Another largely copypasta review because I'm awesome.

So recently I finally got round to one of the many mangas I've had sitting on my hard-drive waiting to be read (as opposed to ones I buy, which is "anything I can buy" since I hate reading scans), and it was a doujinshi titled Masturbation Master Kurosawa (all sources refer to it as "Onani Master Kurosawa", but I have a bug in my ass about leaving in Japanese words so I won't do that, also I am aware of the hypocrisy in this given that I refer to Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei as such). When I first saw people talking about this, I naturally made assumptions based on the title and the pages posted.

What I was expecting initially:

 Wank jokes, Death Note parody (it was sometimes referred to as "Fap Note", due to some obvious references early on, as seen above, and the fact that the protagonist looks and even acts a fair bit like Light).

However, as people talked about it a bit more (especially as translations got closer to the end of its four-volume run) I noticed readers saying that it was actually a coming-of-age story. To give the now overdue blurb, it centres on Kakeru Kurosawa, a solitary middle-school boy who, every day after school, masturbates in a seldom-used girl's toilet on the third floor, fueling this by fantasising about girls in his class. However, as things change, the story comes to focus on growing out of things and finding oneself, with bullying being a prominent theme.

What I was expecting at this point:

 A coming-of-age story, that somehow starts with a loner fapping in a girl's toilet. I filed it away in the "To read" section of my mind, eventually downloaded it, and, just yesterday, finally got round to reading it.

What I eventually got:

One of the most honest, genuine, true-to-life, and well-written coming-of-age stories I've read in the medium.

I'm trying not to spoil too much, since it's honestly too good a story to spoil, but, even with my mended expectations, it still surprised me constantly. The story kept going in directions I didn't expect at all, but it was never the Code Geass style "asspull plot-twist for sheer what-the-fuck value", everything felt natural and carefully considered. Characters constantly defied stereotypes and clichés, and developed in completely believable ways. The artwork may look primitive but the writing and storytelling is brilliant, clearly produced by somebody with a real story to tell. Ultimately, it turned out to have more in common with Catcher in the Rye than Death Note (though it's been years and years since I actually read that so I don't know how precise this comparison is). I find it marred slightly by the "bonus" chapter, not because it's bad or irrelevant, but because I think the content would maybe have been better placed amongst the normal chapters, since the ending without it has considerably more impact. However, this is a minor quibble.

While I never really experienced true bullying at school, I found myself able to relate very well to one of the themes developed later in the story: that the awful things people may do or say as children can be either crucial to one's development, or end up not meaning all that much at all. Sometimes they can even seem to be both. All the events are so well-observed, though, that I'm sure almost anybody could find something specific they can relate to, and it's such a well-constructed story I'd recommend it to anybody regardless.

It's only four volumes so you've got no excuse! Go read it now!

(also I didn't think I would ever actually re-use that "bullying" label)

I'm a real nerd now

I did something interesting recently. I watched a raw anime episode; that is, one with Japanese dialogue and without subtitles, recorded straight from TV or digital storage media (DVD or BluRay). I've never done this before since I've never bothered following a series as it was airing, and thus have never been in the situation of waiting for fansubbers to do their job (for free), but in this case nobody's stepping up to the plate to do that and I couldn't wait. The episode in question is the first of two new TV specials for Hidamari Sketch, a series I ended up falling in love with several months ago. It's kind of bizarre that I did, since it's not strong on drawing or animation at all, and those who've heard me talk on the subject know that I really value these things. I think I like it mostly because the pacing clicks with me somehow, and in general it's just a really sincerely nice show to watch, since it's just about enjoying time spent with friends, but puts it across in a much more sincere way than similar series.
It sits firmly in the "high-school moe slice-of-life" genre, complete with the usual four-girl-ensemble slotted into the standard character archetypes.

Our lot is the third row down, from left to right: Miyako, Sae, Yuno, Hiro (look up the words you don't know)

And, in common with all shows of this sort, it mostly consists of our main characters going to school (one that specialises in the arts, in this case), living every day life, and being fairly cute about it. Unlike Azumanga Daioh it's very much "slice-of-life" rather than "comedy", though, and unlike K-On! or Lucky Star it's not super obnoxious about the cuteness. Something that really sets it apart is that the main characters not only go to school, but also live together, in a small apartment block across the road from their school, the Hidamari Apartments. This may sound inconsequential, but it actually changes the dynamic alot. Most episodes take place on a single day, and at least half of most of them is spent on the time after school, with the girls simply relaxing and chatting together at home. It also means that episodes not on a school day don't have to be the standard beach episode (actually, there isn't one at all so far, though there is a pool episode), sometimes it'll just be about all of them spending the day at home (though maybe with a specific activity), other times they'll make an excursion of some sort (for example, in one episode Yuno and Miyako go to do location drawing at a shrine on top of a hill). On the whole, it just means we relate to the characters in a different way to how we normally do with these series: it changes the "space" in which it takes place. It's really pure slice-of-life.
Another series where the "space" was specifically important is Pani Poni Dash!, so maybe I'll talk about that some time, too (it was also by the same studio and director, which is interesting).

