Gege Talks: The Unfinished Business

I guess many people have ever heard this word before, “Finish what you have started.” Yes, like the word, you should finish everything that you already start before and you should finish it as fast as you can possibly do, or otherwise it will become problematic. Well, I have one unfinished thing here in this blog. And to be honest, I feel kinda uneasy for that.

The unfinished thing here is the anime review that I started at around October 2012. There are two titles of them, Busou Shinki and Girls und Panzer, and both were air in the same season (only GuP were finished so much later). I did the review episodically and both were stuck halfway through the series. That's why I feel uneasy. So, better to finish it then, in a simpler way, hopefully.

Busou Shinki

Synopsis:

Rihito is finally come back to Japan after spent his life abroad. And he also bring his Shinki; Ann, Aines, and Lene. Shinki is a 6-inch robot girl that has a intelligence and emotion, and also has a battle armor and weapon in order to protect from villain. Later, Rihito receive a box containing Strarf model Shinki inside, and he name her Hina. With that, you'll see the life of Shinkis serving her master and also protect him from any danger.

The Review:

Before I start, I have to tell you something. Busou Shinki is actually an action figure made by Konami. The line itself has numerous of franchises. The most notably one is the video game. The game itself has a story in it, and it is rather good. In the PSP game, titled Busou Shinki Battle Masters, the main story is you play as, umm... you, aiming for the top of the Busou Shinki Tournament as you also go through numerous of issue in the game. Then, the line itself also have an OVA titled Busou Shinki Moon Angel, with the story roughly based from the PSP game. So I thought the TV anime will be roughly the same as the OVA. But no, they were different. Not completely though.

Let's go straight to the point. It's a slice-of-life anime focused on the Shinkis. And because it's a Busou Shinki, it's also action-packed as well. It has a good start at first. But, throughout the series, the episode become weirder and weirder. You'll see a race using Shinki's armory, Shinki desperately go on a trip, Shinki being hijack, Shinki turns into a life-size human, and so on and so forth. It's still fun in some way though. Then, with all that weirdness, the series ended in a good way. And that's where the problem lies. With a good start and ending, thanks to all the weirdness, the series become so hollow. It's like a shiny steel tube really. It may look shiny outside, but it might corroded inside. And in this case, it is corroded badly. I don't think the staff use the basis properly. Otherwise it will be a very different anime from the start, and it might be better I think.

As for the visual, it has ups and downs. It is well drawn and well animated, but sometimes the view is kinda lost focus, mainly in 3D scene. For the audio, first of all, all Shinki in the anime are voiced by the same actress as the video game, which is a good thing. And the music, some of them are fit the scene, some of them aren't that don't make you feel bothered, and some of them are weird that you can find kinda irritating.

So overall, it wasn't a particularly good anime. It's weird as a slice-of-life anime and also, even though the action is pretty good, it's not that action-packed for action anime as the armory mostly used in a rather different way. But, it has a charm to impress you sometimes. If you're a fan of Busou Shinki, then you might like this anime. But, if you like the video game like me, you might end up in a dissapointment.

Final score: 5/10

Girls und Panzer

Synopsis:

(Note: This is only a rough synopsis and not exactly detail)

Miho Nishizumi is transfer to Oarai Girls High School for a reason to miss a Tankery (or whatever you want to call it), an art of operating tanks. On her first day, she befriends with Saori Takabe and Hana Isuzu. Later, she's been approached by student council to participate in Tankery, but she refuse it because she has an traumatic experience with it. But, the student council objects and threaten her to be expel from the school. Thanks to that, she decide to take up Tankery with her friends. And later, they meet with a tank fanatic, Yukari Akiyama, and a gloomy girl, Mako Reizei, and forms a good Tankery unit.

The Review:

So, the series is started with a half-hearted main character. Well, half-hearted in Tankery. Despite that, she is very experienced. And frankly, the only experienced character in her pack is herself only. You might probably count Yukari as experienced. But the fact is, she is only knowledgeable, and that's a different thing. So, finding all the team members become well experienced in just one episode is awkward, making the story pace is too fast. But, leave that aside, it actually has a rather good story progress. The tournament battle has a intense feel in it, making you pump-up. And after that, it continues with a calming episodes, like searching for a new tanks and also finding a new member to make a new unit, with fun! The one that is missing is the actual Tankery training, in which they only show once throughout the series and it is rather short. And the ending is very good. Although they delay the final two episodes, the end result was terrific. The battle is epic, even though it isn't actually that realistic. However, there is an issue, like the names. Seriously, why the staff give all the rival's names and their school names (except Kuromorimine, which is essentially Germany) in other than Japanese names despite being national? And why they give weird names to them? I think that's the only distracting issue I have. Apart from that, everything is just fine. Well, nearly.

But, the big plus of this anime, really, are both the visual and audio. In visual, they are well drawn and the animation is genuinely astonishing! In fact, most of the anime is actually animated in 3D! And the animation of the tank is also pretty detail and realistic. Well, not on how it drives though. There are couple of defects, I have to say, but they aren't that noticeable. As for the audio, the VA are fits their roles and characters, and the music is nice that it make it feel like a World War 2. But, the best thing in the audio is the sound effect. They are really recreates the sound of metal scratching, metal bending, tree (or wood) crushing, land (or soil) deforming, tarmac scratching, rotating track, rotating turret, the diesel engine, and the best of all, firing bullets. And it feels realistic. With that and the animation combined, it is genuinely brilliant.

Okay, let's sum this up. It has not particularly strong story, but it is genuinely strong in one aspect; tank. I really enjoy watching this anime because of the tanks. As for the story concern, well, it actually gives some kicks really, but still not strong enough. So, if you are a fan of war and engineering-related things, this is the anime for you.

Final Score: 7.5/10

That's it. All the things are finished for now. Job done.