Well, this isn't shaping up to be a top-drawer series. But it isn't a total loss yet, either.
Looks like this academy is a bit of a jungle, with powerful people bullying those who are weaker. Our hero, Akatsuki, is coming off as a real bad ass, but I sense method to his madness. He's read the situation and is trying to establish a rep as being someone that the bullies shouldn't tangle with.
His relationship with Myuu is a bit ambiguous. He killed her father. But as her father was dying, he entrusted her to Akatsuki. And so far he has been kind to her (when he's awake). So should she hate him, love him, or not care at all? She's decided to watch him and defer that decision about him.
The second episode includes more bare breasts. Though this show is highly unlikely to be anything like as good as Divergence Eve, I'm beginning to think that they may be alike in one way: the high density of fan service in Hagure Yuusha may eventually detract from the story telling.
Looking at the voice cast, there's a lot of top drawer talent on this show. Rina Satou (Misaka Mikoto, Jenny Dolittle) is in it. Kana Hanazawa (Chiaki Kurihara, Aoi Futaba) is in it. Kana Ueda (Hayate Yagami, Rin Tohsaka) is in it. Also Marina Inoue and Youko Hikasa. And I can't really complain about the quality of the animation.
Originally I thought that Akatsuki was the audience viewpoint character, but now I think that Myuu is supposed to be. Part of the story here is that Akatsuki is a bit of an enigma. Is he a bastard with a heart of gold? Or just a bastard? Is he making a demonstration for the powers-that-be in the school for a reason? Or just because he's pugnacious?
Should Myuu love him, or hate him? Ultimately I think that will end up being the story.
But I wish they'd tell more story and do less pandering.
1
I was curious about where this was going as well, so I went and spoiled myself on LN information. I can say that Akatsuki is quite the complex character. (In a good way, though no clue if it'll be presented that way in the anime, though it's likely)
But there is a risk of Divergence Boobs-effect (the nickname for the series when it aired), where the fanservice can seriously detract from an interesting story. Though I don't believe this one is quite as dark.
Divergence Eve was at its core a horror story. I'm not expecting this one to be; more like action-adventure.
They've also telegraphed something.
Princess Listy, the one who originally summoned him to the other world, and who didn't want to let him go, in ep 1, almost certainly will eventually summon him again to the other world. Whether it happens in this particular series remains to be seen, but there's no question it's going to happen.
3
I remember when Divergence Eve (first season) was airing. That series was so hard to figure out, so I ended up dropping it. It was, pretty early in, a dark horror series, but then you have physically impossible boob physics, a sex-pot loli running around and that ED. The "divergence" was strong with the elements of that show. Though I believe it actually sold decently here in the States.
Posted by: sqa at July 14, 2012 07:12 PM (5/dUV)
4
I'd say HSotD had the same problem, although it might be aggravated by a conflict between writer and artist.
Wonderduck is collecting votes for the next series he should review. You'll see how I voted. (My nomination of Medaka Box got rejected, but he did accept my second nomination.)
I really, really, really hope Elfen Lied doesn't win! Blood! Gore! Dead Bodies! More Blood! More Gore! And I am pretty sure I don't want to read about Gunslinger Girls, either. (Dead girls!)
1
No girls die in GSG! Well, there's one, but she gets better for Season 2. Oh, and there's the other one, come to think of it. Okay, so there's some dead girls in GSG. Not many.
Posted by: Wonderduck at July 13, 2012 08:29 PM (PHdMw)
2
Elfen Lied was highly critically acclaimed. I don't expect Mr.Duck going for it on that basis. It's very far from HSOTD. It's like making fun of Lain.
Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at July 13, 2012 08:38 PM (5OBKC)
I got through floating secretary head before I stopped watching. It does actually get less violent later in, but it's kind of a sickening series. Just not worth a watch, really.
Posted by: sqa at July 13, 2012 08:45 PM (5/dUV)
4
Actually, I love the show, and if The Pond Scum votes for it, I'll have a good ol' time reviewing it. There's so much over-the-topness going on that it's begging for a parody. Really, any of the six shows on the list are.
Posted by: Wonderduck at July 13, 2012 11:04 PM (PHdMw)
I dunno. The magic is gone. It's like they threw a switch and turned off all the stuff I liked in the first episode.
I know what it was: Oojima, the male lead, is now sunk in self-pity.
