Gavin Mackey's Pokemon Redesigns

I was browsing around facebook and found someone's post regarding these drawings. I thought they look so awesome that I just have to share them with you!



If you want to see more artworks of pokemon, you can find them here:

Prince of Tennis Songs

I am so glad that I stuck through and decided to watch "Prince of Tennis" and all of their OVAs even though I already read the manga and know what will happen. Not only did I get to see the little chibi episode (which was funny as hell), I also got to listen to all the amazing music they use for openings and endings. After a little research, I found out that the voice actors of the anime worked together to create different bands to sing songs for the anime. In one of the fan DVDs, they did a marathon of 100 songs by the characters and bands they created. I absolutely love their voices! Especially, Kikumaru Eiji (Hiroki Takahashi has an amazing voice range! Look him up on youtube and you'll understand what I mean!) and Shiraishi Kuranosuke's (that Osaka dialect is just pure sexy in my opinion) voice. Anyways, I'll stop my rambling and get on with the few songs that I found awesome:

Wonderful Days (7th ending)- Pulltab to Can (Band formed by characters: Atobe Keigo, Kirihara Ayaka, Sengoku Kiyosumi, Sanada Genichirou, Kamio Akira, Ibu Shinji, and Ooshitari Yuushi)


Little Sky (8th ending)- Kentaro Fukushi


Hello& Goodbye (Nationals Arc OVA 1st Ending)- Kondou Kaoru


These next two are songs that the characters did and is not from the anime. Both of them are a play on the old and famous Japanese fishermen song "Soran Bushi". I think the lyrics are funny. Especially Shitenhouji which had many interesting characters lol.

Kiku-chan no Soran Bushi- Kikumaru Eiji


Naniwa no Soran Bushi- Everyone from Shitenhouji

Prince of Tennis

Summary:

"Prince of Tennis" is a story of growth and competition revolving around the students of Seigaku Middle School and their rookie star player, Echizen Ryoma. Seigaku is famous for their tennis team which had made it to the nationals many times in the past. Ryoma is a first year that just entered the tennis team. Within the first day of entering, he managed to piss off all the upperclassmen with his nonchalant attitude and his superior skills in tennis. Beating all of his upperclassmen during the placement matches, he becomes their rookie star player and join Seigaku's fight to win first in the nationals.

Review:

I've loved "Prince of Tennis" since it first came out in 2001! I read it every time a new chapter was translated and, like many people in Asia, became interested in the sport and joined the tennis team. After I joined the team I became so busy with practice and school that I stopped reading the manga (I played 1st for doubles btw)! Since I was in the midst of my sports manga and anime phase, I decided to check out "Prince of Tennis" again. It turns out that the first manga series ended a while ago and now Konomi sensei is working on the second series which revolves around all the middle school team banding together to fight the high school teams at tennis camp.

After finishing the manga series, I found that after so long, it is still an awesome series! Konomi sensei's art became very awesome! It's so amazing that he could come up with so many different characters for the series and each of them so unique! Also, Konomi sensei also did an awesome job on all the different tennis styles and techniques for each tennis player. Even though most of the techniques became sort of physically impossible after the middle of the series, it was still very creative and it gave me a good laugh!

I realized after reading up to the latest update for the new manga series, I still want more of Tenipuri! I started looking up fanbooks and am watching the anime series right now. From the fanbooks I was able to learn many interesting facts about the characters lol. For fan service, Konomi sensei also put out a couple of baby pictures of the characters. Here are the ones I have managed to find:

Hyotei's Atobe Keigo


St. Rudolph's Mizuki Hajime


Rikkaidai's Yagyuu Hiroshi


Higa's Tanishi Kei


Shitenhouji's Oshitari Kenya


and finally, our Seigaku star, Echizen Ryoma


I've been looking all over to collect these "Premium photos". If anyone of you come across these pictures of other characters or of better quality please send me the link!!!

Well, I hope I've said enough about "Prince of Tennis" to strike your interest! As usual, I'll end this post with some Tenipuri anime openings!

Future- HIRO-X


Driving Myself- HIRO-X


Make You Free- Kimeru


Long Way- Ikuo


Fly High, Sky High- Toshihiko Matsunaga


Shining- Yuki Shirai


I LOVE THIS ONE!!!!
Dream Beliver- Osami Masaki

Eyeshield 21

Summary:

Eyeshield 21 is a manga revolving around high school students from the American Football club. Kobayakawa Sena is a freshmen that had always been bullied all his life. He decided to join the American Football Club as a secretary because they didn't have enough people and secretary was a job that allowed him to be involved in the club without having to actually participate in this violent sport. However, Sena's talent for being a runner was discovered by the captain, Hiruma Youichi. Infamous for using blackmailing and evil schemes to get what he wants, Hiruma got Sena to play under the code name of "Eyeshield 21" and not reveal his actual identity. As they journey forth to their goal of playing in the Christmas Bowl, they meet more friends, enemies, and grew tremendously in football and in life.

