You know, I have been ragging on Darlifura all season. Sure, it’s not really too standout other than the horrors of being forced to be a social experiment and forced into being fertile in order to pilot robots thus being denied happiness at the same time. However, the series does tell a good story even if it parallels Gurren Lagann in the mecha department and Kill la Kill in the ridiculous boss fight department. This week though, was a step in a new direction.

The battle goes to space rather quickly and rather than be given an explanation a few things happen and suddenly Zero Two has MERGED WITH A ROBOT TO BECOME MEGA-ZERO TWO (It’s not her name. I don’t care; I’m calling her that. Don’t @ me). Where Darlifura finally took a step in the right direction was the new space portal where we see Hiro and Mega-Zero Two announce that they are going through it. While there may only be one episode left, this ending felt right. Rather than another forced ridiculous battle, the series is getting more interesting by going beyond Earth. I cannot wait to see how it all ends!

Don’t take this as my review of the anime, since I’ll be actually writing that, but well, Doreiku is over. I’m very surprised by the ending. I thought it’d be more anticlimactic, but at least it wasn’t considering the huge set up it had. I guess I thought it would wrap up too cleanly like many anime that didn’t get the 2 cours they needed. I’ll be honest, when they said this anime would only be 12 episodes, I thought this anime would crash and burn faster than Juuni Taisen and Ousama Game.

Well, I guess I can just say that the anime pulled through decently. It didn’t play out the way I thought it would, but I’m glad that Eiya stuck to her original M.O. and didn’t change from her character archetype in a ridiculous way, the way so many others might have. Yuuga was stupid, but we can’t help that considering how he was drawn (reminds me of a shounen main character). I think there were so many loose ends, but at the very least, they tried at the ending. Guess even the most mediocre anime can fool you.

Summer season is here! And if you like feeling the sun in your face, a new sports anime gives you the chance to feel it while you enjoy a show in the comfort of your couch. This time is not football, basketball or cycling, but something more obscure for most of us: badminton, a racquet game that becomes more popular in Asia every day.

With some tennis anime in mind, is not weird to think about Hanebado as a Shounen; but what if I told you it’s a cool Seinen with a nice mix of ecchi shots and comedy scenes here and there? With just one episode aired it could be one of this season’s sensations, and be sure the lead duet, Nagisa and Ayano, have a lot to do with it. Looks like some months ago Ayano put Nagisa to shame in the nationals, and now our traumatized tomboy can’t deal with the pressure. Unlucky for her, Ayano is one of the new students in her academy… but why is she hiding her badminton skills? Oh, and we already had our classic “coach mistaken for a pervert” scene! As you see, a lot of spokon clichés come into play, but the beautiful animation and the mature tone of Hanebado! make me want more of this. And hey, if you are one of those people who only watch anime because of waifus and husbandos, just know there’s plenty of room for that too!

The final scene to this first episode was really intense, so I’m sure the matches will be really really fun to see.