Yumeiro Patissiere - Episodes 46 to 52 (End)

Okay... I'm going to start catching up here. I've missed this blog. I really let scanlating take over my life for a while there. I really enjoy it, and will continue, but in moderation.

We'll start with Yumeiro Patissiere. I went ahead and watched episodes 46 through 52 in one shot.

Episode 46

Ichigo's grandmother's strawberry tart isn't in her book because the best recipes are taken to the sweet's kingdom and stored in the museum. So Ichigo goes to the sweets kingdom and breaks into the museum with the help of the sweets spirits. The end up finding out that the former curator of the museum is the same old fairy that gave Ichigo the spoon that opens her grandmother's book. She was also Ichigo's grandmother's sweet spirit. They retrieve the recipe and return it to the book, but it is written in the language of the sweets spirits. Ichigo decides not to read it because she wants to create her own sweets and not just copy from others.

I really don't like the Sweets Kingdom episodes. I mean .. the sweets spirits are a fantastical idea, but it really goes past any suspension of disbelief when she goes chibi and flies through an oven to go to a kingdom full of midgets.

Episode 47

Ichigo is practicing making her own strawberry tart, but she can't get it quite right. The strawberries just don't taste the same as her grandmother's. After journeying far and wide, all with the help of the heiress, she finds out that the strawberries her grandmother was using were fraises de bois, found in Europe. The dimwit had already seen them, but didn't try one because they weren't pretty. At the end they find out that Team Tennouji lost in the semi-finals.

In the end, another irritating episode. I wish the heiress would just go away. Characters like her are much more amusing in the manga, since you can't hear their shrill voices. It is kinda amusing to see Kashino sweat, though.

Episode 48

Everyone's shocked about Team Tennouji's loss. After watching the DVD of the competition, it's obvious that they lost because Tennouji-san was distracted. Ichigo goes with the heiress to find out why. Tennouji has locked herself in her room, but opens the door after the heiress yells at her. Tennouji then tells them that she was upset because she saw Henri-sensei with the head of the french team, being all lovey-dovey and telling her that she's the best student he's every taught.  Henri-sensei shows up and mocks Tennouji for losing her composure, saying that a patissiere doesn't need romance. He's even mean to Ichigo. The heiress and Ichigo both argue that love is needed (who saw that one coming..) and Ichigo vows to win the finals. Back at the kitchen, they try the competition's best recipe and are shocked at how great it is.

Booo. Evil Henri-sensei? Something's up.

Episode 49

The finals begin. It starts out with a little amusing part about Kashino being tricked into a making a racy commercial with the heiress. He doesn't know that it's racy until he sees it, though. ^_^  I'm taking the rest of my summary from wikipedia. "The finals of the World Cake Grand Prix has finally came and Team Ichigo and François clash in a three hour team battle with two subjects and themes; an entremet made of chocolate and plated desserts which combines hot and cold sensation. Finally, the match turns out to be a tie. The judges decides to make another match at the same day using batter as the subject and this time it will be an individual match. Andou clashes with Katie, Hanabusa matches against Isabella, Kashino battles against Dominique and the team leaders battles each other. "

Nothing out of the ordinary here.

Episode 50

The rematch ends in a tie, with Ichigo losing her battle in spectacular fashion, of course. The final re-match is a battle between one representative from each team. So it's Francois versus Ichigo. Francois makes her specialty, and Ichigo goes for a strawberry tart (surprise, surprise). Ichigo decides to make her own unique tart, using rhubarb, brown sugar, and ... corn meal, of all things. Ichigo wins by only a point. Henri-sensei tells them that he gave her a higher score because she made something new and that she customized it to each judge's tastes. Ichigo finds out that Henri was playing the bad guy so Ichigo would surpass her grandmother. He reveals that his grandfather taught her grandmother and Henri-sensei wants to do the same while she's in Paris. Two years later, we see Ichigo and Kashino standing by a river at night, holding hands, saying that they won't declare their feelings for each other yet, since they still have so much to learn.

