Fall 2011 Anime Preview

Tier 2

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Boku wa Tomodachi ga Sukunai (I Have Very Few Friends) [Premiere: 10/6]
I’m usually not this high on comedies, especially ones set in high school. But this one may just have some jokes in it that we haven’t all seen 17+ times. The premise is that two new kids in school have trouble meeting people, and decide to form a club for others who are in the same boat they are. Everyone who joins this Neighbors’ Club is super-quirky, and a number of them just don’t like each other. But, having frenemies is better than being alone, right? This show has a similar art style to Spring’s strange surprise Denpa Onna to Seishun Otoko, and it seems set on doing some of the same type of convention-busting we’ve been seeing from the current run on light novel adaptations. I’m hoping for a few good chuckles.

Un-Go [Premiere: 10/13]
Bold literary experiments aren’t something you expect to hear often in combination with anime. But this half of fall’s Noitamina lineup has the potential to really be special. The team that brought us the original Fullmetal Alchemist has put together a unique concept. A set of detective stories written by Post-WWII novelist Ango Sakaguchi, which were

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originally set in the Meiji Era, have been context-switched to the near future. Sometimes, when you take a classic work and give it a new setting that’s completely outside the vision of the original author, you create something that is fascinating and groundbreaking. And sometimes, you get the train wreck that was Baz Lurhmann’s 1996 rendition of Romeo and Juliet. I’m optimistic that the creative team has a good idea here, and this will be a winner.

Mirai Nikki (Future Diary) [Premiere: 10/9]
Imagine for a moment that you have an imaginary friend. You send texts to this person, because you basically have no one else to talk to. And suddenly, BAM! Your imaginary friend starts talking back to you, and tells you that you’re now in a death match with a bunch of other people, whether you like it or not. Oh, and there’s a diary on your cell phone that tells you the future…the way you would have written it. Good luck! While many of the elements here have been done before, the combination of them smacks of a refreshing uniqueness. Add to that an adrenaline-rush plot, and this might be the kind of show that has an effect on you.

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