Read or Die, za Discussion Thread

[Isuzu Inugami]

Right, here we go! Go! Go!

I expect to post about 4-5 episodes a week, starting with the OVAs. Or the OAVs.

The courtesy rules:

1) If you've got to jump the gun and post about the next episode before I get to it, please respond to the root post (this post) and indicate in the subject line which episode you're posting about.
2) If someone has already posted about an episode before you, please respond to that post (or a relevant reply to that post). Keep in the right subthread.
3) Don't use the blue "Post Reply" button because it causes your reply not to correctly inherit the subject line of the post you're replying to. Just click "Quote" to the post you want to reply to.
4) Please be sure to use spoiler brackets (like this) if you absolutely feel compelled to refer to spoilery matters. HOWEVER it is strongly requested that you bide your time and wait until you won't be spoiling anything before you bring up your point.

[Isuzu Inugami]

This opening cityscape shot always annoys me. Overly obvious CG layering. I'm sure it was nifty back in 2001. However I really like that green city glow.

So, the White House is having electrical problems and the President isn't doing so well. Are there any anime shows that present the President in a good light? (I guess we'll have to wait until they make a "My Girlfriend is the President!?" anime for that. ^^)

-Oops, wrong address! And the visitor identifies himself as an "I-Jin," which I don't know why they don't just translate unless it's supposed to be unclear to the Japanese audience whether it's "great man" I-jin or "foreigner" I-jin. I guess either applies in this case. It's a pun!

-Sexy credits-painted-on-naked-women-for-no-reason and snazzy jazz opening!

-What's the value in a written note saying "Wake up! Up! Up! Nenene"? (Happily the blu-ray has corrected these to read the name "Nenene" rather than assuming it's a cutsey way of ending the notes.)

-I have no intention of checking these details out regularly, but the book that falls off Yomiko's telephone is "Little Girl and Me" published by the Japan Lolita Promotion Association. Oh Yomiko.... :sweat: I also see "Ultraman Darling" (!?) and "The Cambodian People." So her tastes are all over the place.

-By the way, Yomiko's name is derived from the word for "read", so you could take her name as "Readgirl Readman." Looking about her room, it's obvious she does her best to live up to it.

-Yomiko has perpetual bed hair. And I guess securing a substitute teaching job means it's time to blow that wad of cash you've been saving, and cut a swathe through Tokyo's book district, Jinbo-cho! Including the secret, members only bookstore, Toto Books! I want it to be real!

-Yomiko can be fierce when she finds a book she wants. Watch out, mysterious lady with the horn-rimmed glasses! I love her pissed off look. (And Toto Books lets Yomiko have a $2,000 book on credit!)

-Yomiko is so focused on reading, she doesn't even notice a traffic accident. Oh, and then things get seriously weird.

-It seeems Yomiko can do cool things with paper. Extremely cool things. She somehow does them in the klutziest way possible, though!

-Hah! She gets back her book, and snags his notebook too. I think grabbing it was a reflex action.

-Yomiko Readman, a.k.a. Za Paper! And the British Library Special Engineer Force, a.k.a. the Last Literary D[efense?]-Line of the U.K., as their sigil indicates.

-I was going to wonder why a special agent for the British Library needs to supplement her income with substitute teaching jobs, but then again look at how much she spends on books....

-So the electricty guy who attacked the Library of Congress bears a great resemblance to Hiraga Gennai, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiraga_Gennai) a contemporary of Benjamin Franklin who was also investigating electricity in spite of Japan still being sealed at the time. It's kind of a fascinating real life coincidence. Also, what's a guy who died in 1780 doing here?

-Well, I guess we didn't string that mystery out for long. Stolen genetic samples, blah blah blah. There's more to a person than their genes, you know! Ahem.

-And the insect guy was Jean-Henri Fabre. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Henri_Fabre) I bet Yomiko has some of his books.

-Yomiko doesn't want to skip out on her substitute teaching job to save the world because of her book bills... so, Mr. Gentleman buys her off with the promise of a book.

-Drake Anderson isn't happy to work with Yomiko. And then there's another agent....

-"Miss Deep!" She seems a bit pissed Yomiko messed up her operation at Toto Books. Also, she doesn't really wear glasses.

-...but don't mess with Yomiko's!

-Miss Deep is a little impressed by Yomiko's swift reaction, but still says it's enough to stick with codenames. Poor Yomiko--rejected!

-Hey, it's Otto Lillienthal! (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_Lillienthal) He was working with gliders a few years before the Wright brothers.

-Drake wants to know what Miss Deep's fortune was.... He's rather focused on fortunetelling, or maybe he wants to confirm it's bad since she's working with Yomiko.

-Heh, they fight Lillienthal by making a huge paper airplane. I often love anime best when it is being completely insane, and this whole sequence is right up there.

-Change in tactics! Yomiko drops Miss Deep at the Statue of Liberty, and manages to inflict some nasty papercuts on Lillienthal, but she's running low on paper....

-Yomiko is really much too focused on that book. Flinging yourself into space to grab it is an idea with a very short planning horizon. (Although hanging on to Lillienthal's plane as it smacked into the Statue of Liberty and exploded wouldn't have been much better, I guess.)

-"Is the book more important that your life," is a question Yomiko has to ponder way too much. But at least now Miss Deep decides to make Yomiko her wife friend. Her real name is actually Nancy Makuhari, and she hates her codename. Commence yuri shipping now!

[Fencedude]

Dammit, I don't have time to watch something else!

Besides, my DVDs are buried in a box in my storage room.

[Isuzu Inugami]

Dammit, I don't have time to watch something else!

Sleep is just The Man's way of trying to keep you down!

Or just fake it! ^^

[Hayate Kurogane]

So, the White House is having electrical problems and the President isn't doing so well. Are there any anime shows that present the President in a good light? (I guess we'll have to wait until they make a "My Girlfriend is the President!?" anime for that. ^^)

Off the top of my head, the, uh... least bad... presentation of a U.S. President in anime I can think of is the U.S.... I mean, Union President in Gundam 00. He's not necessarily winning any awards for goodness, but it's a fairly neutral presentation of a politician who, from his point of view, is trying to protect the interests of his country and cooperate internationally when confronted with a rogue group of robot-piloting idealists.

Having said, that, it's not as if the miscellaneous Japanese Prime Ministers that have appeared in anime over the years really make out much better, on average. :sweat:

Veering back on topic, I've always liked Taku Iwasaki's work as a composer, which just keeps getting better as time goes on. The Read or Die OVA happened to be my first exposure to his work, and I was hooked from the first track, playing over the attack on the White House. Though the bonus here is that that track is a thematic homage to the first track heard in the Michael Bay movie 'The Rock,' composed by Hans Zimmer (and friends), which always makes me smile. Iwasaki must have a Zimmer thing going on, as other musical tips of the hat occur in other soundtracks he's done, such as a nod to 'Batman Begins' in the Soul Eater soundtrack. He's not as direct about it as, say, Toshihiko Sahashi and his homages in soundtracks for shows such as The Big O and Full Metal Panic, but it's still fun.

-Oops, wrong address! And the visitor identifies himself as an "I-Jin," which I don't know why they don't just translate unless it's supposed to be unclear to the Japanese audience whether it's "great man" I-jin or "foreigner" I-jin. I guess either applies in this case. It's a pun!

I always suspected they (Manga) originally didn't translate it for the same reason they screwed up Nenene's notes: ignorance. But I guess they're trying to treat it as a somewhat proper name for a group rather than a generic uncapitalized descriptive term.

-What's the value in a written note saying "Wake up! Up! Up! Nenene"? (Happily the blu-ray has corrected these to read the name "Nenene" rather than assuming it's a cutsey way of ending the notes.)

Maybe it's so she doesn't do the old "roll over and go back to sleep thing," assuming she sees the note when half-awake? Or because...she sleep-reads? :sdsmiley:

-Yomiko has perpetual bed hair.

Yomiko's bed hair is awesome. For no particular reason, one scene I always find adorable and has always stuck with me is the short bit where, after she's picked up by Joker, she's trying to comb it out with a comb that he hands to her.

-Heh, they fight Lillienthal by making a huge paper airplane. I often love anime best when it is being completely insane, and this whole sequence is right up there.

And right here is when I became convinced I was watching something that was not just awesome, but damn awesome. :sdsmiley:

[Fencedude]

Veering back on topic, I've always liked Taku Iwasaki's work as a composer, which just keeps getting better as time goes on. The Read or Die OVA happened to be my first exposure to his work, and I was hooked from the first track, playing over the attack on the White House. Though the bonus here is that that track is a thematic homage to the first track heard in the Michael Bay movie 'The Rock,' composed by Hans Zimmer (and friends), which always makes me smile. Iwasaki must have a Zimmer thing going on, as other musical tips of the hat occur in other soundtracks he's done, such as a nod to 'Batman Begins' in the Soul Eater soundtrack. He's not as direct about it as, say, Toshihiko Sahashi and his homages in soundtracks for shows such as The Big O and Full Metal Panic, but it's still fun.

This is a very epic OST. Its also got some of the best track titles ever. "In the beginning roared the electric genius", for this track. So many shows don't put that much effort into their OSTs.

[Isuzu Inugami]

Having said, that, it's not as if the miscellaneous Japanese Prime Ministers that have appeared in anime over the years really make out much better, on average. :sweat:

Heh, that's true. Nabeshin went all-out to beat up on Koizume in Nerima Daikon Bros.


Maybe it's so she doesn't do the old "roll over and go back to sleep thing," assuming she sees the note when half-awake? Or because...she sleep-reads? :sdsmiley:


She... damn, if anyone can sleep-read, it's Yomiko. In fact, how can she not sleep-read?!

-Heh, they fight Lillienthal by making a huge paper airplane. I often love anime best when it is being completely insane, and this whole sequence is right up there.

And right here is when I became convinced I was watching something that was not just awesome, but damn awesome. :sdsmiley:

The first time I saw this, my anime club was showing it. Being somewhat a bibliomaniac myself, I was in love with the sequence of Yomiko on a bender in Jinbo-cho. And then it shifts into that first paper fight with Fabre... that's when I was completely hooked. It's good they were showing it a dark room, because I must have looked like a little kid seeing Santa Claus coming down the chimney.

[Hayate Kurogane]

Veering back on topic, I've always liked Taku Iwasaki's work as a composer, which just keeps getting better as time goes on. The Read or Die OVA happened to be my first exposure to his work, and I was hooked from the first track, playing over the attack on the White House. Though the bonus here is that that track is a thematic homage to the first track heard in the Michael Bay movie 'The Rock,' composed by Hans Zimmer (and friends), which always makes me smile. Iwasaki must have a Zimmer thing going on, as other musical tips of the hat occur in other soundtracks he's done, such as a nod to 'Batman Begins' in the Soul Eater soundtrack. He's not as direct about it as, say, Toshihiko Sahashi and his homages in soundtracks for shows such as The Big O and Full Metal Panic, but it's still fun.

This is a very epic OST. Its also got some of the best track titles ever. "In the beginning roared the electric genius", for this track. So many shows don't put that much effort into their OSTs.

"Does a sleeping book have dreams of being republished" from the TV series soundtrack is one of my favorites, but that's skipping ahead slightly. The track titles for Iwasaki's Gurren Lagann soundtrack are, of course, another level yet of absurd coolness, but now I'm just getting way off topic. :sweat:

Read or Die just wouldn't be Read or Die without Taku Iwasaki!

[Hayate Kurogane]

Maybe it's so she doesn't do the old "roll over and go back to sleep thing," assuming she sees the note when half-awake? Or because...she sleep-reads? :sdsmiley:


She... damn, if anyone can sleep-read, it's Yomiko. In fact, how can she not sleep-read?!

Actually, thinking about it some more, I wonder just how many of those books we see there has she actually read? Sure, she places a high priority on acquiring them, but... I mean, being the freaks we are, we know full well the thrill of the selecting and the purchasing, all for the sake of the collection (in our case, DVDs and Blu-rays, and assorted collectibles). But how many of us, then, also have backlogs, and no time to make any headway because we're busy with school or work or other things?

*Yomiko Readman joins AoD*

"I know, right?! Like today, I was shopping and was going to try and get through some things that have been in my backlog forever, but I got interrupted by this guy with insects, and then I got called to the office, and then I had to take a day trip to the States for business. I have no free time at all! :cry:"

:P

[KomoriKiri]

Maybe it's so she doesn't do the old "roll over and go back to sleep thing," assuming she sees the note when half-awake? Or because...she sleep-reads? :sdsmiley:


She... damn, if anyone can sleep-read, it's Yomiko. In fact, how can she not sleep-read?!

Actually, thinking about it some more, I wonder just how many of those books we see there has she actually read?

All of them, probably. Given how hard it is for anyone to get her attention once she's actually reading something.

KomoriKiri
I don't need speed reading. I need speed bookcase building.

[Isuzu Inugami]

OAV Episode 2:

-Can't have a spy-action show without travelling to exotic locations. Let me get this right--Gennai steals a random-but-likely looking stash of books from the Library of Congress, and when they turn out not to be what he's after, takes them all the way to India to sell them off? He works for a Mysterious Evil Organization; they don't need to recoup expenses!

-Gennai is hanging out with some mysterious Chinese-looking guy who can notice spy satellites and take them out from a distance! This can't possibly be good. Although meeting this guy may explain why he sells off those books in India, of all places.

-Joker has a full desktop, including part of Lillienthal's plane/ornithopter/thing. Does he like trophies? Shouldn't that be down in the analysis division? Also, I want his absurd TV remote.

-Wendy is a clumsy OL type, but gets trusted with doing "homework."

-Oh god, this scene is fun! Nancy is bored and playing with Yomiko's hair as Yomiko reads, obliviously. It's a torrid love note in the book's margin! And Yomiko gives Nancy her bookmark since Nancy said it was cute. And also because she's a close friend(!) Yomiko says her bookmarks have magical powers! But Nancy doesn't read romance novels (I wonder if she's the type that reads much at all....) and tells Yomiko it's better to love in real life than read about it... although real love doesn't go as smoothly as in a story. She seems regretful as she says this. "Do you prefer a real love that doesn't go well, or a happy love that's fictitious?"

-It's a poser for Yomiko, heh. She's thinking about it long after Nancy forgot she asked it. I like Yomiko's reasoning--real romance is better because you're always the main character. Nancy snarks at her- get to work!

-They took a submarine up the Ganges river?! (Actually, I don't know if it's the Ganges or not.) It's not exactly subtle once they surface, and sure enough Fabre spots them immediately.

-Joker is suspicious of Nancy. Her history is too clean. Do more homework, Wendy! Is Joker putting this work to her because he sees potential in her?

-Jahaal's Antiques--by chance or appointment only. Featuring everything from fine linenwork to crappy Kurata-Men books. Jahaal must be out on a buying trip today--or maybe he's had an unfortunate accident....

-It's a trap! This time it's Genjo Sanzo (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xuanzang), the monk who brought (in real life) Buddhist scriptures from India to China, and in fictional life, did the same, but with Monkey/Son Goku and company to liven things up in Journey to the West. (Yomiko read it when she was four! It's a 1500 page novel!) He's wielding Monkey's staff, which I didn't think anyone but Monkey could lift, but most I-Jin seem to get a power-up in any case. I don't know where the fire-breathing comes from. The Sanzo of Journey to the West was a wimp, getting kidnapped by every demon between China and India.

-Mayhem! Sanzo also has Monkey's cloud-chariot--or is it a fake? But he's still got enough spiritual power to part the Ganges (!) (and what's up with the underwater ruins?) I love Nancy and Yomiko's dumbfounded looks.

-Sanzo can neutralize Nancy's dematerialization?! And fire vs. paper means trouble for Yomiko....

-He's taken out by a torpedo! A beached sub has uses after all! ...or maybe not.

-Yomiko tells Nancy to run for it and save herself, which just makes her less inclined to do so in spite of being injured. Aww... Nancy has another plan.

...it's actually rather gruesome. Of course, it's always when you think you're safe that you screw up. Still, Nancy's more important than some book, right? Yomiko isn't totally lost to bibliomania.

-Ack, Sanzo still wants to go for another round! Nancy's in no condition to help, and Yomiko seems low on paper... and then Tuxedo Mask shows up to hurl a rose--I mean, a rather frightening looking skull-headed staff right through Sanzo's neck. Yikes!

-Poor Joker--his video got cut off early on, and he has no idea what's going on. He looks so forlorn there.

-Yomiko's been at Nancy's bedside for two days. Nancy apologizes--it's her fault the book was stolen. But Yomiko forgives her... they can look for the book again, but there's only one Nancy! Nancy's reaction seems somewhat ambivalent, though.

-Joker deduces that they've been working with a book owned by Beethoven--the margin notes are his (which explains, sort of, I guess, the musical notations in there).

...Looks like the enemy is making their move first. That's one cheezy rendition of Ode to Joy they're flooding the airwaves with.

-And it seems the leader of all of this is Ikkyuu, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ikky%C5%AB) 15th century vagabond Zen poet! He has something to say in favor of negative population growth....

Oh shit! time:
Oh shit! Nancy Makuhari (the real one, who looks rather plain) died years ago!
Oh shit! Ikkyuu just told Nancy to come back on worldwide pirate TV!
Oh shit! Nancy is an I-Jin: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mata_Hari]Mata ([URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mata_Hari%5DMata") Hari,[/url] seductive World War I spy! (Makuhari, Mata-Hari... she was barely hiding it!)
Oh shit! Nancy took Yomiko hostage!
Oh shit! Nancy kissed Yomiko! (this one is actually a good "Oh shit!")
Oh shit! Nancy drops through the floor and goes over to the enemy!

-And so, Mr. Gentleman shifts the operation from book recovery to I-Jin extermination. The British Library has authority over all military forces! (But Wendy is still a klutz.)

[Hayate Kurogane]

The problem I've always had with this episode is that when I watch it, I'm really super-excited, but when I'm done, I think back on it as maybe trying a little too hard and a little too unevenly to just bridge the gap from the "what the hell did I just watch, it was awesome" first episode and the "oh boy, here's where all the shit hits the fan" third episode. But it's still cooler than a lot of other things out there, so it's okay. :)


-Can't have a spy-action show without travelling to exotic locations. Let me get this right--Gennai steals a random-but-likely looking stash of books from the Library of Congress, and when they turn out not to be what he's after, takes them all the way to India to sell them off? He works for a Mysterious Evil Organization; they don't need to recoup expenses!

I'd hire him. I appreciate it when folks are being budget-conscious. But on the other hand, maybe he's just trying to exploit the expense account to get a nice trip?

"What the hell is this?! Plane tickets, hotels, meals...India?! WTF?!"

Plus, he's evil. Maybe I wouldn't hire him after all.

-He's taken out by a torpedo! A beached sub has uses after all! ...or maybe not.

Sanzo hitting the sub with Monkey's staff is a perfect example of how Read or Die knows how to be ludicrous in fantastic ways. A normal show would have him shoot a super-powerful mouth fire blast at it, or maybe spear it with the staff. But no, that's too conventional for Read or Die. Of course he must hit the sub with the staff, and get a vaguely silly rebound/bounce as a result.

The British Library has authority over all military forces!

Out of context, that is such a bizarre thought/sentence. :sweat:

(But Wendy is still a klutz.)

But she's probably great in the sack!

[Isuzu Inugami]

Of course he must hit the sub with the staff, and get a vaguely silly rebound/bounce as a result.

I really like that bounce. It's like Sanzo was expecting to do something cool like split it wide open, but all he gets is the bounce. Which does the job, but there's got to be that moment of disappointment running through his mind.


The British Library has authority over all military forces!

Out of context, that is such a bizarre thought/sentence. :sweat:

The whole idea of the British Library having it's own secret service is one of the things I love about ROD. It's just so... loopy.

(And I probably won't get the next one up before Sunday night.)

[HitokiriShadow]

So, the White House is having electrical problems and the President isn't doing so well. Are there any anime shows that present the President in a good light? (I guess we'll have to wait until they make a "My Girlfriend is the President!?" anime for that. ^^)

Off the top of my head, the, uh... least bad... presentation of a U.S. President in anime I can think of is the U.S.... I mean, Union President in Gundam 00. He's not necessarily winning any awards for goodness, but it's a fairly neutral presentation of a politician who, from his point of view, is trying to protect the interests of his country and cooperate internationally when confronted with a rogue group of robot-piloting idealists.


Uhhhhhh.... does the one in Index's first season count as an anime presentation of a president? Or are we only counting ones that have an actual role and effect on the story (and have more than one line)? Because counting the Index one is.... cheating. A lot.

The one in Canaan was decent, in terms of not being a bastard, if I recall correctly. Though he did deliver a ...... unique speech at an international conference.

[HitokiriShadow]

Dammit, I don't have time to watch something else!

Besides, my DVDs are buried in a box in my storage room.

I'd love to rewatch R.O.D. the TV, but I have the same problems. Time is the bigger one though, the same thing that kept me out of the Sketchbook thread (which I also want to rewatch and discuss again; I wouldn't have minded participating in the Diamond Dustdrops thread as well but in addition to time, I sold off the DVDs for it a few weeks ago). It wouldn't be that hard to get to my R.O.D. DVDs, but I can barely keep up with what I'm currently watching, plus there are shows I need to catch up on/finish, and then there's video game time, which is only going to get so much worse in February and March.... *sigh*

[Asrialys]

Darn! I'm out of town till Sunday evening and decided not to bring my R.O.D BDs.



Of course he must hit the sub with the staff, and get a vaguely silly rebound/bounce as a result.

I really like that bounce. It's like Sanzo was expecting to do something cool like split it wide open, but all he gets is the bounce. Which does the job, but there's got to be that moment of disappointment running through his mind.
Sanzo is so strong and got so much torque on that swing that the strike was still pretty devastating, especially since the staff didn't go through the submarine. Both must be built pretty tough. Besides, he did plan on finishing them off after taking care of Yomiko and Nancy.

[Fencedude]

which is only going to get so much worse in February and March.... *sigh*

Neptunia and AT3 *hangs self*

Why you do this to me NISA? ;_;

[Isuzu Inugami]

-Well, I guess you can't undertake a major operation without tea.

-Yomiko is gung-ho! She isn't even reading anything! She wants to talk to Nancy, but Drake tells her the mission comes first.

-Joker says it's obviously a trap, so they'll charge in to take the initiative away from the enemy. Wat? And Nancy watches them arrive, without betraying a trace of emotion.

-Yeaaaah, that didn't go so well.

-Yomiko can't stay still! Yomiko still believes in Nancy! Yomiko gets conked out by Nancy's lipstick residue. Betrayed by a kiss!

-Joker isn't having a good day. Mr. Gentleman wonders if it's all too much for him, and says they can dump it all in the American's lap if it comes down to that.

-Yomiko is imprisoned... not only do they half immerse her in water, they burn her suitcase full of paper. Ikkyuu explains himself (not all that convincingly, in my opinion), and then she asks just how he plans to reduce the population...

-Disturbing scene! And poor Wendy is the one to discover it. It seems they've created Beethoven (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beethoven) as an I-Jin to compose a suicide inducing symphony. There's a certain logic to this as Beethoven was composing while deaf at the end of his career. Coupled with their ability to commendeer broadcasting airwaves, this is likely to be rather devestating. Anyway, this doesn't strike me as a very Beethoven-like action, but coming back as an I-Jin seems to give most of them a mean streak.

-Yomiko is horrified. Just to add a little insult, Ikkyu drags Nancy to the scene. Yes, she really is a double-agent, although she really had grown fond of Yomiko as well.

-Ikkyuu's going to kill Yomiko. Nancy is upset-this wasn't in the plan! Of course, Ikkyuu wants to take Yomiko's DNA and revive her as an I-Jin... just as he did with Nancy--wait, what?!

-Evil Nancy catches our Nancy by surprise. Evil Nancy has a low opinion of our Nancy. Also, she's tired of being twins.

-Yomiko won't forgive her, as if she's in any position to do anything herself.

-Joker is going to give up on his agents, and nuke the site. Wendy is horrified... but wait! Drake sure is hard to kill.

-I love how Yomiko is saved by that little slip of paper Nancy idly wound in her hair the previous episode. She recovers her coat--stained with Nancy's blood. :depressed:

-American panic attack fails! So, who's the old I-Jin who directs the counterattack...?

-Gennai shows up to deal with Drake--but all the metal around draws off his big electrical attacks. Yomiko intervenes--with the only paper at hand--Drake's wad of cash! No wonder he thinks she's bad luck to him.

-I love the hubbub in the control room when they overhear Gennai say "Za Paper."

-Yomiko's not all that great a swordswoman, is she. She pretty much spends the fight in try-to-stay-alive mode.

-Liquid nitrogen and electricity don't mix. Really, the liquid nitrogen was probably enough on its own.

-Meanwhile, Drake is making explosions. The child version of Fabre seems to throw him, since he constantly seems to be thinking of his own kid.

-Yomiko is down to just a few dollars. And they don't even work on Evil Nancy, who creepily molests her inner organs and then is set to kill her....

-My only complaint about the Nancy vs. Nancy fight is that we don't get to see nearly enough of it.

-I have to think when Yomiko tells Joker the rocket is launching, she was hoping for something more useful than just being ordered to stop it, completely stop it.

-Hah! What's the point in having a gigantic countdown clock if you can't have it lie?

