I would do a retrospective like lelangir did, but it wouldn’t be too interesting—every few points would be interspersed with “then lolikit gave up aniblogging in an emo rage fit, and closed down notdotq for five months.” Not that I ever stayed away for long, but…

… I do have a habit for, shall we call them, disappearances.

Instead of a retrospective, let’s do a highlights, and without dates, because I care more about the feelings than I do the historical accuracies:

- after one year of animeblogging, notdotq is born on wordpress.com, one of the handful of “first” anime blogs to use wordpress.com, along with jp meyer’s fairy tale of love and courage.

- Jason Miao promises to put notdotq on Blogsuki.

- Jason Miao removes newcomer RIUVA from Blogsuki, refuses to put notdotq on.

- Various bedraggled anibloggers realize that Jason is a cancer.

- Hung builds AnimeNaNo, invites Jason Miao.

- I start spreading my name by creating and maintaining the AnimeNaNo IRC channel. The community is thriving. Mr. Pippers is still an aniblogger.

- Jason still doesn’t join AnimeNaNo.

- So there are no killer lolis in Higurashi, mmmkay?

- Jason says that Japanese anibloggers are better than English-speaking anibloggers. Reason: graphs.

- Beginning of holy anti-Jason crusade.

- Oh by the way Haruhi sucks balls.

- I go to France, where I finish Fate/Stay-night and die a premature death due to suck. While in France, AnimeNaNo takes off like a flock of majestic birds, Japes becomes my friend, and Haruhi 12 blows me away.

- Hung, Japes, and Hinano–later, Japes’ girlfriend, now, his wife–start the AnimeNaNo podcast. Pips and I parody: podcast.dotq.org.

- wait, this is turning into a chronological recounting. SHIT.

Okay. Deep breath.

Here are my top ten moments in animeblogging.

#10. The founding of AnimeNaNo. Shit was so cash.

#9. Blogging Kyoushiro to Towa no Sora, Sola, and Aria the Origination with Shirukii.

#8. That time a newbie added me to her initial blogroll along with the big names–Jason, Jeff, Japes, Omo, etc.

#7. Baka-Raptor informed me that I was the king of trolls. (Or maybe it was ‘trolling king,’ either way.)

#6. Konoe and I enjoy many philosophical discourses over AIM, I publish these discourses (“on disagreement,” etc.), ghostlightning realizes that love needs explanation just the same as hate, various anibloggers begin defending their stances more rigorously, “lolikitean” invented.

#5. Kyousora.com is registered and built. My first exercise in hilarious satirical porn stories, perhaps the genesis of my visual novel project.

#4. Graphs. So fucking many of them. Everywhere. All the fucking time.

#3. When Jason stopped posting for three months. Hell yes. This was also when lots of people (ghostlightning, lolikappa, lelangir) were posting on notdotq. I was being extremely productive and the ‘sphere was looking happy.

#2. Miao on My Mind.

#1. So, CCY-senpai, I herd u were maiking a gaem?

I’m going to stop the nostalgia train here because I’m not being very coherent or classy. This was really just a poor excuse to post more.

Love and peace and rock my song,
-Dr. lolikitsune

For those who don’t understand any Japanese, that last bubble is “make a little sister.” Doremi Fansubs are usually decent, and I think they captured Sachiko’s meaning of “accept someone as your little sister” well enough, but I felt like letting a bit of my literalist side take over momentarily. I checked the word in a dictionary, and while “tsukuru” can mean anything from “make” to “cultivate” to “commit sin,” I didn’t find anything in the long list of meanings to keep me from snickering.

Yes, Yumi.

Sachiko wants you to get knocked up.

I’ll write a real post sometime… maybe.

[canned introduction] Maria-sama ga Miteru: a show about disgustingly rich girls attending a private school that at once shields them from the harshness of reality and subjects them to the darkest, most horrific thing a girl could go through: romantic friendship with other girls! [/canned introduction]

As DiGiKerot pointed out, there’s a lot wrong with this new season of Maria-sama ga Miteru. This isn’t limited to the OP song change, or to the running in the OP sequence. This episode sees the *gasp* introduction of apparently heterosexual men! In my Hanadera Academy? Obviously it’s more likely than I thought—I would have said the chances were 0%.