Cute ending! The next series has started, called Yumeiro Patissiere Professional. Of course, they're only in high school, but whatever. I'll be watching it, too.

Uraboku - Episode 20

Summary: Emo scenes, fight scene with Cadenza begins, zweilts are losing, Yuki protects them, Cadenza goes after Yuki, and Reiga appears to stop him. O_O

Cue the cliffhanger music!

Uraboku - Episode 19

The episode was basically backstory on one of the Zweilt partnerships: Hourai and Furuori. Something I did get out of it is that Zweilt guardians' relationships with their partners is more of a marriage-type thing. There are a couple of guy/guy partnerships. I was kind of shocked at that revelation for a bit. Then I noticed that one of the genre labels on wikipedia for the series is shonen-ai. Now it all makes sense. I should have guessed that since Luka and Yuki are a pair, even though Yuki was born as a male for this life. I can't help but keep watching, though. There's the circle of angst, more bishies than you can shake a stick at, cool fight scenes, and lots of mysteries that need to be cleared up. Oh yeah. And Luka. Yup. Luka.

Yumiero Patissiere - Episode 45

Episode teaser from Crunchyroll: "Team Ichigo has been travelling all around Europe, following the instructions from Ms. Sully, on what seems to be a grand European tour! Upon arriving to their latest destination, Neuschwanstein Castle, however, Henri-sensei appears and announces that the rematch with Team Koshiro will happen that evening. They are told to create a variety of bon bon chocolats, but everything else is up to them! What incredible treats will they create this time?"

Team Koshiro makes some great stuff with the Heiress' fancy chocolate. Team Ichigo makes some great stuff with ingredients and themes from their European tour. Team Ichigo wins. Tada.

One thing that was pretty darn hilarious was that Hanabusa randomly whips out an iPad with a bunch of pictures on it. 

I'm starting to wonder why I keep watching this. It looks like it's going to end at episode 51, though, so I'm just gonna stick with it and hope that something interesting happens.

Yumiero Patissiere - Episode 44

Team Ichigo and Team Koshiro are invited to a ball on Mont Saint-Michel. When they arrive, they are surprised by Henri-sensei who tells them that they will have their semi-final match there! They have to make a chocolate dress. O_o  There's a whole bunch of fantasizing about Cinderella and what-not. Blah, blah, blah. So the Heiress makes a big weird led-lit gown. Ichigo and the Princes make a normal-looking pink gown. When it's time for the results, they both get 90 votes. So there will be another match. The only possibly remotely interesting thing in this episode is that Henri-sensei takes Ichigo outside during the ball to dance with her, saying that he was afraid the dress would have been ruined. The Princes look on, somewhat jealous. Well, Koshiro doesn't really look. He just sulks. I can understand a middle-schooler's crush on a teacher, but it looked like he was leading her on in this episode. Kinda creepy. In the end, it was a pretty pointless episode.

Uraboku - Episode 18

Yuki goes out to look for Luka, but can't find him anywhere. He and his companions arrive at an area where they sense a massive negative energy and they run for it.

Meanwhile, Luka meets up with Elegy who invites him to come back to the Duras. Luka tells her that he never considered himself one of them.

"My past and my future ... Everything belongs to Yuki." Ah, Luka... *sigh* They fight. Luka is about to kill her when the female version of Yuki appears in her place.

Luka totally loses touch and embraces the fake Yuki. Toko and Tsukomo show up and dispel the illusion. Elegy leaves peacefully, for now ... (dun dun, duuuuuun!)

Uraboku - Episode 17

Backstory! Reiga was initially part of the Giou clan, but he was half duraga, so many called him a monster and shunned him. Takashiro trusts him and leaves Reiga in charge of the village while he goes to slay demons in the capital.

When he returns, the village is in flames and Yomi is dead, all done by Reiga. They never give an explicit reason why he does all this, the only thing that is said is that Yomi is afraid that Reiga won't know what to do with his power. Knowing all this, Yuki chooses to fight.

Yuki learns about his mother. He was very much loved and wanted, something which he had never believed before.

