In this thread, the topic is the Japanese anime and manga Death Note. I revived the thread because my son and I just saw it and enjoyed it and want to see what is out there that might be like it.
One name that came up as we have looked around is Code Geass(Amazon link to DVD set).
First of all - anyone seen this? Thoughts, esp if you’ve also seen Death Note?
Secondly - forgive my online ignorance, but is there any legit way to stream this online? I don’t see it at Netflix or Hulu, only a bunch of sites I don’t quite trust that seem to skirt copyright/licensing laws.
Thank you in advance for any assistance you can provide.
There doesn’t seem to be a (legal) way. I can’t even find the dubbing company, but it didn’t seem to be any of them that host their dubs/subs online (Funimation has been putting up their properties for streaming).
It’s…really generic. I watched a couple of episodes (and I’m relatively forgiving of this sort of stuff) but it was just bland and felt like it was designed by comittee to fit some sort of successful formula. It had no soul to speak of.
That said, if you’re looking to watch anime online and don’t want to go into grey-area fansubs, your best bets are Crunchroll.com, Hulu, and maybe crackle.com
I’m not super sure what’s available out there right now though, and there’s no guarantee we’d have overlapping tastes anyway, so I suggest just kicking back and watching a couple episodes of a bunch of things until you find something you like - don’t necessary going with the “popular opinion” or you’ll end up with stuff like Code Geass and Naruto.
I thought Code Geass was good but not great. Wildly-over-the-top drama with political backstabbing and double-crosses played out between competing royal families amidst a brewing revolution. I’d say its worth watching but don’t expect it to be on par with Death Note.
The main reason I posted was to point you to http://www.crunchyroll.com/. They’re an anime streaming service, 100% legit. I can’t speak to their quality, though, since I’ve never used their service.
You don’t even need to sign up for a lot of it. (I just logged out and watched the first little bit of episode one of Code Geass.) I think you only need to sign up for a free account to watch ones rated mature (I think that’s why I signed up in the first place).
You can also sign up for a paid account, that gets you access to the episodes earlier (and turns off the ads), but I don’t find that to be worth it.
The FAQ says they might not have the license to a particular show in all countries, but I’ve yet to encounter that. If they do have it for your country…yep, you can watch it via Crunchyroll.
Cool. Thanks again.
And am I correct that Cowboy Bebop and Wolfs Rain are on the site? I did a search and there appear to be links, but I was having a bit of trouble navigating - and don’t want to spend a lot of time on this at work…
Okay - I was afraid of that. I did searches that returned entries - but there was a top set of results labeled Videos, and below that, another set of results labeled All Results.
When I search for Code Geass, for example, there are results in the Video section and the All Results.
For Cowboy Bebop, none in Video, but some in All Results.
So i wasn’t sure if All Results was relevant - from the sound of it, it is not; Crunchyroll must list their contents in the Video results section…
I used to watch anime on there before they were legit for almost a year and I paid to be a premium member. Then right when I was in the middle of a couple of series they disappeared.
All the popular shows like Cowboy Bebop got pulled with just a message saying, “Please support these awesome shows by buying the show.” So I left and then a long time later I went back to check them out again and they had shows for viewing again but they were all shows I had never heard of.
I just went back and they are still mostly shows I have never heard of but there were some that I had. Some that had been pulled back when. So they must have obtained the rights and be legit these days.
As to Code Geass I watched a dozen episodes or so and I thought it was OK. Nothing spectacular but it wasn’t a dud either.
Ooh I see they have Durarara which I just started getting into watching on Cartoon Networks Adult Swim.
Ha they also have Viewtiful Joe which was on Saturday monring cartoons about 6 or 7 years ago. I liked that show. I might have to watch it again.
Yeah even if they don’t have videos for a show they will still have a description and rating about the show so thats why Cowboy had no video but it did have results.
I recommend Code Geass. I haven’t seen Death Note – but I have read the manga and I enjoyed it. Like many animes Code Geass grows on you after a few episodes. The dubbing is solid, especially of LaLouche, the protagonist.
Admittedly, it was designed as a hash of genres. They meld high school romantic drama, with fighting robots, political intrigue, strategizing, mind games and scifi-fantasy. And the premise is terrific: take a character with the traits of a villain and set it up so that he fights an evil empire. Put the character with more typically heroic traits and make him defend it. Don’t want to have unnecessary bloodshed you know.
The West Coast’s Anime Lane: Recommended
Incidentally, you can rent DVDs online of course. Netflix offers some. I’ve found AnimeLane to be superior to Florida’s RentAnime.com. AnimeLane manages to deliver disks at the very top of my queue. RentAnime in contrast might send disk 4 months after delivering disk 3, even if I had Disk 4 at the top of my list and the title was still in print. Delays associated with DVDs labeled “Low availability” can vary greatly. This recommendation is based upon about a year’s experience with the Florida outfit and ~3 months with the West Coast one.
