How Kyoka Suigetsu is still in harmony with Aizen? While Kōga sitting alone in a cave, Muramasa appeared and asked him why he would kill innocent bystanders, which prompted Kōga to claim he was teaching Soul Society a lesson for exiling him from their world. Soon, Kōga was even abusing Muramasa when he was anything less than absolutely obedient. This disharmony between them gradually caused Kōga to lose his ability to communicate with Muramasa, or even access his power.

  Bleach anime; Episode 251

If killing innocent bystanders can make a Zanpakuto feel bad and revolt to its master, why wouldn't Kyoka Suigetsu revolt against Aizen?

The entire premise you're referring to is during a filler arc, and thus, would not have any satisfactory answer to any plot holes that were left.  This is one such plot hole.

That said, speaking more general to the series, it is not known what kind of relationship Kyoka Suigetsu and Aizen have with each other, given that we have never seen a bankai, nor have we seen  Kyoka Suigetsu directly communicate with Aizen on any level.  It is easy to presume that it's quite strained given the level of abuse it has suffered due to Aizen fusing with the Hogyoku, which ultimately led it to break, but we simply don't know.

It's also worth noting that Muramasa only impacted Zanpakuto that he was able to directly come in contact with.  Aizen was not in Soul Society during this filler arc, so Muramasa could never have communed with Kyoka Suigetsu to cause it to rebel.


What happened in episode 11 of the Little Busters Refrain anime? I am on Episode 11, they just "explained everything" but I don't understand it at all. How is a new world created? What was season one? What happens to the people from the bus?

Simply put the world that Kyousuke, Masato and Kengo created was one semester being looped endlessly.

While they were repeating, it was not a full reset, where you rinse and repeat. Rin and Riki were able to subconscious keep the experience they gained, making them stronger every loop.

They were friends even in the real world and got also involved in the bus crash of the original Little Busters.

Also to note, Kurugaya's loop was basically a loop within a loop. It was her wish to stay forever with Riki, because she knew she would never see him again.

It was believed that the gang saying farewell at the end implies they think Riki is the strong one who will have to protect Rin from now on. While direct at Riki this probably applies to Rin as well. The main loop was for both of them to get stronger in order to overcome that of what is to come for them (i.e. their actual future).

I don't believe the fate of everyone was explicitly mentioned here, but keep watching to find out.


Does Izumi Shinichi's parasite suffer from a lack of power because of his injury? After his parasite completely heals his heart and regenerates his arm, does Migi lose any abilities except the power to locate other parasites when he's asleep?

I suppose you know this already, but to be clear, Migi does not just lose the ability to locate other parasites when he is asleep, he is completely dormant and unable to wake up and react to danger during the sleep. The information about his weaknesses is given by Migi himself on Page 190 in Volume 2:

   Interestingly, a 70% Migi could still sense other parasites within a 300m radius after the incident (for example, in Volume 3, he detected the presence of the parasite murderer 300m away) and a 30% Migi inside Shinichi likewise enables Shinichi to see 300m far, so I see no loss in either power or ability by Migi after his "injury".

The conclusion is Shinichi's parasite Migi does not suffer from a lack of power because of his "injury" other than the weakness mentioned by Migi in the picture above.


Is there any particular reason behind why Dressrosa is such a long arc? I am sure most of the fans of One Piece agree with me on this one. The entire story of Dressrosa is progressing slowly. If you follow the anime like me, rather than the manga it's a very painful wait for something to happen.

Is there any particular reason behind it? Do the decision makers want One Piece to go on another 15 years. Some facts I know which might answer this are:

Previously one episode was made up of 2-4 chapters of manga, now its 1-2 chapters per anime episode.
Character Introduction: The amount of character introduction in this arc is too much which I think we can safely assume that they have some purpose in the upcoming arcs. (Similar to how so many pirates were supporting Whitebeard in the war)

⚠ The answer below contains spoilers. Read at your own risk.

As of this writing, the 10 longest arcs with their respective number of episodes are:

Clearly, Dressrosa is roughly double the length of the second longest arc until now.

The major reasons behind this are:

Character Introduction/Development:
As you point out, the number of characters introduced during this arc are far too many as compared to any other arc. To list the major ones:

Admiral Fujitora
Bellamy is revealed to be alive and has visited Skypiea
Buggy is confirmed to have joined the Shichibukai during the time skip
CP 0
Colloseum Fighters (Mainly Rebecca and Kyros)
Dwarves
Kaido (seen for the first time, as opposed to the silhouette we have been seeing)
Kuzan is revealed to have become associated with the Blackbeard Pirates
Revolutanaries such as Sabo, Koala and Hack
Rob Lucci, Hattori, and Spandam have joined CP-0
Many characters make their first appearances after the time skip. The characters (in the order they were reintroduced) are: Jewelry Bonney, Brannew, Sakazuki, Bellamy, Jesus Burgess, Bastille, Sabo, Koala, the Gorosei, Urouge, Capone Bege, X Drake, Sengoku, Tsuru, Rob Lucci, Spandam, and Hattori.Source

Plot development: A lot of plot was covered in this arc, from introducing new story lines to filling in the gap that was left after the timeskip. To list a few of the things coveredSource:

Law's backstory and history with the Donquixote Pirates is shown.
Luffy activates a new technique called Gear Fourth.
Luffy fights and defeats Doflamingo with the other crew members having their own fighting scenes with their respective opponents.
More information about Haki is revealed during this arc. According to Law and Luffy, if Haki is overused, it will not be able to work for a certain period of time until it recharges.
The gladiators and dwarves who allied with Luffy offer him an alliance with 7 representatives of each crew, giving a total of about 5,640 pirates. He refuses the offer but they choose to pledge their allegiance to him even if he refused, forming the Straw Hat Grand Fleet.
Trafalgar Law is revealed to have the "D." in his name. It is also revealed that anybody that is a part of the Will of the D. is considered "an enemy of God".

Slow Pacing: As you pointed out, the pacing of One Piece has been slow during this arc. As mentioned in this article:

  TOEI has decided to translate 1 manga chapter to 1 anime episode. Which is something that doesn’t really always work since narrative in comics and audiovisual pieces is not the same. We’ve also seen too many unnecessary reaction shots. For example, recently we got nearly a quarter of an episode of just toys transforming back to humans. Or hundreds of panning shots of Sabo (without showing his actual face until last week’s episode). Or repeated flashbacks, like Rebecca and her father.

This is happening because the manga and the anime are pretty close at the moment. Usually, an anime makes fillers in cases such as this. However, One Piece fillers are rare, and the one that we did get prior to the Dressrosa Arc:  Caesar’s Retrieval Arc, was only 3 episodes long. We also got the 3D2Y Special, but it still doesn’t seem to be enough.Source


Why don't Araragi and Senjougahara call each other by their given names? It only happened once in Bakemonogatari when Araragi went on his first date with Senjougahara (and her father). Araragi called her by her family name Senjougahara, and Senjougahara teased Araragi and asked if he call her or her father. And then Araragi called her by her given name (Hitagi)

They're dating, so why they don't call each other by given name? Does Senjougahara do this out of respect to Hanekawa?

Even though we viewers have spent three, four, five years of our lives watching Monogatari, Koyomi and Hitagi have only been dating for about a year at the end of Monogatari Second Season. In other anime, characters who've known each much longer than that are still on a family name-basis; for example, Honey and Clover takes place over four years, but by the end of it, almost everyone is still on a family-name basis. That's something we should probably consider.

Not only that, Hitagi herself is a distant sort of person. Look at the lengths she went to to stop anyone getting involved with her when she was afflicted by the Heavy Crab—she alienated her friend, Suruga, and actually cut open Koyomi. Because of her past, she's distant and standoffish with everyone, but she's especially uncomfortable with romantic matters. She warns Koyomi early on in their romance (Tsubasa Cat Part 2) that it's going to move very slowly if he stays with her, and that she might never be ready for certain intimate activities. I'm sure she wasn't including calling each other by given name in that, but it's still a sign of the very slow progress that she warned Koyomi about.

I also think we should look at Koyomi himself. In general, he seems to use pretty respectful forms of address. He calls every one of the heroines by family name, even though Mayoi and Nadeko are younger than him and could probably be referred to by given name, possibly with -chan. (In Love Hina, Keitaro Urashima calls Motoko Aoyama "Motoko-chan" from the get-go, and even though she despises him, she never calls him on this that I can remember.) He calls his own sisters "Karen-chan" and "Tsukihi-chan" with an honorific, which Tsubasa remarks on as odd. He refers to Oshino Meme as "Oshino-san", even though Oshino is a weird transient in a Hawaiian shirt and Koyomi doesn't seem to find him particularly worthy of respect in most ways.

Given all of the above, it seems likely that:

It's somewhat normal in Japanese culture to still be on a family-name basis after dating for just a year.
Hitagi is trying to take things slow; for that reason, she might be sticking with family names as a way of keeping a little distance.
Koyomi seems to prefer using a family name with no honorific to address his friends, and without a sign from Hitagi, he isn't going to switch how he addresses her.

As for Hitagi hassling Koyomi when they're in the car with her father, well, that's Hitagi. She loves making him uncomfortable. It might also have been a way for her to try on being on a given-name basis in a non-threatening environment without committing to anything. If she liked being called by her given name, she could ask Koyomi to keep doing it; otherwise, once she's had her fun, they're back to family names. I don't really think she keeps this up out of respect for Tsubasa. I would go too far into literary analysis if I talked about all my theories on the dynamic between Tsubasa and Hitagi, but suffice it to say, I don't think Hitagi ever saw Tsubasa as a loser who she should be a gracious winner towards, which is the view that that kind of gesture would suggest.


What song/theme is playing in episode 10 of season 2 in Tokyo Ghoul? It's playing between 6:46 and 7:46. I've heard it multiple times in TG itself but couldn't find it on soundtrack, and many times elsewhere. I have a feeling it's somewhat popular

The ending theme song is by queen bee and the song name is called HALF


Why is most anime centered on fighting? Something I have always wondered, why is most anime centered on fighting? DragonBall Z, RWBY, Bleach just to name a few. I've seen some that aren't, but it seems to be few and far between. Is this something that just relates to the Japanese lifestyle?

Anime can be broken into three broad catagories - shounen, shoujo, and seinen. These translate into roughly young guys, young girls, and adults (as in not young people). Most of the "popular" shows are shounen, which contain a lot of action/fighting, simply because that demographic likes that kind of thing more.

