I don’t know how I’m ever going to get anything done this summer!

Since I haven’t posted for a while, and it seems like no one else is posting on their blogs either, I give you the following, which should enable you to waste a good 20 minutes of time. I mean, now that my French class is over, I’ve got nothing better to be doing than making these lists, right?

My List of Top 15 Anime Openings

In response to the many (lame) Best Anime Openings on YouTube, I decided that I obviously needed to compile my own list of best anime openings to demonstrate my superior taste ;-) After doing extensive research and watching many, many openings, I found that honestly, it’s pretty hard to rank many of them. Only a few are painfully bad, and many others are somewhat formulaic even though they’re still entertaining. I’ve tried to make a list that reflects the the more original and unexpected openings, as well as those that capture some of the best aspects of the genre (by which I mean boobs). Thsi means you’ve got some of the silliest as well as some of the most serious style of openings. I also went for ones that I thought worked well as a whole, that is, the song and the animation went well together, but utlimately, the choice and ranking is pretty arbitrary. They pretty much all have their strengths and weaknesses. I tried not to favor too heavily series that I liked (sorry Bleach, FMA!) but it undoubtedly didn’t hurt if a series I like also happens to have a cool opening. Enjoy!

15. Hellsing
The new opening, even though it wins out spectacularly in the blood and guts department, just lacks the style of the earlier Hellsing opening. And if anyone knows about style, it’s Alucard in his pretty red outfit with his pretty gigantic gun.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cTsZ5aKAjwY

14. Kemonozume
An interesting and unexpected visual style to this opening. Don’t ask me to try and explain what’s going on though.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p3DnZYlwP2g

13. Mouse
I don’t know this show, but the opening has tits, asses, ninjas, and a brief shot of a little mouse. If only there were some tentacles, they’d have covered all the important anime bases.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=57Ef6egT4kE

12. Gunslinger Girl
It’s not exactly a flashy opening, but I think captures the mood of the series well. And there are orphan cyborg assassins. Sweet!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xEMjq9VpBSE

11. Dai Guard
Of all the giant mecha anime out there, I still think Dai Guard has the most fun and infectious theme song.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DvLBnMvApBg

10. Lupin III
Sooo 70’s. But how can an opening that involves the classic boxing glove on a spring trick fail to make anyone’s top 10 list?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UHwA2WIEBXQ

9. Azumanga Daioh
This made a lot of other people’s top ten lists and the more I watched it, the more I found myself unable to resist the cutesy weirdness of it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=huWKSYUX5Fs

8. Read or Die OVA
Admittedly, part of my love for the opening comes from my love for the show, but think it’s still got the essentials of a good opening: catchy tune, lots of action, and Nancy Makuhari.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fj12Qt9pcWs

7. Ghost in the Shell Stand Alone Complex 2nd gig (Japan)
I wish the song were a little more intense to go with the visual feel of this opening. Nonetheless, I enjoy the unsettlingness of it as a whole.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5662vcnTvrE

6. Beck Mongolian Chop Squad
I’m a sucker for Engrish and for the unconventional theme of this series. It’s like Wonder Years meets anime. With a rock band. Riiight.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cqlROvI6LmM

5. Elfen Lied
Even if the opening has nothing to do with the series, the strangeness and artistry of putting the main character in a series of Klimt-inspired portraits with the hymn-like theme song is just so unexpected, it continues to impress me.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cqlROvI6LmM

4. Neon Genesis Evangelion
I will never, ever forgive Shinji for being the whiniest, most unsympathetic wimp in all of anime, but damn if that theme song isn’t permanently stuck in my head.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EgATlhZFAfs

3. Ergo Proxy
There are many series out there now that are trying to play up the X-fileseque, cyberpunkish gothic sci-fi niche, but I think the opening to Ergo Proxy really captures that feeling the best, even if the song is a little too emo for my taste.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p6JJrhNFHsA

2. Paranoia Agent
Being the morbid person that I am, I can’t help but be taken in by the creepy juxtaposition of the laugher and the destruction. Love him or hate him, Satoshi Kon has a real knack for the disturbing.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-anabfAg06U

1. Cowboy Bebop
I lost interest in the series pretty quickly, but I can’t deny the opening has plenty of flair. I don’t know that it truly deserves to be called “the best,” but I think it’s one of the most solid entries on the list so that’s why I’m giving it the #1 spot.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pzyB0Cc1fFM

If you are not completely exhausted by that list, I have one more opening to submit to popular scrutiny. This one wasn’t really fit to make it into the top 15 (probably not even the top 50), but Jon, this one’s for you!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MV9pf0abVtk

We let Sparrow William go today. She (yeah, turns out William’s a lady) had been given a clean bill of health from the vet on Wednesday and the vet said that sparrows are pretty good at re-adapting to life in the wild. So with that info and the good weather forecast over the next few days, it seemed like now was a good time to let the kid go. She didn’t hesitate for too long once the lid was taken off her cage, but I’m pretty sure that she was whicked away a little farther and a little faster than she’d intended by a big gust of wind that let out as soon as she took flight. Of course, I can’t say that seeing that helped me feel any better about cutting off a creature that is still so used to being taken care of by humans.

