My Shiny Toy Robots

AnoHana: The Flower We Saw That Day is an 11 episode series produced by A-1 Pictures (whose other works include Black Butler, Fairy Tail and Blue Exorcist) that aired between April and June in 2011. In Japan the show was released under the its full name of Ano Hi Mita Hana no Namae o Bokutachi wa Mada Shiranai (meaning "We Still Don't Know the Name of the Flower We Saw That Day"), but thanks to being a huge mouthful in either language was soon shortened among fans to simply AnoHana . A group of six friends, who call themselves the "Super Peace Busters" drift apart after one of them, Meiko 'Menma' Honma, dies in an accident. Ten years later, Jinta "Jintan" Yadomi, who no longer goes to school and has become a recluse, sees the ghost of an older looking Menma. She asks him to help her grant her wish so that she may ascend to heaven, but does not remember what this wish is. Although at first believing her to be a hallucination brought on by...

Dairanger, much like its successor Ninja Sentai Kakuranger, is one of the Super Sentai series that has had a more interesting history in the West. While in Japan in was the seventeenth instalment in the franchise (following on from Kyōryū Sentai Zyuranger) it has no direct Power Rangers adaptation, the monster/mecha footage instead being incorporated into the second season of Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers. The show aired between 1993 and 1994 for a total of 50 episodes and one movie. Eight thousand years ago, the Daos Civilisation flourished in Southern China. It was made up of three separate tribes - the Dai tribe, the Shura (who went on to become modern day's humanity) and the Gorma. However one day the Gorma tribe decided to take over both the Daos and the world itself, leading to a 5000 year war between the Dai and the Gorma. The Dai defeated the Gorma, whose magical powers granted them the ability to turn into monsters, with the help of five Dai warriors whose high...

While the Gokaiger series may be over it looks like Bandai will be continuing on with the ranger key collectibles, and since we have a brand new team with a whole new set of ranger keys (not to mention Kamen Rider keys are on the way) Bandai have gone all the way and released a brand new version of the Gokaiger changer, the mobirate - dubbed the Legend mobirate. It supposedly boasts 68 new sounds to create a grand total of 148 voice commands.   The box art is particularly impressive - depicting images of all 36 red Sentai warriors on each side. Also included in a DX AkaRed key, the flip-up key part bearing the official 35th anniversary Super Sentai logo that the character also wore during his appearances in Gokaiger.   The legend mobirate sports a slightly different deco to the original, which the gold and silver colouring reversed and the front now bearing "MOBILATE" (which I guess means is the official romanization, but I'm sticking with mobirate ...

  As the winter 2012 anime season draws to a close, it's time to have a look at the few series I've been watching for the last few months. The first of which is none other than Black Rock Shooter. Originally based on a piece of artwork by Huke (of Steins;Gate fame), the character grew further life in a Hatsune Miku/Supercell song of the same name, an OVA episode and a slew of merchandise. While the OVA boasted impressive visuals, its short length meant the story left a lot of things unexplained. This eight episode series is a retelling of the Black Rock Shooter story, but delves deeper into the mystery behind the girls from another world. From left to right: Chariot, Dead Master, Black Rock Shooter, Strength, Black Gold Saw Seemingly normal high-school student Mato Kuroi is drawn to new student Yomi Takanashi. Despite her attempts at friendship, Yomi doesn't seem to open up to Mato. As she tries her hardest to make a new friend, Mato also juggles life with h...

  As the Gokaiger merchandise draws to close (save for ranger keys and a few other things), it's only fitting that one of my final purchases is of a toy that was also my very first piece of Gokaiger merchandise. This clear plastic version of the GokaiOh mini-pla/candy toy figure was released as a web exclusive last month, and featured all five Gokai machines in one large box covered in some great pictures of its contents (no candy included this time though). However this isn't quite the same toy that I reviewed almost a year ago , and is in fact the enhanced 'Starburst' edition that was released later in 2011. This version not only came with a far better cannon piece for the chest, but also had the Gokai Jet, Marine and Racer all moulded in their correct colours (meaning significantly less sticker work). Having never seen this version in person before, it was nice to see that it improved some of the minor issues with the stickers on the original (such as...