Kamen Rider W CycloneAccel Xtreme in Action!

Since the day this form made its "appearance" in the series, many wonder on how Kamen Rider W CycloneAccel Xtreme (W CAX) fights because it was only briefly seen in the series as a possible stronger form than W CJX and that's it. But thanks to a game called, Kamen Rider Climax Heroes OOO, we have the chance to see this angst version of the good ol' W CycloneJoker Xtreme, in which instead of Shotaro, Philip partners with Terui and with the help of the power rage and anger, they fight as CAX!

In this first clip, W CAX fights with the player controlled, OOO Sagohzo Combo!

In this second clip, W CAX fights with the player controlled, W!

In this last clip, W CAX fights with the player controlled, Accel!

In all three clips, Kamen Rider W CycloneAccel Xtreme can utilize Accel's Engine Blade and the Xtreme Memory's Prism Bicker. Asides from that, W CAX can use one of W CJX's finisher, Bicker Final Illusion in which all the powers off all four Memories (Luna, Cyclone, Heat and since this is CAX, Accel) attached in the Prism Bicker will combine and emit a strong rainbow laser attack onto the opponent!

In case you are wondering if W CAX has a proper finisher in the said game, according to the poster of the video, he doesn't have one, so yeah, asides from using the Engine Blade's abilities, he tends to laser spam much. In all three clips, it seems that asides from the intro of the character in which we heard a more gruff voiced Philip and Terui, W CAX utters a few grunt sounds.

Kamen Rider 999th & 1000th Episode Special! [UPDATED]

OOO is one lucky Rider, and he wasn't promoted as an anniversary Rider! Anyways, it was earlier rumored that an episode of Kamen Rider OOO will commemorate the 1000th episode of the entire franchise! Just recently, the first information about the upcoming 999th and 1000th episodes of Kamen Rider!

The 27th and 28th episodes of Kamen Rider OOO are not canon, so don't panic if they decided to break the fourth wall! Also, expect a lot of references from the past shows! Anyways, here is the information about this special arc! Kougami calls out Eiji and Ankh to celebrate the 1000th episode of the Kamen Rider franchise. Together they have to create a Kamen Rider Commemorative Movie, a Rider VS Shocker film.

While filming a guy shows who nobody seems to know. He calls himself Sendou and claims that he knows Kougami. Ankh is able to smell the stench of Yummy from Sendou. Who is this mysterious Sendou? Why does Kougami want this movie to be made!?

The Squid Jaguar Yummy is a was created from a Shocker soldier's hatred towards the Riders. Its right arm is also a sword which can cut OOO's body, it's also good at fight in water. It is said that this Yummy is a direct tribute to the Isogin-Jaguar back in the original series back from top to bottom and especially, the white boots.

The cast and crew of this fan film are: Akira Date as the director, Eiji Hino as the first remodeled human, Kamen Rider, Maki as Ambassador Shinigami (an obvious reference to Shocker's Ambassador Hell and Doctor Shinigami) and as the cameraman (you are screwing with me, Kougami!), Satonaka will take care with the make-up and costumes, Chiyoko will be the one handling the sound and the illumination. Ankh plays Shocker's Great Leader and Hina is going to be Eiji's love interest and Gotou is playing a scientist for Shocker.

Asides from our regular cast it is confirmed that, Chiaki, Chisato Morishita (Kamen Rider Ryuki, Kamen Rider Kabuto GOD SPEED LOVE) and Chinatsu Watsuki will guest star in the special 1000th episode! What's funny is that the 3 of them has the kanji "千" in their names and it means 1000! The comedy duo, Harisenbon will also guest star in the special and are going to play Shocker Grunts.

Source: JEFusion, Henshin Justice Unlimited, DecaEnd of HJU (Link 2, Link 3), Chiaki's Blog (images) via Hasami Jaguar, alternate-zer0, Igadevil

UPDATE 1: Added more info about the guest stars in this special episode.
UPDATE 2: Added pic of Squid Jaguar Yummy and a much detailed episode summary.

Kaizoku Sentai Gokaiger 03 – Turning Magic Into Courage ~Maagi Magi Go Gokai~

Kai Ozu, secretly uses the Force.

