Ben Huber

Durarara!! 05

We're starting to really advance in the story and the push to link all these seemingly random characters together is really working out. I'm continually impressed by the director's technique to communicate the story, via unique camera angles, natural-sounding dialogue, and well-arranged scenes. The episode itself focuses on the collision of several characters and the resulting chaos -- I hate to say too much about it, as you really need to watch it for yourself and experience the events. Plus, we get some really cute lines from Celty that made me DAWWWWWW. "What if it was an alien?"

Also, let me take a moment to note that the music is still awesome. Plus, THEATRE BROOK's opening song is probably the best OP this season. I'm a fan of jazz, and the soundtrack does that really well -- plus the smaller songs that often back the conversations are surprisingly good. All in all, I'm really anticipating some of the upcoming episodes: there are some scenes from the novels that I can't wait to see animated.

Jon Snyder

Note: I have dropped Ladies versus Butlers because it sucks. I'll be reviewing So Ra No Wo To instead.

So Ra No Wo To 05

After a round of simulated combat in the tank, Filicia gives the three youngest squad members a 'mission': they are to trek through the mountains while carrying absurdly heavy packs, and check up on three ancient high-tech observation posts located on the border of No Man's Land. After foolishly leaving their packs unguarded while frolicking in a stream, the girls lose their food and compass. Despite this, they bravely solider on and, after a bit of infighting, manage to complete their mission. Their reward is a stunning and chilling view of No Man's Land, a city that suffered a great catastrophe and now lies in ruins.

This episode was a fairly enjoyable mix of moe antics and team-building character development. The bit with the giant packs was slightly cartoonish, but I didn't find it as egregious as Karen did. It also would have been nice to see the girls' characters fleshed out a bit more; I don't think the writers utilized the 'stressful infighting' plot device as well as they could have. Still, this show remains a fun and mostly lighthearted slice-of-life offering, as long as you're willing to overlook a few minor flaws.

Dance in the Vampire Bund 05

After Princess Mina demonstrates her skills at math and engages in an unusual cooking session, she loses her temper when learning of Yuki's feelings for Akira. This romantic tension is cut short, however, by the Prime Minister of Japan, who announces he plans to block the creation of the Vampire Bund. Upon meeting the Prime Minister, Mina learns he is self-serving and only cares about his own legacy. To force his hand, she orders the kidnapping of his grandson.

Meanwhile, Akira and Yuki find themselves under attack by vampires, dressed in school uniform. They are saved by the timely arrival of Meiren and her deadly arsenal of projectile candy. After they escape, Akira finally realizes Yuki has feelings for him, and begins to wonder if he can truly trust Mina...

Wow, the shit really hit the fan! Seeing Mina's well-laid political plans fall apart was surprising, but her choice to kidnap a child in order to further her goals really brings to light Bund's black-and-grey morality. The action scenes were fluid, well-animated and absolutely kickass. Seriously, seeing Meiren fight is like watching pure, vampiric poetry in motion. As far as character development goes, this episode highlighted one of Mina's deepest character flaws: her incredible arrogance. Will this bring her delicately-crafted plans to ruin? Only time will tell. For the time being, Bund continues to build in intensity, and I'm happy to be along for the ride.

A Certain Scientific Railgun 18

blah blah blah FILLER blah blah blah PRODUCT PLACEMENT blah blah blah

I'm seriously starting to develop a love-hate relationship with Railgun. There were some funny moments in this episode, but otherwise it was painfully mediocre. It wasn't as bad as the swimsuit episode, but I'd still recommend skipping it. The sooner all this mind-numbingly boring filler ends, the better.

Karen Gellender

Baka to Test To Shokanju 05

The whole school takes part in a scavenger hunt, with great prizes on the line to boot. Unfortunately, as with everything on Bakatest, finding the coordinates of the prize locations requires doing well on tests, which is bad, bad news for Yoshii. However, through a combination of effort, luck, and the manipulation of the school administration, Yoshii finds the prize he's looking for and gains the ability to summon his being whenever he wants; furthermore, it looks like the headmistress has some big plans for her favorite idiot and his summon.

