Random Curiosity

It’s that time of the year again: the start of the summer season! Summer isn’t as big as spring or fall – there’s about two-thirds as many shows premiering compared to this past spring – but there are still several exciting titles to talk about. As usual, I’ll watch the first episode of most shows within certain parameters (in other words, not the kiddie shows), and what I list here are the chances of me actually blogging something based on my initial impressions from promotional material. However, even if I list the chances for a show as good or guaranteed, it doesn’t necessarily mean I’ll stick with it for more than a few episodes.

By no means does this list reflect every single anime series that is going to be aired, though I did try to be as comprehensive as I could. Check out MOON PHASE for an entire listing, syoboi’s calendar for specific air-times, and Fansub Wiki’s Summer 2008 page for who’s tentatively subbing what.

Technical Note: All times are given in a 24-hour, relative-day format where times are extended to show which day they belong to. For instance, Friday morning at 1:30AM would become Thursday at 25:30 to show that the episode aired late Thursday night.

Sekirei http://www.sekirei-tv.com/ Premieres July 2nd, 2008 Airtime in Japan (JST, GMT+9): Wednesdays at 23:30 Airtime in U.S. (EST, GMT-4): Wednesdays at 10:30 Information Links: ANN Encyclopedia, AnimeNfo, AniDB, syoboi Sekirei is one of the series generating the most pre-season excitement, partially because it comes from a fairly well established manga, and partially because there’s been a lot of promotional material for it. The story involves a worthless guy who failed his college entrance exams but one day has a beautiful and buxom girl suddenly fall out of the sky on top of him. The girl chooses him as her master, and they subsequently get involved in a battle royale with other fighters. The manga has a lot of fanservice and nudity to go with all the action, and if the PVs are any indicator, it looks like the anime version will follow suit. I’ve generally heard pretty good things about this though (I’ve personally only read a couple of chapters), and it’s also being worked on the same Seven Arcs team that did Inukami! and all three Nanoha series, so this might be something that might be worth tuning in for. Odds I’ll Blog This: Good

Zero no Tsukaima ~Princesses no Rondo~ http://www.zero-tsukaima.com/ Premieres July 6th, 2008 Airtime in Japan (JST, GMT+9): Sundays at 24:30 Airtime in U.S. (EST, GMT-4): Sundays at 11:30 Information Links: ANN Encyclopedia, AnimeNfo, AniDB, syoboi If you’ve been coming to Random Curiosity for a while, Zero no Tsukaima is a series that probably needs no introduction since I’ve blogged both the first two series. You may also remember that, particularly towards the end, I wasn’t too happy with the second series and had questioned whether I would want to watch a third one. Well that time has finally come, and the decision is still up in the air. The third series will feature Louise and Saito going back to Albion to search for the fairy with mysterious powers (aka. Tiffania), and apparently Saito’s rune disappears as well. My issue with the series currently is that I know that the anime adaptation has completely ruined any semblance of the novels’ overarching story, and while that doesn’t necessarily prevent the anime adaptation from being good in its own right, the second series proved to be rather lackluster. Add to that the fact that this is airing on the same day of the week as CODE GEASS, and I’m less inclined to devote the time to blog this. In short, if the second series had been better, I’d mark this as guaranteed, but as it stands, I’m taking a wait-and-see approach with the first few episodes. Odds I’ll Blog This: Good

Note: This is a rather long and fairly comprehensive list of the shows coming in July. Much much more after the jump, including the torrent link for promotional material.