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My heart swelled with inexplicable joy as Makino Yui temporarily purged it of all the evils and hatred this world has mercilessly injected it with.
And that in itself is what makes this trailer so special. With no English dub voices to show off, it has been the most enjoyable thus far by employing solely the anime’s soothing and beautiful OP.
It seems that Rightstuf has answered my prayers and went ahead with a license. Apart from the moe-Bishoujo anime licensing trend in the US, it appears that slice-of-life as a genre is starting to pick up the pace.
ARIA tells the tale of a group of Gondola rowers (known as Undines) who reside in a city on the terraformed planet Aqua (formerly Mars) modeled after Earth’s very own Venice. It is one of the better examples of “iyashikei” or “healing” anime, and never fails to charm after a hard day’s work (especially in the military).
For the love of Haruhi, please give the trailer a go over here. And if you love slice-of-life series’ like I do, please pre-order ARIA over here as well. Onegaishimasu!!!
Reading Aqua is like sipping wine, in a cute (martian) cat shaped glass. Except sometimes it makes you laugh out really loud. If anyone could concoct a drink that could do that, I would love to try it. But for now, there is always Amano Kozue’s artistic goodness, with the occasional bout of unique humour, to savour.
Sidenote to self: I realised a good method to blog manga is to keep a bunch of post-it notes around to bookmark the pages where there are memorable or interesting panels as you read the manga.
Sidenote to light novel enthusiasts or would be enthusiasts: I use post-it notes to label all light novel illustrations when I read light novels as well. I find that to enjoy a light novel fully, you have to constantly refer back to the insert illustrations and front illustrations as you read the light novel, because the story will become much clearer if you do so. Just a tip for those who have not read a light novel before in real-life, as Seven Seas is publishing a whole bunch of light novels in authentic format next month. Oh and yeah, all my current light novels are filled up with post-it notes 
One of the recurring themes that appear in the earlier volumes of the manga is the contrast of life on Aqua and Manhome (Earth). Life on Manhome isn’t described in detail in manga, because most of us already know how hectic life can be down here. However, life on Aqua is illustrated and brought across to the reader in great detail: even though it is a lot more troublesome due to lack of technology, there is simply nothing that can beat living in a water city re-imagined after Earth’s own Venice, on the 3rd planet from the sun.
Amano Kozue proves again and again that she isn’t only proficient at drawing up breathtaking scenery views of Aqua. Her chibi artwork works extremely well, complimented perfectly by her cynical and slightly weird characters which are none other than Aika and the salamander trainee that keeps calling Akari “sideburns” (in vol.2).
But still, her scenery stills are what make this manga click besides its memorable characters. The little bits of science tidbits also make it a rather educational, and an extremely interesting read.
Oh and I recently got her third illustration work Cielo from Kinokuniya, which set me back SGD55 (after member’s discount), and this is a sample of what Amano Kozue is capable of coming up with in full colour:
Needless to say, I’ll be purchasing Alpha and Stella sometime in the near future :3
ARIA reference in Sketchbook ~full colors~?
Did you know that the team behind the anime adaption of ARIA came together again to do Sketchbook ~full colors~? I think it was an excellent decision on the studio side, since the pacing for ARIA is quite similar to Sketchbook. I must say that they did an excellent job for both series… which leaves me wondering. Why isn’t ARIA the ANIMATION (first season) or ARIA the NATURAL (2nd Season) licensed? I can probably watch it over a few million times on DVD since it is a slice-of-life “healing” anime which is free of most fetish traps (except Shoujo-Ai). If stuff like KANON and AIR can sell, I don’t see why not for ARIA. Big hint for ADV Films here ^^
While I was aware of the ARIA anime for the longest time ever, it is only recently that I started sampling the first season. The 3rd season titled ARIA the ORIGINATION is currently airing, but despite wanting to watch it and consider purchasing the OP (the ARIA OPs and EDs for the first 2 seasons are fantastic), the 3rd season is inaccessible to me as I’m simply an ARIA noob. And sad to say, by the time I discovered this excellent evergreen series, the OP and EDs for the first two seasons are out of print. Really, really sad… hontouni desu 
That aside, if you’ve been keeping up with manga news, you should know that Tokyopop picked up the ARIA manga series that ADV Manga has dropped. Long before watching the anime, I had already started reading the prequel to the ARIA manga titled AQUA. AQUA was the series’ original name before it was re-titled to ARIA, and this prequel series ran a total of 2 volumes. While it is widely known that both the Sketchbook and ARIA mangas were published in the Seinen manga magazine Comic Blade, Amano Kozue’s (mangaka of ARIA/AQUA) starting point was a lesser known manga magazine known as Monthly Stencil. He went on to illustrate 3 artbooks for this series which I am currently considering to purchase (WHY IS ONE OF THEM OUT OF STOCK WHILE THE PREVIOUS 2 ARE NOT!?!?)
I wonder how many ARIA anime fans have missed out on the manga, because quite honestly despite being a slow anime, fans of the manga will be shocked at how fast they are rushing things. I have read both volume 1 of AQUA and ARIA (a grand total of 4 times each), and episode 2 of ARIA the ANIMATION has already proceeded past volume 1 of ARIA. Which mean they squeezed 3 volumes of goodness into 1 and a half episodes.
Of course, thinking back, there were many scenes in the manga that can only be expressed fully in a still medium, not in animation. It may have been a waste of animation time, but still it is a slow series. Perhaps the director could have done more. The omitted scenes in the manga did manage to evoke very intense emotions in my heart as I flipped through, and it would be a pity if pure anime watchers missed out on them.
Ara ara!!!
That said, I strongly urge ARIA fans who have not read the manga before during ADV’s reign to give it a go, especially AQUA. The anime adaption completely skipped out on the events covered in AQUA (before Akari became a Single), which I felt was a horrendous mistake. I re-read AQUA vol.1 three times in one sitting, the fourth time coming a short 3 days later. There was a crucial event in AQUA that the animation failed to cover, and many of the scenery stills in the manga are literally breathtaking. Upon turning the page, I could feel my breath being taken away… something that the animation has failed to do so, so far.
Animation has always been able to capture comedy better than manga though, doncha think?
P.S. There is this NSF sergeant in my camp who is still hanging on to my ARIA volume 1 along with volumes 1-5 of my Gunslinger Girl among other manga. Gotta make some time to get my loot back sheesh…
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