Review:

EYESHIELD 21 WAS AWESOME!!!! I loved it so much that I read the whole 333 chapters over the weekend! It was very much like you average sports manga in that it focused on game play, technicalities of football, and learning to never give up no matter how hard things are. Although I'm not a football fan, this manga's humor and characters kept me wanting more and more. I find myself growing anxious as the clock in the manga began to run out and I'm constantly cursing my internet to be faster as if the clock in the manga would change with real time lol. I cheered and even cried with the team when they meet defeat. I haven't finished Prince of Tennis but I think if you liked Slam Dunk then you would probably like Eyeshield 21 as well. Besides manga, Eyeshield 21 is also an anime series. So if your too lazy to read you can always watch it. It might be more interesting that way since this is a sports manga and it would be easier to see on screen.

At first the manga started off with drawings that were not very appealing. However this is common in many manga when you first read it. Art requires practice to improve after all. Later on in the series, the mangaka succeeds in putting more eye candies into the series. Even, Sena and Shin who looked very rough in the beginning looked cute and sexy later on! ;) I especially like Kakei Shun of the Kyoshin Poseidons. The dude possesses these sexy eyes that the mangaka described as "smoldering". Here is Kakei-kun!

From left to right: Mizumachi Kengo, Kakei Shun, Kobayakawa Sena, Hiruma Youichi, and Seijuro Shin


Have you seen or read Eyeshield 21? If so, what did you think about it?

Tegami Bachi 1 and 2

The first thing about Tegami Bachi that caught my eye was the beautiful art style of this manga. I've been wanting to read the manga since last year but I've been so busy with everything that it was forgotten.Since I'm out of school right now, I've had a lot of time to watch anime! So recently I finished Tegami Bachi season 1. After watching the first season of the anime though, I was a bit disappointed.

Tegami Bachi is a story revolving around a young boy, Lag Seeing, who strives to be the best Letter Bee. Letter Bees are mail delivery people who risk their lives fighting monsters called Gaichuus and traveling endlessly to make sure the hearts within the letters can be delivered to their destination. During the course of the story, Lag finds out many secrets of the government, why his mother was taken from him, and possibly what he really is.

First Season OP:



The beginning of the anime was very much like the manga and had a very captivating story that makes the readers want more. But in most of the season was filled with fillers and I almost gave up watching. Luckily, during the last few episodes, the story picked up it's speed again and leaves a cliffhanger for the second season, Tegami Bachi: Reverse.

Second Season OP:


The second season was a lot more exciting than the first season in that it revealed many secrets regarding the anti government organization Reverse and the birth of Niche, Lag's Dingo. Currently, the second season is still on-going on a weekly basis.

Tegami Bachi is full of all kinds of emotions. I found myself crying with Lag (who is a giant crybaby) in more than one occasion. Since most of the main characters are children (12-14) they are fill with silly moments. In one recent episode, Lag finally meets the famous Jiggy Pepper, a letter bee who makes express delivery on a motorcycle. Lag and the other boys idolized him so much that they imitated him in a very silly way! XD

Jiggy saying good bye to Lag:


The boys reenacting the scene (Lag pretends to be Jiggy while Conner plays the role of the motorcycle):




Besides all the emotion this anime was able to evoke from me, I was also captivated by all the songs they used for the opening and endings. They were all very soft and lovely and definitely reflected the mood of the anime (plus I've always had a likeing for Suga Shikao's music). All in all, I would reccomend browsing through the first season of the anime, watching the second season, and then reading the manga in addition to get the missing info and the latest bits of the plot. I hope you all will enjoy this series as much as I did! :D

Sengoku Basara 1 and 2

Some of us videogamers might recognize Sengoku Basara as a videogame series revolving the Sengoku Era of feudal Japan. Though I have yet to play any of the games, I've been watching the anime series first and second season. I first heard about this series from an online webpage talking about women of Japan being captivated by this anime series and that it increased Date Masamune (an actual historical figure in the Sengoku Period) popularity with women due to his portrayal in this anime. Curious, I decided to watch the anime to see what it was all about.

OP to first season:


The first season of Sengoku Basara was about our hero's quest to stop Nobunaga Oda's ruthless plans to take over Japan. Within the first 3 minutes of the first episode, I was thoroughly confused by the Date Masamune's character. He rode on a horse that had strange pipes which made it look like a motorcycle. What confused me more was the fact that in between his dialogue in Japanese, he threw out little pieces of English like "Let's party!" or "Put your guns on!" This cracked me up a bit (I thought I accidentally clicked a dubbed version of the anime) prompted me to keep watching the series.

OP to second season:


This season, the heroes band together to fight Toyotomi Hideyoshi, who wants to conquer the land an allow only the strong to live (meaning only warriors and none of the regular citizens). After watching the first season, I immediately wanted to watch more of this series (especially since there where so many bishis in this series). The second season was a bit slower in the movement of the story (most of it was flash back or internal conflicts). But it was still interesting to find out more about the past of Maeda Keiji, who was a character who wanted peace without fighting from the first and second season.

