When I first heard about Basquash! my immediate thought was that it was either going to be mind-blowingly stupid or completely awesome; there’s just not much room for middle ground when the premise is giant robots playing basketball. However I may have been wrong. I forget to consider the possibility that it might be both incredibly stupid and awesome all at the same time. 

Let’s start with the stupid part. Our protagonist is a spiky orange and scarlet haired kid named Dan JD who lives on the planet Earthdash. He hates the popular sport Bigfoot Basketball because one of the Bigfoots (they look like car frames with legs and arms) somehow injured his kid sister, reducing her from a great b-ball player into a cold computer nerd in a wheelchair. Then there’s the childhood friend Miyuki whose character design allows the animators to completely outdo the Gainax bounce by focusing the camera on her enormous jiggling breasts for a full 10 seconds. She also shows Dan how to pilot a Bigfoot… all while making it sound as much like having sex for the first time as possible. Oh and did I mention that Dan, using the alias Dunk Mask, regularly goes out and ruins Bigfoot basketball games while wearing a mask made out of a small blue monster voiced by Aya Endo (Sheryl Nome)? I swear I’m not making this stuff up.

On the good side of things, if you can get over the silly premise the mecha actually looks pretty cool in action due to mecha designer/co-creator Thomas Romain (who was a director of Oban Star-Racers, a 2D/3D co-production between France and Japan) and Shoji Kawamori of Macross fame. The CG is seamlessly integrated and the overall production values are great. I love the vibrant city too, which reminds me very much of Tekkon Kinkreet’s Treasure Town in how it feels both futuristic and run-down. There’s even a huge moon hanging overhead which is lit up at night by the lights from the city on its surface and, strangely enough, images of pop singers that are broadcast across it.

If you take away the robots and the unique setting all you’re really left with is a handful of awful character designs and a whole bunch of anime clichés, but here’s the thing – you can’t separate Basquash! from its unique premise and style. This is the lifeblood of the show and it did its job well enough to make me forget how stupid this whole thing was and actually start enjoying it. I’m definitely not expecting greatness from Basquash! but if the first episode was anything to go by it could be pretty damn entertaining.

Since this year is Gundam‘s 30th anniversary many of us have been hoping that Sunrise would announce a new anime addition to the franchise. For a while there were rumors of an OVA in the works but it turned out to be just an upcoming PS3 game. However I have good news, everyone! After following some links on 2chan I found that Gundam Ace magazine released a special issue today in which they announced an upcoming, 50 episode TV series that will air sometime next year. I’m sure I’m not the first to announce this news but I thought I’d translate a portion of the article for you guys. My Japanese is not perfect but I did the best I could:

This new, as yet unnamed series will be unlike anything fans have seen before says Yoshiyuki Tomino, the original creator of Gundam who will be helming this project. “A lot of fans want to see more of the Universal Century, the timeline that the original TV series was set in, but we also have new fans who got into the franchise by watching shows that have nothing at all to do with the UC. So we asked ourselves, how can we appeal to both types of fans at the same time?”

The answer was an unexpected one: bring back the old characters from Mobile Suit Gundam but place them in an entirely new setting, in this case the AF or After Fighting timeline. What does this mean for Amuro, Char and the rest of the cast from Mobile Suit Gundam?

“They’ll be getting a makeover” said Tomino. “In this economy selling model kits to guys just isn’t enough. We have to appeal to girls too and what do they want? Pretty boys that you can easily mistake for women. Amuro is just goofy looking, he has no sex appeal. So we’re bringing in [Gundam 00's character designer] Yun Kouga to make him beautiful.”

On the right: Amuro’s new look.

Sunrise has released a few of Kouga’s designs to the public and they reveal startling results. Amuro, now with long braids and feminine features, could easily be taken for a girl. As for Char, Kouga says he is already “sexy enough” but adds that she thinks the addition of a reddish-pink cardigan will be perfect for The Red Comet.

These are not the only revolutionary changes the staff has planned. The one that will surely surprise fans the most is that the pilots will not actually use their mobile suits to engage in battle. “We thought really hard about this one,” said Tomino, “and I just feel like we’ve done everything we can with the concept of mobile suits being used in war. So we’re going to do away with it entirely.”

