Anime Bloggers Unite! Haruhi, Fan Art, Meta Meta and All time favorite series

So I thought I'd do something a bit different. My poll is almost up, and it looks like most people who visit this Site are too ambivalent to vote. But for the majority of people who aren't, they'd like to see me do critique and analysis on blogs.

Well as part of that I thought I'd step out of my shell a bit and offer up some stuff that I came across on AnimeNano. And to show that I'm not a copycat, I'm actually going to add my own thoughts.

Tea Shop Beloved - Defloned talked about the plethora of favorite series that people seem to list. Especially when it comes to all-time favorite series. This post is close to my heart. I'm still struggling with how to define an all-time favorite series. And why, some series that have some problems are on my all-time favs list, but some series with problems aren't.

But I do agree with Defloned. There isn't any reason to have more than 20 all-time favorite series. It's a sign that people aren't really being serious with themselves. They confuse an initial emotional reaction with a series really being good. I do think the initial reaction is important, but I think it's a question of how long a series haunts you after watching it. Do you find yourself thinking about what the symbolism in Wolf's Rain could mean, or that stupid picture in RahXephon. Good lord. That's going to drive me crazy for the rest of my days.

To be fair, it's in part a reaction to a misconception I've heard floating around lately. That an enjoyable series must be great or else it isn't good. Why can't someone just enjoy a series? It is entertainment after all.

The Ramblings of Dark Mirage

So I don't read DarkMirage. I know I should, but it's kind of like picking up the DaVinci Code. Everyone tells you it's great, but because they tell you it's great you don't want to read it. Although I did think this blog post was interesting. Granted, I don't know jack or shit about what he's talking about, but I did think the part about the high price of the dojinshi was interesting. Mostly because it's part of a larger phenomenon, I'm seeing lately - so I'm going to coin a term here: The "I did this" argument.

I've heard this in the fansub debate too. The idea that X people did all this work and should get paid for it, even though they didn't create anything. It's a little more substantial in the fansub argument, but not by much. Granted, I don't draw and I don't do translations, but I wouldn't expect people to pay me more than the cost of materials to make a copy of something that someone else did. That tends to be why I support indie artists at the Artist's Alley. Rather than getting a picture of Ruroni Kenshin dressed up in TERRA gear. Ew... that's a bad thought.

On to the next one.

Furu Anime Panikku - This one was mostly a self-reflective post about the blog. But what I noticed here was an idea about different types of blogs - mostly episode recap blogs. Granted, I don't really read episode recaps myself, mostly because I don't usually watch fansubs. (Except for Blood +, damn you Sony for not making a R1 release yet.)

I do think this is an interesting social phenomenon that we tend to gravitate toward a certain type of blog. Whether it's personal thoughts and reflections, or analysis. To be fair, I do it myself. I tend to frequent the same blogs again and again. And in all honesty, those are the blogs that I try to emulate here with mixed results.

But I do think episode recap blogs do have a place in the anime blogging community. Let's face it, they're in some ways the ultimate expressions of fandom. They're talking about what they're watching and offering up their opinions. In some ways they're the primer for the hype that starts about a series.

And speaking of hype (how'd you like that transition), HappySoda wrote an pretty standard review about Bandai's release of Haruhi. What caught me here was a reference to what I like to call: the curmudgeon-hype formula. The amount of hype a series gets is inversely proportional to how much a curmudgeon will like a series.

Last but definitely not least, the Anime Blogging Collective has launched a retrospective on the last year of anime called the 12 days of Christmas. Seriously, I don't know how many of these guys there are, but check out What is eternity doing tonight?, The Animachronism (who has one of the best titles for a blog ever) and Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?! along with at least one post by AnimeOtaku - all of which wrote some awesome posts. Well they always write awesome posts. (I subscribe to all of these blogs) EDIT: AnimeOtaku is not part of the collective, but he did do one post for the project.

And Anime Sophist is having a month of El-Hazard, which is neat too. Considering it was one of those shows I watched way back when. Granted, I still haven't seen the last episode of the OVA, but still he writes a mean review. (I subscribe to this one too.)

Okay, so if you think I missed something, or you'd like to see some more just leave a comment or email me at iniksbane@gmail.com. Also, if you're interested in participating in the blog in review project, please send me an e-mail. I will be starting next week if at all possible.

And as always, thanks for reading.