-Now that's a rocket cockpit! Luxurious windows and an organ. Yomiko hangs on to the outside, with a handful of dollars. And she wants her book back!

-Ikkyuu pulls off some Jedi Zen Master tricks, though. But here comes Nancy to save the day, again...

-But which Nancy is it...?

-"To deceive your enemy you must deceive your friend." She outright tells him, but he takes it wrong. I like how Yomiko sticks her finger through the bullet hole in her skirt.

-Poor Nancy, though. She loved him all the same. It's the old "better to have a love that doesn't work out" thing again.... She'll live by that... and die by it. I suppose tricking Yomiko was the only way to save her, but still...

-Yomiko crying as she reports to Joker. :cry:

-"Please take care of my younger sister."

[Harls]

-American panic attack fails! So, who's the old I-Jin who directs the counterattack...?
That bugged the heck out of me when I first watched it all those years ago... thankfully, Google never fails (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Wilcox). (usually :sweat:)

[Hayate Kurogane]

-Joker says it's obviously a trap, so they'll charge in to take the initiative away from the enemy. Wat?

:sdsmiley:

No guts, no glory. Or at least a good dose of "the sun will never set on the British Empire" confidence.

Or self-awareness of oneself and one's allies as being aligned with the protagonists of the show in which you exist. :P

-Liquid nitrogen and electricity don't mix. Really, the liquid nitrogen was probably enough on its own.

Shush! You do not interrupt Read or Die when it goes into ridiculous mode. That's just impeding the awesome!

-My only complaint about the Nancy vs. Nancy fight is that we don't get to see nearly enough of it.

Truly a damn shame. Mmmm...Nancy-on-Nancy action...

(they're doing it wrong)

:catgirl:

While this is certainly not the first time in anime there's been a climactic confrontation in and around a giant enemy fortress, I've always really enjoyed this one, setting-wise. I don't really know why. Maybe because it's out in the middle of the ocean, yet its size is still wonderfully conveyed even without any surroundings for scale (except for the ships, I guess). Maybe because it's got a rocket hidden inside it. Maybe because it's Read or Die. *shrug*

And of course, here at the end, is where I sat back and thought, "That was a lot of fun. But now I'm sad it's over. I hope they make more." And that's when Ron Popeil came leaping in through my window, and buoyed my spirits with a cheerful recitation of his trademark line, as well as the offer of a new knife set (on a convenient installment plan for payment).

What does that reference really have to do with anything? Nothing, actually. But it's what came to mind, so I typed it. :P

[Isuzu Inugami]

-American panic attack fails! So, who's the old I-Jin who directs the counterattack...?
That bugged the heck out of me when I first watched it all those years ago... thankfully, Google never fails (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Wilcox). (usually :sweat:)

Aha! Thank you. I should have picked up on the name on Lillienthals' engine sitting on Joker's desk.

[Isuzu Inugami]

-My only complaint about the Nancy vs. Nancy fight is that we don't get to see nearly enough of it.

Truly a damn shame. Mmmm...Nancy-on-Nancy action...

(they're doing it wrong)

A fight in which both combatants are able to dematerialize is both visually amazing, and a bit frustrating. And I suppose they felt the need not to emphasize it because they'd just given us the terrific fight against Gennai, and also since we can't tell which Nancy is which, we don't know how to react to the back-and-forth of the fight. But still... I want more!

So just what are the parameters of Nancy's ability? Can she dematerialize if she knows to dematerialize, but getting caught by surprise may subject her to harm? She partially materialized when falling through the Statue of Liberty to stop herself (and it sure looked uncomfortable!)

[Hayate Kurogane]

-My only complaint about the Nancy vs. Nancy fight is that we don't get to see nearly enough of it.

Truly a damn shame. Mmmm...Nancy-on-Nancy action...

(they're doing it wrong)

A fight in which both combatants are able to dematerialize is both visually amazing, and a bit frustrating. And I suppose they felt the need not to emphasize it because they'd just given us the terrific fight against Gennai, and also since we can't tell which Nancy is which, we don't know how to react to the back-and-forth of the fight. But still... I want more!

So just what are the parameters of Nancy's ability? Can she dematerialize if she knows to dematerialize, but getting caught by surprise may subject her to harm? She partially materialized when falling through the Statue of Liberty to stop herself (and it sure looked uncomfortable!)

I would assume that it's a conscious action, and therefore she can indeed be caught by surprise. I'm sure that some of it is almost reflexive, as she is a skilled fighter, but if she weren't able to be caught by surprise then I'm not entirely sure how the fight would've ended the way it did.

And, based on her Statue of Liberty drop, especially how she stops herself at the bottom, I would also have to assume a far greater degree of specific control as well as the ability to vary the amount of dematerialization and localize it as well (i.e., more badass than Kitty Pryde). Because if she weren't able to dial her dematerialization up and down, she'd have no way of slowing her descent in a situation like that, though doing so probably is uncomfortable as she's essentially catching herself on those bars and then letting go, and she'd dislocate her arms when stopping herself the way she did at the bottom.

Wait, could this be too much thinking?

[Asrialys]

So just what are the parameters of Nancy's ability? Can she dematerialize if she knows to dematerialize, but getting caught by surprise may subject her to harm? She partially materialized when falling through the Statue of Liberty to stop herself (and it sure looked uncomfortable!)
I think this was just an assumption on the now-defunct Dreams of Twilight ROD fansite, but I believe that Nancy must control which parts of her body to dematerialize. I think her only limitation is her ability to concentrate.

EDIT: By the way, there exists a pretty detailed Read or Die fan wiki with a very detailed page on Nancy (http://readordie.wikia.com/wiki/Nancy_Makuhari). Although, seems like it hasn't been updated in nearly a year.

[UEHacker]

Ah Dreams of Twilight, those were the days. I used to visit that website and post on those forums almost every day when R.O.D's dvds were coming out :)

[Isuzu Inugami]

TV episode 1

-Mystery montage! Nothing much makes sense, although the burning picture of Yomiko is worrisome.

-A female writer who apparently isn't producing much these days. Still, she has a news conference lined up, so she's got some kind of reputation.

-And her name is Nununu... err, Nenene Sumiregawa. Now we know who left Yomiko all those notes. Love the look of irritation when she sees her name misspelled. It's an innocent mistake!

-Michelle doesn't make the best of first impressions. She's an "Ara-ara" girl!

-Maggie and Michelle don't really look like sisters....

-So the news conference has to do with Nenene's book being made into a movie. Is the movie being made here in Hong Kong--is that the justification for flying her in for the news conference?

-Nenene's suite explodes! Also, nice driving, Maggie.

-Nenene isn't scared, she's pissed! She won't cancel the conference and signing.

-This isn't the first time she's tangled with people angered by her work? What exactly was in her book that provokes such ire?!

-Michelle is impressed enough by Nenene's determination that she'd sacrifice Maggie's life to protect her... uhh....

-The Three Sisters Detective Agency will put Nenene up for the night. If she can make it past the book-slide.

-Anita hates books! Nenene starts off with her by yelling at her for being loud. Things don't go uphill from there.

-I have a feeling Anita doesn't win many Three Sisters Conferences.

-Anita has a "No books or authors permitted" sign by her bunk.

-Nenene wandered off in the rain. Big panic! Anita is the one who finds her. Nenene looks pretty down, actually.

-She's remembering her precious friend, who is pretty clearly Yomiko, and who disappeared(!) I think Anita is the right person to have found her at this moment--Nenene doesn't need some fangirl's sympathetic ear right now. She feels like she can't move forward until she hears what Yomiko thinks of her last book.

-Anita cheers her up. This is the first smile we've gotten out of Nenene!

-At the booksigning... so much for security! It's a standoff, with Nenene holding a diabolical trigger device. I'm sure in that situation I'd be freaking out so badly I'd accidently detonate the thing in seconds.

-The Paper Sisters take action, with Anita in the vanguard!

-Do not mock the frustration of frustrated writers! But... "If you're a writer, kill me with your work! A mere bomb can never touch me!" Nenene is less than sympathetic to the guy, heh.

-They can use paper! Nenene is stunned. Stunned and excited! She shows them Yomiko's picture, kept in her locket, but they don't recognize her.

-Anita is less than gracious at the airport. She gets a signed book anyway. "I wonder how much I can get if I sell it."

-Uh oh... the frustrated novelist had a collaborator! Of course he's on Nenene's plane. Isn't it a little late to go after her when she's leaving the country?

-Nenene tells the guy off. God, I love her, she's so hardass! Speaking of which, Anita shows up at the plane's window. Can't quite get in though. It's a nice detail that they are giving her oxygen inside Maggie's bird after her initial attempt fails.

-Second try, those poor pilots! Anita comes in through the front spectacularly.

-"Write a thicker one next time; I'm not so good at defense."

-And then an engine blows, but Anita says not to worry, her sisters are here. Dawww....

-Perfect landing. The slow slide up to the glass gives a wonderful sense of mass.

-Since they've landed in Japan, Michelle suggests visiting Jinbo-cho, the book district of Tokyo. Anita tells Nenene to make up some story to explain the craziness. They leave her in the lurch!

-Heh, we get the episode title at the end of the episode. Episode 1: The Papers Have Landed.

[Hayate Kurogane]

-This isn't the first time she's tangled with people angered by her work? What exactly was in her book that provokes such ire?!

"Little red cookbook, little red cookbook..."

/Eddie Izzard

:P


-They can use paper! Nenene is stunned. Stunned and excited! She shows them Nenene's picture, kept in her locket, but they don't recognize her.

Fun with typos. That, or the R.O.D the TV you're watching is not the R.O.D the TV I'm watching. :sdsmiley:

This is easily near the top of, if not at the top of, my list of favorite, well-done, could teach lessons to other shows, fun and exciting first episodes. A good first episode is supposed to hook you and let you know what you're getting into. Granted, R.O.D the TV is preceded by a three-episode OVA series that is action-packed and lets you know what sorts of rules this world plays by, but the TV series can still be taken on its own, and in that regard it opens with one hell of an excellent first episode.

Action! Character development! Suspense! Intrigue! Humor! Explosions! Girls! Books! What more could a fan ask for?

*Waits for someone to reply with a post containing other things a fan could ask for, starts to calculate odds on whether the reply will be earnest or in jest.*

The plane rescue scene at the end is just so damn cool every time I watch it, which is kind of weird since if you think through it, not a lot actually happens. And of course what puts the cherry on top is that it's all set to Taku Iwasaki's slightly reworked version of his OVA theme. Those first few guitar notes come up, and it's like you just know whatever comes next is going to automatically be sweet.

[Isuzu Inugami]

-They can use paper! Nenene is stunned. Stunned and excited! She shows them Nenene's picture, kept in her locket, but they don't recognize her.

Fun with typos. That, or the R.O.D the TV you're watching is not the R.O.D the TV I'm watching. :sdsmiley:

Well, you know how writers can be rather introverted....


This is easily near the top of, if not at the top of, my list of favorite, well-done, could teach lessons to other shows, fun and exciting first episodes.

Oh absolutely. My anime club likes to show random first episodes to keep the regular schedule from stagnating, but man, I've seen too many that fail to hold any interest until the last five minutes when they decide to finally reveal what they're trying to do with the show. I just love way this episode manages to introduce the characters, allow their personalities to display themselves entertainingly, and maintain well paced action with moments of calm. In fact, it covers so much ground I find it hard to believe they managed to fit it all so smoothly into 24 minutes.

And right from the start I adore the weird relationship of antipathy plus respect between Nenene and Anita. Some of the finest snarkiness in anime.

[Hayate Kurogane]

This is easily near the top of, if not at the top of, my list of favorite, well-done, could teach lessons to other shows, fun and exciting first episodes.

Oh absolutely. My anime club likes to show random first episodes to keep the regular schedule from stagnating, but man, I've seen too many that fail to hold any interest until the last five minutes when they decide to finally reveal what they're trying to do with the show. I just love way this episode manages to introduce the characters, allow their personalities to display themselves entertainingly, and maintain well paced action with moments of calm. In fact, it covers so much ground I find it hard to believe they managed to fit it all so smoothly into 24 minutes.

And right from the start I adore the weird relationship of antipathy plus respect between Nenene and Anita. Some of the finest snarkiness in anime.

Given how important first impressions are in general, and how important it is for a first episode to be engaging, it's striking how poor a lot of first episodes are, and how a first episode like this one really highlights that fact. If nothing else, it's just bad marketing, since that's really what a lot of this stuff is anyway (thanks for watching, now go buy some CDs and towels and figures and pillowcases, damn it!).

Now, this has nothing to do with the school of thought that says one needs to watch more than one episode to really get a feel for a show (an idea which I firmly agree with). This has to do with the fact that a lot of viewers will judge that way, or that the impression of the first episode will color their impression of the series as a whole ("well, I mostly enjoyed it overall, but the first episode was kind of crap, and someone had to talk me into continuing, but maybe I should have watched that other show instead"). Something as simple as folks not having time to watch many things, so they have to pick and choose that way.

You only get one chance to make a first impression. R.O.D the TV does so very successfully, by offering up an episode that almost feels like a mini-movie because it's so wide-ranging and thorough and substantial, without feeling crammed or rushed.

[Isuzu Inugami]

EDIT: By the way, there exists a pretty detailed Read or Die fan wiki with a very detailed page on Nancy (http://readordie.wikia.com/wiki/Nancy_Makuhari). Although, seems like it hasn't been updated in nearly a year.

Very nice (although it's kind of spoilery even before they get to the spoiler warnings part. Mentioning why they think Nancy's power is genetic, and all.)

I remember discussions about which Nancy is which and where, although watching the third episode this time, it all seemed very straightforward to me. :sweat:

[Isuzu Inugami]

"Rise Up, Oh Dregs of Humanity" Right off the bat the title makes me laugh. This is probably my favorite episode in the series. Visually it's rich with the details of character actions and reactions, and the dialogue and timing are just spot-on from start to finish.

-Hey, it's an opening theme! Dooon, boo-doo-di-dat, doot do-doon doo; doon, boo-doo-di-dat, doot do-doon doo... Michelle hair flip!

-Michelle wants the Three Sisters Detective Agency to develop a global perspective, based on one job that ended up in Japan accidentally. Although they have a hard enough time finding work at home to begin with....

-Anita wants to go to the amusement park with the mouse, although Michelle points out they have plenty of mice at home. That... err, but....

-Actually, Nenene's editor has one more job for them... he sets them up as bodyguards across the street from Nenene--it seems Nenene has ardent fans and fanatic haters. Once again, just what sort of things does she write?! (I have a pet theory that her book Midnight Liberation Zone is some kind of bestselling transgressive lesbian literary spy thriller. But I still can't see that as upsetting many people.)

-Anita doesn't want anything to do with Nenene (and this job), while the other two are fans (Maggie in particular blushes at the thought of guarding Nenene.) They hold a Three Sisters Conference... Anita must really hate these, as she's always outvoted. Democracy sucks!

-Nenene is a slob!

-Michelle is not good managing their money. Although they can make paper clothes, so that helps. Maggie is crying. There's nothing to read. But Michelle has an inspiration!

-Let's go trash Nenene's apartment--I mean, introduce ourselves to Nenene as her bodyguards!

-Nenene lays down the law about visiting other people's apartments--and Anita calls her on sneaking out in Hong Kong. Hehe, I love Anita's completely unapologetic defiance around Nenene.

-Uh oh... that's not how you turn on a TV.... That's a huge flatscreen, and this was, what, 2003? That's a hell of a lot of money! How did Nenene even afford it? Maybe it was her movie money from Hong Kong. In any event, BIG PINCH!

-Meanwhile, Nenene is facing down the Big Blank Page, and losing. If something changed in Hong Kong, as editor Lee thinks, it has yet to manifest.

-Crash! Michelle's attempt to block Nenene from seeing the missing TV is, uh, admirably optimistic...? Somehow Nenene figures it all out.

-They brush their teeth in unison. Nenene is astounded.

-Hah, they get a new TV at the cost of their apartment. (Which is not actually rented under their names in the first place.) Of course, Nenene also kicked them out, so where are they planning to live?. Although rather than worrying about it, they're lazing around and reading.

-And assigning blame to one another--but then they remember their motto: "One because of all, and all because of one." Anita thinks it sounds rather negative here.

-Nenene meets with editor Lee, who thinks the Paper Sisters are good for her. She's so energized! "I'm consumed with anger!"

-Which way are Japanese books oriented on bookstore shelves? Either Nenene has a lot available, or just one. And some new girl is being pushed heavily with her First Love, Now It's Begun book.

-Maggie shyly greets Nenene home, and acts the perfect butler. Having cleaned the place... excessively. Nenene sends her fleeing.

-"Ho-ho-ho no ho!" Michelle in a China dress :blush1: and with a cheap tape deck will soothe the savage Nenene! It goes so well, until she presents the bill for takeout. She goes from bad to worse when she makes her little comment about cooking being so tiresome anyway.

-Maggie invokes her paper skills to recover Nenene's furniture. A pair of kids get to see something wonderful.

-Third try is the charm, right? "Anita-chan's Pure the Diary" (text by Michelle), a painfully saccharine and obvious bid to soften Nenene's heart. Complete with music-box accompaniment. Anita can't endure Nenene's spectacularly unimpressed reading for long. I adore how Nenene on the Japanese track reads a squeal as an utterly bland "kya." She's pretty amusing on the English track as well.

-Michelle is undaunted. "Our Sweet-and-Sour Cajoling Operation has just begun." That's really something that shouldn't be announced. Nenene has had enough. OUT!

-Peace and quiet. And the residual traces of how hard they were trying. You'd have to be made of stone if Maggie's "I'm sorry" taped to the TV remote doesn't get to you at least a little.

-Terrible, terrible, terrible TV "glasses" comedian.

-Michelle is undauntedly scheming. And they aren't living on the streets, they're cherry-blossom viewing! Nenene relents... with conditions.

-Anita can't manage calling her Nenene-nee-sama.

-Was that Joker next to the President on TV?

[Harls]

Action! Character development! Suspense! Intrigue! Humor! Explosions! Girls! Books! What more could a fan ask for?

*Waits for someone to reply with a post containing other things a fan could ask for, starts to calculate odds on whether the reply will be earnest or in jest.*
Yuri! :catgirl:

(Oh c'mon! You knew the shot was coming, just not from where.) :noodle:

[EmperorBrandon]

-So the news conference has to do with Nenene's book being made into a movie. Is the movie being made here in Hong Kong--is that the justification for flying her in for the news conference?

I'm guessing given the frustrated writer-terrorists' words later in the episode that it's some sort of Hong Kong company making a movie out of her work.

And man, novel-writing is such serious business for them. I'm always kind of amused over the loony villains this episode, particularly with them being voiced by Liam O'Brien and Sam Riegel. Heh... Love how Nenene tells them off despite the danger.

There's so much lovely interaction between Nenene and the sisters right from the very start.

[Isuzu Inugami]

So Anita, Maggie and Michelle seem to be homages to the Hong Kong action stars Anita Mui, Maggie Cheung, and Michelle Yeoh. But I haven't actually seen many of their films, so I don't know if their characters typically match up. :sweat:

Unlike Yomiko, they all seem to have specializations.

Anita is a close range fighter who sticks to individual sheets of paper for her weaponry. She also says she's not so good at defense. As the youngest and smallest, one doesn't really expect to see her on the vanguard of any fighting, but that's where she's best.

Michelle seems focused on distance attacks, and likes to fight with a paper bow and arrow, with the arrows either carrying various paper payloads, or capable of being manipulated by her at a distance.

Maggie falls somewhere between the two, and is probably the most versatile fighter. Her paradigm for manipulating paper revolves around animal golems, although she is capable of creating straightforward shields and such as well. Also, all three of the sisters create their battle outfits (and normal clothing as well?) out of paper.

I expect Yomiko is more powerful than them simply because she seems to have no need to specialize, but I wonder how they would stack up against her within their specialties.

[Asrialys]

Maggie falls somewhere between the two, and is probably the most versatile fighter. Her paradigm for manipulating paper revolves around animal golems, although she is capable of creating straightforward shields and such as well. Also, all three of the sisters create their battle outfits (and normal clothing as well?) out of paper.
I think the best term to classify Maggie's abilities would be support.

I expect Yomiko is more powerful than them simply because she seems to have no need to specialize, but I wonder how they would stack up against her within their specialties.
Yomiko certainly has more skill and experience. And she's a specially trained agent. We'll see later in the series that her abilities are a bit stronger than that of the sisters. We just don't see much of her limitations and abilities, however. It's great to see different, complex uses from the Paper Sisters, especially since they tend to give their paper shape, as opposed to Yomiko's somewhat simplistic (but effective) usage.

[Isuzu Inugami]

-Michelle hair flip!

-Nenene at the computer fell asleep on the letter "n". Good thing she wasn't playing shiratori.

-"It gives one a great sense of satisfaction to do it in perfect unison."

-Maggie-chan got onto TV news (as an UMA.) Michelle is so congratulatory! Nenene doesn't want to be put through another airport questioning ordeal.

-Nenene's parents are in America. She chose to stay in Japan because she'd already debuted as a writer--and, she alludes, because the right people were around her, which I take to mean Yomiko.

-Note the picture of a young Nenene and Yomiko, right beside Nenene's work computer.

-Heh, Michelle finds Nenene intimidating. Maggie points out that as her bodyguard, they shouldn't be lazing around the apartment... seeing as Nenene is being accosted by a journalist on live TV and all....

-So where was Nenene going? Michelle freaks out when she discovers it's around Jinbo-cho, the book district. Um... about that bodyguard idea...?

-Anita is sooooo unimpressed with Jinbo-cho.

-Nenene won't go over her old work for a new movie edition. And she can't deal with any fan mail. But she gets caught by a fan, Haruhi Nishizawa, the new author who's book was being pushed in the bookstore last episode. She's radiant-Nenene is jealous of her youth... but Lee says she's Nenene's age, which really throws Nenene. Nenene debuted quite young.

-Michelle buys out a whole bookstore! While Maggie feels dutiful and looks for Nenene while struggling to resist going in any bookstores. And Anita turns out to be the one to locate Nenene.

-Toto Books. Anita finds herself spying on Nenene. In a glorious parody of Yomiko and Miss Deep in the same store she meets a mysterious boy and immediately lets him have the book he's looking for. Nenene finds her and asks her what she's doing, and she uses her codename(?) "Za Bodyguard!" "Don't add 'Za!'"

-Michelle has inadvertantly set Jinbo-cho awash with rumors of Yomiko's return, heh. And Maggie has reached her limits.

-Nenene takes Anita along to check on Yomiko's place. Yomiko filled an elevator shaft with books! Nenene is sure Yomiko is still out there somewhere, and will come back one day. She also thinks it's strange how Anita hates books, when all the other Paper Masters love them. Anita doesn't really have any answers.

-Jinbo-cho is having an impromptu outdoor book fair in Yomiko's honor! I feel bad for Nenene, when she gets all excited thinking Yomiko has returned. Instead, she gets Michelle. It's not so much that she bought the books, it's more like she received them after she gave money to the stores.... :sweat:

-Oh, hey, its the mysterious boy Anita ran into. His name is Junior, and apparently he fetched whatever he was supposed to get, for "Mr. Carpenter." ...Uhh, look at that hair. He is a boy, right...?

-Anita declares her own book-free territory in her and Michelle's room. And is it bad I think Maggie's little space seems inviting?

-Books have been multiplying all over the apartment... but it's kind of nice.

[One Vorlon]

. . .
-Oops, wrong address! And the visitor identifies himself as an "I-Jin," which I don't know why they don't just translate unless it's supposed to be unclear to the Japanese audience whether it's "great man" I-jin or "foreigner" I-jin. I guess either applies in this case. It's a pun!

I always suspected they (Manga) originally didn't translate it for the same reason they screwed up Nenene's notes: ignorance. But I guess they're trying to treat it as a somewhat proper name for a group rather than a generic uncapitalized descriptive term.Are you sure its "I-Jin"? I hear it as "E-Gen" (which I assumed was either an homage to the X-Men* and/or a reference to some form of genetic enhancement)


*Read or Die has always struck me as what a crossover between X-Men and James Bond would look like

[Isuzu Inugami]

Are you sure its "I-Jin"? I hear it as "E-Gen" (which I assumed was either an homage to the X-Men* and/or a reference to some form of genetic enhancement)

Well, the subtitles spell it as "I-Jin," although I rather like your interpretation too.

[Isuzu Inugami]

-Michelle hair flip!

-Some fellow with a gun being hunted down near a train overpass? This is some other show, yes?

-Nenene has decided Anita will be going to school. Compulsory education is a drag... But at least Nenene has them vote on it. Now Anita is outvoted 3 to 1 rather than the usual 2 to 1.

-Michelle forged Anita's papers and passport, but getting money for school tuition means getting a job. A publishing company called Dokusensha (Nenene's Hong Kong publisher?) has work for them, although Anita thinks there's something sketchy about them.

-Nenene has Yomiko up on a missing persons website... but there's been no response.

-School introduction time for Anita. She's somewhere between shy and sullen, but that teacher is kind of obnoxious. And she almost gets into a fight before making it to her seat. Go Anita!

-She gets seated next to Hishiishi Hisami, which is a mouthful of a name, so Anita immediately Hisa-chans her. Blush.

