Anime in Focus: X episode 2

 <- This is the lady in charge of the seven dragons of heaven, a group of people who believe in sacrificing character development to bring in more fight scenes

Previous Episode

This anime is available for free on Funimations website HERE

Well, after my review on the first episode of this series, you may find it shocking that I actually watched the second. Well, you see, I was having an anime night with some friends, and there wasn’t anything else going on. This episode starts with us finding out how much of an antisocial jerk Kamui is. We get a flashback to his childhood, showing him as a nice young boy, along with some girl we saw in the opening episode.

After this, Kamui gets into a fight with some guy who weilds wind magic. It doesn’t go well for the wind guy, because Kamui’s power level is inversely proportionate to his character development at this point. Hence, our local wind caster gets bailed out by that chick that looks like Aoyama Motoko, who apparently DOES possess a sword.

Anyway, our lead wants to wield some divine sword or something, but the people in charge of guarding it don’t want him to have it because he’s a jerk. Quite logical really. Then we see some people talking to some really important looking lady, who talks about Kamui’s role in the fate of the world and how important he is. Her henchmen really hope some other guy is in charge of deciding the fate of the world, as would anybody who makes logical sense. Also, Kamui is apparently going to be the one who ruins the world or something. I dunno, if some antisocial jerk was going to be the one who decides the fate of the world, wouldn’t using a sniper rifle to get rid of him be a logical choice? Once again though, that would make for a very short anime.

Rest of the episode is about a couple of guys who were watching Kamui creating an alternate dimension that is not connected to this one and duking it out. Fight it moderately interesting, but like all of the other fights in this series, we aren’t really given a reason to care. Episode ends with a cliff hanger, but I’m not really pushed to care.

I really wish this show would focus less on introducing characters and having fight scenes, and focus more on the characters themselves and their motivations for fighting. Anime doesn’t follow the same rules as video games, you know!

Someday maybe: My anime watching friend said we might watch a third episode of this. Maybe.

Related stuff:
xxxHolic volume 1, manga (also by clamp)

XXXHolic Volume 1

Wow, I’m broke. Well, not really broke, cuz I can still pay the bills, and buying people Christmas presents shouldn’t be much of a problem. Actually, I just don’t have enough spare money to go blow on a ton of Manga. However, since I AM the guy who wrote “Dude, you’re paying too much for anime”, I really shouldn’t make a fuss about this. No, instead I used my massive resourcefulness to conjure up manga from nowhere. Nowhere, in this case meaning a library I normally don’t borrow from, and some stuff I have lying around I haven’t got to watching.

Bringing us to the title of this post, XXXHolic. I picked this up from ye local library, and am currently at the mercy of whoever is borrowing it if I want more. They only had the first volume, and if they actually carry the second, it is probably in the hands of some creepy CLAMP fangirl/boy. *shudders*

Which may force me to go borrow the next few volumes, because this looks like it could go somewhere. Maybe. As a first volume, not much happens, we start with a plot, introduce some characters, yada yada yada. Our lead appears to be spineless boy #3012, who has a crush on cute girl #7123. Spineless boy has the unique feature of being able to see spirits, who bother him greatly. He really wants to get rid of them , leading him to Yuko, the hawt hermit/witch. She claims to be capable of removing his little curse, but it will cost him… HIS SOUL! MWAHAHAHAHA!

After selling his soul to our hawt creepy witch, he gets to endure the strenuous torture of working for her as an assistant. Now he is forced to help her in her shop where she grants people favors in exchange for things that they find valuable. This could lead somewhere interesting, as we have one interesting cast member, and the potential for a great deal of interesting stuff to happen. Alas, my library only had volume 1, so I can’t tell you any farther. Tune in tomorrow for my views on Fruits Basket 21!

Opinion: Might go somewhere, might not.

Related stuff:
X (another project by CLAMP)