Overall, this series had an interesting story plot and it retold the history of the Sengoku Period (to a very limit degree of accuracy). I loved the characterization of the characters: Date and his biker gang leader role, Sanada with his burning determination, etc. I really loved watching the character interact with each other like Sanada and Takeda. The two of them are like student and teacher. For some odd (and entertaining) reason, Sanada like to run at Takeda while questioning their ways and Takeda would beat him up everytime he answers. I guess everyone has their own way of learning lol.

Have you seen Sengoku Basara? My favorite character is Sanada Yukimura. Who is yours?

Live the Anime

Have you guys ever wondered how things would be like if we were a manga or anime character? Enjoy lol!

See more funny videos and funny pictures at CollegeHumor.

From Japan Probe: http://www.japanprobe.com/2010/11/06/im-part-anime/

Switch

I've never hear of the mangaka group Naked Ape before but I have to admit, they have really great story plot. While their art may not be as appealing as Clamp, their story plot and humor level is definitely comparable. Switch is a story about a group of investigators, independent from the city police, arresting and investigating illegal drug activity. Their circle does not only include Japan drug activity, but all over the world as well. As our main newcomer investigators, Hal and Kai, gets closer to capturing the leader and discovering the dangerous secret behind "Switch", they discover more and more of their own forgotten past and realize that they might be more involved in the conspiracy than they have previously thought. The plot is full of suspense and surprises. Of course, you can't compare it to the suspense of Death Note. But while we are waiting for another Death Note like manga, why not check this out for the time being.

So far, there are 11 volumes of this manga published. I, being able to read many languages, was able to read up to the latest volume through sites from other countries. In the few volumes that I read last night, there was a scene where Kai what totally freaked out cause he got caught between a gun fight because he was investigating a case undercover as a waiter. The deal between the two parties he was serving went sour and everyone pulled out guns. However, it turned out that the two people who initiated the gun fight were also undercover agents like him. In the end, all the bad guys got caught and the case ended. This scene left a great impact on me because last night I dreamt that I was a new agent and they sent me undercover as the boss of a newly formed but powerful gang. In order to be convincing, I had to beat up people and be ruthless. However, before I got to the dealings of the drugs, I was awaken by a call from my friend. Lol. I totally thought that I was still dreaming and that I was in fact sent by the drug investigators to be an undercover dealer and the actual drug dealers also gave me an alias as a college student. LOL. I was so confused that it took me 5 minutes before I realized that I just woke up from a dream and I finally worked out what my real identity is. Told you I get obsessed with stuff. :P

Air Gear 204 & 205

I checked today and found out that two more chapters of Air Gear had been released this week: 204 and 205. The previous chapters had been about Ikki and Kaze fighting with their ATs. While fighting Ikki, Kaze finally snapped out of his self-blaming for losing Spitfire's regalia and began to fight Ikki without fear.

In chapter 204, the guys who owned the weird cult place decided to just let go of the fact that Ikki and Kaze's battle totally wrecked their place and business. With that, Ikki and Kaze went out to camp to have some male bonding time. >:D

Chapter 205 focuses more on what the enemies have been up to. This chapter confused me so much cause it kept switching back and forth from Sora and Nike Takeuchi. So I wasn't sure who they were talking about half the time. I guess the one in the beginnig is Sora since his legs are gone. Another thing I don't understand is why Sano is on the enemy side now... Wasn't he like obsess with Ikki to the point that he wanted to rape him when Ikki stayed at his house?
Anyways... yea... He's a weirdo anyways. Since he escaped alive, this makes me wonder if Spitfire really died? Nevertheless, Kaze now knows both Sano and Spitfires techniques. I just hope to see more battles soon.

Manga: Nabari no Ou

If you are waiting for another manga or anime episode to come out and have nothing else to entertain you right now, then check out Nabari no Ou at onemanga.com. However, if you already have too many other things to occupy you, then don't start on this manga. Because once you start reading it, you will not be able to stop. Nabari no Ou is another manga about ninjas. However, unlike Naruto, this manga focuses more on plot and characterization instead of actual ninjutsu. The main character Rokujou Miharu is a 14 year old boy who looks cute and exceptionally small for his age as if he is a elementary school kid. But don't let his innocent and indifferent look fool you, he is actually quite the little devil inside.

Although he looks weak and kiddish, don't underestimate him. Miharu is actually the owner of this "wisdom" that every ninja clan is after. The wisdom is infused into his cells and only he can use it!

Look interesting? Go check it out at http://www.onemanga.com/

Recent Manga Favorites

As some of you may know, watching Code Geass is one of my weekly pleasures. But what do I do when I'm waiting for the new episode to come out? I catch-up on my manga reading of course! I read all kinds of manga: shounen, shoujo, fantasy, horror, and (very rarely) shounene-ai. So here are my recent manga picks!

Air Gear