Since this is a special episode, I decided to use the original episode title instead of making my own episode title for this review. Anyways, the Gokaigers are stuck in some place thanks to a Zangyack attack and now meets a Jedi Knight, I mean a wizard named, Kai Ozu. Now separated with their group, Doc and Marvelous decides to chase Kai to learn where the devil this greatest treasure of the entire universe is.

Young Padawan, use the force, you shall.

Since I barely watched any Magiranger, I will just say my impressions about Kai in this episode, and luckily, I was able to watch some clips coming from the original series. Based on what I remembered, in Magiranger, Kai himself is not courageous, but reckless and he giving the test about courage felt something weird in my case. I guess that is what I call character development in the original series.

Anyways, what I can say about him in this episode is that, he felt like somewhat a cross between a Jedi Knight less the light saber and Harry Potter less the glasses, which is awesome especially that their aim is to chase him (with Doc and Marvelous being chased by the rock while chasing him, Indie reference, FTW!) to get the info regarding the greatest treasure of the entire universe! Asides from that, he played a semi-mentor role that has this same feel like that of Wataru when he appeared in Kamen Rider Decade, he tells what is their aim and leaves later, in Kai’s case, he left magically.

While Doc and Marvelous are chasing Kai, Joe, Luka and Ahim are fighting the Zangyack forces while they are away. If there are two things that I liked in this episode, it might be that they transformed into Black and later, White Rangers and two, Pink turning into White Swan (or Pink Swan in the dub back in my childhood) and caused me to remember some fond memories of Jetman. Ah, those were the days where Dora the Explorer never existed… ah yes. Anyways, as for them turning into Black and later, White Rangers, it was amazing. Asides that they are utilizing their own unique style while in a different Ranger form (for the second time, finally!), they were able to stand out as individual Rangers while in battle, especially Luka.

Since this is a Doc focused episode, let’s talk about him. Doc is the pacifist in the group and tends to run away if a strong threat will came into picture. In this episode, they were able to flesh out more of Doc’s character that even if he is like that, but if it is for his friends, he will do everything just to save them, yes, even jumping on a cliff and shoot a boulder even if the chances of landing on clear ground is zero.

Asides from that, they have unlocked the Magiranger Keys’ full potential. So the ability they displayed in the earlier episode was just a fluke? Now, I am starting to have a Kamen Rider Decade feel after this revelation. To put it simply in Decade sense, they can transform into the said Rider but can’t use its other forms or special attacks. I think I am seeing a possible pattern once the Dekarangers will appear in the next two episodes.

As for the Magi GokaiOh, the Magi Dragon in the chest of the GokaiOh felt weird. But hey, at least they can use magic and fly, what’s wrong with a giant dragon in your chest? And oh, you can remove the dragon and let it burn its enemies! How cool is that?

Overall, this is one epic episode of Gokaiger. Asides that we have an old Sentai actor back to become a pseudo mentor figure to Doc and Marvelous and it seems that that Toei has learned by some of the mistakes they made back in Kamen Rider Decade… and some of the fandom wants this show not to exist after Movie Wars 2010! Asides from Kai returning in this episode, the part where the remaining Rangers turned into Black and later, White Rangers is fun to watch, especially that they put their own spice and distinct style while in a different Ranger form, which makes those scenes fun.

And on the next episode, GokaiBlue decides to master his swordsmanship and ends up like Roronoa Zero from One Piece, and on our ending sequence this week, they have ended their Super Sentai Hero Getter theme with Gaoranger-Goseiger in the sequence... and on top is some guy decided to mesh all of the ED sequence in a single vid!

Dragon Ball Kai Premieres on GMA!

The updated version of the classic anime, Dragon Ball Z, Dragon Ball Kai will finally make its way in the Philippines via GMA! According to the ad, it will premiere on March 7, replacing Love ni Mister, Love ni Misis on the 9:30 am timeslot. For those who are affected by GMA's Regional TV, it is not sure if it will be available in those areas.

