First Impressions / Miscellaneous / Random Musings / Series Introduction

Queen’s Blade Minus The Nudity Equals…?

In the comments of Jaalin’s Queen’s Blade post, a number of people were wondering how the other channels would censor the show since AT-X was going to be the only one airing the uncensored version. Well, the first episode aired on Chiba TV today, and the answer is that they made good use of cropping, bright glow, and fog, as you can see in the images above. A poster on 2chan even made some comparison images (NSFW). It was kind of amusing just to see how much censoring had to be done for this show, but I can’t say I’m surprised. To answer my own question though, I guess the series still has a very strong voice cast, and if you can’t watch the uncensored version on AT-X, then this might be better than nothing. As for me, I could care less about the plot or the nudity, but what I am curious about is what the absolute limit that AT-X will let them show is. I suspect that it might be even more hentai-ish than just what was in the first episode given how the promo videos had tentacle monsters.

Anime News / Daily Dose / FMP! The Second Raid

The Daily Dose

  • A live-action feature film adaptation of Full Metal Panic! is being developed by Mandalay Pictures with Zac Efron as the potential star. Mandalay hasn’t set up a studio for the film yet, but the company does have a first-look deal with Universal. I can only see this adaptation going two ways – the Dragonball Evolution way and then the Transformers route. Personally I vote for the latter.
  • Square Enix made an announcement in its Young Gangan magazine that four new titles will be launching in the next four issues of the magazine. The four titles includes Atsushi Suzumi (Venus Versus Virus) doing Nightmare Go Round, Izumi Kirihara (Hitohira) is doing Akira to Hiyori, Yuji Iwahara (King of Thorn) will be doing a title that has yet to be named, and Yuki Azuma (Dark Blue) will also do a title that has yet to be named.
  • The FUNimation Channel has announced that it will be running new Viz shows on its channel sometime late spring and summer. The shows in question will be NANA, Honey And Clover, Monster, Buso Renkin, and Hunter X Hunter.
  • Leonardo DiCaprio is considering casting SMAP as the Ninja Scroll live-action feature film adaptation’s main cast. It was announced last year that DiCaprio’s production company Appian Way had picked up the rights for the film. DiCaprio expressed that he wanted to make all the fans of the original film happy and to make sure that they put their best effort into the making of the film. At least Ninja Scroll sounds like it’s in “good hands,” but Leo just doesn’t come off as someone who’d be into anime.
  • The third Naruto Shippūden film, which shares the same title as the 99th episode in the original Naruto series is Hi no Ishi o Tsugumono (lit. The Will Of Fire Still Burns), will open in Japanese theaters on August 1st.
  • Detroit Metal City singer Hideki Kaji was beat up and robbed in Sweden while watching over filming equipment which was stolen. It was reported on Kaji’s official website that he was doing well. The Swedish police have yet to determine the identity of the assailants.
  • It was reported that a new Hidamari Sketch special had been green-lit for production. The announcement was made at the “Chō Hidematsuri Z” event that was held in Tokyo.
  • A promotional video is up for the slice of life, romance anime series Hatsukoi Limited on its official website.

    • Day Of Whale artwork courtesy of nnfsh on pixiv (account needed to access)