Crunchyroll advertising has hit a new low. 
Trying to watch Attack on Titan Episode 7 – The Small Blade - The Battle for Trost (3) and instead of starting the episode it is looping commercials non-stop. Even if you skip the advert, it reloops with another advert. It's been 15 minutes of adverts waiting for the episode to start. So fucking awful I can't even put it into words. Sometimes it repeats the same commercial twice in a row, the skip option just restarts another ad.
Oh wait the episode just started and within 10 seconds.... cut to another commercial, the same one I HAVE SEEN 7 TIMES ALREADY IN THE PAST 15 MINUTES. 
WTF? Is that Eren??
Jagi has now appeared in FOTNS.
Also the movie has some way different versions compared to this. That giant iron guy has a far different role in the series.
Just finished Aku No Hana. Very surprised by it. It's hilarious early on, but builds up nicely to the melodramatic finale. The rotoscoping works really well with the atmosphere (but makes it very hard to believe any of the characters are in middle school lol). The last couple of episodes are a bit weird, though, because they come after the climax and are leading up to a season 2 teaser. Beware: it’s extremely slow at times, with minutes of dramatic walking. Which I think fitted perfectly, but GG wouldn’t even touch Planetes. 
Yeah no.
Started One Piece, saw the first 3 episodes. I find a lot of the character designs repugnant. So offputting and the colour palette is somewhat weird too, feels unnatural. Voice acting is a slight childish at times. However the music is awesome, feels better than the show it's on. And so far the episodes have been quite fun, a bit like Fairytail, not as modern or polished but still pretty fun to watch.
Sword Art Online II review
Claymore Manga to Publish 'Grand Finale' in October
Space Dandy in the UK is this any good guys?
Raven, wanted to thank you again for the Crunchy roll pass.
Something weird though, I thought it was a 48 hour pass? I log in a week later when the pass should have expiried and it still lets me watch videos..... with ads of course.
So is this pass unlimited as long as I sit through the ads?
I finished watching Death Note, it's actually great series, well directed, very nice animation and a great plot. The only reason I'm not super pumped about it is because it takes a lot of concentration to watch it. You have to really pay attention to all the machinations to get the fully effect and honestly I'm sometimes too tired to be into that all the time. It's machination on top of machination on top of.... etc
I think if you watch it, make sure you watch it all at once instead of taking breaks, but sometimes you find you need breaks because it's all so exhausting.
Also saw up to 8 episodes of One Piece despite some fairly average animation it's a pretty fun series. It's very much the closest thing to Fairy Tail I've seen, nowhere near as good but with many similarities.
I finally got past the movie scenes in the Fist of the North Star original series.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fist_of_the_North_Star
This shit's epic. Yes it's incredibly old and somewhat repetitive but it's still epic shit. So in the movie Raoh sort of wins and is about to crush Kens' head when the little girl stops him. In the series it's a blatant draw and they man up for the next fight. Anyhow there is a character that was completely white washed from the movie, Toki. He was the 4th Hotoko Shinken student.
So there are 4 brothers who grew up as foster children/students of the current master. Ken(shiro), Raoh (Lao), Jaggi and Toki. And Toki should have been the real heir/inheritor of the Hotoko Shinken style, but he became physically ill and Kenshiro was given the mantle even though he hadn't mastered it like Toki had.
So we see the scene when Kenshiro is chosen as the heir instead of Raoh. They face off with a massive Tiger and while it bows and lets Ken stroke it, it's aggresive towards Raoh... who then chops it's frigging head off with his bare hands and holds it's decapitated head in his hand.
Then later when he is suppossed to have his power stripped of him the master shows this unbeatable power, but suddenly gets sick which allows Raoh to kill him. It's intimated but not explicitly said that Raoh had poisened him somehow. So Rei, the guy who sliced up people to death, who died at Raohs hand in the movie is actually given 3 days to live and goes in search of the woman he loves. Also, Yuria (Julia) actually dies in the series, jumps from a building - maybe she's still alive but so far the series hasn't shown it. And Shin never faced off with Raoh before facing Ken(shiro). Ken kicks the crap out of Shin and kills him.