As can be expected, there are also shoujo shows, which are mostly romance, drama, and romantic comedies. Seinen shows contain themes of psychology, mystery, and other stuff adults are interested in.

In the end, you can compare the anime genres to western movie genres, you have big block buster action flicks, aimed towards guys, you have chick flicks for the girls, and you have these thriller/mystery/philosophical stuff for the "sophisticated"


What is the song that was playing in Code Geass R2 episode 10 at 11:50? What is the song that was playing at 11:50 in Code Geass: Lelouch of the Rebellion R2 episode 10?

This track is not featured in either of the OSTs, after a long search I found this version:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nh8CS8PM7vk

or

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FEK28DBU2_I

  The Unreleased Album is from people ripping music from the original
  series and trying to reduce all of the foreground sound be using audio
  subtraction and splicing from different uses in the series. It's a
  massive effort and it's a real shame that we'll never get official
  releases of a lot of Code Geass music, this one for certain really
  should have gotten one.


How many types of Rasengan does Boruto have? I know that Boruto has at least two Rasengan, but I don't know exactly how many he has.

There are a total of 9 Rasengans, and all can only be attained by combining the power of the tailed beasts. As of right now, Boruto has 3 types that he can use with the help of his Karma (Which was made to Boruto by Koji Kashin a Jiraya clone), the three types are Wind Style Rasengan, High Compression Rasengan & Vanishing Rasengan.

Wind Style Rasengan was taught to him through an explanation by Kakashi then the Wind Style Rasengan evolved into the High Compression Rasengan which Boruto can only use once in extreme cases.

Vanishing Rasengan Was created by Boruto as a result of his chakra nature.


Why doesn't Naruto possess any of his clan's specific jutsu? Neji, Hinata, Shino, Kiba, Sasuke, Choji, Shikamaru and Ino all have their clans' Kekkai Genkai, e.g. Shikamaru possesses shadow jutsu, Ino has mind controlling jutsu.

The Uzumaki clan is said to have sealing techniques. Then why doesn't Naruto possess any of the techniques? At least, he should have some of his father's abilities (excluding Rasengan, as Jiraiya and Kakashi were able to do it), but from the beginning, it is shown that he didn't possess any clan-specific technique. Why so?

To expand on my comment, as per nhahtdh's request:

Because clan specific jutsu have to be taught, even though you may have an affinity toward them or less difficulty in learning them.

Unlike Kekkei Genkai, which are techniques (usually) unique to a clan passed down genetically, clan specific jutsu - or Hiden - are passed down through teaching/orally.

Examples of Kekkei Genkai include, but are not limited to, the Sharingan, the Byakugan, the Shikotsumyaku (Kimimaro's bone ability), Ice Release techniques (used by Haku) and Wood Release techniques.
Examples of Hiden include, but are not limited to, the Nara clan's Shadow techniques, the Aburame clan's Insect techniques, the Hyuuga clan's fighting style (Gentle Fist) and the Uzumaki clan's Sealing techniques.

However, it is also noteworthy to point out that Naruto possesses many of the general "abilities" of the Uzumaki clan, such as an incredibly strong life force, great recuperative powers and over the average longevity. He possesses these because, not unlike Kekkei Genkai, they are passed down genetically.
On the other hand, he does not posess the clan's specific jutsu, due to the simple fact that there was no Uzumaki around to teach them to him.


What exactly is the yellow thing that plue has? In this picture off Plue from the Rave Master wiki, it's stated to be a horn/nose.

But what exactly is that yellow thing? Is it a nose or a horn? If it's nose, can Plue smell with that?

Most site, even Rave wiki always refer it as a nose due to its position that like a nose. But actually it's not both, it looks like horn, and the position is more like nose but it's the weapon that only Plue has

Just like that picture says, even Hiro Mashima not sure what it is. (or he just didn't want to tell us)


Why did Killua kill the opponent of Leorio? I'm currently watching the anime series Hunter x Hunter. I'm currently on the episode 30. But looking back, I get confused why exactly did Killua kill the opponent of Leorio.

Before the fight, his brother was seemingly hypnotizing him that he will need to step back if he know that his opponent is stronger than him, thus making him protecting Killua.

His brother also stated that a certain day will come that Killua will leave Gon to die. I don't get the point why such action will be done to Kill the opponent of Leorio.

Yay, I watched this again yesterday:

He felt he had to quit the exam due to pressure from his brother (which involves literal and quite horrific mind control that is explained in more detail in the chimera ants arc).
Disqualification is a faster way to quit than waiting to the end.
He wanted to kill something as he is quite a blood thirsty individual and wanted to reaffirm his strength and control over the world.
He lost most of his self control because of his emotional state.  Note that he truely believed that Illumi would kill Gon and that his losing the match without fighting proved his was not fit to be a normal human. He was not willing to fight to protect his only friend from being killed.

While he might have considered that killing that opponent helped Leoreo that was determined not to be why he did it.  If it was why he killed him, Leoreo would have been disqualified as was explained when Leoreo (and later Killua too) wanted to step in against Hanso to protect Gon.


Why didn't Light just kill the Task Force? I know that Light didn't want to kill his father in cold blood, but after his father, Soichiro Yagami, died, he could've just killed them. And then, Near accused L #2 of being Kira.

Near only found out that Light was Kira because of the information Aizawa gave him. He could've just killed the Task Force and went incognito. I know he wanted to kill of Near and Mello, but I'm sure that he could've found a way to kill them off later.

Why didn't Light just kill the Task Force then?

To add to Vixen's answer, Light didn't kill the Task Force before Near was even in the picture because they posed him no threat. Initially, he only killed criminals, and later he started killing everyone opposing his utopia. However, they were working for him then, so there was no need to kill them.

Also, keep in mind that he couldn't hide those deaths from the world. It would seem rather strange that the entire Task Force died and he was the only survivor. He would have to made them all die in such a way that he would seem innocent, but it would still seem odd to any onlooker. So, maybe he didn't want to risk exposure even more.

On a side note, it might have been his conscience if he still had any left. He partly killed his own father to convince everyone that he was innocent. He purposely made his father do the eye-trade so that his father could prove his innocence by telling everyone he had a showing lifespan, meaning he could not have been the Killer. Killing everyone else after that ordeal would make his father lose his lifespan in vain.


Why did Ika Musume lose her squid powers? At the end of season one's last episode in Shinryaku! Ika Musume, Ika Musume loses her squid powers, like glowing, tentacle usage, and regeneration, among others. In fact, it seems that the only power she kept was breathing underwater. Why? The anime gave no reason for her powers to go away, nor any reason for them to come back. The trigger was, "someone is in danger", but Takeru threw an inflatable orca at her to no avail, and Sanae managed to glomp Ika without being hurt. Given Ika's notorious selfishness, the best motivator should have been her being in danger, rather than someone else.

Was it ever explained or implied in the manga? Was this anime-only filler? What's the deal with that?

It's because she didn't use it as much as when she was still living on the sea her tentacle withered. So she said...

Unlike the anime, the reason her tentacle grow back was because she was in danger - she saw a killer whale float


Why are Haki attacks not effective on admirals (akainu, Kizaru, aokiji) in one piece? I don't have reputations enough so for that,
the most understandable answer is that they are not logia fruit users, i suspect that their are other types of devil fruit in which the body can produce as much amount of the matter(i unable to say the exact word) as they want. For example- admirals (more plasma, ice, or light), trebol( Donquixote Doflamingo family more sticky material), Blackbeard(more darkness), ace (more fire) etc. In such case the haki attack was only hits the matter covering their body and only able to scratch a little and therefore in this type of devil fruit power the body can be regained back to normal by just producing more matter.
Please upvote if You find this helpful.

Obviously the admirals have logia-type fruit, check this:

Akainu fruit:  Magu_Magu_no_Mi

Aokiji fruit: Hie_Hie_no_Mi

Kizaru fruit: Pika_Pika_no_Mi

The problem here was the level of the power of the haki, this case the Busoshoku haki.

You have a lot of examples of different battles where you can see that the level difference in this type of haki allows one user hit other. A clear case is the fight of Roronoa Zoro vs Pica, where Zoro manages to hit Pica thanks to that his haki is superior.

Also the admirals are it affected for this haki, this is clear when Rayleigh used Haki to stop Kizaru and even touched his Logia body.


How involved was Akira Toriyama in the production of Dragon Ball GT? I always had this doubt about whether Dragon Ball GT was an official, canonical sequel of Dragon Ball Z or not. I know that Akira Toriyama helped in the development, but did he write any of it?

Dragonball GT was not made by fans. It was made by Toei Animation with involvement from Akira Toriyama. According to this wiki, his involvement is outlined as:

  Akira Toriyama is credited as author in the ending credits of Dragon
  Ball GT; he oversaw the series' production, this was the same process
  that was used during the production of the anime series Dragon Ball
  and Dragon Ball Z. He drew a rough design for the GT logo, he designed
  the GT appearance of the series main cast, and he designed the
  appearances of Giru and the GT spaceship used in the Black Star Dragon
  Ball Saga. He also drew at least three color pictures of Goku, Pan,
  and Trunks adventuring on various planets (Monmaasu, Rudeeze, and an
  area in Hell).

  Toriyama seems to have positive feelings towards his works'
  continuation, as he drew his own version of Super Saiyan 4 Goku (which
  was originally designed by Katsuyoshi Nakatsuru) exclusively for the
  Dragon Box GT. Characters and events from GT have also been included
  in more recent Dragon Ball video games.


How much of the light novels does the anime Sword Art Online covers (so far)? So... I want to start reading Sword Art Online light novels, but I want to read them from the point the anime left off (that is, Sword Art Online II, episode 24). Does it even go chronologically? How do I go about it?

The two seasons cover pretty much the whole story of the first eight light novels.
Only exception is "The First Day" chapter of the eighth novel.
However as Euphoric wrote the anime does not contain every bit of the novels.
Some things have been left out.
For example the second "Fairy Dance" novel includes an excursion of Kirito and Leafa into Jötunheimr which was left out of the anime.
So much regarding the anime.

The light novels are for the most part chronologically sorted.
The only exceptions are the second (which contains side stories for the first one) and the eighth one (which contains other side stories in SAO/ALO).
So you could start reading beginning with the first light novel or if you want a complete new story arc the ninth one.
There is also the "Sword Art Online: Progressive" light novel series which is a reboot of the original Aincrad arc and contains mostly new content.