Spiral power? “Your sexy lesbian is a sexy lesbian that can pierce the gay man’s gayness?” I don’t even know!

Anyway, this episode sees us approximately one year after the events in episode one of season one. The school festival is coming up, and Lillian Jougakuen’s Yamayurikai is once more holding a play. Once more, the boys from sister gay school Hanadera Gakuen are participating. Once more, there’s some tall, dark, and bishoujo girl bitch who hates men and wants out. Once more, Yumi is given the task of making everything work out.

By the way, Kanako. You want Yumi to remain an angel?

Protip: People die when they’re killed.

Crazy Sachiko, in classic Crazy Sachiko style, informs the actors that the girls and boys will be switching roles. Well, she’s gotten better about gender issues in the last year (remember her moaning about how evil men were?), but this kind of blunt trolling isn’t very attractive. At first Yumi is displeased with her onee-sama’s decision, but then she decides to take it like a good little walking vagina when said onee-sama melts her with her eyes.

Shirukii is also on board with Sachiko’s “meaningful” expressions.

“Rape is imminent.”

In between the Yamayurikai practicing the play and Shimako training her new dog, Yumi has some flashbacks of when she became Crazy Sachiko’s petite soeur. We get some nice piano version of Pastel Pure that almost makes up for the new OP, and… Yoshino suggests that Yumi have a nice anniversary with her onee-sama. I’m starting to see eye-to-eye with IcyStorm here; Yoshino rocks. “Nice anniversary?” Roses, chocolates, a fancy dinner, and a hotel room.

The fanfiction writes itself!

In any event, Crazy Sachiko clearly remembers what day is coming up. She’s got her rape mask on.

Later on, Yumi and Touko are having some problems with their relationship. Thankfully Yumi has learned the lessons taught by Rainy Blue and confronts Touko directly, making a big fuss in front of the Yamayurikai’s sex chapel.

As the school watches in horror, Yumi trills “Ano (Tou)ko wo Rape.”

Now that Maria-sama ga Miteru is current again, I should really do some YFR fic of it, huh?

The stage was set. The metools painted a rainbow over Lillian’s entryway and the Yamayurikai took to the sky in kaiawase formation. Who will profit? Who will get sexxings? Who will make my next blog post funny? So many questions, and a whole another week until episode two…

(The emo girl was emo, but such is the lot in life for those who fall in love with DEAD PEOPLE WHO WERE KILLED. OH EM GEE.)

Fuck Yesssssssssss

Toward the end of the episode, we are informed that Rosa Gigantea is coming back for the school festival. The possibilities are endless. Personally, I’m hoping for the “Sei surprise-sexes Yumi while Yumi is waiting for Sachiko to meet her for their after-festival anniversary-celebratory make-out session” route. Other lovely possibilities include a threesome, an overly-dramatic scene with humongous sexual tension, and a tennis match.

Other coverage by:
Link
Cuchlann
Totali

Maria-sama ga Miteru: a show about disgustingly rich girls attending a private school that at once shields them from the harshness of reality and subjects them to the darkest, most horrific thing a girl could go through: romantic friendship with other girls! Maybe I’m a lesbian, by Yuki Seto, on sale at doujin markets near you.

I don’t like the new OP song but that’s just because I’m a stickler for tradition. When Undine came on in Episode 26 of Aria the Natural, I came fucktons of omobuckets. When they got rid of Pastel Pure, I cried more rivers than Noe can throw chickens into. Other thoughts on the OP include, but are not limited to:

• “the cake is lie!”
• “magical girl lyrical fukuzawa?!”
• “needs moar Rosa Gigantea (and not the Shimako variety)”
• “FUCK YES FUCK YES FUCK YES”
• “キター！”

Fuck yes fuck yes Crazy Sachiko is back!!

The second best character Of All Time is Ogasawara Sachiko, AKA “Crazy Sachiko” as dubbed by my senpai and hero, Lovely Kitsune. I say second best because Fukuzawa Yumi (ribbons, funny faces) is younger, and thusly a more acceptable lust-target. Fuck yeah lolis.

