Reaper Forums Anime/Manga Discussion Thread

[dwarvenranger]

Well, it's more for my girlfriend as we're going to be starting an L5R campaign and she doesn't know anything about it. She is a big fan of anime, so I thought that might be a good way to get her into the setting. But anything you guys got that you think will be useful, I'd appreciate. Thanks.

[Nocturne]

There are ,surprisingly, not many feudal era style anime about Samurai. Quite a few on ninja like Basilisk and Ninja Scroll though.

 

Off the top of my head I would recommend Ayakashi: Classic Japanese Horror.

Also Princess Mononoke, earlier period than L5R but a good look at human and spirit interactions.

Possibly also Otogi Zoshi and Shigurui, I say possibly as although I have both on DVD I've not watched them yet, but they do look to be the right sort of thing.

 

Should add I've just watched a trailer for Shigurui and if that's anything to go by the series is insanely violent.

[dispatchdave]

L5R is a lot of fun (I haven't tried the RPG but I've read a lot, and I've played the CCG off and on for over a decade; I'm still terrible!).

 

Keep us updated on how your campaign goes!

 

Maybe check out Samurai Champloo? I can't recall the tech-level of the show, but I recall it being full of samurai goodness.

-Dave

[chaosscorpion]

There was a 7 novel series set in the L5R realm. The titles were the name of the 7 major clans. They might help.

[klawzie]

Backing up the recommendation on Ayakashi: Classic Japanese Horror. Also, if you liked the last few episodes in the series, there was a spin-off called Mononoke featuring the Medicine Seller hero. Not to be confused with Princess Mononoke, which I haven't seen, but as you see is recommended.

 

I really enjoyed Samurai Champloo (the episodes I've seen, anyway), so check that out if you can find it. Like the Saiyuki anime, it's a bit anarchistic iirc, but fun.

 

I've only seen the first episode, but Katanagatari might be one to check out. I sort of think of it as what might happen if Ōkami had a kid with Pokemon. I mean, I hear that the series gets really dark and tragic, but it's basically about collecting ALL THE SWORDS. Which possess people and turn them into monsters? I'm not really clear on that. I love the animation style, though. And in spite of its very anime-ness, it's probably the most L5R-like of what I have to recommend. (Well, aside from a few episodes of Ayakashi, that is.)

 

Folktales From Japan might give sort of a general culture insight, as well as insight into sort of perhaps a children's eye view of the period. The first few episodes I've watched were pretty great. Episode one has the stories "The Man Who Bought Dreams" and "The Rat Sutra" which really genuinely are two of my favorite fairytales now.

 

Utakoi is actually set earlier than the feudal-style that you'll probably be playing with, but probably gives the most interesting insights into the culture. It's basically a series that looks at the love stories behind the hanafuda (the traditional Japanese poetry card game) and hits sort of the highlights of the rise and fall of the loves. (Very few of the love stories have happy endings. Saying this now.) It is interspersed with sort of "OOC" goofiness where the poets interact with each other and pretend to be on game shows...? It's very difficult to explain, but it does provide comic relief to the sometimes heart-wrenching love stories. I also recommend watching Utakoi before starting on Chihayafuru - which has nothing to do with L5R style gaming (it's set in the modern era and not about sword battling at all), but is all about hanafuda as a sport and, well, it's one of my favorite animes and it's related, so there. But, yes, very highly recommending Utakoi just in general and also for sort of human interaction background.

 

I'm sure I'm missing some obvious suggestions, but I don't really maintain a very good database of anime I've watched. >_>;

 

When in doubt, it probably wouldn't hurt to browse through Crunchyroll's "Historical" category. http://www.crunchyroll.com/videos/anime/genres/historical I know that there are a few series there I'm very interested in watching, but I can't recommend something I haven't seen at least a little of.

[Suden]

Soooo... Husband and I just finished watching Evangelion the other day.

And boy howdy, did the last two episodes ever take a hard sideways corkscrew into Crazy town, located smack dab in the center of Bizarre county.

 

 

After we scratched our heads in befuddlement for awhile, I went to Wikipedia to see if the written summary made any more sense, and discovered that there was a film remake of the last two episodes.

 

We watched that today.

 

 

And while it certainly explained things better than the original ending, it still went real weird toward the end. My brain experienced the equivalent of a car engine being thrown from Drive into Reverse while going down the freeway when the animation switched over to live action.

