Here’s some stuff that kept me in the loop for the past week or so:

1. Akagi First Impressions
   Ahh… someone who has discovered the uberness of Akagi. Reminds me that I should restart blogging on the series since it has entered a new arc (ep. 8/9) - which BTW seems to be suggesting that Akagi’s crazy skills could actually be more outrageous than we’ve seen so far.
2. The 5 Loli-Sister Collection
   Who in the world can withstand the “insidious whisperings of the Dark-Loli-Siscon-Overlord”? Surely not me…
3. Death Note Movie Out in Japan
   This piece of news would surely be more interesting if I had gotten past Volume 3. Probably time for a restart (urghh, should kill this word from my vocab soon…).

And the suspense continues with this episode. I may be a sucker for anime involving the development of some tensai (genius), but the objective side of my brain still finds Akagi pretty good so far. In this episode, Akagi’s very first Mahjong session against the Yakuza continues (at the 5th game, I think) - with the detective that barged in earlier watching that is.

In the last episode, we saw Akagi simultaneously handle the police (with an excellently executed alibi) and the Yakuza Mahjong players (by stealing tiles with the police watching). In this episode, however, we see no more of that hanky-panky Akagi is capable of. Instead, we witness the Awakening of the Genius, which happens to be the title of the episode too. With super-risky move after super-risky move, Akagi wins the next Mahjong games hands down, to the extent that the Yakuza ends up calling their rep player (pro player), Yagi.

Yagi is no slouch either. He immediately recognizes Akagi’s talent in Mahjong and prefers to sit out and observe Akagi’s games rather than rush in with zero prep like overly arrogant pros tend to do. When Yagi starts playing, his first super-move is a full-blown psychological attack on Akagi by attempting to cause Akagi to lose trust in his judgment. And, of course, we not only see Akagi standing tall against that pressure, but deflecting the same tactic back at Yagi. With that ends the 2nd subbed episode of Akagi.

Conclusion:
Like all anime series of this kind, detailed explanation of every wonder-move that the genius (and his opponents) makes is given to allow appreciation of the skill involved. But unlike series like Prince of Tennis - where a super-move can easily be recognized as one (well, a ball that never bounces and a ball that changes spin in mid-air are clearly super-moves) - the super-moves in Akagi are far more difficult to understand, especially for a Mahjong newbie like me. This does turn me off a little.

But I suppose the converse is also true. Those who are proficient in Mahjong should appreciate the super-moves even more. The greater problem at hand is probably the slow subbing for Akagi. I can’t blame Triad (they have relatively few staff), but being at episode 2 with the epiosde 13 raw already out is pretty sucky. Now, this is when I wish my Japanese studies were more advanced.

anime, animation, summaries, akagi

Arghh, I just cannot resist these kind of anime series. Here, I am referring to series that focus on the growth of an already tensai (genius) main character, e.g. Prince of Tennis, or those that have initially pathetic main characters that somehow contain ridiculous levels of potential, e.g. Bleach.

Akagi, a mahjong-based anime, is a mixture of both. Our main character, Akagi Shigeru, is the ultimate daredevil - a genius when it comes down to risk-taking endeavours. But when it comes down to Mahjong, he is a total newbie.

That’s where the series starts. The first episode is the description of Akagi’s entering of the yakuza-sponsored Mahjong world. Narration is primarily done by another character (which I thought was the main character at first), XXX, who is down on his luck and is about to be killed unless he happens to win.

Then comes Akagi, who has just survived a “chicken” game (I’ll leave it to you to find out what this means if you don’t already know). With the police hot on his trails, Akagi is spotted by XXX, who believes that Akagi has all the necessary qualities to win at Mahjong. With 5 minutes worth of Mahjong rules, Akagi begins playing. Right after that, the police barge in and we are treated to what is probably going to be the type of situations that will occur throughout the series - a super risky situation that Akagi handles like a pro.

Interestingly, the art in Akagi is rather different from the norm. See the screenshots for yourselves. In any case, based on this episode, I’ll most probably be watching the next one.

anime, animation, mahjong, akagi