There's some badass 70s style music and for most of the series Ken and Rei (Ray) roam a post apocalytic world kicking bad guys asses each episode.
gamingeek said:Raven, wanted to thank you again for the Crunchy roll pass.
Something weird though, I thought it was a 48 hour pass? I log in a week later when the pass should have expiried and it still lets me watch videos..... with ads of course.
So is this pass unlimited as long as I sit through the ads?
You're welcome, GG. It must have converted to a free account. Crunchyroll and Funimation both have free accounts that lets you watch a lot of their videos at low resolution-only with ads. Premium removes the advertisements, and allows subscribers to stream full HD. Also, most newer releases are available day one for subscribers, but are blocked from free users for a set period of time, if they get them at all.
Sounds good, I may get a premium account someday but I think I want to try out Funimation too. I just wish I could output the video to my tv.
I watched more Sword Art Online episodes 8,9 and 10. Getting much better, liking it more now. It was the episodes where he started dual wielding then was forced to join the guild.
Also, checked out Eden of the East movie: Air Communication which was presented as a prequel movie. It's not a prequel movie, it's just the series episodes smushed together with a lot of cut content. 
Finished watching Sword Art Online, about 13 episodes? Err... it seems to have finished but not? Is this a double bluff? 
I started seeing the cracks a little in the last few episodes. I can see what they are trying to do with the Asuna, Akirito relationship but it's often heavy handed and not very memorable. The story about the litte girl just came and went too quickly, if they had built her up for 5 episodes maybe I would give a sh** when she went.
Still it's become a much more pleasant and interesting series to watch.
Also saw more Kenichi the Mightiest Disciple, fun show, it's totally a throwaway saturday morning show, entertaining enough, somewhat reminds me of Full Metal Panic's school based sections but not as funny. Sometimes it tries to do the manic comedy anime arm waving thing a bit too much and 30% of the jokes fall flat.
Mamoru Oshii Asks Ghibli's Suzuki About Restructuring
Oshii pressed Suzuki about the state of Ghibli itself, particularly its existing animation staff. "I am asking what you will do with Ghibli […] Production I.G won't take the animators […] Are you going to fire all [animators]?"
Suzuki responded, "I am not going to fire all of them."
Oshii continued, "So, you are going to fire half?" Suzuki did not answer Oshii's question.
Attack on Titan: No Regrets Anime's Promo Previews 1st Episode
So, Fist of the North Star update.
Raoh^
So Ken fought Rao, it was a stalemate but it seems the injury Rao sustained affected him longer than Ken. Rei (Ray) was given 3 days to live before his Rao inflicted injury kills him. He went on a hunt to kill one of the 6 other Nanto Ken martial arts masters, a an effeminate man called Juda who kidnaps young women and forces them to serve him or die.
Rei is dying and Toki (one of the 4 Fist of the North Star master students) says he might be able to help him live but via a very painful looking treatment. Rei comes through and seems reborn, free of Raos death attack countdown. He faces off with Juda and eventually kills him, Juda revealing in his death throes that the only reason he hates Rei and became this feminine women hoarder - is because.... Rei is the only man that has mentally aroused him in a sexual way. And he's happy that he died in Rei's arms. So Rei wins, we think all is good but then Rei suddenly dies from Raos earlier attack, Tokis treatment only gave him a life extension.
So Ken continues roaming the land smashing bad guys skulls when he meets Shu, a blind guy who protects children. Shu turns out to be one of the 6 other Nanto Ken martial arts masters.
Sauzau the Emperor Star of the Nanto Shinken style (Rei's finger slicing style) is kidnapping kids and forcing them to build a giant pyramid. So eventually we see a flashback where Rao, Sauzau and Shu are watching a child Kenshiro fight multiple opponents. Shu eventually beats Ken and saves him from being killed as the rules of the bout would dictate. He does this by slicing into his own face, destroying his eyes and making him blind. Back in the present Sauzau soundly beats Kenshiro to a pulp and puts him in prison, it turns out even Rao the Fist King wont face him because he has a secret to his biology which makes Hotoko Ken ineffective against him. Shu's son rescues Ken and sacrifices his life. Rao sends his men to pick up Ken and heal his wounds.