Instead, each side will throw psychic attacks at the other by using the Newtype abilities that every character now possesses. Tomino says he envisions that these battles will use a wide array of stunning special effects such as sparkly particles, flashes of light and giant rainbows. 

As for the Gundams and other mobile suits, they’ll still be present they just won’t be used for war. Tomino says he’s thought of many purposes for them including industrial applications, underwater exploration, transporting goods and even vacuuming. In other words, everything robots do now. “This is about as ‘real robot’ as you can get,” said Tomino. When asked if he thought this might decrease toy sales Tomino replied “no, Gundam fans are stupid. They will eat up Gundam kits and toys for as long as we churn them out.”

As for the fact that some of the characters who will be brought back actually died in the original series, Tomino is not worried that this could be a continuity problem. “This is not really an alternate universe, the characters have simply been transported into the future through Minovsky particle wormholes caused by a refraction of sunlight on Jupiter… which is all based on real science of course. Honestly I don’t even think fans will care that some of the dead characters are alive again. They’ll be too busy creating yaoi doujinshi to notice.”

This is because Eiichiro Oda is extremely creative and not at all above throwing the readers for a loop. Take for example what I like to call Moments of Oda Madness. You’ll know a MOM when you see it because it will make you stop reading, slap your hand to your forehead and shout aloud “Dammit, Oda, you mad genius!”. You’ll probably then wonder what he’s smoking and where you can get some.

Take for example in the Alabasta arc when Usopp and Chopper fight against two of evil Sir Crocodile’s agents: Mr. 4 and his partner Miss Merry Christmas. Miss Merry Christmas once ate a devil fruit which turned her into a mole human and so, since they’re out in the desert, she starts burying herself in the sand to attack from below. At this point Usopp whips out one of his weapons – a giant hammer – and starts doing this:

And it dawns on me… he’s playing whack-a-mole. Oh wow, Oda.

Or how about during what is arguable one of the most serious and heart wrenching arcs, the Enies Lobby arc. As the Strawhats are battling to save a comrade from a fate worse than death they suddenly meet a foe who fights… by shooting ramen out of his nose.

Dammit, Oda. Stop making me laugh at dumb jokes aimed at kids.

Naturally, all reaction shots are MOM:

But what just may be the MOM to trump all others is what recently occurred in chapter 537. Don’t worry, this isn’t much of a spoiler although if you haven’t read it yet seeing it now might rob you of your own slack-jawed reaction face when you get there. Then again knowing this in advance might just save you from choking on a sandwich and dying an extremely embarrassing death. 

It’s a little hard to explain this without giving away the context but let’s just say that in a time of need this character shows up. And she… he?… Ivankof… is a drag queen. The Queen of Drag Queen, actually. Feast your eyes on this: 

Imagine flipping on the Disney Channel or Cartoon Network to see that there’s a whole bunch of drag queens in fishnet stockings and briefs. If that’s not enough, Ivankof later uses her powers to turn a burly man into a busty female. Is this too silly, too out there, too… gay? No, it’s just One Piece being wonderfully over-the-top again. And before anyone starts saying that it negatively satirizes crossdressers let me say that a certain drag queen recently proved himself to be a loyal and self-sacrificing friend, which in One Piece is pretty much the highest complement you can receive.

It’s all in good fun, and although they’re just silly jokes they sure as hell make for an entertaining read. Personally I can’t wait to see what crazy thing Oda will think up next.

Oh My Goddess! would’ve made a great horror series. You’ve got the hapless victim Keiichi who attempts to order take-out but dials the wrong number and reaches a ”goddess helpline” instead. Then there’s the goddess Belldandy who comes out of his mirror like a scene from The Ring except instead of trying to kill him she opts for a more devious scheme to ruin his life: moving in and staying forever.

This is where the real horror begins. You see, Belldandy is perfect. She’s cheerful, kind and warm. She loves to clean and cook. Every day after school she brings Keiichi homemade cake and other snacks. She even sits in his class and hands him school supplies whenever he needs them. And the worst part? As long as he wants her around, Belldandy will never leave his side. In fact the universe itself will bend just to make sure they are never separated. Ah, how terrible! What sick and twisted individual came up with something so frightening?

