Cunting Arc the Lad Episode 1—Wait, This is Bee Train??

Hey everyone: I Hate Bee Train is not dead, but I will be posting everything from this site on my main blog My Sword Is Unbelievably Dull from now on. I will post the posts here as well until I start forgetting.

Moving along: Arc the Lad. I’ve been aware of this show via ADV previews for an eternity, and was interested in the games before, but never got to play them.

Arc the Lad was Bee Train’s second production (after PoPoLoCrois Monogatari), made when the studio did nothing but video game adaptations. (Wild Arms: Twilight Venom and Medabots soon followed). These shows differ greatly from what has come to be the Bee Train norm.

One huge difference is that Wild Arms and Arc the Lad were directed by Kawasaki Itsuro (who did a little work on Noir and then presumably left the studio), as opposed to studio head/chief director Mashimo Kouichi. More noticeably, Arc the Lad doesn’t feature a Kajiura Yuki soundtrack, but one by Oshima Michiru (who hadn’t made music for the game that the anime was based on, but would work on the soundtracks for later games in the series.)

I could make the case (but I won’t) that Mashimo Kouichi is a somewhat competent director; and Kajiura Yuki is certainly excellent. These aren’t the elements that make Bee Train shows bad, and changing them isn’t the magic that turns things around. Every Bee Train show’s biggest weakness is its art and animation, and that’s where Arc the Lad has me doing a double-take.

It actually looks nice! Episode one was consistently good-looking—there were even moments that honestly impressed me. My standards may be low right now because the last few things I watched were embarrassingly shitty 1997 OVAs, but I’m pretty sure a Bee Train show has never visually impressed me before. It reminds me that they started off as a subsidiary of Production I.G.

The episode is an in media res introduction to major plot elements by way of a one-off action operation. The main character, Elk, is a fire-controlling, spear-wielding “hunter” (i.e. mercenary). He and a partner infiltrate a hijacked airship with the goal of rescuing its passengers and taking out the hijacker. A mysterious girl who can apparently control beasts and has a big cat with her is part of the cargo. When things come to a head, we learn that the bad guy is a mutant Chimera, which clues Elk in to his involvement with an organization called White House (lol). An airship, presumably sent by White House, takes out the bad guy and grabs up the mysterious girl, while Elk escapes to the ship he flew in on minus a partner.

None of this is terrifically interesting, but it’s portrayed well by the directing and script to create intrigue. Everything happens quickly (this is really Bee Train?!). Elk’s partner is killed without fanfare; little is said by any character that isn’t out of urgency; and Elk shares less than two sentences with the mystery girl before she’s taken away. He doesn’t even have time to fall in love with her!

I’m curious about a lot of things. I learned nothing about the world from this episode, except that it has airships. I assume it’s a fantasy world, presumably some kind of desert planet going by the OP, yet the opening narration brings up the Arc of the Covenant, which would be a weird thing to have in a fantasy world! That “arc,” by the way, is not, “Arc the Lad,” as I understand it—there’s also a character named Arc who hasn’t shown up yet. Presumably he’s the protagonist of the first game, and this anime primarily adapts the second one.

It’s amazing to me that I walked out of a Bee Train show curious about its mysteries instead of rolling my eyes and screaming, “get on with it!” However, I won’t be getting my hopes up. After all, I enjoyed the first episodes of .hack//SIGN, and that show proceeded to shit all over my hopes. With any luck, Arc the Lad won’t be such an asshole. The fact that it’s never been well-reviewed and is, in fact, a Bee Train show, still worries me.

Fucking MADLAX Episode 14

Fucking Madlax is finally back! I apologize for the extended absence, which had nothing to do with my mom’s health (on the steady incline) and everything to do with my being lazy. That’s all behind us now, so let’s tackle Madlax fourteen!

Right off the bat, this episode pulls lame shit very common to anime, though never acceptable; that is, constant replays of shit we’ve just seen minutes ago.

Fucking MADLAX Episode 13 Special~

We’re halfway through! While a few weeks were postponed for one reason or another, today I’ve essentially blogged an entire season of Madlax! (That’s a quarter of a year, for those keeping score.) As I thought, it’s somehow easier to episodically blog a show I hate.

To celebrate reaching the halfway point, I wanted to do something big and special, so here it is: an audio commentary on Fucking Madlax episode thirteen! 22 minutes of bad anime, my droning voice, and retarded on-screen captions. I hope you enjoy it!

