Kiddy Grade 2 (OMFG!)
The original Kiddy Grade started out as a cute little show about the cosplaying space police, and ended up, if I remember correctly, turning into a rather depressing Battle For the Universe With Drama and Plot Twists. Back in 2002~2003 when the show first hit the air, the main reason to watch it really was - you guessed it - the cosplaying girls. The show was fanservice galore, though in general it managed to be sexy without smashing you in the face with softcore pr0n like many other fanservice shows.
Well, Kiddy Grade 2 is now in the works, introducing two new characters that look strictly better than the originals. In some ways the new character designs remind me of the girls from Venus Versus Virus (this is a good thing), but with the superior Kiddy Grade art style. There’s a pilot DVD available that is definitely worth checking out.
Not much else to say, considering the show isn’t actually airing yet, but I’m definitely looking forward to it.
Official website here: http://www.kiddygrade.com/
AniDB entry here: http://anidb.info/perl-bin/animedb.pl?show=anime&aid=4999
J said,
2007.06.01 at 06:48:51
I still have trouble bringing myself past the first few episodes. I heard later it gets good, but I just can’t grind my way through all the fanservice for this series.
metsuke said,
2007.06.01 at 10:13:03
Kiddy Grade was one of the shows where I tended to like the fanservice. Eclair had some pretty kinky costumes, not to mention that the whole idea of cosplaying space police is comically ridiculous to begin with. That said, Lumiere is roricon-bait, and I hate those kinds of characters.
In point of fact, I doubt you’ll need to watch the first one to enjoy the fanservice of KG2. Having watched the promo DVD, I know this is going to be one of those shows where, if the producers can plaster my screen with attractive characters, I honestly won’t care about anything else.
Joe said,
2007.06.04 at 02:18:42
Right, but I never really watched anime to enjoy the fanservice. I mean, look at my anime collection, none of the titles I really liked have that much fanservice. The reason i’m still thinking about KG1 is because I am wondering if I missed something really good because i stopped before the series actually started hitting its strides.
Tim said,
2008.01.28 at 23:13:50
The fan service is something that you only notice if you want to notice it. I watched the entire series through and I never noticed. It wasn’t until I saw a person mention it on some forum a while back that I became aware of it, and it still took a bit to notice it.
I found it to be a good series from start to end. There is far more depth to it than fan service.
metsuke said,
2008.02.09 at 10:59:00
I don’t watch any show with the feeling of, “I’m looking for fan service”. In point of fact, I actually skim or skip most episodes, simply because there’s rarely anything worth watching. The fanservice in KG is obvious because the show sets the user up to notice it - the aura of the show is one of eyecandy, and while it might not be a panty shot every other frame (see: Ikkitousen), it certainly doesn’t have the clean, serious feel that pervades strictly-business shows.
It’s been a while since I watched it, but I can’t think of it as being ‘deep’. In my view, it was a strictly anime-as-anime show (versus anime-as-reality ala Ghost in the Shell, Gankutsuou, etc.), and comes with most of the standard anime cliches.