Oh wait… this is supposed to be an otaku’s ultimate fantasy? Keiichi isn’t going to crack from the pressure of living with someone so perfect and hack everyone to bits with a cleaver? Oh. Damn…

Ok, so maybe Belldandy isn’t really that frightening outside of being the ultimate Yamato Nadeshiko or traditional, ideal Japanese woman; the kind of housewife who is humble and always acts in the best interest of her husband or father. It sounds terribly antiquated but I wouldn’t be surprised if this concept is still alive and kicking in Japan, although I doubt that any Yamato Nadeshiko actually exist outside the imaginations of beleaguered husbands and lonely otaku.

I figured that this kind of character would get on my nerves when I sat down to watch the 1993 Oh My Goddess! OVA – the first animated incarnation of Kousuke Fujishima’s long-running manga – but I found that she really didn’t. Perhaps it was Kikuko Inoue’s pleasant voice that won me over or the fact that Belldandy is so damn nice but I just couldn’t bring myself to dislike her even if she does set women’s roles back 50 years.

With names from Norse mythology: Belldandy and her sisters Skuld and Urd

In fact Oh My Goddess! ended up being a fun watch just as long as I turned my brain off and agreed to accept two things: 1) Keiichi is a self-insert character thus he has no defining traits outside of being a nice guy and 2) because of this Belldandy loves him for no discernible reason at all. Number two was the hardest to ignore and, let’s face it, when your girlfriend has absolutely no motivations outside of pleasing you than you might as well be in love with your hand. Except your hand doesn’t talk to you, I guess.

Then again I might be being overly harsh on Belldandy. Is Belldandy really a doormat or does she just have a different kind of power? The power to protect Keiichi when the situation demands it, to understand people’s emotions and to subtly influence them. In other words, soft power. I’d be inclined to say that this is the case except for one thing. Near the end of the OVA something occurs which threatens to separate Keiichi and Belldandy forever. So what does she do to stop it? Absolutely nothing. She spends the entire time knitting a sweater. Ah well, Belldandy might be a doormat but Oh My Goddess! is really pretty harmless. It’s what I could imagine parents calling “wholesome entertainment”… at least until Belldandy’s sexy sister Urd shows up. 

If I’m going to waste time watching a magical girlfriend show this is the one I’d do it with. I’m not sure if the premise is enough to hold my interest for an entire TV series but the 5 episode OVA was just about right. Of course, I still think with the right twist this could all have been way more creepy than Higurashi ever was but hey what do I know.

Once again it’s been a month since I’ve posted anything here. I wish I could say I’ve been too busy doing something incredible to bother with silly Japanese cartoons but no, I’ve been watching just as much as usual. In fact I’m in deeper than ever thanks to ghostlightning (fast becoming the guy I go to for all my recommendations) turning me into a fanatic for anything relating to Gundam, that highly influential and ever popular mainstay of mecha anime.

I never thought I’d get into Gundam. For one thing, I had the idea that it was all merely a marketing ploy by Bandai to sell toys to little boys. I know better now; it’s a ploy to sell to boys and full-grown men (and women if I break down and buy those Dynames and MS-07B3 Gouf kits I’ve had my eye on, but I digress). 

However the real reason I didn’t want to get into Gundam is that the sheer size of the franchise is utterly overwhelming. As if the incredible number of TV series, OVAs, novels, manga, video games and more wasn’t enough to scare off newcomers there’s the alternate timelines to worry about. Universal Century, Future Century, After Colony, After War, Anno Domini… it all sounds more complicated than millions of years of real human history. At least until you realize that each timeline exists in its own bubble and you really don’t need to know about anything except for the timeline that the particular Gundam you’re watching takes place in.

Instead of being turned away by the dizzying number of Gundam shows I now view each one as an exciting possibility. It’s like sitting down at a table piled high with food for a feast. You might try the turkey only to find out that it’s stringy and overcooked or you might end up with a slice of delicious apple pie. That’s all part of the fun. Stay at the table long enough and you could also find yourself engaging in a vicious food fight with the people around you, each side pelting the other with mashed potatoes and insisting that the other has no taste. That’s all part of the fun too… I think.