Manga Spoilers: Control over Rod Reiss I'm not sure in which chapter this took place exactly but

   this is after Rod Reiss transformed into a titan. Eren has the ability control titans, then why wasn't Eren able to control him with his titan power? He had Historia by his side who possesses royal blood. That doesn't make sense...

Why couldn't Rod Reiss be controlled?

A very short answer is because Eren doesn't know how to.

Spoilers below:

   Eren has what that has been called as "The Co-ordinate" which was passed to him from Freida Reiss through his father. This is the ability of the Founding Titan which allowed them control over the titans and memory manipulation. We do not yet know how exactly this power works. The real limit of this power is unknown, but as it can be observed, it extends to the point of making Titans perform actions that threaten their own lives. It was also mentioned by Rod Reiss that the power is so strong, it has the potential to wipe out all the Titans if the user is able to wield it to its full strength.

Then why it was Eren was unable to use it while he had contact with a royal bloodline, the reason is that Eren has only shown this power under very rare and unique circumstances. One can argue that the danger to his life was one such circumstance, but unless the writer clarfies the exact nature of this power we don't know the limitations.

For more information, with HEAVY SPOILERS refer to : Wikia : Founding Titan


Why are there so many vehicles in the world of Hokuto no Ken? In the world of Hokuto no Ken, as far as I can see, there is no industry left. There is nowhere to produce parts for vehicles or repair the current ones. Also I don't see any industry for finding oil and distributing it to towns.

However, there are a lot of vehicles running in the series. Where do they find so much oil? What is the explanation of why there are so many fuel engines able to run?

Hokutou no Ken was created in 1983. A lot of inspiration for the post-apocalyptic world in the manga came from the movies Mad Max (1979) and Mad Max 2 (1981).

In these movies (especially in Mad Max 2), oil is very important. Gangs of marauders fight for oil. They have the same kind of vehicles as we can see in Hokuto no Ken. In fact, in Mad Max 2, Max, the hero, protects a group of people around an oil refinery.

Ken and Max have a lot in common as characters.

So why is oil so important in the movie Mad Max in the first place?

In 1973 the world endured what was later called "the first oil crisis". 1979 was the time for the second oil crisis.

So the 1970s were years when people were talking about oil a lot. It was THE topic of the decade (maybe the second topic, just after disco music). In a way, it is logical to imagine that a movie made at that time would give such importance to finding oil.

If you have oil, you have power. In a post-apocalyptic world oil would be more important than money. In fact, money doesn't exist anymore, there is only barrels of oil to trade.

For the manga, the world is very similar than the world of Mad Max 2, but the topic of fighting for oil is not the main theme. Ken fighting for revenge, seeking his brothers, martial art, ... are the main themes. The problematic of oil/energy is not really explained, since it would be a little bit off-topic.

The enemy organizations are just bad guys and the don't really need a reason to attack the normal citizens. They attack normal people because they are bad guys. This is a reason good enough for Ken to fight them. There was no need to add some stuff about fighting for oil.

If you really need an answer, we can probably say that the bad guys are fighting for the control of oil. The gangs probably gather around an oil refinery, or a storage of oil barrels. This explains why the bad guys have vehicles, while normal people just live where they can. However, this problematic was not considered important to the scenarist and he just omitted it.


Has there been a woman that Sanji did not get attracted to? As far as I have read One Piece, Sanji has not met any woman yet that he did not get attracted to (except okamas, old women and young girls).
My question is, were all middle-aged women in the series supposed to be beautiful? Or does everyone look beautiful to Sanji?

There are women Sanji has met who he hasn't been attracted to, like Kokoro, Lola and Shakuyaku. I believe he's more into young women and young girls, and although he does respect older women, he doesn't swoon over them.


Why are Kobato's eyes inconsistent in color between episodes? In Boku wa Tomodachi ga Sukunai, Kobato (Kodaka's sister) appears to have Heterochromia iridum.
Her right eye is red and her left eye is blue.

But in episode 5 of the first season, both her eyes are blue.

What gives?
Is she wearing contacts? I wasn't able to find an explanation for this from the Anime.

It is not heterochromia. The manga does explain it better and ...

her normal eye color is blue.
she is wearing a contact lens.

There is also a mention of her mother being English and having red eye color. So wearing a contact might be a fashion statement.


Where did the Skinship Grope trope come from? We have all seen it often before, that when girls are among themselves, they tend to playfully grope their friend's breasts and it all seems to be okay and accepted behaviour. This trope is thus appropriately called Skinship Grope. I am aware this is used often as fan service and it does mention at the trope page, that one should not try this at home, yet I have had this trope confirmed by friends and TV shows. Therefore it made me wonder where this trope originated from. Did it come from a (at that time) weird manga or did this originate from a cultural difference I am not aware off being a European male myself?

As the member of the Manga & Illustration Society student club at a Japanese national university, I have seen young Japanese women involved in sub-culture perform this joking action in public in real life.  I have seen it done in a small group of female friends while staying at an onsen ryokan (traditional inn at a hot spring), in the midst of a large group of male & female college students, and my husband saw it done by girls in a booth sitting in a bar-type restaurant. Sometimes it is either asked ("Can I touch your breasts?" and the person answers "No" or "I don't have any breasts to begin with"), or threatened ("I'm gonna touch your breasts!") but if the person protests, the threat is not followed through, or she might only threaten playfully and then not go through with it of her own volition. In all cases, the girls have been fully clothed (I have not witnessed a case in an onsen [hot spring] itself or otherwise nude context where the Japanese and Korean phrase "skinship" might be applicable).

Culturally, it is indeed considered okay and acceptable behavior, and does not imply that that the girl/s involved are lesbians.  It seems to be a sort of compliment, i.e. false hitting-on (a true lesbian could engage in such banter/activity without ever coming out since the purportedly straight girls do it too).  I heard one female college sophomore give her name, grade, major, and "I love breasts" as her entire self-introduction to the group (a mixed gathering of males and females) at the start of the academic year. Of course, the context matters: young women would not do this at formal functions, when professors are present, etc. Young Japanese can throw out the phrase 「セクハラ」(seku-hara, short for "sexual harassment") in these cases, but it does not bear the severity and criminal meaning of the English phrase and is not necessarily unwelcome by the person being hit on.

So in anime, this is not simply unrealistic fan service for male viewers, but rather is a practice among real-life young Japanese women who do not do it for the sake of the enjoyment of men.  As a non-Japanese, of course this is rather surprising the first time you see it happen.

Culturally, bathing at an onsen or sento does not generally lend itself toward any sensual content; most women there either avoid eye contact with others, just don't look down (focus on the other person's face), or look at the scenery or wall painting instead of at the friend sitting next to you. People who normally wear glasses cannot see clearly while in the onsen anyway. You can go with your family, relatives, friends, co-workers, and/or acquaintances, or alone and no one expects to be looked at uncomfortably. The very fact that everyone is naked and no one cares or is weirded out or shy about it makes it easy for the average Japanese to enjoy and truly relax.


Can the Tailed Beasts' relative power levels be compared? A Tailed Beast's power seems to be greater the more tails it has. For example:

Power of 3-Tailed Beast = Power of 2-Tails + 1-Tails.
Power of 9-Tailed Beast = Power of 8-Tails + 7-Tails + ... + 1-Tails.

This is clear. But is it possible to compare the power level of the 1-Tails and 2-Tails with this equation? Does the power of the 2-Tailed Beast = the power of the 1-Tailed one? Or is it greater?

Reference links:

Most of them have shared the same idea in this link.
Badranious's answer in this thread.

Actually, it's never explicitly said that every Bijuu is stronger than all of the Bijuu with lesser tail number combined.

The practical power probably is determined by tail number (even though the Eight Tails told the Nine Tails that it isn't, much like 'friendship' is more valued than 'power').

It is stated that the Nine Tails is stronger than all of the rest combined, because Itachi said that if it were to be sealed anytime but last, the Gedo Mazo won't be able to withstand the imbalance, and will break apart.

There isn't a clear power distribution and balance, nothing is explicitly stated, so most of what you'll hear is speculation.

As for the specific question, I'd say that the Two Tails is "just stronger" than the One Tail.


Where does Natsu and his party get money from, to pay their living cost? I started watching Fairy Tail and have just finished the Galuna Island arc where, once again, the reward is turned down for pointless "moral" reasons.

Unlike One Piece (where they can just steal/procure food and such), they do actually require money for paying rent and such.

Do we ever actually see Natsu's party claim a reward? Otherwise, where do they get their money from to pay their living cost?

As Aki Tanaka has recommended. I have expanded my previous comment as an official answer. Fairy Tail is guild noted pre-time skip and post-time skip for two things:

Blowing s*** up
Getting the job done

The guild hall has been destroyed completely on more than one occasion along with towns and villages being blown to the ground due to battles, scuffles and even arguements amongst members. This is shown early on from Natsu v Gray, Natsu v Erza, and pretty much Natsu v anything.

It's shown in a few episodes that Natsu and the team take a job and either don't feel comfortable taking the reward because it got done in a round about way (like in Lucy's first job) or the money that they were supposed to get winds up getting donated by the guild to rebuild what ends up getting destroyed.

Now to answer the question as to how these guys even survive, this comes from two things.

The first is pretty obvious which is that not all of their members outright end up destroying stuff, some of their top-tier wizards (Gildarts,Erza, Mystogen, Lauxus, etc) do take jobs that pay lucratively high and bring home the bacon which happens to cover it.

The second is up to speculation and there are some theories out there. But the cannonical answer is that the plot demands it. The heros are supremely powerful but kept in check constantly by the laws of the society in which they reside. Kind of like how Luffy and the strawhats are rarely ever shown being stocked up on ship supplies.


Is there any scene in Naruto where the destruction of the Uzumaki clan was shown? I think I saw somewhere that the leader of the Uzumaki clan used some jutsu and literally commited suicide while destroying everything around him.

No, there's no scene. Uzushiogakure was destroyed by some of the world's nations banding together out of the fear that it was too powerful.


Why doesn't anyone suspect that Sai could be a computer bot? Hikaru makes Sai play Go over internet with the nickname "Sai". Sai is very powerful, and defeats everybody, even Meijin.

I don't know how to play Go very well, but I perceive that a computer algorithm that plays Go can be written easily. And I believe that there must be a lot of Go bots all over the real world currently.

