Winter anime season started a couple of weeks ago, and I could just as well copy what we posted when Autumn season began. Although this isn’t directly about Tiger & Bunny, it can’t be helped that we still compare everything we watch to reactions Tiger & Bunny got – and still gets – from us. (Aki thinks this will go on forever, and I gotta agree. It’s not easy to beat the experience Tiger & Bunny gave us.)
For example, one thing we really got pampered with in Tiger & Bunny is the fact that Nishida held the reins on scripting the whole time. Of course he wasn’t the only writer but he was involved in every episode even when other writers worked on them. The importance of the writer didn’t really register with us before, we rarely paid attention to who’s writing the episodes until we started watching Persona 4 the Animation after Tiger & Bunny had already ended. The episodes were so uneven that it didn’t take many weeks for us to figure out that out of the three writers working on the scripts, only one actually seemed to have played the game and cared about characterization. This sucks because many of the parts that we loved about the game have been given a really poor treatment in the anime so far – the camping trip episode is a very good example, with bad pacing. Most of the things that made the camping trip so funny in the game were lost somewhere.
Anyways, back to the current Winter season. We ambitiously checked out quite a few of new series, but most of them have already been dropped due to being a) boring b) stupid c) bad d) all of the above. Some of the new stuff we’ve decided to keep watching falls into both b) and c) but because they’re so bad they end up being unintentionally funny. (That means you, Brave 10 and Aquarion EVOL.) Go figure, Aquarion EVOL gives even better laughs than the actual comedies – Daily Lives of High School Boys and Thermae Romae – that we are watching. Another is the most interesting one so far. We both love horror, and good horror anime is pretty rare. The sound design and scene planning in Another gives us chills, we just hope it’ll carry all the way through.
It was watching the latest episode of Another last night that made me realize what really is the difference between watching Tiger & Bunny and watching any other series. Allow me to demonstrate:
And we played a game until it was bedtime. Feels a bit sadman if I compare it to Superhero Saturdays and talking about Tiger & Bunny until we had to go to bed.
Aki would like to add the following:
[Aki_the_geek] one more comment
[Aki_the_geek] this is one of your shortest posts despite the fact you are talking about several anime in it
[Aki_the_geek] THAT SAYS SOMETHING.
As you may know, ASCII published an interview with executive producer Ozaki Masayuki a couple of days ago. In the interview he talked about how Tiger & Bunny was born, and also about what future plans for the franchise would interest him – such as live-action and musical. It seems he may have said too much (and it’s not the first time – though who can blame him for being enthusiastic?) because he further clarified his thoughts on a live-action adaptation in length on Twitter. You can read a full translation of his tweets at Crunchyroll.
“These are my personal feelings as the producer. However, at this time nobody less than a Hollywood mainstay production studio could realize the vision I have. If we don’t secure complete agreement on staff, cast, production scale, supervisory rights, etc then I don’t intend to give permission.”
– Ozaki Masayuki
The feeling I got from his tweets is that he and the other creators are very protective of Tiger & Bunny – which is a really good thing for the future of the series. Although he has ruled out a Hollywood live-action for now, a musical seems like a possibility. The Code Geass stage musical is currently in production, and I could imagine that if it does well it would be a good sign also for a Tiger & Bunny musical. As a fun fact, director Satou mentioned in an interview around September that he’d be interested in trying a musical in the future. He didn’t specify it further and I took it just as a joke but maybe he wasn’t trolling after all…
Personally I think that Tiger & Bunny would fit a live-action movie better than musical. I’m not into musicals in general, and us foreign fans would have no chance of seeing a musical until the eventual BD release. A live-action movie – if done right – could turn out very good, but anime/manga based live-action movies have a pretty uneven success rate. The Japanese versions tend to be better than the few Hollywood versions that have been made. Tiger & Bunny has taken a lot of inspiration from the American superhero comics and movies so a live-action adaptation feels fitting – although I may be pretty alone with my opinion.
Whether or not you like the idea of a live-action Tiger & Bunny, Ozaki has no plans for that at the moment and he is currently concentrating on the already announced movie projects. That hasn’t stopped the Japanese fans from making speculations about a dream cast for a Hollywood live-action adaptation:
We’re halfway there with the song samples from BEST OF HERO. Despite Mr. Ozaki’s spoilers we weren’t really sure what to expect…
“Thanks, and thanks again!” by Sky High (Inoue Go)
Sky High’s song was pretty hyped on Twitter (Inoue and Ozaki chatted about it the week it was up for sampling on radio), but it doesn’t really hit the mark with us. It’s a good match for Inoue’s voice, and the background vocals are amusing. Maybe we expected too much, or maybe full version will be more interesting? The sample doesn’t get us very excited.
“ICE DOLL” by Blue Rose (Kotobuki Minako)
This is a huge improvement over Blue Rose’s single. The song sounds kinda European style, and Kotobuki’s voice works great with it. This is the kind of music that would be found on my playlist so I guess I’m really partial to it.
“Shougai wairudo sengen” by Wild Tiger (Hirata Hiroaki)
Swinging, but considering Kotetsu’s taste in music it was to be expected. Hirata is a good singer and this is fun to listen to. We both agreed that this is our favourite of the song samples so far. (I may have been affected by the MMD above, it puts a huge grin on my face.)
“Koisuru Heroine” by Girls☆Club (Kotobuki Minako, Ise Mariya, and Tsuda Kenjirou)
The first word that came to mind was “cute”. Especially Ise singing as Pao-Lin is just incredibly cute-sounding. The full version will hopefully have more Nathan, now his part was way too small and the song ends up being a bit on the forgettable side judging from the sample.
“Sake to nakama to otoko no baraddo” by Rock Bison with Wild Tiger (Kusunoki Taitem and Hirata Hiroaki)
This is not a duet unless there’s actual singing from Tiger in the full version. In the sample he’s just making quips from the background and ordering more alcohol. I was trying to come up with an adjective to describe Kusunoki’s singing but I can’t think of anything but “manly”. Because it is manly. And listening to it makes us feel manly too. I guess that’s the “old man flavour” that Ozaki advertised.
We’re not going to go into how well lyrics fit the characters, I think it’s best to have the full versions for that. (And there might be a spontaneous discharge inducing surprise hiding in these songs, just like Barnaby’s part in the B.T.B. song.)
As for the samples not played yet, we’re looking forward to Barnaby’s new solo song the most, because Morita’s voice is reallywell-suited for ballads. We also want to hear the new duet although it will have a hard time beating “Seigi no koe ga kikoerukai”.
A closer inspection led me to their Facebook page, teasing about Kotetsu Zero maybe not being an exclusive if you live in North America. This sounds like good news to our friends on the other side of Atlantic, and maybe this’ll be the start of the merchandise flow there.
Update: Now they’re also teasing with Barnaby Figuarts Zero on the Facebook page. I’d suggest going to comment/like the Kotetsu and Barnaby Figuarts Zero posts there if you’re interested in getting them brought to the North American market.
Update 2: Figuarts Zero Kotetsu is coming to North American market in limited quantity, release in May 2012 and price $49.99. (source)
This is Sternbild 