The one question that remains for newcomers like myself is, where to start? Allow me to recommend Mechafetish and ghostlightning’s Finding Your Gateway Gundam guide. As for me I’ve only just wet my feet with the original Mobile Suit Gundam compilation movies (which are a bit dated but still highly worth it and deserving of a post of their own), Gundam 08th MS Team and the currently airing Gundam 00. My feelings for 00 will depend on how it ends but I can say that I’ve been enjoying the hell out of it and reports of train wrecks have been greatly exaggerated.

I might be looking at this with the rose-tinted glasses of a newborn fan but I don’t think there’s a better time to get into Gundam than right now. As we approach April 7th, 2009 which marks the 30th anniversary of the original Mobile Suit Gundam it means not only that there’s 30 years worth of shows to go back and watch but also at least one new, recently announced addition to look forward to. Not to mention Bandai’s plan to build a life-sized, 59 foot tall Gundam at Tokyo’s Odaiba island. I know I’m really far gone because I don’t think this sounds like a ludicrous endeavor in a failing global economy… it sounds awesome.

Hey, remember the turn of the century? New Years Eve, 2000. I was only 11 at the time and I remember being glued to the TV, waiting anxiously for the clock to strike midnight at the first place in the world. Waiting to see if the Y2K bug – which was probably some kind of computer problem but could just have easily been an enormous rampaging alien bug – would bring about the end of the world. Or if the bug didn’t show, maybe a giant robot would destroy us all instead… hey, it was a new millennium. Anything could’ve happened.

So what if it had? Who could have fought to save humanity?

How about Kenji Endou, a man who can’t give a speech to save his life but who dreamt in his childhood of saving the world. Except now he’s grown up and spends all his time working in his family’s mini-mart and taking care of his sister’s baby whom she left with him before running off. It’s a typically dull life until strange events begin to occur around him. People disappearing or murdered, the emergence of a familiar symbol, a cult and its leader who calls himself “Friend”… and somehow all of this is connected to Kenji and his friends’ childhood memories.

This is how Naoki Urasawa’s 20th Century Boys, one of the finest manga I’ve ever had the pleasure of reading, begins. I say “begins” because it’s a story that spans over 30 years… possibly a lot more than 30 but I wouldn’t know yet as I’ve only read through volume 6 of 22 and will be talking strictly about the first five in this post.

Kenji’s adult years take place in the late 90s leading up to 2000, in the same town he and his childhood friends grew up in. Most of them are still living there too, leading lives as fathers and salarymen. Yet there’s frequent flashbacks (that for once don’t make me tear my hair out and scream “not another damn flashback!”) to the 70s when the boys and their imaginations ran wild. It’s like The Little Rascals with a 70s twist: Kenji and his buddies idolize rock and roll, watch Neil Armstrong land on the moon on snowy TV sets and sit in their secret fort dreaming of saving the world. 

These flashbacks always add something to the present story whether by furthering the plot or adding insight into the characters. For instance seeing the adult Kenji compared to the childhood one adds layers of depth. Although he’s not necessarily unhappy with his life as is, there’s a subtle regret that lurks just below the surface. Regret at giving up on his dreams of playing his guitar in a band or of no longer being the person he once was… the kind of kid who would jump to defend a friend from local bullies. Watching Kenji and the other characters reconcile with their former selves is infinitely satisfying and interesting.

20th Century Boys is a lot of things. It’s a mystery that had me burning through entire volumes as if I was trying to win a speed reading competition. It’s brilliantly well written and intricately plotted in a way that outdoes just about every other manga I’ve read. It can be funny but never beats you over the head with a joke and most of all it’s highly suspenseful, even scary. There were times when a couple panels would send a delightful shiver up my back and I’d check over my shoulder just to be sure Friend wasn’t behind me smiling evilly and levitating. Or putting his creepy symbol up on my wall.

Symbols can be powerful things. This one is everywhere.