Why doesn't anybody consider the probability that Sai could be a computer bot? I'm very surprised that it is not mentioned even once during the entire series. Is there a reason for this?

Firstly, the manga was released in 1998 which was just about when the Internet was exploding all across the world and the dot-com bubble taking shape. Similarly, the off-the-shelf hardware available at the time was a shadow (think 300 MHz Pentiums) of what is available now. Things were far different back then than they are now.

Secondly, while it might be possible for computer algorithms that play Go to be written reasonably easily, algorithms that seemingly play Go well is exponentially complex. If you consider Deep Blue, the chess engine that beat Kasparov 2-1 (out of six games played) in 1997, it used racks of cutting edge hardware calculating 200 million positions a second, and intricately tuned software specifically built for the purpose by IBM. It didn't exactly overpower him. In terms of board size, possible moves and combinations, Go is far more complex and demanding than chess and it would have been extremely unlikely for any 1998 desktop software to be able to match Go grandmasters of the time.

Lastly, incorporating cheating and other negative elements of real life was unnecessary to the story and would have hamstrung one of the objectives of the manga, that being the aim to popularise the game of Go.


Mjolmire and what does it profit a man? At time-code 20:45 of episode 21 of That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime, the merchant Mjolmire is considering Rimuru's offer to go to his capital city and help teach the folks there about trade. He says something I find strange:

"So we would both profit... I mean benefit!"

Why would he feel the need to reject the word "profit"? It seems perfectly natural to me. Rimuru's nation might be an ideal communist society (debatable point) but even communists would understand that a traveling merchant seeks profit. Or is the issue something else entirely?

The whole merchant part of the manga/LN changed in favour of ending the anime at a certain point. That line isn't even in the manga. That is why there will be two answers to this question:

Anime-only:
Rimuru is the representative and the highest ranked official in his country. Usually while doing deals like this, you have to pick your words carefully such as this example. You should seek things that will benefit your country and people live in there. A corporation, on the other hand, should seek profit. Profiting is a financial type of benefitting. However, this merchant aims higher than just financial gain which brings me to manga spoilers.

Manga Side / Spoilers

   In his word, the merchant simply wants to "invest in Rimiru". As we know, the country Tempest is trading very high-quality potions and geographically placed in a very good trade route. Knowing the leader of this country won't simply profit you, but there are many more merits/benefits to that. So he is betting on this idea.


Were the Arbiters previously humans? First, I was going to ask where the Arbiters originated from? Like where were they chosen from? But then after watching the animé, I learned the following:

Arbiters' 2nd Law : Arbiters have no emotions since they are dummies!
Decim's statement to Chiyuki : If humans stay here for too long, they’ll turn into dummies!

These two things make me think that the Arbiters might be previously humans turned to dummies and then to Arbiters! Is it possible? Is that true? And if not then what about the origin of the Arbiters? How are they made or chosen?

As per the Wikia article on Arbiters:

Their existence remains a mystery. Nona has stated that they are not human, do not experience emotions like humans do, and have never lived or died. They are even made to look like humans but are created for the specific purpose of judging humans.

This makes it evident that the Arbiters were never humans and shall never be.

The only exception to the "feeling emotion" bit is Decim.

                        Decim expressing human emotion

However, Decim appears to be an exception as Nona has implanted human emotions in him which, though at the beginning did not yet seem to appear or were not yet tapped, appear to be surfacing with him as Chiyuki criticizes him for drawing the darkness of human hearts and passing judgement, stating that it is not right for them to be doing that since humans are more simple than the arbiters think.

Simply put, the origin of the Arbiters is unknown. Since they're said to be "created", we  can only assume that some methods/technology is used for creating them, or maybe Oculus has some power to create them:

Oculus is the creator of the system of arbitration. He observes all floors and is in a higher position than Nona. He is the second in line to the position of God.

Note: This is only speculation on my part. There's no mention of it in Death Parade or Death Billiards (Movie), so we can never truly know where they originate from.


Why does Madara wear a samurai uniform? As per the title suggest, I am more curious to know about the Madara Uniform. Does it symbolize anything? If you look at the picture below, Mifune and Madara's uniform are kind of similar.

If you'd notice, not only Madara, but also Hashirama, Tobirama and other Shinobi's from the past have worn this kind of attire. The outfit which he is wearing is not exactly the samurai's outfit, but it is the standard outfit of that time. It's just fit for combat.

According to the Wiki:

  Hashirama's attire took the form of the standard shinobi dress of his
  era, consisting of dark red traditional armour — similar to that of
  samurai — worn over a simple black suit. This armour was constructed
  from numerous metal plates, formed into multiple protective guards
  along his body, in particular: chest, shoulders, thighs and forearms.

Madara accepted this and followed Hashirama's attire, says the Wiki:

  After accepting Hashirama's truce, Madara's attire consisted of maroon
  armour with numerous metal plates, forming protective guards along his
  chest, waist, shoulders and thighs. This clothing under the armour was
  a indigo long-sleeved shirt with a knee-length mantle, pants,
  open-toed boots, gloves.

So basically, this doesn't really symbolise anything or any mystery with it. It's just the attire of their era and it's fit for combat due to the heavy armour which protects the person wearing it. This attire is derived from the Japanese Armor's tradition.

This is what I personally feel: Kishimoto is trying to give a feel of Madara's timeline which means that in the past, Japanese warriors (which mainly consisted of samurai's) wore this kind of outfit. So he might be trying to match the timeline of Madara with Japanese history and show how the generation has advanced by changing the attire of the current Shinobi's.


I can't find the name of this anime with a witch whose only weakness was bleeding I watched it around 2009 but I can still remember lots of details.

It involved a young boy, an older guy (a knight I think) and a girl going on a quest to find these stones/gems/whatever.
The girl had a small pet... puffball thing, and a raven.
There was a witch, sorceress something-or-other, and at one point the raven pecked her. Making her bleed was her only weakness, and so she died from that.
There was an episode where they met a giant guarding a bridge, and he told them a riddle: "Tell me the truth, and I will kill you with my sword, tell me a lie and I will kill you with my bare hands". The boy said "you will kill me with your hands", which caused a paradox thing (If that was true, he would kill him with his sword, but then it would be a lie, so he would... yeah, you get the idea.)

That's all I can remember.

It could be Deltora quest:

The Shadow Lord, an evil sorcerer and The Lord of Shadows which comes from The Shadowlands, has taken over Deltora by destroying a magical object known as The Belt of Deltora, which is Deltora's only protection against him. Throughout the course of the anime, Lief, Barda and Jasmine travel around the land of Deltora to return the seven gem of the initials of which combine to form DELTORA, hence the name Deltora Quest, to the belt and save the land. Their first destination is the Forests of Silence.

The three characters are:

Lief: At the start of the series, Lief is the son of a blacksmith who lives in the run down city of Del. He is (as Barda describes him) 'A young hot-head' and spends his time roaming the streets and both tempting and dodging trouble. On his 16th birthday he leaves Del on his father's quest to find the magical gems missing from the belt of Deltora and the heir destined to wear it. [...]

Barda: At the start of the series Barda appears to be a poor beggar living on the streets of Del. He is revealed to be an ex-palace guard who assumes the role of protector to Lief, much to both his and Lief's dismay. He is a skilled swordsman and frequently makes jokes about being stuck with two young hot-heads- Lief and Jasmine. [...]

Jasmine: At the start of the series Jasmine is a wild orphan girl who lives a solitary life in the dangerous Forests of Silence. She has messy coal black hair which frames her elfin like face and emerald green eyes. She is often described as impatient and lonely but with a good heart. Her only friends in the Forests are the raven named Kree and a small furry animal called Filli. Jasmine understands the language of trees and many other animals. [...]

They met the giant guarding a bridge (see picture below)  in Episode 4. The guard asked each person a riddle, and allowed only the ones who solved their riddles to cross the bridge. The paradoxical riddle was given to Lief after he failed to answer the riddle given to him.

The scene with the raven pecking the sorceress (see picture below) happens in Episode 7.


Why always "skirt-flipping" fan-service's (mini-skirt blowing up.)? Sometimes in anime/manga, I see some scene's where the MC flip the skirt of the heroine, or even some random character with a cute face. I know there are many kind of fan-service's like groping breast, yuri scene's, etc. But why is it almost always skirt flipping ? Like it is the standard of fan-service.

Is there story behind it? Where does this originate from?

I have made some research and this is what i got (and sorry about my grammar )

So it called Panchira (パンチラ) refers to a brief glimpse of a woman's underwear.

  Panchira (パンチラ) refers to a brief glimpse of a woman's underwear. The
  term carries risqué connotations similar to the word 'upskirt' in
  English usage. The word is a portmanteau of "panty" (パンティー pantī) and
  chira, the Japanese sound symbolism representing a glance or
  glimpse. It differs from the more general term "upskirt" in that
  panchira specifies the presence of underpants (the absence of which
  would more accurately be described as ノーパン; nōpan).

Origins

  Traditionally, Japanese women did not wear underwear. On December 16,
  1932, there was a fire in the Tokyo Shirokiya department store. Legend
  has it that some of the female staff tried to use their kimonos to
  cover their privates as they climbed down ropes from the higher
  floors, and accidentally fell to their deaths. Japanese newspapers
  began agitating for women to start wearing 'drawers' (ズローズ zurōzu),
  but seemingly had little impact at the time. In a 1934 survey by a
  Fukuoka newspaper, 90% of the women surveyed were still not wearing
  'drawers' a year and a half after the fire.2

  As noted below, the development of panchira in Japanese popular
  culture has been analyzed by a number of American and Japanese
  writers. Many observers link the phenomenon to the Westernization of
  Japan following World War II.7 During the occupation, fashions,
  ideas, and media previously unavailable were accessed by the local
  population, leading to a slight relaxing of earlier taboos.
  Western-style clothing (including women's underwear) gained popularity
  in the post-war period, reinforced through numerous media outlets —
  magazines, newspapers, films, journals, and comics.

