DVD Review - xxxHolic cures inner demons with love story

Some anime focus on saving the world from monsters. Other anime focus on a love story. This anime, however, focuses on resolving problems with evil spirits and falling in love in the process.

"xxxHolic" is probably the first anime that involves a love story with a cool fortune-teller. The anime involves a high school boy, named Kimihiro Watanuki, who helps a fortune-teller cure people with spiritual illness for a price.


In the first episode, Watanuki is being chased around by black, smoking demons. He shouts aloud that he wishes he could stop seeing them, and lo and behold, he arrives at fortune-teller Yuko's wish-granting shop.

After magic literally pulls Watanuki into the house, Yuko tells him that he sees demons because of the blood in his veins. And demons latch on to him because of his blood. Yuko offers to cure him from seeing demons if he works for her.

This is a tricky anime that forced me to think about why certain people in the anime were possessed by demons. This series is a unique mix of caretaking, Confucianist dialogue, Ouija boards and predictions of the future. However, underneath the dialogue there is a hidden love story. Based on episode four, I have the sneaking feeling that Yuko likes Watanuki. What makes this series excellent is the way in which the story hides the love story in a prediction of Watanuki's future by Yuko's mother in episode four.

Also, to break up the long dialogue, there are plenty of humorous characters as well. There are the cute twin girls, Maru and Moro. They share funny, though disturbing, romantic moments together. And for Magic Knight Rayearth fans, there is the cute black Mokona rabbit. It's black, it's little and it's Yuko's drinking buddy. I'd really love to drink with a Mokona, but then people would think I was weird.

Although this series has plenty of spirit, the only problem so far is the character design. I appreciate that the director wanted Watanuki to be tall, so that the Maru and Moro twins would look smaller in proportion. However, in this series, he looks as tall as Shaquille O'Neal! I’m really disturbed that Watanuki’s as tall as he is.
Still, this is a minor complaint to what could be a really great series. Even though the dialogue could be lengthy for some and the characters are a little tall, this is one of the most promising shojo anime releases of 2008. I'll really be looking forward to volume two of the series.
Oh, by the way, this has one of the best ending songs I have ever heard. Feel free to look up the song on Youtube. The song is “Reason” by Fotogenico.

Images courtesy of deepgraysea.com and randomc.animeblogger.net

DVD Review - Moonlight Mile: First astronaut anime sex-fest

I don't mind watching space films most of the time. Although most of them feature only men, the characters perform acts of courage and goodwill that few people could do themselves.

But this anime really shows off the masochism of space movies in its worst form. The series is so degrading for women that it's downright ridiculous.

First of all, this anime covers two daredevil mountain climbers, Saruwatari Garou and Lostman, who work hard to become astronauts in space. It sounds like a great dream. What isn't so inspiring is their ritual of having sex with women as a token of "good luck" before every mountain climb. It's true--just watch the "preparatory" sex scene in episode one before they climb a mountain.

Although I'd have to say that those guys are sure lucky to do such things while I'm still a virgin, it gets downright disturbing when these guys make an effort to have sex at the most illogical times. For example, while a secretary is taking a tour of a construction site, Garou is having sex with a waitress against the window of his heavy-duty crane. And before Lostman flies on a deadly mission in the Middle East, he has to get laid for good luck before his mission.

Good grief, these guys sure get a lot of sex. Also, how do they manage to convince their ladies to get it on? They must be really, really convincing, or disturbingly seductive.

There's also something just wrong about making almost all the men astronauts and all the women as cashiers or secretary. Although I figured that two thousand years in the future women would have the civil rights to become astronauts, apparently most of the astronauts (and most of the characters) are men, as portrayed in "Moonlight Mile".

Still, I had to admit that the animators thought of some ingenius Apollo 13-style situations. The third episode is especially engaging. Steve O'Brien, an African American who is transporting a crane in space, mysteriously loses the thrust in the rockets for his ship. To make matters worse, a meteorite hits his ship, causing him to spin slowly downward into the Earth's atmosphere. Garou saves him with a clever spaceship propelling trick--first O'brien boards the ball-shaped command module. Then the command module is released so that the spinning long end of the ship hits the command module like a bat, propelling it away from the atmosphere. My dad would probably say that this isn't physically possible, but still, I have to admit that the scene looked impressive from a visual standpoint.

Yet, I still can't help but think that this anime is pushing the limits of masochism a little too far. Although "Moonlight Mile" is visually impressive and suspenseful, it is also an unbelievable story. I was looking forward to a brave story about astronauts performing courageous feats. I wasn't expecting a sex-fest, which really became downright ridiculous. When compared to the awesome space anime series "Planetes", "Moonlight Mile" falls flat.

Image from doanimation.wordpress.com