There’s big things in store for Kenji and his friends but they’re no longer the kids they used to be. Nor are they spiky haired teenagers, they’re nearly middle aged… hell in manga years that means they’re practically dead. Even the music they like is old (“20th Century Boy” is from a song by T. Rex, an English rock band popular in the 70s). I really love stories about old guys forced back into the spotlight for one last stand and I think this manga is enough to make just about anyone a fan of that kind of story. It’s really that good.

Viz is releasing volume 1 in English in just a few days, on the 17th. Do yourself a favor and go pick this one up. It’s the approach of a new millennium all over again in 20th Century Boys and this time it’s going to be a lot more exciting. I can’t wait.

It’s been nearly a month since I’ve posted here but if there’s one thing that can shake me out of my apathy it’s the finale of Xam’d: Lost Memories. Although I expect to do a review of the series later, for now I’m just writing about the ending. It goes without saying that this post contains massive spoilers.

So let me get this straight. The final enemy is actually a stillborn baby, Xam’ds were created by old Lady Sannova to fight said baby and Nakiami saves the world by taking a 1,000 year nap. Yeah, I’ve heard stranger premises… but not many.

The Hiruken Emperor and Akiyuki – The Power of A Name

Let’s start with who and what the Hiruken Emperor is: a stillborn of royal blood imbued with artificial Hiruko which turned him into a monster. He isn’t actually bad because Xam’d doesn’t have bad guys, just characters who really need a hug. First we had Furuichi who just wanted Haru to love him, then there was Kakisu who just wanted his mom to love him and finally the Emperor who, like Frankenstein’s monster, is just incredibly lonely.

Which is why Akiyuki gives the Emperor his own name thereby freeing him from the endless void of nothingness. I’ve always loved the idea that names have power and we see it work here to turn the Emperor from a monster into a man. Perhaps we are meant to draw a parallel with Nakiami and how her name was given to her by Ishu. As for Akiyuki, by this point he’s already finished his character development and grown into a young man who is sure of himself and knows what he wants in life (Haru, of course). He can afford to lose his own identity because he knows he’ll get it back.

This struggle to find oneself seems like a theme I’ve seen in pretty much every anime ever (because if there’s anyone who needs help with that issue it’s teens and otaku) but I think Xam’d pulled it off pretty well here. Especially because it was handled with, if not subtlety, than at least a distinct lack of screaming, crying or temper tantrums.

Nakiami Makes a Prettier Neo than Keanu Reeves

If I’m not mistaken, Lady Sannova implies in episode 25 that she’s been alive for 1,000 years. Are we to believe then that this whole thing is some kind of repetitive cycle and there always must be someone to sacrifice themselves for world peace? I think I see room for a sequel now.

Hiruken Emperor or Hiruken Pharaoh?

From an emotional standpoint Nakiami’s sacrifice was an utter success. If the goal was to make me struggle to hold back tears while Yango, Ishu and the others went to visit Nakiami’s tomb then this plot development did it’s job. There was also something undeniably beautiful in the fairy tale like quality of Nakiami supposedly sleeping for 1,000 years.

Unfortunately I’m still hard pressed to make any sense of this development besides the fact that the writers wanted to turn Nakiami into a messiah and then break my heart by (sort of) killing her. Which is all well and good but I wish they’d actually explained what the Quickening Chamber is and why she had to sacrifice herself to close it. I usually don’t mind some ambiguity in my anime endings but this just didn’t make much sense at all.

Akiyuki and Haru – I Believe in A Thing Called Love

Forgive me for making this comparison once again, but I really felt that this was similar to that other show that I don’t want to spoil but you’ll know what I’m talking about if you’ve seen it. Except that because Xam’d is more mature, instead of a rainbow heart carved into the moon there was just Haru and Akiyuki standing at a cliff and looking out over the water. And in a way the situation is reversed as it is Haru who must save Akiyuki.

There really isn’t much more to say about this except that it is undeniably romantic that Haru spent nine years faithfully sending her thoughts to Akiyuki which turned him from stone back into a human again. The relationship between Haru and Akiyuki was one I liked a great deal both for how romantic it was and that it was pretty realistic for an anime.