Back to Sachiko… why is she so awesome? Nobody knows. All anyone knows is that she just is.

I mean, shit man. She has a “Sa” in her name (さ). Look at that mother-fucker right there. Where have you seen that before? I’ll tell you the fuck where. Remember this guy? Shit yeah you remember that guy. Coincidence? I think not. Sa-chan does not forgive and Sa-chan does not forget. Sa-chan is a psychobitch; expect to not go on dates with her. Did I mention she likes tea? Fuck.

It’s like a damn waterfall down there when I think of her, SHIT.

- question for the peanut gallery: if one can “come harder than omo,” can one “come down more gracefully than IcyStorm” (who orgasms while watching anime approximately once per episode per open IM window yet still functions in society)? -

Sorry for getting derailed. At least “Sachiko” is a better name than “Darry” and all that. Oh and her nose is more sexual. But I digress… back to the episode.

Waitaminute…

I’m going to go download a different version of the episode once my eyes stop being the new waterfall.

YES YES YES YES!!! The writer’s goldmine known as Maria-sama ga Miteru comes back for a second fourth season! Each episode I write about brings me one step closer to an afterlife of suffering in the fiery depths of the netherworld. Is it worth all that? The answer is a resounding FUCK YES!

Maria-sama ga Miteru (マリア様がみてる) – A show about a bunch of snobby girls who rule an all girls Catholic school with an iron fist and their unambiguous homosexual tendencies.

/me drools a little

Huh? Wha? Other shows? Fuck no there’s no other shows next season. Nothing on my radar, at least. I’m going to watch this show raw and I’m going to blog it raw because I’m like Kuze and yuri… yuri… yuri… oh Maria-sama am I clever! Anyway, I will blog the shit out of this show, and Shirukii, honoring the age-old tradition of tandem Winter blogging, shall join me.

Also, yes, I totally lifted the first two paragraphs of this post directly from Lovely Kitsune.

You should know why.

Right now it seems I’m prioritizing my work on this over more serious writing, so please reward my efforts with helpful feedback :)

You can ask Jason Miao for a sign.

So yeah. Please, download this and test it out. Even if you’ve played previous versions. There’s a lot of new content, save games from previous versions should still work, and Skip Mode should remember what text you read in previous versions (it does for me).

Download whichever build floats your platform:
Mac: .zip, 7.2mb
Linux: .bz2, 3.9mb
Windows: .zip, 4.6mb

Changelog :: v0.04

==== Endings ====
+ 2 bad endings
+ 1 good ending
==== Characters ====
+ Owen (introduced outside of bad end)
+ Baka-Raptor (professor)
+ Os (professor)
+ DarkMirage (professor)
+ Scott (student)
+ Mike (student)
+ Riex (professor)
+ Impz (professor)
+ lKnight (professor)
==== Gameplay ====
+ 3 menus
+ Day 1 has a date
~ updated concluding notes
~ updated tutorial
==== Contents ====
+ 3600 words (total is over 9000 now)

If you do either of the things he mentions, you’re a pedophile. I’m a pedophile.

Anime bloggers featured/referenced thus far:

Baka-Raptor (male)
CCY (male)
CJ (female)
DarkMirage (male)
hashihime (mentioned)
Impz (trap)
Jason Miao (male)
Jeff Lawson (mentioned)
lKnight (male)
lolikitsune (male)
Marmot (female)
Mike (male)
Omo (female, genderbent)
Os (male)
Owen S. (male)
Riex (stuffed animal)
Shirukii (mentioned)

Again—I don’t have character art, and I likely won’t ever if someone doesn’t contribute it. There will be credits. There probably won’t be payment. I want this to be an open “resource” for the aniblogosphere. So that people can say “I see what you did thar” and make their own VNs. Yeah.

Art? Contribute it.
Music? Contribute it.

I’m focusing on writing, and throwing in cop-out backgrounds where I can.

Thank you for your time!

Now for some random whoredom:

• a post of mine has been published on Oi, Hayaku! I’m linking this not only to get you guys to read my post, but also to get Riex to see this post. He’s a lazy fellow who only checks trackbacks. Lamer.

