xxxHOLiC TV-anime

[Aiia]

I taped this last week but forgot to watch this until now. I think this might be the show that benefits the most from being animated so far. I've always been a fan of CLAMP, but xxxHOLiC is drawn in a very stiff, static way compared with most of their other manga. The anime used its animation very effectively in order to bring motion and feelings into the story and the characters, and they did it beautifully. They still keep a lot of the stiffness though (which also serves to keep the atmosphere from the manga) but it didn't bother me in the way the manga does.

The intro music was really good, but the outro wasn't for me. The opening animation showed off some of the characters that show up more than once through the story (like the Amewarashi, Himawari and Doumeki) but only Yuuko, Watanuki, the two little helpers in the shop and Modoki showed up this time.

The next episode will be the one about the ring from the first volume. Looking forward to it since its still one of the best stories so far.

If the quality keeps up like this, it will be my favourite show of the season together with Nana. /images/graemlins/catgirl0.gif

[AbeChinchilla]

I was very disappointed with this episode.
The animation looked very poor.

[redxxii]

I really liked the first episode, and I was very surprised to see they kept the same character design and style from the manga (very long limbs, hands, etc). Overall I really liked the look of the show and so far it seems pretty good plot wise. I'll have to wait and see, but so far so good.

[AbeChinchilla]

[ QUOTE ]
redxxii said:
I really liked the first episode, and I was very surprised to see they kept the same character design and style from the manga (very long limbs, hands, etc). Overall I really liked the look of the show and so far it seems pretty good plot wise. I'll have to wait and see, but so far so good.

[/ QUOTE ]

But I didn't remember Yuko's breasts being so... uneven.

[mifuneral2]

pics?

[Aiia]

[ QUOTE ]
AbeChinchilla said:
I was very disappointed with this episode.
The animation looked very poor.

[/ QUOTE ]

Poor? They've completely captured the art and designs from the manga as well as the mood of the story. I thought it looked great myself. /images/graemlins/catgirl0.gif And Clamp has always drawn breasts uneven, especially in Chobits and xxxHOLiC. /images/graemlins/stunned0.gif

[BluWacky]

[ QUOTE ]
AbeChinchilla said:
I was very disappointed with this episode.
The animation looked very poor.

[/ QUOTE ]

The animation is very good IMHO, but very badly formatted - the show's animated in widescreen, but TBS broadcast everything in pan-and-scan first and then show it in widescreen on a digital channel three weeks later. I'm waiting for that to judge how I really feel about the animation quality; I think the odd framing spoils the effect somewhat.

[Aiia]

[ QUOTE ]
mifuneral2 said:
pics?

[/ QUOTE ]

Sorry about the double post but I wanted to add some pictures (sorry about the super tiny size, I don't know what happened to them when I put them on Photobucket!). Not all of them are of Yuuko's breasts but a lot of them. Spoilers for the first episode of course! Keep in mind that it looks better on screen.

1 (http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d56/Momijii/xxxHOLiC/0.jpg)
2 (http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d56/Momijii/xxxHOLiC/1.jpg)
3 (http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d56/Momijii/xxxHOLiC/2.jpg)
4 (http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d56/Momijii/xxxHOLiC/3.jpg)
5 (http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d56/Momijii/xxxHOLiC/4.jpg)
6 (http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d56/Momijii/xxxHOLiC/6.jpg)
7 (http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d56/Momijii/xxxHOLiC/95.jpg)
8 (http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d56/Momijii/xxxHOLiC/10.jpg)
9 (http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d56/Momijii/xxxHOLiC/11.jpg)
10 (http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d56/Momijii/xxxHOLiC/13.jpg)
11 (http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d56/Momijii/xxxHOLiC/14.jpg)
12 (http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d56/Momijii/xxxHOLiC/18.jpg)
13 (http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d56/Momijii/xxxHOLiC/19.jpg)
14 (http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d56/Momijii/xxxHOLiC/28.jpg)
15 (http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d56/Momijii/xxxHOLiC/33.jpg)
16 (http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d56/Momijii/xxxHOLiC/37.jpg)
17 (http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d56/Momijii/xxxHOLiC/40.jpg)
18 (http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d56/Momijii/xxxHOLiC/41.jpg)
19 (http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d56/Momijii/xxxHOLiC/49.jpg)

[AbeChinchilla]

Photobucket stinks. Imageshack.us is the way to go. /images/graemlins/wink.gif

This was animated in widescreen? Blaah... what's up with TBS?!

[mifuneral2]

Those pictures (though small) look awesome. Thank you! /images/graemlins/sdsmiley.gif

[Aiia]

The quality of episode 2 dropped quite a lot, so poor Yuuko didn't look very hot in this episode. But the intro, background music, story, pacing and voice acting were still great, so if they just fix the animation for the DVDs I'll happily collect them. Yuuko's seiyuu is really good and has a deep, sexy voice, Modoki is cute and Watanuki is so funny whenever he has one of his "moments". /images/graemlins/catgirl0.gif

[golthin]

[ QUOTE ]
Aiia said:
The quality of episode 2 dropped quite a lot, so poor Yuuko didn't look very hot in this episode. But the intro, background music, story, pacing and voice acting were still great, so if they just fix the animation for the DVDs I'll happily collect them. Yuuko's seiyuu is really good and has a deep, sexy voice, Modoki is cute and Watanuki is so funny whenever he has one of his "moments". /images/graemlins/catgirl0.gif

[/ QUOTE ]
they changed a lot of things from the manga for episode 2.

