Steven Den Beste made an interesting comment last week in response to our choice of Lucky Star for OP of the Year in our Best of 2007 Anime Awards, and it really set me thinking. I know which OPs I like and don’t like, of course, but I had never really stopped to consider what criteria I use to judge that.

Steven’s comment help illustrate that while we hold most of the same criteria on what makes a good OP, we disagree on how important each of those criteria are. From his comment:

“I suspect a lot of the difference of opinion is in what we view the purpose of an OP to be.

For a lot of people, it should be an AMV. That’s what the Lucky Star OP is. Myself, I think it should be an advertisement for the series. It needs to be fun to watch, and to have catchy music, but more important than those things is that it needs to introduce me to most of the major characters and give me some idea of what they’re like, and what their relationships are like. (But it shouldn’t give away spoilers, of course.)”

…

The Potemayo OP does show us those kinds of things, too. For instance, it shows Mikan trying to get close to Sunao and being chased away by Potemayo. It shows Guchuko bouncing on top of Potemayo, and Potemayo getting mad. We get to see Guchuko’s laser beams. Lots of relevant stuff packed into there.

The Lucky Star OP doesn’t do any of that. You can’t tell from it that Konata is an otaku, that Tsukasa is a wimp, and Kagami is strong and sane.

(Emphasis mine)

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Amidst all the furor over Japan’s newly implemented policy of fingerprinting every foreigner entering or leaving the country, as I was reading through the various comments on different blogs and news sites there was one particular type of reaction that stood out to me.

Many people were making comments like “That’s too bad, I was thinking of taking a vacation to Japan, but now with all these things I’m hearing, maybe I should stay away.”

Now certainly, Japan is not the magical land of rainbows and ponies and gumdrop smiles that your average weeaboo imagines it to be. In fact, sometimes it looks pretty bad. But at the same time, it’s also not all doom and gloom, racism and xenophobia, which is the impression that many people seem to be getting from all of the recent negative press.

So let me just reiterate a very important point:

Japan is still a wonderful place to visit.

Japan is a beautiful country with a rich culture and heritage and some of the kindest, most hospitable people I have ever met. It has some of the most breathtaking sights, most delicious cuisine, and best entertainment anywhere. It is also arguably the safest countries in the world to travel in.

Matsumoto Castle

Yes, if you are not Japanese you will generally be treated differently. This doesn’t necessarily mean in a derogatory way, however. On the contrary, the Japanese generally go to extraordinary lengths to be accommodating to guests in their country. Read the rest of this entry »

Every year Hiatus Disease claims the lives of thousands of blogs. In fact, it is the leading cause of blog mortality worldwide.

It can quickly turn fatal if left untreated, and thus should be taken extremely seriously. If you or someone you know may be suffering from Hiatus Disease, don’t wait. Seek professional help immediately.

Fortunately, Hiatus Disease is almost always treatable if diagnosed in time, and the long term impairment effects are usually minimal. Even if you have not contracted Hiatus Disease, you may still be at risk. Learn about the symptoms and take the short quiz below to find out whether you should be concerned.

This young girl is currently battling against the ravages of Hiatus Disease. Don’t let yourself end up like this. Read the rest of this entry »

DarkMirage’s recent criticism of Nyoro~n’s Gundam 00 translations sparked a flurry of criticism, mostly petty ad hominems telling him to get out of his parent’s basement, but also a few reasonable arguments defending Nyoro~n. After checking out Nyoro~n’s releases myself, I feel compelled to offer some defense of my own, on DarkMirage’s side of things.

Although I don’t usually watch fansubbed versions, I decided to download a few of these Nyoro~n subs to check out whether this was for real. I almost couldn’t believe that these so-called “translations” could actually be that bad until I saw it for myself.

At first I thought maybe it was just an isolated incident, or perhaps due to the extensive technical jargon that Gundam 00 employs. To double check, I decided to take a look at Nyoro~n’s subs for Gurren Lagann, a show which is much easier to understand and translate.

To my dismay, however, it’s just as bad! I feel sorry for the people who watched this thinking they were getting the real Gurren Lagann!

Take a look at the following comparisons: Read the rest of this entry »

Google has a search comparison tool called Google Trends, which allows you to look up and compare the popularity of certain high volume search queries over time.

After reading this article, I was inspired to see if I could find anything cool regarding anime related search terms. Rather than performing more generalized comparisons, however, I decided to look up specific shows to see if I could learn anything interesting about them. Read on for the results.

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Yes, even Epic Win is not immune to that greatest of cliches, that bane of bloggers everywhere – metablogging.

If you’re a regular, you’ve most likely noticed that our usual routine of posting every 1 – 2 days has slowed over the last week to, well…none. Guff got KO’d by a nasty flu, and I’ve been busy with work, so things here at EW have been pretty quiet. Honestly though, none of the new anime that have aired so far have gotten me really interested yet, so I haven’t exactly been burning with the desire to pen long-winded diatribes on the merits (or lack thereof) of a given show.

The above images are purely for illustrative purposes. Any resemblance to real bloggers, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Instead, I thought I’d take a moment share some thoughts about blogging in general. Despite my earlier disparaging remarks about metablogging, I do often find it interesting to learn more about what goes on behind the scenes at some of my favorite sites. Really, metablogging only becomes a problem when it starts taking the place of real blogging. Of course, by talking about metablogging, I’ve fallen to an even lower level… meta-meta-blogging.

Anyway, so here we are, two months and 25k pageviews into this whole blogging thing. We’ve learned a few things, but still have a long way to go to achieve “serious business” blog status. Thus, rather than the usual routine of the grizzled veteran blogger sharing wisdom gained from many years in the trenches, I thought it might be interesting to offer my perspective as the fresh-faced new blogger, still enthusiastic and naïve.

Here’s a nice random picture that’s only very loosely related
to what I’m talking about. I’m supposed to put these in
periodically to break up the wall of text, or something.

So a few thoughts: Read the rest of this entry »

Some of them, anyway.

After watching the recent OVA and reading through some of the manga, I have revised my opinion of Kojika somewhat. Read the rest of this entry »