• lolikitean is now a word. ghostlightning continues to rock my socks.

October 24th, 2008

BERKELEY, CA—Miao on My Mind, an anime blogging and anime blog blogging site, has been launched to the public today by enthusiastic admin and gold-winning satirist lolikitsune. Already, it has been the target of much fanfare and many rotten oranges tweets. It is both a bitter day for the aniblogosphere and a sweet day for the aniblogosphere; in essence, it is a bittersweet day for the aniblogosphere.

It is a bitter day, because the birth of Miao on My Mind signals the death of notdotq, an aniblog and aniblog blog previously run at the same URL by the same admin. Many long-time readers will be shocked to see their favorite site mysteriously missing when they load their only bookmark.

“I’m not worried ’bout dat,” said lolikitsune, who prefers to go by the more intimate monicker of lolikit, when he was questioned about the issue of reader loyalty, expectations, and potential betrayal. “If a long-time reader looks around with the critical eye I have trained my readers to have, he or she will notice that all the old content is still intact, and that all new content follows in the footsteps of the old.”

When we asked him about the aforementioned “training,” he likened it to a high school education.

“I keep throwing nonsense and utter bullshit at them, you see,” he patiently explained. “Eventually they learn how to cut away that bullshit and get to the heart of things.”

He went on to add, “of course, there isn’t always a heart. Aniblogging is heartless business. But that’s the point, you know? There’s no real substance, anywhere. A true notdotq reader won’t be disappointed by the new shell—the same old lack of meaning is still pervasive.”

Miao on My Mind promises to be “the same old shit” in a “refined package.” The fifteen-day redesign shows lolikit’s hard work in the field of CSS, especially.

“[lolikitsune] learned how to create classes the names of which mean nothing,” said a noted expert from the World Wide Web Consortium. “This is no mean accomplishment. We at the W3C are all very impressed with how far he’s come since he learned HTML 4 in the ninth grade.”

One contact in the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Communications Department revealed that the W3C was in fact so impressed with lolikit’s abominable coding habits that plans to file three different lawsuits were currently occupying two entire 1.5TB hard drives. When asked for further details, our contact—who asked to remain anonymous—said that the rest was “classified information.” She also sent us an animated .gif file of a red-haired anime character winking.

But the W3C aren’t the only ones taking notice of—or offense at—lolikit’s latest shenanigans.

“It’s atrocious,” stated Impz of THAT Animeblog [@] and the Anime Blog Awards [@] Committee. “Simply atrocious.”

Owen S. of Cruel Angel Theses [@] concurred with Impz, adding that “lolikitsune is an unthinking douche, and should be removed from the internet with post haste.”

Some, like Shirukii of Anime Blog ga Arimasu [@], merely shrugged when we asked them about the news. “lolikit’s an old friend,” Shirukii said when we pestered him. “I can forgive him for liking flat chests more than <ul> tags.”

Others are on the other side of the love/hate spectrum.

“I think the jasonisms are totally out of hand,” said CCY of Mega Megane Moe [@], in reference to the fact that lolikit’s XHTML stopped being very semantic with the redesign. “But that’s not necessarily a bad thing, you know? lolikitsune has always been an out-of-hand kind of guy. And he’s doing something 100% original, bringing a new style of anime blog to the table.”

100% original, it might be noted, so long as you count “recycling the memes of others” as original. To lolikit’s credit, most anime bloggers recycle crowd memes (see: 4chan) or their own memes, and the reuse of other anime bloggers’ memes is a rare practice. Devoting a site to this is an even rarer practice, and indeed lolikit’s efforts might be the first in the field.

The new genre of website that Miao on My Mind purports to be—”aniblog, aniblog blog, and aniblogger shrine”—may sit stagnant for months or even years before lolikit sees new neighbors joining him, rushed studies show. Only 1 in 17 anime bloggers even recognize the term “aniblog” as official jargon in the aniblogosphere, and only about 1 in 25 read other anime blogs. With those numbers, it is extremely unlikely that anyone will be joining Miao on My Mind anytime soon.

