Image thanks to Incise-soul.

And the summer is already upon us with full force. I have been feeling the raging heat here for weeks already, so much so that my room temperature has gone up abnormally each day, forcing me to turn on my air-conditioner for short stretches to bring it down so I can survive. But in any case, I was never a fan of summer anime much, and this current list of anime series airing is still not enough to make me feel encouraged. Nevertheless, here are mine and three other guest writers’ impressions of the shows we are or are not watching, and unlike my spring anime watchlist, this is a serious post, because I got others’ opinions written in as well.

My thanks to the following blogs for their summer anime previews which has helped tremendously in the making of this post – T.H.A.T. Anime Blog, Sea Slugs! Anime Blog, j1m0ne’s blog, and hashihime. Hashihime also has an airing schedule for the summer shows here. All summaries and sypnoses are taken from each of these blogs so I would encourage reading theirs for a full rundown, because I will only touch on our impressions in this post.

If shows do not appear here, that is because none of us are watching it.
 

Cobra the Animation

Panther – Not my alley despite it being so old-school. So I am not going to even pick this up despite it being by Madhouse.

Shadro – Haven’t watched the old series, though it does sound like it will be a neat over the top show; that is one thing we don’t see often is crazy over the top stuff and so anything that does that I approve of!

Lelouch – Madhouse is love and badass space pirates with an old school feel makes me embarrassingly fanboyish. Will watch this, though not for the tight-fit red suit.
 

Princess Lover

Panther – I know, I am a sucker for harem anime series like this one, and it is an eroge-to-anime adaptation. I have no high hopes for it, but I will watch this for sure. There are good seiyuu in it as well, as is usual for such shows – Wakamoto Norio, Koyasu Takehito and Toyoguchi Megumi lend their powerful talent to the likes of Katou Emiri and Matsuoka Yuki (Inoue Orihime in Bleach). Charlotte Hazelink, the leftmost girl in the picture above, captures my heart in this particular harem, but is played by a relative unknown for me, Yuzuki Ryoka (latest known role was Cattleya in Queen’s Blade and previously she was in Kishin Taisen Gigantic Formula as Chau Yan Li).

Shadro – I was just going to say moving on without really looking into it, but I looked into it and…well it looks nice. I’m not too sure I’m a mixed bag with eroge to anime…though I end up watching most of them >.>

Lelouch – Harem show means more boobs and pantsu-shots. Of course I’m watching it, and you should too. Hmm, those girls look yummy…

YuKi-To – Love the eroge chara designs, the anime designs look so poor in comparison, but will want to know what it is about.
 

Kanamemo

Panther – What in the bloody F? No, I am staying off this. I dislike designs like that, and slice-of-life wut. I prefer real slice-of-life shows.

Shadro – Not my thing…not really much I can do about that. I don’t see any appeal for me on this one. Though it could be good, who knows, not I.

Lelouch – I don’t care about plot or story or literal mumbo-jumbo anymore. One look at Kana and I’m under the loli spell. Give it to me, fast!

YuKi-To – Looks interesting for a light watch.
 

Sora no Manimani

Panther – Lolwut? I am pretty sure this show will be filled with useless astronomical trivia that I already know better than the show’s producers, and it will likely be about relationships anyway the way this show is going. A definite waste of my time, so no.

Shadro – Um…I really don’t have anything to say…it’s a show…about astronomy club and some people and then its standard romance comedy stuff? Yeah I’ll go with that!

Lelouch – Romance with astronomical geekdom? I’ll roll the dice and take a chance on this. It might become something special, but then again, it’s also equally prone to being a childish, cringe-worthy, cliché-loaded torture story.

YuKi-To – Looks interesting, would want to know more about astronomy too.
 

Yoku Wakaru Gendai Mahou

Panther – Contemporary mahou shoujo FAIL NO

Shadro – Ok, I looked at this and saw a cell phone and magic. Now if anybody watched Battle Programmer Shirase, remember when he went “DOUBLE COMPILE!” and such with his phone, I really want the show to be that, or just like it a little.

Lelouch – Of course every season needs its share of magical, height-challenged, loli with stereotypical all-powerful, often physiologically gifted, counterpart. It happened with To Aru Majutsu no Index (fine, all of the girls there were loli) and it happened with Asura Cryin’. I want to avoid these, but I just can’t…

YuKi-To – Lovely chara designs will give it a try.
 

Tokyo Magnitude 8.0

Panther – I have been waiting for this one since I learned about it at the start of the spring anime season. TM8.0 will follow the lives of a brother and sister who flee the reality of a Richter magnitude 8.0 earthquake in Tokyo. There is a huge possibility that a 7.0 or higher could hit Tokyo within the next 30 years, and BONES specifically mentioned they were going to go out and interview actual earthquake survivors and gather data on what would happen in a real earthquake, so the anticipation for this natural disaster show is very high for me. There will be a look into sociological, psychological and geological factors, so the insights I might gain from this show is going to far outweigh anything else this season for me.

A relatively young cast backing up the main unknowns, so I will only touch on the supporting ones – Kaida Yuko, Kitamura Eri, Endou Aya, Inoue Kikuko, Sawashiro Miyuki and Nonaka Ai all make an appearance here. That is not to say, indeed, that the cast is not strong – few would protest the strength of having Inoue, Kaida and Sawashiro on board, and Nonaka and Endou distinguished their teamwork in Sora wo Kakeru Shoujo.

Shadro – Remember that game for the PS2 that was basically the idea this show is doing? I don’t really care for it, but I think it could be interesting.

Lelouch – I like BONES so I’m giving them a chance on this one. Earthquakes are not exactly the most attractive plot devices though, but this seems like dark horse material, so watching this carefully before either dropping it, or worshipping whoever thought up this shit.

YuKi-To – I trust BONES so this is a definite watch.

Related posts:

1. Summer 2010 Anime Watchlist
2. Winter 10 Anime Watchlist
3. Summer 2008 Anime Watchlist
4. Spring 2010 Anime Watchlist
5. Fall 09 Anime Watchlist