[theworld]

Episode 1 had me kinda wary, considering that Production IG didn't quite live up to what I thought they'd be able to do animation-wise for this series. Honestly, episode 2 was a total disappointment for me. I can only hope the animation quality goes up from here.

I'm really starting to regret that Bee Train didn't get a hold of this series.

[jecca-neko]

[ QUOTE ]
AbeChinchilla said:
This was animated in widescreen? Blaah... what's up with TBS?!

[/ QUOTE ]

What's wrong with widescreen? Feels like almost all TV series anime nowadays is animated that way.

[BluWacky]

[ QUOTE ]
jecca-neko said:
[ QUOTE ]
AbeChinchilla said:
This was animated in widescreen? Blaah... what's up with TBS?!

[/ QUOTE ]

What's wrong with widescreen? Feels like almost all TV series anime nowadays is animated that way.

[/ QUOTE ]

I think he's just more upset that the show was animated in widescreen, but is being broadcast in 4:3; they haven't letterboxed it or whatever, you're only getting part of the picture. The problem with that is it puts the composition of the scene off so some shots just plain don't look right, although most of the time it isn't a problem.

[AbeChinchilla]

[ QUOTE ]
BluWacky said:
[ QUOTE ]
jecca-neko said:
[ QUOTE ]
AbeChinchilla said:
This was animated in widescreen? Blaah... what's up with TBS?!

[/ QUOTE ]

What's wrong with widescreen? Feels like almost all TV series anime nowadays is animated that way.

[/ QUOTE ]

I think he's just more upset that the show was animated in widescreen, but is being broadcast in 4:3; they haven't letterboxed it or whatever, you're only getting part of the picture. The problem with that is it puts the composition of the scene off so some shots just plain don't look right, although most of the time it isn't a problem.

[/ QUOTE ]

The animation... so big... probably zoomed in... and plain!
Upon rewatching, I was surprised to see "Production I.G." in the credits. Wow, they sure went to the dogs.

Why couldn't Bee Train do this one... Yuko was hot in Tsubasa.

[golthin]

[ QUOTE ]
AbeChinchilla said:
[ QUOTE ]
BluWacky said:
[ QUOTE ]
jecca-neko said:
[ QUOTE ]
AbeChinchilla said:
This was animated in widescreen? Blaah... what's up with TBS?!

[/ QUOTE ]

What's wrong with widescreen? Feels like almost all TV series anime nowadays is animated that way.

[/ QUOTE ]

I think he's just more upset that the show was animated in widescreen, but is being broadcast in 4:3; they haven't letterboxed it or whatever, you're only getting part of the picture. The problem with that is it puts the composition of the scene off so some shots just plain don't look right, although most of the time it isn't a problem.

[/ QUOTE ]

The animation... so big... probably zoomed in... and plain!
Upon rewatching, I was surprised to see "Production I.G." in the credits. Wow, they sure went to the dogs.

Why couldn't Bee Train do this one... Yuko was hot in Tsubasa.

[/ QUOTE ]I think that the reason they are not doing crossovers is that bee train has the rights for the crossovers and it will be hard to double license that. I agree they should have let bee train do XXXholic, but maybe they don't have the time to do two series like Tsubasa and XXXholic at the same time.

[DiGiKerot]

[ QUOTE ]
golthin said:I think that the reason they are not doing crossovers is that bee train has the rights for the crossovers and it will be hard to double license that.

[/ QUOTE ]

Not really - I'm pretty sure that Beetrain is actually part of Production IG.

[LimePie]

[ QUOTE ]
DiGiKerot said:
[ QUOTE ]
golthin said:I think that the reason they are not doing crossovers is that bee train has the rights for the crossovers and it will be hard to double license that.

[/ QUOTE ]

Not really - I'm pretty sure that Beetrain is actually part of Production IG.

[/ QUOTE ]

It was. However, the two recently parted ways.

[theworld]

Man...I know it couldn't be possible now, but I really do wish Bee Train had gotten XXX~HoLiC. With that kind of atmosphere in the show, I'm sure they could've pulled things off much more interestingly, as well as with a better soundtrack.

[golthin]

[ QUOTE ]
The World said:
Man...I know it couldn't be possible now, but I really do wish Bee Train had gotten XXX~HoLiC. With that kind of atmosphere in the show, I'm sure they could've pulled things off much more interestingly, as well as with a better soundtrack.

[/ QUOTE ]
Beetrain is also doing the new hack dot series, it will be hard to do 3 series at the same time.

[theworld]

It's wishful thinking. I know they're hard at work on Spider Riders, Tsubasa season 2, and the new .hack//Roots.