Spice and Wolf / Ōkami to Kōshinryō

Lawrence a traveling merchant wanders into a small rural town preparing to celebrate the harvest. They talk about the legend of the land god, Holo, a wolf-deity. When he is about to leave he notices someone in his cart under the furs, and he is surprised to find a girl with ears and tail. She introduces herself as Holo, and explains to him that she wants him to take her back to her hometown of Yoitsu. They begin their journey, in their travels she learns about how the world has changed, and learns about Lawrence’s trade.

Available on: Hulu, Anime-Planet, TV, Animeflavor

Spice and wolf is an older anime, but still sitting at my top 20 even though I haven’t got to finishing it. If you haven’t had the pleasure to watch anime yet, or haven’t before I would suggest starting with this one. It’s not terribly offensive and there is very little ‘exposure’ as far as exaggerating the female form.

Blue Exorcist – Movie

Rin and the gang are preparing for a festival that is celebrated every 11 years. Rin and Yukio are sent to assist in an exorcism. Things go bad and the two meet a mysterious young boy. The young boy turns out to be the demon from the stories, and Rin fights to keep the exorcist from killing the demon.

I wasn’t as thrilled about the movie as the series, it wasn’t as great in my opinion. Though the animation was insanely amazing, but the plot wasn’t as appealing as the series or the manga.

Available on: Yidio, Amazon

Blue Exorcist – Anime Series

Rin a orphan teenager raised by Father Fujimoto, after reaching his teen years he finds himself to be abnormal with superhuman strength. One day Father Fujimoto decides to tell Rin he is the son of Satan one of the most dangerous of demons. Father Fujimoto is killed in front of Rin, and he is told to draw the demon-slaying blade Kurikara. After the funaral, Rin and Yukio (his twin brother), are taken to True Cross Academy, where Rin trains to become an exorcist and defeat Satan.

I loved this show! It will forever be a favorite,the only thing that I was sad about was that… Well… It ended! My favorite character in the show was Kuro, a black cat-spirit turned demon, who becomes Rin’s familiar. I haven’t seen the movie yet but it’s supposed to be good too. I do plan on watching the movie and will do a review on it soon. I also want to read the manga because it’s supposed to be much longer then the anime, which I’m very excited about.

Available On: Itunes, Amazon, Crunchyroll, Hulu

Kamikaze Girls

The story starts off with Momoko, having a flashback to when her parents met, her father was a gang member and her mother who divorced her father to marry a doctor after she was born. Her father after getting in trouble after selling fake brand clothing – she decides to pawn off some of the clothes to buy her Lolita clothing. Momoko becomes friends with Ichigo, a gang member who buys clothes from Momoko. Ichigo basically tells Momoko her life story.

This movie is very Japanese. It perpetuates almost every Japanese stereotype in the book, but that’s what made it so entertaining. Bringing together the stereotypes and the well developed plot. I love this movie, I would put this as my top five favorite Japanese movies of all time.

You can watch this movie on YouTube.

Cast: Kyoko Fukada, Anna Tsuchiya, Hiroyuki Miyasako, Sadao Abe, and Eiko Koike. 

Psycho-Pass – Season 1

The show fallows Akane Tsunemori, a new inspector of Unit One. Tsunemori hunts criminal with other criminals called Enforcers. Enforcers are given special guns called Dominators designed to only kill people with a high Crime Coefficient. On Tsunemori’s first day she shoots Kogami, a talent criminal. She is accompanied by Ginoza, her superior who looks down on Enforcers, and Masaoka (previous detective) and Karari (Enforcer). She is assigned to be Kogami’s handler for missions. The main antagonist is a criminal named Makishima, who’s psychology yields a low crime coefficent, which them from shooting him with the Dominators.

I was unsure if I was going to like this series since I’m not used to detective anime shows, but it was good. I think Kogami and Makishima were my favorite characters in the show. But after the first couple episodes I really got into it. I’m really looking forward to seeing the next season.

Available On: Netflix.

