3 June 2009: I dropped Eden of the East and K-On! but I'm still watching Queen's Blade
Reina is always back-to-back with Death.
Queen's Blade is awesome. No, wait. It's horrible. Actually, it's awesome because it's horrible. Or is it horrible because it's awesome? You kinda have to see it for yourself. On the one hand, it is wall-to-wall fan service. And I don't mean soft core Hatsukoi Limited fan service, I mean hard service of the "Look at all the tits! There must be...57 tits!" variety. And also the snake-rape and acid-lactation variety. No, really. And it goes on like that.
I wonder if Tomoe even knows what kind of show she's in.
But it also has A-List seiyuu in nearly every role. Kawasumi Ayako plays the lead girl, an inept middle-child named Reina who manages to lose nearly every single fight. (Really, a victory for Reina is a loss during which she doesn't piss herself.) Ayako isn't in Lafiel mode by any means, but she's taking it a lot more seriously than her He Is My Master role, for example. And it has Noto Mamiko playing an absurd miko character, also dead seriously. I guess it's a chance to get away from her Shimako typecast.
Of course there's a maid character.
And it has Hirano Aya yammering at a thousand words per minute about all sorts of insane crap related to this "Queen's Blade" reality television show she's trying to promote, albeit with only dubious success. That's what Queen's Blade is technically about: a ridiculous contest, but none of the characters seem especially motivated. I can't really blame 'em. Nanael is crazy.
I still think Nanael is making it up as she goes along.
On a whole, Queen's Blade isn't a show you watch for its merits—you watch because it's a curiosity. Still, it's a freak show, not a train wreck. If it were a better show, Queen's Blade would be boring and pointless. If it were any worse it probably wouldn't be any fun. As it is, it's brilliant slack-jawed entertainment and I can't stop watching.