-Michelle will spy--err, watch over Anita discreetly!

-Anita is fluent in English and Japanese! And shows up Tohru, the boy who was picking a fight with her earlier. And shows up the teacher, while she's at it!

-Hisa has been reading Nenene, but Natsume shows up to present Anita with her big sister's book. Anita has the temerity to turn her down! Hisa pours gasoline by suggesting Anita might prefer Nenene's books, heh.

-Michelle infiltrates badly, in a schoolgirl outfit. Yum!

-Natsume determines Tohru is picking fights with Anita because he's in love with her. This doesn't go over well. I like how Anita is pounding back everyone's milk like a drunkard at a bar.

-Michelle is relieved to see Anita already has so many friends.

-One post for Yomiko on the missing person's site? Nenene is off like a shot... probably for a week!

-Anita needs to choose a club but isn't enthusiastic. "What club are you in, Hisa-chan?" Anita decides to join before she hears an answer, oops.

-Hah! Michelle is still lounging around the school, playing cards with the upperclassmen.

-Anita is actually okay with the library club, since she's built up some immunity around her sisters, and she only has to cope with a library's worth of books... [nervous laughter]

-Hisa's friend, the English textbook salesman visits the library, suspiciously locates a book, and then gets shot through the ankles! The life of a textbook salesman in intense!

-Anita pretty much trashes the library taking down the assailant--and he looks like he's her age!

-The assailant was Junior from the previous episode... and he's reporting to Joker!... who is surprised to hear of paper users... and doesn't like being called Joker anymore.... There's way too much to mull over in this brief little sequence!

-Michelle feels sorry for the assailant if they're in the same business as the Paper Sisters. Anita says she ought to feels sorry for her, since she was almost killed. Michelle says no one can kill Anita, because she and Maggie will protect her, no matter what.

-Lee isn't overly worried about Nenene's disappearance because she's done this before. The Paper Sisters are on paid vacation until she returns.

-The pigeon brought them a job offer!

[Hayate Kurogane]

. . .
-Oops, wrong address! And the visitor identifies himself as an "I-Jin," which I don't know why they don't just translate unless it's supposed to be unclear to the Japanese audience whether it's "great man" I-jin or "foreigner" I-jin. I guess either applies in this case. It's a pun!

I always suspected they (Manga) originally didn't translate it for the same reason they screwed up Nenene's notes: ignorance. But I guess they're trying to treat it as a somewhat proper name for a group rather than a generic uncapitalized descriptive term.Are you sure its "I-Jin"? I hear it as "E-Gen" (which I assumed was either an homage to the X-Men* and/or a reference to some form of genetic enhancement)


*Read or Die has always struck me as what a crossover between X-Men and James Bond would look like

It is actually "I-jin" for the reasons that Wanko specifies, further confirmed by dialogue (or at least certain decisions made regarding the translation of said dialogue) in later episodes.

[EmperorBrandon]

Oh yes, I love every single episode that features Anita at school, and this is the first! I also really love sweet shy book-loving girls. :beatingheart: Anita's friendship with Hisa is so nice, and I like her impressing her class on the first day.

I wonder how the heck such a seemingly important book (worth killing or injuring someone over) ended up in a middle school library of all places, and just happened to be the one Anita attended. :P

[General Hentai]

I love this episode but I still get 9-11 flashbacks when they land on the Twin Towers and see them in the skyline.

I've used this OVA to introduce friends to anime, to show it's not just giant robots, harems and catgirls...not that there's anything wrong with giant robots, harems and catgirls, or harems of gaint robot catgirls, for that matter.

I find the 3-part OVA to be as good as anything done in the visual medium. It's that fricking good.

[General Hentai]

When I heard they were doing a TV series, not starring Yomiko, I was wondering how they'd manage to keep in the same league as the OVA. This episode said, "Yes, we're damn well in that league, love our new Paper Masters!"

And love them I do. Just Michelle more than the others... drool.

This episode is simply beyond outstanding. I've lost track of the number of times I've rewatched it.

[Isuzu Inugami]

-Michelle hair flip!

-Evidently the Paper Sisters are in Romania. Mr. Kim from Dokusensha is their boss on the scene. There was an incident with a fire at the British Library four years ago...? And Great Britain has "collapsed" since then?? WTF??! Anyway, seems they've a lead on some missing books from then, secret volumes not circulated by the library.

-They're looking for Book of the Pulsing Flesh. Ewwww!

-Anita says Dokusensha is a thief stealing from a theif. Mr. Kim assures her this is a liberation, and they're the good guys.

-Professor Webber's home is a walled castle in a lake. Senic!

-I like Anita's magazine cartridges full of paper. She's suspicious--why didn't the people who investigated the place get the book? "Because they didn't have our teamwork," Michelle says. Anita says they basically just wing it.

-"May the power of paper be with us!"

-Everything is going fine until some sonic pulse disrupts Maggie's paper bird. They lose their paper outfits, too! :blush1:

-Irving (the butler?) finds a leftover scrap of paper and reports intruders. So much for sneaking in. The Professor is very excited to have a Paper Master to kill.

-Michelle and Maggie have no binding power for their paper, so they can't summon up their full abilities. Anita doesn't mess with that sort of paper mastery, so she's unaffected.

-Bat attack! Actually it's probably just bat panic. Maggie tries to assist Anita, but perhaps because she's not used to fighting as Anita does, she accidently cuts Anita (Ow! Papercut!). They make their escape, but Anita is pissed off at Maggie for messing up (and for thinking Anita couldn't take care of herself.)

-Mr. Kim idly wonders how many will return. Man, that's cold! And then a big guy gives him a start, although he seems to recognize him.

-Anita doesn't want the others to burden her, since her powers are unaffected. She gets slapped by Michelle for being mean to Maggie! Which only sets her off more, but before things go further, they get attacked by an evil-looking dog. Michelle's abrupt shift to protecting Anita at all costs is intersting. They can fight, but there's no question how important they are to one another.

-The Professor is an audiophile?

-They are collected in the boss's chamber. I guess this makes it showdown time. Fortunately Michelle knows what's going on here--he smells! Or maybe not. But Maggie knows. Sonic attack!

-Professor Webber has a copy of the Suicide Symphony?! His name is on the book and he claims it's his composition, based on the work of his predecessors. So it may not be quite the same, but still.... And does this imply he's an I-Jin?

-Michelle is strangely resistant... nevermind. But Maggie catches her, so are they vulnerable on different sonic wavelengths?

-Webber declares victory and taunts them with the book they came for. A little early, but what's the good in being evil if you can't mash your opponents noses in their defeat?

-Oh, Maggie gets to be cool, and tells Anita don't worry--they'll protect her no matter what.

-Heh, they cue up the OAV opening song here for Maggie and Michelle's attack.

-A paper sound baffle to protect Anita... and her attack is technically with paper, in that she whacks him with a copy of Dracula. I expect Anita finds getting to hurl a book a bonus.

-Anita's true closeness and concern for her sisters comes through, now that Maggie's been hurt. She apologizes tearfully for how she was acting.

-The big scary quiet dude is Sonny Wong, a.k.a. Paper Recycler. Did he just pay them with two rolls of toilet paper?! Apparently yes, but they serve as vouchers for the real payment... uh, okay. I don't like this system. :P

-Like any action thriller, there's the little kicker when you think it's all over. Seeing laser sights on Anita makes me raaaage!

-Maggie was serious about protecting Anita, and puts up a shield at the last moment from Michelle's souvenir copy of Dracula.

-Nenene returns home to find the three sacked out on the floor. She's tired enough to join them... but watch out, they're dangerous in their sleep.

So this episode we get to see a bit of what the Three Sisters Detective Agency does. Although I expect this mission was a bit more dramatic than the usual--no wonder Anita dislikes taking work from Dokusensha.

[Isuzu Inugami]

When I heard they were doing a TV series, not starring Yomiko, I was wondering how they'd manage to keep in the same league as the OVA. This episode said, "Yes, we're damn well in that league, love our new Paper Masters!"

Yeah, I was very dubious. "Yomiko isn't in it? What's wrong with them?" And by the time the episode ended I had completely forgotten I had been worried.


This episode is simply beyond outstanding. I've lost track of the number of times I've rewatched it.

Episode two is like that for me. I don't know why I keep coming back to it.

[Isuzu Inugami]

-Michelle hair flip!

-A late-night drink of milk with Froggy-kun prompts Anita to... well, at least not leave Nenene's book lying on the floor where she accidently knocked it. Grudging respect for her?

-Anita critiques the school statue of Ninomiya Kinjiro for reading and walking at the same time (which sort of misses the point of the Ninomiya Kinjiro story). Hisa has done the same thing. "Nothing good comes of reading books!"

-Parents Day is coming up. Anita isn't too enthusiastic about her family.

-Junior is sneaking around the library, but disappears when a library club member(?) offers to let him in. And the library has been trashed (again!)

-Hisa wants to meet Anita's sisters, and asks to come visit. Michelle puts on her China dress for her! And they dare to raid Nenene's special cake for Hisa. Although they won't wake her up to visit--I like Maggie's comment that "Sensei is dangerous right now."

-And Nenene is writing again?! :bigsmile:

-Anita doesn't want to do her book report because there aren't any books she likes. This makes Hisa sad. Maggie will walk Hisa home even at the cost of her life!

-Junior reports in... he hasn't been able to find anything. Mr. Carpenter isn't mad, but he has certain expectations. And Junior reveals his school uniform fetish... err, he wants one, anyway.

-Nobody in the school library has requested Natsume's sister's book! (Possibly because she gave everyone a copy already....) Scandal!

-Anita meets Junior in the library, just like in Toto Books all over again. He's half-Japanese... or something like that.

-Nenene complains to her editor about the cake incident, and then blindsides him with her work on her new novel. And then she runs into Nastume's sister, who mentions the whole Parents Day thing, which Anita has kept secret.

-Oh, they're giving their book reports for Parents Day, which is why Anita didn't want to have them there. Nenene wants to know why Anita hates books.

-Junior doesn't particularly like books. Anita insta-friends him.

-Anita was traumatized around burning books--they are a symbol of fear to her. There's a very brief flashback to the conflagration.... This all happened before Maggie and Michelle met her.

-Anita's going to help Junior find whatever book he's looking for, but he disappears when she goes to Hisa for help. Hisa tries to get her to pick a book for Parents Day, but Anita plans to just skip that day. Hisa is upset--she's going to do a report even though she has no family coming, so Anita ought to as well. Good things can come of reading books, and, and, Hisa likes Anita as much as she likes books, so she wants Anita to be friends with them! That was damn near a confession!

-Anita starts to read Nenene's book (and walks while doing it!) Also, I have a sense that Midnight Liberation Zone isn't a book for kids, but that'll just make the book report intersting, I guess.

-Natsume annouces her sister in class. You have to love her ridiculous celebrity-by-proxy (and be sure to talk her up into being a celebrity) attitude. Anita surprises Hisa by saying she did a book report, even though no one will be coming for her.

-...and she spoke too soon. She just about dies of embarrassment. And they loudly announce they brought Sumiregawa-sensei. Poor Natsume's been upstaged. And Anita gets called on to read her report. Nenene's look of shock is fantastic.

I confess, Read or Die is all about the paper action, but I love these school episodes to death as well.

[Isuzu Inugami]

-Michelle hair flip!

-The Paper Sisters are in England(?) tracking John Smith, an incredibly nondescript actor with a somewhat distinguished career. Apparently he somehow wound up with a book from the British Library. Maggie says it makes sense--hiding a leaf in a grove. (Anita points out it's "hiding a leaf in a forest.")

-(Isn't "John Smith" Dr. Who's pseudonym when he absolutely has to give one? The Paper Sisters are after Dr. Who?!)

-Anita checks on Michelle. Michelle has vanished from the restuarant bathroom. "There were only the two of you when you came in." Dwah?!

-It gets distinctly creepy when Maggie notices there are only two settings at their table.

-Maggie doesn't panic because Michelle wouldn't be kidnapped easily. She'll likely meet with them at the hotel. But any sign of her existence has been removed from the hotel room (which is a funky circular affair, I add for no reason.)

-"John Smith is in a grove." Their opponents have made the first move. Kim calls and warns them Smith is in the town... with his acting abilities, he could be anyone, and who knows how many confederates he has.

-Maggie named the pigeon "John Woo." :sweat: Anita thinks Maggie seems more dependable than usual (well, she's filling in for Michelle, isn't she!) Aaaand then Maggie gets arrested on suspicion of murder. What?!

-They have witnesses that Maggie stabbed Michelle to death in the cafe! And a photo of the crime scene. "It's real. At least now, in this room." Things are getting weirder and weirder. Are they crazy, or is it Maggie? Who is to judge who is lying, and how?

-Anita gets kicked out of the police station. There's no such person as Maggie there. Anita finds a crazy note... "John Smith got his forest burned down. That's why he planted new trees. A lot...." Creepy! Every damn thing in this town is creepy! And then the old couple from the cafe show up. "We can watch porn videos together." Aaaaaghh!

-Anita, alone, stressed, depressed... finds Michelle (alive and well!)

-The cafe was a setup, and everyone is in on the deception. Isn't this classic paranoid thinking? Michelle says to wait for backup from Mr. Kim.

-Oh right, Maggie has a get out of jail free card... err, I mean, Maggie has a piece of paper.

-Anita notices a fancy book on the desk. Just like the one in the old hotel room bedstand... and the one at the restaurant bar... and "Michelle" just got scary behind her.

-The real Michelle pounds her way out of a coffin. Now that's how you detain people with style. She's in a room full of manuscripts.

-Meanwhile in Hong Kong... Joker is at Dokusensha, presenting them with the Book of the Rising Intellect.??! Joker looks the worse for wear, and Mr. Gentleman is spoken of in the past tense??!?! WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON?!?!?! Joker now serves Dokusensha! It's just a publishing house, man. A very sinister publishing house, but still....

-"John Smith is everywhere. John Smith is nowhere. John Smith never gets caught." Michelle calmly walks out to some random guy, identifies him as John Smith, and makes him guide her.

-Maggie nearly gets run over by a car (obviously gunning for her, but still, she shouldn't just be standing there!), and Michelle saves the day, ordering John Smith to stop the car. Everyone is John Smith!

-John Smith has Anita, we just don't know which John Smith. Michelle explains he's just like they are, but for acting instead of books. Heh. He likely sold the book they're after and built the whole town with the proceeds. It's all been a wild goose chase!

-They find Anita on a roof (pretty easily!), with a Michelle wig beside her. I guess fake Michelle didn't get the best of her after all. She's miserable because she doesn't know if they're the real ones, or more imposters. The almost broken tone of her voice is heartwrenching in either soundtrack.

-Michelle couldn't possibly put on an act in front of Anita. Awww.

-They demolished the town?!

Seriously, this episode was just creepy. Brrrrr!

[Isuzu Inugami]

-Mysterious goings on in the school library! It's almost like a poltergeist....

-I love the details this show bothers to include. There's a completely extraneous melon-theft and revenge punishment going on while Hisa explains about the poltergeist and the Library Club President asking her to catch it.

-Secret library stakeout party tonight! Be there or be square!

-There's a bookstore closed for restocking. Is this the one Michelle bought out? No... lots of stores are low on stock.

-Anita runs into Junior. He's always alone, and doesn't get why people would bother joining clubs. He doesn't have friends--Anita invites him to the poltergeist party.

-Meanwhile, at an undisclosed location, horrible brain experiments are going on! Though they fail at whatever they're doing, Mr. Carpenter (a.k.a. Joker) applauds the attempt.

-Somehow Natsume has become hostess to the party. She's even named the poltergeist "Polpol." And Tohru showed up, in spite of his saying he had other things to do earlier.

-They start ghost hunting so seriously! It doesn't last all that long, though....

-Hisa goes to get drinks, and Anita is going to go with her, until a more observant girl holds her back. Stay out of the way--Tohru's going to confess!

-Anita spies on the action. Tohru won't let Hisa "-chan" him. Junior shows up at Anita's shoulder right when things are getting good, heh.

-We miss the confession, but Hisa's "I'm sorry" afterward tells it all. I feel sorry for Tohru, even though Hisa is clearly meant to be Anita's waifu. (What was that about the show needing yuri? ;P )

-Meanwhile Anita hangs out with Junior and watches the stars. He has a feeling the ghost won't show up tonight. It doesn't really matter to Anita, because she's having fun with everyone. And she wants Junior to have fun too, because he never smiles.

-Hisa tells Tohru she may be in love with someone.

-Heh, Michelle came by to check on Anita, and is doing magic tricks with paper for everyone.

-Anita wonders aloud why the library is being haunted, and Junior says maybe there's a valuable book there. Suddenly it all makes sense to Anita, but she says not to worry; if that's the case that book is hidden in another book. Loose lips sink ships, Anita!

-Anita introduces Junior to Michelle, providing her with a new toy....

-"Is that your boyfriend, Anita?" Hisa's startled jump when she hears that is so cute!

-Aww... she tries to ask Anita about it later, but can't bring herself to finish the question. And is Anita filled with a sense of dissatisfaction to see her walking off with Tohru?

-Uh oh... it looks like the ghost--that is, Junior--showed up after everyone left... and found what he was looking for.

-...Except he reports that he hasn't found it yet!

[Hayate Kurogane]

Avatar change! Recognize it? :devil: :P

-Michelle hair flip!

Y'know, what I've also noticed is that, in the cut prior to Michelle on the train, Maggie in the car has a slight...bounce.

-I like Anita's magazine cartridges full of paper.

This is another one of those awesome things about Read or Die (and anime in general, for that matter). Because, when you stop and think about it, carrying reserve cartridges of paper has got to be damned inconvenient, as well as uncomfortable. Even small cartridges, or cubes like they also have. That briefcase of Michelle's has also got to weigh quite a bit if it's holding all that paper.

But perhaps as bibliophiles who are also skilled in combat, they've got the strength to just haul masses of paper around anyway?

-Anita doesn't want the others to burden her, since her powers are unaffected. She gets slapped by Michelle for being mean to Maggie! Which only sets her off more, but before things go further, they get attacked by an evil-looking dog. Michelle's abrupt shift to protecting Anita at all costs is intersting. They can fight, but there's no question how important they are to one another.

Notice the glitch at the end of this scene? When Anita's in the tunnel after escaping the big room where they get split up, she's clearly been animated to be calling out loudly to the others, like "he-eey you guys!" volume, but was directed to be speaking timidly, like "...is anyone out there?" volume. Someone was not communicating with someone else during production. :sweat:

I've always found this to be one of the weakest episodes, if not the weakest episode in the series. While it's interesting to have an action-adventure episode show up, the whole thing felt kind of goofy and out of place, Webber and Irving register as even less significant than your average monster/baddie-of-the-week, and the production values in an otherwise-largely-well-animated show take a bit of a dip (which is always bad for an action episode). Compared to, say, episode 7, which is another girls-going-somewhere episode that isn't necessarily action-packed but is a very compelling adventure episode, this episode just doesn't hold up that well.

[Isuzu Inugami]

Avatar change! Recognize it? :devil: :P

Hah! Wow, I laughed out loud. Nice. :bigsmile:

-Michelle hair flip!

Y'know, what I've also noticed is that, in the cut prior to Michelle on the train, Maggie in the car has a slight...bounce.

Heh, there are a lot of nice details in the opening. I obsess over the hair flip (no hands! Just a twitch of the head to clear her vision! She's so smooooth and stylish!) unreasonably, but what the heck.

Because, when you stop and think about it, carrying reserve cartridges of paper has got to be damned inconvenient, as well as uncomfortable. Even small cartridges, or cubes like they also have. That briefcase of Michelle's has also got to weigh quite a bit if it's holding all that paper.

I figure they've built up a lot of upper body strength from this sort of thing. Or maybe they use their power to cancel the weight (if that's possible), although the way Yomiko lugged her suitcase around makes me think not.


Notice the glitch at the end of this scene?

Hmm, it sort of slid by me. Err, she was shouting, it's just Webber was baffling the sound! Yeah, retcon, retcon! :sweat:


I've always found this to be one of the weakest episodes, if not the weakest episode in the series.

Well, the whole vampire element is just there without any explanation or exploitation apart from atmosphere, and does seem out of character with the rest of the show. The novelty of seeing them out and doing a mission more or less independent of anything else in the show is kind of nice, but it does seem more like a case of needing to fill a hole in the schedule. I still thought it functioned reasonably well, although the attempt to shoot Anita at the end felt rather cheap and tacked on.

[Hayate Kurogane]

-Michelle hair flip!

Y'know, what I've also noticed is that, in the cut prior to Michelle on the train, Maggie in the car has a slight...bounce.

Heh, there are a lot of nice details in the opening. I obsess over the hair flip (no hands! Just a twitch of the head to clear her vision! She's so smooooth and stylish!) unreasonably, but what the heck.

And this is another show where anyone who skips opening sequences will miss changes that start filtering in around the halfway point. I think there are at least four different configurations involving ten or so cuts of animation. It's not major, like, say, a Goro Taniguchi show, but the ones they swap out are pretty neat.

What I've actually fixated on in the opening sequence, this time through the show, is that the bird flying by in the background of the shot with Nenene in the elevator drops something. It's probably just meant to be a feather, but for all anyone knows it could be bird shit, at that distance and with that level (or lack thereof) of animation detail in such a short cut of animation. You think, "okay, fine detail is great and all, but dust motes in Yomiko's room, good, tiny background bird dropping something, bad." That's one of those animation judgment calls that maybe should've gone the other way.

Because, when you stop and think about it, carrying reserve cartridges of paper has got to be damned inconvenient, as well as uncomfortable. Even small cartridges, or cubes like they also have. That briefcase of Michelle's has also got to weigh quite a bit if it's holding all that paper.

I figure they've built up a lot of upper body strength from this sort of thing. Or maybe they use their power to cancel the weight (if that's possible), although the way Yomiko lugged her suitcase around makes me think not.

Yomiko always had the awkward clumsy thing going on. Like, she has excellent reflexes (think: Nancy trying to touch her glasses), but then she's struggling to pull herself up onto ledges after a decent but unathletic jump off a platform inside the giant rocket fortress. That, versus Anita doing a remarkable backflip sort of move off her top bunk just to verify that Nenene has gone out wandering in episode one of the TV series. The sisters are certainly more athletic, so maybe it is just a pure strength thing.

Or what they're carrying around is actually a fairly light weight of paper? Volume-wise, if it were all tissue paper it'd probably be more reasonable. Their powers would still be as effective in controlling it, and it wouldn't throw off their balance in combat as much as that much regular paper would (i.e., inertia and momentum and all that, contributing to difficulty in reactive movements, versus whether or not they were able to simply lift it and move around normally with it).


I've always found this to be one of the weakest episodes, if not the weakest episode in the series.

Well, the whole vampire element is just there without any explanation or exploitation apart from atmosphere, and does seem out of character with the rest of the show. The novelty of seeing them out and doing a mission more or less independent of anything else in the show is kind of nice, but it does seem more like a case of needing to fill a hole in the schedule. I still thought it functioned reasonably well, although the attempt to shoot Anita at the end felt rather cheap and tacked on.

I agree that "fill a hole in the schedule" is a good way of describing the flavor of this episode. The whole callback to the Suicide Symphony thing just made it worse instead of better; presumably the viewer is supposed to think, "oh, look, this is important, I remember that from the OVA!" or something like that, but Webber was so absurd and thinly-developed that it came across as more like the staff was scrambling for a way to make the episode relevant and this was the best they could do at the last minute. I mean, we'll never know for sure, but anyway.

There's also the first appearance of Sonny Wong, but he's so irrelevant to the episode (other than the single coolest thing in the entire episode, which is his method of defeating Irving: grabbing Irving's face and slamming Irving's head, full-force, backwards into a brick wall, causing instant death). There's no reason that his next appearance couldn't have been his first.

[Hayate Kurogane]

-Anita's going to help Junior find whatever book he's looking for, but he disappears when she goes to Hisa for help. Hisa tries to get her to pick a book for Parents Day, but Anita plans to just skip that day. Hisa is upset--she's going to do a report even though she has no family coming, so Anita ought to as well. Good things can come of reading books, and, and, Hisa likes Anita as much as she likes books, so she wants Anita to be friends with them! That was damn near a confession!

They say close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades, but... :beatingheart:


-...and she spoke too soon. She just about dies of embarrassment. And they loudly announce they brought Sumiregawa-sensei. Poor Natsume's been upstaged. And Anita gets called on to read her report. Nenene's look of shock is fantastic.

I love this end of the final scene, and especially Nenene's reaction. I mean, the episode is written so that you know the whole thing is going to end up with a scene like this, but it's framed to be very much a growing-of-bonds moment (moreso from the viewer's perspective than the characters') rather than anything else, and it's just spot-on perfect.

Though it's completely irrelevant to the episode or the story, I've always wondered just what exactly Anita put in that report of hers. Is it boring and normal? Or is it perhaps well-intentioned but clumsily constructed? Or is it very smoothly written? We don't get many clues as to Anita's intelligence, or layers of it. Like, we see her copying Hisa's math homework at one point, but we don't know if that means she's bad at math or if she's awesome at it but doesn't feel like applying herself (true story: I always failed my homework grades in middle school because I found homework boring and I couldn't focus so I would hardly ever do any of it, but then I would walk in with no preparation and ace all the quizzes and tests).

