Tag Archives: Nogizaka Haruka no Himitsu

Blogging and Watching slate

I didn’t get around to doing a Fall preview post like usual just because I didn’t have the time, but I did want to go through the series I was going to blog and watching.

Blogging

  • CLANNAD: After Story
  • ef - a tale of melodies

I had forgotten about ef when I said I was only blog one series due to time.  Unfortunately, the one season when I wanted to only pick up 1 series is the season which has two must-blog series in the second seasons of CLANNAD and ef.  Damn them!

I don’t really think these series need much explanation.  If you need it, go look at the episode reviews for the first seasons.

Watching

  • Yozakura Shijuusou ~Yozakura Quartet~
  • To Aru Majutsu no Index
  • Toradora

So we have

To say that the top series I’m merely watching is the top series in that group because it looked “somewhat interesting” doesn’t say much about the series airing in this season.  Unfortunately, while there weren’t a lot of series I was drooling to watch, there were probably a half dozen series in the “somewhat interesting” category, so I still had to decide which ones to put on the list.

First, ones I didn’t put on it:  First up was Hyakko.  I almost put this on the list, really.  But it looks too much like Lucky Star/Azumanga Daioh/Hidimari Sketch and I’m both kind of worn out on random comedies with no plot, and I think my expectations for such series is so high that, if I had the choice, I’d rather pass on a series which has a good chance of disappointing me.

The next one I almost added but left off was Kannagi.  It looks interesting enough: tree girl turns into spirit.  But then again, the set up for this eries suggets a type of series which I’m also somewhat burned out on.  If this was the Spring 2009 season, maybe.  But I don’t feel like this one now.

Finally, it’s Akane Iro ni Somaru Saka.  Anime based on eroge is hit or miss.  I usually find that they’re either a) dramatic and good or b) lame.  Unforunately, after looking at the art and OP and ED, it appears like this one chose door #2.  Whenever people try to do a comedic eroge or a half-heartedly serious one, it doesn’t seem to work out all that well.

Next, the series I am watching, but not blogging.  The first is Yozakura Shijuusou ~Yozakura Quartet~.  I’m a little iffy about this series, but the supernatural/comedy premise plus the character art sold me on this one.

The second series I’m watching is To Aru Majutsu no Index, just because it reminds me of Shana.  That probably means I’ll go into the series with a set of expectations which totally aren’t met, but whatever.

Next: Toradora.  Yes, I know, everyone else is watching it too, but it does look interesting.

To be fair, most of the big hyped-up series are sequels, including the two I’m blogging, and most of which I haven’t even seen the first season.  It’s the original series which give me the yawns.

All of this is on top of the fact that I still has Two episodes of Maid Guy still not subbed, 2 episodes of Someday’s Dreamers, and 3 episodes of Nijuu Mensou left to go, not to mention Candy Boy and KimiNozo: Next Season which seem to get released whenever they’re ready.

I’m also catching up on some series I was only watching from past seasons, though at least those are easier to do (I can just sit down for a couple of nights and blow through those).

Update

I’m now just catching up on The Secret of Haruka Nogizaka.  Any series which pimps Shana so much is an instant win.

First Impression: The Secret of Haruka Nogizaka

The third non-blogged series I’m watching in the summer is Nogizaka Haruka no Himitsu a.k.a. The Secret of Haruka Nogizaka.

This one is about, shockingly, Haruka Nogizaka, the quintessential perfect girl in the school - rich, good grades, great looking, good at sports, etc., etc., etc. Meanwhile, there is Yuuto Ayase who is kind of your average nerdy boy, but more in the mold of Ike from Shakugan no Shana in the sense that, yes he’s a nerd, but he isn’t really a loser. Yuuto also has just about 0 interest in girls, largely thanks to two girls who I’m not totally sure what their relation to Yuuto is who live at his house and basically do nothing but drink.

One day Yuuto finds out Haruka’s secret hobby - that she’s an otaku. She’s afraid that he’ll tell everyone but, of course, he’s too nice of a guy to do that (unfortunately she runs away from him for a while, making everyone else think he’s done something horrible to the queen of the school). She is largely afraid of being picked on “again,” which makes me think that she’s become this super-girl person in response to bad teasing, which I’m sure we’ll get into later if that’s the case.

I think this series definitely has potential, since the “queen of the school” type girl is a huge otaku, and I can see a lot of laughs from that, though Haruka seems to be a little too ditzy to be one supposedly so good at everything, but maybe we’ll be shown otherwise later.

I also get strong vibes that this is going to be in part a parody otaku series. First off, the ending theme and the name give out vibes of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya. I’m sure the OP made fun of several shows, many of which I’m not catching, and I’m sure the same is true of the Clumsy Aki-chan cartoon from the beginning.

And especially since this doesn’t seem like a series which is going to rely on fan service for most of it’s laughs (at least based on the first episode), this series definitely looks like it has some potential.

Summer 2008: Blogging and Watching Series

So, in a shock to no one who read my Summer Review, I’m going to blog the series Someday’s Dreamers: Summer Skies. I liked the first Someday’s Dreamers, and it was really the only series which really caught my attention this season. And since I was only planning on picking up one new series to blog in the summer, it made the decision easy.

Someday's Dreamers: Summer Skies

Now, as to the series I’ll be watching, but not blogging, all of these series have the possibility to be good, but also have signs that they might be iffy, so hopefully they’ll be the former rather than the latter.

The first series I’ll watch is Nogizaka Haruka no Himitsu which appears to be a harem comedy, though with a little twist: the main loser boy finds out that the hot super-popular girl in the school is actully an uber-Otaku in secret.  This just begs hilarity to me, and I hope I’m right.

Nogizaka Haruka no Himitsu

The second series series I’ll watch is Natsume Yuujinchou, which is about a boy who discovers a book which has a binding contract with some spirits, and his quest to release those spirits from the contract.  Now, I assume the story will be deeper than that, but I sounds interesting.  Part of the reason why I’m picking this up is that the director has worked on some series I’ve liked before too.

Natsume Yuujinchou

As for whether I’ll pick up a third series to watch, I’m not sure.  The first season of Hidamari Sketch was kind of borderline, and if the second season is going to be the same, I don’t know about watching a series which I know will be borderline.

As for Strike Witches, this probably would be on my list, if it wasn’t for having to pay to download copies to my computer from Crunchyroll.  BOST TV has promised some “new things” for this series, and if one of those is being able to download an actual high quality version (i.e., like what one could download from Crunchyroll) for the $1 it costs to watch the episode, then I might watch that one as well.

Other than that, the landscape is pretty barren after taking out sequels to series I haven’t seen.

Summer 2008 Anime Preview

It’s that time again: It’s time to look at what anime is airing in the Summer 2008 season. Shows are listed in alphabetical order.

There are 7 possible levels of ratings that I’ll give a show:

  • Will definitely blog it
  • May blog it
  • Will definitely watch it
  • May watch it
  • May watch it if I hear good things about it
  • Probably Won’t Watch it
  • Won’t watch it

As usual, I’m leaving out anything that seems to obviously be a children’s show. Like always, thanks to the Fansub Wiki for keeping a great list of upcoming shows.

Now that I’ve gotten that out of the way…here we go!

Read More »