Rapid Fire Anime Impression Collection Part 1 (Baka to Test to Shoukanjuu, Hanamaru Kindergarten & Durarara!!)

Name
Baka to Test to Shoukanjuu or Idiots and Tests and Summoned Beings

Graphics
I wouldn’t call the graphics stunning by any counts, however I think the designs were decent enough for this sort of anime. The chibi style of summons was also very cute and makes a change from the normal human transforms you see in most anime nowadays.

Music
The opening theme is Perfect-area complete! by Natsuko Aso and the ending is Baka Go Home by milktub and BakaTest All Stars. Both of these themes are catchy and work well with both the theme of the anime and the animation used. The voice acting is at the moment in my opinion, average, so no complaints or complements from me on this.

Storyline
Instead of going for the generic school-life genre, they actually thought outside the box and mixed  Final Fantasy or something similar into the whole normal school-life genre. The story goes that at the beginning of the year, all students take an exam and are separated into classes A (The highest) to F (The lowest). The A class has the best facilities imaginable whilst class F (Which the main characters are put in), is no more than a tiny shack with broken furniture. They can rise ranks by studying hard and making their summon more powerful, in which they can duel other classes so they can swap spots with each other. Weird setting but I think it could work.

Name
Hanamaru Kindergarten

Graphics
The graphics kind of adopted the sweet and cheery style of graphics, which is honestly a shock considering that I havent seen an anime series this colourful in ages. Not to complain but I think they could have gone for a bit more realistic art design so you arent cringing your eyes at the colours. But anyway, the designs of everything were appropriate for the genre.

Music
Didn’t actually pay much attention to the music in this episode. Voice acting of the adults were good whilst the voices of the students were as you expect, higher in tone and cheery, but at least they weren’t bad enough to give a headache or anything like some voice acting has in the past with series like this. The opening theme wasn’t played this episode however the ending theme, Egao Narebete by Kei Shindou, Ayahi Takagaki and MAKO, did have that fairytale theme to suit the animation.

Storyline
The story focuses on a new teacher at Hanamaru Kindergarten named Tsuchida as well as focusing on one of his students, Anzu who misinterpreted him asking her a question as “Hitting on” her, which inevitably leading to a crush which is fueled by her two friends Hiiragi and Koume, as well as her mother, a past friend of Tsuchida’s who jokingly or willingly (unknown) vows to make it happen as proclaimed at the end of the episode. Right~ As long as it isnt like Kodomo no Jikan it should have a solid storyline.

Name
Durarara!!

Graphics
The graphics in this anime are the best I have seen in a loooooong time, even in the average quality screencaps I have here, it should be pretty evident that both the character designs and backgrounds really do look quite realistic in anime style. Even if it isnt graphical worthy, I liked how they did the voice over sections as a kind of chatroom setting which I thought was a creative way to do it, even if I personally would go insane using a default chat avatar like that. Even if it is a dark and gloomy setting I personally love the graphics!

Music
Once again, I didnt really pay attention to the music of the episode however voice acting was tolerable and the opening theme Uragiri no Yuyake by Theatre Brook was very good overall with the ending theme Trust Me by Yuya Matsushita also being a decent listen.

Storyline
I think the best way of summaising the storyline is by copying the one off the MyAnimeList page, since I couldn’t come up with a good summary to give:

The story takes place in Ikebukuro, a district of Tokyo. Teenage punks gang up and fight against each other. The gangsters are afraid of an urban legend called “Dullahan”, a headless rider, who rides a black motorcycle without head lights or engine sounds. Ryuugamine Mikado is a normal high school boy who seeks peculiar beings. When he moves in to Ikebukuro, a mad scramble for Dullahan’s missing head breaks out.

It is different from what I would normally watch however with so many other good qualities to go with it, it will be hard to pass up.

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So I suppose the question I must ask myself is…. will I be blogging any of them or the ones I plan on giving impressions on any day now? Well, whilst I would like to say yes I think I am going to have to stick with a safe no at the moment since I said I would for Umineko and despite watching it many times over and loving the novel series, I still cannot get motivated to do summaries for them. It all depends on time I suppose.