[Hayate Kurogane]

-The Paper Sisters are in England(?) tracking John Smith, an incredibly nondescript actor with a somewhat distinguished career. Apparently he somehow wound up with a book from the British Library. Maggie says it makes sense--hiding a leaf in a grove. (Anita points out it's "hiding a leaf in a forest.")

I certainly do not envy whoever has had to make a decision about how to spell Smith's name for subtitle purposes. While a name like "John Smith" in this sort of context is generally spelled as such, the typical route to go for accuracy's sake is to take the spelling from within the episode itself (or whatever is strangely mandated by the licensors). In this case, the animators clearly could not settle on one spelling: the episode shows us "John Smith" and "Jon Smith" and "Jhon Smith" and "John Smiths" and probably one more that's not leaping to mind as I'm typing this (no note-taking while viewing). Oh well.

-Maggie doesn't panic because Michelle wouldn't be kidnapped easily. She'll likely meet with them at the hotel. But any sign of her existence has been removed from the hotel room (which is a funky circular affair, I add for no reason.)

I think it's a neat room, but it also makes no sense architecturally when the hallway outside the room is straight and the closet opens off of it at an odd angle, because it's all such a waste of space.

And then the old couple from the cafe show up. "We can watch porn videos together." Aaaaaghh!

:sdsmiley:

It's such a double-take line, but fantastic, if a bit forced. But maybe that's why it works. Whatever the case, it makes me laugh every time.

-Meanwhile in Hong Kong... Joker is at Dokusensha, presenting them with the Book of the Rising Intellect.??! Joker looks the worse for wear, and Mr. Gentleman is spoken of in the past tense??!?! WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON?!?!?! Joker now serves Dokusensha! It's just a publishing house, man. A very sinister publishing house, but still....

THE PLOT THICKENS!!

...no extra comments. Just felt that that was an appropriate place for that particular cliche. :P

-They demolished the town?!

Makes sense to me.

Seriously, this episode was just creepy. Brrrrr!

After the inadequacies of episode 5, thankfully episode 7 comes along and lets us know that it's all right, the show does know how to do a random action-adventure episode that's compelling. Granted, episode 7 still feels a bit out of place, like, "who are you, and what did you do to my R.O.D the TV?!" But its unsettling, paranoid, "The Prisoner"-esque vibe really works for me.

[Isuzu Inugami]

Episode 9: Heart of Darkness

-Maggie bounce! Michelle hair flip!

-Nenene and some high school friends are talking about old times--Nenene had a girlfriend--Yomiko--didn't she? Nenene denies she swings that way. Dammit, Nenene, why must you.... :(

-Let's all go to the hot spring by the ancient burial mound they discovered. Why does this sound like an inherently bad idea...?

-The pigeon John Woo insists on an honorific. He also brings work in Gifu Prefecture. Michelle wonders what country that's in.... :sweat:

-It's Drake! He's acting as bodyguard to someone from the U.K., who is risking being spotted by Dokusensha by coming to the, you guessed it, burial mound.

-The Paper Sisters are to locate Alice Alice Arquette, British archeologist. They'll be working with John Woo.... And as it turns out, this is one of those scenes I love where absolutely everyone is in the same place, oblivious to the fact that everyone else they are looking for or avoiding is also there.

-Nenene's friends are seriously impressed she's lasted six months without kicking out her freeloaders!

-Kim thinks they're on the trail of the Book of the Forlorn Blood. Michelle gets all excited wondering if it's part of a series with the others they've found.

-Oops, Kim found a picture of the target. Mayhem ensues--Drake is pretty quick to think of throwing water when he sees the sisters whip out paper, although I suppose he must have thought of ways to deal with people like Yomiko.

-Classic cheesy secret door in the tomb. Nenene finds them, and wonders what the heck they think they're doing when she told them to stay home. Guess she doesn't know about their side work

-The sisters catch up to Drake--he won't shoot at Anita, since he's got a daughter around her age. Perceptive of Michelle to sense his hesitation--Alice keys in on it too, and takes things in her own hands with one of Drake's grenades.

-Nenene rescues Anita--she must be seriously wonder what the hell is going on! Maggie and Michelle are lost in the caverns below.

-Michelle is blinded by darkness and dust from the fall... but Junior is there?! He takes her by the hand and offers to guide her, although she doesn't recognize him. Meanwhile, Maggie notes it's awfully humid in the caves for paper.

-And Kim is briefing the big dude, Sonny Wong, to send him in as backup. Also, he can go ahead and kill Drake and Alice. (!) Kim's kind of a nasty fellow, isn't he.

-They didn't tell Nenene because she would have been mad. Nenene says she wouldn't have (I don't believe her!) but she'd worry (and she thinks of Yomiko's line of work.) No, you can't ditch her, Anita!

-Wong takes the direct route. :sweat:

-Junior takes off before Michelle can see him.

-Hot springs time... but Alice is working after all. Ancient key GET! Now we can take a moment to enjoy the spring.

-Michelle and Anita surprise attack! Drake does pretty well against them. Until Wong drops straight into the water. Isn't that bad for a paper master to do?

-Uh oh... he's badass all right. And Drake shielded Anita with his body! Alice is a bit pissed off... but Drake can read the situation and surrenders--just spare Alice's life--

-Well that was rude. Just as I had gotten to like her. Really, there wasn't any call to kill her now. Damn!

-And the way Wong casually blocks Drake's shots, until, like swatting a pesky insect he finally returns one, is just chilling. Wong has pissed off, well, everyone, but it's Nenene who tells him off.

-I'm impressed Alice is still alive to have some last words.

-Wait, what... Junior suddenly jumps out of the ground to grab the key, and shows off some dematerialization powers when Wong tries to stop him.

-Drake has a present from Alice! (Why must everything have a self-destruct mechanism?)

-Even though they failed, Dokusensha will still give them half their pay. Nenene recognizes the name.

-Drake lives. In fact, everyone lived and the tomb was successfully raided, so I'm not sure what the point of triggering the destruct mechanism was.... And there's either a continuity error here with Drake's arm, or he heals really fast.

Well, that was a depressing episode. I suppose with a title like "Heart of Darkness" it can't be anything but....

[Isuzu Inugami]

We don't get many clues as to Anita's intelligence, or layers of it. Like, we see her copying Hisa's math homework at one point, but we don't know if that means she's bad at math or if she's awesome at it but doesn't feel like applying herself

That's a good question. Based on how she seems to secretly enjoy getting into snark-fights with Nenene, I feel she's got smarts that want to be exercised; but in the normal course of events, not much engages her. That book report... I really want to hear it now, just to see if she works in any sly digs at Nenene herself.

[Hayate Kurogane]

-Hot springs time... but Alice is working after all. Ancient key GET! Now we can take a moment to enjoy the spring.

I'll be back later to comment properly, but I just wanted to jump in and say I'm surprised you didn't mention Alice's breastiness in this episode. Because, y'know, random attractive well-endowed female, sans clothes, in a show you wouldn't expect to see such things in, is always a plus. :catgirl:

[Fencedude]

-Hot springs time... but Alice is working after all. Ancient key GET! Now we can take a moment to enjoy the spring.

I'll be back later to comment properly, but I just wanted to jump in and say I'm surprised you didn't mention Alice's breastiness in this episode. Because, y'know, random attractive well-endowed female, sans clothes, in a show you wouldn't expect to see such things in, is always a plus. :catgirl:

C-cup-chan, as she was named...somewhere. I forget which forum exactly.

[Isuzu Inugami]

I'm surprised you didn't mention Alice's breastiness in this episode. Because, y'know, random attractive well-endowed female, sans clothes, in a show you wouldn't expect to see such things in, is always a plus. :catgirl:

C-cup-chan, as she was named...somewhere. I forget which forum exactly.

But her name is a triple A! I think the cognitive dissonance must have derailed me from making a comment; I can scarcely believe I didn't in the first place. Consider me suitably shamed--especially given there was some strategic pausing of the disc while I wrote up that section.

[Bibulb]

(But Wendy is still a klutz.)

But she's probably great in the sack!

To change paradigms for a moment, there are certain times, certain situations when a crit fumble is BADBADBAD.

Boinking is one of them.

[Asrialys]

Because, y'know, random attractive well-endowed female, sans clothes, in a show you wouldn't expect to see such things in, is always a plus. :catgirl:
Well, we did get some nudity in a panel of the Read or Dream manga...

[General Hentai]

Avatar change! Recognize it? :devil: :P



LOL! I love it.

-Notice the glitch at the end of this scene? When Anita's in the tunnel after escaping the big room where they get split up, she's clearly been animated to be calling out loudly to the others, like "he-eey you guys!" volume, but was directed to be speaking timidly, like "...is anyone out there?" volume. Someone was not communicating with someone else during production. :sweat:


Hmmm. Need to rewatch that, as I always chalked that up to how sound was being played with in this episode.

[General Hentai]

Yeah, the plot definitely thickens. After episode 5 and this one, I was wondering why on Earth were they not just sending Wong in, which was indeed answered later.

Poor Alice. Brought in for us to love, and then killed off to show that Dokusensha is in this for keeps, and is ruthless as can be, that Wong's killing of Irving in ep. 5 wasn't just to save the girls, or just a rogue operative at work.

Great episode, and it was great to see Drake again.

[Isuzu Inugami]

Well, after the hearty darkness of the last episode, lets have something more uplifting. ^^

-Maggie bounce! Michelle hair flip!

-Nenene's busy putting off her editor. And there's a mysterious postcard in the mail. Probably an invitation, Anita says. And Michelle won't let Nenene throw it out. Not that subtle, are they.... :sweat:

-Nenene's also invited to a writer's award dinner she won previously. What a pain. Although she's won over by the sisters' enthusiasm about meeting writers or eating the food.

-Haruhi Nishizono says hello at the party, and gets coached by her staff. Now I see where her little sister gets it from. She's already up to the third volume of her series! And she's snagged a TV appearance (at 2:25 a.m....)

-Nenene sees herself in the shy new writer being awarded this year. Where is that young Nenene to be found...?

-Nenene gets publicly humiliated by someone from the awards committee, who doesn't have much sympathy for the concept of writer's block. No wonder she didn't want to come! It's Lee to the rescue, though he pretty much just makes things worse, heh.

-Anita gives him a thumbs-up for it, though. Lee really is a Nenene fan.

-Nenene gets dragooned into giving what turns out to be a really nice speech, and unexpectedly announces her new book.

-Afterward, Michelle says there's another party to attend. Secret message on the postcard.

-It's Michelle, Anita, and Maggie's birthday! The paper blooming into decorations is a spectacular effect.

-They first met two years ago, Christmas Eve....

-Michelle and Maggie are new partners for some mission. Instant bonding over reading the same book. (Given how much they read, the odds of being on the same book at the same time seem astronomical.)

-Sneaking into an abandoned church... Michelle feels guilty, but Maggie says it's to rescue forgotten books. (A stash of rare books from before World War I!)

-They're fake! Michelle can identify the paper's age and composition are wrong! It seems the information wasn't sure, so Dokusensha sent them with the idea they could be cut loose if it didn't pan out or they were caught? I'm not so sure of the logic here, even if the British Library might also be hunting for this stash.

-"Are you guys Santas, or thieves?" Suddenly, a wild Anita appears.

-She doesn't look too good, though. If they're Santas, give her something, and if they're thieves, let her join. Michelle says they're more like thieves, but stealing is bad and Anita shouldn't ruin her future joining them.

-Anita says she doesn't have a future. :depressed:

-They won't help, so Anita sent them on their way. She's cold and lonely.

-Maggie doesn't feel good about it either. She wonders aloud how you make happy Christmas memories, and she and Michelle go their separate ways.

-Anita has her Grinch on... it's Christmas and she starving. And suddenly Michelle returns with a "Merry Christmas!" and gives her the book she was reading. And then Maggie shows up completely independently and does the same. It's the same book!

-Michelle suggests the three of them become sisters. Her little speech pushes Anita to break down and start crying. Awwww....

-So that's the day they were born as three sisters, M.A.M. Here in the present, Anita denies she was crying like they described it, heh. And then Nenene tears up over the story as well, to everyone's shock.

This is one of the episodes that just puts a grin on my face. And I hate Christmas stories!

[William K]

I think this is my favourite episode in the whole series. From Nenene's speech to the sisters' backstory, it was just heartwarming all around.

[Jimmie M]

I think this is my favourite episode in the whole series. From Nenene's speech to the sisters' backstory, it was just heartwarming all around.

I like it too-In fact, I try to make a point of watching this episode every year at Christmas time.

[General Hentai]

I think this is my favourite episode in the whole series. From Nenene's speech to the sisters' backstory, it was just heartwarming all around.

Not my favorite, favorite of this series, but it's near the top. A really great episode.

[Isuzu Inugami]

-Maggie bounce! Michelle hair flip!

-Things are looking good for Nenene on the publishing front. And things have been quiet, so the Paper Sisters can go home again. Wait, what?! They leave at the end of the week. :depressed:

-They'll have to say goodbye to the bookstore owners... (and settle their bills....)

-Anita drops the bombshell at school. Hisa is hit really hard by it. Natsume will arrange the going-away party!

-There's an observation camera watching Yomiko's place...?

-Anita is alone with Hisa... and it hurts. Hisa's reading Red-Headed Anne, a.k.a. Anne of Green Gables. (I feel as if someday I ought to read it.) Hisa says Anne is a lot like Anita, and the parallel between Anne's bosom friend and Hisa is pretty apparant. Hisa would like Anita to read it as well, but there's no more time.... :cry:

-Anita runs into Junior, and gives him the news as well. She tells him to make more friends, besides her. He didn't realize he was her friend. I love the exasperated sigh this elicits from Anita.

-Hmm, Anita cleans up loose ends by getting the mystery book back in the hands of the guy who got shot in the ankles. It doesn't work out well, though...!

-The Book of the Supporting Bones. Yet another creepy title. The only one left is the Book of the All-Seeing Eye. Apparently it's Joker's gang monitoring Yomiko's place. They're going to build an ideal future--everyone will be saved thanks to Junior's efforts! They why is the music so ominous?

-Anita wants a copy of Anne of Green Gables! She reads it through in one night, seeming utterly absorbed too.

-It's the goodbye party... but Hisa isn't there. Tohru understands right away, and dashes off with an excuse to find her. I guess he's a good guy after all. (Is he the most tsundere character in a show well stocked in tsundere characters?)

-If Hisa goes, it really is goodbye, and she'll be alone all again... Tohru tells her off! She's stupid to think that way, and Anita is stupid to pretend to be strong for her, and pretty much everyone is stupid!

-Anita leaves a gift for Hisa, and starts to break down. :depressed:

-Hisa gets there in time. Yes, Tohru knows he's stupid to help her be by Anita, but he's glad he did it anyway.

-"Wherever we are, we'll always be bosom friends."

-Nenene gives an awesome scary laugh when she contemplates getting her quiet life back. But then she says it was fun being with them... and, uhh, they can come over and visit. Occasionally.

-Anita gave Hisa a pair of Froggy-kun Anne of Green Gables dolls.

-Nenene will crash with the Sisters in Hong Kong (as revenge!). They get to their place, and there are no books--they were all sacrificed to save the plane back in episode one! Anita likes it like this, but Michelle looks forward to filling it with books again.

-There's a knock at the door, and--

-Lee sold them out? He wants Nenene to write for them? Didn't he promise not to smoke until her new book was finished?


Another great Anita/Hisa episode, although it doesn't look good for getting any more, alas.

[Isuzu Inugami]

...Not that there's anything ominious about that title....

-Maggie bounce! Michelle hair flip!

-Lee wants Nenene to write the greatest story in the world. What a supportive editor! Dokusensha is behind this. Lee finds comptent writers for them.

-Maggie has Nenene's locket as they carry her off. Lee says they did their job well--in getting Nenene back on her feet as a writer--and pays them handsomely. Obviously this doesn't sit well, but they've got the drop on the Paper Sisters. Lee says to forget about Nenene. Don't even think of rescuing her, or the whole world will be their enemy. Now that's some big talk!

-Lee doesn't enjoy the taste of his cigarette.

-Junior clandestinely drops out of Joker's helicopter as it lands at Dokusensha? Hmmm...

-Anita wants to hurry up and rescue Nenene. Michelle thinks things through--that's a lot of money--and Anita is utterly disgusted. Even though she's not Nenene's fan or anything.

-The best Three Sisters Conference ever!

-Joker says if they get the last book, they'll have all human knowledge assembled in one place? Must be a pretty small font.... However, they need a master key to unlock the books. Seriously? They could just slide a knife along the spine gutters and disbind the things, you know.

-Nenene wakes up in a mad-scientist contraption. They're going to install... something... into her mind.

-Junior's setting bombs?

-Heh, Nenene has too much of an ego for it to work properly. But they'll just drug her up. Lee complains it'll change her writing style.

-Maggie uses paper divination to locate Nenene?

-Oog. Mindrape isn't pretty. Nenene wants to know if Lee was lying all this time about wanting to read her work.

-We're here to see Lee from the Kidnapping Department! Man, I love Anita. And Michelle has this bright smile as she terrorizes everyone in the lobby.

-Three intruders, all female. Nice of them to pipe that announcement in to where Nenene can hear it. Joker opts not to abort whatever he's up to.

-Sonny Wong goes to deal with the disturbance--Kim feels sorry for the Paper Sisters now.

-Most publishers don't have robots... or so I've been led to believe. Nice action sequence... but the Sisters shouldn't congratulate themselves yet once they've finished them off. There's still the main event, Sonny Wong.

-They promised to rescue Nenene at all costs.

To be continued. :P

[Isuzu Inugami]

(Previously on Read or Die: Oh crap. Oh crap. Oh crap--oh crap! OH CRAP! Ohcrapohcrapohcrap! Oh shit!)

-Maggie bounce! Michelle hair flip!

-The Sisters can't beat Wong, so they'll try another route--but Maggie will keep him occupied. If you've read enough, you know this sort of thing is a death flag... and Anita knows it.

-Secret plan--property destruction. Good thinking, Maggie... but don't relax too soon. (And that's some very slow-falling debris.)

-Joker's ready to pull out, given the chaos the Paper Sisters are causing. They almost run into Junior!

-And Michelle is staying behind, just like Maggie. Anita... isn't making a fuss, but seems on the verge of breaking. Michelle reassures her... they're always together.

-Even drugged, Nenene is resistant.

-Anita looks like jumping to that central sphere was a bit more than she was ready to tackle... that expression when she lands has a real "I never want to do that again" quality.

-Michelle seems to have things well under control, until they gas her. No fair!

-Joker hacked the central computer to get it to do an emergency data upload he could copy? He's not being a very good ally of Dokusensha.

-And Junior saves Michelle. But what prompted it? Association with Anita? He helped her out back in the hot springs cave too.

-Lee is ordered to "dispose" of Nenene. Is he really going to do it? He wants to know why she fought it so hard... the book she would have written would have been a masterpiece of world literature. But it wouldn't have been her book, she says, agonized over line by line... how could that have been interesting? She'd be ashamed of facing Yomiko!

-ANITA! Yeah! She delivers Nenene's glasses, but puts them on crooked? Although they seem to straighten out once we're out of Nenene's point of view.

-Lee manages to draw a gun on them, but then gives up. Nenene is out of his league. He'll help carry her instead.

-Michelle wakes up with a gun in her hand?! Did Junior want her to think she'd taken care of her attackers on her own? Would any Paper Master stoop to using firearms?

-Maggie is still holding off Wong. Maggie is awesome!

-Joker's crew evacuates and sets off explosions, explosions everywhere! They've managed to snatch all the books the Sisters have been collecting for Dokusensha, too.

-Wong gets beaten, assisted by building demolition! They had to drop a building to stop him. Lee goes down, victim of a random security guy who ought to have been more worried about evacuating. Lee at least gets to enjoy a last cigarette... this time the taste is delicious. And John Woo carries something away from him?

-The whole island of Hong Kong sinks!? That right there is overkill, that is.

-Anita can manipulate paper in water, which seems to contradict the hot springs episode....

-"Mi-nee... Ma-nee...." They're okay after all, but it's a bad moment for Anita and Nenene before they show up. And Nenene is a jubilant as Anita to see them.

-Roll the closing credits. Meanwhile, back in Japan someone hesitently leaves a message on Nenene's machine....

[tuffy]

-And Junior saves Michelle. But what prompted it? Association with Anita? He helped her out back in the hot springs cave too.

He seems to have developed a crush on Michelle, ever since meeting her at the end of the "ghost hunting" school episode.

Anyway, I love these episodes when the budget gets a boost. I'd forgotten just how big a difference there was in this series between the "A" animators and the "B" ones.

[Isuzu Inugami]

-And Junior saves Michelle. But what prompted it? Association with Anita? He helped her out back in the hot springs cave too.

He seems to have developed a crush on Michelle, ever since meeting her at the end of the "ghost hunting" school episode.



I don't <bounce> know what <bounce> might have fascinated <bounce> an adolescent boy <bounce> like him. <jiggle>

[Isuzu Inugami]

-Maggie bounce! Michelle hair flip!

-Junior has gone out on his own somewhere. And we finally get confirmation, if you were still wondering--yes, this is Wendy. Cute, tea-fetching, dojikko Wendy is now a ruthlessly competent pistol packing operative! Wow!

-Ugh, time for a recap episode...err, report. Actually I like both that the recap episode isn't really a recap episode, and that it's formatted into this report that carries loads of information about just what the heck has been going on.

-"United Kingdom of Great Britain Recovery Plan: Operation Sleeping Books." Mr. Gentlemen (shouldn't it be "Gentleman"?), "father of the U.K." has been around a long time... and then not around more recently. I didn't learn this stuff in history class, but then I'm an American.

-Since Mr. Gentlemen was dying, the I-Jin project was started to create host bodies strong enough to carry his intellect. It looks like Joker was on the staff for this.

-They still don't know who raided the I-Jin gene banks, but suspicion falls heavily on Dokusensha.

-Dokusensha is the Chinese counterpart of the British Library, guarding the Imperial book collections? They recruited a million-man army of readers through their bookstores, and moved into Hong Kong when it transfered back to China. And then started intensifying sub-rosa conflict with the British Library. But it's still uncertain whether the I-Jin in the OAV series were acting for Dokusensha, or on their own.

-Longs story short, back to square one for the Gentlemen Revival Project. But hey, it's a digital age, so we can digitize him into (7) grotesquely name books, and restore him at a later date, when they can locate a suitable candidate to host him. Gosh, that sounds inviting.

-LOL, "Jiggy Stardust" developed the special paper for this.

-Junior's back! He startled Wendy just as the report was getting interesting, heh. Apparently he's been watching for Nenene's gang to return, and copying her phone messages!

-Back to the report. They lost some genes and a Gentlemen book in a terrorist attack on the British Library. Somehow this damaged relations with other countries (wha-?) and initiated a drastic tumble for the U.K. The remaining books were hidden around the world.

-Joker negotiated with Dokusensha to buy time and information, offering bits of Gentlemen's books to assist their "Perfect Language" project. Hmm, judging from last episode, negotiations seem to have ended dramatically....

-Yomiko disappeared when the Library was attacked. But the Paper Masters to watch now are the Paper Sisters....

-They first encountered them in a Japanese school library, where staff member "J" was trying to recover one of the books. Heh. Fun to see the other perspective.

-Ooh, fresh animation of Yomiko from the British Library! :beatingheart: She made a model of Big Ben. ^^

-Junior made Wendy a birthday dinner, even though her birthday isn't for another two weeks. "So it doesn't make you happy unless it's your birthday?" Awww....

-Junior doesn't know when his own birthday is. Wendy seems... like she's just realized how much like an object everyone including her has treated him. She tells him she'll find out when it is.

-The sinking of Dokusensha's Hong Kong branch has put the British Library in a very good postion.

-Heh, this report is actually for Joker to justify his actions to the rest of the Library! It seems it worked well enough.

-Joker has taken an interest in Dokusensha's Perfect Language script (so is this what they were programming into Nenene?). It's rubbish, he says. Not a story that would be loved by all the people of the world, but a tale of vengeance. (Or is he saying they should have used a tale of vengeance? The syntax is a little unclear.) In any case... it's time to look for the girl with glasses.

-New ending theme! Two girls sitting on a park bench reading. They trade books three quarters of the way through the song. I think I prefer the first ending, though; both the music and the dynamic bookmark.

[Hayate Kurogane]

-Mysterious goings on in the school library! It's almost like a poltergeist....

-I love the details this show bothers to include. There's a completely extraneous melon-theft and revenge punishment going on while Hisa explains about the poltergeist and the Library Club President asking her to catch it.

-Secret library stakeout party tonight! Be there or be square!

Other than the brief scene with Joker and the test subject, you'd really hardly even know this belonged to the same show as the other episodes. :sdsmiley:

But it's amazing how the context of the show as a whole lends such a degree of extra fun to all the cliches: the ghost hunt at school, the confession, the group of school chums getting along, the friendship bonding between a couple of main characters which very slightly hints at what in any other show would develop into romantic feelings.

Michelle crashing the party/ghost hunt is, of course, excellent. :)

[Hayate Kurogane]

Episode 9: Heart of Darkness

The requisite hot springs episode, Read or Die style. :P

-Nenene and some high school friends are talking about old times--Nenene had a girlfriend--Yomiko--didn't she? Nenene denies she swings that way. Dammit, Nenene, why must you.... :(

Ah, but in my mind, it's all good. :catgirl: :beatingheart:

-The pigeon John Woo insists on an honorific.

