First look at Winter 2011 anime

So I have been watching a few shows this season, starting with 4 so far. It's a larger start than I had last season, though I did end up finding some shows late last season that I enjoyed. This time around I had 2 anticipated titles and 2 titles I thought I'd try out because they seemed interesting. The series I picked up just because they seemed like they may be interesting are Kore wa Zombie Desu Ka? and GoSick. I was anticipating Madoka because of the staff involved with the project, and anticipating Kimi ni Todoke because I've enjoyed the 1st season a lot.

Top image is from the 2nd episode of Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magika, which is a mahou shoujo from SHAFT that has quite an interesting staff working on it. The music is great, the show has that SHAFT trippyness build right into it with scenes that. as many have put it, make it seem as if these girls are being attacked by the Zan Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei opening. I'm not too sure where the story is heading after 2 episodes, and it's a mahou shoujo with a grim feel to it (the writer is the same writer of Nitro+ stories like Saya no Uta). So far it's just Nodoka level of darkness to it, rather than sunshine and lolipops everywhere. Who knows where it'll go from here though, I'll keep watching to see what direction it goes. Interesting to me so far.

Then there's season 2 of Kimi ni Todoke. I wasn't expecting this to come so fast, actually. Not going to spoil anything in case nobody has seen the 1st season. If you're into innocent and cute high school romance with a nice balance of comedy, you may want to check it out. The opening and ending weren't as good as season 1's, but the artwork in them still made me smile because of how cute they were. Drama already starting up from the 1st episode, and I can already tell where it's heading from here.

Kore wa Zombie Desu Ka? Well, what can I say about this show. It's fun to watch. The comedy is nice, the fanservice isn't too distracting (yet), and it doesn't take itself seriously. The main character of this show is a zombie that was reanimated by a necromancer (who seems to be mute, or just dislikes talking) for some reason not explained yet. Nobody knows he's a zombie, he resumed classes after his death and apparently is out to find out who killed him. He meets up with some reject magical girl that uses a chainsaw as her weapon. 1st episode already tells you what to expect from this show, wacky and random humor. The zombie is attacked by some dude in a dark suit that transforms into a giant lobster. The Zombie has to team up with the magical girl to fight him. I'll keep this on my watch list.

Then there's GoSick. Okay, the anime name is written as ゴシック (Gothic) while the official romanization of it is GoSick, so I'll just assume they're trying to play on words since the main character is a gothloli. This show is about some detective loli in 1924 Europe that solves an insanely easy case in the first episode and then gets dragged into something bigger along with some dude that I assume will be her sidekick for the series. I actually don't have much to say about this show so far, it didn't leave too much of an impression on episode 1. I have episode 2 ready to watch, but haven't seen yet. The series may turn into something interesting, it just doesn't jump into the meat of the story from the beginning, so it's too early to really pass judgment on it. The loli is cute though.

Managed to pick out 3 shows I plan to stick with and 1 show in limbo. Of course, like always, I'll end up picking more shows up along the way that didn't seem interesting to me at first, and they may just be my favorite of the season. My classes for next semester are set up so I only have to go to school 2 days of the week, so hopefully that means more free time for me to watch my animu and chip away at my general backlog.

~ Kirari ミ★