Yumiero Patissiere - Episode 43

Kashino and Ichigo are apprenticed out to a 3-star patissiere for three days. Kashino finds himself staring at her, gets nervous when she gets too close. He even thinks about her when something reminds him of her. I'm thinking that he's starting to realize that he likes her. *^_^*

The patissiere seems to be leaving just a bit in the bowls when they go to be washed so that Ichigo can taste it and evaluate the ingredients.

There's only one bed for the two of them! Eek! They sleep (almost) half and half on the bed, but Ichigo ends up smacking Kashino in the middle of the night. In retribution, he wraps her up in the sheet so she can't get out. ^_^

They end up helping the chef start using oranges in his sweets again. He was avoiding them since it was his dead wife.

200th post! Wow!

Gakuen Alice - Chapter 134

Natsume confessed to Sakura last chapter. This chapter Sakura returns her feelings. Then almost immediately, Ruka tells Sakura that he loves her too! Geez, all at once! Everyone is in love with this chick!

The traitor has been revealed as Hijiri Goshima. Honestly, I can't remember the details on the traitor stuff. I need to go back and re-read some chapters. It's been too long between releases. Anyway, Natsume is given the responsibility to catch Hijiri and get the key to the door that takes them out of Gakuen Alice.

Next chapter is out on 8/5. Gotta find another source, since OM will be gone by tonight.

Why no posts?

Part laziness. Part Kaichou wa Maid-sama chapter 52. Review to follow.

Uraboku - Anime

This anime reminds me of X, pitting near-brothers against each other. It's very emo. It's a bishie festival. The characters have an inescapable tragic fate. Yet with all of this angst, I still like it.

Summary from Wikipedia: "Sakurai Yuki is a mysterious boy with a mysterious power. Right after he was born, his mother left him near an orphanage, and he was later found. Because of that event, Yuki strives for independence. He hates being a burden to anyone near him, but at the same time, he is afraid of being left alone. Moreover, ever since he can remember he had a strange ability where when he touches others, he can feel their emotion. Unable to control it, he often made insensitive blunders in the past. He later meets with a mysterious yet beautiful man who saves his life, but somehow he feels so nostalgic, like he's met him before. While death threats and his ability increasing, a man who claimed to be his older brother suddenly appears, so what will Yuki do when he learns the truth?"

At this point, I'm on episode 16. There are episode summaries here at Wikipedia. I've gotten pretty lazy lately, so I don't feel like writing a summary myself, just some notes.

I like it, even though it's moving slowly. The bishies (especially Luka) don't hurt, but I find the story quite interesting, particularly that the main character was a woman in all of his previous lives. If you didn't know this, you would think that there was a whole lot of gay stuff going on. Oddly enough, I find myself really wanting Yuki to hug Luka, but only that much. Any more than that would be gross. I'm looking forward to seeing how this will turn out. When the anime is over, I'm going to read the manga.

Yamato Nadeshiko Shichi Henge - Anime

25 episodes of the manga. Pretty much that's all there is to it. I didn't notice anything that was added or removed. They didn't even add in a fake ending. The boys don't look as skinny in the anime. Yuki looks like an alien ... But this is definitely all about Sunako, so I can overlook that. Love the nosebleeds!

Overall, I think it was worth watching. Will I buy it? Probably not.

Yamato Nadeshiko Shichi Henge - Live Action

The live-action adaptation of the manga which is also known as Perfect Girl Evolution or Wallflower. (There are too many damn names for this thing.) There are a few big deviations from the original story. There's a new character, for example. He's the son of the landlady and, therefore, Sunako's cousin. He's a cute little guy who is a really great for breaking ideas out of the thought bubbles. Great plot accelerant, too. I'm definitely okay with this modification.

The second most obvious difference is that everyone is in college, not high school. Now, I can see some of the reasons why they would want to make the characters older. Ranmaru, for one, is dating older and married women. In the manga, he's 15. I don't see that one going over really well in prime time. The disadvantage of this change is that you lose all of the high school scenes. I really prefer the way Sunako cuts her bangs off in the manga to the live-action adaptation.