Another example, albeit small, of how Read or Die really knows how to take it to the next level in awesome ways. There's a messenger pigeon. Whom the characters decide to name John Woo. Who insists on being addressed with -san. Who continues to appear in episodes as the show progresses. :sdsmiley:

-The Paper Sisters are to locate Alice Alice Arquette, British archeologist. They'll be working with John Woo.... And as it turns out, this is one of those scenes I love where absolutely everyone is in the same place, oblivious to the fact that everyone else they are looking for or avoiding is also there.

This scene was one that didn't really do much for me the first time around, but the second time I found absolutely hilarious, for some reason. (This viewing being the fourth for me, and the third prior to it, I split the difference and it made me smile both times.) I guess the fact that it's such a contrived bit that's played for obvious laughs makes it inherently hit or miss.

-Michelle is blinded by darkness and dust from the fall... but Junior is there?! He takes her by the hand and offers to guide her, although she doesn't recognize him. Meanwhile, Maggie notes it's awfully humid in the caves for paper.

While this is ostensibly the beginning of a bit of a minor relationship dynamic between Junior and Michelle that pops up a few times throughout the rest of the series, I always figured there must have been less awkwardly-constructed ways of bringing Junior into the episode.

-Hot springs time... but Alice is working after all. Ancient key GET! Now we can take a moment to enjoy the spring.

For no particular reason, I offer my thoughts via haiku:

Hot chick in hot spring
Strips for no good reason but
Service for the fans

Alice is pretty adorable in her own way, for being an episodic guest character, but it's really the random extended boob-tastic hot springs scenes that make her memorable. Was it necessary? Who cares!

-Uh oh... he's badass all right. And Drake shielded Anita with his body! Alice is a bit pissed off... but Drake can read the situation and surrenders--just spare Alice's life--

-Well that was rude. Just as I had gotten to like her. Really, there wasn't any call to kill her now. Damn!

-And the way Wong casually blocks Drake's shots, until, like swatting a pesky insect he finally returns one, is just chilling. Wong has pissed off, well, everyone, but it's Nenene who tells him off.

Up to this point, Wong's few appearances had pretty much established that he was a badass and that we were going to somehow eventually see him do something awful and not for the sake of the sisters, but this whole scene still shocked me because it was just so straightforwardly brutal.

-Drake has a present from Alice! (Why must everything have a self-destruct mechanism?)

Well, she did say when they first got into the hot springs chamber that she had to push the right buttons because pushing the wrong ones would cause the whole thing to go bad.

[Isuzu Inugami]

Nenene denies she swings that way. Dammit, Nenene, why must you.... :(

Ah, but in my mind, it's all good. :catgirl: :beatingheart:

I don't believe her anyway!


Up to this point, Wong's few appearances had pretty much established that he was a badass and that we were going to somehow eventually see him do something awful and not for the sake of the sisters, but this whole scene still shocked me because it was just so straightforwardly brutal.
Yeah, it's not what you're expecting of the episode--or at least it wasn't for me. I didn't really know how things were going to play out, but having him essentially drive a Mack truck through the front window of the pizza parlor that the episode so far was, well, startling to say the least.

[Isuzu Inugami]

-Maggie bounce! Michelle hair flip!

-Suzuki Junko makes it through customs. Why, she could be Nenene's long lost twin! Anita's disguise is a little more divergent. Maggie and Michelle are way out there. Turns out the Paper Sisters are wanted criminals, thanks to Dokusensha propaganda.

-Nenene will let them stay at her place... Anita points out it's the least she can do, considering she owes them her life. Too bad the place has been ransacked....

-Oh, hai Nenene, you're on the news and wanted for questioning too! Nice picture of her they use. I have to laugh that the live report gives away that the police are about to raid her apartment.

-Is that John Woo keeping an eye on them? But who's side is he on...?

-Michelle reassures Nenene that the four of them can handle anything. On what basis? Absolutely none!

-Anita has a touch of traumatic flashback idly playing with Lee's lighter (wait--I missed when they got that!). They discover Lee's orders hidden inside... Collect the Book of the All-Seeing Eyes from Toto Books... Owner: The Paper!

-!!!!

-!

-!!!

-There are no books in Jinbo-cho?! But it's Yomiko that Nenene is fired up to ask about.

-The bookstore owner isn't talking. Anita smacks some compassion into him with a paper fan. That and Nenene's own heartfelt plea brings him around. She misses Yomiko! It doesn't hurt that he's a Sumiregawa fan too.

-Yomiko went into hiding five years ago, in the largest library in Japan. (Can this really be considered hiding?)

-Heh, Anita is put off by all the books, but she'll come along in spite of it.

-Anita's wondering what Nenene will do after meeting Yomiko. After she gets finished yelling at her, that is.

-Nancy inadvertantly trolls Nenene! Wait, what's she doing here?!

-Yomiko comes round the corner with an armload of books, and for a loooong moment she and Nenene stare at each other for the first time in five years. Yomiko carefully puts down the books... and runs away!

-Hilarious denial of who she is as she runs. Ultimately, Nenene clocks her with a book and glomps on and starts crying. Awww...

-Yomiko has a makeshift apartment hidden behind a set of moveable library bookshelves. Yomiko shows off her paper skills with an origami butterfly.

-Heh, there's a copy of Midnight Liberation Zone here in Yomiko's hideaway.

-Nancy tries to make friends with Anita by offering her a book. Anita's almost as cute as Nancy's child. Wha-wha-wha-wha what?! But... he died long ago. :depressed:

-Nenene wants Yomiko to go with them, but Yomiko is content to spend her life in hiding here. Way to piss off Nenene! It's like Yomiko's given up on everything. What happened to her?

-Actually, Joker would like to know that too. Ack! Nancy looks about ready to freak out, and Yomiko's not a whole lot better. To be continued!


Anyway, I'd just like to say, Hell yes! Yomiko's back! :bigsmile:

[Isuzu Inugami]

"Fahrenheit 451," that's a song by Hawkwind. What an obscure reference!

-Maggie bounce! Michelle hair flip! ...And a Yomiko tumble! That's new, isn't it?

-Man, Nancy is seriously freaked out by Joker! Joker is familiar with everything about Nenene (but not so much shoe etiquette.)

-Joker wants the book Yomiko took with her, but she can't hand it over. Because Joker is an evil person. And don't call me "The Paper," Shirley!

-Joker goes for the emotional manipulation--everyone misses her... well, everyone we can account for. And if he's evil, does that mean Yomiko claims to be good?

-Heh, Nenene and Anita tag-team him!

-...Or we can do this the hard way. Oh, and it seems he has a request from Dokusensha to find Nenene, while we're at it. (Apparently they haven't been able to piece together how badly he betrayed them in Hong Kong?)

-"Three Sisters conference!" Really, Michelle? Right now?! Heh, Nenene votes too, and raises Yomiko's hand as well.

-They should consider who they're dealing with, though. Never bring paper to a plywood fight! Or, uh, something.

-They bought the Diet National Library just to get Yomiko?! Are you sure the U.K. is down and out? How was it even for sale? Joker is prepared to execute... not Yomiko, but Nancy. (Does she not have her powers?) (She seems not to have her powers....) Yomiko has to give up the book.

-...But don't count out the Paper Sisters! Anita's athleticism is almost as impressive as her paper skills.

-Nenene punches out Joker, and tells Yomiko she's on her side, even without knowing her circumstances. "Come with us. I'll share your problem with you." Nenene's not about to give her up now.

-Joker's cellphone seems a little bulky.... He tells Wendy he's failed, and to proceed with "Operation Fahrenheit 451." Well, that doesn't sound too good.

-Something is rotten in the book world--and big trucks roll into Jinbo-cho to collect what few books remain.

-There's John Woo again, settling on Maggie's head! Yomiko says they should go to her parents' place to rest and sort everything out. She wants to check in on Jinbo-cho first though.

-Junior is stationed at Yomiko's place? Michelle goes to scout the town, Maggie needs to know where Saitama is, and Nenene asks Yomiko the tough question about just what happened five years ago--Yomiko didn't talk to Nenene because she didn't want to get her into trouble. Yomiko did something terrible to the people she worked with. She also made an important promise (and hey, there's that bookmark from Nancy. It obviously explains the "promise", but I also love how a little detail like that is carried over from the OVA.)

-Anita spots some hanky-panky--Junior is going for the book. Of course they would stake out this place! But boy is he surprised when Nancy can hold him! That book belongs to Yomiko. And I love how casually she bats the gun out of his hand. So did Anita actually recognize that was Junior?

-All the books have been stacked in the middle of Jinbo-cho. And Wendy calmly sets them ablaze. Oh man, Yomiko is just horrified, and walks right up to it, begging them to stop. "It's just like that day," Wendy says to her. But it's Anita who freaks out! Wendy tells Yomiko she must pay for her crime....


Damn! Evidently payback is, indeed, a bitch.

[Hayate Kurogane]

I'm falling behind on comments. What really kills me about that is that I've actually finished rewatching the show, because I got some good momentum going and flew through the rest over the weekend. :sweat:


-Nenene's also invited to a writer's award dinner she won previously. What a pain. Although she's won over by the sisters' enthusiasm about meeting writers or eating the food.

I really, really like the portion of the episode that takes place at the award event. Quite a bit more than the flashback portion, actually. It's tough to put my finger on why, though I guess I'm somehow more invested in Nenene's life and her struggles because they've been brought more into the picture than those of the sisters, so this is another good chance for Nenene development that builds on some of what's been hinted at before.

-Haruhi Nishizono says hello at the party, and gets coached by her staff. Now I see where her little sister gets it from. She's already up to the third volume of her series! And she's snagged a TV appearance (at 2:25 a.m....)

I realize I hadn't mentioned this yet at all, but I really appreciate how the series and its staff chose to deal with Haruhi as a character. What's great is that she's genuinely a fan of Nenene's, and honestly has very little self-awareness in regard to her own growing popularity and entourage and so on. Typically a character like this is designed to be a rival of sorts, whether consistently or as someone who goes through a sort of tsundere sublimation from rival to fan. Instead, we as viewers benefit from the great result of splitting up the dynamic so that Haruhi herself spends her appearances being in awe of Nenene, who finds it all very awkward, while Haruhi's sister gets to do the blatant self-promotion rivalry bit, still without hardly any actual malice and as part of an excellent dynamic between her and Anita and the class.

-Nenene gets publicly humiliated by someone from the awards committee, who doesn't have much sympathy for the concept of writer's block. No wonder she didn't want to come! It's Lee to the rescue, though he pretty much just makes things worse, heh.

-Anita gives him a thumbs-up for it, though. Lee really is a Nenene fan.

Lee rocks here, though it works best if you really understand how much of a breach of etiquette his outburst was, culturally and situationally, since otherwise it comes across as kind of mild.

-Michelle and Maggie are new partners for some mission. Instant bonding over reading the same book. (Given how much they read, the odds of being on the same book at the same time seem astronomical.)

The manga (non-canonically) does go into a bit of detail as to what Ben Wilson's compelling "A giraffe with shrunken neck" novel is about, though that's not really the point. I do think it would be fun to have a fake dust jacket made up so I can have a copy of the book sitting in one of my bookcases. :)

-So that's the day they were born as three sisters, M.A.M. Here in the present, Anita denies she was crying like they described it, heh. And then Nenene tears up over the story as well, to everyone's shock.

As I kind of mention earlier in the post, the sisters' portion of the episode doesn't work for me as well as the Nenene portion. At least part of the reason is because the sisters' portion feels kind of forced; it's like they're telling the story as some sort of fable or idealized recollection, rather than as events that actually happened, so it makes it tough for me to really get too emotionally invested in it even though that's clearly the point. It's also overshadowed a bit, in my mind, by the Nenene portion having such strong elements to it (Nenene's introspective moments, Lee getting a chance to shine). I don't know what I'd want to be different, though maybe giving it its own episode might have helped (and getting rid of episode 5, perhaps).

[Isuzu Inugami]

I really, really like the portion of the episode that takes place at the award event. Quite a bit more than the flashback portion, actually. It's tough to put my finger on why, though I guess I'm somehow more invested in Nenene's life and her struggles because they've been brought more into the picture than those of the sisters, so this is another good chance for Nenene development that builds on some of what's been hinted at before.

The flashback is loaded with "moe" cues for Anita. She's so alone, she doesn't think she has a future. It plays well in a rather simple and direct way. But the award dinner part is a showcase of subtle character interaction and changes, and just showing without drawing attention to all the things that are going on. It's a really interesting contrast.


Lee rocks here, though it works best if you really understand how much of a breach of etiquette his outburst was, culturally and situationally, since otherwise it comes across as kind of mild.

Oh yes, he cost anyone associated with him all sorts of face. Well, himself too, for that matter.



The manga (non-canonically) does go into a bit of detail as to what Ben Wilson's compelling "A giraffe with shrunken neck" novel is about, though that's not really the point.

It looks like a book of naturalist essays from going on safari in the sixties to me. Going by just the book design, that is.

[Isuzu Inugami]

-Maggie bounce! Michelle hair flip! Yomiko tumble!

-Junior is perplexed! Who could catch him?

-Anita is having a bad flashback--Yomiko's silhouette against the fire here triggers too much of her memories. Michelle brings her back. :beatingheart:

-Yomiko says Wendy is being decieved by Joker... but Wendy says she knows exactly what she's doing. Yomiko can scarcely believe it's the same Wendy. I know, right?

-Yomiko's glance accidently gives away Nancy, still carrying the Book of the All Seeing Eyes. Nenene defends her with a good verbal thrashing, and Maggie defends Nenene when they shoot back. Things are looking to rapidly escalate from there.

-And Wendy shoots Yomiko, insisting they surrender! Of the two of them Joker is the lenient one!

-Nancy tries to surrender the book to save Yomiko--but then the booksellers are revolting, and chaos breaks out all over, wheee! It's Drake to the rescue!

-Don't shoot the booksellers, Drake! They come to offer a getaway car. They'll take care of everyone's home, Jinbo-cho, so go without regrets.

-Junior is watching....

-Nancy is very solicitous of Yomiko. Like, really solicitous. Anyway, introductions in the car. Drake is startled by Maggie's name (since his own kid is named Maggi.) Drake was asked to help Yomiko, but he's not saying by whom (it's totally the Todo Books guy!)

-The British Library is taking over book districts all over the world? It's the key to controlling a nation's knowledge and wisdom! He who controls the spicy books controls Arrakis!

-Wendy is frustrated by her failure... and by Joker's bland words of encouragement?

-I love the image of everyone conked out in the back of the minivan, except Anita sitting scrunched up stiffly and staring forward.

-And Junior has tracked them to Yomiko's hideout? How did he keep up with them?

-Heh, yeah it's a Yomiko place. Maggie and Michelle are delighted, and Anita is disgusted by all the books. Yomiko always used to wonder why her friends only had one bookshelf.

-Anita comes out while Drake is setting a perimeter. She wants a private talk about Yomiko. She think Yomiko is the one who burned down the British Library.... Drake doesn't know much about what happened--but he has some good words for Yomiko, in precisely the sort of backhanded way Anita might respect. Anita's going to have to ask Yomiko about it herself, though.

-So apparently Yomiko's parents are dead. And there's also a photo here of herself with Joker and some other colleague in shadow--the good old days?

-Junior sneaks in for the book--Nancy goes from sleep to raging tigress in an instant! He can't get away from her when she grabs him! And his face is revealed to all.... As a last resort he draws a gun on Nancy--and Yomiko drops a bombshell. Nancy is his mother!

-And they tease us with the sound of a single shot as the episode's conclusion!

[Hayate Kurogane]

-Anita is alone with Hisa... and it hurts. Hisa's reading Red-Headed Anne, a.k.a. Anne of Green Gables. (I feel as if someday I ought to read it.) Hisa says Anne is a lot like Anita, and the parallel between Anne's bosom friend and Hisa is pretty apparant. Hisa would like Anita to read it as well, but there's no more time.... :cry:

This time around through the show, I felt sufficient motivation to give Anne of Green Gables a try. (That, and it's free on my Kindle.) I'm about halfway through it right now, and it's a very fun read. Quite a bit different than I thought it would be, though I have no idea what exactly I was basing those thoughts on. :sweat: Anne sure is feisty as all hell; I realize quite distinctly that she's a person that's highly enjoyable to read about, but who would probably annoy the crap out of me in real life.

It's also left me wondering just how much the anime staff were actually influenced by the book in constructing the anime series, specifically the school characters and events, or if it was just a convenient book to use as a minor plot element and, other than the relationship between Anne and Diana as an abstract, there's really not much of it in the anime. I mean, while I read, I think about how certain characters or personalities or events could arguably have loose parallels in Read or Die, but then I feel like I'm overthinking it and finding things that aren't there. Oh well.

-Anita wants a copy of Anne of Green Gables! She reads it through in one night, seeming utterly absorbed too.

As noted above, I'm only partway through the book at this point, having read bits over the course of a few evenings in the minutes before sleep time. I could get through it in one night if I started earlier, because I do speed-read (like, really really). So, Anita just has more motivation than I do.

-Hisa gets there in time. Yes, Tohru knows he's stupid to help her be by Anita, but he's glad he did it anyway.

-"Wherever we are, we'll always be bosom friends."

Now this is a confession scene! :beatingheart:

-There's a knock at the door, and--

-Lee sold them out? He wants Nenene to write for them? Didn't he promise not to smoke until her new book was finished?

Maybe I'm the only one, but I really didn't see this coming the first time I watched the series. Even in hindsight, it's not like the show gives any genuine clues about Lee; his actions and moods and dialogue are too consistent, and there aren't any little tips of the hat to the audience that you'd normally find in anime (I don't mean lazy telegraphing of future events, necessarily, but more like things like odd reaction shots or a particular cinematographic choice in the midst of ambiguous dialogue).

That being said, it also makes perfect sense in hindsight, and I thought it worked well as a plot twist. I mean, sure, you could argue that the complete absence of any tipoffs is the simplest way to have a villain suddenly emerge in a story, but if it feels like it's done simply to move the thing forward then all it does is earn an "epic fail" rating and falls flat for the viewers. Maybe that's the case here, for some folks. But it gets a thumbs-up from me.

[Isuzu Inugami]

It's also left me wondering just how much the anime staff were actually influenced by the book in constructing the anime series

There's also the possible influence of the anime version (http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/encyclopedia/anime.php?id=421), although I suspect it's probably fairly close to the book.



-Lee sold them out?

Maybe I'm the only one, but I really didn't see this coming the first time I watched the series.

Knowing full well what's coming, I still get a twinge of What?! What's he doing?! from it. Just the previous episode he stood up for Nenene at the party in a way I cannot bring myself to believe was just a front.


That being said, it also makes perfect sense in hindsight, and I thought it worked well as a plot twist. I mean, sure, you could argue that the complete absence of any tipoffs is the simplest way to have a villain suddenly emerge in a story, but if it feels like it's done simply to move the thing forward then all it does is earn an "epic fail" rating and falls flat for the viewers.

It seems like a sudden "gotcha" that wasn't set up, and yet I feel like it works, and let the show get away with it. And I'm not really sure why, unless it's that the show has built up the characterizations for everyone else so well to this point that the viewer is willing to extend some trust and see where this goes before being turned off.

[Hayate Kurogane]

That being said, it also makes perfect sense in hindsight, and I thought it worked well as a plot twist. I mean, sure, you could argue that the complete absence of any tipoffs is the simplest way to have a villain suddenly emerge in a story, but if it feels like it's done simply to move the thing forward then all it does is earn an "epic fail" rating and falls flat for the viewers.

It seems like a sudden "gotcha" that wasn't set up, and yet I feel like it works, and let the show get away with it. And I'm not really sure why, unless it's that the show has built up the characterizations for everyone else so well to this point that the viewer is willing to extend some trust and see where this goes before being turned off.

While I seem to use "because it's Read or Die!" as a reason for a lot of things, it's just so true, so that's probably the best reason in the end. If you can accept a story where books are a major plot device, featuring girls wielding paper weapons and familiars, then the old "surprise, I'm a bad guy!" reveal isn't really that ridiculous in comparison. :)

[Hayate Kurogane]

-Anita wants to hurry up and rescue Nenene. Michelle thinks things through--that's a lot of money--and Anita is utterly disgusted. Even though she's not Nenene's fan or anything.

-The best Three Sisters Conference ever!

You know exactly where the whole thing is going, and maybe it's just a hair too long before they get to the "but..." part, yet it's still a great scene. And it sure lets Anita really show how much she actually cares about Nenene.

-Joker says if they get the last book, they'll have all human knowledge assembled in one place? Must be a pretty small font.... However, they need a master key to unlock the books. Seriously? They could just slide a knife along the spine gutters and disbind the things, you know.

Your logic has no place here, sir!

-Junior's setting bombs?

See, now, this is a good way to slip Junior into an episode, when he's on a mission (as opposed to episode 9). And the show just keeps cutting back to him setting more bombs. It's like, holy crap, they're really going for broke, aren't they? :sdsmiley:

-Three intruders, all female. Nice of them to pipe that announcement in to where Nenene can hear it.

I suppose "make an absurd general announcement about things that should be limited to just security staff" is found in the same handbook for antagonistic individuals or groups that also covers things like "tell the protagonist all your plans before leaving him/her alone and unmonitored" and "have no escape plans in case of defeat other than one that's either really inconvenient or one that leads to your capture or death."

-Most publishers don't have robots... or so I've been led to believe. Nice action sequence... but the Sisters shouldn't congratulate themselves yet once they've finished them off. There's still the main event, Sonny Wong.

Not a big fan of the robots. They just seem out of place in a show like this. More of the white-suited soldier guys would've worked better, for me anyway. Thankfully Sonny Wong, Professional Badass, makes up for it.

[Hayate Kurogane]

-Anita looks like jumping to that central sphere was a bit more than she was ready to tackle... that expression when she lands has a real "I never want to do that again" quality.

As tuffy mentions, it's always good when the "A" Team gets to have a go at an episode, particularly an action-filled important one. Anita's jump scene in particular is well-served by these circumstances, and might be the best-looking scene in the whole episode.

-Michelle seems to have things well under control, until they gas her. No fair!

...


-And Junior saves Michelle. But what prompted it? Association with Anita? He helped her out back in the hot springs cave too.

When the gas canister makes it into the room and does its thing, I fully expected Michelle to have managed to accommodate it, and when the guys start to break into the room that she'd launch some sort of new attack. I don't think I'm giving her too much credit, so maybe the staff just needed a way to take her out for a bit to keep her from stealing Anita's thunder and to bring Junior into the picture in more than just a "im in ur base, setting my bombz" way.

Though it is odd that Junior seems to be encountering Michelle only in situations where she's incapacitated to some degree (first blinded, now unconscious). That's how unhealthy relationships start.

-ANITA! Yeah! She delivers Nenene's glasses, but puts them on crooked? Although they seem to straighten out once we're out of Nenene's point of view.

I always thought this was unusual, too. I mean, the shot is supposed to be from Nenene's point of view, but usually when you see this sort of thing the frames of the glasses vanish out of view peripherally, more or less as they would when you actually put on a pair of glasses in real life. The way they opted to animate it here, with the frames ostensibly sitting straight on Nenene's face but visible onscreen and at an odd angle to represent Nenene lying crosswise to Anita, is just really strange.

-Michelle wakes up with a gun in her hand?! Did Junior want her to think she'd taken care of her attackers on her own? Would any Paper Master stoop to using firearms?

I know Junior means well, but I really have no idea what he was thinking here. :sweat:

-Wong gets beaten, assisted by building demolition! They had to drop a building to stop him. Lee goes down, victim of a random security guy who ought to have been more worried about evacuating. Lee at least gets to enjoy a last cigarette... this time the taste is delicious. And John Woo carries something away from him?

Couple of things: wasn't the guy who took out Lee the project manager guy who actually had some lines in various episodes, rather than just some random underling? And that's the lighter that Nenene gave Lee that John Woo flew away with.

It's good that Lee kind of redeemed himself in the end. I mean, I guess in one sense it's hard to make up for having lied to Nenene for four years and then kidnapping her to have her mindscrewed by Dokusensha. But from an abstract storytelling point of view, he did turn out to be an okay guy in the end, and showed that he wasn't truly evil. Well, I dunno; I like Lee, so maybe I'm just more willing to forgive and forget.

-The whole island of Hong Kong sinks!? That right there is overkill, that is.

Ahhh, the Read or Die Effect strikes again! Destroy a building? Nope. Let's destroy AN ENTIRE ISLAND CITY-STATE instead. :sdsmiley:

Though I am disappointed that the scale of the destruction was woefully under-represented, animation-wise. It's kind of hard to tell what exactly is going on as it's happening. Like, okay, there goes the building, but now the ground is liquefying underneath it, so it's actually sinking, but also crumbling, but then water's flooding everywhere in the streets, and wait, what, the whole city's going down now, huh?!

-Anita can manipulate paper in water, which seems to contradict the hot springs episode....

