I haven’t done an NHRV related article for a while, so I figured now was the time.

I think we have a great staff with mature opinions and appreciable anime knowledge, but, as is the case with any review database stitched together by multiple people, there are going to be disagreements. I’m the strange one in the group in that, whenever a review is posted where I don’t agree with the contention, I don’t bother expressing my own opinion in a second review of the same title. I just don’t see the point for various reasons. But, needless to say there are a number of reviews in our database that I don’t agree with. That’s just the nature of things… people aren’t always going to see eye-to-eye on every occasion, even though I do find most of my colleagues to be generally reliable. But, here’s a few of those reviews that I don’t agree with and a few words on where our opinions split.

Ouran High School Host Club – DarkKanti

The split in opinions here isn’t too great, but I’d have given this series a (slightly) higher rating. It’s not often that a comedy series is able to remain consistently funny for 26 episodes, but Ouran managed to achieve this, which is a highly commendable feat. Most of the points he made, though, I agree with: some of the character development was surprisingly good, but the fact that they were able to handle most but not all of the characters well was frustrating, as was the lack of a resolution at the end. I think we both agreed in the end that the plot wasn’t great, but the comedy was, but I think we had different ideas on which components this show should have placed its emphasis on: I was happy with it being mostly comedy for its entire run since it was executed so well, but DK seemed to want it to spend more time developing a proper story with a real conclusion. In the end, though, we both did like it… I guess I just liked it more.

Neon Genesis Evangelion: End of Evangelion – Shadowmage

Here’s a movie that everyone has an opinion on. My problem with this movie was that it was pretentious and too confusing-for-the-sake-of-it. It was undoubtedly a hell of a ride, but the storytelling wasn’t great as it went down some bizarre paths and didn’t exactly do a sound job of explaining itself. The result is that it’s meaning is still being debated (though not as hotly as a few years ago) almost ten years after it was made. Almost everybody has a different interpretation of events, including one prominent theory that it all meant nothing. And, truthfully, this one seems the most sound to me. I’m not going to argue that EoE is a visual experience unlike any other in anime, but as a story, it falls short, IMO.

Air – royal crown

Which ironically leads me to Air. Isn’t it funny how one anime with unconventional story-telling draws one reaction from me, while another draws a completely different reaction? But, unlike royal crown, I thought Air utilized its bizarre chronology and alternative point-of-views for the same events to great effect, as it really allowed for some great character and plot development. Although, I do agree that the show desperately needed more episodes, since it was always slightly more rushed than it should have been. Aside: I edited royal crown‘s review and chose two of the three screenshots. Try to guess which ones. How about that, two different characters wearing very similar hats, and I (unconsciously) chose those particular scenes for screenshots… It is a really cool hat, though.

Outlaw Star – DarkKanti

I’m not sure what DK was thinking here. Outlaw Star, Fantastic? Hardly, IMO. Sure, it’s a fun series, but not really anything outstanding or memorable. All of the characters are ’90s archetypes and most of them get very little character development. The series drowns is filler right up until the final few eps and when the plot finally does progress, it never becomes anything special. Is it an entertaining series? Yes. Does it deserve the same rating as Monster, Gankutsuou and Mushishi? I don’t think so.

Full Metal Panic!(1,2) – DarkKanti, Kuma

FMP! falls into the same category as Outlaw Star, it’s a fun series, but it doesn’t deserve such high ratings. Personally, I think Gonzo‘s handling of the FMP! franchise is shamed in comparison with Kyoto Animation‘s handling of its sequel, Full Metal Panic! The Second Raid. TSR developed its characters properly by putting them through some grueling trials, had some truly intense examples of drama and had a more gripping atmosphere. FMP! was lackluster in comparison: some nice action and an interesting plot, but nothing as profound as its sequel. I wouldn’t rate it significantly lower than my colleagues, but I would rate it lower nonetheless.

I’d give credit for the OP image, but I don’t know who made it.

So, I made the foolish “promise” to the staff that I’d somehow write a soundtrack review for Death Note’s (awesome) OST. Soundtracks is a bizarre section we have on our site. It’s the most neglected and I’d say far and away the toughest section to maintain. The link between these two postulates is obvious. But, with most anime series seeing one, often two, sometimes even more complementary soundtracks released, a site of our size (which, I’d approximate, manages to cover six or seven anime each season within a few months of their release, which I’d say is pretty good coverage considering our size) would have to demand at least one soundtrack review a month out of every one of our staff before we could even think about covering the soundtrack industry with the same comprehensiveness with which we do with anime. That might not sound terribly difficult until one tries to sit down and actually write a soundtrack review. Man, they are not easy things to write.