To those who don't know, Dragon Ball Kai is the reversion of the classic Dragon Ball Z anime which celebrates the 20th Anniversary of the said franchise. In this version, it eliminates all unnecessary filler and now on widescreen HD resolution. In short, it is still Dragon Ball Z, with less fillers, less talk and straight to the action. Currently, the anime is still on-going in Japan, episode 95 airing at March 6th, which is the end of the Cell Saga. It is said that it will end till the Cell Saga.

It is not sure if the original cast of Dragon Ball Z will reprise their respective roles for Dragon Ball Kai considering that QTV once aired the redub version of the original Dragon Ball anime with Jefferson Utanes reprising his role as Son Goku... and he will reprise his role as Son Goku again for DB Kai same goes for Picollo's VA, based on the latest advetisement! Also, it is confirmed in the ad that they 4:3 stretch-o-vision format will be utilized instead of using the widescreen black bars.

Special thanks to Noeru Chan for the tip and theBlockerPH for the confirmation via text, ZEN Otaku Honbu

IS: Infinite Stratos 08 – Find Out My Mind

In this episode, finally, the most awaited duel between Houki and Laura vs. Ichika and Charles (err, Charlotte) will finally happen! And it seems that we will now find out more about Laura and Houki’s abilities as a pilot!

To be honest, I was in complete awe when the battle happens. Ichika and Charles are in complete synch with each other while as for Houki and Laura, Laura thinks that Houki is in her way, and thus we can’t see Houki’s performance as an IS pilot. Too bad. As for the animation during the battle, it was amazing, like I said, I was in awe and cause me to get a lot of screen captures and some of it I might not use in this review!

Asides from the epic battle, we learned more about Laura that she is once a nameless test subject and an ace in the military, till the IS System came and turned her into a loser, till Chifuyu came. To be honest, I find her reason to hate Ichika too stupid. I mean, having your mentor’s inspiration is his younger brother? What’s wrong with that? Now I am quite bothered with Laura’s way of thinking.

Asides from that, the function of Laura’s special eye has been revealed. It turned out to be a special eye to enhance her abilities in using the IS and not something related to the Geass. But it also turned out to be a way to help her trigger her IS’ Valkyrie Trance System, a system which can cause IS to turn into somewhat a monster and cause her too loose control. To be honest, I find it quite an amazing system, so amazing that I do not know what words to describe this abomination.

Ichika has just used the Force!

Because of this abomination, we saw more Ichika badassery, which is always welcome. In this episode, I find the scene in which he only used his IS’ katana to attack the out of control Laura, epic, especially his motivation on stopping Laura. She is copying his sister’s fighting style!

At the near end of the episode, Charlotte and Ichika have a male bonding, which is a bit awkward considering that Charlotte is a girl pretending to be a boy. Seriously, the scene that happened in the bath tub cause to say that after this, an army of Ichika and Charlotte hentai doujins will be created in Japan and some guy will scan it and translate and some guy will decide to download it and read it during the dark. DON’T LOOK AT ME! And oh, she officially introduced herself as Charlotte to everyone, not Charles.

Overall, this is one heck of a episode. Like the previous episode, which involves a guy legally beating a girl because of their class, this tag match has been cancelled. Like I said earlier, the fights here are amazing and caused my jaw to drop on how well choreographed the IS fights are. At the end of this episode, it is official, Laura is now part of Ichika’s harem and kissed him at the end and declared that Ichika will be Laura’s wife!

Kamen Rider Accel RETURNS Event Report!

Not much related to the title, but no top is the picture of the earlier rumored Eyes Dopant which will appear on Kamen Rider Eternal's V-Cinema. Its ability is too shoot light rays from the eyeball looking orbs. Pretty freaky huh? Anyways, just recently, some people from 2ch are talking about the recently concluded Kamen Rider W RETURNS event and in the said event, they got the chance to watch Kamen Rider W RETURNS: Kamen Rider Accel and they are posting their comments about the V-Cinema! Be warned that after the jump break, spoilers about the V-Cinema will be posted.

According to one poster, it is better compared to Cho Den-O Episode Red in terms of executing the love story aspect of their respective films. The film has a lot of action scenes and it is not inferior to the movies that were released in cinemas in any kind of way, and it is really good.

