Anime Page Archen's Corner Review Handbook Review Index

About me, blah blah blah:

You know I made these reviews so that I could recommend titles and give information to those who may be interested in seeing different titles. And honestly I'm thinking I've seen a LOT of anime. However all of this is opinion based. So it seemed to me that I should give a bit more information about myself and such so that you know what sort of person is even writing these reviews. I mean I COULD be anyone... hell, maybe I'm your mom. Go clean your room.

I wouldn't say I'm well rounded, but I definitely have varying tastes in the titles I like. One key thing to keep in mind about Archen is that I'm totally OLD SCHOOL. I have a fondness for old titles. And actually I don't care much about the actual age of a title, I just care whether it's good or not. I guess it's a key thing to keep in mind that the majority of anime fans out there are probably teenagers now days, aside from the traditional foundation of college going anime fans. What that means is that you will find tons of opinions from these two demographics that will probably differ from mine. Why? Simply put, anime is new to them. It is not new to me. They'll rave about a title like it's the most awesome thing ever, and a totally new concept; while I've probably seen the same thing 3 or 4 times before.

I'm also not a big fan of the computer generated glitz effects you see in anime a lot in modern anime. In an anime with budget restrictions you usually got a lot of cheap panning and just all around stills. The new thing to do is to do jerky computer movements and such on anime stills. Sorry but that's still not animation. I've also become rather disenchanted with the artistic quality of many modern animation titles. The good news is that the anime industry seems to be pulling out of the shock with the loss of pulp cells. For a time computer generated anime was new, yet cells had stopped production. I'd say this was around 2001. Many anime titles had very dead colors, and character designs were unappealing when compared to their predecessors. Slowly but surely anime has been coming back to show some vitality, so I'm finding myself enjoying modern titles a bit more than the first CGI anime generation. And as far as computer effects go, they don't impress me much either. All I really care is about the artistic qualitative animation. And in all honesty the heyday for those titles was in the 80's. With only a handful of notable titles in the 90s and 00s.

All around I'm sort of atypical for an anime fan. I enjoy comedy, action and romance but I get rather picky about them quick. Comedies for instance I enjoy but if a title crosses a certain threshold of gimmicks then it's almost guaranteed I won't like it. I've also been watching anime for quite some time so many comedy gimmicks that are new to some fans are old hat to me. Action is also something I'm picky about. If a title doesn't have a story, then I just won't like it regardless of how cool the action is. I'd say I have a fondness particularly for sword fight/gun action sequences, but I've seen anime do just about everything action oriented in a cool way. I also like romance. Yeah, I know. I can hardly believe it myself. But it always seems like I'm way more interested in a show if there is some sort of love interest. It's not a necessity with me, but I do seem to like them for some reason. In an odd sort of way this has led to me typically liking shoujo titles. Yeah, it's totally bizarre man.

Recommended?

Okay so what do I recommend? Now I would typically not do this because likes with everything are a matter of taste. I mean I've seen some people list "Sister Princess" as a top 10 best title, and while I believe those people should be sterilized for the good of humanity; it goes to show that there is indeed always someone that likes a show no matter how bad YOU think it is. So anyway, if you want me to just say, "here watch this", then here's where it is. If you don't like them... well though luck.

My favorite anime titles are Record of Lodoss War OAV, Hourglass of Summer, and Area 88 OAV by the way.

Honorable Mention:

Title Reason Notes
Sailor Moon Popular Who hasn't heard of this one? Warning: BAD dubbing.
Akira Influential One of the most influential anime titles EVER
Vampire Hunter D Influential One of the first titles to hit American shores. Old school, but cool.
Neon Genesis EvangelionClassic Must see for anime fans. You may like it, or you may not
Battle Angel Classic Sad but soo good!
Mermaid Saga Classic Mermaid Scar + Mermaid Forest = twisted classic anime
Vampire Miyu Classic Yay vampire girls!
Fairy Princess RenMost Insane Anime Wow man... wow.

Anime I actually own:

And what about anime that Archen actually owns? Out of the many many anime titles I've seen, many if not most have been rented. Also many were viewed out of courtesy of friends. I still actually go out and buy titles despite the fact that I may have already rented them. This list isn't complete since I haven't gotten around to buying all the titles that I want to (budgetary concerns). This is mainly for reference purposes.


Best of Anime according to Archen