I'm just shy of half way through the episode and all I'm getting is Oojima whining, combined with a series of meet-cutes. I had hoped that the show wasn't going to be a harem, but it's evident now that it will be.
I think I'm going to quit this one.
UPDATE: I think I should probably explain a bit more. Here's how the second episode begins:
Our Hero (Oojima) is having a dream, remembering something along time ago. It's about the chick with the red hair, the "childhood friend", when both of them were maybe six years old. In his sleep he reaches out with his right hand...
And then he wakes up, to this:
This babe is in the habit of sneaking into his bedroom in the morning and getting onto his bed with him. It happened in the first episode, too.
So Our Hero wakes with a handful of wonderfulness. The redhead doesn't seem too concerned about it. She doesn't scream; she doesn't pull his hand away. She grins at him. Our Hero gives the wonderfulness a couple of good squeezes and then freaks out and pulls his hand away.
I understand that any kind of fiction involves a certain willingness to suspend disbelief. So I'll believe in FTL drives and space pirates. I'll believe in a world where everyone has animal ears and tails. I'll believe in a scenario where space aliens show up and they're all gorgeous catgirls. I can even believe in the MCSA. I can accept those things in the service of a good story.
But I won't believe this. No girl would act that way. This redhead isn't a plausible character. She's an Otaku Dream Girl, and Otaku Dream Girls don't exist.
And the other girls involved in the various meet-cutes in this episode all give evidence of being Otaku Dream Girls too, albeit in slightly different ways.
1
What I find just as unbelievable is that so many healthy, teenage males are horrified at the prospect of having sex with beautiful, willing young women. That's not the universe I grew up in.
Posted by: Dave Young at July 13, 2012 05:29 PM (ZAk0Z)
3
The series is based off an eroge, so it's a harem series through and through.
As for that type of scene, they do happen in real life, but, generally, the girl isn't taking much of "no" for an answer when it comes to getting sex.
Posted by: sqa at July 13, 2012 06:05 PM (5/dUV)
4
Maybe I'm just in the wrong mood. I have been known to enjoy harem shows, after all. But just having a harem isn't enough. There needs to be more to it.
5
I don't think you're in the wrong mood. Something was just off in the first episode. While there were things I liked, that made it seem like it could rise above type, something just seemed a bit off. Having watched all of Guilty Crown, I've gotten a better understanding that when I feel "something seems off with how this is going", it's more than just thinking a series isn't working for you. (That's a different feeling)
Oddly enough, I kind of have the opposite feeling with "Kono Naka ni Hitori, Imoto ga Iru!". The series isn't going to be "good", by any stretch, but it's not actually bad and there's this feeling of a genre shift that might happen. (I'm really hoping it's a really cynical take on the Harem genre, and they've already hinted that the girls are all gold diggers) But I could easily be wrong. When reading Tea Leaves, you get stuff wrong.
It probably doesn't help that the presumptive next Student Council President happens to be a future member of the harem. So it's really hard to square her riding around on her bike, by herself, with the altercation in the hallway with the current president. Those scenes feel like they're from a different series.
Posted by: sqa at July 13, 2012 07:43 PM (5/dUV)
6
Oh, and I asked this in another place, but since I've seen this a few times lately, I'm really curious: is being in a school on scholarship looked down upon in Japanese society? This might be a really American point, but the times I've seen it in anime, it's passed off as a bad thing.
Now, I get the Japanese class structure is very different from what I'm used to dealing with (and that's likely the issue), but I wore my academic scholarship like a badge of honor (hey, I worked hard for that). So, I'm just curious if that's a standard view over there, or just something that pops up in anime. I doubt anyone here knows, but I figured I'd mention it, since we're talking about this series.
I don't know. I can only think of one other series right off which has that kind of division, Ladies vs. Butlers. And the scholarship kids have to wait on the ones paying full fare.
But I have no idea whether this is a real cultural attitude in Japan.
8
I dunno about the school, but college is different, or was in the heidy 80s. In Dai-Guard, there's a scene when character A tries to lick some mass-mailing envelopes or something menial like that. Character B comes to help, and asks: "how comes you're so bad at this, didn't you have any part-time jobs in college?" (they are all adults in the series). A replies: "no, I had a stipend". At that, B and everyone else assumes inferiority, since full stipends are given to best of the best. So it's the opposite.
Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at July 13, 2012 09:04 PM (5OBKC)
9
It shows up in Hana yori Dango and Ouran Host Club.
Posted by: muon at July 19, 2012 05:29 AM (JXm2R)
10
If I'm reading it right, it's a need-based scholarship, and the embarassing thing is not the scholarship per se, but being poor enough to get it.
It reminds me of how I was too proud to apply for the reduced-price school lunches as a kid. (It's an American program; back in the 80s, full price for lunch was 75 cents, but if you showed that your parents' income was low enough, you only had to pay 35 or even nothing.)
I suspect that the trope is a callback to a bygone era, that today is only found in fiction -- like cruel, all-powerful mothers-in-law.
Anyone have any opinions about Microsoft Expression Web?
I do a lot of my composition using Frontpage 2002, but it has some problems. The biggest problem is that when I have two pages open, and want to put a link to one of them into the other one, it crashes instantly.
And there are things about it that are pretty clumsy. Microsoft stopped supporting it a long time ago, and I'm thinking maybe it's time for me to buy something more modern. If I stay with Microsoft, that would apparently be Expression Web. (Though it appears it can't be purchased singly, so it would be Expression Studio.)
The things I'm reading about it say that it requires Silverlight and NET Framework 4. Does that mean I can only create things to run on servers which have those things? (which would be bad) or only that I have to have them on my computer in order to run the program? (which would be OK)
Frankly, for what I want to do (compose basic HTML with no frills) it seems like overkill. So is there an alternative? Anything under about $200 would be fine; quality is more important than cheapness.
1
Expression Web is probably overkill for your needs, but I bet all the modern commercial tools are equally so. It should be capable of producing sites that don't use silverlight code, and if it doesn't, there wouldn't be a requirement that the server have silverlight on it, there is no server runtime, you'd just have to have the embedded link to the client runtime so any visitors could get it if they didn't have it. But that seems unlikely to be necessary, since you're not likely to be putting silverlight controls in your pages.
Pixy is about to release a massive upgrade to the Minx editors, btw.
Posted by: David at July 10, 2012 01:44 PM (vyRm+)
2
My friends-and-family price for Expression Studio Web Professional is way, way below retail, if you want to give it a shot. The Silverlight requirement is definitely for the application itself, not the generated pages; it can generate perfectly normal HTML/CSS-based pages.
-j
Posted by: J Greely at July 10, 2012 02:09 PM (fpXGN)
Based on what you said above, the Express version of Visual Studio (web developer) will probably work for you.
Posted by: RickC at July 10, 2012 05:05 PM (WQ6Vb)
4
Well, the price is certainly right. I'm installing it now, and we'll see. (But it sure wants to install a lot of other crud. What in hell is it doing with SQL?)
It installs sql, I believe, because it uses a database to store, among other things, autocomplete information. It's kind of overkill if all you want to do is edit a web page, but it's a really nice editor.
Posted by: RickC at July 11, 2012 05:05 AM (A9FNw)
10
Oh, one thing--you will find that VS likes to work in the context of projects, given it's origins. You don't have to make one, though--you can just open a plain old html file.
Posted by: RickC at July 11, 2012 05:09 AM (A9FNw)
I noticed that. There didn't seem to be any obvious way to directly compose a normal HTML file, but I didn't really look at it all that long.
I'm thinking I should probably stick with Frontpage. I know its crochets now, and when I stay away from a few flaws, it works adequately.
I did updates today, and with VS installed it took almost an hour for all the patches to update. This machine got 21 patches. The other machine, without VS installed, only got 7.
That's the project-orientation coming through. I normally just use File|Open and right-click and create a new file in the dialog, or create a new file in Explorer or something first.
You got a ton of patches because even though it's been out for like 3 years, they don't ship the latest version: you have to download the original version, then apply a service pack, as well as various updates.
If it's not to your taste, that's fine. I have to write HTML sometimes for my day job, and it's my preferred tool.
Posted by: RickC at July 11, 2012 06:58 PM (WQ6Vb)
UPDATE: By the way, BD #5 got delivered this morning. All the image samples I included in the review are from the BDs, and I decided they would all be full-sized.