Fucking MADLAX Episode 12

The Mullet and the Muff
An Erotic Madlax Hatefiction
by 21st Century Digital Boy

My excursion from Nafrece, land of my heart, taken form in the beauteous cuteness that is my young lover, ever slightly absent of mind but never so of my adoration, even as I quiz the nature of the shape-shifting snakes that are her follicle dilemma, was to be a trip purely of business, neverminding the vicarious excitement of co-workers gushing that Gazth-Sonika is the paradise of this world. Yet while the mildly impressive beauties of the middle-upper-class metaphorical eden indeed delighted an otherwise somber effort in search of truth, ’twas a beauty wholly of the flesh which scorched my heart that I might even for a while forget my true love’s face whilst tangled betwixt bedding comforts and the ample thighs of a mercenary.

Her name alone might drive me MAD, so intensely that the breakdown of my constitution constitutes an utter loss of faculties, resulting in a fetid stream of excrement expelling itself from my body as though I’d been treated to a box full of LAXatives. I dare utter it only between the lines, for fear that if placed upon them, it may take my mind away again.

She was a lit stick of dynamite thrown in my face. An eldritch abomination slithering from the depths of hell up into my hotel room. There for my protection, though she might’ve killed me through all those times she took my breath away (without mention of the times her humble services flatly failed to accomplish anything). From the moment I laid eyes on her, my advances were stunted only by a putrid aura emanating around her—I sent her to the shower as soon as we got to the room.

While she was occupied, I contacted my informant, the one who had insisted upon a mercenary for my protection.

“Have you regrouped with her?” he asked.

“She has a mullet.” I responded.

Before the conversation could proceed, my correspondent was suddenly silenced. I spun to react, meeting with the woman fresh from the shower. As per my fear, the removal of her stench had not stayed the onslaught of bestial hideousness, but in this state she was approachable.

Upon the site of my CG fan dildo—the ultimate aphrodisiac—she was too horny even to stand, ass-planting herself parallel to me. She looked me in the eyes as my gaze remained fixated on her Roadwarrior-era cut. ‘Twas the first disaster of the head more startling than my lover’s back home to ever grace me with its presence. The heat of my disgust set a fire between my legs.

I went straight to business, pouncing forward and shoving her sturdy body back onto the bed—knowing as I did that for it to budge, it only could have caved willingly. Opening the drapery of her shower gown, I dug the cavernous depths of her ample, unyielding thighs. It felt like hours upon suffocating hours of battling a continuous onslaught of flesh before I emerged upon her glorious muff.

It hung broad and loose like the sleeve of a wizard, gaping and breathing like a tunnel beckoning the car of my fist to drive through—perhaps my entire arm. Even my foot wouldn’t have met much resistance. Her clitoris was Moby Dick in the ocean of her vulva—as massive as it was strangely elusive. With all the spirit of Ahab, I thrust the spear of my tongue upon it. This generated the first of near constant waves of liquid crashing against the helm of my cheeks. There simply was no end to it.

All the while, she never moved nor made a sound. Only when I sought brief respite and a grasp of precious air did I catch a glimpse of her satisfied face, full of modest approval.

“That was nice,” she said. And then she rose from the bed, reminding me that she had to get dressed and get to work.

I knew she had to go, but I couldn’t let her. Upon her completed dressing, I shoved her unto the couch and began touching her all over (and much over there was to be touched, might I add). I lost myself in her, imagining only the sensation that I fantasized her feeling, unlikely as it might’ve been that she could feel anything. A couple minutes of that and then she shoved me off, again with a smile saying, “I appreciate it, but I’m busy.” Finally, I allowed her leave.

Night fell whilst I remained transfixed upon the bed, all day touching myself and thinking of the rolling mountains and rough, flame-scarred plains of that unforgettable body. And then, finally, a sound! My demi-goddess of Hell had returned, and started to undress, ready to sleep on the couch. Surely this was a tease!

She obliged. Three infinite hours, the blackest shadow play we acted out in the moonlight, constant growls and barks in passion and rage, our bodies crushing and smushing one another. Before long, I was covered in bruises, suspecting a fractured rib and busted lip. Every limb was soaked in vagina filth from constant curiosity over just how much I could fit inside that void of her crotch. Our demonic dance only dwindled to a halt when no part of my body remained capable of movement.

