Kurogane's Anime Blog

Bleh, it’s the typical facepalm-inducing Gonzo filler episodes. Not to say it wasn’t amusing at the least, but the comedy was a bit too slapstick for the show I felt. Heck, they even had a ejector-seat sequence in it.

If I had to pick out the best bits, it would probably be Hayase getting taken away by a stretcher every time he got mixed up with disastrous things, like walking in on Emi when she putting on her bra (oppai!!). And what’s with Aya Hirano’s characters and knives this season?

The only worthwhile parts of the show was Kouichi telling Shizuna to act more feminine and putting on his tie pin on her hair, but it felt kinda out of character for Kouichi at that point since he was still putting on his spoiled brat airs, There was also Emi transferring to his school, and finally the short little scene of him visiting the site where Yajima died, giving a sort of closure and a sense of acceptance on Kouichi’s part to his death.

Also, is Satoru a boy or a girl in this show? It gets more and more confusing every time he/she appears. I think Satoru was a girl in the manga, but I’m not so sure for the anime.

Ah finally, the show starts stepping in to the right direction. With Yajima’s death, Hayase finally starts to realize the meaning of having power and finding a reason to use it properly. It’s that underlying theme that makes up the real story of Linebarrels from here onwards, so let’s hope Gonzo doesn’t thrash that for now.

I’m surprised at how faithful to the manga the show is now, perhaps with a bit more “spice” added to it, given the comedic changes Gonzo has put in. At least they’re tackling the Emi x Hayase dynamic pretty well, considering how they changed it thoroughly plus it’s good to see Emi not being the hapless “princess” that Kouich has to protect for now. Ah, thank god too that he doesn’t need to “interface” with Emi anymore to summon Linebarrel, that would be bloody irritating to watch if they kept that up. At least that cuts out another Gonzo original factor in the series.

The twins are also introduced, though their appearance carried a lot less impact in the manga. They were first introduced at this point of the story in the manga but we’ve already seen both of them earlier in the anime quite prominently. The impact mainly comes from the fact that Shizuna’s first action in the manga was her putting a cute face then giving Kouichi the “nutcracker”. You would really remember that as a first impression, wouldn’t you? Oh his poor balls… hm, I guess that explains his superiority complex in a way too?

The preview for next week shows the cast in comedic situations so I guess it’s time for a breather after all the major developments. I’m just hoping the Gonzo scriptwriters can at least write out an enjoyable “filler” episode, yet not too detracting too far from the feel of the series. It’s annoying when they write crap filler episodes that go out of character.

CrunchyRoll link

Well, Gonzo can still do things properly! I’m glad Yajima’s death scene was left pretty much intact, along with the emotional value of the moment. They did shortened the fight where Kouchi goes berserk a bit I think. I loved the outtro remix for this episode too, it was nicely done to fit in with the sad moment at the end. “Ame ga Furu” is gonna be one of my favourite songs this season.

As manga readers will know, Yajima’s death is pretty much the big turning point of the series where Kouichi comes in to grasp with the meaning of possessing power. Being a Factor is pretty much a big responsibility and to quote Stan Lee, “with great powers come great responsibilities” and Kouichi pretty much realizes the truth of that principle with Yajima’s death.

Well, this should probably mean that the anime will finally go in to the real meat of the series, and I sure as hell hope they can still pull it off nicely. Despite some disappointing decisions on Gonzo’s behalf, I still do have an optimistic outlook for this show and I hope it will be rewarded in due time.

It looks like there will still be some ridiculous stuff from Gonzo that we might have to put up with, such as the love-comedy sequences. The slap by Risa when she was questioning Kouichi about Emi was just, *groan* facepalm-inducing as well as Kouichi’s younger sister (her way of waking him up was just wtf lol?!). Guess I’ll just have to grit my teeth through that. Rachel isn’t entirely unwelcome though…

Also, Emi finally gets her black seifuku outfit \o/! I still don’t like how they made her in to such a “helpless” character though. One of the best parts of the manga involved Kouichi trying to make the moves on a grossed out Emi who was keeping an eye on Kouichi for JUDA in secret and with the changes they’ve done, it looks like that won’t be happening at all. And the twins will finally get their screen time next week too! I hope the “nutcracker” is still kept in.

Wow, Gonzo, you managed to even insert some cliche’d love comedy routine in to the show? Dayam, you guys are awesome (at ruining stuff). While I’m sure a dojikko Kizaki is cute, but it’s not something we need from this series! I guess I don’t even need to add that Kouichi managed to be a bigger douchebag this episode.

P.S: Let me add this in too, kinda forgot about it. Isn’t it just… facepalm-inducing?