Posted by: Mauser at July 10, 2012 11:33 PM (cZPoz)
5
Great point on the music in the series. I streamed this using my WD Live player to my home theater setup, and it's clear that the OP is a very well composed, very well mixed song. It sounds piratey and fun, has smart breaks and clever use of effects on vocals, keeping it lively and interesting, and definitely gets the subwoofer thumping. I don't think I'll be blasting it from my car, necessarily, but it set the right tone for the show.
The background music was excellent, too. It's never obtrusive, yet it always complimented the mood of the particular scene.
Posted by: wahsatchmo at July 12, 2012 10:14 AM (r4uXE)
I can see that it's going to be a long summer. I've watched the first episode of Dog Days 2 about eight times already. It's everything I could have hoped for, and I'm increasingly confident that Becky is going to be an asset to the story, not a swamp of angst.
I wanna watch the next episode!
I think I better put the rest of this below the fold.
1
Only watched it fully twice, haha. Might watch again. Working through some other series at the moment as well.
I'm going to assume the 3 unknown characters from the OP/ED will bring us most of our World Story this time around. There's just so much to this world that there's no real way to guess what it's going to be.
And, I do agree that we won't get concluded fights among the major players. Spoil too much of the fun, really. Though it is nice to see Rico packing some heat again, hehe. Always watch out for the loli characters!
Posted by: sqa at July 08, 2012 06:31 PM (5/dUV)
2
This sounds like a really fun show, and most of the reviews I've seen about it have been positive. With all the anime that's being streamed now-a-days, it's surprising (and disappointing) that nobody has picked up either season of this series. The Ways of the Anime Business are Mysterious.
Posted by: Dave Young at July 08, 2012 08:30 PM (ZAk0Z)
I thought the first season had been licensed, but I just looked and I'm remembering wrong.
I can understand why licensees here might be a little bit put off. It comes off as a kid's show, except that there's enough nudity and other fan service in it so that it can't be sold that way.
But if the second season is a success in Japan, then someone here may decide to license both seasons.
5
They have a nasty habit of not opening old series, making them premium-only. Naruto is like that, for example: only Naruto Shippuuden simulcast is accessible to plain members, but not the original.
Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at July 09, 2012 02:24 PM (5OBKC)
6
That announcement at CR has a link to their Dog Days page. Only it's a 404. And Dog Days isn't present on their Summer 2012 season listing.
Crunchyroll is sometimes slow coordinating their news announcements with the rest of their site, but I don't have any doubt the announcement is true. The only question in my mind is the timing. Sometimes their "streaming" shows don't show up until several days after an episode has originally aired. (I think Fate/Zero was that way.) But I'm still happy. At least I'll get to see the show now, as well as the first season. And hopefully it won't take them too long to get Season 1 up, 'cause I'd like to watch those before starting on Season 2.
Posted by: Dave Young at July 09, 2012 04:10 PM (ZAk0Z)
8
Link displays fine for me, but here's tinyurl for it:
http://tinyurl.com/74rrut5
"Crunchyroll continues its summer anime simulcast announcements with the addition of Dog Days (Season 2) which
is set to broadcast every Saturday at 9 am PDT for premium members with
free members able to view one week after initial broadcast.
Additionally, the first season of Dog Days will also be available on Crunchyroll with launch times to be announced at a later date. More information can be found on www.crunchyroll.com/dogdays. "
Posted by: sqa at July 09, 2012 04:31 PM (5/dUV)
9
I can't check because of my data loss last year, but I don't that that's the extent of the makeovers. Leo's shorts have gotten a lot, um, shallower, and she's sporting white thong straps sticking out on either side. And her belly-button is visible, whereas before the armor straps hid it. Compare to the poster on the page sqa linked.
12
Warning to All:
My E-Mail was Hacked. Don't open ANY E-mails you got from me on July 9th.
Very Sorry for the OT comment Steven but it seems prudent to let people know.
Posted by: The Brickmuppet at July 09, 2012 05:22 PM (e9h6K)
SQA, please look at the comment entry form. There's an omega. Just to the left of it is something that looks like chain links.
That control allows you to enter a URL inline so that it can be clicked. Please use it from now on instead of directly pasting your link in the raw text.
Enter the text you want to have be a link. Then sweep-highlight it. Click the link control, and you'll get a popup where you can enter your http://etc...
14
What browser are you using, on what operating system? Even just pasting a URL directly should automatically create a clickable link, but it doesn't seem to be doing so for you.