For me, personally, there are lot of hurdles to overcome which add to the difficulty of writing soundtrack reviews. For one, The Nihon Review is close to the only anime soundtrack reviewing site I know of, and pretty much the only one I actually read. Which, sort of limits my sources and my exposure to the type of language used in standard soundtrack reviews. It’s a simple matter of fact that all writers base their style and formats to some extent on works they’ve been exposed to before. For anime reviews, we use a rather tried and true format that we’ve tweaked only very slightly to suit ourselves that we’re all familiar with and we’re all very comfortable with. But, with a general disinterest to actual critical analyses of anime soundtracks on the internet, there’s not much for someone like me to go by, as far as getting some actual exposure to the language is concerned. Second, my musical knowledge and training is rather limited. Sure, I know what I like as far as music is concerned. Saying “I like this” is easy. But, saying why I like it, in other words, separating the good in a piece of music from the bad and then articulating it is a completely different kettle of fish. In my younger days, I did study a few years of music classes in high school, and I did learn a musical instrument for a while (though I was never good at it), so I do have a foundation of music knowledge to base things on, but it’s been years since I’ve even thought of looking at music from an academic point of view, so my memory of technical terms and the like is very rusty to say the least.

I know for a fact that this is the sort of thing that can be remedied with a bit of time and effort. If I were to sit down and force myself to actually write some soundtrack reviews and force myself to read music reviews (and not just anime soundtracks) across the internet, eventually it will become significantly easier. I know this, because I was in the exact same position in regards to my knowledge of anime just a few years ago. I knew what I liked, but I struggled to express it. Reading anime review sites, hanging around on anime forums, exposing myself to anime-related literature and, of course, watching anime itself allowed me to learn the technical language as well as refine my taste and give me the ability to articulate my opinion so that the next step of actually sitting down and writing a review became a straightforward process. Arguably, learning how to write a soundtrack review (with ease) is much the same. The problem is that, people just aren’t talking about anime soundtracks as often or as much or to the same amount of depth as people talk about anime. And, for myself anyway, arguably the greater hurtle is the fact that, unlike watching anime, listening to music is a passive activity. You don’t have to think to enjoy music (although that’s not saying that brain-dead, inane music is just as enjoyable to listen as something with a given amount of complexity or uniqueness, since I certainly wouldn’t say that’s the case for myself… it’s just that such music doesn’t always require active thought to enjoy). However, a really outstanding anime with a compelling story or complicated themes will almost always demand some amount of active thought. This, I would say, is probably the greatest hurdle to overcome before I could even thinking about reaching a stage where writing about music is as easy as writing about anime. In the end, writing about anime at any stage, reviews or just general commentaries, is usually a case of just recalling the thoughts one has while actually watching the anime, and then sorting them into something coherent. Before I could do the same with music, I’d actually need to have thoughts to sort while listening to it, rather than being distracted by other things as I usually am while listening to music.

It was Tamashii that asked the question and it was Kuma that answered it. The question (slightly paraphrased for convenience): What can we do to make ourselves more useful? The answer: Write our own blogs. Sure, it might seem like a counter-productive distraction, but I’ve been of the opinion for a little while now that blogs have a greater freedom than anime reviews (in the format we maintain, anyway), which will inevitably lead to a greater insight into the minds of our staff: our opinions, our inherent biases, our pet hates, our fanboy/girl-isms. This post introduces the premise, as well as the flavour of my particular blog. Many of my articles will attempt to allow my readers an insight into the inner workings of The Nihon Review from the point of view of this self-proclaimed manager of the site (as well as, on the flipside, an outlet for me to vent… not that I need to vent often, since we have a great staff and I very rarely have to play politics with them). The other type of article (and, very possibly, more interesting to you) will be topical (topical = whatever Answerman is talking about at the moment), opinionated op-ed pieces on aspects of anime (and, obviously, other aspects of Japanese culture, though admittedly, primarily anime) that I feel strongly about… and probably lots of genre commentary. What you won’t see on my blog: episode reviews. I’ll be following the mold set by anime|otaku (an outstanding anime blog, which is slowly getting the credit and respect it deserves) and other similar blogs and steering away from episode reviews simply because there’s enough of them out there already and, at the pace and magnitude they are written at, I couldn’t keep up and expect to make an impact.

So, that’s it. My blog’s intention in a nutshell. I do intend to update weekly, but I lead a very hectic life so if that happens will be a case of ‘wait-and-see’. Nonetheless, I hope you enjoy.

Comments are always welcome. They’re the only way I know that people are actually reading my work.