“I did quick studies of my own,” admitted lolikit when we asked him about this. “Ran some quick simulations through Technorati, converted the results into some pleasing graphs, and quickly discovered that the most likely candidate to start up another site like Miao on My Mind in the next two years is yours truly. Now THAT is Web 2.0!”

We appreciated lolikit’s jovial tone, but we noted the despair in his eyes. He’s a true pioneer.

When asked about the future of Miao on My Mind, lolikit lightened up significantly.

“Oh, it’s going to be awesome!” he declared. “The site looks different, but behind the scenes, nothing’s really changing. Working on notdotq was almost always fun, so Miao on My Mind will be a barrel of monkeys as well, I’m sure.”

We asked him to be more specific about his plans.

“Well, at some point I’m going to have to acknowledge those Oi, Hayaku! guys. Riex has been clutching onto my epenis for dear life. He’s even stalking me on Facebook. I feel like the guy from LME in Skip Beat—if I don’t satisfy this fellow, he’ll follow me to the grave. That aside… I guess I’m going to be blogging some anime this season, Mouryou no Hako, and whatever else catches my fancy. As for aniblog blogging, I’m long overdue for some good Versus posts. Expect to see the following before the year is out: Baka-Raptor.com VS. LovelyKitsune.com, Natsuneko VS. TheBigN, and the big one that everyone’s been waiting for, anime|otaku VS. Cruel Angel Theses.”

In short, lolikit’s spirits are wavering back and forth like Higurashi no Naku Koro Ni‘s per-episode quality, and his ambitions are soaring like the proverbial (and actual) paper airplanes of noted symbolism anime ef. It will be interesting to see what comes of this transformation, and where Miao on My Mind goes from here.

In the meantime, we can satisfy our hunger for lolikit’s obscenities by examining the various new pages of information that he has set up around the site, including, but not limited to, a fresh page about the admin in question himself, a new page of frequently asked questions, and a page about blogging awards.

Lastly, lolikit expressed his desire to thank selected members of the aniblogosphere. We have published his message along with our article, and you can read it just below.

FUCK JASON MIAO!

Thank you, lolikit.

lolikitsune, also known as Flak, is a first-year student at the University of California, Berkeley, where he will begin exploring the fields of Cognitive Science, Rhetoric, and Legal Studies in January. He spends half his time working in the Communications Department at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and in his free time he enjoys writing stories—such as Miao on My Mind’s featured Night Switch—and maintaining websites, both activities he’s pursued for several years now. You can learn more about him at his main site, Dreams of the Quill.

The former notdotq was part of the second generation of anime blogs, rearing its little head around the same time as other now-notable anime blogs, including the award-winning Minaide! Hazukashii… and the award-winning RIUVA (recipients of Bronze and Silver in the 2008 Anime Blog Award’s Satire section, respectively). notdotq has come and gone four times in the last three years, appearing and disappearing with the seasons and lolikitsune’s mood swings.

So it looks like ef ~a tale of melodies~ is going to be the first in a long awaited new series of posts here on Miao on My Mind: A Certain Whoredom Index. Basically, what this means is that ef ~a tale of melodies~ is deep. Like a whore.

Before I go on, I want to make something clear: admittance to the Index is not necessarily bad. “Whore” is usually used as a derogative, but on this site it only means “thing that has some semblance of depth.” You know. Like a standard Kyoto Animation show. Or like Author’s incisive postings. Or like CJ. I could give more examples, but I’d rather add to the Index with further posts. That said, let’s examine our current specimen!

I called it before anyone else! Eat my dust, bitches!

So I was watching episode 3 of ef ~a tale of melodies~, and the OP came up, and I was like “lol” because the OP makes me lol. But then I stopped myself—”lolikit! Get it together! This show is srs fkn bsns!!” And I forced myself to take a second look at what I was watching. One opening of VLC, a shitload of play/pause syncing, and half a minute later, I was looking at the OP sequences of episodes 2 and 3 side by side. As I’d remembered, the OP had once been far more monochrome. It’s got colors now! Lots of them! They clash and look bad!

Shinbo must be up to something!

