The Summer 2013 Anime Season has started, it started about a couple weeks ago but don’t worry about that, and like a lot of the other guys on the site I’m going to be listing my picks for the season. I actually didn’t pick up many from this season but the few that I did are ones that I swear by and have been, and will be, watching religiously. I’m still following series’ that have continued one from Winter, series’ like Attack on Titan (Shingeki No Kyojin) and Mushibugyo but I don’t believe they count towards the Winter season so I’m not going to talk about them. There are some absolutely “top notch” shows going on this season and I’m glad I picked up on these ones!
BLOOD LAD
Wow, just wow, what a damn good show this is! If you don’t know about this at all basically it’s a series that takes place mostly in the demon world but it’s not what you think, the demon world isn’t a bunch of things on fire where the sky is dark and people are just in immense pain, no, not at all! The demon world in Blood Lad is much like your regular metropolis…if it was populated by mythological creatures…so yeah like your regular metropolis! We follow the story of Staz, he’s a vampire but he’s unlike those that came before him; he’s not really into sucking blood but he’s a massive Otaku so he loves his games and he loves his action figures and, my God, does he love his Manga.
Staz is also the leader of a gang and he runs a certain section of the demon world, he’s like a vampire Bancho. One day a human girl wanders into the demon world and, as you can imagine, Staz goes crazy over it; “a human girl!?” he loves the idea of having her around and really wants to know all about our world…but…she gets killed by a rogue, man-eating plant and becomes a ghost. Yeah. That’s ok though because Staz vowed to turn her back into a human so he can once again be in the presence of a beautiful female human. There’s plenty of action, plenty of comedy and the art style is fantastic, I say give Blood Lad a good whirl!
GATCHAMAN CROWDS
Gatchaman Crowds is one of the bests of this season both aesthetically and concept-wise, it’s the greatest looking, Super Sentai-Style anime you will see for a very very long time. No nothing about it? Allow me: I’m going to say it’s a remake of an old show even though it’s not an exact remake, basically it’s extremely similar to the old-school series Science Ninja Team Gatchaman. It’s about a small team of “normal people” who have been called into action to fight the “Mess” who are a bunch of crazy, Rubiks cube looking monsters from who-knows-where that are attacking the earth.
Now these “normal people” aren’t so normal when they go into what I’m calling “Catchaman Mode”, they get this weird yet awesome suits of armour that are all very unique and all sporting their own crazy weapons, in this mode they fight the evil “Mess” and save the day. I’m not too good at explaining things but I think you all get the drift. The animation is beautiful and, much like Blood Lad, the art style is really just fantastic. It’s an all around good anime that’ll get you going crazy! The best thing is that, really, it’s nothing like the old series which is just great because it means no overly-camp bad guys and “not a lot” of cheesy one-liners that’ll make you cringe. You also don’t need to know anything about the series before watching it so jump in!
DANGANRONPA THE ANIMATION
This one right here is another Game-turned-Anime series’ that really knocks socks off! Well, I think so. It seems as though the series’ I’ve picked this time round are all good for their own reasons yet no reason better than how great the art style is, I’m freakin’ loving this seasons art! Danganronpa The Animation is no different, I had to get used to the ways the characters looked but after episode one I warmed up to the style and realised how cool it is. So Danganronpa is a PSP game as well as this new anime and basically it revolves around a bunch of teenagers who were brought into this school for being good at something in particular, for example: one girl is good at gambling (yeah…I know) another is a great swimmer and another is just an awesome Bancho.
The main character, however, is just “extremely lucky” for getting accepted because he has no real skills. So they go to this school and, let me tell you, it’s not what it seems to be. Once they’re all in the school the doors and windows are locked and there’s no escape, a crazy looking bear appears and explains to the teens that the only way out of the school is if they kill one of their peers, not only that but their other peers cannot find out who the murderer was…basically the only way out is to commit the perfect crime. Real strange huh? Oh yeah! Real strange but real good! It’s so gritty and so gory and you can absolutely tell that it was based on a game because they add the game elements in so well. I hold this series in higher regard than Devil Survivor 2: The Animation from last season, when it comes to making shows out of games Danganronpa has seemed to do it the best.