  At least one Japanese source traces the beginnings of panchira to the
  release of The Seven Year Itch in 1955.[8] The media coverage
  surrounding Marilyn Monroe's iconic scene fueled the emerging Japanese
  craze. According to architectural historian Shoichi Inoue, the
  practice of "scoring" a glimpse up young women's skirts became
  extremely popular around this period; "Magazines of the time have
  articles telling the best places where panties could be viewed".[9]
  Inoue also writes that actress Mitsuyo Asaka spurred the popularity of
  the word 'chirarizumu' (チラリズム 'the thrill of catching a brief glimpse
  of a women's nether regions') by parting her kimono to show off her
  legs in her stage shows in the late 1950s.[10]

  In 1969, the Japanese oil company Maruzen Sekiyū released a television
  commercial featuring Rosa Ogawa in a short mini-skirt that gets blown
  up by the wind with her forming her lips into an 'O' in surprise. This
  led to children imitating her line "Oh! Mōretsu" (Oh！モーレツ, too much,
  radical), and a fad for sukāto-mekuri (スカート捲り flipping up of a girl's
  skirt).[11] Ogawa subsequently appeared in a TV show Oh Sore Miyo (Oh!
  それ見よ, literally "look at that," but actually a pun on 'O Sole Mio,' a
  neapolitan song 'my sunshine') that again featured scenes of her
  mini-skirt blowing up.

Anime/Manga

For anime/manga culture,  it's 'partially' answered from this question.

Where did the anime trope of Clothing Damage / Clothes being torn originate?

it was from this manga, Shameless School

Wiki Explanation

  Harenchi Gakuen (ハレンチ学園, lit. "Shameless School") is a Japanese media
  franchise created by Go Nagai. Harenchi Gakuen was one of the manga
  serialized in the very first issue of Shueisha's manga magazine Weekly
  Shōnen Jump. The series was the first big success for Go Nagai. It is
  also considered as the first modern erotic manga, sometimes considered
  the first hentai manga, though Nagai never used explicit sexual
  situations in the original run of the manga.

And from the same wiki, it was written

  By the late 1960s, panchira had
  spread to the mainstream comic industry, as fledgling manga artists
  such as Go Nagai began exploring sexual imagery in boys' comics
  (shōnen manga).[12] Adult manga magazines had existed since 1956 (e.g.
  Weekly Manga Times), but it is significant to note the introduction of
  sexual imagery into boys manga. Millegan argues that the ecchi genre
  of the 1970s rose to fill a void left by the decline of Osaka's
  lending library network:[13]

and i read an article about Shueisha’s Weekly Shonen Jump came under fire for running a busty spread on Yuragi-sō no Yūna-san (Yūna of Yuragi Manor). The illustration sparked conversations about ecchi works in a magazine that is largely seen as reading material for kids under 14 years of age.

Summary

From what i could tell, the originate of "skirt-flipping" is from short mini-skirt that gets blown up by the wind ). There is a book with titles, Perversion and Modern Japan: Psychoanalysis, Literature, Culture that explain about this topic, but i couldn't copy the reference's, since its licensed. You could read the book online Here

References

Perversion and Modern Japan: Psychoanalysis, Literature, Culture
Panchira (パンチラ)


Manga about a survival game where people in the game make friends with outsiders using cell phones I read a manga last year (I think it was last year ^^) and want to read it again, but I forgot the title. I hope you could help me find it.

It's about a guy who got dragged into a showroom or something like that with a big stage. They were being tested by a person, and had to win games in order to survive. They used cell phones.

I think the main character was playing a social game or something like that, in which you could make friends. He had a lot of virtual friends with whom he could talk about his problems, because he didn't get along with people in real life except for his sister. All other humans who weren't dragged into the survival game could watch this whole spectacle from a TV in the city.

The first part of this game was that the people outside this game could cancel their friendship with the people in this room, but if they cancel their friendship with them, the participants die immediately. The people outside the game would also die if the people in the survival die.

This is as accurate as I can remember. I hope somebody might be able to help me.

I'm quite sure it is Real Account.

Color spread from the first chapter:

Summary of the first chapter (written by yours truly, since I can't find any with enough details):

  The story revolves around the social network Real Account. The protagonist generally didn't associate much with his friends at school, rather, he spent most of the time on his phone on Real Account, in which he had thousands of followers. When he was fiddling with his phone as usual, he (or rather his consciousness) got sucked into the virtual world of Real Account. This marked the start of the death game, where if you died in the virtual world, you and your followers would die in reality, and if your number of followers reached 0, you would died. The mastermind then announced the first game, where people were allowed to unfollow whoever got trapped in the virtual world within 3 minutes. Except for his sister, who told him she would never unfollow him, all followers of the protagonist unfollowed him.


Lyrics in Madoka Magica - Rebellion? I'm looking for lyrics on the songs in the Rebellion movie (original and translated), what are the lyrics for:

Nightmare song (track #3)
Mami's fight scene
Mami's remixed theme
"Dream world"
"Noi!"
"the worst ending"
"I was waiting for this moment"

The only lyrics I've been able to find so far is for Made Dame Yo.

Nightmare song (track #3)

Track #3 is "Mada Dame Yo", which you said you found lyrics for.

  "Dream world" [#25]
  "the worst ending" [#33]
  "I was waiting for this moment" [#40]

The lyrics for these are in Kajiuran (cf. this answer), which is not an actual language. Lyrics for pieces in Kajiuran are typically not released (though even if they were, you couldn't translate them, because, you know, it's not a language).

  Mami's fight scene
  Mami's remixed theme

If you can point me to the track numbers or titles for these, I can check on them (I don't remember off-hand which ones these were). Odds are, though, these are also in Kajiuran.

  "Noi!" [#32]

The lyrics for this one are also not a real language. I would hesitate to call it "Kajiuran", just because it seems a lot more Germanic-inspired and less Romance-inspired than her usual stuff, but anyway, you're not going to find lyrics for this one either.


Is Gatchaman Crowds set in the same universe as Gatchaman? I read about the upcoming Gatchaman Crowds anime.

According to this source, the series is about

  "Gatchaman" — warriors who fight in special reinforced suits powered
  by "NOTE," the manifestation of special spiritual powers in living
  beings.

This surprised me - the original Gatchaman series had no supernatural material. Some pretty improbable things happened, but they were all understood to be advanced science & technology. The "Bird Go!" transformations were not spiritual but technological.

So, is Gatchaman Crowds set in the same universe as the original Gatchaman?

Note: I'm aware this can't be answered until the show starts, or until Tatsunoko reveals more information.

I don't have a definitive answer to this, but based on the first 2 episodes of Crowds (all that has aired so far), at the very least there's no clear connection between the two series. If they are in the same universe, the characters in the two series don't seem to be interacting at all. There are definitely references to the original series, e.g. all of the members of the Gatchaman team in the original series have counterparts in Crowds, and many of the concepts stayed the same.

There's good reason to believe that the two series are in different universes. In the original Gatchaman, all of their powers were, at least in principle, just the product of science and technology. In Crowds, by contrast, their Gatchaman powers are of some sort of mystic origin. It's not yet clear how they work, but they aren't purely within the realm of science fiction anymore. This rendition of Gatchaman is thus fundamentally different from the original, and probably only makes sense in its own universe.

Wikipedia seems to agree with this, describing Crowds as "based in the Gatchaman universe", which would seem to preclude it from being in the same universe. However, there's no solid source for that statement, so it's at best questionable.

Of course, this answer could still change (at least until Crowds ends) but for the moment it seems more likely that they are in different universes.


Manga about possessed child who develops a taste for people The main character was a young (probably 10–15 years old) boy who was possessed by some sort of demon (so, fantasy); a tree might have been related here
This might have caused him to (want to?) eat people
Said possession happens during the course of the book, and the character is still himself, only more… evil
The cover was this character with a sharp-toothed grin
The title was one word starting with K
It was a series
I found the first in the series in a book store somewhere between 2007 and 2011; it was the only one there at the time

This is a bit of a stretch and it’s been so long that I’m not completely sure of any of the details. Still, if anything can be found from it…

We confirmed in chat that this is Kurozakuro. Here's the plot synopsis from MyAnimeList:

  This is the story of a wuss named Sakurai Mikito who one day swallows the creation of a creature called Zakuro and becomes an "oni", a superhuman creature with a taste for human flesh. As Mikito is horrified by this change in his once-gentle nature, he decides to leave on a journey with an oni-hunter in order to discover a way to turn back to normal.

Essentially everything matches the description in the OP. The first volume of the manga was released in English in November 2010 by Viz media. The series was finished in English at 7 volumes a year later in November 2011.

Here's the (Japanese) volume 1 cover:


An action and ecchi manga about a girl who has multiple personalities, whose body also changes whenever she changes her personality I think the genre of this manga is action, ecchi, and supernatural.

The main girl has multiple personalities, and every time she changes her personality, her body changes, too.

I remember in the first chapter, as she was being chased by some people, she ended up transforming (or like I said, changed her personality) and killed them.

Well, that's all that I can remember. Please help me find this manga.

This sounds a lot like Gun x Clover. It is an action and ecchi manga, according to mangaupdates, and I think the female protagonist's power can be considered supernatural.

This is a page from the first chapter, showing Futaba - the 2nd personality of the female protagonist. The girl has multiple personalities (7 in total), and whenever she changes her personality, her body features (and even her outfit) also change to match the personality.

This is another page from the first chapter, showing Mitsuba - the 3rd personality of the girl. As you can see, her hair turns white as the 3rd personality takes control, and she becomes violent and capable of killing people. This is right after the scene where Futaba got caught by mercenary and was about to be defiled, when the 3rd personality Mitsuba surfaced to protect herself and killed off all the small fries.


Does Ultra Instinct have a larger multiplier than Potara fusion? So in Dragon Ball Heroes is pretty clear, Goku Ultra Instinct is able to overpower Cumber, something Super Saiyan Blue Vegito Kaioken times 50 wasnt able to do. So in Dragon Ball Heroes Ultra Instinct has over 50 times a larger multiplier than Potara Fusion.
But how about the canon universe? Are there hints or statements which shows which would have a larger multiplier, Ultra Instinct or Potara fusion?

The Multiplier for Ultra Instinct is definitely greater than the Potara fusion Multiplier. We know this as the SSJ Vegito for the Buu Saga, is nothing in comparison to MUI Goku. There are several other examples indicating the same:SSJG Goku being stronger than Vegito in the Buu Saga(MUI is several times stronger).UI Omen completely overwhelming SSJ2 Kefla and MUI is even more stronger.The Potara fusion is also dependent on the characters who fuse and I think it is safe to assume the multiplier always stays constant. Disregarding the power of the fused characters, the potara fusion multiplier will never be > than the Ultra Instinct Multiplier. It wouldn't make logical sense for a potara fusion between Hercule and say, one of his students, be able to go toe to toe with a god of destruction.