Furthermore, the girls have faces now. I remember when, in ef ~a tale of memories~, the OP visuals were changed so that the girls were like, no longer chained, or something (I don’t recall all the details, geez). But that was for the last episode, and this is episode three. If the changes were less subtle, I’d guess that the animators finally got comfortable with their budget, but really, it’s just a matter of colorizing something.

I guess another difference is in the amount of text displayed in the background at any given point.

Speaking of text… the text in the last ef’s OP was the text of Chihiro’s novel. What could this OP’s text be? The “policies” of Himura? It’ll be interesting to see where this ef goes, since Kuze seems to be on a 24 hour clock at this point and Himura’s backstory is not cool at all. He’s much better sitting on a church altar playing Isako than he is being angsty about his dead sister. Well. He is better. I’m not sure the plot is. But it’s all questionable either way.

And we’re left wondering, did the lily exploding and fading like a firework inside the dark recesses of Kuze’s mind at 00:26 somehow symbolize his chance at raw sex with Mizuki disappearing as his death draws nearer?

Fear not, Kuze! You can make like Narcissu and disappear into the waves, and then you’ll have no regrets because you didn’t die at home or on 7F.

Lily’s less important than that, right?

Eventually, Mizuki will get over you and begin screwing her love interest’s twin sister. After a couple weeks, Renji will find out and bow out of his relationship with Chihiro like the true wimp he is. Maybe, in desperation, he’ll settle on his mother (whom, incidentally, people seem to be forgetting is just as delicious as Furukawa Sanae). But no matter what happens there, everyone’s happy—including Himura, ’cause he got to send you off with some poorly-pronounced German.

Did I do a good job of presenting an “omg stylistic thingy omg” element, pretending to begin analyzing it, and then launching into rabid fanboyism? A good impression, right? You guys are impressed, right? I could take over for Owen anytime, right?

lol lights don’t work that way and neither do shadows

I have to confess to something shameful—Shirukii’s no-nonsense straighter-than-a-Euclidian-line anime blog has, in fact, affected my sense of humor. I’ll always remember a playful response by one of his readers to a comment by “Raigomaru“—”chickens don’t work that way, and neither does death.”

Alright, that’s all from me for now.

Hopefully that’s all the ef blogging I do for the rest of this season. We really don’t need more pseudo-intellectual elitist pricks around here, right?

deftoned insults Aquamarine’s quality. I agree that the quality of Aquamarine’s grammar was not Owen-notch. I agree that it’s pretty pitiful. I would contend, however, that there’s nothing wrong with what they did (in the context of us being people who consume fansubs).

Thank you Aquamarine for ruining 2 very good episodes of Aria with lousy grammar.

I wouldn’t call it ruining. The episodes are still the episodes. You watched the raws, right, deftoned? If you watched the raws, and if you’re discussing the quality of the subs, then you were fine with just the raws, or something, I’m assuming. In that case, these subs affect nothing for you.

Aria deserves better.

It’s going to get better when the boxset comes out in 2009 or 2010. Aquamarine I think released their subs with the intention of getting a quick fix to the people who were left high and dry by Hikari no Kiseki. They didn’t go back and sub episodes 1-11; they clearly were patching a hole. As far as that goes, I think it was pretty suteki or whatever. I was happy to see Aria the Origination 12. I appreciated what they did. I danced around the bad grammar and unnecessary TL notes and I enjoyed the episodes and I was grateful.

This isn’t to make a judgment on HnK—I know they have their reasons for dropping the show and taking down their torrents, it’s a matter of their conception of respect and all that—but yeah, I’m glad that Aquamarine released those subs.

Whether or not they’re native speakers doesn’t matter because the quality of the subs doesn’t matter past a certain point. As far as I could tell—and I’ll have to admit, I’m not the King of Japanese or something—the subs were ‘correct’ and gave a good idea of what was happening. This could by the Nyoro~n subs thing all over again but the circumstances are very different. Nyoro~n was trying to be a fansubbing group while Aquamarine was just trying to fansub something. The circumstances don’t call for easy and poor-quality releases done for releasing’s sake; they call for a product that will satisfy. I understand that Aquamarine failed in that regard at least as far as deftoned and his comment-leavers are concerned, but they succeeded with me.

