the rest and hopefully we’ll get to see more of it 😀

History’s Strongest Disciple Kenichi

Episode 43: Limiter! The Asura Realm’s Lure

Rating: 6/10

History's Strongest Disciple Kenichi Episode 43

Not a very exciting episode and there really isn’t any funny moments in this one, unless you count the part where Kenichi was chased by a bear, which was quickly taken care of by Ogata Ishinsai, who turned out to be the person who would have been Ryouzanpaku’s first disciple if it weren’t for the Elder’s objection.

One of the Elder’s objective to bring Kenichi to Yamigata was to test whether Kenichi would accept the invitation of a “dou” user, a fighter who uses their anger to gain massive destructive power. To do that, the Elder had planned for Kenichi to meet with Ogata, a dou type fighter. It was later on revealed that Ogata is none other than Ragnarok’s Kensei.

The second objective was to train Kenichi in Seikuuken. The draft behind his head that Kenichi kept feeling since entering the forest was actually the Elder kicking behind him, testing to see if Kenichi had realized the basics of Seikuuken. The fish catching exercise turned out to be the training Kenichi needed to achieve that. The real training for Seikuuken began at the end of the episode.

Blue Dragon

Episode 1: Invoke the Shadow

Rating: 7/10

Blue Dragon Episode 1

Being the first episode, there really isn’t much in it except for character introduction. Zola quickly stood out among the rest as being the cool type character for this series and I immediately took a liking to her. Zola and Jiro went to a ruins nearby a village in search of the Blue Dragon and met Shu and his pals there.

Shu had heard that a Knight Master was in town and decided that he would join up with him as a disciple. Shu picked a fight with Jiro and just as Jiro was about to unleash his power on Shu, Zola appeared and interrupted. Mistaking Zola as the Knight Master, Shu tried to convince Zola to take him as a disciple, but was shot down instead with a question he could not answer.

The village then came under attack from the Grand Kingdom and Shu rushed to the ruins to get Zola for help. However, Zola refused and Shu, angered, rushed back to the village with his friends to save it. Just before Shu reached the village, Zola purposely attacked one of the enemy’s aircraft and caused the attackers to become even more hostile. Things got worse when Shu and his friends finally arrived and confronted the army from Grand Kingdom, but was quickly captured.

That’s when Zola finally showed up and attacked the army. The commander realized who Zola was and challenged her with his Shadow, Goblin. Zola responded with her own Shadow, Killer Bat. The battle between the 2 shadows caused a building near where many civilians were and the debris threatened to flatten them all. Shu rushed in, remembering Zola’s questions earlier which now suddenly made more sense to him. As Shu leapt under the falling pieces, the Blue Dragon manifested from his shadows.

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Weekly Review #8 – Naruto, Kenichi, Lucky Star

Posted by Neko Kyou in Weekly Review on August 12th, 2007

Naruto Shippuuden Episode 24

History’s Strongest Disciple Kenichi Episode 42

Lucky Star Episode 17 – 18

Naruto Shippuuden

Episode 24: The Third Kazekage

Rating: 3/10

Naruto Shippuuden Episode 24

I think I have just wasted 20 minutes of my life watching this episode. First we have a few minutes of Sakura showing off which is from the previous episode, then we have Naruto and Kakashi wasting even more time chasing Deidara again, and yet even more time of the deadlock battle between Team Gai and their clones, with absolutely nothing new. Even the opening and ending animation that featured clips from the new Naruto Shippuuden movie was much more entertaining than the entire episode itself.

When we finally get back to Sakura and Chiyo vs Sasori, we’re treated to the same scene two times in a row. Honestly, this whole episode can be completed in under 5-10 minutes. Sakura’s dodging skills, Sandaime Kazakage’s Saitetsu Kaiho, and Sakura breaking the Kazekage into a million pieces.

Why they have to keep wasting and dragging more time is well beyond me. It’s really starting to piss me off that they’re still adding more fillers in when they should have enough material to last for at least another year or two even they even come close to where the manga is it at now.

History’s Strongest Disciple Kenichi

Episode 42: Elder’s Special Training! Do or Die Mountain Seclusion

Rating: 6/10

History's Strongest Disciple Kenichi Episode 42

Kenichi goes to train with the Elder and from the looks of Akisame’s reaction, it might not be something which Kenichi should be looking forward to. Sure enough, the Elder does seem to have something up his sleeve, but exactly what, we’re not so sure yet. After some persuasion, Akisame finally spilled the beans about how this journey with the Elder would change Kenichi for either the better or worse.

The comedic highlight of this episode is once again by the Shinpaku alliance group, who has gone to convince Kisara for an alliance. I’m beginning to think that Sieg might actually be more cunning and persuasive than Nijima.

Lucky Star

Episode 17: Under the Sun

Rating: 7/10

Lucky Star Episode 17

It’s Konata’s birthday and her family was going to throw a surprise party for her. Predictably, however, she ended up partying with her friends at work. Then we get a look behind the life of Kagami and her sisters. It seems that she’s only close to Tsukasa and often gets into arguments with Matsuri, one of her older sister. It’s interesting for sure, but it was kind of boring at the same time. There just isn’t any Lucky Star comedic effect there.

The Lucky Channel this time was quite entertaining, with the Anime Tenchou making a guest appearance and taking over the set, leaving Akira disgruntled. And Shiraishi Minoru ended the show with his own version of Lucky Star’s opening theme, Motteke! Sailor Fuku.

Episode 18: To Each Her Own

Rating: 8/10

Lucky Star Episode 18

I like how Konata relates everyone to animals and starts to imagine how they would look like. Definitely moe! The FMP parody between Konata and Kuroi-sensei was just too much fun as well. The focus on the 2nd part of the episode switches to Yutaka and friends. They appear to be another whacky branch as well. Iwasaki always seemed concerned about her “flat-chestedness” (I know I made word up) and Patricia thinks that popular shopping places are Japan’s sacred places. Hiyori also have this habit of drawing Yutaka and Iwasaki in “perverted” manners.

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