Kannagi: Crazy Shrine Maidens

[blkmage]

[SIZE="4"]Ah! Pretty shining love![/SIZE]
Kannagi: Crazy Shrine Maidens starts with Jin, an art student, who carves a statue out of a sacred tree from a shrine. Because this is anime, the statue comes to life in the form of a goddess, Nagi. The rest of the show is about the crazy hijinks that ensue as Nagi goes around doing random stuff while Jin is left to make sure she doesn't break anything.

[SIZE="4"]Yay! Unbelievable![/SIZE]
Kannagi originally aired last fall, from October to December. At Otakon, Bandai announced that they had licensed the entire thing. What's great is that they're selling DVDs and, simultaneously, offering free, commercial-supported streams on ANN. Since you can all watch it now, I thought I'd tell you all about this awesome show that you probably wouldn't have checked out.

[SIZE="4"]Madamada ji·mi·da·NE![/SIZE]
So what's so great about Kannagi? It all has to do with the amazing cast of characters. Each of them are awesome and hilarious. Even though it's not explicitly about otaku-ism like Lucky Star or Genshiken, it's rife with otaku in-jokes. Overall, it's a solid comedy with an awesome cast.

[SIZE="4"]Osaerarenai kodou yasegaman de kakusu[/SIZE]
Kannagi was produced by A-1 Pictures, who did Kuroshitsuji and Valkyria Chronicles and will be doing Fairy Tail. It's directed by the first Lucky Star director, Yutaka Yamamoto. Nagi is played by Tomatsu Haruka, who has become popular recently and has been doing a lot of roles in these past few seasons.

[SIZE="4"]Supiido ihan no DRIVING[/SIZE]
You should watch it if: you enjoy slice of life, you enjoy hardcore otaku jokes, you enjoy comedy, you were interested in it when it was airing but for whatever reason didn't check it out, you want to check out something new but don't feel like buying DVDs, you enjoy dancing OPs.

[EricTheFred]

I dearly wish the manga would come to the US, since I like it better, but the anime is pretty good stuff. Sadly, the manga is currently on hiatus because of the mangaka's serious health probelms.

BTW, in case you didn't know yet, Kannagi the anime is getting a second season.

EDITED TO ADD: Forgot to mention, the OP is the best part of the series. The rest is still worth watching, but the OP is genuine greatness.

[Maokun]

Because this is anime, the statue comes to life in the form of a goddess

I love this line XD

So is this a more comedic Ah! Megami-sama? (And I'm not stating that dismissively, just in case)

Sadly, the manga is currently on hiatus because of the mangaka's serious health probelms.

Gha, I did not need to hear this. It embodies what's probably my biggest fear and despair in the world: To remember that the authors of the awesome creations I enjoy in a continued basis are just feeble and fragile humans such as myself, bound to simply disappear some day, leaving me in a dark void of ignorance about the resolution of their stories.

[blkmage]

I'm not too familiar with AMG, but it shares a lot with Lucky Star, which isn't surprising since the director worked on LS. The goddess part doesn't actually play a huge role in that Nagi's character doesn't really do many supernatural feats. Her deity is used more by the plot and for clearing up the few macguffins.

[EricTheFred]

There's no more resemblance specifically to AMG than to any number of harem school-life romance comedy titles. Once you get past all the standard things that you see in nearly all such titles though, what's left is fairly original stuff.

And a LS connection does slip in, here and there, but don't go in expecting anything like LS. Thatt's more a matter of the flare the director brought into it than the content.