Despite the often barely-there animation, Hidamari Sketch also has lots of really nice visual turns. The director (Akiyuki Shinbo) and studio (Shaft) seem to love playing weird games with colour, graphics, icons, text, editing, cinematography... actually almost everything BUT the actual animation (though this may partly be due to the fact that they somehow have no money and even less time for most of their projects). I'm still in the process of catching up with their other shows, but Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei and Bakemonogatari look particularly interesting.

This latest episode of Hidamari actually seemed to have even less animation budget than usual, as the drawings were considerably ropier than most of the second season (which itself was a vast improvement over the first). It was still nice, though. Enough of words, here's some pictures!
Isn't this autumnal green delicious? Green is a colour I feel is often handled poorly for some reason, even in shows with otherwise good colour design (e.g. Manabi Straight). This image is actually taken almost straight from the equivalent panel in the manga the anime adapts, but it's carefully selected in that regard, and fits right in with the feel of the rest of the show. Also, note the halftone-pattern. This was also inspired by the manga, but is used alot in the anime as a sort of visual trademark, and often to very nice effect.
It's kind of an anime/manga cliché to illustrate embarassment or fear with vertical blue lines coming down over a character's eyes. Here it's taken to such an extreme that it becomes a sort of parody, a gag in itself.
Orthographic camera (that is, no perspective). This is used a fair bit. Sometimes it's a bit weird to look at and chances are alot of people just won't like it, but I like it just as another visual trademark.
Some moments will be accented with these tightly drawn, super stylishly inked close-ups. I love these. Lovely colours, too. Also, make a note of the fourth one for "identifying a character by a close-up of their hair". There's a few other instances of this throughout the series (usually involving Yuno's magical floating X-shaped hairclips).
A few semi-random images just to show some of the different types of colour schemes employed. Usually the colours are pretty muted, but it'll also switch to very bold or warm palettes, monochrome, pastel shades (see some of the close-ups above) or what have you. This episode mostly uses a sort of autumnal pallette, but tending more towards dulled browns and yellows than oranges or reds, since it doesn't actually take place in autumn (February 10th).
A couple of interesting shot choices for you. The first reminds me of this amazing sequence in another episode where one shot from behind a bookcase is used repeatedly over the course of a scene, but each time the books are arranged differently to obscure different characters, reflecting the progression of the conversation. Nobody's got up to re-arrange them or anything, they're just moved by the laws of cinematography, or something. It's so bold! It drives me absolutely crazy because it's the sort of thing I can never think of!

Of course, this is all just from one episode. Alot of the things I've shown here are employed repeatedly, but there's a bunch more of those "visual trademarks" that I either haven't picked out or that weren't used here, and there's also plenty of unique, one time things that I could talk about from almost any episode. And I haven't even mentioned the anachronic ordering yet!

Are there any modern western cartoons that are this inventive and playful? If somebody combined this sort of stuff with cartoony designs, better drawing and real animation I'd just about have a fit.

As well as these two specials, a third season's going to be airing early next year (February, I think). The first two seasons adapted manga material covering Yuno and Miyako's first year at high school and the Hidamari Apartments (as well as adding some new content, which, far from being filler, actually really added to the show as a whole). From the next year two new girls move in, Nazuna and Nori, bringing the main cast to six.
Reading their character descriptions on Wikipedia I was initially worried that Nazuna would be just a more exaggerated version of Yuno, and Nori a less exaggerated version of Miyako. I checked out a couple of more recent scanlated manga chapters featuring them, and while they didn't necessarily assuage those specific worries it was some of the best material I've seen so far, so I've no fears. I'd love to see some tighter drawing (god knows they should have the money for it by now, considering Bakemonogatari actually managed to beat K-On's DVD and BluRay sales somehow), but to be honest if Shinbo just keeps doing what he's been doing I'll be happy enough.

Expect more on this series in future.