To Aru Majutsu no Index - Anime General Discussion [NO SPOILERS]

[Ravagerblade]

Thanks, although I can't read it, the visuals I can almost more or less understand. lol BTW I noticed Index has yet to fix her Habit. those pins get in the way sometimes. (airports/metal detectors, ect.) But just as well there was a time where they were useful.

[ACertainStark]

Originally Posted by marconii2002

So for now you can forget about third season http://yaraon.blog109.fc2.com/blog-entry-23136.html

From the gist of it, yaraon writer basically says what dniv said. Don't give up: Fiscal Year ended March 31, still more announcements in 10th anniversary.

[GoddyofAus]

They're just dicking around with us. The new season will be the last announcement, probably. Did anybody catch the Atlus stream when Persona 5 was announced? This reeks of that. Long and drawn out in order to drive the fans crazy and build hype. It's marketing 101.

[TJR]

Originally Posted by LG-MAX

the WWIII like a movie of 3 parts would at least ensure good animation, something that hardly had in Index II.

Index II was produced during a terrible period at the studio, which began in 2010 and continued through 2011.

The Index movie and Railgun S were produced at just the right time, with the dust having finally settled. Nevertheless, the industry is so unstable these days, so there's really no guarantee of anything. Things seem fine now, but if another rupture were to occur......

[zerozeronine]

They might want both the NT and the Railgun manga to get further since Index 3 will probably cover vol's 14-19 in 2 cours,Index 4 probably cover's vol's 20-22 in 1 cour followed by the 3rd season of Railgun,after that there is currently only 10 vol's of NT to animate (probably will get to vol's 12-14 by the time they will start to animate NT) and that can be divided in only 3 cours.I just wish that either Bones,8-Bit,Silverlight or Madhouse to be the studios to continue the Raildex franchise,never have been a fan of JC staff.

[TJR]

Nowadays, Silver Link is essentially J.C. Staff from 4-5 years ago (maybe like 1/3 original Silver Link, 2/3 old J.C. Staff). See Strike the Blood as an example of how they handled a two-cours Index-style series. It isn't bad, but they aren't quite there yet.

The Railgun S/Witch Craft Works/Wixoss production crew (IMO, they've produced some of the strongest and most consistent work at J.C.) would probably do a great job on Index, if they stick around and are assigned to it.

[Miraluka]

Railgun S' staff when it comes to adaptation only, when they do original stuff they are quite poor at work.
Witch Craft W. was solid so I agree.
Wixoss's staff, nope unles you mean again abou adaptation, their over the top angst and melodrama overshadows the main purpose the series had.

[GDB]

Originally Posted by TJR

Nowadays, Silver Link is essentially J.C. Staff from 4-5 years ago (maybe like 1/3 original Silver Link, 2/3 old J.C. Staff). See Strike the Blood as an example of how they handled a two-cours Index-style series. It isn't bad, but they aren't quite there yet.

To be fair to Silver Link, everything I personally hated about Strike the Blood had everything to do with the content written by the author and, at most, 2% to do with the pacing and cuts they used to animate it.

[Chaos2Frozen]

I just figure it's the nature of these "Chunnibyouish" settings that always have a problem translating into Anime, whether it's Narrative from texts or Animation (lots of flashy stuff but none of the budgets from bigger shounen titles).

[dniv]

Originally Posted by TJR

Nowadays, Silver Link is essentially J.C. Staff from 4-5 years ago (maybe like 1/3 original Silver Link, 2/3 old J.C. Staff). See Strike the Blood as an example of how they handled a two-cours Index-style series. It isn't bad, but they aren't quite there yet.

The Railgun S/Witch Craft Works/Wixoss production crew (IMO, they've produced some of the strongest and most consistent work at J.C.) would probably do a great job on Index, if they stick around and are assigned to it.

I didn't really like witch craft works but to be fair that was just because of how the mcs looked... The animation was pretty good actually though. I heard wixoss though is suffering from some terrible animation so I'm confused as to why that'd be good. (Take note: I'm in japan so I can't watch wixoss right now to verify said rumors lol. So if it has gotten better in the last week or so I wouldn't know.)

All I know is that railgun s was pretty fantastic when it wasn't original. The movie animation was fantastic but the story was kind of badly paced... Or done... And index anime has always been great but nowhere near as good as the LN's. Who's doing attack on Titan? I'd like to see that level or quality of music and animation in Index. Heck the Sao animation and music were also great. While the violence and added fan service could be annoying, i want a more reliable index adaptation...

[ACertainStark]

Originally Posted by Chaos2Frozen

I just figure it's the nature of these "Chunnibyouish" settings that always have a problem translating into Anime, whether it's Narrative from texts or Animation (lots of flashy stuff but none of the budgets from bigger shounen titles).

That's what I've always thought, too. No matter what and going from Light Novel to anime.

Also, no to Madhouse Mahouka staff. Mahouka has been disappointing.

[TJR]

By production, I'm referring to a team's ability to staff and coordinate animation work. Screenplay quality is out of their hands and would be the same even if another team were tasked with bringing the scripts to life.