The lack of nosebleeds is also quite a difference. It wouldn't work in a live-action series, so they replaced it with a headbutt. It's okay, but the effect is quite lessened. Ah well.

Overall, I'm glad I watched it. There were 10 hour-long episodes, so it was actually quite short. I really have to go watch the rest of the anime now, dangit.

Yamato Nadeshiko Shichi Henge - Manga

Also known as The Wallflower or Perfect Girl Evolution. Yay. So many ways to be confused.

Yamato Nadeshiko Shichi Henge is about a girl who was called "ugly" by a boy, the first and only person to whom she confessed her love. This incident sparks a life change, and as a result Sunako shuns all forms of beauty, both in herself as well as in life. Concerned by her change for the worst, Sunako's aunt, the owner of a beautiful mansion where four very handsome students live, offers the guys free rent in her mansion if they can turn Sunako into a "perfect lady" (referred to in Japan as the titular Yamato Nadeshiko).

While the four of them manage to make Sunako physically beautiful enough to become a lady, the problem lies with her attitude and interests (which Sunako has no intention of changing). Up until the most recent release in the story, they've managed to convince Sunako's aunt that her niece is indeed a lady befitting the mansion in which they live (and prevent the rent from skyrocketing to triple the required amount). However, in reality, Sunako has not changed considerably. - Wikipedia

I like Sunako a lot. She's a very funny character. ^_^ The art is not quite my thing, though. The boys are supposed to be absolutely gorgeous, but they are often skeletal or too out of proportion. However, the artist is very good at eyes. There is a lot of chibi going on, which is my thing, so it's all a trade-off. As much as I love the characters, the recent lack of progress in the main storyline is making the series more repetitive and dull.

The scanlators are releasing chapters from the tankobon, so the release schedule is rather irregular. Right now they're up to chapter 98. I'll still be reading this one. It's always amusing!

Yumiero Patissiere - Episode 41

Team Ichigo meets their opponents. They are quite the international group which includes Lemon and Rick, the Italian playboy. The theme for the first round is food wagon, which I'm guessing means something like roach coach (tee hee).

Ichigo tries to make breakfast in the oven and it blows up. In the process of cleaning up, they find out that the landlady used to run a gelato shop downstairs.
The team decides to make gelato for the competition. Ricks stops by and bets that if his team wins, ichigo will be his girlfriend. The sweets princes are obviously not happy with this.

The episode had the usual level of cuteness, if not a little less. Caramel is always super-cute though. ^_^ I wish that Kashino would be a bit more jealous. That will come with time, of course.

Limited Lovers

Karin, a spoiled rich girl, falls down the stairs and becomes paralized from the waist down. While in the hospital, she falls in love with her doctor, Teppei. He refuses to give her his personal information when she leaves, so she investigates him herself. She ends up buying his house, but will let him continue staying there with her on one condition: he must spend 2 hours every day with her. She finds out soon enough that Teppei is engaged, but is only using the marriage as a stepping stone for his career. Eventually he falls in love with Karin and they get engaged, have some problems, break up, get back together, etc. Pretty average and predictable.

This one was a random short manga. Only 15 chapters. There was actually some potential in the story concept, but the writing was pretty terrible. I only read to the end because I knew it was so short and my sentimental side did want to see them together.

Faster Than A Kiss - Chapter 31

The conclusion of the Maeda-sensei story. Maeda-sensei was kidnapped by Kazuma's rival, Retsu, from another school. Kazuma goes to rescue him by himself, but a lot of other students follow him because they care about Maeda-sensei so much. When they get there, they see that Maeda-sensei had actually already made friends with Retsu. Kazuma is about to fight Retsu one-on-one when Maeda-sensei warns him that he's about to be ambushed. The thing is, the warning was in English, so it was a real accomplishment that Kazuma understood.

After this, Maeda collapses and has to be taken to the hospital. He has to quit being a teacher at Kazuma's high school, but he promises Kazuma that he'll keep teaching.

