This is your brain on anime

I began writing this blog entry to tell a tale of how Shakugan no Shana had survived the purge, about how I gave it one last chance, was dragged through to the eighth episode and have decided to let it live. But in review my benevolent nature has been tested.
Much of the plot and theme still remains reasonably tacky, but the characters developed enough of a personality to keep me interested. When I sit down to watch an episode it always manages (beyond all reason) to keep me entertained, yet in between episodes I always look back on it and wonder why I bother. I know it's not going to improve drastically, and in having a sneak peek into later episodes I can see that this deep feeling of doubt is not going to lift. With a continuation of generally poorly designed and minimally animated supernatural monsters playing a heavy role in this title, I have made an executive decision to scrap it and find another series to follow.
I'm sure it would be brilliant if that style was more to my tastes, but while it unfortunately is not I am left with a sense of satisfaction that I gave it a damn good try.

On the other hand, Paprika certainly lived up to the hype. It reminded me of Otomo Katsuhiro's Memories, with the surrealist difficulty to define the difference between sleep and waking consciousness in the dream like scenes of Magnetic Rose, smoothed over with the playful and frivolous comedy of Stink Bomb.
Stunningly animated with brilliant direction and an excellent soundtrack, I would have happily watched this in a full sized cinema.

Lucky Star unfortunately reaches an end with its 24th episode.
The series wafts carefree through its light and wonderfully humorous climate making it a mercifully relaxing title to watch, often resembling the 2002 title Azumanga Daioh. Many of the similarities arise from the fact they were both adapted from a serialised 'yonkoma' 4 panel manga, which gives it plenty of topics for discussion entirely unrelated to a plot or any running story.
However, unlike Azumanga, Lucky Star is far less inviting to people watching anime for the first time, as what seems like most of the jokes play reference or parody to other anime and manga titles and much of Japan's export culture, which only people heavily involved with up to date online communities based on such things will pick up on completely. While being unfortunate for them, is exquisite for us.
And as if Lucky Star hadn't secured its place in history enough, they just had to go and have their own dance. Which will no doubt compete with 'that dancing anime', and if I don't see both dances performed at this month's MCM expo I will be intensely disappointed.

Last on the rota is the brief and fleeting Jigoku Shōjo.
The name had sat on the stangant list of titles to look into for quite a long time, but was bumped up to first priority when I saw it had been dubbed and rereleased in the west, and due to a sudden desire for a dark and gothic title. In the past most anime titles to follow the style have been poorly funded, resulting in both cheap animation and an uninspired plot, unsurprisingly Jigoku Shōjo is no exception.
I did consider giving it more of a chance and sticking with it before reminding myself that if Shakugan no Shana is going to receive exile after seven mediocre episodes, this cannot be allowed to remain after three dire performances.