In the film, Terui never calls Akiko, Akiko which cause her to complain since Terui calls every character in their first name except hers. It is also revealed that the identity of the Commander Dopant is being played by Minoru Tanaka (Ultraman Mebius & Ultraman Brothers, Ultraman Mebius). As for W, he barely showed up in the film.

Here is the sequence on how Terui ended up being Kamen Rider Accel Booster. Akiko is falling down, Terui has badly injured his leg, he won't get there in time and so, Aoi grabs the Commander Dopant and takes the Gaia Memory Enhancing Adapter and throws it to Terui. Terui transforms and flies over to her. As for Jinno, he is still alive and has some action scenes that were great. There was a scene about the man and wife which felt awkward to one poster.

In the said event, Kirihiko's actor voiced Futo-kun in the talkshow and it was funny. In the talk show, they talked about Eternal's V-Cinema theme song called, cod-E　～The Code of E～ (cod-E　～Eの暗号～) by SOPHIA. During the talk show, Koichi Sakamoto showed up and said that he wants to continue on doing Kamen Rider W. Kamen Rider Joker V-Cinema anyone?

Also, the first ten minutes of Kamen Rider Eternal's V-Cinema was played in the event. In one scene, Kyosui, best known as the Luna Dopant back in W FOREVER sees the dead Reika aka Heat Dopant dead and says, "She looks good." Giving us a possibility that he is once straight.

Asides that people who attended the event had the chance to watch Kamen Rider W RETURNS: Kamen Rider Accel, they also had a chance to watch the latest trailer of the upcoming, OOO - Den-O - All Riders: Let's Go KAMEN RIDERS film and the theme song, Let's Go RiderKick 2011 by Kamen Rider GIRLS was played during the event.

The trailer also shows Hiroshi Miyauchi yelling "V3!" and a shouting Hiroshi Fujioka. There's also a scene showing Shotaro and Philip transforming into Kamen Rider W. Kamen Rider OOO Tamashii Combo is shown and is preparing the TaMaShii Bomber. The Shocker Greeed seems to appear.

There is one scene which involves Kotaro Nogami, saying something about, "I won't give this medal to you."

And some kids said something about "But Shocker will disappear then."

It is reported that the trailer for OOO - Den-O - All Riders: Let's Go KAMEN RIDERS is going to be on the official website on March 3.

UPDATE 1: Fixed Minoru Tanaka bit, added info regarding the first ten minutes of Eternal's film and the info about the trailer of Let's Go Kamen Riders that was scene during the event edited by JEFusion.

15th Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize Nominees Announced!

The eight nominees of the coveted 15th Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize has just been announced on the newspaper, Asahi Shimbun! The awards commemorate the contributions of the God of Manga, Osamu Tezuka (Astro Boy [pictured], Kimba the White Lion, Phoenix, Black Jack) by recognizing the manga that best follow his tradition. Past winners of this award include: Doraemon (1997), Vagabond (2002), Moyashimon (2008) and Ooku (2009).

This year's nominating committee, which includes renowned manga-ka Go Nagai (Mazinger Z, Devilman), manga-ka Keiko Takemiya (Toward the Terra), novelist Shion Miura, essayists, and university professors selected from among the works that were published from January to December of 2010.

The winner will be awarded 2 million yen (about US$24,000) Manga Grand Prize along with a statuette of Tezuka's Mighty Atom character (pictured on the left). In addition, 1 million yen (US$12,000) goes to each of the winners of the New Artist Prize, Short Work Prize, and the Special Prize every year. 

The winners will be announced in the middle of April, and the actual awards presentation ceremony will take place on May 27.

The list of nominees are as follows, on the top are: Chūshun Komawari-kun by Tatsuhiko Yamagami, Fantasium by Ami Sugimoto, Fullmetal Alchemist by Hiromu Arakawa and Jin by Motoka Murakami.

The nominees on the bottom are: Ōma ga Hashi by Yōko Kondō, Shigurui by Takayuki Yamaguchi and originally created by Norio Nanjo, Tentai Senshi Sunred by Makoto Kubota and Takemitsuzamurai with Story by Issei Eifuku and Art by Taiyo Matsumoto.