Fumino gets a call from Ryu saying that Maeda-sensei is in critical condition, so Fumino makes Kazuma rush to the hospital so he can talk to Maeda before it's too late. When they show up, they see that Maeda-sensei is just fine. He made Ryu call Fumino with the fake story so Kazuma would show up. Kazuma expresses his thanks to Maeda-sensei and introduces Fumino to him. Apparently he already knows their little secret and is just fine with it. ^_^

Glass Mask - Anime

I just finished the 2005 version of Glass Mask. Fifty-one episodes in about 2 days. Heh. There's been another TV anime, 3 OVAs and 2 live action films as well. These are all based on a manga that has been running since January of 1976. Summary from Anime News Network:

Kitajima Maya, a 13-year old girl with a talent for acting, was discovered by the reclusive actress Tsukikage. The story follows Maya's growing up, intense training, overcoming challenges, and evolving into the foremost actress of her generation (she is about 20 so far). Maya's greatest rival is Himekawa Ayumi, the beautiful daughter of a famous movie couple. They ultimately vied for the most sought-after role - the "Crimson Goddess". An equally important subplot Maya's relationship with the handsome and ruthless entertainment mogul Hayami Masumi, who secretly became her number one fan, but misunderstandings and bad-timing obstructed their romance.....

This show has a compilation of so much that I like about shojo manga/anime. Strong female lead, worthy rival, several love interests, one destined love, challenges, and triumph. There's something about Masumi that makes you want to root for him, even though he's been such an amazing jerk sometimes. It's nice to see Maya grow and change. The anime was undoubtedly much much faster than the manga. I wonder how much they cut out.

It took me a few episodes to get into this one, but dagnabit, I love the story. I found myself cheering for Maya, crying when her Mom died, and feeling downright anxious about her relationship with Masumi.  I feel like I have to hunt down the manga now. I don't know if I want to start reading it from the beginning or .... *sigh* I'm going to read it from the beginning.

Yumiero Patissiere - Episode 40

Ichigo forgets her passport and misses the flight to Paris! Oh wait, that was a dream. She's really there. And she's living with the boys. Alooone. O_O When they take a little tour around Paris all Ichigo wants to do is eat, of course.

She gets lost in Paris and is saved by an Italian boy. Since she got lost, there was no sight-seeing. The princes are not very pleased with Ichigo, but they are even less pleased with the Italian kid. His familiarity with Ichigo and his farewell kiss on the cheek really irritate them. He and Satsuki proceed to have a bishie sparkle battle.

They have to go to a pre-competition party, where they find out that the Italian boy is on a rival team. At the party we find out that everyone has a Sweets Spirit. The Spirits have to compete for their places in the tournament. There's really no point in this competition since it ends up being a lottery anyway.

The tournament draw is such that Team Ichigo will go up against Lemon-chan's team. (She competed against Lemon-chan a while back.) Italian dude is on Lemon's team. Once again, he's all over Ichigo, angering the princes. The Heiress shows up, apparently joining a team from another campus using her father's influence. Geez.

Faster Than A Kiss - Chapter 30

So here we get a glimpse of Kazuma's past. He was quite a delinquent in high school. One day, Maeda-sensei showed up and became his homeroom teacher. Maeda-sensei concentrated particularly on Kazuma, trying to get him to reform. He figured that if he took down the most delinquent student in the school that many others would follow. He even started an English exchange diary with Kazuma, who used the opportunity to try out using vulgar language in English. Other people started to notice that Kazuma was starting to calm down a bit and was refusing to fight. The boss of another high school was particularly upset about this, so he kidnapped Maeda-sensei and will only return him if Kazuma fights him. And so the chapter ends in a cliffhanger.

I really enjoyed the change of pace. We still got a bit of the weird but cute relationship between Fumino and Kazuma, but we also get to learn about Kazuma's past. During the chapter we also learn that Kazuma was disowned by his family during high school and he was living by himself. Good chapter. I'm looking forward to the next chapter, but the cliffhanger isn't so bad that I'm going to be in despair until I read it.