P.S. 2: Ehh~ damn, the blonde haired loli scientist is Chiwa Saito. And what’s with that… meh, Gonzo, whatever.

But there are good signs a-coming! The preview shows a scene familiar to manga readers, and it’s a pivotal one too. Let’s hope Gonzo will do that scene correctly.

Episode may be watched online with subs for free here.

God, what’s with the whole happy family thing with Kouichi. There’s even the mother and the younger sister along. At this point, I think it’s pretty safe to say this isn’t even an adaptation but more like a total retelling of the series.

Anyways, this episode continues in the “oh god this is so gonna be a trainwreck of a series but it’s gonna be damn funny to watch it anyways” way as Kouichi learns about his “death” and his new-found powers. For one, the news of his “death” is accepted in a better way than in the manga, in which that he actually celebrates it as it signifies his “rebirth” as a “Hero of Justice” and I salute his new-found delusional self-esteem. Heck, he even makes his own grave marker at the site of his “death”.

Kouichi also comes to grips with the fact that he can not only summon Linebarrel, he’s also granted superhuman physical abilities and godly regeneration as part of his job as Linebarrel’s Machina. Gonzo inserts a hillarious scene where he gets ordered by the bullies to buy curry bread in 10 mins, but instead does it in 5, before he realises he shouldn’t have done it at all, then drops the bullies with punches. I guess you can’t shake away 16 years of loser mentality that easily. Thank god it seems he can’t summon Linebarrel without performing BOOB INTERFACE with Emi though, idiot actually tried to summon it at school and claim his new-found fame.

Let’s proceed to the action instead. Katou corps appear yet again to try and reclaim Linebarrel. JUDA responds with Hind-kind and Painkiller. Not wanting to lose out on the commotion, Kouichi summons Linebarrel too and heads for the battlefield, but not before making an “important” call to Yajima to tell him he’s gonna play his “Hero of Justice” game again from a public phone. Had to seriously resist rolling my eyes at this part.

Reaching the battlefield, an industrial area, the idiot actually attacks Hind-kind and Painkiller first, believing them to be his enemies. When Yamashita calls out to him andd explains the reason they’re here, he actually asks them how they got their name before he’s reminded of the fact he bloody shouted out his name in his first battle earlier for everyone to hear, groan. Despite that, he decides that BOTH the Machinas and the ARMA’s are his enemy because he “is justice”, and attacks both sides equally.

Long story short, he makes a much more tremendous mess as he destroys most of the ARMA’s and forces the Machinas in to retreat, celebrating at the end with a hearty laugh, as a horrified Emi looks at the carnage wrecked by Kouichi. Only thing’s missing is her famous “Anata wa, SAITEI desu.” line.

Well, at the least they’re gonna paint Kouichi as the “seigi-baka” of the series, where he does all those terrible things and justifies it by claiming he on the side of justice, even though what he’s doing is not much different from the same people he wants to punish.

One good thing about the retelling is how Emi gets more screentime, but it’s compensated by the fact she’s not as awesome as the character she was in the manga, turning instead in to a generally helpless and amnesiac girl, although it seems she still recognizes that Kouichi is seriously going overboard much.

I didn’t expect to also see Kouichi’s family being introduced. In the manga, any mention of family members are virtually non-existent, as far as vol. 5 goes to. Kouichi’s current family might or might not be canon, so if anyone knows better, please enlighten me. Even better, scanlate all the available manga tankoubans for the benefit of us fans! :D

It also seems that there is some kind of subplot going on as well, with the police inspector guy who seems to like curry bread. He’s seen Kouichi summoning Linebarrel already and it does look as if he has a big hidden agenda about it too. Let’s just hope it doesn’t detract too much from the main story, but weaving subplots in to shows is considered a specialty and habit of Gonzo, so it’s expected.

In case anyone doesn’t know yet, the show is being offered for free streaming from the usual suspects, Crunchyroll, BOST and Youtube.

Addendum: Just watched the the CrunchyRoll version. It’s not a bad experience actually. Gonzo is really doing something right with this method of distribution. Though the subs seem to be on the “cleaner” side.

Unintentionally hillarious yet admittedly entertaining is all I can describe the first episode of Linebarrel.

As I expected, they did change the story. Instead of starting with the EPIC ASSHOLE Kouichi, we get the pussy failure version of him who quietly lets himself bullied while lashing out at his best friends when they try to help him.

Then, uh, Linebarrel crashes down ON him when he’s getting food for his bullies, and like in the PV’s, he wakes up next to nekkid Emi. I should mention how much he looked like a pervert when he saw her and decided to take off his inner shirt while saying “I’m also a man too!”. Could’ve just used his blazer instead *shakes head*.