Basking in the afterglow, my head full of fuck, I asked.

Ah, what a thing I had done, to forget my true love in throws of horrendous, passionate battle against another the same age as she. Though filled with shame, tears welling in my eyes, I knew that I had followed the true intentions of my heart. I regretted nothing.

I know not what became of the monstrous woman. She faded in the night like the terrors thereof which she so resembled, and by morning and my waking, she was nowhere to be found. I never saw her again. The next night, my flight back to Nafrece was waiting. I decided to forget all which occurred on that night and speak not of it again.

The night is long in Gazth-Sonika.

~The Mullet and the Muff, end~

Audience reactions to The Mullet and the Muff.

In all seriousness, I genuinely enjoyed this episode. Whereas episode seven stood out as a good episode for Madlax, this was simply a good episode. There were lots of lesbian overtones, some really stand-out moments (especially the beginning of Madlax’s confrontation with the sniper bitch), and for once, the fight used an element of tactics to be interesting, which works way better with this shitty animation than straight-up action scenes. And the animation wasn’t as bad as usual in this episode, either.

I seriously fucking doubt she has that high of a success rate.

Just because it was a great episode doesn’t mean that nothing stupid happened, but I’m willing to forgive all of that because stupid stuff happens in almost all anime. Ordinarily, I’m very forgiving of stupid stuff—it’s only when the stupid stuff reaches overwhelming levels and is coupled with crappy visuals that I feel the need to rage about it.

When Madlax says something stupid like this, it doesn’t bother me because this scene is well done. Whereas the rest of the show had me making fun of sniper girl for being worthless, this episode did enough to show her as ruthless and dangerous that her threat became real during the fight, and I was willing to buy that she might be good enough to sense presence or whatever stupid shit. I wasn’t even really all that pissed when the fight ended with Madlax needlessly sparing her yet again.

I’m not going to get my hopes up that this show might be good in the next episode, because I made that mistake with episodes seven and eight. Tune in next week to see how it turns out!

A Brief Hiatus

My mom is currently in the hospital with lymphoma, and I haven’t had nor foresee myself having time to write posts for this site, so it’s going on hiatus for however long it needs to.

Fucking MADLAX Episode 11

This week’s episode was a continuation of last week’s Vanessa/dicking around on computers arc. As such, it was equally boring and absolutely nothing happened, so I did another of these Ugly Fucking Madlax comic things. This one also comes with a video!

God Damn .hack//SIGN Episode 5

Even at its most tolerable, this show is so ugly and boring that my mind constantly wanders. At one point, I actually thought to myself, “why the hell am I still watching this?” before remembering, “duh, because I’m blogging it.” If nothing else, this confirms that, were I not running this blog and was simply rewatching .hack//SIGN (which I’d planned to do long beforehand), I would have dropped it by now.

There’s no excuse for this slowness. .hack//SIGN could be cut by half its length and lose nothing—hell, it’d probably work with just six episodes. The only reason I can think of for it to be so drawn out is because it’s a franchise tie-in. At the dawn of the franchise, it probably made sense to do at least two cours, even though there clearly wasn’t substantial material for it.

Fucking MADLAX Episode 10

Apologies for the lateness. Last week my town was hit by a hurricane, which was incredibly lame but nonetheless distracting. As for missing .hack//SIGN on Friday, that was from the follow-up natural disaster of discovering Homestuck and taking four days to read all of it. But I’m back now!

This week, I’m trying something a little different. The format I’m using doesn’t work well with the site’s thin columns, so instead I ask that you follow this link (presented in glorious Comic Sans) for the rest of the post:

God Damn .hack//SIGN Episode 4

Usually, the phrase “deliberate pacing” is used as a compliment. It’s a way of saying, “this series is slow, but it’s slow on purpose to create a certain atmosphere.” To name a show that I’d compliment as deliberately paced, Texhnolyze is the first that comes to mind. I do think that .hack//SIGN is deliberately paced, but I don’t think that this is a good thing.

Fucking MADLAX Episode 9 (Or Not)

Yesterday snuck up on me—until now, I’d watched all of and written about most of these episodes long before the posts went up, so now that I’ve slacked until it caught up with me, I’m late. Good thing I don’t have anything to say about this episode.