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Okay I've been watching a lot of anime over christmas and I believe it's finally time to put this thread to good use. I'll be copying and pasting the summaries though. I hate summarizing.


Sayonara Zetsubō Sensei
Sayonara Zetsubō Sensei revolves around a very pessimistic high school teacher named Nozomu Itoshiki who, at the very beginning of the series, tries to hang himself on a sakura tree. Despite this effort of self-destruction, he is saved by an extremely optimistic girl known only as Kafuka Fuura (though in her effort to save his life, she almost kills him). She explains to him that it is simply unimaginable that he would hang himself on such a nice day, especially in front of such beautiful trees. She decides to nickname Nozomu "Pink Supervisor", and offers to pay him fifty yen to call him by that nickname. After having enough of the strange girl, Nozomu bolts to the school and starts his homeroom class, but the attempt to escape was in vain as he finds that the girl is one of his students. Not only that, but Kafuka is just the tip of the iceberg: each and every student in his class represents a new personality quirk or bizarre obsession, posing challenges that the suicidally-inclined teacher must overcome in spite of himself.

Review: I thought this was a very funny (and weird) anime. There's no plot and the series is character driven, but the characters have a lot of weird quirks that it pretty much doesn't need a plot. I have to say, his class has so many weird people that his own quirk is pretty much overshadowed. It's a short series though, but I guess it can't be helped when there's no story.

Final Grade: Great, a must watch

Kino's Journey

In Kino's Journey, the protagonist, Kino, accompanied by a talking motorcycle, a Brough Superior motorcycle named Hermes, travels through a mystical world of many different countries and forests, each unique in its customs and people. Kino only spends three days and two nights in every town, without exception, on the principle that three days is enough time to learn almost everything important about a place, while leaving time to explore new lands.

Review: I love this anime. It has a certain kind of fairy tale atmosphere in it. Every town is always different from the last. I don't really know how to describe Kino's Journey. It's basically about Kino's travels and adventures. The whole series is composed entirely of short stories, but it works just fine. Unfotunately they ran only 13 episodes and there was nothing to close it. Then again there wasn't really a main plot to close in the first place so whatever.

Final Grade: Awesome, a must watch

You could always watch it online if you can't get your hands on a copy. (I know I do.)

Dai Guard

Twelve years ago, Japan was attacked by a strange unstoppable creature which was later called a Hedrodyne. It took a great deal of sacrifices and loss of life to stop the creature. A private company builds a giant robot that was called Dai-Guard. But not another creature appeared for 10 years and Dai-Guard becomes more of a joke then the protector of the city. Until the day a new Hedrodyne raises it's ugly head. Against orders three PR officers steal Dai-Guard and now are our only help to protect the city against this new wave of Hedrodyne attacks.

Review: I thought this was a fascinating anime. It's different from most giant robot anime. While most giant robot anime do insane stunts, this anime performs on real world physics. Imagine in real life there really was a giant robot protecting the world. It would actually be heavy and slow to control. In my opinion, this anime seems to really portray the problems with having a company owned giant robot as it goes through masses of paperwork, lawsuits, property damage, tactic squabbles with the military and other bureaucracy problems. Eventually, the real drama is in the bureaucratic troubles and office politics that the Corporation faces as Dai guard continues to defend against the Hedrodyne.
*possible spoiler*
What surprised me the most however, is that they don't explain where the Hedrodyne come from. Instead, they eventually treat the hedroyne as simply yet another disaster to be faced in a dangerous world-no different from earthquakes or typhoons.

Final Grade: Good, Definitely worth watching

Sgt.frog

An alien and his platoon invade "pokopen" (Earth), but is capture by two human who restrains his abilities to successfully conquer Earth. Sargent or Keroro the alien uses his low brow schemes to conquer Earth, but always fail because of human interference.

Review: Much like a retarded version of tom and jerry with more anime like fan service. It is a manga and anime. It contains many puns, otaku inside jokes, and some political humor. As you watch the anime or read the manga you will notice that as the number of episodes or volumes of sgt.frog increase the plot begin to fade away (that is if you considered that it had a actual plot in the first place). There "were" moments when it was fun, but that is now a pleasant memory fading away as the number of volumes and episodes increase. I'm disappointed in you Mine!

Grade: D- "Don't buy it"

Quote from experience: "Hmmmm.......I think I'll go kill myself now....and I think I'm gonna make it very painful"