Conclusion

Like I said about Nakiami’s disappearance, I think that the end of Xam’d succeeded on an emotional level. Every scene in episode 26 tugged at my heartstrings and was incredibly cinematic, especially when the kids dumped letters off the side of the Zanbani in the hope that their feelings would somehow reach Nakiami and Akiyuki. I know that some people have complained that the characters were flat but I cared about or was interested in nearly all of them, even Yango who didn’t show up until late in the series but was interesting in his own right and brought out Nakiami’s motherly side.

Still there were some major problems with the ending and with Xam’d as a whole. For instance, what about the war? For a show that seemed to try to have war as a central element I don’t even know why the conflict began and I don’t really know what Xam’d wants me to think about war besides the usual: war and hate is bad.

Another problem was that the characters all felt too spread out. The Zanbani crew stopped being important a little more than halfway through the show and I felt like they never really affected the plot as much as they could have or should have. The same goes for Kakisu and Haru’s sister Midori who never really added much to the show despite how much time was spent on showing the military developing Humanforms. 

At the end of the day I still love Xam’d. With gorgeous animation, interesting characters, few of the typical anime stereotypes and a unique premise despite borrowing heavily from Ghibli it was extremely refreshing to watch. I just wish the plot had made more sense and had answered the ever present question I had while watching – “what is this all adding up to?”. I want to give Xam’d a 10/10 because it could have been a masterpiece. As it is, I’ll just say that despite its flaws it was good – better than most of the new shows this year – and it might make more sense when I re-watch.

This fan-made trailer is by Miguel Mesas who as far as I can tell from his website is an independent filmmaker from Spain. Apparently he released this in March of 07 but I only just stumbled across it while browsing Youtube.

Now if this were a real movie there’d be things to nitpick about: Daiba is too old, El Capitán isn’t sexy enough and I can barely see his scar, Mime looks like she stepped out of The Ring, and so on, but because it’s from a fan I can easily forgive all that and see that it perfectly captures just how grandly dramatic the anime is. Not to mention that the CG is amazing. The Arcadia is simply beautiful, especially when it sails off around the Earth at the end – a shot lifted straight from the anime.

In fact this trailer is so good that it actually makes me want to see a Harlock live action even though news of anime adaptions or at least those done by Hollywood usually fill me with dread. Just look no further than the possibility of Keanu Reeves starring in Cowboy Bebop (please no! There’s a difference between being laid back and being as emotionless as a plank of wood) to see why.

Yet the 1978 Space Pirate Captain Harlock TV series is already so cinematic that I’ve long thought about how well it would transfer to the big screen. From Captain Harlock who merely has to stand there to look iconic, to beautiful women who burn like paper and a soundtrack at times rousing and at others elegiac it’s a wonder a live action hasn’t been made already.

Well, the reason is probably because original creator Leiji Matsumoto is not about to give consent lightly. Or that’s what I would say except that didn’t stop Korean production company Eight Peaks from announcing in April of last year that it would be turning Harlock into a film… even though they didn’t have Matsumoto’s permission! Apparently they signed a deal with Genome Entertainment (which I’ve never even heard of and can’t even find any additional information on) but Matsumoto stepped up and said that this was all premature. Since I can’t find any mention of Harlock on Eight Peaks’ website I’m guessing the movie is not going to happen. 

So the question remains: will we ever see a Harlock or for that matter any Leiji Matsumoto live action films? I’m sure we will. His stories might be old but I believe they have an enduring quality that makes them appealing even to people like me who weren’t around in the 70s and early 80s to watch this stuff when it aired. Let’s just hope that when it does happen it’ll be half as good as this fake trailer.

How about you, is there an anime or manga you’re dying to see adapted into a film or is the possibility of it being terrible too much to ignore?

It’s been nearly three weeks since I posted here. I wanted to take a break over the holidays, not only from writing about anime/manga but from reading and watching it too. Of course being the addict that I am, I couldn’t entirely stop myself from indulging.