I came back to check on William after I got off work, about five hours after releasing her, and I could hear her chirping loudly and hungrily in roughly the same place she’d been released. I whistled a few times to let her know I was down there, and waited around for a bit just to watch and see how she was getting on with the other birds. I saw one sparrow chase her away from a spot she’d found on the windowsill of on of the campus buildings, and I listened to her continue to chirp chirp chirp in that way she does when she’s hungry or lonely. After a few minutes, she seemed to catch sight of me, because she flew down straight to me and landed on my arm. I showed her where I’d left some seeds and watched her eat them pretty greedily. She also continued to follow me around, landing on me repeatedly when I would try to put her down and walk away. I know in time she’ll learn to be friends with sparrows and not with people, but that thought doesn’t make me feel any less like I’ve abandoned her. After all, wasn’t the point of saving her as a baby to help her have a good life? Until I start to get the sense that she’s really gained significant independence (ie, she knows I’m there but doesn’t want to follow me around, sit on me, and nibble at my fingers), I’m going to feel bad about tossing her out into a world that I haven’t prepared her to handle. I plan to go back to campus tomorrow and check on her and put seeds down again. I don’t know what it is that I’m hoping to see when I visit tomorrow. Maybe just some kind of sign that she’s less distraught and more eager to spend time with her sparrow friends than her people friends.

Overall reaction: Meh.

The good:
1. It was *way* better than HP4.
2. Dolores Umbridge was played to perfection by Imelda Staunton (who was also quite good in Vera Drake. Just FYI)
3. They handled the angsty Harry bits well–got the idea across without being as over-the-top as the book.
4. I Snape.
5. Tonks gets very little screen time.

The bad:
1. Not enough Snape.
2. Tonks stole my purple hair (it was PINK dammit!)
3. Luna didn’t seem spacey enough to me. Weird, yes. But there was something very genuine about her character in the book that was just missing for me in the film.
4. Too rushed. I realize this was a long book and I can appreciate the difficulties in trying to condense all that to a reasonble-length film, but I still think the film could have been edited much more effectively, such that it felt like they were telling a story instead of rushing to incorporate as many scenes as possible. This complaint extends into problem #3…
5. The movie really can’t stand on it’s own. I saw the third HP film before I read the books, and while there were some confusing bits, the movie was still an enjoyable, standalone film. But this one I honestly can’t see someone watching who wasn’t already thoroughly invested in the series. And if you are thoroughly invested in the series, then the movie is really just a video-montage of the highlights of book 5. More than once in the film I felt like we were just whirling from one scene to the next in an attempt to cover as much of the book as possible. This is not to say that it isn’t still enjoyable, as the scenes in general do seem to do justice to the book. But it still just doesn’t feel very satisfying at the end. I found myself constantly trying to recall the book to mind in order to fill in the blanks and to recall to mind the emotional import of each scene. Sadly, the movie itself doesn’t do a very good job of making you care about anything that happens in the film–you have to care beforehand.

Overall, I was entertained. I was just also left feeling a bit dissatisifed. I know I’m tough to please in general, and I was even tougher to please in this case because The Order of the Phoenix is my favorite book. Still, I couldn’t help but feel that they had all the ingredients here to make a really great movie, and they blew somehow it in the editing. The audience never really gets a chance to pause, catch their breath, and take in what’s happening. This was a real detriment to a story with such an intricate plot. I’m almost inclined to say that the fifth book would actually have been better as two movies. The first could that fully sets up the sinister mechanations of Umbridge and the Ministry in their campaign against Harry and Dumbledore, culiminating in Umbridge’s appointment as Hogwarts’ headmaster. And then the second movie could move a little slower at first, focus a bit more on character development, Voldemort’s plotting, and the resistance of the students and faculty to Umbridge’s reign of terror. Granted, I can see from a Hollywood perspective that this 2-movie plan might not have much appeal, but the slap-dash version left me feeling very emotionally uninvolved. Whereas the book had me wringing my knuckles in anger at Umbridge (and Harry for being so thick) as well as waiting on the edge of my seat to find out what the Death Eaters were up to and how on earth the messy political situation with the Ministry would be resolved, the movie just left me thinking things like “oh yeah, I remember that part,” and “oh, I like how they did that.”

Ah well, I guess I’ll just have to wait and see if book 7 will satisfy my Harry Potter itch for a while.

I thought after stupidly, stupidly dying in 100th room of the Pit of 100 Trials, that maybe this was a sign to stop goofing around and actually get to work. And by get to work, I mean procrastinate by checking my email, checking thesuperficial.com, checking my friend’s blogs, checking ICQ, and then getting to work. And boy am I glad that I did all of those things, because otherwise I would not have found this!

“Batty,” you say, “I’m not clicking on this link unless you tell me what it is first. After all, it might be a diseased anus and I don’t really want to see that.”

Oh ye of little faith! Fine, I’ll tell you what it is. It is a ridiculously fun game little flash game involving some young coquette bitchslapping these other young coquettes (and an old maid and the old demonic mistress of the house). I don’t really know what’s going on–it’s all in Japanese and while I can recognize some spoken Japanese, I can’t read a damn thing. Use your imagination kiddos, plot’s clearly not all that important here anyway. Just slap away!!!