Does the Village/Academy ensure the number of graduates is always a multiple of 3? We know that when young shinobi in traing graduate from the academy and become Genin they are places in 4 man cells, 3 Genin and a Jonin Sensei.

At the beginning Naruto inital failed the exam and wasn't going to be a Genin until Iruka graduated him. had Iruka not passed Naruto the Rookie 9 would have been the Rookie 8 and Sasuke and Sakura would be without a third person for their team.

So i am wondering, if the number of new Genin is not a multiple of 3 does a village or academy do anything to correct the numbers?

The answer is yes (there's a tldr; at the bottom if it's too long and boring for you).

Just to clarify, my answer is a mixture of evidence and speculation. And it goes more in depth. And it assumes that you are talking about Konoha (not the other villge where they kill each other to graduate).

Entering the Academy

^ In episode 419 (Papa's Springtime of Youth), it shows on the bulletin the names of the people who made it into the Ninja Academy. If you count the number of names, there's 34 of them. Not counting Might Guy, who couldn't find his name.

[I can't find this image. When I do, I'll post it.]

^ In this image, two more people are allowed to graduate, which includes Guy. This suggests, although not proves, that the Academy requires a fixed number of students in the Academy every year — in this case and time, 36.

Graduating from the Academy

From the image below, it implies, from Kakashi's words, that only 27 of the 36 students can graduate. That's a fixed 75% pass rate, meaning that no matter what happens, there will always be students who fail. And their performance in the exams is relative to each other.

Becoming a Genin (Teamwork Test)

Again, from the image above, it states that only 9 of the 27 graduates can be Genin (33%). This means taht there will always be exactly 3 more new teams, each with 3 Genin, at the end of every school year.

Conclusion (tldr;)

Since only 27 people can graduate and 9 people can become Genin, there will always be 3 teams, each with 3 people. Naruto not graduating just means that another person would have filled his place (that would make for an interesting alternate story).

The use of multiples of 3 (i.e. 36 can enter, 27 can pass, 9 can become Genin) greatly hints to the fact that all of this is intentional.

Oh, and by the way, graduates who don't become Genin have to go back to the Academy. Iruka may have helped Naruto, but at the cost of another student. Talk about sympathy/favoritism/nepotism (okay, I'm being harsh).

What a long post. If you have any questions, ask. I did my research.


Does Jesus Christ exist in the Dragon Ball universe? In episode 70 of the original Dragon Ball series, Krillin fights one of Fortuneteller Baba's minions, who is a vampire. After he's defeated, Oopa and Puar jump in, and they manage to defeat him.

To do this, Oopa stands like a cross, stating that vampires can't stand crosses. In the next angle, the vampire is shown panicking, as he pictures a crucifix over Oopa, which starts to radiate light with organ music playing, as the words "Jesus Christ!!" and "Oh God!!" scroll across the screen.

In order for a vampire to be afraid of a crucifix, then the religious aspect of it must exist in universe, and the scrolling text seems to confirm this. Therefore, I'm wondering: Does Jesus Christ exist in the Dragon Ball Universe?

The answer to your question would be a no!Jesus Christ doesn't exist in the Dragon Ball Universe. However, there are multiple  Real Life references/ Fictional works that exist in reality which have been referenced on the show. A few other examples apart from the one you stated would be:The entire Pilaf Saga being a loose adaptation of Journey to the West, a famous Novel from Ming-era China.When Krillin kicks General Blue in the face without enough force to make his nose bleed and Blue complains about the Bleeding and compares it to the action of throwing red paint on the Mono Lisa.There's a grocery bag which says "Super Mario" on it, in Chapter 71 in the manga when Krillin and Launch come back to the Kame house.I have attached a list here with more similar references with regard to the same.


Which was Destro (Re-Destro's father)'s quirk? Re-Destro's father, Destro, it's said that it was one of the most powerful villains, compared to All For One.

Which was his quirk?

Yoriyoshi Nakajima also known as Destro, is the leader of a paramillitary terrorist group called the Quirk Liberation Army.

Generic capacities: Physically, is stronger and faster than the average, also
mentally remains very sane.
Charisma: Even more dangerous than its peculiarity is Destro's ability to convince
others to fight  and die the name of their cause. It has a huge power of persuasion,
and can be very convincing.
Quirk: Pyrotechnics power, Destro can generate and launch bombs, explosives, and
 other volatile constructs that have various yields from his body and then can
 manipulate them. Destro's bombs don't need to detonate on impact, he can make them
explode immediately after leaving his body he can set them on a timer or can detoante
them remotely whenever he feels like it.

Sources: Me, Manga and https://myheroacademiafanon.fandom.com/wiki/Destro


Was Krillin based on the Turkish folk character Keloglan? I recently learned of a folk storybook character in Turkish culture named Keloglan.  He is a bald child that uses his wits to get out of tough situations:

I was pretty struck by how similar he looked to Krillin in Dragon Ball, and it made me wonder if Krillin was based on this character.  Some reasons behind my suspicion:

1) The names are remarkably similar:  The Turkish pronunciation is keh-lee-o-lan, and the Japanese name seems like a very likely transliteration of this name.

2) Goku was based on a folklore character (the monkey).

3) They look quite similar, and share their primary physical characteristic (baldness).

Is there any information about whether Akira Toriyama used Keloglan as an inspiration for Krillin in the Dragon Ball series?

This seems to be a coincidence.

From http://dragonball.wikia.com/wiki/Krillin:

  Like most characters in the series, the name Krillin is a pun. In his case, its Japanese source, Kuririn, is made up of two parts. The first two syllables come from 栗 (kuri), which means "chestnut" in reference to his shaved head (the "chestnut" pun is also carried over to his daughter Marron). The second part of his name comes from 少林 (Shōrin; "Shaolin" in Chinese), as his early character designs were closely modeled on Shaolin monks.

So, the similarity to the name Keloglan looks like a coincidence.

Regarding the baldness, as is pointed out by @krikara, this is probably because he is a Shaolin monk. Note that Krillin can grow his hair, whereas Keloglan cannot.

Even so, Krillin does not have a counterpart in "Journey to the West", so it is possible that Akira Toriyama looked to other folklore for inspiration when creating Krillin.


Does somebody know where to find subtitles for Kureyon Shin-chan? I've gotten this set of Kureyon Shin-Chan episodes from a friend (クレヨンしんちゃん (Crayon Shin Chan) DVD TV版傑作選) but they don't have subtitles. Does somebody know where could I find english subs for these?

I doubt there are any subtitled releases of Crayon Shin-chan. The show's ANN page lists multiple Region 1 releases, but all of them are dubbed (and don't even include the Japanese audio, except for bonus episodes).

In general, don't count on being able to find subtitled versions of children's shows - if children's shows do get released in an English-speaking country, they'll almost certainly be dubbed. After all, their target audience is children, and children aren't very good at reading subtitles.


Third Hokage’s Magic Ball, how you can see anywhere through the Magiball? And Gamamaru’s Magic Ball, how it records everything that happened in any ERA?

The "Magic Ball" that the Third Hokage and Gamamaru use is the Telescope Technique.

  A technique that uses a crystal ball to track a particular individual anywhere they are. There are a few restrictions about the person that is subjected to pursuit. The user must know that person's chakra pattern. If someone can be targeted for pursuit, they may be very far away, the crystal ball will be able to confirm their position. As this technique is infallible for intelligence purposes, the Third Hokage used it to maintain public order in the village.


Did Yoshimura cannibalize after becoming "a good guy"? Yoshimura is supposed to be this wise good old man, who was evil in the past. But he has a kakuja and it's mentioned in the Tokyo Ghoul wikia he had to cannibalize to obtain it. If I recall correctly, in the flashbacks when he was an evil ghoul it's never shown he having a kakuja. Did Yoshimura cannibalize after becoming "a good guy"?

This was not specifically discussed nor explained in the manga. But, in Chapter 119,

  it was mentioned that when Kuzen heard of the One-Oyed Owl, he took the One-Eyed Owl's place for fear that the organization, V, would find out that the Owl was his child.

Also, if you notice while Yoshimura was telling Kaneki his past, he talks about it in a third-person point-of-view

  (by using 'Kuzen' instead of 'I').

While this might be just a style of telling a story, I interpreted it as his dissociation of his current self from his past self. He does not want to be seen as what he was in the past. Furthermore, notice how Yoshimura mentions this in Chapter 119:

  'And so, Kuzen took the place of the One-Eyed Owl.' Not 'Yoshimura took the place of the One-Eyed Owl.'

Assuming that Anteiku was established and he assumed the identity Yoshimura afterwards, this means that he cannibalized before becoming Yoshimura. While the wiki mentions that

  he was already going by the name Yoshimura when he found out about his child, this was not directly stated nor explained in the manga as far as I know so I have no idea where the wiki gets its information. It was only mentioned that time passed.


Is Highschool of the Dead on hiatus again? I was really happy when I heard that HoTD would be continued. And even happier when the first new chapter actually came. but now after several months of waiting there still has been no other chapter. So my question is, has HoTD gone on hiatus again ?

Quoted from a post on Facebook. The post explains why the authors release chapter 30 after so many gap, all the reasons for delay and whether they will release more chapters or not:

  Alright folks, after WEEKS of intense investigation, convincing, pleading, smooth talking, and talking to "people who know people" in Japan... I'd like to clear things up about the situation of H.O.T.D. from the past 2 years, now, and the foreseeable future:

  The reason for the manga's 2 year hiatus was for 2 reasons:

  Writer Daisuke Sato had a heart disease that required a lot of treatment, surgery, and recovery.
  Because of the earthquake that happened in Japan, he didn't think an apocalypse story was appropriate to continue at the time until Japan recovered from it.

