Full Metal Panic

Full Metal Panic Season 1, Fumoffu, Second Raid
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The first thing I thought after reading the title was "Full Metal Jacket Anime". But nothing could be further from the truth. On one hand, you have heavy mecha action and special ops missions with plenty of casualties and no punches pulled. On the other hand we have a high-school comedy. Kinda like a paramilitary Inu Yasha or the result of mixing Black Lagoon with Great Teacher Onizuka.

The key scenario is that of an about 17 year old seargent of a paramilitary counter-terrorist force. He was originally a child-soldier who survived his battle-filled "childhood" in the battlefields of Afghanistan (not against the heroic US soldiers, of course - against the oh-so-evil communists!) and has now some - let's say - social deficits. Nevertheless Sousuke get's appointed the job of undercover agent in a japanese high-school in order to protect a girl with special abilities (although she doesn't know she has them. They are pretty subtle anyway). Kaname Chidori grudgingly puts up with the strange behaviour of her new classmate (such as bringing live grenades to school or blowing up footlockers, "just to be safe").

So, to sum the whole series up in one phrase: Rambo Junior goes to school.

Any boy, I got cramps laughing. If you miss that series then you really - er - missed something. Enjoy!

Sex&Violence: No sex, but sexy. The onsen & swimsuit scenes, as well as panty jokes. Adult - hmm - situations in the second raid, but nothing to be ashamed of watching in the train. But rejoice, plenty of violence. And like mentioned earlier, you get an equal amount of comic violence and real one. Plenty of dead soldiers - friend and foe - and bloodshed. It's not a splatterfest like Claymore but it's violence alright.

Conclusion: A Must See.

The Dirty Pair

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Yuri and Kei are the two members of a "trouble consultant" team codenamed Lovely Angels in earth's far future. Trouble consultants are some kind of agents whose job it is to eliminate threats to humanity. Or catch'n'kill terrorists and such.

The Lovely Angels are pretty competent in their job. However, most of their missions end up with tremendous casualties along their way through no fault of their own. Don't think collapsed buildings - think nuked cities, space stations, planets, solar systems. This - along with their working attire - earned them the name The Dirty Pair.

The Dirty Pair are the archetypes of anime-chicks with guns. The whole series flows over with action in a strange utopian/dytopian high-tech setting. Every technological advance - no matter how ethically deplorable - has been made and commercialized. Cyborgs, AIs, The Matrix, Mutants, Bio-Engineering, Genetic Modifications, Personality Transfers and weapons in all forms and sizes inside.

The original series is pretty old and started out as a light novel (i.e. trash), became an anime and then a manga ... or rather a comic. The main guy responsible for this comic is the american Adam Warren, so this can't technically be called a manga despite the japanese drawing style. You even have to read from left to right.


But no matter who dunnit - this series is great fun and utterly chaotic. You probably won't get more chicks'n'guns per square inch than in Dirty Pair for a very long time.

Sex&Crime: Lots ! Ok, they don't do sex (publicly), but they know exactly how they are showing of their assets. ^_^
Nah, the violence displayed is ... well ... much, but not the kind of nightmare inducing violence you sometimes see in other mainstream mangas (I recall a couple of very disturbing Berserk panels). And the utter disregard for human casualties is strangely undisturbing - probably because you never have to bother with the aftermath of all the carnage.
Imagine Plastic Man on a mission to recover a nuclear suitcase-bomb from terrorists. The mission succeeds although two passenger planes fly into the twin towers and the last panel shows a grinning plastic man flying away from the collapsing buildings while saying "Doh! Well, could've been worse.".
Well, you get the idea. If you can laugh to that then you'll love the Dirty Pair.

The Ultimates

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US-Comics for a change. And this one is awesome.

You probably read a few classic superhero comics at one time or another. Superman/Spiderman and shit like that. Some probably ditched this kiddy stuff and switched to some advanced forms of graphical novels, like Sin City, V or Preacher. Or the no-nonsense brutal reenvisioning of the superhero genre, like Planetary, The Authority or the relaunch of the Squadron Supreme with the almighty Hyperion. Definetly not the Justice League.

Now imagine that the new generation of authors responsible for the new, realistic and cynical tone of the best comics america has to offer - what if those authors gang up and take over Marvel Comics shitty Avengers series. Enter The Ultimates.

You get nazis, aliens, nazi aliens, superpowered domestic violence, heroes killing brand name villans, heroes killing innocents, cannibalism, a black Nick Fury (and boy, this guy is hardcore), torture, a god out of a mental institute, a naked giant man and his 10-foot dong, politics, intrigue and a captain america that knows how to use guns and grenades.


And most important: A believable and great story.

The Ultimate relaunch of the Marvel Universe is probably the best thing Marvel ever did. And now you get it on the iphone.

The images were scaled down to a width of 480, which makes the text readably - not as readable as the larger manga text bubbles, but readable enough. I had to compromise a bit to ensure that the images load fast in the Comic Viewer. It's not optimal but it's enough, i think.

If you haven't installed the Comic Book viewer program yet then you can find a guide for that if you follow this link.

I hope you'll enjoy it. I did so much that I bought every single Ultimate hardcover I could find. Well worth it.

-DF

modern art

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