Horror of horrors, Emi has AMNESIA when she wakes up! Oh god, Gonzo, how much more cliche’d can you get. Did this show just turn in to a romance dorama?! I mean, saving a naked girl who has amnesia… how much more “delicious” can it get! And uh, Kouichi has an imouto now o_o?!

Then the inevitable happens, the Katou guys come attacking and Emi dashes out instinctively with Kouichi right behind. They get caught up in the shit when Yajima comes helping, which further enforces how fail Kouichi is now when he just lets him guide Emi to safety. Seriously, emofag.

Shit happens and they’re nearly crushed by debris, if not for Yajima. This causes a reaction in Kouichi and he punches the debris to pieces which also awakens Emi’s memories. Then BOOB INTERFACING occurs, Kouichi goes in to SEED FACTOR mode and summons Linebarrel, turning in to his GAR version. Damn, the BGM at this part was awesome too.

He proceeds to beat up the Katou ARMA’s, all the while boasting about his new found powers. Great CG mecha fights too here, Gonzo sure spent a pretty penny on it. After dispatching the last of them, he starts to laugh, happy about gaining his new powers, but Emi throws a big spanner in to the works by saying he’s dead already.

Phew, I actually did a full summary-commentary of the episode. Overall, it wasn’t that bad… or maybe perhaps I’ve already expected the worst out of this, so I can’t get disappointed anymore. Even with all the changes in the story, I think they still managed to keep it close to the manga’s character development process roughly, where we see Kouichi change from a weak, bullied kid to a pompous bastard.

Admittedly, that was the most fun thing about the manga from me to see asshole Kouichi getting his life lessons and slowly changing for the better. If Gonzo can pull roughly the same thing off, I’ll be satisfied. Of course, doesn’t change the fact that Gonzo’s Kouichi is a coward dorky loser at the first place, ROFL.

Well, I’m not gonna be a broken record and complain about Hisashi Hirai’s crap designs again. Otherwise, the show doesn’t seem as bad as it looks at first, so I’m gonna give it a few more weeks to see how it goes and whether it’ll be as entertaining as it’ll be. Sure hope the emo phase doesn’t last long…

Didn’t get to see the OP, but the song’s all ready out in the form of the 2 min KnL PV released earlier anyways. Finally got to hear the Maaya Sakamoto ED though and it’s pretty good, possibly one of the best songs for this season. Ironically enough, the ED animation consists of scenes from the manga… including a pivotal scene of a younger Emi and Kouichi holding each other. Is that to spite the original manga fans, LOL.

Decided to check the manga out after watching the promos and finding out some generous Anon scanlated volumes 1 till 4. Man, this manga is definitely kick-ass. I sure didn’t expect it to be this entertaining, since I thought it was another typical shounen-style manga.

While it’s definitely falling square inside the shounen-manga story archetype, the characters make a whole world of difference here. The lead character, Koichi Hayase, isn’t a pussy at the least, heck, he’s the direct opposite of one by being an arrogant bastard and a gung-ho type. He even actually flaunts the fact he has a personal giant mecha around to try and impress the girls, LOL. Sure is pretty darn refreshing for a change of pace.

The other fellow mecha pilots are generally quite normal though. We have the usual cool and calm type and the do-gooder type with a little variation in the form of the tsundere-type and shy-type twins, who are also gender-bendering, heh. Of course, there’s also Noto-sama(god damn it, I keep reading her lines with Noto-sama’s voice already) the engimatic female lead of Emi Kizaki as well to provide the (very little) romantic tension in the manga. The character development is also rather expected though, coming in the form of the “I don’t like that idiot” at first only to be impressed by his actions later.

Now I am kinda dreading the anime though. I really gotta stop reading a manga title whenever the anime is announced, it makes things hard when the producers decide to mess things up with the story. Since the anime is a Gonzo production, there’s already a 50% chance it’d be fucked up. But the anime sure has a weird combination of traits, with Ali Project music, Hisashi Hirai character designs (oh god GSD/Fafner redux?!) and Noto-sama in it(!). Wonder what it’ll turn out to be.

Oh man, I sure can’t wait to hear this line being spoken out. Noto-sama kakkoii yo Noto-sama!

I sure hope the generous and awesome Anon that released Vol. 1-4 will follow up with Vol. 5 onwards. I hate cliffhangers. Correction, I hate reading myself in to cliffhangers ;_;.

P.S. Rewatching the trailers again gives me a feeling that Gonzo’s gonna totally start with an original plot of their own for the series. I mean, Hayase lying down beside a naked Kizaki NEVER happened in the manga… or does it? Also gonna have to add that Hisashi Hirai’s art is total rape of the original manga art. Sigh.