  During those 2 years, Daisuke and Shouji were VERY surprised to find out that H.O.T.D. had become so popular worldwide.
  The purpose to release Chapter 30 was for multiple reasons: to get the Satos back to work on the story, to see if the manga was still popular, and finally to let fans know that they haven't forgotten about it.
  In May, Daisuke started preparing rough drafts for chapters 31 and beyond and throughout this summer he will be working on finalizing on where the story will go, and research in terms of locations, military, weapons, and vehicles... as stated last year at the anime convention in Germany.
  Shouji went back to work on Fire Fire Fire: Black Sword to make himself get used to working on multiple stories. Plus he had a desire to go back to that story anyway.
  Sales for Chapter 30 when it was released digitally were going "surprisingly well for a single chapter" and that future chapters WILL be released on the same day in both the US and Japan.
  The Japanese Publisher Kadokawa is currently deciding if they want to release a chapter of Triage X and H.O.T.D. at the same time or a bi-monthly pattern.
  The next chapters of H.O.T.D. are VERY crucial on deciding if the series will end with an 8th volume or continue when they go on sale. If you American H.O.T.D. fans don't buy digital copies, they'll take it as a sign of losing interest and the series will end prematurely... So don't go bitching and whining if that does happen. It'll be your fault for not supporting the creators.

  So there you have it, a lot of hard work and contacting the righ[t people]

  Credit to Joey Senna McRae for gathering all this info.

EDIT : As comment above by Darjeeling the mangaka Daisuke Satou passed away, so we probably will never see the continuation of the story.


Why hide Naruto's identity? What harm would come if Naruto was told the fact about his lineage?
Why didn't they just hide the fact that Naruto was a Jinchuuriki to save him from the outcast treatment from the villagers during his childhood?

Short answer.

Naruto's dad, Minato Namikaze (aka Fourth Hokage), was a famous ninja and, of course, had a lot of enemies, and if his enemies knew his son's identity they would go after him.

  Orphaned, Naruto grew up not knowing who his parents were, receiving only his mother's surname, as Hiruzen wanted to protect Naruto from his father's enemies.

Yes, they could have just told Naruto his parents identity, but since the villagers hated him he might think that the only way to stop their hatred is by telling them his parents identity. Which would then lead to the spreading of the word and people hunting him down.

Sources:

Naruto Uzumaki


What anime is this where everyone has a virtual world from glasses? So a few years ago, I saw an anime where everyone had special glasses that basically superimposed a virtual world onto the real world (so, erm, Google Glass but better). I don't remember it very well, but I think there was a very large round red object related—does anyone have any idea what anime this is?

Odds are you're thinking of Dennou Coil.
The large round red thing is a Searchmaton / Satchii. These creepy little buggers:

Dennō Coil (電脳コイル Dennō Koiru?, lit. Electric Brain Coil or Computer Coil), Coil—A Circle of Children, is a Japanese science fiction anime television series depicting a near future where semi-immersive augmented reality (AR) technology has just begun to enter the mainstream. The series takes place in the fictional city of Daikoku, a hotbed of AR development with an emerging city-wide virtual infrastructure. It follows a group of children as they use AR glasses to unravel the mysteries of the half real, half Internet city, using a variety of illegal software tools, techniques, and virtual pets to manipulate the digital landscape.

Source


Boku no Hero Academia season 3 episode 10 OST? What is the song that plays at season 3 episode 10 at 20 minutes of Boku no Hero Academia? It's also in episode 4 at minute 18, and I can't find it.

Hello i think that's the music that you were searching for :)

https://youtu.be/BsbVtAJMHys


What's the song used when previewing the next episode of Fairy Tail? At the end of each episode, there is a preview of the next episode. It also plays in the very beginning of episode 15 of the new Fairy Tail 2014, I think that makes it episode 190 in the total running.

What is the song that plays when they preview the next episode?

The track that you're referring to is a bit unclear.

The pre-2014 preview music is different from the 2014+ preview music, and the music at the very beginning of 2014 episode 15 (the track before the theme song itself) is different from those two.

However, I notice that the track that plays immediately after the theme song in 2014 episode 15 is the same one as the one that plays during the 2014+ previews.

If this is the track that you are referring to, then the name of the song is

"Fairy Tail Main Theme 2014 (FAIRY TAIL メインテーマ 2014)"

(The Katakana as Romaji is "mein teimu" i.e. "main theme").

It is track 1 on disk 1 of the album "Fairy Tail Sound Collection" by Yasuharu Takanashi (the fifth original soundtrack for Fairy Tail if you don't count the movie soundtrack).

I believe that I have supplied enough information for you to look up the track. I am hesitant to link to a Youtube video because I have noticed that Fairy Tail OST videos get taken down due to copyright violations very quickly and frequently so I don't want to provide an invalid link.


Are there any sources for high resolution (digital) manga? I've just got my first tablet and I'd love to explore manga with it. I've looked at a couple of Kindle samples from Amazon and also randomly sampled some fansub, and everything seems quite low res. The fansub I saw was ~0.75 megapixel. The Kindle version seems slightly sharper (not sure how to be more specific) but especially if zooming in on a panel it's noticeably blurry. It seems to me that modern screens with their insane pixel densities would be great canvasses for manga, and I just wondered if anyone's started going down that route.

Clarification: I don't have problems as such, the manga is legible. To draw an analogy, imagine I've bought a full HD TV but only have DVDs as a source. It would be nice to find an HD source for the HD display. And once you're used to 1080p, if you go back to DVDs they will seem less sharp (the blurriness I mentioned above). So are there any sources for high res manga, ie HD manga! (I realise I'm being vague by saying high-res - > 1MP would be a find, > 2MP would be great, but the higher the better for this question.)

Hate to write a suggestion in an answer, but too new to comment.

Have you tried crunchyroll? If you pay for their premium membership you're supposed to get HD anime and manga (you can get a manga only subscription).

If you're looking at fan scanlations, some online reader sites downgrade the quality of uploaded chapters in order to make the pages load faster, which will result in jpg artifacting at times as well. If you're looking for higher quality, I suggest grabbing it from the scanlators' sites and/or using their readers if possible.


What is this scene parodying? In chapter 8 of +Tic Neesan, what is this scene parodying?

I don't get the references at all. :(

The only thing I could possibly link would be Welcome to the NHK's anime mascot who has a similar catchphrase, but I doubt very much that it's the link.

Thanks to @Krazer.

The characters in the scene seem to be Ikkyuu and Shin'emon from Ikkyū-san.

The low-effort scribbles are signifying that they are characters from another series and want to avoid copyright issues, like how many MacDonalds in anime are called WacDonalds or similar.

I think it's not parodying a particular scene but instead just making fun of Shin'emon's cleft chin:


Why did Itachi say that he needs to get someone's MS to get EMS while Sasuke only had a normal Sharingan? In the fight between Sasuke and Itachi, Itachi said that to get Eternal Mangekyou Sharingan (EMS), he must transplant his brother's eyes that have to be Mangekyou Sharingan (MS). However, Sasuke didn't have MS yet.

So, even if Sasuke did get his normal Sharingan eyes, how could he get the EMS?

Because he actually didn't want them. He was trying to relay that information to Sasuke before his death. He gave that information about EMS to Sasuke so that Sasuke could obtain EMS after his death if he wanted.

Plus Itachi was on the verge of blindness. So even if Sasuke had normal sharingan Itachi could at least have sight, that's a good excuse.


Why are the Gaichuu alcoholic? I think every Gaichuu named in the Manga wears the name of an alcoholic beverage:

Cabernet -> Wine (Cabernet Sauvignon)
Absinthe -> Strong Liquor
Cider -> Applewine
Daikiri (or Daiquiri) -> Rum-based cocktail

and some more...

Is there an in-canon reason to name the "Heart"-eating bugs after Alcoholic beverages?

I'm not sure an in-universe answer is ever directly stated. If there is one, it would probably be in one of the Doctor Thunderland segments at the end of each volume. I only have volumes 14, 15, and 16 at present, but if I get the chance, I'll review the others.

That being said, I can think of a reason that the Gaichuu would be named after alcoholic beverages. Alcohol is a depressant. This means it slows down your body and brain. The wikipedia page for alcohol lists lethargy as a possible symptom for drinking alcohol. This is similar to a battle with a Gaichuu: A letter bee will fire off fragments of their heart to defeat it. The weariness they experience would be comparable to the effects depressants cause. They would both cause some loss of feeling and thinking. The wikipedia page for depressants lists one of the effects of depressants as being memory impairment, similar to how a bee could lose memories if they fire their shindan too much. Firing too many shindans and drinking too much alcohol can also both cause loss of consciousness.

So, letter bees might have seen the similarity between battling gaichuu and battling alcohol and named the gaichuu accordingly.

I'd like to point out a relevant passage from Dr. Thunderland at the end of volume 16:

  To be honest, in the last volume I prudently resolved to stop sulking about my continued failure to appear in this story. But before I knew it I found myself drowning my sorrow in booze from the stress of being prudent. I'd get up in the morning and have breakfast and beer. At noon it was lunch and draft beer. My afternoon snack was a tequila. With dinner I'd have wine and sake. After dinner I'd have shochu and a whiskey nightcap. After using the bathroom I did shots of alcohol hand sanitizer... Incidentally, I lose my memory when I drink too much. I hypothesize that the drinking is causing my brain to shrink. I wonder if it's something like What-chamacallit for Algernon. But they do say, "Ignorance is bliss." Still, my life has been a mess lately. I wonder why. Oh, right, because of the drinking... heh heh heh...

Here, Dr. Thunderland specifically mentions the memory-loss properties of alcohol. And from an out of universe perspective, Dr. Thunderland's article conveys that the author has some kind of interest in alcoholic beverages and drunkenness (the references to different kinds of alcohol are particularly interesting). I admit it might be a little presumptuous for me to assume so since drunken characters are a common gag.


Is this girl really from Bleach? On some sites which have ads I've been seeing the following image

possibly NSFW if you look hard enough

Now I've only seen up to episode 130 and I've never seen her before. However she kind of looks like Lighting (AKA Clare Farron) from Final Fantasy XIII.

I am wondering: is this girl really from Bleach? If so when would I see her in the series (which episode or chapter), and if not where is she from?

This isn't a Bleach character. This is, as you guessed, Lightning from Final Fantasy XIII, at least according to this page on TheAnimeGallery.


Was Naori Uchiha the creator of Izanami? During the fight between Itachi-Sasuke and Kabuto Yakushi, we learnt about Izanami and its origin. Itachi explained that Izanami was created to counter the effect of Izanagi by throwing the illusions of Izanagi in a loop. We also learnt that Izanagi was a powerful jutsu which was mostly abused by clansmen. We see in a flashback that there was a war between clan members where shinobis were fighting with each other and defeating them with Izanagi. The last survivor was Naka Uchiha who was confronted by another comrade, Naori Uchiha. She used Izanami on him and was able to help him realize his mistake and made him accept the fate. Naori broke the cast and she became blind for the rest of her life.
The question is did she learned a new jutsu just to break Izanagi? Did she learnt about Izanagi's loophole and created an ultimate jutsu to overcome Izanagi? Maybe she did, she was seeing everyone abusing Izanagi and so she created an even more powerful jutsu.