One thing I have been reading is NANA which is so addicting that I couldn’t help going beyond Viz’s volume 13 and catching up to the latest chapter in Japan which is at about volume 20 (I will of course still be buying it in English as it comes out). In retrospect, I probably shouldn’t have read all seven volumes in one day but let me tell you – it was a glorious ride. When it was all over the only thing to do was put on some black eyeliner and a leather jacket, light a cigarette and moodily strum my guitar in the rain… and by rain I mean sun because it never rains here and by leather jacket I mean t-shirt. Never mind that I don’t smoke either, it’s the thought that counts.

In all seriousness, though, what NANA does really well is angst. That seems like a negative word nowadays, perhaps because it conjures up images of Youtube video bloggers reading poetry about how at 15 years old it’s already too late to live. Trust me, NANA is nothing like that. A better comparison would be to teen television dramas in the way that all the characters’ relationships, break-ups and feelings are so incredibly dramatic. As if their entire lives are hanging in the balance. Yet where these shows often become nearly indistinguishable from soap operas, NANA always remains classy. 

But I may be getting ahead of myself here. If you haven’t heard of it, NANA is a shoujo manga by Paradise Kiss author Ai Yazawa. It revolves around two girls named Nana who happen to meet on a train ride to Tokyo. One is Nana Komatsu, a flighty and quick to fall in love girl who is moving to Tokyo to be with her boyfriend. The other is the tough Nana Osaki, a singer who wants to make it big with her punk band Black Stones or BLAST for short. The two end up sharing an apartment and living together in room 707 (“nana” means “seven” in Japanese).

NANA is the story of the Nana’s close friendship, of the increasingly convoluted relationship between BLAST and their rival band Trapnest and of both bands’ musical careers and ambitions. In the hands of a less skilled author the story of young people becoming big rock stars could easily be cliché and unbelievable. It works here because Yazawa creates complicated, three-dimensional characters. It’s not hard to really care about them even when, or maybe because, they show their weaknesses to the reader. 

I mentioned earlier that the character’s have a lot of angst. Well, there’s certainly humor as well but NANA is best when it’s tugging at the heart strings. Such as whenever one of the Nanas narrates the beginning or end of a chapter it often hints at something tragic that will occur in the future. This lends a bittersweet feeling and a sense of transience to everything, as if the characters are fragile and may very well break in an instant. In essence, NANA is beautiful people in beautifully heartbreaking and sometimes heartwarming situations. And I can’t get enough.

For more on NANA, I recommend reading Melinda’s excellent post: Why you should read NANA.

My sister is home for the holidays so I forced her to watch a few episodes of Gurren Lagann with me. I think she sort of enjoyed it although her first impressions were pretty funny, like calling Kamina an idiot and his dad an ass for abandoning him at an early age.

Then she turned to me and said, “so the robots are powered by testosterone… can girls pilot them too?” 

“Of course they can! It’s not testosterone, it’s fighting spirit” I said, desperate to keep her from forming a bad opinion of her first mecha show. But let’s be honest here, in Gurren Lagann piloting giant robots is a man’s job. Sure, Yoko and Kittan’s sisters pilot a couple of times but it still comes down to the girls providing backup for the guys. This is an important job – just look at how Nia was the catalyst for everything that happened after episode 8 – but it’s just not as cool as ripping a giant pair of sunglasses off your robot and cutting down the opponent with them.

Mind you, this doesn’t bother me. I love Gurren Lagann and frankly my tastes are so “manly” that I’m told people think I’m a guy (that’s probably what you get for thinking that the chauvinism in Golgo 13 is funny). Even so, there’s times when I really do wish there were more anime with girls in the cockpit. In fact I can only think of two with female pilots as main characters: Gunbuster and Gunbuster 2. I do love both of these but there’s only so many times I can re-watch them before hungering for more.

What I really want is a full length TV show revolving around a female mecha pilot, and she can’t just be a moeblob or fanservice character. Unless she’s cute and has a badass-goggle-wearing-planet-sized version like Nono. Have you seen through to what this post really is yet? Yes, it’s a shameless request for recommendations. So if you know, please tell me. Are there any anime that fit the bill?

Oh and I am somewhat optimistic about the upcoming Ride Back which has a girl riding a motorcycle mecha… or is it a mecha motorcycle?