Noblesse – 04

This series seems to be almost universally shat upon, which I must confess I find a little puzzling.  Why?  Because I like it, of course.  I can understand manga fans being dissatisfied, because manga fans are usually dissatisfied with anime adaptations.  And maybe they’re the only ones watching Noblesse, which would explain the uniformity of the reaction.  It makes me kind of sad, but I’ve long since stopped trying to figure out what was wrong with me when I liked a show most people hated, and just assumed I was right and they were wrong.

The thing is, I like pretty much every character in the cast so far, which is pretty rare for a shounen like this.  Even somebody like Shark, who I like as a character despite his being a dribbling A-hole – he fills his role very well.  The newbies Tao (the hacker) and Takeo (the sniper) – who Riv singled out in the comments after the premiere – are immediately a very winning pair.  I find Tao’s bromance with Manabu to be pretty hilarious, and Takeo’s interaction with Yusuke and Seira was likewise a lot of fun, and the hints about his backstory with his sister seem interesting enough.

I enjoy it when a series takes the time to make characters distinct, even when they’re satellite to the main story, and that’s really what makes Noblesse tick for me.  I don’t love it or anything, so I can’t say for sure I’m going to stick with it for blogging purposes – but we’re getting pretty close to the fish or cut bait stage so I’ll need to decide soon.  But I do feel like this is a series that folks should give a chance to, especially if they’ve been put off by the negative aggregator scores.  Just watch the Awakening OVA and you’ll be good to go.

Ikebukuro West gate Park – 04

I was about as close to outright dropping IWGP as you can get, but I stuck it out a bit longer just based on the reasonably high expectations I had for it.  That, and the interesting history behind it.  Last week’s episode was nothing special but it was just – just – enough of an improvement to get me watching one more week (though I had no intention of writing about it).

Well, damned if it didn’t improve again.  And quite a bit more, too – #4 was easily the best episode of the series, and almost enough to convince me that there could be an interesting show hiding in here somewhere.  It was the first time I felt like IWGP really used the setting effectively for story purposes, and it checked the moralizing at the door.  This was just a good, gritty story about lowlifes on the streets of Tokyo that didn’t pull any punches or jump on any soapboxes.  In short, it was almost what I expected IWGP to be from the beginning – at least in terms of overall quality.

Ohtsuka Houchu was a nice choice as the middle-aged man looking for info about his murdered son.  He turns to Makoto for help, but the problem here is soon apparent – Nanjou-san is going to be happier not finding out what Makoto learns.  Nanjou is not naive about what his son was, but he has no idea as to the depths of his faults – primarily physically abusing the women in his life, including his wife.  She has a child Nanjou treasures as a grandson, but there’s more to that story too.  All in all it’s actually pretty engaging and well-executed, and it certainly bought Ikebukuro West Gate Park a ticket into the bubble.  If this one makes the cut it’ll really be a case of coming back from the dead, but I can’t rule it out.  Next week will tell a lot.