Might as well post my rant here. There are some other threads about Anime as well, but a change of tune so to speak doesn't hurt every once in a while Now, although this post centers around one cartoon / anime series some of the things I mention and refer to apply to most of them. So due to a recent event (Hi Jinx, errr: LauraLye!) I got reminded about this one and I felt like sharing. Now... I suppose some could argue that this series borders the regions of Anime but to those I'd like to say that for me this series is Anime in every way, shape and form. And I'm not saying just because of the sound track. Teen Titans! Not to be confused with the later (and IMO kinda bad) "re-release" called Teen Titans Go. No, I'm specifically referring to this one here: click here if the video doesn't play So what makes this so appealing to me? First and foremost the simple approach. Its a kids show, its pretty simple overall: 'bad guy' does 'bad stuff', Teen Titans go into action and (usually) snatch bad guy and send him to justice. I like the fact that it's filled with those commonly seen and used Manga / Anime shots, it is loaded with humor where some of it can be very subtle and in the overall the show even does character building. A character like Raven for example, who is pretty dark and self centered, really seems to evolve and somewhat starts to trust her fellow titans as the show progresses. Even across seasons! Now, dark and mysterious characters aren't uncommon in Anime. The first I met was Rei Ayanami (from Neon Genesis Evangelion) but even so... The way they portrayed her (Raven) is very well done. Another thing is that Teen Titans roughly follows real encounters (from the comics) also. So if you watch some seasons (for example the one featuring Terra) then you actually got a good impression of things which 'really' happened in the Teen Titan universe. And of course there are also plenty of (silly) episodes which make no sense at all, which may even trigger emotional responses from the viewers and which can be both horribly funny and sad at the same time. For example when Beastboy finds "Silkie" (one of Killer Moth's infant moths, secretly adopted by Beastboy). In order to keep his pet hidden he stashes it with Starfire who immediately gets a crush for it and loves the small critter as her own baby, she feeds it some of her home planet berries which make the small and tiny (cuddly) moth grow into a huge beast. And now it's hungry too. So it starts to eat away at Teen Tower, layer by layer! So awesomely funny and well done. And sad too when Starfire is told that she really needs to abandon Silkie, which she does, and Silkie (which doesn't understand) tries to follow her so Starfire actually shoots it in order to make it stay. How to separate those silly / funny episodes from normal ones? Simple! By watching the intro. Instead of an English version you're now treated to a Japanese soundtrack. One feat which I also really enjoy: click here if the video doesn't play Speaking of that music.... This is something I really admire about Anime in general; the music scores. More than often the studio hires famous Japanese singers or (this is the part I really like): the person(s) doing the music / singing / voice-over does such an amazing job that they become famous because of it. Megumi Hayashibara is a good example (Slayers). Teen Titans is no different. The title song was done by Puffi Ami Yumi and they even made a whole video clip out of it. Which I think is quite cool, also because it includes everything. The intro and the outro are both taken from the same clip. And that clip can be seen here: click here if the video doesn't play So yeah.... Now if you'll excuse me. I got some DVD's to grab (I got the full series) and find my favorite episode: Episode 257-494, AKA: Don't touch that dial. Starring Control Freak
Oh! Im glad to say I was full of baloney about Atyack on Titans. Confused it's ending with another one and seems like they are waiting on the manga writter to have more meat and carry on the torch on the anime version! Yay!!! Great news! But its gonna take a while to get animated... Shoo!
