Carnival Phantasm 1st Season

Received over a month ago but unable to do a proper review until now, Carnival Phantasm 1st Season, the OVA series that commemorates TYPE-MOON's 10th anniversary.

Carnival Phantasm, the limited edition book Catalogue and the Toranoana exclusive postcard.

The contents and all the leaflets. It includes both a dvd version and a Blu-ray version. Except for the floating menu in the blu-ray version, the contents are the same.

As every one knows, Carnival Phantasm is based in a couple of manga anthologies by Takenashi Eri called TAKE MOON that were released several years ago:

The episodes were rather nice and much more faithful to the original chapters than I expected. The biggest part in each of the four episodes included is actually a short story from the anthology:

Some minor characters that appeared in some of the stories were changed for the OVA for more popular and newer characters. For example, in the beach volleyball chapter Akira, Hanei and Souka were changed for Miyako and Sion (and Len doesn't play)
Some of the mini-gags are also faithfully based in the short stories, like Phantasmoon:

The Blu-ray it doesn't contains many extras besides the audio track "Teach me Ciel-sensei" written by Nasu itself that features Ciel-sensei and Neco-Arc loosely explaining the situations and characters on screen.

This is the floating menu in the blu-ray, featuring all the necos; the already old Neco-Arc and Neco-Arc Chaos plus the newly added Neco-Arc Bubbles (voiced by Ciel's VA Sakuma Kumi) and Neco-Arc Destiny (voiced by Caster's VA Tanaka Atsuko).

The limited edition extra, Catalogue, is an over 250 pages long artbook that compiles Takeuchi Takashi's illustrations in the last 10 years.

The format is rather small (is the same size of a dvd box) and 95 % of the contents already appeared in other media, but as a Takeuchi fan is definitely a must have and probably the best TYPE-MOON artbook available.

The contenst are divided in sections covering each franchise: Tsukihime, Melty Blood, Kara no Kyoukai, Fate/stay night, Fate/hollow ataraxia, Fate/stay night [Realta Nua], Fate others (Fate Zero, Unlimited Codes and EXTRA) and Others.

Some random photos:

Tsukihime illustrations from 2001-2002 period.

Usually each section contains a newly drawn pic. In Tsukihime section is the Arcueid to the left.

Melty Blood pictures.

Kara no Kyoukai

Fate/stay night newly drawn Saber to the left.

The Fate Others section

Fate Zero pictures from the drama cds

Thee others section includes the covers of the Vampire Wars novels.

CANAAN

Guest illustrations for Kannagi, Gainax (Fushigi no Umi no Nadia) and for the Tactics eroge Harem Party

B&W pictures used in stuff like Comic Market catalogs.

The 2nd season was released this week, so I expect my copy at the end of November...

Shin Seiki Evangelion volume 12

Shin Seiki Evangelion volume 12 by Sadamoto Yoshiyuki was released in April, but I forgot to buy it until a while back.

This is the manga series that I'm following for the longest time. The first volume was released in 1995 and is still ongoing. Sadamoto finishes each volume in one or two years, so it advances really slow...

It was the first manga series that I bought in Japanese because I was not happy with the Spanish edition quality. Until now I bought all the volumes so far:

Those are the 12 volumes plus the limited editions of volume 7 (two types, Rei & Asuka versions) and the limited volume 9.

The story follows the End of Evangelion movie quite closely, but with some notable differences:

Badass Gendou using an AT-Field

Recovered Asuka against the JSDF

Misato's farewell

The volume finish with the battle against the Eva series.

Weiß Schwarz IDOLM@STER 2

Received a while back, a Weiß Schwarz IDOLM@STER 2 booster pack box:

I'm missing 13 cards for a full set (not counting the always elusive promo and SR cards): 1, 3, 26, 29, 52, 53, 55, 71, 72, 76, 78, 84 and 85.

The SR card that I got was Makoto:


And also purchased Yukiho and Chihaya SR cards from the first series:

Now I'm only missing Hibiki, Makoto, Ritsuko and Azusa

For WS cards sales and trades, please visit this post!

Comic Market 80 doujinshi loot

Late and brief review of C80 releases (and some Comitia releases as well) that I bought:

As usual, those are mostly works from the circles that I systematically follow. In detail:

T-Moon Complex X 07, keeping the excessively long Fate vs. Tsukihime crossover by Shirotsumekusa of circle Crazy Clover Club and Mado☆Magi Complex, an updated version of his previous work.
This time bonus is a shitajiki with Arcueid in one side and the T-Moon Complex cover in the other.

Konton Lady Studio Ryuu Soushuuhen from circle Konton Lady Studio, a compilation of IDOLM@STER works that are not part of their Super Kotori Time series.
Their released 2 compilations at the same time: Ryuu, this one, is focused in the works drawn by Tee and Tora, focused in the works of DIT. Sadly I was unable to find the other volume...

The works by Kikuta Kouji from circle King Revolver: Futanari Gohan (featuring futa Mami and Homura "playing" with a non-futa Madoka) Natsu No Bunny (featuring several characters in bunny outfits, but mostly Mami from Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magica), Summer Pudding (starring a yukata dressed Rider) and the copy-shi Serio-san to Ecchishiyou starring Serio.

Atsui Hi Daradara by Takemura Sessyu from the circle Chotto Dake Aru Yo., starring extremely lewd versions of Makoto and Miki staying at Producer's home.

Hijirin Yume Mousou and Mima-sama Yume Mousou by Tsukiwani of Circle Nurumaya.
When I was living in Japan I was strongly exposed to Touhou universe, but now my interest in it is quickly fading (I didn't play anything since Subterranean Animism). Besides that, Tsukiwani does exactly the same situation in every issue, and while it was fresh in the first ones, after 14 issues it's a bit repetitive...

And Enikki Recycle 16, the blog entries compilation of A1 (Initial-G) covering the second half of 2010. The omake booklet features Chihaya from IdolM@ster.