They succeeded with me, and I am thankful.

deftoned’s vitriolic disregard for Aquamarine’s efforts strikes me as somewhat cold and not particularly well-thought-out. I feel like he could have made a more wonderful post if he had been less harsh and had perhaps offered constructive criticism rather than flames. That said, it is time to thank some people.

You five groups—especially Crystal Nova—have brought to me one of the greatest things of my life. All of you helped in some way to convey the feelings and messages of my new favorite anime to me. Thanks to you all, I have “chotto ureshii dake da yo” echoing in my mind. Thanks to you, I’ve been on the verge of tears almost all day. “Almost,” because I in fact did cry at one point.

For a long time, I said things like “Kannazuki no Miko is my favorite show,” emphasizing the word “show” because I had this gimmick that Interlude was my #0 top anime (it being an OVA). Obviously, Kannazuki no Miko is no longer my favorite show. Also, as should be obvious given my emphasis on wording and the diction of my previous paragraph, Interlude is no longer my top of the top. That’s right—Aria has surpassed it. Aria is officially my best. My top. I don’t know what this does to my Top 5 list and frankly I don’t care. It seems totally inconsequential right now. That’s how good Aria is—it can be my Top 5, all by itself.

A note to anyone who might err and call the ending “rushed” as though that were unexpected or unpleasant or disappointing: any kind of ending for Aria is, by definition, rushed. Let us take a quick look at the story structure of Aria:

The Animation, episode 1: Introduces Akari, Alicia, Aika, Aria, Ai, some side characters, Neo-Venezia. Sets the stage, creates the premise, etc.
The Animation, episode 3: Introduces Alice. Everything has been put in motion.
The Origination, episode 9-13: Promotions! And everything comes full circle.

Notice what’s missing up there? That’s right, 45 episodes of the show! Yes, there’s continuity and character development throughout the entire series, but forty-five episodes go by without having any major points in that overall plot of “Akari becomes a pro.” Forty-five episodes go by slowly, plugging away at the mystique of Aqua, the beauty of life, the power of love. Things change, seasons come and go, but aside from passing references to Akari’s skill improving there’s no real mention of barriers overcome or checkpoints cleared. So yeah, no matter how they paced the ending, so long as they were trying to have Akari reach her goal, things were going to seem rushed.

Rushed, but just as planned.

Rushed, but wonderful.

By the way, who called it? Back with episode 4 I said Akari was Prima-level. Alicia agrees with me:

By the way, Shirukii, you’ve been delinquent in your duties. Where are Aria posts? What happened to our blogs being matching lovers?!

There were so many hard-hitting moments in the last episode of Aria that I don’t know where to start cataloguing them. Aika and Alice visiting Akari and being concerned. Alicia’s news of retirement and marriage. Akari’s panic attack. Alicia’s confession. Alicia’s tears. The boat ride with the mailman. Akari’s Aria Company, and Akari’s Neo-Venezia, and Akari’s Aqua. Alicia’s retirement ceremony. Akari’s memories. The epilogue. Ai-chan as apprentice.

And that last line.

“Chotto ureshii dake da yo.”

I’ve referred to Akari’s wonderful revelations before. The things she’s said that warrant Aika’s objection. The things she’s said that improve people’s lives. Like what she said to the Singles in episode 4 of the Origination, about clean slates and starting over. Those things are all pretty lovely, I’ll admit. But this line… this line that she subconsciously pulled from Alicia’s treasure trove… it may well be the line that takes the cake, the line that will become a mantra for me.

I guess I can’t close this post with, “let’s be together on Aqua again next time,” because there is no next time.

I guess I have to close this post with…

I’m just a little happy.

They sound suspiciously like fansubs, don’t they?

So, I’m a huge fan of transparency. And the Anime Blog Awards have transparency—you can easily see who nominated what. But I like taking transparency a step further. A step further into the realm of attention whoring. So I’m going to display all my nominations here along with unfunny comments.

Best Episodic Blog
I nominated Shirukii and Lovely Kitsune. Bias in the case of the former, adulation in the case of the latter. Lovely Kitsune blogged epic on AIR, and it’s arguable that without him I would not have started anime blogging, and that without that, ANO‘s IRC channel would have never been created, and that without that, the ANO community might never have come together, and well… the possibilities run wild from there. But basically, Jason Miao would still run the aniblogosphere.

