So, another year has come to a close, and since I’ve written so very, very little about anime in the last six months, I figured that I should follow up last years end of year posting.

The pre-amble to this years End of Year Post is a bit of a sticky wicket. It’s been a pretty good year in general, at least as far as TV anime goes. Theatrical anime, or at least those I’ve gotten to see this year, has been a little disappointing in comparison to last years smattering of high-budget spectaculars, but even then it’s hardly been bad.

I think the real problem is that, well, anime news and discussion has kind of been dominated by Madoka Magica this year. It’s pretty unusual that a show that aired in the earliest part of the year is still being brought up at the very end of it, but even as I write this, the top stories on some of the news sites I check are about the show. With the movies in production, I guess that’s probably going to end up being the case for 2012 as well.

Oh, and I’ve also yet to get around to watching those Gundam Unicorn OAVs I’d said I’d not got around to watching last year, despite the fact that the forth instalment turned up a week or so ago. Given I’m spending £30+ a disk on that thing, I should really keep on top of that. I also regret to say that, alas, despite my best efforts, I managed to get spoilt for the ending of Katanagatari about two episodes prior to it’s conclusion. That was frustrating, to say the least.

Ok, without further ado, let’s talk about the specifics with the Beta-Waffle Entirely-Pointless Awards for 2011 Anime Existence.
(more…)

Geez, could they have chosen a worse place to put a three-month break in Fate/ZEROs broadcast schedule? Probably, but maaaaaan, it’s going to be a long three months. Well, actually, I suppose it’s technically a short three months, given that, even in a leap-year, February isn’t the longest of period denominations, but let’s not argue semantics.

Anyway, I’d like to wish all of you reading a pleasant Holiday season from all of us here at Beta-Waffle – and since it’s just me here, that’s not a difficult operation to complete, being free of any grumpy or tsundere staff members to extract pleasantries from. Personally, I’ll probably celebrate by watching the Haruhi movie or something, since that’s nice and seasonal and all. Or maybe Tokyo Godfathers. Or maybe neither.

Or I could just call it Catalogue 3, but that feels a little disingenuous given that much of this content is also hitting the 360 version of the game, where it certainly isn’t just the third catalogue.
(more…)

This is just me following up on something I mentioned when I saw it theatrically a little under a couple of months back, although this isn’t something that came in the same package as iM@S which I got yesterday, rather being something I’ve just procrastinated posting about.
(more…)

I realise that I’m not exactly being prescient with this discussion here, but I was watching the second BD volume of iDOLM@STER yestereve (itself not exactly prompt, but I guess you can’t expect too much out of international mail this time of year) and Producers tie started bugging me again.
(more…)