Although never explicitly mentioned here's a possible explanation. Before that however, there are a couple things to consider.

Firstly, the cost/consequence of using either technique leads the caster's sharingan to loose its light immidiately
Secondly, Both techniques enable users to change reality. In the case of Izanagi, the illusion is applied onto reality itself. While in the case of Izanami, the caster is able to put an individual in an almost sentient never ending illusion which becomes the reality of the opponent, continiously, until some trigger is met. (i.e the opponent either changes their ways or is trapped in an eternal loop)

Now the point I'm trying to make here is that I believe that the Izanami is a variation of the Izanagi which attempts to save a person by creating a repeating loop of specific events until some criteria is met. Thinking about it in the broad sense it still classifies as changing reality but only for the opponent because it will always work regardless of the opponents 5 senses, even if they know its an illusion.
So yea I believe she is the creator of Izanami, nevertheless, considering the similarities both have. It seems to me that she creatively used the Izanagi to such a degree that was completely unthought of (using it to help an individual change and thus creating a variation of the izanagi to stop the izanagi hence the izanami).


What's the song when Kaneki wakes up after fighting against Nishio in episode 2? In Tokyo Ghoul episode 2, there's a music playing when Kaneki wakes up after fighting against Nishio.

It's playing from 7:54-8:03 on this YouTube video.

What's that song?

The song is called Licht und Schatten, the 25th track of disc 1 from Tokyo Ghoul Original Soundtrack composed by Yutaka Yamada.


What regiment do soldiers under Dhalis Zachary's belong to? Their uniforms are different from the scouts,garrison and military police as shown in the scene when they stage the coup. Are they Dhalis Zachary's personal guard ?

Dhalis Zachary is the leader of all the military regiments. All regiments (Scouts, Garrison and Military) have a leader and they directly answer to him.

So as you can guess he and his soldiers don't belong to any regiment but they answer directly to him.


What is Serial Experiments Lain about? I have yet to find a clear answer to this question. From what I've read, it may be an art-house series about dangers of remote communication, phobia of technological advancement and feeling of insecurity. The last point I can agree with because of how easily information can be accessed with the use if internet these days, but the rest… I think there's a more concrete meaning to this series.

SEL is a series with very unusual direction and a peculiar artistic style. These traits are commonly seen in art-house works that may not bear any specific message.

Throughout the series we learn about the difficult reality surrounding Lain: her relatives are troubled, some of her friends have psychological problems, there are suicides happening in mystical circumstances, and then there are some secret agents following around.

Later in the series, things become rather surreal and Lain turns into some kind of god of the Net. I've never understood this portion of the anime and what it could possibly suggest. Does it warn us about dangers of becoming too self-important? Does it mean it's possible to lose the sense of reality when using internet? Or maybe Lain's character is a metaphor for a person new to technological advancements of today?

What is the message the authors of SEL are trying to communicate?

At first, I flagged this as opinion based. However I remembered seeing an interview with the producer, director and writer a long time ago and was able to find it.

There are a few pages of interview on that site, but I have quoted the most relevant material here.

  [Writer] Konaka: There's not a particular message about technology. Technology advances anyway. [...]

  [Producer] Ueda: [...] This work itself is a sort of cultural war against American culture and the American sense of values we adopted after WW II. [...]

  [Interviewer] Q: Does the series have a "message"?
   Ueda: The message is, Things are simple.

This is probably the only English language interview. I definitely wouldn't take what they say at face value.


What song is Kyoko dancing to in Puella Magi / Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magica? I've just been re-watching Puella Magi Madoka Magica / Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magica (episodes, movie, doesn't change this situation). I noticed a song that sounded quite nice, that Kyoko was dancing to (playing Dance Dance Revolution, if you're happy to go by that name) in the 6th episode, or at 1:20:25 roughly, during the first movie. I'd like to make it clear that I am referring to the first song she dances to, not the second. I am well aware that the second song is Connect by ClariS.

The scene can be found at this link. It starts right near the beginning. What is this song / tune? Does anyone know the name, artist, or what it is from, if it is known outside of Madoka Magica?

Thanks in advance,

It's part of the song Connect. You can say it's a remix version. The title is Connect -Game Installation-

It's from Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magica Special CD 6 (track #13).

Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magica has total 6 Bonus CD. From what I could see, the artist is still ClariS. (I actually has all the bonus CD)


The song playing in My Hero Academia season 3 episode 14 when everyone is training What is the name of the soundtrack in My Hero Academia season 3, episode 14 beginning at 18:45 when everyone is training?

It's 英雄的武闘戦闘曲 (Heroic Fighting Battle Song), the 18th track from My Hero Academia 2nd Original Soundtrack.

YouTube link


How many nations are there in the Naruto universe? How many total countries are present in the Naruto universe, including small or less significant ones? Are there only the five nations which participated in the war?

There are for sure more than the big five nations. I never watched a single episode of Naruto, but I will try to provide an answer here. You only ask for the nations, but I will add a list of the villages too.

This map is made by xShadowRebirthx. This is not a official map and also some places could be differ from the original! Click on the image to enlarge the map.

The countries in Naruto operate as separate political entities and are presumably all monarchies, ruled by feudal lords who stand equally in rank with the hidden villages' leaders.

The great five countries

Five of the countries are considered to be the most powerful and influential of them all.

Land of Earth

  The country is mostly comprised of desolate, rocky areas. The border
  of the Land of Earth runs along a rocky mountain range, blocking
  communication with other countries. The wind blowing from the north
  passes over these mountains, carrying small rocks from the Land of
  Earth to the surrounding countries.

Land of Fire

  The Land of Fire is appropriately oriented towards the element of
  fire, typically having very bright and warm weather. While not the
  physically largest country, it has the largest hidden village.

Land of Lightning

  In the centre of the country are vast mountain ranges, whose many
  thunderstorms are said to give the country its name. From these
  mountain ranges, many rivers flow to the sea, creating a very crooked
  coastline that displays an impressive oceanic beauty. There are many
  hot springs located within the country.

Land of Water

  The country's weather is typically cool and the islands are usually
  covered by mist. The islands themselves also feature many lakes. The
  nation is oriented towards the element of water.

Land of Wind

  The country covers a vast realm, but that realm is largely composed of
  deserts. Because there is very little rainfall throughout the year,
  the people of the country live in villages built on one of the
  desert's many oases. Despite the country's extremely harsh
  environment, it has a large population.

So there are all countries listed, here are four more of the bigger ones

Land of Iron
Land of Snow
Land of Sound
Land of Sky

Minor countries

I also found some other wich I could not assign to a catagory. These are the Land of Grass, Land of Rain, Land of Read Beans, Land of Rice Fields, Land of the Waterfall, Land of Udon and Land of Waves.

Shinobi Villages/Hidden Villages

Shinobi villages, or also called hidden villages, are ninja villages that serve as the military force for their country.

In summary, there are the 5 big nations, the 4 smaller one which make 9 nations. There are 28 minor countries (or 7 more if you count the not categorized countries) and 31 hidden villages.

Most of the information are from the Narutopedia. Other information from the frozen site narutoarikiri. A cached version is available here.


What's inside the UFO Robot Grendizer Manga Kanzenban? I want to buy a present for an old anime fan and since he likes UFO Robot Grendizer I decided to get him a manga of it. I found something called UFO Robot Grendizer Manga Kanzenban / Complete Edition on eBay. It says that the release date is 2012 but there is no other information.

Does anybody know what's in this book? Is it a collection of old manga chapters or just random artwork? Also, is it drawn by Go Nagai or not? I really appreciate your help...

A kanzenban (完全版) is similar to a viz big edition or 3 in1 edition, or the English equivalent, a omnibus. This means it will contain several chapters in 1 edition of the magazine. This is done to be cheaper in production etc.

If I recall correctly the Kanzenban edition is already the 4th edition, published by Manga Shop. Yet it still contains the original art work of Go Nagai and Yū Okazaki. As do the other 3 versions. All tough there might be some slight change when buying translated version, the french version is known to have allot of changes (Speaking from experience.. I have a copy over here)

The kanzenban edition did get released in 2012, and is listed under

ISBN:     9784775914533 4775914537 or
OCLC-nummer:  788225116


How is Louise what she is in the Red Garden OVA: Dead Girls? In the OVA sequel, we are introduced to Louise who looks exactly like Lise in the Red Garden TV series. Lise is last seen dying the Animus death of turning into ashes on Roosevelt Island, so it is generally taken that Louise is a reincarnation of Lise. Later on, Louise revealed her identity as an android. (Gasp!)

How could Lise, a human girl turned Animus infected with the cursed Doral blood, reincarnate as an android? What happened during the 300-year time span between the end of the TV series and the beginning of the OVA to have caused this inconceivable transition in Lise's identity?

The answer lies within the OVA's title, Dead Girls. The OVA is a homage to the 1992 debut novel of the same name by British science fiction author Richard Calder, which

  tell[s] the tale of a virus that turns pubescent girls into vampiric gynoid dolls called Lilim, and the doomed love affair between 15-year-old Ignatz Zwakh and a Lilim assassin called Primavera.

What's more, it appears that the TV series has also drawn inspiration from the Dead Girls novel, as the Animus-Doral feud and the conditions affecting members of the two warring clans match well with the rivalry between Cartier and Kito and the conditions affecting their dolls:

  years ago during a trade war Cartier infected Kito's fake dolls with an impotence STD and in response Kito sent her own virus to infect the genuine Cartier dolls in Paris - a virus that Morgenstern thinks responsible for the doll plague.

To answer my own question, Louise was probably born a human, but was turned into an android upon contracting a virus similar to that in the novel.


What does Gold Lion Shiki say at the beginning of "Strong World: Episode 0"? At the beginning of the OVA One Piece Film Strong World: Episode 0, Gold Lion Shiki says something to the Straw Hat crews (YouTube reference), which a certain fansubber refused to translate since they considered it as a spoiler to the related movie One Piece Film: Strong World.

What does Gold Lion Shiki say at the beginning of the OVA?

There are no spoilers. Shiki is basically saying Nami cannot save her friends by sacrificing herself.

Also, it was quite easy to find a YouTube video with English subtitle.