Anime OP of the ???: an effort to put more content on this blog, while being brief and informative at the same time. I came up with this idea while sitting down in the pews today. By providing info on various OPs and EDs, I can still give a valuable reference point on more animators and directors while not having to spend too much time on a single post. However, since this is the inaugural post, I've decided to provide two for the price of one. The "???" in the title just indicates that there is no set interval that a new entry in this series will pop up.
And without further ado:
I listened to this song on this week's ANNCast and I just had to watch the opening itself. The animation is done by Takuya Suzuki, song (Yuusha-oh Tanjou!; King of Braves is Born!) is performed by Masaaki Endoh (not to be confused with the animator). I'm going to make a sweeping generalization here, but I think everybody who's a fan of animation appreciates good 2D mecha action. If there's anything that breaks my heart, it's the lazy, almost insulting, use of CG on mecha and just about everything else that's not human. There's none of that here, and everybody's happy for it.
Director, Storyboard: Masaaki Yuasa
Animation Director: Nobutake Ito (listed incorrectly as Nobutaka Ito on ANN, as of now)
Key Animation: Yuichiro Sueyoshi, Kenichi Yamaguchi, Takayuki Hamada
Song: "Never" by Seira Kagami (available on iTunes)
Ah, yes. One of my favorites. This is the perfect piece to introduce every episode of Kaiba, even when the story in the second half sadly becomes kind of a mess. This piece can also serve as a litmus test to see if you can stomach the eclectic visuals that's employed throughout the series. Here you can see the motif of mirroring the same act that Yuasa also used in the Kemonozume OP; one of Yuasa's artistic quirks that he seems to like to use, from my experience.