 

As for how I felt about it, I think the words of one critic sums it up perfectly: "a dark, brutal, psychedelic orgy of sex and violence that culminated in the mass extinction of humanity set to an optimistic J-pop song with lyrics about suicide."

 

I just...it...arghblah. *clutches head*

 

If you'll excuse me, I think I need to go find some mind bleach now.

 

*goes and watches cute fuzzy kitten videos for an hour*

 

 

EDIT: Don't get me wrong, I did really enjoy the series for the most part! It was really just the ending that I disliked so strongly.

 

Huzzah!

--OneBoot :D

I read an interesting article on i09 the other day about Evangelion, the ending, the creator and his struggles with depression. http://io9.com/why-you-should-learn-to-love-the-ending-to-neon-genesis-1495919375

[Nocturne]

I know the fight with the Thirteenth Angel episode directly led to the budget being due to it's violent content.

Back when I mentioned about it being structured like a three act play, the episode that introduces the fourth child and EVA Unit-03 is the start of the last act (episode 17). That's why it was intentionally a much more violent conclusion to the fight than previous ones, it was marking a complete tonal shift.

 

Likewise the last episode of Act 1 is the introduction of Asuka, all the characters are then in place and things get more lighthearted and action based for a while. The episode immediately after is the dancing one.

[ShadowRaven]

for something that sets the tone for L5R there are a few that I strongly recommend the ruroni kenshin OAV's labeled as 'samurai X love and betrayal' capture a lot of the action, and some of the tragedy that L5R can hold. I also strongly recommend the Kurosawa movies Yojimbo and Sanjuro, not anime, but very very good. Another anime you may want to look at is 'Moribito: guardian of the spirit' or 'Seirei no Moribito' It's more about character interactions than about fighting, and is set in a Japan analogue world like L5R that captures much of the feel.

[dwarvenranger]

Thanks for the suggestions. I do have the 7 scrolls of the Clan War as well as the 5 scrolls of the 4 Winds Saga. Likewise I do have several of Kurosawa's films including Yojimbo and Sanjuro. Just started watching Samurai Champloo (which my gf has seen), I'll have to check out Ayakashi: Classic Japanese Horror next. If I can find it on Netflix, that is. I have Ninja Scroll, it's actually the only Anime I have.

Doumo arigatou, tomodachi

[ShadowRaven]

iie iie

[Nocturne]

Halfway through Noein. Oh recap episode, how I doth detest thee.

 

It's the worst sort of recap episode where it throws in brief bits of new material throughout so I can't just skip it.

[aku-chan]

Made it to roughly the halfway point of Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood, and so far I'm honestly a little disappointed, I'm finding I prefer the story changes the anime studio made in the first version.

 

It still has 20ish episodes left to change my mind, but I think this is going to be the Sailor Moon situation all over again.

[ShadowRaven]

Sailor Moon situation? you mean the one from BNL's "One Week" or something else entirely

 

Gotta get in tune with Sailor Moon
'Cause the cartoon has got the boom anime babes
That make me think the wrong thing

[aku-chan]

Sailor Moon situation? you mean the one from BNL's "One Week" or something else entirely

 

Gotta get in tune with Sailor Moon

'Cause the cartoon has got the boom anime babes

That make me think the wrong thing

 

Something else entirely.

 

I loved the series (still do), but I'd heard for years about how much had been changed when it was adapted. So when the manga finally got re-released I was all excited to see how the story was originally meant to be.

...And I hated it, turned out all this time what made the show great for me was all the stuff Toei had invented to pad the episodes out.

[klawzie]

Yeah.... I got my hands on some of the early issues of Sailor Moon and sat down all excited to go for it... and was so underwhelmed I just got rid of the beginning collection. Still have to properly see all of the anime (I've only caught episodes here and there), but I know I like it better as anime vs manga. It might get better towards the end, of course, but...

 

Same thing happened to me with Card Captor Sakura, only moreso. Really enjoyed the first few episodes I caught of "Cardcaptors" (the American remix show of the series), so when I realized that the original CCS was different from CC, I ended up devouring the series as it was meant to be seen. Then I set about buying the boxed set of the manga and was like, "....there is no substance here. Scenes that impacted me greatly in the anime are watery at best in the manga. This is the turning point in the character's arc and it comes and go with barely a panel...."