Source: Anime Anime Japan via Anime News Network, tokyohive

Haruhi Suzumiya Vol. 10 Light Novel Update!

Kadokawa Shoten has confirmed that the limited first edition of Nagaru Tanigawa's next Haruhi Suzumiya light novel, The Surprise of Haruhi Suzumiya (Suzumiya Haruhi no Kyōgaku), will ship on May 25 with a special booklet containing a short story by Tanigawa about Kyon's middle school life.

According final issue of The Sneaker, the booklet's short story is called Rainy Day, and it is set during the protagonist Kyon's time in middle school. Tanigawa had personally written the "Someday in the Rain" episode of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, which serves as the show's finale in the DVD and chronological order of the show.

In addition to the short story, the booklet's 64 color pages will feature illustration work by novel artist Noizi Ito, contributions by artists Gaku Tsugano (The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya manga) and Puyo (The Melancholy of Suzumiya Haruhi-chan), and a behind-the-scenes account by the original editor of the light novel series.

Since The Surprise of Haruhi Suzumiya is 600 pages in length, it will ship in two volumes in Japan; the limited first edition will shrink-wrap both volumes along with the special booklet. Asides from that, this new light novel will receive a simultaneous worldwide release, but it is not shipping on May 25th (the day of its release) in all 13 countries that the said light novel series is in print but on select countries, namely: Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Korea.

Source: Moe Ota-News Sokuhō via Anime News Network

Gokaiger Transforms Into Magiranger Ver. 2!

Gokaigers as Magirangers back in ep 1

As we all remembered, the Gokaigers transformed into the Magirangers back at the show's first episode, and there is nothing special with it except that MagiBlue doesn't have a skirt and MagiYellow has a skirt. Just recently, on the show's third episode where they met MagiRed, Kai Ozu, they transformed into the Magirangers for the second time... except there are some changes.

As you can see in the video, asides that they did the Magiranger's pose, the Mobirates turned into the Magiranger's henshin device, the Magiphone and what's more is that as the Gokaigers transformed into the Magirangers, a BGM from the said show is playing!

Marvel Anime: Wolverine 07 – Miyuki and Kai

Vadhaka, a statue version of the Hulk except he is not green...

Even though the episode’s title is Vadhaka, which is the giant that Logan fought, that segment in this episode is really, really lame. It felt like Logan is just fighting some second-rate version of the Hulk, which is a better opponent in my opinion! So let’s talk to the best thing in this episode, what happened underground.

Under Madripoor, Logan met a man named Koh who has the same grudge with the Kurohagis and apparently, he is one of the heads of the city before Shingen came into picture! And so, he wants to get his city back thus, he is staging a rebellion against Kurohagi. But what makes this grudge much stronger is what happened years ago.

To be honest, it is one of the episodes of this series that I find unwatchable, but thanks to the flashback, it saved this episode. Let’s go back to the flashback, after weeks of not telling us who are Yukio’s parents, finally they revealed their names! They are Miyuki, who is back then working with Shingen and Kai who is Koh’s son. And since both of them are similar in many ways, Miyuki never got the chance to kill Koh like she was ordered to do, but fell in love with Kai.

This is the aspect in this episode that I liked, people who are working underground that ended up falling for each other even if they are on different sides. It has this Romeo and Juliet aspect except it is not cheesy but more angst. Later on, they will battle Shingen and his men and in my opinion, the battle of our lovers versus those foot soldiers is fun to watch compared to this generic Hulk also, I love how it ended even if it felt like some scene that happened at episode 2.

Also in this episode, our generic assassin arrives in Madripoor looking for Logan. So yeah, he is still as generic like last time we saw him. Now to the fight that happened in this episode, as I said, it felt like Logan is fighting a bad version of the Hulk, which is a big disappointment in my part. Luckily, the events that happened later made this episode watchable!

Overall, this is a mediocre episode of Wolverine. If not for the back story, this episode would not be that good even if we got decent Logan action with Yukio doing some back-up and end up being captured by Kurohagi!