The Railgun S group works so well because:

a) They have a regular rotation of excellent storyboarders and episode directors, plus they occasionally invite a famous guest (Keiji Gotoh, Goro Taniguchi, Atsushi Nishikori, Kiyoko Sayama, etc.). The regulars are regrouped for each succeeding project.

b) They have a regular rotation of supervising animators. Where possible, they alternate between a highly creative talent (Hiroshi Tomioka) and an experienced, speedy workhorse. IMO, the art can be unstable at times, but there's no lack of interesting motion throughout a series.

c) Production work is mostly in-house, although this arrangement may possibly be secured at the expense of other J.C. projects. Every episode of Ano Natsu de Matteru, Joshiraku, and Witch Craft Works was produced in-house (the same goes for Wixoss so far); Railgun S was all in-house except for three episodes during the first half.

d) They're becoming known for their eagerness to rally around the director during difficult times. We've heard good feedback from Atsuko Ishizuka and Tsutomu Mizushima (who remarked that he has become the master of procrastination and last minute work, yet the crew would always save the day. They also averted some kind of crisis toward the end of Joshiraku).

The Little Busters vs Sakurasou debate can more or less be settled now. J.C. Staff assigned LB to their most senior line producer (as expected for such a high profile project), but it's the junior upstart who's delivering the most impressive work and consolidating the best people under him. In light of their Railgun experience, they'd be great choice for Index, provided that they can get along well with Hiroshi Nishikiori.

[ACertainStark]

Is Nishikiori hard to work with? or is that on a case by case basis for any director?

[TJR]

Originally Posted by ACertainStark

Is Nishikiori hard to work with?

Can't say for sure. Nishikiori admits to being demanding in terms of quality (i.e. backgrounds, CG) and once complained that the freelance animators on Index were unreliable. However, disgruntled freelancers say that he's bad at project and staff management, which forces people to rush and subsequently take the blame for poor quality.

Hearsay also suggests that Nishikiori pushed the J.C. production staff too hard, leading to a mass walkout during and after Index II. However, it's unproven speculation. J.C. is a rigorous place to work with few opportunities for advancement. Since Silver Link and Aniplex/A-1 wanted to expand fast (and J.C. had recently promoted their team leaders to the position of producer, giving them industry clout), a major split was bound to happen.

or is that on a case by case basis for any director?

Some directors are well liked. Former Index/Railgun producer Shinichiro Kashiwada mentioned that Tatsuyuki Nagai was great to work with even when things were tough.

Others are notorious for being difficult. An example would be Kunihiko Ikuhara, the director of Utena and Penguindrum.

[Chosen_Hero]

Get Bones to do season 3 and give them enough cours to finish OT. Can you imagine if this were to happen?

[ACertainStark]

Originally Posted by TJR

Can't say for sure. Nishikiori admits to being demanding in terms of quality (i.e. backgrounds, CG) and once complained that the freelance animators on Index were unreliable. However, disgruntled freelancers say that he's bad at project and staff management, which forces people to rush and subsequently take the blame for poor quality.

Hearsay also suggests that Nishikiori pushed the J.C. production staff too hard, leading to a mass walkout during and after Index II. However, it's unproven speculation. J.C. is a rigorous place to work with few opportunities for advancement. Since Silver Link and Aniplex/A-1 wanted to expand fast (and J.C. had recently promoted their team leaders to the position of producer, giving them industry clout), a major split was bound to happen.



Some directors are well liked. Former Index/Railgun producer Shinichiro Kashiwada mentioned that Tatsuyuki Nagai was great to work with even when things were tough.

Others are notorious for being difficult. An example would be Kunihiko Ikuhara, the director of Utena and Penguindrum.

Thanks for the insight. That's really interesting.

Of course, as you say, speculation is speculation. The movie seemed to turn out fine in production and I'm of the opinion on a directional level, as well. Was that because of a change in staff or behind-the-scenes improvement?

[TJR]

Originally Posted by ACertainStark

Was that because of a change in staff or behind-the-scenes improvement?

Yeah, conditions behind the scenes had stabilized by then. On Index II, the production chain was breaking down (and it was a chain that delivered J.C.'s output for the better part of a decade, so the impact was huge), so it was the difference between a well mobilized staff and a demoralized crew that could barely keep things together.

[GDB]

Wasn't something supposed to be potentially announced sometime this weekend?

[ACertainStark]

Originally Posted by GDB

Wasn't something supposed to be potentially announced sometime this weekend?

I'm going to try to put this nicely as possible... the "announcement" for this month was on May 9th was just an update on staff comments from the anime side this time.

And then at the very end they said: "We have 1 announcement of the 10 projects for... next month!!"

is what I believe this says (I could be wrong):
"来月は、10大コンテンツがまたひとつ、オープンしますので、お楽しみに！"

Yeah.

Originally Posted by TJR

Yeah, conditions behind the scenes had stabilized by then. On Index II, the production chain was breaking down (and it was a chain that delivered J.C.'s output for the better part of a decade, so the impact was huge), so it was the difference between a well mobilized staff and a demoralized crew that could barely keep things together.

Thanks. I'm glad to see improvement in the management when looking back compared to Index II now that I know more about what happens behind-the-scenes.

[Chosen_Hero]

Originally Posted by ACertainStark

I'm going to try to put this nicely as possible... the "announcement" for this month was on May 9th was just an update on staff comments from the anime side this time.

And then at the very end they said: "We have 1 announcement of the 10 projects for... next month!!"

is what I believe this says (I could be wrong):
"来月は、10大コンテンツがまたひとつ、オープンしますので、お楽しみに！"

Yeah.



Thanks. I'm glad to see improvement in the management when looking back compared to Index II now that I know more about what happens behind-the-scenes.

So an announcement... gor an announcement? Seems legit. They really love to troll the fanbase.