Futurama

Fry is a pizza delivery boy. Moments before the year 2000, Fry is frozen in time for the next 1000 years.  In the year 3000, he refuses to return to being a delivery boy, and meets a new friend named Bender by accidentally stepping into a suicide booth. They both live and decide to mooch off of his living distant nephew, Dr. Farnsworth, incidentally Dr. Farnsworth is looking for a delivery team for Planet Express. Leela the career assignment officer decides to abandon her job, and joins Fry and Bender on the Planet Express team. Fry meets Dr. Zoidberg the Planet Express doctor who is an lobster-like alien, and Amy Wong a rich engineering student at Mars University. The main plot revolves around the Planet Express company and it’s employees and the central group (Fry, Leela, and Bender).

Voice Actors: Billy West, Katey Sagal, John DiMaggio, Tress MacNeille, Maurice LaMarche, Lauren Tom, Phil LaMarr, and David Herman.

WE LOVED THIS SERIES! Mostly me though. I was so thrilled when I saw the ending, which is a real tearjerker and an utter surprise at that. Even though this show had lots of crudeness it was maybe one of the best endings to a TV series that I’ve ever seen. I was very pleased that it didn’t end on a cliff hanger.

Available on: Netflix, Google Play, and Amazon.

Durarara!!

Ryūgamine a young boy moves to a big city, and he’s very excited to be attending a new school with his childhood friend Kida. Kida warns Ryugamine about the bad people in the city. As they head into the city they see the local legend “Black Rider”, sometimes at night the motorcycle turns into a horse, and locals believe that the rider has no head. The rider is known through out the anime as “Celty Sturluson”, how riders around looking for her stolen head. The anime is set in a town in Japan called Ikebukuro.

I wasn’t sure originally about watching the anime, and I haven’t read the manga quite yet but I do plan to. This anime was much different then the majority I have seen recently. It was very enjoyable and I would recommend it to someone interested in animes about gangs and criminals.

This anime is a spin off of the light novel written by Ryohgo Narita, and the illistrations were produced by Suzuhito Yasuda.

Available on: Crunchyroll and Hulu.

House (TV Series)

Dr. Gregory House (Hugh Laurie) an unconventional doctor with amazing skills at a fictional hospital (Princeton Plainsboro) in New Jersey. He works as the head of Diagnostic Medicine with his team working on the most puzzling cases, . He deals with constant pain from muscle damage by popping pain relievers. His physical disability causes him to be depressed and moody, as a result Dr. House is not exactly a ‘people person’, quite the contrary, he is frequently quite offensive to people around him but his medical brilliance and dedication tend to overshadow his rudeness.

I love watching House even if it’s the reruns, but I think it might be an acquired taste for many. The cases they face can be quite amazing! I was surprised how good Hugh’s American accent was, since he is British, it was spot on.

Cast includes: Hugh Laurie, Lisa Edelstein, Omar Epps, Robert Sean Leonard, Jennifer Morrison, Jesse Spencer, Peter Jacobson, Kal Penn, Olivia Wilde, Amber Tamblyn, Odette Annable, Charlyne Yi

Available on: Netflix, Google Play, Amazon

Barakamon

Handa a professional calligrapher punches a curator of a gallery after his work is criticized. The curator had said that his work was too unoriginal, causing Handa to get angry. Handa’s father sends him off to a small remote village for a ‘retreat’. There he practices to prefect his work, and meets the villagers and interacts with them. The anime is an adaptation of the manga, Handa-kun, by Kinema Citrus, Funimation has licensed the show for streaming.

This is one of my recent favorites since I have been looking for good animes to watch. This anime doesn’t disappoint. It’s very funny and very enjoyable.

Crazy Taxi City Rush – App Review

Crazy Taxi is a mission based application published by Sega. It’s really a fun game that keeps you coming back, The game allows you to choose your driver, buy the taxi that you want, upgrade your taxi, and add decorations to get more cash. The major enjoyable part is that the game has multiple maps, and it allows you to beat your previous scores. I also enjoy the fact that the whole thing seems to have a story line.

This app is available on: Itunes and Google Play