I have to admit that this show hasn't been focusing on the summoning battles nearly enough for my liking, but with the development that Yoshii can now summon his being outside of school, I'm excited for where the next few episodes will go. Yoshii's increased summoning skills probably won't pay off in any of the awesome ways that I'm imagining, but I just love little Chibi-Yoshii, so the prospect of seeing more of him just makes me happy. Even weak episodes of this show have redeeming value because of the humor- it's still a bit forced at times (ENOUGH BAD COOKING JOKES!), but the montage of Yoshii's team ransacking the school in SD-form was masterfully done. Also, director Shin Onuma and his team should get some recognition for what they're doing here- some of the animation techniques are really imaginative and refreshing. Even when I'm disappointed with the plot of the episode, visually this show is always a joy to watch.

Hanamaru Kindergarten 04

Anzu and Tsuchi go on a "date", which means spending a lot of time on the playground together during afternoon play. Also, Anzu gets into being Yamamoto-sensei's 'little-helper', despite the fact that they're both after the same man- er, kind of. As per usual with this show, there are some great moments that remind you of your childhood- at least, I certainly remember playing restaurant on the playground, and pretending that piles of dirt were cake- but that's all that seems to be going on. I still think this show has a lot of potential to do interesting things, but I'm afraid we may have to wait until the final batch of episodes to see any of that, if at all. It's like they're just focusing on Yamamoto's character, who is fairly boring, and shoving all the more interesting subplots as far into the background as possible. Don't get me wrong, Anzu's antics still put a smile on my face, but this show is continuing to tread water. The only thing worth noting beyond that is that the constantly changing ED sequences are very interesting- I just wish the actual episodes reflected what we're seeing in the end montages.

Chu-Bra! 05

Komachi continues to prove himself as more than just the token dude who gets nosebleeds at the sight of boobs by taking responsibility for the peeping tom incident; interestingly, he feels at fault for trying to STOP the peeping toms, because if he'd just left them alone, it wouldn't have started a loud argument that attracted the teacher's attention. He suggests to Nayu that she drop the "Underwear Club" title in favor of an "Underwear Appreciation Society", which wouldn't require any funding from the school, thus the group would be independent. Nayu jumps at this immediately, and in the course of the first UAS meeting, it's revealed that Mizuki (the friendly teacher and UAS advisor) and Nayu's step brother Keigo are old high-school friends. Also, we learn more about Nayu's late grandmother, the lingerie designer who fostered the love of underwear in Nayu's family.

For an episode that seemed to be just a lot of talking heads, there was an incredible amount of plot progression; I love how Komachi, basically 'the token male', is by far the most dynamic character; every single thing he does moves the plot forward. The focus on the older characters means that this show is moving away from simply being about Nayu's unusual hobby, and I'm all for that. For a show all about underwear, strictly from a writing perspective this show is kind of kicking ass and taking names. If you want to understand why the characters in So Ra No Wo To piss me off so much, watch up to episode five of Chu-Bra! and see how much personality characters like Nayu, Komachi, and Haruka have in comparison. I'm still on the fence about Mizuki.

Jeff Chuang

Seikon no Qwaser 04

In episode 4, there was a criminal ploy where random women in dressing rooms would get tazed, tied, and filmed with weird toys. This criminal ploy also had nothing to do with the main story, because these bad guys are not Qwasers and are not related to them. It did have much to do with the near-porno anime that Qwaser is, however, because they just wouldn't stop having fun with Tomo's hooters! Meanwhile, our Russian loli made her move and introduced "mom" to the gang, with a twist that she is an ally more than an enemy. At least, she is an ally of making her sugar mommy/slave excited. The moral of the story is that front-clasped bras serve an extra purpose in this anime, care to guess, Japanator AM listeners?

The director's cut version of episode 3 featured most of the things you imagined missing, although they were awfully careful with Katja's fanservice (as in, very little at all). It's probably noteworthy that they also censored out some of the gory parts, such as when Katja's mom wiped the military guys.