Well, they can't manipulate wet paper, but assuming the paper sphere was thick enough that dry paper remained on the inner layers (for just long enough), they should still be able to manipulate that, and essentially drag the dead weight of the outer layers along with it. Like how Magneto can screw with people's bodies by manipulating the iron in their blood, not because he can manipulate their whole bodies. Or something like that.

[touma]

It had been so long since I watched R.O.D. the TV that I had forgotten how funny it can be.
"It's 'NeNeNe!' That says 'NuNuNU!'"
Michelle looks ...
"My my my."

When NeNeNe defies the police she stomps her foot on the top of the coffee table, giving the cops a nice view up her thigh.

Anita's "No Books or Authors Permitted!!" sign.

In addition to the humor the action is very impressive.
Anita is totally awesome, even without her paper skills.

There is definitely the potential for an interesting relationship between Anita and NeNeNe.

[touma]

I had also forgotten how massive Michelle's boobs are!
And that Chinese dress ... :nosebleed:
I have seen some serious bouncing before, but those things are like two giant supper balls in a paint mixer!

I knew that Anita would not be able to endure listening to NeNeNe read "Sweet Baby Anita's Pure diary." But she did hold out a lot longer than I expected her to.

[Hayate Kurogane]

When NeNeNe defies the police she stomps her foot on the top of the coffee table, giving the cops a nice view up her thigh.

Lucky cops. I always thought Nenene had nice legs.

Just thought I'd throw that out there. :noodle:

[touma]

Evil pigeon! Haven't we seen that pigeon before?

What!? Bodyguards should be with the body that they are guarding? Michelle is stunned by the concept. I thought that she was the brains of the outfit. Who is the brains? Are there brains?:sweat:
But Michelle recovers quickly and tries to locate the place where Nenene said that she was going, and is immediately distracted by seeing Jinbo-cho on the map. Why look for Nenene when they could look for books?
Anita is immune to the attraction of the books. She does get distracted by a frog plushy, but quickly gets back to the search.
There was really no reason for Anita to be looking for Nenene in Jinbo-cho, but she found her so it's all good.

How did Michelle ever get an unlimited credit card?

[Isuzu Inugami]

What!? Bodyguards should be with the body that they are guarding? Michelle is stunned by the concept. I thought that she was the brains of the outfit. Who is the brains? Are there brains?:sweat:

Michelle is a "rises to the occasion" kind of leader. Clearly, this is not an occasion.


How did Michelle ever get an unlimited credit card?

"Borrowed" it from Nenene of course. ^^

[touma]

Getting kidnapped and sold in Hong Kong or Macao? Why Macao? And why does the dub say "Morocco"?
Maggie points out that anybody who tries to kidnap Anita is likely to get his ass kicked.
Michelle observes that if they are sold in Hong Kong they would save on travel expenses, ignoring that Anita is really the only one in the kidnap scenario.

Anita has a really big stuffed purple ... thing. What the hell is that?

Anita: "Can I call you Hisa-chan?"
Hisa (blushes): "Yes."

Hisa: "You're smart, King-san."
Anita (blushes): "I told you to call me Anita."
And so begins my LLL* fantasy.:blush:

Natsume really needs to choose her rivals more carefully. But she did not really seem to mind having her nose smashed by Anita's power spike.

After all of that the fight in the library was a rather jarring change.
Junior's abilities seem somewhat familiar.

The pigeon is back, with a message.


* Little Loli Lesbian, in case you didn't know.

[touma]

How did Michelle ever get an unlimited credit card?

"Borrowed" it from Nenene of course. ^^

Of course. How could I have missed that.:sweat:

[Isuzu Inugami]

When the gas canister makes it into the room and does its thing, I fully expected Michelle to have managed to accommodate it, and when the guys start to break into the room that she'd launch some sort of new attack.

Yeah, that did bother me a bit. She... well, all the Paper Sisters are far too competent in combat to be dispensed with quite so easily.


Though it is odd that Junior seems to be encountering Michelle only in situations where she's incapacitated to some degree (first blinded, now unconscious). That's how unhealthy relationships start.

Oh my! :sdsmiley: When you put it that way....


Couple of things: wasn't the guy who took out Lee the project manager guy who actually had some lines in various episodes, rather than just some random underling?

Oh! I wasn't paying enough attention. That would be much more structurally satisfying.

And that's the lighter that Nenene gave Lee that John Woo flew away with.

And that explains a question I had in a later episode.


It's good that Lee kind of redeemed himself in the end. I mean, I guess in one sense it's hard to make up for having lied to Nenene for four years and then kidnapping her to have her mindscrewed by Dokusensha. But from an abstract storytelling point of view, he did turn out to be an okay guy in the end, and showed that he wasn't truly evil. Well, I dunno; I like Lee, so maybe I'm just more willing to forgive and forget.


Well, he is a real editor, so I wonder if he was on board this thing and lying for the entire time he worked with her, or if somewhere along the line her name came up as a candidate for this and his duties were... shifted with regard to her. He is conflicted about it, even if he's not up to doublecrossing his employer, so I give him a bit of credit.

[Isuzu Inugami]

-Maggie bounce! Michelle hair flip! Yomiko tumble!

(Hey, it's the obligatory yukata episode! Doesn't every anime have an obligatory yukata episode?)

-A quiet morning. Did Anita just unthinkingly pick up Maggie's cookbook and start reading?! This isn't where we left off last episode!

-Junior is brushing his teeth as if he belongs here! However, Yomiko is holed up in her room being semi-catatonic with Nancy.

-The issue is Junior. Michelle insists he's a good boy regardless, heh.

-We get to see what happened--Nancy seems as shocked as Junior to hear he's her child, and the gunshot is accidental and wild (thanks to Michelle, anyway.)

-Yomiko has her head in Nancy's lap. She's sorry she lied to Nancy.

-Anita gets some time alone with Junior. "You tried to shoot me at school!" Heh, he gets off lightly. He hasn't reported in to Wendy because he wants to know the full story. They're in truce mode.

-Meanwhile, in Evil-land, Wendy is concerned there's no word from Junior. They know where he is--should she go collect him? Joker tells her to delegate; she has work here.

-No, seriously Maggie, Michelle knows Junior is a good boy!

-Nenene sends in a note to Yomiko. Come out and talk to me! Nancy tells Yomiko she doesn't mind staying hidden in here with her. She's worried about Junior, but Yomiko is more important to her.

-Nenene sits down with Anita--who wonders how she can be so relaxed when they're fugitives. Nenene admits they're running away, but feels like they're chasing something too. Anita wonders if she's getting enough sleep!

-Drake overslept! Everyone is fooling around blowing bubbles and doing origami, because they're bored and nobody's showing up. He's not inclined to join, but changes his mind after trying to give Junior a suspicious glare and giving up.

-And Yomiko makes an appearance. She's ready to explain. Nancy was pregnant at the end of the I-Jin incident! Junior is Ikkyu's son! (This would imply he's also four years old!!?) He was taken away because the British Library thought he would be useful. Yomiko thinks they accelerated his growth, given the technology she knows they have. They don't intend to make him an agent, though. It's much worse. They mean to make him the vessel for the revival of Mr. Gentlemen.

-Yomiko confronted Joker about this, but.... And Junior wants to know what this means for him. Apparently he can Vulcan mind-meld with The Book of the All-Seeing Eyes, but it's not a good idea!

-Telemetry on Junior indicates he's already at Mr. Gentelmen's levels?! The kid's a monster! Joker smiles.

-Junior-inspired collective flashback commemorative holograph--British Library, Special Operations Unit! (Complete with bratty little kid running around!) Anita has the chills. Cut to: Yomiko imploring Joker to return Nancy's baby. Don't you know, Yomiko, you serve the greater good of the UK! Or is it that the UK exists to serve Mr. Gentlemen? Yomiko's still not taking it well, so Joker suggests a vacation. Oh, and Yomiko's lover (?!) and mentor, Donny Nakajima is still alive. (He must be the shaded figure from the photo last episode) Except... he's not quite what he used to be...? Yomiko freaks now, and seriously goes nuts then! She burned down the British Library! (Was the actual fire an accident?) And Anita was right there as well, to see it all! I like how she's lined up just as she was then, to see the terrifying image of Yomiko surrounded in flames.

End credits! They're just picking worse and worse times for these.

[Isuzu Inugami]

Anita has a really big stuffed purple ... thing. What the hell is that?

Not a book, and that's what's important. ^^


And so begins my LLL* fantasy.:blush:

Fantasy hell, it's three quarters canon!


Natsume really needs to choose her rivals more carefully. But she did not really seem to mind having her nose smashed by Anita's power spike.


I like how Natsume is set up as this rival figure, and almost immediately becomes so... not. She doesn't set up her little cadre of bullies, she doesn't turn up her nose and ignore Anita, she doesn't try to turn everyone against her.

[touma]

Natsume really needs to choose her rivals more carefully. But she did not really seem to mind having her nose smashed by Anita's power spike.


I like how Natsume is set up as this rival figure, and almost immediately becomes so... not. She doesn't set up her little cadre of bullies, she doesn't turn up her nose and ignore Anita, she doesn't try to turn everyone against her.

I am wondering if there might be a potential triangle here.
Actually, a second potential triangle. I think that the boy who is dumb enough to pick on Anita might be hot for Hisa, not that I would blame him.

[Hayate Kurogane]

Though it is odd that Junior seems to be encountering Michelle only in situations where she's incapacitated to some degree (first blinded, now unconscious). That's how unhealthy relationships start.

Oh my! :sdsmiley: When you put it that way....

I don't recall exactly how far and in which directions Read or Die was taken in terms of doujinshi during the height of its popularity, but one does find obvious...uh, potential in this fact.


Couple of things: wasn't the guy who took out Lee the project manager guy who actually had some lines in various episodes, rather than just some random underling?

Oh! I wasn't paying enough attention. That would be much more structurally satisfying.

The question I had, though, is why exactly a project manager, even if he is part of Dokusensha, would be carrying a firearm in the lab.

And that's the lighter that Nenene gave Lee that John Woo flew away with.

And that explains a question I had in a later episode.

If you watch the scene again, you'll notice that after Lee lights his cigarette, there's a shot showing him setting the lighter down on the floor on his left hand side, and then a few cuts later, after the shot in which John Woo is flying off with the lighter (in slow motion!) which is admittedly hard to make out due to the distance, there is a repeat of the same shot by Lee's side which shows/confirms the lighter is what the item was.

[touma]

... although the attempt to shoot Anita at the end felt rather cheap and tacked on.

I think that may have been done mostly to provide a chance to show how bad-ass Sony Wong can be. Aside from the fact that he grabbed the guy's head like he was gripping a baseball, and then smashed it through a wall, how did he even get over there?

[touma]

We meet Mr. Kim from Dokushensha. Is he a good guy or a bad guy? He seems good, but he gives me a bad feeling. Besides, characters who make a point of saying that they are good guys usually are not.:)
His conversation establishes the time of these events relative to the OVA, and the fact that Great Brittan is on the decline (the dub insists on using "England").

The three sisters in those tight black outfits give me a definite "Cat's eye" feeling. They give me another feeling too, but this is not the place.:sweat:

Sony Wong is rather impressive, and intimidating.

And again, the pigeon.

[Hayate Kurogane]

... although the attempt to shoot Anita at the end felt rather cheap and tacked on.

I think that may have been done mostly to provide a chance to show how bad-ass Sony Wong can be. Aside from the fact that he grabbed the guy's head like he was gripping a baseball, and then smashed it through a wall, how did he even get over there?

Because he's a Professional Bad-Ass, of course. :sdsmiley:

But you're right, in terms of passage of time from when he walks off the dock to when he appears on the parapet, it doesn't really work out sensibly.

Hmmm... maybe in addition to being a Paper Master, he's also the Read or Die universe's Criss Angel? :sweat:

[touma]

Hisa wants to meet Anita's sisters, and asks to come visit.
"I think it's time that I met your parents.":knowitall:

and, and, Hisa likes Anita as much as she likes books, so she wants Anita to be friends with them! That was damn near a confession!
Very, very damn near.

[Hayate Kurogane]

-Ugh, time for a recap episode...err, report. Actually I like both that the recap episode isn't really a recap episode, and that it's formatted into this report that carries loads of information about just what the heck has been going on.

This is how a recap episode should be done, in the event a series ends up with one. Though the context probably helps, in that much of it involves material from the OVA which really hasn't been touched on too much thus far in the TV series, which then just gets the viewer excited about how OVA elements are going to start to become more prominent.

-"United Kingdom of Great Britain Recovery Plan: Operation Sleeping Books." Mr. Gentlemen (shouldn't it be "Gentleman"?), "father of the U.K." has been around a long time... and then not around more recently. I didn't learn this stuff in history class, but then I'm an American.

I know I've come across a proper explanation for why "Gentlemen," plural, is correct, though damned if I can't recall what it was or where I found it, such that it would be believable and canonical. It might have been an unofficial manga contribution suggesting that he's been able to survive for so long by transferring his mind through multiple bodies, not just the one transfer around which the TV series is based, though I'm really not sure. It's going to drive me nuts now until I find it again or someone tells me.

-Dokusensha is the Chinese counterpart of the British Library, guarding the Imperial book collections? They recruited a million-man army of readers through their bookstores, and moved into Hong Kong when it transfered back to China. And then started intensifying sub-rosa conflict with the British Library. But it's still uncertain whether the I-Jin in the OAV series were acting for Dokusensha, or on their own.

I find the part of the story about Dokusensha beginning their return to power in the modern era as a small chain bookstore to be absolutely hilarious. Only in Read or Die... :sweat:

Borders: You're Doing It Wrong

:P

-Back to the report. They lost some genes and a Gentlemen book in a terrorist attack on the British Library. Somehow this damaged relations with other countries (wha-?) and initiated a drastic tumble for the U.K. The remaining books were hidden around the world.

It's great how this whole franchise is based around the idea that printed literature and an institution that maintains it are so significant. It's no less ridiculous than alchemy in Fullmetal Alchemist or Black Technology in Full Metal Panic or various power sources in Gundam shows, to name a few examples, but it's so much more refreshing somehow.

-New ending theme! Two girls sitting on a park bench reading. They trade books three quarters of the way through the song. I think I prefer the first ending, though; both the music and the dynamic bookmark.

"Moments in the Sun" is a better song in many ways, the sequence associated with it is more interesting (until the final episode of the TV series confirms what you kind of suspect the second sequence is actually showing), and Kazami is a better vocalist than Rieko Miura. Certainly, the very idea of having Rieko Miura, Yomiko's seiyuu, sing the second ending theme is purely for marketing and novelty reasons.

Yet... I really enjoy listening to "Confidence." Moreso than "Moments in the Sun." I don't know. Something about the tune, and the lyrics, and how it's all been put together just really, really works for me. Yeah, the lyrics are pretty standard anisong cliches, and the song itself is a bit too conspicuously constructed to be a dramatic and spirit-rousing anthem, and I kind of get the feeling that the original recording of Miura's vocals before the sound guys got a hold of it was probably pretty rough even compared to the average J-pop artist. But still. Oh well. It's not like there's anything for me to gain by overthinking it. :)

[touma]

Finally, more Hisa. After a whole episode without Hisa I was starting to get withdrawal symptoms.:relief:
Anita and Hisa hold hands as they walk (or are they skipping?).
All of the sisters like Hisa, of course.

Junior again.
He pulls a knife, but then realizes that Anita remembers him only from the book store. Apparently she did not recognize him during the fight in the library.
I wonder why the dub left out the line about him being half Japanese. And I wonder if that information will ever be important.
Does Junior really like Anita, or is he just trying to get information out of her? I think that he likes her, and that is the reason why he asked for a school uniform.

When Hisa is talking to Anita about the book report she is just too darned cute.:beatingheart:
"Until I met you books were the only friends that I had." "Because I like you just as much as I like books." It does not take too much imagination to see a confession there.

Is Anita really going to read Nenene's book? Yes!

I think that Nenene had been putting off starting on her next book until Yomiko returned. But now it looks like she is working on it. Because of the sisters?

[touma]

So the old couple says to Anita "If you don't have anyplace to go, come to our house" Uh ... yeah ... right ... sure, who would ever go anywhere with those two?
Sub: We an watch porn videos together.
Dub: We can watch movies together. (At least the dub version is less likely to induce nausea.)
Anita quite understandably freaks out and runs away.
I am anxiously waiting to see if there is a point to all of this. John Smith, or whoever, apparently has the whole town under his control, so why bother with the deceptions?
Michelle, the real one, figures out what is happening. I guess that she really is smarter than she seemed to be back in episode 3.
The situation with the town full of actors finally does make sense, in a demented sort of way.

Kim's idea of punishment is a bit extreme. The demolition of the town was done so casually in the background that I almost did not realize what was happening.

[Isuzu Inugami]

-Maggie bounce! Michelle hair flip! Yomiko tumble!

-Everyone recognizes young Anita in the library. A flurry of papers protects her as the library erupts in flame--was that her, or Yomiko? The style of paper usage seems more Yomiko, but Yomiko was running amok at the time....

-And we're back to the present, with Junior back to normal. Yomiko and Anita especially are pretty shellshocked. Anita dashes!

-Yeah, Anita isn't taking this well, and now she knows who's at fault.

-Yomiko apologizes for everything that happened. Nenene doesn't think she truly did anything wrong.

-Anita can't remember why she was at the British Library. It's okay, Michelle tells her--now is what's important. (Damn, but Michelle and Maggie are good at taking care of her.) Anita says she's okay with continuing to protect Nenene, even though she can't stand Yomiko. She'll be fine as long as her sisters are with her.

-Junior understands his fate if he returns the book to Joker. Nenene suggests he stay with them instead. Anita's his friend after all. Friend? The idea catches him by surprise.

-There's a wonderful semi-halting, semi-awkward conversation as Junior and Nancy are together in the kitchen getting to know each other. She might not have chosen "Junior" for his name, but she isn't sure what she would have called him either.

-"Mirror Man" (what a casual looking dude, lounging about) has located them. Joker wants him to contact Junior and capture the others... "preferably" alive.

-Nenene wants to burn the Book of the All-Seeing Eyes. But the key to Anita's past might be in the book (How did they come to this conclusion? The fact that Anita appeared in the book-induced flashback?), so what does she think? She's fine with it, because she has her sisters.

-This isn't a crowd for burning books, though, and Yomiko objects--they should bury it, since it might technically be considered human remains. No! Burn it! This is the time for decisive action!

-Junior is awkward about suddenly having a family. Nancy overhears part of that, but not Anita reassuring him "once you become used to them, they're like air."

-Drake asks Junior where the book is--no, that's Mirror Man, as a glance in the mirror reveals. Okay, I get it. Junior has to report the situation, and come up with a way to get hold of the book. He's not free of the British Library.

-Joker has a new lackey named Marianne? And Wendy is Very Not Happy she wasn't sent to pick up Junior. Joker says he has more important (and dirtier) work for her.

-Anita wakes up alone. Looking for her sisters, she finds Yomiko and Nenene, but nobody else. What's going on? They check that the book is safe--Yomiko hid it in another book's slipcase-- And then we discover Nenene isn't the real Nenene.

-Mirror Man, you're better off not explaining your ability. "Changing the refractive index of light"?

-The rest of the gang has been gassed, and are being taken to Joker in a helicopter. Don't worry, Junior's with them as a guide. Ouch! He's betrayed them!

-Yeah, pasting them to a bookcase isn't the safest way to keep paper masters down.

-Invisible! Well, I guess that's a somewhat closer to the stunts you could do by changing the refractive index of light.

-Heh, Anita grudgingly allies herself with Yomiko with a "Don't get in my way!" and Yomiko comes back with a "Nice to work with you." They're on such different wavelengths.

-To be continued!

[Isuzu Inugami]

I find the part of the story about Dokusensha beginning their return to power in the modern era as a small chain bookstore to be absolutely hilarious. Only in Read or Die... :sweat:

Borders: You're Doing It Wrong

:P



They needed to recruit their Million Reader Army (although I'm kind of vague on just what the Million Reader Army was supposed to have done.)

Living not an hour away from Borders' home base, (Friend of mine in Ann Arbor was hosting someone who wanted to go to a local bookstore, you know, not something like Borders, but a local book store.) I've not heard of any violent subsidences sinking Ann Arbor in the local news, but maybe the it's the Paper Sisters who got them all the same.

[Isuzu Inugami]

I think that Nenene had been putting off starting on her next book until Yomiko returned. But now it looks like she is working on it. Because of the sisters?

I think that both having to deal with them crashing in on her life, and consciously choosing to let them continue to do so, has shaken her around enough to drive some cracks thorugh her writer's block.

[touma]

Hooray! Hisa is back.

The library is trashed again. Has Junior still not finished searching?
Hisa is going to spend the night in the library, alone. Anita asks "do you want me to come?" Gee, I wonder what Hisa's answer might possibly be.:devil:
But then the other girls decide to invite themselves to the party. The look of stunned disappointment on Hisa's face is really funny, and quite touching. It nearly broke the needle on my moe meter.
Then Natsume makes a dramatic entrance and completely takes charge.
Natsume: We will gladly join you.
Hisa: Huh?!!

Hisa tries desperately to convince herself that "the more the merrier."
Anita invites the poltergeist to the poltergeist catching party.

Another jarring transition. They are trying to forcibly increase a persons IQ? No matter what it does to the test subject?

And we are back at the school again. That's a relief.
Natsume, who has named the poltergeist Polpol (her sister must have gotten all of the creative genes) is becoming a really great supporting character. She brought a "ghost net" and basket?

Anita, you dummy, it is not the stars that Junior wants to stare at.
Junior predicts that the poltergeist will not show.

Hisa's rejection of Toru was cruel, but necessary.:devil:
Did she actually tell him that she is in love with Anita?

The way Anita blushes and loses composure when she sees Hisa.
Hisa's reaction when someone asks if Junior is Anita's boyfriend.
Toru's expression when he sees Hisa's reaction.
Anita's look of disappointment when Hisa walks away with toru.
Junior lying to Wendy about finding the book.
All of these potential relationships are getting a bit complicated for me.
Right now I am definitely enjoying the school romance story more that the action drama story.

[touma]

-And Kim is briefing the big dude, Sonny Wong, to send him in as backup. Also, he can go ahead and kill Drake and Alice. (!) Kim's kind of a nasty fellow, isn't he.
He orders a couple of killings, and blows up a town. I vote for nasty.

-Junior takes off before Michelle can see him.
But she had already realized who he is. Apparently Michelle can identify people by hugging them.

-Well that was rude. Just as I had gotten to like her. Really, there wasn't any call to kill her now. Damn!
I felt a little bad about it. I would have felt much worse if she had not just tried to kill the sisters and Nenene.

-And the way Wong casually blocks Drake's shots, until, like swatting a pesky insect he finally returns one, is just chilling.
Indeed. And after what happened I am sure that the sisters are not going to be on friendly terms with him. This could become rather troublesome.

-Wait, what... Junior suddenly jumps out of the ground to grab the key, and shows off some dematerialization powers when Wong tries to stop him.
I was rather shocked when it seemed that Wong had cut Junior in half.

-Even though they failed, Dokusensha will still give them half their pay.
And Anita is really, really pissed off at Kim, and Wong, and not because of the half pay. I am sure that the other girls feel the same, but Anita is the only one who can express her feelings like that.

There seems to be some dissension inside Dokusensha. Joker just pledged allegiance to them, but now he sends Junior to take the key from them. At lease I am assuming that Joker sent him. Junior has obviously been having some doubts about his own allegiance, but I can not think of any reason for him to go after the key on his own.

[touma]

-Haruhi Nishizono says hello at the party, and gets coached by her staff. Now I see where her little sister gets it from. She's already up to the third volume of her series! And she's snagged a TV appearance (at 2:25 a.m....)
Both of the Nishizono sisters have become surprisingly fun and interesting characters. It's too bad that there is not more time for them.

-Nenene gets publicly humiliated by someone from the awards committee, who doesn't have much sympathy for the concept of writer's block.
This scene really does not work for me. It seems too forced and contrived, like it is there just to make Lee and Nenene look cool later.
Not only does the old witch insult Nenene but she shows no respect for the awards ceremony, the other writers, or the guests. To me she humiliated herself more than Nenene.
I do like the results, but the scene itself just did not seem right.

-Nenene gets dragooned into giving what turns out to be a really nice speech, and unexpectedly announces her new book.
And the old witch does look like she is embarrassed by her earlier rant.

-Anita has her Grinch on... it's Christmas and she starving. And suddenly Michelle returns with a "Merry Christmas!" and gives her the book she was reading. And then Maggie shows up completely independently and does the same. It's the same book!
I knew that they would come back, but I expected them to bring something a bit more practical. Like food, a coat, blankets, a kerosene heater ... :sweat:

[touma]

-Anita runs into Junior, and gives him the news as well. She tells him to make more friends, besides her. He didn't realize he was her friend. I love the exasperated sigh this elicits from Anita.

-Hmm, Anita cleans up loose ends by getting the mystery book back in the hands of the guy who got shot in the ankles. It doesn't work out well, though...!
Junior would not take the book while it was in Anita's care, but as soon as she handed it off he was free to act.
I think that he was lying about not realizing that they were friends.
I wonder if Junior killed that guy or just knocked him out. That is something that I will probably never know.

