Earlier this past week, I was able to take in a screening of the anime series From the New World by Sentai Filmworks. It's very strange and is something of a slow build. It doesn't get super interesting until the 4th episode. There are a lot of time skips and this is a show that rewards an audience who pays attention. It intrigued me enough for me to plop down cash for the release of Part 1, and I'll probably pony up for Part 2 as well. I'm trying to restrict my physical media purchases to Sentai Filmworks this year, but there are still a few stray FUNimation titles that I do aim to collect, even though I have a working streaming subscription to FUNimation.com that I usually enjoy via my Roku player. As I said previously, with Neon Alley drastically curtailing its English dub offerings, I've been picking up a few of the recent but no longer brand spaking new titles such as LaGrange and Accel World, put out by VIZ. The Aniplex shows are simply too rich for my blood. I'm looking forward to finishing Accel World. I may even re-watch it. LaGrange wrapped up its first season neatly; I have started Season 2 but I'm in no hurry to finish it. I have to admit I'm less fond of the opening and closing animations & songs for Season 2. The action does pick right up again, with a big fight starting at the end of Episode 1, but it's more of the same unresolved conflict from Season 1, requiring Madoka to rush to the rescue of her bickering alien girlfriends, who are once again on opposite sides of a galactic conflict.
This week they will be screening the Appleseed movie in honor of its anniversary, but I never particularly liked this film and don't feel any pressing need to rewatch it. It was redubbed by Sentai Filmworks, which is kinda cool. It's a little weird, however, that FUNimation actually owns the rights to Appleseed XIIIwhich gives the story a series-length treatment, with a lot of overlap in terms of voice cast. I own this series as a DVD box set, but I haven't gotten past Episode 4 yet. I won it in a drawing, which is good because otherwise I'd never have spent money on it. It's not bad, but the CGI is a little much...and honestly the RBWY characters from Rooster Teeth have more expressive faces than do the Appleseed XIII characters.
Anyway, I'm looking forward to the yet-to-be-posted 2014 May screening schedule for Anime at the Alamo.