I guess I’m making it sound like LK’d be good for Most Influential Blog (which he is), but this is due in large part to his episodic posts, which are deserving of epic lulz.

Best Editorial Blog

I nominated jp meyer. He is true win of the editorial. Or at least, he was. I hear he hasn’t been blogging about Kimi ga Nozomu Eien and porn conventions and college anymore, now that he’s not in college anymore. Or is he still? What does an absentfag like me know.

Best Team Blog

I rowed, rowed, and fought the power, and didn’t nominate either of the favorites. I nominated Anime Diet and Anime Blog ga Arimasu. The former because Mike thinks Lain is good (I’m a troll, right?) and the latter because technically Soda accompanies Shirukii.

Also, there has been much outcry against the disappearance of Epic Win Blog. I would have nominated them, but they apparently disappeared off the face of the planet or something. Ah well, must be divine retribution for liking Lucky Star.

Best Manga Blog

I nominated Extrange. He introduced me to My Lovely Ghost KANA or something like that. It was delicious cake and I was a regional CO. ’nuff said.

Most Influential Blog

Here I once more nominated jp meyer and Lovely Kitsune. jp meyer started blogging around the same time as me, just a little over two years ago. He is epic win and inspired me to be such as well. Lovely Kitsune I already explained. In addition to these two, there is one more:

Owen.

He’s the epitome of anti-influential seeing as he is a derivative work of me. Buuuuut, to be generous, for the purposes of nominations I took the absolute values of everyone’s influence. Owen got up to >9000 instantly, and thusly deserves a nomination.

Best Dorama

DrmChsr0 gets my only nomination in this category. DarkMirage deserved one but I hate dislike him intensely. Drm on the other hand is lovable Jesusfag.

Rookie of the Year

I nominated Owen here again, just to put him in his place. As he himself rightfully noticed, he is technically a rookie until April 9th, the date that my chef d’oeuvre Lucky Star post forced him into the aniblogosphere.

Funniest Blog

More Lovely Kitsune and jp meyer. These Anime Blog Awards are pretty good at at least one thing—they are helping me put a finger on why I like the blogs that I do. Notice how I’m like, the one guy who DIDN’T nominate Jason for this category.

Best Satire Blog

jp meyer. The others are, unfortunately, all complete garbage.

Best Seiyuu-Orientated Blog

I didn’t nominate anyone for this category, for the obvious reason that I would spam my nomination comment with “THE OGRE THE OGRE THE OGRE THE OGRE” and links to hashihime who, though I appreciate him for his work on Simoun, seems to have taken it upon himself to become Hirano Aya’s lifetime biographer. And she is hideous to behold.

Most Thought-Provoking Blog

I’m embarrassed that I nominated Mike for this category. Especially after that post about fansubs and slavery. Totally fucking depressing.

At least I made up for it by nominating Owen (who’s deep like a whore) and jp meyer (who’s deep like stingrAIDs).

Best Blog-related Comic

I’m not going to discuss my nominations in this category because there’s nothing funny about meta-humor. I’ll just say that DiGiKerot is cool.

Best Figurine Blog

I gave a pity nomination in this category to my cute kouhai Riuva. I could go on about “not-win anime blogger” or “tri-penile mangoes” or whatever, but I don’t think I will. Instead I’ll just say that Riuva could have won my support in other categories were it not counter to the very nature of Riuva as originally envisioned to be involved in other categories. Whew. That was hard to say.

Best Art/Doujin/Visual Novel Blog

Best News Blog

Objection!

In closing I think I’ll just say this: nominate notdotq for Most Influential, or Funniest, or Best Satire, or Best Dorama. Any of those or all of them. Remember the Haruhi hate. Remember the Higurashi hate. Remember the Lucky Star hate. Remember the love.

V!

EDIT: I am impelled to apologize to Baka-Raptor. Even though he went back on his morals and made his site look more like a blog, he’s almost Lovely Kitsune-class funny and that’s epic and I should have nominated him. Unfortunately, the time to edit comments is over. OTL