-The Book of the Supporting Bones. Yet another creepy title. The only one left is the Book of the All-Seeing Eye. Apparently it's Joker's gang monitoring Yomiko's place. They're going to build an ideal future--everyone will be saved thanks to Junior's efforts! They why is the music so ominous?
I expect Joker's utopia to be a typical one where life is better for everybody, except the ones that he decides to kill because they do not meet his standards. But this show has surprised me several times.

-Anita wants a copy of Anne of Green Gables! She reads it through in one night, seeming utterly absorbed too.
Some people declare their love by by writing a book. Anita does it by reading a book, twice now.

-Anita gave Hisa a pair of Froggy-kun Anne of Green Gables dolls.
Those are some rather weird looking engagement rings.:)

-Nenene will crash with the Sisters in Hong Kong (as revenge!). They get to their place, and there are no books--they were all sacrificed to save the plane back in episode one!
I never even thought about where all of that paper might have come from.
Nenene is probably feeling a bit guilty for treating them like freeloaders.

-There's a knock at the door, and--
This show is really good at throwing a sucker punch.

[touma]

At least the Dokusensha goons brought some non-lethal weapons. I am sure that they were well armed with lethal weapons too, but they refrained from using them.
That could not have been because they are nice guys ('cause they ain't). I am guessing that it was part of their deal with the police.

-Joker says if they get the last book, they'll have all human knowledge assembled in one place? Must be a pretty small font.... However, they need a master key to unlock the books. Seriously? They could just slide a knife along the spine gutters and disbind the things, you know.
If that toroidal (?) thing that Junior stole was the key then the lock that it opens would be bigger than the book.
Maybe these are not ordinary books.:P
And how will the get the information into Nenene? I am assuming that this is their goal.
It should be interesting to see where they are going with this whole book thing.

-Sonny Wong goes to deal with the disturbance
I was afraid that something like this was the reason why they showed us how dangerous Wong is.

-Most publishers don't have robots...
I am beginning to suspect that maybe, just maybe, Dokusensha is not your typical, ordinary publisher. Maybe.:P

To be continued. :P

Nasty cliffhanger.:(

[touma]

-And Junior saves Michelle. But what prompted it? Association with Anita? He helped her out back in the hot springs cave too.

He seems to have developed a crush on Michelle, ever since meeting her at the end of the "ghost hunting" school episode.



I don't <bounce> know what <bounce> might have fascinated <bounce> an adolescent boy <bounce> like him. <jiggle>
In addition to that ...
I think that Junior recognizes that Michelle is just a nice person who likes him as an ordinary boy*. He probably does not have much, if any, experience with adults who are not trying to exploit him for his abilities.

*She did want to make him her little sister, but he did not seem to be offended by that minor misunderstanding.

[touma]

I had planned to watch this episode immediately after episode 12, but circumstances forced me to wait a whole day between episodes. Now I feel really sorry for people who had to wait a whole week when they watched it on television.

-Michelle wakes up with a gun in her hand?! Did Junior want her to think she'd taken care of her attackers on her own? Would any Paper Master stoop to using firearms?
I think that Junior left the gun with her just so that she would have it if she needed it. Junior is really amazing, but he is still a child. I do not remember seeing anything to indicate that he had any previous knowledge of paper masters.
Besides, if I was a paper master I would most definitely use firearms if the opportunity occurred. Pistols, rifles, chain guns, LAWS rockets, thermonuclear devices, whatever it took to do the job and save my ass.

-Maggie is still holding off Wong. Maggie is awesome!
Indeed she is. She did not really defeat him, and I would have been a bit disappointed if she had, but she definitely did keep him from going after Michelle and Anita. She did what she had to, and a lot more.

-The whole island of Hong Kong sinks!? That right there is overkill, that is.
And that really went beyond my suspension of disbelief capability.

-"Mi-nee... Ma-nee...." They're okay after all, but it's a bad moment for Anita and Nenene before they show up. And Nenene is a jubilant as Anita to see them.
Was that John Woo leading Michelle and Maggie to Anita and Nenene?

[touma]

-Ugh, time for a recap episode...err, report. Actually I like both that the recap episode isn't really a recap episode, and that it's formatted into this report that carries loads of information about just what the heck has been going on.
I thought that this was a very good way to provide some background information and explain the reasons why some things have been happening.
I do not consider the OVA material to be a recap because that was a different show that the TV viewers might not have seen. I have seen it but that was long ago, so this episode was very useful to me.
Episodes that are mostly narrative usually do not work for me, but this one did. Rather than Wendy's narration explaining what I was seeing it was more like the visuals were explaining what Wendy was saying. If that makes any sense.:sweat:

-LOL, "Jiggy Stardust" developed the special paper for this.
I knew that I should recognize that name, but it did not come to me until just now:
Ziggy Stardust, aka David Bowie. How soon I forget. Actually it has been a while, hasn't it? And I really am old enough to remember him.:sweat:

-Back to the report. They lost some genes and a Gentlemen book in a terrorist attack on the British Library. Somehow this damaged relations with other countries (wha-?) and initiated a drastic tumble for the U.K.
I am not getting it. Why would any other countries be upset with GB because some terrorists attacked them? I really feel like I must have missed something.

[touma]

-Nenene will let them stay at her place... Anita points out it's the least she can do, considering she owes them her life. Too bad the place has been ransacked....
They are internationally wanted terrorists and they go directly to the place where they had been staying before they supposedly committed their crimes? I know that they have no experience with being on the run from the law, since they are not really criminals, but with all of the books that they have read I would think that they would have picked up a clue or two.:knowitall:

Interesting background exchange as they assess the damage to the apartment:
Michelle: Her bankbooks and credit cards are still here.
Nenene: How do you know where I keep my bankbooks and credit cards?
Michelle: Oh? Well ... Hehehe.

-Anita has a touch of traumatic flashback idly playing with Lee's lighter (wait--I missed when they got that!).
Just a guess:
Back in episode 13 John Woo took the lighter, and I think that I saw John Woo leading Michelle and Maggie to Anita and Nenene after the flood. If I am right about that then he might have given the lighter to Maggie and Michelle.
I do not have a guess about why he would have done that. But John Woo, who is definitely not an ordinary pigeon, seems to have his own agenda, separate from Dokusensha.

[Isuzu Inugami]

-Maggie bounce! Michelle hair flip! Yomiko tumble!

-Anita and Yomiko vs. an invisible man. "Is... is he still here?"

-Anita thinks she's clever, but it's Yomiko who's alert. They aren't very in sync (as Mirror Man points out.)

-Heh, they use his power against him, by throwing ink and seeing where it disappears. Anita seems ready to slit his throat (or so Yomiko fears) but settles for a good punch instead.

-Anita vows vengeance on Junior... although Yomiko wonders why Anita was left behind and points out they still have business to take care of.

-Like surrendering? Yomiko has to keep headstrong Anita under control. "The early bird gets the three pieces of paper," huh.

-Ahah, Yomiko was still carrying reams of paper! Anita is great fighting, but those guards could use some more training-the one guy at the end of the row just stands there like a doofus, waiting to be taken down. Anita acknowledges Yomiko's ability.

-Joker anticipates the coming era of U.K. dominance. Although some wonder if Mr. Gentlemen will live up to their expectations? They're going to test the "Perfect Language" in Jinbo-cho?

-"A human being who doesn't grow up has no right to live" says Joker about how Wendy's changed. Yeek!

-Witness the workings of a true Paper Master, Anita! Yomiko brings forth... a paper airplane! It wasn't the most reliable thing in the OAV, and Yomiko says she'll need Anita's help with it here. Yomiko attempts to calm Anita by pinching her cheeks... it doesn't work... but it sort of does.

-Joker has Dokusensha taken care of, and will be making an announcement about them soon...? The President asks when he can meet the new Mr. Gentlemen... dinner tomorrow?!

-Junior doesn't appreciate the helicopter pilot's small talk. Meanwhile, Anita is discovering she can fly!

-They catch up and start calling for everyone and OH WHAT THE-!! The helicopter explodes right before their eyes. Anita screams out for her sisters, and Yomiko is too stunned to say a word. :depressed:

-Joker doesn't even twitch when Wendy writes down what happened and shows it to him during his call to the President. Incredibly smoothly, he buys some time before he has to display Mr. Gentlemen, though. Damn he's cold!

-Anita and Yomiko can only stare at the burning wreckage. (And John Woo arrives!) Anita snaps--this is Yomiko's fault! She grabs the book and hurls it into the fire--this is what they should have done to begin with! (That's what I said!) Anita hates books and hates Yomiko and tells her to get out of her sight! And Yomiko... walks away, crying quietly as Anita breaks down and howls. :cry:

-Anita has returned to visit her school. No one is in the library, but there is a copy of Anne of Green Gables. And just then Hisa arrives. Anita has no one to turn to but Hisa. She's on the edge of tears, the words forcing their way out of her throat, heavy as stones.

"Who are you?" asks Hisa.

FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFUU-

-Oh, and Joker's "Alternative Plan" file has a picture of Anita on it next to Junior. As if things aren't bad enough.

-Yomiko arrives in Jinbo-cho, to see it being torn down en-masse. As if things aren't bad enough.

Hey, look, it's a new entry competing for "Most Depressing Episode!"

[touma]

"Fahrenheit 451," that's a song by Hawkwind. What an obscure reference!

It is also a book by Ray Bradbury. Which is apparently an even more obscure reference to some people.:P

Edit: Are all of the episode titles derived from book titles?
Some of them are exact titles, Such as:
The Right Stuff
Heart of Darkness
Christmas Carol

Some are close:
"The Papers Have Landed" from "The Eagle Has Landed"?
"Twilight of the Papers" from "Twilight of the Gods"?

But most of them I can not even guess at.
There are too many for it to be a coincidence, but maybe there are just a few cases.

[touma]

-Junior is stationed at Yomiko's place? ...

... -Anita spots some hanky-panky--Junior is going for the book. Of course they would stake out this place!
Of course, that should have been obvious to everybody. But not only do they go there but Nenene insists on getting an explanation from Yomiko while they are sitting there! She can't wait until they are in a safer place?

But boy is he surprised when Nancy can hold him!
She apparently does still have at least some of here powers. Maybe she just doesn't remember her powers. The way that she has been acting makes me think that she has mentally regressed to a much younger age.

[touma]

-The British Library is taking over book districts all over the world?
I am having a real problem with this.
It was bad enough that Joker had control of Tokyo, and apparently the entire Japanese government (where was the JSDF?) but now it is happening everywhere in the world. If the British Library has that much power how am I supposed to believe that the entire nation of Great Britain is weak and helpless?
I am still enjoying the show but my level of enjoyment has dropped precipitously in the last two episodes. And it is going to continue to fall if I do not get some reasonable explanations. If I did not care more about the characters than the story I would probably have already given up.

-And Junior has tracked them to Yomiko's hideout? How did he keep up with them?
Maybe Yomiko was wrong about the Library having lost all of her data and Junior was actually there ahead of them. If that is the case then Joker will not be far behind.
Or maybe Junior was in the van with them. I do not remember if there were any places where he could have hidden. Perhaps on the roof?

-And they tease us with the sound of a single shot as the episode's conclusion!
They are getting really god at this kind of thing.:(

[touma]

-A quiet morning. Did Anita just unthinkingly pick up Maggie's cookbook and start reading?! This isn't where we left off last episode!
At this point I was seriously starting to think that I had somehow skipped an episode.

-We get to see what happened--Nancy seems as shocked as Junior to hear he's her child, and the gunshot is accidental and wild (thanks to Michelle, anyway.)
Junior was definitely pulling the trigger before Michelle's arrow hit the gun. Was he intending to shoot Nancy? This is just one more thing that I will probably never know.

-Meanwhile, in Evil-land, Wendy is concerned there's no word from Junior. They know where he is
Right here I was thinking that somebody should have suspected that Junior might have some kind of tracking device on him. But I have to admit that I did not think of it until Wendy said this.:sweat:

Yomiko freaks now, and seriously goes nuts then! She burned down the British Library! (Was the actual fire an accident?)
I think that it was an accident. If she had wanted to start a fire she could have found a more reliable way to do it than by cutting the power cord on a computer. In reality that almost certainly would not have started a fire. But, reality has no place here.:P

And Anita was right there as well, to see it all!
Is this so traumatic for her because she was caught in the fire? Or is there even more to it?

End credits! They're just picking worse and worse times for these.
Aye.

[Isuzu Inugami]

-Maggie bounce! Michelle hair flip! Yomiko tumble! They haven't changed the opening in spite of killing off half the cast! :knowitall:

-Anita back in school, and friends with Hisa again...? But things aren't right. Natsume is embarrassed by her sister's book!

-Anita wonders if she can be anything when she grows up. She goes home to Nenene's apartment, living alone. :cry:

-There are posters for "The Permanent Library for Mankind" all over the place. Yomiko is led by a cat to the Last Literary D-Line of Jinbo-cho, "Toto Books Makeshift Store!" Hah! Can't keep a good bookseller down! :bigsmile:

-Books are disappearing worldwide, libraries and book districts replaced by transmission centres for some sort of world wide... web... of information distribution and control.

-The Toto Books guy offers Yomiko all his books to save Jinbo-cho.

-Hisa and Tohru are a couple now?! And Natsume now has a desk full of her sister's books. And Wendy shows up to ask Anita how she's settling in. It may still be "off," but she's happier this way, yes? This is a "sample", they'll have to correct the things Anita feels awkward about, so they'd like her to cooperate. Is everyone in the school artificial, or mind-controlled, or what? They're still looking for the Book of the All Seeing Eyes. Wendy takes it pretty calmly when Anita tells her it burned, though. Anita won't be needed anymore once they complete the Perfect Language, so they just want some cellular samples before setting her up with a new past, family, and friends. And mind-wipe. Can't forget the mind-wipe... oh, wait. :sweat: Wendy is seriously creeping me out here.

-To conclude: Anita can consent to this phony dream-life, or be cut off and die like a dog on the streets.

-And Wendy orders a search of the helicopter wreckage for the book. It's fireproof, isn't it. Damn.

-Junior's telemetry shows a gap between when it cut off and when the helicopter crashed. Suspicious!

-Hisa translates a nice passage about eternal love friendship from Anne of Green Gables in class, and Anita is happy to spot that she still carries the gift she made her. But... this is still a fake. Anita apologizes, and runs away. Hisa doesn't come after her.... Hisa would have come after her!

-And back at the apartment waiting for her... is Yomiko, crying over that old picture of her and Nenene. Anita won't forgive her... but there are people she finds even more unforgivable. They are allies again...but Wendy is already giving orders to capture them....

-Junior is alive, hiding out with Michelle (and where are the rest?) He set them down, then got rid of the transponder in his body (ick!) and blew up the helicopter!

-Uhhh, what do you mean they all got separated, Junior? You're the one who....

-Anita and Yomiko are liberating Jinbo-cho! Joker will handle it, with words alone. And his agents may have located the others via spy satellite.

-Joker outlines his plan for a peaceful utopia. Anita gives Yomiko a pinch to the cheek lest she be swayed by him, heh. Anita won't let them play with her memories.

-They have the upper hand on Joker, but he has the upper hand on information. The others will likely be killed in the commando raid that's about to begin. He wants their surrender, but Yomiko and Anita kidnap and carry him off via paper airplane...!

[Isuzu Inugami]

-Maggie bounce! Michelle hair flip! Yomiko tumble!

-Maggie and Nenene scouting out something.... Nenene wonders if the others are all right and Maggie is certain the world works in such a way that they'll meet again. Nenene's reaction to this is amusing--she's defeated by Maggie's goodheartedness.

-Drake and Nancy find Michelle and Junior. Did they know they were supposed to rendezvous here? Drake goes along with the idea, but later talks Junior out of his gun. And is Junior having trouble phasing?

-Junior's not hungry, and Nancy keeps asking bothersome questions about when and how everyone (read: Yomiko) is meeting up here. She's kind of out of sorts and immature here--why did they all have to come and mess up her and Yomiko's life--(which sets off Junior on his own rant.) He disowns her!

-Michelle slap!

-Wendy is the last to know the situation.... :sweat:

-John Woo: the ultimate sentry! Drake takes cover, but the rest of the gang isn't getting along well. Michelle won't abandon Nancy. And Junior was hiding another gun.

-Drake sure was captured easily... Oh, maybe not so much. But instead of running, Nancy comes out of her near catatonia, snags Junior's gun from him, and goes Miss Deep on us! She does remember her power! Junior races off with Michelle in tow.

-Nancy, you are awesome! :sdsmiley: Alas, a bit rusty though. Fortunately you've bought enough time for the cavalry to show. I love Anita springing from the heap of paper that was their airplane. I also love the look on Drake's face when they present their hostage, Joker.

-Wendy takes command. That can't be good for Yomiko's side.

-Anita figured it out--Junior's the one who separated them all. She thinks he's still working for Joker, but Joker doesn't know what he's up to either. "Betrayal is in his genes." Yow, still butthurt over the I-Jin incident, Joker?

-Meanwhile, in the Kurata Hotel, Nenene is absorbed in writing, heh. Maggie gets caught by surprise in the elevator with Wendy. She'll trade Anita for Nenene. (She doesn't technically have Anita!) Or Anita will die. Poor Maggie is in a horrible bind.

-And she really agonizes. :depressed: She's also a horrible liar, so she just tells Nenene outright what's going down. Nenene figures they have someone, otherwise Maggie would never betray her. That Nenene understands and doesn't blame her is almost more than Maggie can bear.

-Heh, Wendy was not expecting Nenene to walk up and say "Thanks for waiting." Maggie insists on coming along until she sees Anita.

-Wendy is surprisingly upfront. She'll trade all four of the people she has under seige for Nenene. None of them are "necessary human resources."

-Nenene wants a pen and paper. Writing at a time like this? She's on a real roll, I guess.

-Michelle and Junior are in hiding. She wonders if he won't regret rejecting Nancy as his mother. But he says she only cares about Yomiko--that he saw it when he merged with the book, he knows everything about it, about the British Library, about the Paper Sisters themselves--

What does he know about the Paper Sisters?

[touma]

-Everyone recognizes young Anita in the library. A flurry of papers protects her as the library erupts in flame--was that her, or Yomiko? The style of paper usage seems more Yomiko, but Yomiko was running amok at the time....
I think that it was Anita. Possibly using her powers for the first time. And possibly without even knowing that she was doing it.
Of course it could have been some other paper master that we do not know about yet.

-Drake asks Junior where the book is--no, that's Mirror Man, as a glance in the mirror reveals. Okay, I get it.
I do not get it.
Why does he look different in the mirror?

[touma]

-Anita and Yomiko can only stare at the burning wreckage...
...And Yomiko... walks away, crying quietly as Anita breaks down and howls.
Even though Anita is really amazing she is still just a child, but Yomiko is much more mature. Yomiko is Agent Paper. I really expected her to think of waiting for the fire to stop and checking the wreckage to see if there are any bodies.

"Who are you?" asks Hisa.
And instead of answering any of my questions about how Joker is controlling things the show just makes me ask more questions.:angry:

-Oh, and Joker's "Alternative Plan" file has a picture of Anita on it next to Junior.
Maybe that is why Anita was at the library?

[Hayate Kurogane]

-Nenene will let them stay at her place... Anita points out it's the least she can do, considering she owes them her life. Too bad the place has been ransacked....

-Oh, hai Nenene, you're on the news and wanted for questioning too! Nice picture of her they use. I have to laugh that the live report gives away that the police are about to raid her apartment.

I know that neither the sisters nor Nenene are really of the espionage, run-from-bad-guys mindset, but I just found it to be really strange that the best decision they could come up with after escaping from Dokusensha and Hong Kong was to go straight back to Nenene's apartment in Japan. Especially when they're cognizant enough of the situation to disguise themselves and create fake documents to get there.

-Anita has a touch of traumatic flashback idly playing with Lee's lighter (wait--I missed when they got that!). They discover Lee's orders hidden inside... Collect the Book of the All-Seeing Eyes from Toto Books... Owner: The Paper!

It's good that the Law of Plot Convenience means that Lee would be carrying around a printed copy of his mission (though this is Read or Die, after all, and printed documents are clearly a priority).

Having accepted that, then, it's interesting to think about how John Woo:

- Knew Lee had those instructions and kept them in his lighter.
- Made sure to save the lighter from the building collapse and deliver it to the sisters.
- Knew the sisters would discover the instructions (or, perhaps, would have intervened subtly if it looked like they weren't going to find them).
- Knew the sisters would go to retrieve the final book, and fight to keep it out of the hands of any Dokusensha remnants and the British Library.

Who, now, is the smartest, most important character in the show? :P

-Yomiko comes round the corner with an armload of books, and for a loooong moment she and Nenene stare at each other for the first time in five years. Yomiko carefully puts down the books... [I]and runs away!

-Hilarious denial of who she is as she runs. Ultimately, Nenene clocks her with a book and glomps on and starts crying. Awww...

The alternating shots of Nenene and Yomiko go on just long enough for it to be hilarious, and Yomiko's subsequent reaction is perfect.

Interesting that Yomiko is 30. I mean, not so much in terms of Read or Die itself, since she was clearly in her 20s in the OVA and several years have gone by, but because you don't get a lot of 30-somethings in anime. It's like the age groups in telenovelas: babies, small kids, awkward tweeners, attractive teens or early 20-somethings, grandparents. :sweat:

-Yomiko has a makeshift apartment hidden behind a set of moveable library bookshelves.

Does everyone notice now what the point of the series logo animation (both the silhouettes and the images inside them) and the last two shots in the opening sequence are? ;) If only Nenene had been watching R.O.D the TV, she might have found Yomiko sooner! :P

[Hayate Kurogane]

"Fahrenheit 451," that's a song by Hawkwind. What an obscure reference!

*punches Wanko in the arm*

-Man, Nancy is seriously freaked out by Joker! Joker is familiar with everything about Nenene (but not so much shoe etiquette.)

Stepping onto one's tatami mat with your shoes still on is one fiendishly subtle way to establish your evil-ness, that's for sure.

-They bought the Diet National Library just to get Yomiko?! Are you sure the U.K. is down and out? How was it even for sale?

Yet another example of Read or Die's awesome excessiveness (or excessive awesomeness). It always brings a smile (an evil one?) to my face when Joker, with such disdain and arrogance, states simply: "We bought it." Now that's the attitude of a villain!

-There's John Woo again, settling on Maggie's head!

Taken out of context, that is such a strange sentence. :sweat:

-Anita spots some hanky-panky--Junior is going for the book. Of course they would stake out this place!

Our heroes just do not do that well when it comes to avoiding obvious places where they can be ambushed. :sweat:

Running From Bad Guys, Rule #1: Do NOT go back to your home! They will either be on their way there soon, or already have someone there!

But boy is he surprised when Nancy can hold him! That book belongs to Yomiko. And I love how casually she bats the gun out of his hand. So did Anita actually recognize that was Junior?

With Yomiko and Nancy being reintroduced, it's more than strongly suggested that there will be more awesomeness coming later on, though not as certain for Nancy since she'd have to overcome her amnesia somehow (and while I wouldn't think that Yomiko's afraid of that, even if this Nancy used to be the enemy, she's certainly invested in keeping Nancy safe, which kind of goes hand in hand with Nancy remaining rather oblivious as to her past). But then there's a scene like this, which leaves me going, "oh man, oh man, that's so great, neat Nancy things are definitely going to happen!"

[Hayate Kurogane]

-Yomiko says Wendy is being decieved by Joker... but Wendy says she knows exactly what she's doing. Yomiko can scarcely believe it's the same Wendy. I know, right?

Now she's got to be great in the sack!

-Don't shoot the booksellers, Drake!

It's funny how... refreshing, I guess might be the best word for it, a character like Drake is in a show like this. He's a tough-guy soldier-type with a good heart and good intentions, and no special abilities or Secret Plot-Changing Backstory. He's like the straight man to... well, to the rest of the cast, really. :)

-Nancy is very solicitous of Yomiko. Like, really solicitous. Anyway, introductions in the car. Drake is startled by Maggie's name (since his own kid is named Maggi.)

The clarification is nice, though one wonders what the staff was thinking when they chose the name for the two Maggies. Other than this particular scene and startled reaction from Drake, it never amounts to anything, other than kind of a let-down for anyone paying attention to the OVA who up till now always had in mind the possibility that Maggie could possibly be Drake's daughter (yeah, yeah, Drake's a Yankee, but we don't know anything about his wife, and there's always adoption too). I guess if it had turned out that way, it would've been kind of an odd coincidence, but this is clearly a show that doesn't worry about that sort of thing. Oh well.

-Yomiko always used to wonder why her friends only had one bookshelf.

This entirely deserves a <:sweat:>, if anything does.

-Junior sneaks in for the book--Nancy goes from sleep to raging tigress in an instant! He can't get away from her when she grabs him!

"Oh man, oh man, that's so great, neat Nancy things are definitely going to happen!" :sdsmiley:

And his face is revealed to all.... As a last resort he draws a gun on Nancy--and Yomiko drops a bombshell. Nancy is his mother!

-And they tease us with the sound of a single shot as the episode's conclusion!

Maybe it's just me, but the incredible drama of that whole final scene fell a bit flat for me.

I know none of the characters know it's Junior, but we've just spent a bunch of episodes watching Junior plant bombs and sneak up on people and engage the sisters in various situations, so it's perhaps a by-product of overexposure that adds a bit of "why hasn't his identity already been accidentally revealed" to the whole thing.