So Sauzau keeps kidnapping kids and Shu eventually has to give in to Sauzau because otherwise he would execute the kids. Sauzau forces Shu to make this Christ like sacrifice at the top of the pyramid. Ken recovers and gets there, but too late and faces off with Sauzau. He manages to beat him, finally and the pyramid is destroyed. Then Toki becomes resolved to beat Rao and stop him. Rao finally recovers from the wounds from his Ken fight and goes to beat another martial arts master - someone who lost in a battle to Ryuken (Fist of the North Stars' master). He kills the master but uncharacteristically spares the lives of his two sons.
Toki and Ken catch up with Rao and then we see through flashbacks that Toki and Rao are actually real life brothers not just brothers in the martial arts style of Hotoko Ken. We see how Ryuken was an asshole and made the brothers compete for a scholarship of sorts. Rao climbs to the top of the mountain with grit and determination. We then see that he has Toki with him with broken legs, he climbed the mountain with one arm carrying Toki.
Rao trains under Ryuken, then one day a marauder happens upon boy Toki and tries to harm him. Toki unleashes a massive beatdown and Ryuken learns that Toki has been watching and learning in secret. He's so good that he takes Toki on as a second student - even though the destiny of the style means that eventually only one brother will inherit the style fully and the other will be pitted against each other. Years later Ken is chosen as the inheritor of the style but Rao refuses to give up the style and leaves to dominate the world and control it. Rao tells Toki before he leaves that if he takes the wrong path that it will be up to Toki to close his fist.
Back in the present we see the fight, Toki adopts the Rao muscular style of Hotoku Ken, which surprises Rao. But Toki's radiation poisening from many years ago catches up to him. Seemingly dying in Raos arms, Rao says that if Toki had used his usual style he would have won, instead as always he follows his brother. Rao is distraught and asks why Toki forced the fight. Rao avoids delivering the death blow and leaves to reclaim his position as King Fist.
Back at the palace someone else has taken over as king, a decent man. We learn he is another of the Nanto Ken disciples (Rei's finger slicing style) the lone star. As Rao approaches he suddenly gives up his seat and bows to him. Rao cannot work out why the lone star who usually is like a lone wolf has allied himself with Rao. In flashback we see that the man seems to believe Rao can bring order, through fear and discipline to a horrible age of violence. But then the man wonders whether he should be attached to Rao or Kenshiro. He asks Rao if he can fight Kenshiro and Rao agrees.
So as a series, this is pretty great. It starts off a bit slow, I guess because I was such a ye olde fan of the film I was being tortured watching this, waiting for the series to overtake events in the film so I could see what came next. This is another anime series that is serious and consistent instead of sometimes being all over the place as some anime can be, in tone.
It starts fairly slowly, it was 20 plus episodes before Ken even met up with Shin for their duel. Once that was done things got much more interesting when Rei showed up. Now I'm way past that I can say that the events in the anime are yes, just as worth watching as events in the movie adaptation. And very interesting to see where the characters went and what happened next.
Aniplex USA to Release Gurren Lagann on Blu-ray Singles
Saw the first ep of Rurono Kenshin, it was okay, very old though.
Watched more Attack on Titan in bed. I've learned how to cope with the free Crunchyrolls' excessive advertising.
Ack, the licencing means I can't see past episode 13 of AOT till mid december 
Seems like a good anime, Armins speech and salute bit was a little ridiculous though.
I checked out the Berserk and Claymore mangas, I've only ever looked inside the pages of Oldboy, FMA and Bleach books before and found the art too simple. But Berserk and Claymore look great, much more detailed, I wish they would colour it like western comics, it could look amazing. Still getting used to reading from left to right though.