Disclaimer: This is an old ass post. I probably do not agree with the ideas it presents, and I in all likelihood denounce whatever is written herein. It has been preserved entirely for the purpose of keeping the history and progression of the blog visible.
Daicon Opening Animations:
The Daicon Opening animations are two of the most important anime since the creation of the medium. The first of the two was Gainax’s (then known as Daicon Film’s) first production. With the second of the two being one of the most memorable anime shorts of all time (and the short that gave us the first ever Gainax bounce)
Watching the Daicon shorts is an experience of pure catharsis. Seeing the technical improvements between Daicon III and IV is a joy, and I love trying to catch all of the references is a fun game to play while watching it. Even after all the times, I’ve seen it I still don’t think I’ve caught everything.
There aren’t as many anime that give me as much joy as Daicon IV. The song, the animation, the character designs, the concept, I love everything about it, and I’ll probably end up watching it a couple hundred more times.
Score: 10
Rain Boy:
Rain Boy is a one episode, 24 minute OVA directed by Osamu Tezuka, released in 1983. The OVA tells the story of a little boy who befriends an Amefuri Kozou (a Rain Boy) who asks for his rubber boots in exchange for 3 wishes.
I didn’t enjoy this as much as I was expecting to. There were some funny moments sure, and the ending was emotional to some extent. But I thought it was, for the most part, entirely bland.
The OVA looked good enough, the backgrounds have a really nice storybook quality to them, and the character designs are pretty cartoonish, which I appreciate. Movement occurs often, but it’s never impressive. For how cartoony it looks everything moves in a rather “realistic” way. The movements don’t have much personality, and it all looks really bland, which is unfortunate when the animators had such great designs to play with.
Overall, I really didn’t get much from this short OVA. I didn’t really have much investment in the characters, and it didn’t resonate with me especially deeply thematically or aesthetically, The best part was the final scene, but other than that it’s totally skippable.
Score: 5
Touch
The spoilers are strong with this one…
Touch is my latest completion on my journey through the anime from the 80s, and my favourite I’ve watched so far for this project (i.e. not counting ones I’ve seen before). If you’ve ever seen an anime or read a manga by Mitsuru Adachi, you know what you’re in for. Sibling rivalry, romance, and baseball are abundant in this 1985 sports anime.
Along with being my favourite thing I’ve watched so far for this project, it’s also the longest. Clocking in at a whopping (for non-action shounen standards) 101 episodes. The series follows Uesugi Tatsuya, the older of two twin who’s for years been living in the shadow of his brother Kazuya. Kazuya is one of the best pitchers in the area and is the pride and joy of Meisei Highschool. That is, until he dies. After the death of his brother, Tatsuya, the sibling who no one thought would amount to anything is forced to fill his brother’s shoes in the baseball club.
The most interesting thing about Touch is that it really isn’t a baseball anime. I mean, it is, technically. Baseball is a big part of the show, and games take up a fair amount of the final season (or at least the final season according to the Torrent I was using, it wasn’t actually released that way) but what Touch really is, is an interpersonal character drama/romance series. And that’s what it works best as.
That’s because the series’ greatest strength is the characters and their interactions with one another. The character’s and their relationships are all believable, and seeing how they develop, both as people and in their aforementioned relationships is the real draw of the series. Of course, that doesn’t stop it from having some kick-ass baseball in there too.
The games are all suspenseful and well constructed. And best of all, because of Adachi’s willingness to show his characters get their ball’s rocked, you really never know where it’s going. For the entire last match, I really had no clue if they were going to lose or win. One thing that I really appreciate about Touch is that it doesn’t overstay its welcome. The entire push of the series is the team trying to get to the Koshien, not to win the Koshien. All that matters to Tatsuya in regards to baseball is accomplishing his brother’s goal of getting to the tournament, winning it isn’t what’s important. And in the end, they don’t even show us if they win the tournament. The show stops after the final match of the preliminaries, which I think made it even better.
There are two sequel specials that came out in the 90s and 2000s respectively, and I’ll be talking about the alt version films which changed a bunch of stuff later down the road, but without having seen any of these, I can say that Touch works perfectly without any addition. Plus it has a killer OST, so there’s that too.
Score: 9.6
Postcard Memories 