15
CR simply added a redirect from "/dogdays" to "/dog-days", which existed previously.
Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at July 09, 2012 06:39 PM (5OBKC)
16
I'm using updated Firefox. I'd just copied the link from the browser page. Though I have noticed it likes to scroll to the top of the screen when I paste something.
I've only watched the OP so far, but I had to post. Lots of good stuff revealed in the OP.
Most important of all: Nanami and Becky both learn magic. Becky is shown riding a broomstick. Nanami seems to learn Tornado from Shinku, or else she independently develops an equivalent. They're shown racing.
I think that Nanami is wearing Ex Machina. Of course Shinku has Palladion.
Becky becoming a mage means she isn't going to be a useless moping sop on all the action, which is a relief.
UPDATE: Holy Cow! Eye Catch!
UPDATE: And now to talk about it, spoilers, below the fold.
1
Thanks for the eyecatch. I needed a new wallpaper.
Posted by: jcm3 at July 07, 2012 04:13 PM (OU30d)
2
I think this will work.
If Becky agrees to become hero for Pastillage, then it gives her something to do. And it gets her away from Shinku and Millefiore, so she doesn't have to see them getting puppy eyes with each other.
Kuberu will give her the flying broom, and maybe, maybe it will also turn out that she can do other magic. And if she's applying herself to that, then she won't have time to become an angst fest.
4
And another thing about Becky:
If Pastillage has their own pair of holy weapons, and I bet they do, then presumably Kuberu will loan one of them to Becky, with all that implies.
6
I just realized:
The flying broom is one manifestation of the Pastillage holy ring that Becky will get. It'll be something she can summon when she needs it.
7
Tornado was a skill that Shinku developed from the Seal powers, not from Palladion, so it makes sense that Nanami can learn it. Which should be fun. I REALLY want to see Shinku vs Nanami, but I get the feeling we won't get that until the end of the series.
On ep 1:
It's so nice to see anime characters being actually "happy". For as "generic" or "constructed" as the starting point for Dog Days, these characters feel like they actually know each other and enjoy seeing each other.
I loved that they've upped the "media presentation" in the world. In series 1, the battles were run together pretty quickly so they weren't well prepared for. But, this time, they had 3 months to plan and I love that they sprang for pyrotechnics. And dropping the news of another Hero in the middle of the battle was a great bit of in-universe presentation. I loved that. It's always fun to see in-universe "sense of the dramatic" for legitimate reasons.
Becky is taking Shinku's setup pretty well, all things considered. He had no way to prep her for it, so might as well just go with "straight surprise". Still, her expression when he jumps was great.
I also loved that Nanami followed the letter and just went with it. Her and Shinku are going to be fun to watch interact. Actually, the best interaction set should be Nanami + General Godwin + Prince Gaul. There will be much scenery to chew. Oh, glorious scenery chewing.
All in all, I'm really happy and I'm so looking forward to the entire course.
Posted by: sqa at July 07, 2012 07:07 PM (5/dUV)
8
I get the feeling we'll see a bit more of Yukikaze this time around. I can't complain about that.
Also:
Two knights, one of which was the first series, were named and will apparently be around a bit more. Should be fun to see the training stuff again, haha.
Posted by: sqa at July 07, 2012 07:09 PM (5/dUV)
9
I noticed her. And the new knight was one of the chibis in the ED.
It should be interesting to see what Ex Machina can do. Clanvert is a giant ax, but Ex Machina always looked a little strange (like maybe armor) in the first series. Or it might just be a ring like Palladion, not sure.
All of them are rings. The user can make them take whatever form is desired. In the first series Millefiore said that to Shinku when she first gave him Palladion. And he said he wanted a staff, and it became one. But over the course of the series, his standard combat weapon got modified. The final version had a break in the middle, and he could pull it apart and make two energy blades appear on the ends.
When Leo uses Granvert, she wants it to be an axe. But it could be anything. In resting form, all of them look like rings. Millefiore wears Excelide all the time, and if you look closely, you can see it on the index finger of her right hand in this episode when she's entertaining Becky.
Likewise, if you watch closely, you can see Ex Machina on Nanami's hand when she makes her grand entrance.
12
I'd forgotten that she'd said they were all rings. I was just thinking that it was just those two were rings and others were something different. Granvert was always shown in Axe form and during the press conference with the holy swords on the line, Ex Machina looked like it was armor.
I did see Excelide on Millfiore's hand and Nanami wearing a ring. Them all being rings makes some sense.
Apparently Couvre's is a Holy "spear" that's actually a gun... or something. At least per wikipedia when I went looking for if it was Clanvert or not in spelling, haha. I do wish there was some official romanizations of these.
Nanami is using a pair of flying ice-skates. That's her version of Tornado.
We should get at least 1 new and well animated concerts from Millefiore.
Rotating blue star design might be someone's iris. Hard to say.
There'll be an image change to part of the OP, as 2 characters are on screen but you can't make them out. 1 Male with some sort of massive claw as part of his hair. Other is female with a crown of some type, but can't make out animal traits.
Another OP change scene, a character (new) is walking away from the camera and only turn his/her head slightly. Looks like some noble, but can't say anything past that.
So, at least 3 characters that are important will be introduced later. I think the pair might be antagonists. They look like they're in "evil pose" mode.
Dawned on me that the 2 hidden figures in the 1 shot, from the OP, are likely Leo & Gaul's parents. Or maybe Aunt/Uncle that rule another domain. We'll see, but that would kind of fit with their designs & coloration.
All 3 of the hidden characters are as chibis in the ED.
The single noble is with Biscotti. The male/female pair is with Pastillage. With their colors there, my guess at Leo/Gaul relatives is likely wrong.
Posted by: sqa at July 07, 2012 08:10 PM (5/dUV)
16
It's apparent that Kuberu
is not an enemy. But she may be less than a total friend, given her relish at the prospect of spoiling the battle for Millefiore and Leo. I am getting "spoiled brat" vibes from her.
That could very well be possible. Or at least a bit jealous/mischievous. I'm not sure we'll see any "human" characters be truly antagonistic in this franchise. Or at least not normally.
The two hidden characters from the OP that are with Pastillage could be Kuberu's parents, since she is just first princess and not a full ruler at the moment.
Posted by: sqa at July 07, 2012 08:44 PM (5/dUV)
18
Regarding rings:
In the first series they weren't referred to as "rings", mostly. They were referred to as "holy swords". Each one can take any kind of form that its user needs, but the true form is a sword, and that only comes out when it's really needed most. We saw Excelide and Palladion in their true forms near the end of the first series.
And there was a point where Leo fired an energy arrow out of a tremendous bow. That bow was Granvert, in bow form instead of her usual choice of a battle axe.
20
I noticed. I also noticed that I think her bust line has gotten slightly bigger. She's also being a tad less formal, but she was never the terribly formal one of the pair.
I still love they have a logical, in-universe reason for the "clothing damage" effect on knight-rank characters. Obviously it exists for the reason shown in ep 1, but it's still pretty fun.
This show is despicable and disgusting. I'm likely to come back to it eventually for top rotation pictures, but I'm not even slightly interested in watching any more of it.
It's even worse than that. He has this habit of mumbling his thoughts. So he goes to school with his next door neighbor, who happens to have really big tits, and he's musing about how she's soon going to be an F-cup, and wondering when she started growing like that. She apparently is used to this and isn't bothered by it, and answers him.
And at the school he sees three girls who were caught in the rain in their gym clothes, rendering their shirts transparent, and mumbles about this, too, and they hear him. And get pissed.
He apparently has a reputation as being a world class perv, as a result of this.
That whole sequence made me ill; I did a lot of skipping.
3
I actually like characters with "Liar, Liar" syndrome. It always makes for interesting interactions, as all of the characters will know what that person is thinking. It's a nice opposite of the standard reserved character.
Still, yeah, this series isn't too promising.
You might keep Kono Naka ni Hitori, Imout ga Iru! in mind for future top rotation material. The series actually seems like it'll be a cynical take on the harem genre, which I'm kind of up for at the moment, haha. Not sure if it'll be good, but the fact they're already hinting that our group of haremettes will be, for all intents and purposes, gold diggers is so very different from normal.
That and I watched it right after Dakara, so I was surprised by the step up in storytelling quality. (Doesn't mean the story won't fail horribly later, but of the first episodes so far, it was pretty tolerable for me. But I also have a pretty high tolerance for fanservice shows, as long as I get an interesting story.)
