From episode 11 of the show whose full title I’m refusing to regurgitate on this occasion, because these unwieldy light-novel titles are a pox upon the world which really must be cleansed. I’m pretty sure there was another mikan box – or at least a fraction of one – in one of the earlier episodes during the school festival preparations, but I neglected to grab a screendump on that occasion.

That being said, I’m pretty sure this is a fake – I mean, look at that large, cartoony writing scrawled over the front of it. I’m pretty sure Rikka just realised the amazing cult powers of the tangerine box and fabricated one to install in the Far Eastern Magic Nap Society of Summer club room.

I only just got around to finishing Chuunibyou today, having delayed on the last couple of episode for various reasons (mostly just waiting for Anime on Demand to get them posted, but also because it’s been a busy few weeks). It’s a cute enough show, I guess. I do appreciate the fact that they realise that a little of the shows main gimmick goes a long way, and don’t overplay the chuunibyou-ness anywhere near as much as they could have, but it’s hard not to think that the show doesn’t really have all that much else going for it. The first few episodes of the series, where they really layered on the more surreal elements the thickest, were the most entertaining, but it really couldn’t have continued on the same path without outstaying its welcome. The shows attempts at serious (melo)drama ended up ringing a bit hollow with me, though, and I came out of it feeling that it’d been strangely empty an experience, and probably not something that’s going to stick with me. I can’t really imagine how thin an experience the original novels were without Dekomori and Kumin to pad things out.

Girls und Santa
Well, OK, we’re still about an hour or so out based on Blighty time, but, hey, it’s close enough, and it’s been Christmas Day in Japan for a good few hours now. Also, I kind of want to go to bed. Sleep and all that.

Anyway, have yourselves a Merry Christmas and an Acceptably Amusing New Years. I might actually try and update the blog a few times this week with content of… well, it’ll probably not be anything exciting, but it’ll be something. Maybe.

(P.S. It was nice to get another episode of Saki to watch today, but can it please be March already so we can have more Girls und Panzer? Thanks).

No, I’m not bidding farewell to the character Katyusha, who appears in the most recent episode of this seasons not-so-secret best show Girls und Panzer, but rather the Russian wartime song of the same name, sang by the character who shares it’s name in the same episode of the same show.

Or maybe not, depending how and when you watched it. You see, not just the song, but the entire scene in question was removed between it’s initial Japanese TV broadcast earlier in the week, and it’s streaming on Crunchyroll this morning – the episode up on Crunchy at the time of writing is in the region of fifty seconds shorter than the average anime episode. Which is kind of annoying for those of us who wait to watch things the entirely-above-board way, particularly when it’s the one scene that everyone else had been highlighting as, well, the highlight of the episode. Ho-hum.
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The Mystical Laws is an anime movie which is currently playing in London, three times a day for one week only. Just let that sink in for a minute – how many anime movies actually have what can be constituted as being a theatrical run, even if it’s just a week in a single cinema, in Blighty these days? Most anime movies are lucky to get a single screening at events like Scotland Loves Anime in more recent times, and even the days of the likes of Pokemon opening theatrically are long gone. That says something about this movie.

That said, it is running in one of the most ghetto cinemas I’ve had the pleasure of attending, despite being part of a well known chain. It was a small screen with no allocated seating, the air conditioning was clearly audible when the movies score wasn’t blasting on all channels, and the lavatories were actually situated just to the left of the screen – had I not been sat in the front row, I’d have had to suffer having an illuminated “Gents” sign in my peripheral vision for the movies two hour running time. This probably also says something about the movie in question.
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Spotted at this weekends MCM Expo in London, much to my astonishment, an actual, In Real Life Mikan Box. Yes, such things actually exist in the physical, 3D space. I was almost tempted to ask them if they’d sell me the thing, but aside from the fact that I’d have to lug it half-way back across the country, they’d ruined it by taping notices onto it by the time I passed the stand again.

As for MCM Expo, well, it was certainly a MCM Expo. I guess the main things this year were the video game content (both Nintendo and Microsoft had a fair presence, alongside the more nerdy companies which usually show) and the fact that the BBC also showed for pretty much the first time with a big Doctor Who presence (indeed, Matt Smith was there Friday, though I was not). Of course, this just meant that, combined with the cold outside weather pushing those who usually lurk around the front of the ExCel into the main hall, horrific, traffic halting queues broke out in all directions. It was exasperated by some bad, or at least confusing, floor planning which resulted in people who thought they were heading towards an exit were walking towards a wall. Crowded as heck, basically, despite the fact that they had the biggest overall floorspace I can remember.

Generally speaking, though, if you don’t know a bunch of people heading to Expo, aren’t going with a specific shopping agenda (and hopefully know how to spot bootlegs!) or aren’t London-local enough to write the entry off against what you’ll be saving in shipping/product costs, it’s really kind of hard to justify the expense of hitting Expo for the anime crowd. There isn’t really enough anime-related programming going on, and it’s kind of exasperated with annoying scheduling like putting the anime industry panel opposite Hiroshi Maruyama from CyberConnect2 demonstrating the new Naruto game.

Yet I’ll probably be back again in May. Ho-hum!