And the truth of the Nancy-Junior relationship seemed a bit too telegraphed, though maybe most of that is attributable to the incredible oddity of the mention by Yomiko a couple episodes back that Nancy is a mother but her child is dead, but the ages don't match up. I wonder what that's all about?

(Not really a show content spoiler, but more of a general comment about posting: I've avoided for the most part in my posts any of the "I haven't seen this before, I wonder what's coming next!" comments, simply because it just seems completely weird to me to type them, in regards to a show that I've already seen several times. I guess that's just me. Oh well.)

[Isuzu Inugami]

Junior was definitely pulling the trigger before Michelle's arrow hit the gun. Was he intending to shoot Nancy? This is just one more thing that I will probably never know.


I'm not convinced... he had the shakes bad at that point, and I'm not certain squeezing the trigger was even a conscious act.

And Anita was right there as well, to see it all!
Is this so traumatic for her because she was caught in the fire? Or is there even more to it?


Well, I suspect the weirdness of her being a paper master who hates books may be related to being traumatized by seeing so many burn. And Yomiko strikes a rather terrifying silhouette against the flames as well.

[Isuzu Inugami]

-Everyone recognizes young Anita in the library. A flurry of papers protects her as the library erupts in flame--was that her, or Yomiko? The style of paper usage seems more Yomiko, but Yomiko was running amok at the time....
I think that it was Anita. Possibly using her powers for the first time. And possibly without even knowing that she was doing it.

I'm come around to agreeing. At first I thought it was Yomiko, but really, she's in no shape to worry about others (and actually others died, as Joker intimated at their reunion in the Diet Library.)

-Drake asks Junior where the book is--no, that's Mirror Man, as a glance in the mirror reveals. Okay, I get it.
I do not get it.
Why does he look different in the mirror?

He's Mirror Man--you can only see the real him in the mirror! Or something. I guess it doesn't really make sense, but it feels right. :sweat:

[Isuzu Inugami]

-Maggie bounce! Michelle hair flip! Yomiko tumble!

-Yomiko makes it clear--Wendy is going to release everyone in exchange for her. Maggie won't forgive Wendy if Anita has even a scratch.

-Yomiko says Maggie was cool just then, heh. Of course Wendy is monitoring everything they say while she's out.

-Meanwhile, under seige.... (This time it's Nancy resting her head on Yomiko's lap, as opposed to the other way around back at Yomiko's parents house.) Wendy calls to negotiate. "Maggie handed Nenene to us." Anita is scandalized by such nonsense. They'll trade Nenene for Joker. Hmm, just how is Wendy playing this? They start arguing about how to handle this, and Joker pipes up--does Anita really know the sisters she trusts so much? Are they really irreplaceable? Has she really even met them? Anita knows so little about her own past--but the British Library knows--she's been living in a dream they made.

-Oh hell, they drugged Maggie's coffee? She's been left behind.

-Junior tells Michelle about the three of them. Their life in Hong Kong never happened--it's all an illusion! What the fuck? (But, but Nenene was there! In their apartment!)

-They all come from experiments to create Paper Masters artificially. Anita was a failure until her powers finally activated when Yomiko burned the library. At which point Dokusensha kidnapped her and the Paper Master genetic samples. Michelle and Maggie were created later to try to stabalize Anita and get her reliably working. Artificial Paper Masters are psychologically disconnected, so they implanted false memories and put them together in a family situation. So did they meet in the church on Christmas Eve, or is that just a false memory?! And there have been several sets of Paper Masters, but only the sisters have survived. FFFFFUUUUU---

-There's a helicopter arriving, and Joker says it's time for him to go. (Now, wasn't Nenene being held for a plane, though?)

-Wendy has Nenene gagged for the exchange! Joker offers Yomiko a last chance to come back to the British Library. She declines easily, and wants to know what they're trying to accomplish by treating people's lives as convenient fictions.

-Wendy's working a double-cross! She tells Nenene she'd better come back with Joker, or else.... DAMN, but Wendy has become utterly ruthless!

-Ahhh, crap, that wasn't even Nenene, that was Mirror Man! Suckered!

-Escape via enormous paper golf ball. I like how they add a saw blade and slice right through a helicopter. :sweat:

-Joker says not to chase--find Junior instead. And shrugs off his bruised face with a "They haven't changed at all."

-Junior wants to run away with Michelle, and protect her. Awww-- I mean, uhhh.... But then the special forces show up. He runs off to fight them, but they recover him without too much trouble. Well, except for the two he shoots, I guess.

-And meanwhile, the real Nenene is flown off in a plane, leaving Maggie behind. With a notebook (Wendy must have left it behind just for her, how kind) detailing the truth about her past.

-And Joker recovers the Book of the All-Seeing Eyes.

-Junior lost his capacity to phase through matter? Joker says it's better he doesn't have such a "vile ability."

-Joker is the new president of Dokusensha?! Hostile takeover, I presume.... They shall expand as an information network to the whole world, using these "information antennas" they've installed everywhere. (Hey, do we see the fisherman who had the I'Jin fortress come up underneath him during this montage?)

-Mankind will enter a new era in 10 days time! But first, Dokusensha will place itself under the control of the United Kingdom, and rename itself the British Library. President Cole is not pleased. Too bad he can be blackmailed. And also be subject of another peeing joke. :rolleyes:

-10 days to go! Then the Singularity!

[Isuzu Inugami]

"Fahrenheit 451," that's a song by Hawkwind. What an obscure reference!

*punches Wanko in the arm*

OW! You'd have rather they picked Hawkwind's song "Damnation Alley" for the title?


Stepping onto one's tatami mat with your shoes still on is one fiendishly subtle way to establish your evil-ness, that's for sure.

It's such a minor thing, yet so dripping with contempt!


Our heroes just do not do that well when it comes to avoiding obvious places where they can be ambushed. :sweat:

Yeah, I would expect Nenene to be savvy enough to take care, and Yomiko to have actually been trained in espionage dos and don'ts.


With Yomiko and Nancy being reintroduced, it's more than strongly suggested that there will be more awesomeness coming later on, though not as certain for Nancy since she'd have to overcome her amnesia somehow

Given which Nancy she is, I don't think remembering her past is likely to cause her much joy, especially given how faithfully Yomiko has guarded her in spite of what she did. Still, the desire to see her back in full possession of her skills is something one can't help but anticipate. Eagarly.

[Isuzu Inugami]

-Maggie bounce! Michelle hair flip! Yomiko tumble!

-Yomiko's group is in Toto Books, prepping for their counterattack. Yomiko is stocking her suitcase with nothing but Nenene's books! (There's Midnight Liberation Zone, and something titled Kimi ga Boku o Shitteiru, which can translate as "You know me," the title of this episode!)

-Drake notes that with the British Library proclaiming a new era of world peace, his group seems like the bad guys. Yomiko knows it isn't true peace, though.

-Drake also gets startled when Nancy displays an uncanny felicity with firearms. She wants to go with Yomiko as well, to find her past. In contrast, Anita is utterly dispirited, and Yomiko tells her to wait here--they'll look for her sisters when they return. But Anita says they aren't her sisters. She's forever alone. :depressed:

-Yomiko is kind of inept at trying to cheer her up, but ultimately it comes down to this: she envies the relationship the sisters have. That's why she doesn't believe Joker about them.

-The British Library patrols the skies with dirigibles! I don't care how evil they are, they can't be all bad if they do that!

-The Toto books guy tells Anita if she truly wants to find the truth, she'll find it no matter where she goes. Which is either encouragement, or telling her not to wander around outside. ^^

-Anita wanders the streets of Tokyo, and thinks about her sisters, and what they mean to her. It's a nice sequence, with a spot of fresh animation snuck into the flashback montage in which the sisters attempt to have a dinner of Danish cookbooks?

-She returns to Nenene's place, and is starting to break down and cry, when another appears--it's Michelle! In the flesh! But Anita isn't ready to accept her when all their memories are false. Anita starts to leave--and runs straight into Maggie. I guess Michelle wasn't expecting her either.

-Maggie won't let Anita go. Listen to what your sisters have to say, she tells her! But Anita says she'd have been better off never meeting them, and Michelle looks genuinely angry for, I think, the first time in the show! Anita thinks Michelle is uncaring and fake because she doesn't cry... but it's just that she's been trying so hard to be strong. And even if their memories are fake, what they had together here with Nenene was real. They all know the real Michelle--and that's how she can believe in herself. She wants to be sisters with them forever. Maggie... and at last, Anita, agree.

-Anita forgives Maggie for selling out Nenene--even without being told she figures out why it happened. And Michelle builds up a good head of steam against the British Library, heh. Three Sisters Conference! Getting even with the British Library, decided!

-Meanwhile, in the UK... it's possible Junior was injured by removing his locator, so that's why he can no longer phase through matter. (Well, I don't think this makes even the slightest bit of sense.) Joker wants care taken with him, since the weight of the world will be on his shoulders.... And Nenene isn't showing signs of resisting them. How... un-Nenene-like! Her cell is next to Junior's, so they can talk. Nenene is writing a novel--it's not for the British Library, it's for herself and those she knows are coming for her! "Not resisting" my ass! Junior envies her having people to believe in, but she says of course they're coming for him as well. Even if he betrayed them, they're the kind of people to rescue him.

-Aha! And out on the English Channel, Yomiko is passed by the Three Sisters, who drop a note to her apologizing for going on ahead!

-Coming into London, Anita spots a horse-drawn carriage? And Maggie's familiar is attacked by a flock of pteranodons*??[i]

*So says Maggie.

-They nearly get run over by a steam engine, and London is looking very Victorian... and a Martian tripod is patrolling the city! What on Earth is going on?

-London is being refashioned in the form of classic British literature? They locate the British Library--it's cut off from the rest of the city by an enormous moat....

Yes, I think it's fair to say things just got [i]seriously weird.

[Isuzu Inugami]

-Maggie bounce! Michelle hair flip! Yomiko tumble!

-Well, not everyone is subserviant to the British Library. In fact, the American President is miffed enough to launch figher jets!

-Is that a computer composed of the brains of reconstituted authors?

-A UFO? Now hold on a minute! (I think it would have been more appropriate for Nemo's sub to defend the seas....

-And yet another peeing joke. :rolleyes:

-The sky is too well defended for the Paper Sisters to get to the British Library, but John Woo guides them to the rest of their allies. I guess there wasn't so much point to their going on ahead last episode....

-Anita expects Yomiko to know of some secret route into the Library, but she always just used the front doors. Heh.

-Yomiko figures about when London has regressed to, and thinks if they find an anachronism, it must relate to the Library and might be their way in. They'll research by reading everything they can....

-They have seven days before the broadcast. Drake loans them money... "Be sure to pay it back!" Ahh, Drake....

-It's an action montage of... uhh... reading. But they seem to be running out of time.

-Anita calls Michelle a "book drunk," hah!

-Yomiko spots a problem--the Crystal Palace was moved (as it historically was) but this implies that London is moving forward through history now. It covered three years in two days for the Sisters. It's not the British Library doing it, it's Mr. Gentlemen?

-It will take two days to boot Mr. Gentlemen, but the books themselves are deteriorating in the process. They have to get it right the first time. Fine--Joker never intended to need a second chance!

(So on the blu-ray set, Mr. Gentlemen is now being consistently spelled "Gentleman" in the subtitles. Although he still seems to be being pronounced "Gentlemen" in the Japanese dub.)

-Joker visits Nenene--he enjoyed reading what she's been writing. She thinks he's planning to do to her what Dokusensha was--must be nice to be an evil organization--you can recycle (perhaps she means plagiarize, since this doesn't otherwise strike me as a property of evil organizations) the same idea over and over.

-But Joker is contemptuous of Dokusensha's "Perfect Language." True brainwashing doesn't hurt anyone... you don't even notice it happening. Once Junior becomes Gentlemen, he'll use the British Library transmission system to reprogram everyone on the planet. It'll harmonize everyone--a public service!

-They want to have a Great Book to go along with it, though. (Joker, don't walk on a page of Nenene's manuscript while singing its praises!) He wants to add her to the computer of great authors' brains (eww!) but she's not quite at their level yet. She needs to (as they all did!) meet Mr. Gentlemen in the flesh and be "awakened as a writer" by him.

Nenene:
Impressed
X Not Impressed

-It's the last day, and time has slipped up to 1871, which is really picking up the pace. The Sisters are impressed by Nancy's mad speed-reading skillz--Yomiko trained her. Maggie says it's Yomiko-style. They are connoiseurs of reading styles?

-They pass by a London Underground station (oldest in the world! 1863? Seriously? I am impressed!)--but this particular station didn't exist yet. They've found their anachronism!

-And Mr. Kim comes out, as dumbfounded to see them as they are to see him! Anita tackles him. :sdsmiley: They question him (only somewhat coercively--they give him tea, after all.) Yes, the Underground connects to the British Library. He's a bit confused by all the new faces with the Sisters, heh.

-Kim sneaks them in. Suddenly it's not a 19th century subway anymore! Welcome to the British Library Geofront?

-Yomiko says they have three goals--rescue Nenene, rescue Junior before Mr. Gentlemen is programmed into him (I like Nancy's determined eye-flinch at this), and stop Joker's operation. Anita wants to destroy everything, but Yomiko says the idea is to get Joker to give up, or he'll just do it over again.

-Drake says to divide into three teams. If two win it's a success, but really, all three should so as to have no worries. Anyway, today is his luckiest day of the year!

-Nancy and Drake go after Junior. The Sister go after Nenene. And Yomiko will take care of Joker. Anita doesn't like her going on her own... and Nenene is probably waiting for her. But Yomiko says she's the one who has to stop Joker. Synchronize watches... GO!

-Wendy is having a few words with Junior. She hated his docility, because it reminded her of how much this job dirtied her. Junior says she always scared him a little, but he hoped she'd come to like him. It... gets to her a little. She apologizes... but soon he'll be reborn as a great man. If he still remembers her, she won't begrudge him his revenge.

-London will reach the 20th Century in an hour! Stuff is happening! It's time to act!

-Anita rushes in to save Nenene and get's karate-chopped by her! Oops. But Nancy and Joker are too late to find Junior. And the Sisters are eagerly reading Nenene's manuscript while they catch her up on the situation. Nenene is... not happy. Is Yomiko going to die without reading her new work?!

-Joker is too busy to be taken hostage by an unemployed person like Yomiko. Carry on, British Library!

[Isuzu Inugami]

I'm not too sure about the whole time slip business. I'm not sure it adds anything more than weirdness, and while I approve of weirdness as a rule, this just seems odd and kind of out of place.

[Hayate Kurogane]

I'm not too sure about the whole time slip business. I'm not sure it adds anything more than weirdness, and while I approve of weirdness as a rule, this just seems odd and kind of out of place.

If it weren't introduced in the second-to-last episode, then it probably would've worked better. It also doesn't help that it's poorly explained, and is completely unnecessary. You don't throw stuff like that at the audience at the end of a show; it's easily the biggest flaw as far as the show's plotting is concerned.

[touma]

I'm not too sure about the whole time slip business. I'm not sure it adds anything more than weirdness, and while I approve of weirdness as a rule, this just seems odd and kind of out of place.

If it weren't introduced in the second-to-last episode, then it probably would've worked better. It also doesn't help that it's poorly explained, and is completely unnecessary. You don't throw stuff like that at the audience at the end of a show;
Well, it did give them a way to find the Library by spotting the anachronism, but there must have been a lot of other ways to find the Library.
Considering the huge size and complexity of Joker's operation there must have been a lot of evidence of it around London.

it's easily the biggest flaw as far as the show's plotting is concerned.
I don't know about that.
There is a lot of competition for the coveted title of Biggest Flaw.:P

[Hayate Kurogane]

I'm not too sure about the whole time slip business. I'm not sure it adds anything more than weirdness, and while I approve of weirdness as a rule, this just seems odd and kind of out of place.

If it weren't introduced in the second-to-last episode, then it probably would've worked better. It also doesn't help that it's poorly explained, and is completely unnecessary. You don't throw stuff like that at the audience at the end of a show;
Well, it did give them a way to find the Library by spotting the anachronism, but there must have been a lot of other ways to find the Library.
Considering the huge size and complexity of Joker's operation there must have been a lot of evidence of it around London.

it's easily the biggest flaw as far as the show's plotting is concerned.
I don't know about that.
There is a lot of competition for the coveted title of Biggest Flaw.:P

Yeah, I know what you're getting at, but in much the same vein as Wanko has commented, it doesn't work like the other arguably strange and unnecessary plot elements and decisions do. Not nearly as well, at the very least.

[Isuzu Inugami]

-For the last time (sniff): Maggie bounce! Michelle hair flip! Yomiko tumble!

-So here's the problem with taking people hostage: if they know you well enough to know you wouldn't actually carry through your threat, you can be ignored, just as Wendy does to Yomiko. If this were Sonny Wong instead of Yomiko, it'd be a whole different story!

-Not to mention Joker seems prepared to be a sacrifice in any case. Yomiko folds--Joker says no need to shoot her, just disarm her of paper. (And Yomiko's been carrying the same picture of her and Nenene that Nenene has... or did we see this before and I didn't notice....)

-The British Library (Geofront) sure has some high ceilings... Nenene and the Sisters perch up in a vent(?) while security scurries around below. They can't get in contact with the others, they'll just meet up in Jinbo-cho after the operation. Well, that's not very satisfying. Luckily, Joker is there to update them via general broadcast.

-Don't mock Yomiko for going it alone! (Even if it's a fair critique) Joker tells Nenene she has ten minutes to give herself up. And, heh, Nancy stumbles across her Miss Deep outfit. Yes yes yes!

-Nenene doesn't even hesitate. She'll give herself up for Yomiko. Sorry, guys. But the sisters aren't going to let her go on her own.

-Drake reads the situation well. He and Nancy are the only two who can act--although he's only thinking about complete their piece of the mission.

-Nenene (and the Paper Sisters) are taken into custody. Like Yomiko, they are stripped of paper. And it's time to move on to the "Gentlemen Reissue Plan."

-Junior is more or less out of it, but tells Joker and Wendy this is all meaningless. Wendy's stone doughnut says otherwise (it's the "key" they recovered from the burial mound hot spring. I kind of wish I understood its significance a bit more, beyond being glued to people.)

-"Wisdom Wave Antennas"? Some technologies ought not be named. Anyway, the whole world is involved in rewriting Gentlemen onto Junior!

-Nenene and the Paper Sisters are brought to the scene. Fuuuuuck, Joker you're an asshole. He burns the Nenene/Yomiko picture and says even this will be rewritten into something better by Gentleman. He also lays into Yomiko--all her polite pleading is just a mask for her arrogant self-styled sense of justice. And even if she did stop him, the cause would continue and try again, for as long as it takes. He believes in the force of will over any special skills--if your will is only as thin as paper, stay out of our way! It's almost an inspiring form of populism, until you remember he's also brainwashing the planet. Oops.

-Wendy and Joker are so committed that they will also be rewritten by Mr. Gentlemen. They will bet their memories on Gentlemen for the sake of creating a utopia. Nenene still doesn't buy into it, though. This isn't the power of their will, this is simple escapism.

-Actually nobody's buying into it. Maggie doesn't want to lose what few memories she can believe in, and Anita riots! She won't lose--and Junior's too stubborn to lose to some old fart! She knows what her future should be (and Hisa's in it! :P), and wants no part of the British Library's version.

-Well, whatever. Time to finish up Junior. With tentacles! However, Drake's been busy as well, with a load of explosives.

-And Nancy, in Miss Deep regalia, and in full possession of her abilities, has come for her son! (But the show doesn't have time to revel in her as they should. :angry:) Not to mention Nenene has managed to hang onto her mansuscript (what a slip-up!) Rearmed, it is but a moment's work for the Sisters to dispense with Wendy and Joker!

-However, Junior is still in the grip of the system. Joker tries to stop them from cutting him out of it--and Junior gives him a dose of what he's getting and fries his mind!

-Anita focuses on the key stuck to Junior's chest--the Sisters wrench it off of him (that's gotta hurt!), and Anita falls back with it in her hand, victorious.

-Or not. It fuses with her (and that definitely hurts!). Sucks to be the backup plan. The sisters manage to tear it off of her and hurl it away, though, and without a human target, the Gentlemen information dissipates into the ether. The British Library staff are stunned. Serves 'em right!

-Junior is Junior, right? Nancy is incredibly relieved when he answers her. But what about the others?

-Anita... wake up.... (Okay, I have big problems with this scene. I see they're going for a challenge to Maggie and Michelle's determination to always protect Anita, but if she's really not breathing, they ought to be doing CPR, not bemoaning that this can't be happening. And in the end, it's all just a big gotcha anyway. Trying too hard and too cheap, guys.)

-Nenene's going to have to rewrite her manuscript, since she let the Paper Masters use it. It's okay--she was still deciding how to end it. She's going for a happy ending after all. dawwww....

-Wrap up. The U.N. is shutting down the Permanent Library for Mankind Plan and investigating just who is responsible for what happened. Natsume's sister has a new book out with a happy title, and Jinbo-cho rises from the ashes, with a new set of VIP notices in the bookstores.

-Wendy is a klutz again! And Joker has been more or less catatonic until the sight of a dog brings him out of it? Huh? I don't get this. But Wendy throws off her apron... I have a feeling they're heading for the next round. :devil:

-And Anita's back at school with Hisa--who has debuted as a writer! And it's the usual school hijinks. Remember Tohru, you'll always lose to Anita! And not only did Anita read Hisa's book, she's already read Natsume's sister's book, even before Natsume could present it to her. Everyone is dumbfounded. Even Maggie's a little alarmed at how much Anita has been reading. (Well, she's got some catching up to do.)

-Michelle is baby sitting Junior? Hmmm....

-Nancy is tracking down her(?) past in India. I don't know what to think of her being attracted to a pistol keychain.

-And Nenene isn't going to let Yomiko out of her sight again, heh.

-The end credits roll, and this time we get the close up of the two girls on the bench. Of course, it's Hisa and Anita, reading happily together. Nenene's books, in fact. The most recent of which is titled "Staircase to the Angel."

-And at the very tail end of the episode, a shot of the "M.A.M." they carved at the church, now underwater in Hong Kong. They're real, all their memories, everything from they day the met, is real. :sdsmiley:

[touma]

Now that it is over I have mixed feelings about it. I enjoyed it enough that I am glad that I watched it. I have no regrets about that. But my enjoyment is due almost entirely to the characters.
The only major character that I dislike, a bit, is Wendy. I do not dislike her because she is a cold, heartless, ruthless bitch. I dislike her because I see no reason for her to be that way. Ordinarily I would not need a reason but the show made it clear, or so it seemed to me, that Yomiko, Nancy, Joker, and Wendy are the characters from the OVA and Wendy was not like that in the OVA.
As for Joker, I just assumed that he is a megalomaniac and I like him for being a good megalomaniac.
I love most of the other characters. Anita and Hisa have a special place in my heart, but most of the others are also great in their own ways.

The story is the reason for my mixed feelings.
It seemed like the writers were trying to push my ability to suspend my disbelief beyond its limits. Unfortunately they succeeded.
I had seen the OVA so I went into the TV show already accepting paper masters and people who can "phase" through matter, and the "British Library" of the OVA.
I was able to accept Dokusensha because China is big enough and mysterious enough, to me, that I can believe that such an organization might evolve there in secret.
And I believe in John Woo just because I want to.:)

But there were just too many other things piled on top of those.
I am not going to make a long, long list of those things because people who have watched the show will have a good idea of what they might be, and most of them were mentioned in this discussion thread.

So, even though I did really enjoy the show I think that I could have enjoyed it a whole lot more if some things were done differently.

But overall it was a very positive experience.
I would not hesitate to recommend R.O.D. the TV, but with a caveat to people who insist on a "good" story above all else.

[Isuzu Inugami]

I kept meaning to mention these, and then didn't. :sweat:

Both the Geneon DVDs and the Blu-ray set have the bonus next episode "previews" (obviously not actually aired due to their random 1 to 2 minute lengths), featuring Nenene and the Paper Sisters improvising in-character speculation about the next episode, mostly based on knowing nothing more than the episode title. They range from the bizarre to the hysterical, and you all ought to check them out if you haven't already. The dub does a good job of reproducing them, but can't quite catch the improvisational edge they have in the Japanese, in my opinion.

I personally think they're one of the cooler on-disc extras I've seen in anime.

[Hayate Kurogane]

I kept meaning to mention these, and then didn't. :sweat:

Both the Geneon DVDs and the Blu-ray set have the bonus next episode "previews" (obviously not actually aired due to their random 1 to 2 minute lengths), featuring Nenene and the Paper Sisters improvising in-character speculation about the next episode, mostly based on knowing nothing more than the episode title. They range from the bizarre to the hysterical, and you all ought to check them out if you haven't already. The dub does a good job of reproducing them, but can't quite catch the improvisational edge they have in the Japanese, in my opinion.

I personally think they're one of the cooler on-disc extras I've seen in anime.

Yeah, while I do enjoy listening to the English versions, the at-times sheer honest awkwardness of the Japanese versions really wins out. You can tell that on top of having very little material to work with, the seiyuu were likely given fairly loose instructions, which seem to have consisted of little more than "try to stay in character, kind of, or at the very least just remember to refer to each other by your characters' names." :sdsmiley: