What was the controversy with Kokoro Connect?

All dates listed are in 2012. I have merely summarized the events and more detailed information can be found via the source links.

June 24: Advanced Screening Event

Some time before this date, Mitsuhiro Ichiki auditioned for an original character for the TV series. He was invited to the screening event as "a surprise voice cast member". However, at the event, he was informed that he was actually appointed "Head of Public Relations" for the series. The original character does not actually exist.

Source: ANN

September 2: Twitter

The opening theme's composer, Hajime Kikuchi, sent rude tweets to well known voice actor and singer Momoi Halko. He decided to step away from the music group (eufonius), but it's unclear whether this was truly his own action or something "forced" upon him by the label.

Source: ANN and MAL

As a result (well, according to the animation studio, due to "production issues"), the opening theme was changed on the BD/DVD release of the series and for some of the episodes during the TV airing. This was probably the cause of the BD/DVD release getting delayed by a month.

Source: Two ANN articles: One and two

The linked ANN article for the screening event also mentions that Hajime Kikuchi may have made some tweets about that incident, but it does not mention whether they were apologetic or negative.


Why did Kishi draw the One Piece symbol in the last page of the last chapter of Naruto?

Oda also made a reference to Naruto in the latest chapter (766):

Notice Nami's dress with Konoha's symbol on it, and how there's a fox eating ramen with a whirlpool on its back.

It's just a way for them to acknowledge each other's work.


What is the OST playing in Naruto Shippuden Ep 42 where Four-tailed Naruto fights Orochimaru

It sounds like an unreleased variant of Dark Clouds (Shippuuden OST 1 track 20). There's an unofficial version here, titled "Dark Clouds (other Verison)".
(Same as in this answer.)


Does having large chakra reserves for a child ninja indicate what one can achieve as an adult?

Strictly, no. It also has to do with training, but given that almost every ninja gets good training,  and some are just born smart like Sasuke, I think yes. Look at what happened to all the Jinchūriki, despite having those massive chakra reserves, they were killed ( but they had Akatsuki members as enemy, so uhh.?)

But it does gives a ninja a good head start if they have large chakra reserves, as that person, if dedicated enough, can practice and excel at any jutsu because they don't have to worry about depleting their chakra.

Just look at Naruto.He practiced and mastered every jutsu not only because of his incredible dedication, but also because he had Kurama's chakra as well.

Rock Lee doesn't seem to have an exceptional chakra reserve. However, he is an amazing Taijutsu user, having opened 6 gates while being a teenager is an incredible feat.

He might have even surpassed Might Gai, and that is saying something, considering Might Gai fought well against Madara.


Are there more Titan Shifters unknown as of now?

To answer your first question,

   Does this mean there are other colonies with people like those from the Reiss family who can control titans?  It would be enough to state that you don't need to be a member of the royal family to use the power of the Coordinate. You need to be a member of the royal family to use the coordinate's power optimally.  The reference being in chapter no. 50, Eren, while still in human form, used the power of the Coordinate to order titans to eat the Smiling Titan and attack the Armoured Titan.   In fact, any one can control the titans, as done by Eren, the royal family, using the coordinate, or by Zeke (beast titan), his method remaining unknown yet.   So, no, there doesn't need to be a colony with other people who know how to control the titans. But I won't be surprised if the mangaka came up with one.

For your second question,

   Can we conclude that there are other titan shifters who fight against humanity?   We can say that there are certainly many titans fighting against humanity, many of them have a certain level of intelligence, as shown by the quadruped titan carrying the goods, informing Zeke, Reiner, and Bertolt of the Survey Corp's advance in chapter 77.   As of now, there isn't enough information to definitely end the question by saying that there are no more titan shifters, the reason being that they can create one at any moment by devouring one of the existent titan shifters. The list of known titan shifters can be seen here.   So, as of now, I shall say that there isn't any other titan shifter shown/mentioned in the manga, other than those mentioned in the list.  Edit 1: According to the latest chapters, chp nos. 86-89 to be precise, there can be a total of 9 Titan shifters with special powers, whose powers can be transferred from one person to another by consuming their nervous system. Out of those 9 powers (8 people), 6 people fight against humanity. The two people in humanity's favor are Eren (Attack Titan, Founding Titan) and Armin (Colossal Titan).


He is now the Hokage and the father of two children. I think the designer wanted to give Naruto a mature old look with all of his responsibilities and stuff.

Also don't forget that there is a main character (the new main character), Boruto, which looks like exactly like old Naruto.

But the new look has removed the mischief smile I loved about him.


What's with Rei's appearance at the very beginning?

There is a mind boggling theory for this. If you are an avid reader of EVA Geeks you would enjoy it very much. So here is my small take on it.

Rei appears with the same uniform in the End of Evangelion standing on a sea of LCL. Here is the scene:

Shinji, when he first sees Rei at Nerv, recognizes her and makes a connection to the girl in the school uniform. So he is not hallucinating when he sees the image of Rei.

At this point there are a few theories:

The Rei which is seen could be Eva Unit 01 which is trying to contact his mind.
Another theory is that Shinji has mental visions of Rei in episodes 16 and 20 which could be Rei herself contacting Shinji telepathically.
A nice theory would be that Rei has the DNA of Yui Ikari and Lilith. So essentially, it's two mothers watching over their sons: namely, Yui looking after her son Shinji in the first episode and Lilith, who is the mother of Lilin, or all mankind, looking after her sons / daughters (let's not go on that path) in the End of Evangelion (picture above).

Mind blowing theory:
        I swear this is one of the mind blowing theories I have read about Evangelion. But it gives reason to your question.

In episode 23 Ritsuko shows Rei's room. If you notice the wall it has the words "Top, Bottom, Strangeness". This presumably is put there to show Rei's powers or nature. In quantum physics these three represent a sub atomic particle called the quark. The six types of quarks are: up, down, charm, strange, top, and bottom. As you can see, three of the quarks are listed in Rei's room. The way it is related is that quarks defy classical physics. They can be at two places at once. In End of Evangelion, Rei is seen everywhere. At the sub-atomic level the particles do not follow the laws of physics, so much that they can create effect without cause, or they can reach their destination before starting their journey. So this could give you reason why she could be at two places at once or show up as an image at the beginning and at the end.

P.S.: I did not come up with connecting the quark theory, but I did realise the writing on the wall meant that Rei had a connection to quarks or just that she likes quantum mechanics a lot (like me :D). But EVA Geeks had this connection posted and credits to them for this mind boggling theory.

Source at EVA Geeks: Theory and Analysis: Rei's Ghostly Appearances and Quantum Mechanics.


Why doesn't Minato use the Eight Trigrams Sealing on himself?

The reason to that is because Minato knows that "Uchiha Madara"

   (in quote as it was actually Tobi/Uchiha Obito)

will definitely pose danger, and Naruto would need extra power to fight Madara. Thus he planned to put the less dangerous part of Kyuubi (the Yin part) into Naruto using Hakke no Fūin Shiki (Eight Trigrams Sealing) on Naruto because he wanted Naruto to slowly get accustomed to Kyuubi's power. This was done by deliberately designing so that the seal would weaken overtime, so that slowly, bits of Kyuubi's power would leak and be accessible by Naruto. Of course as a safeguard, he also gave the key to strengthen the seal into the toad Gerotora and left it with Jiraiya. Other than that he added an extra security measure by sealing part of his chakra into Naruto and make it so that it would activate if Naruto was about to turn into Kyuubi and re-seal the Kyuubi.

As noted by Killer B, the seal used on the Kyuubi was of greater quality, thus better sealing strength than Tekkou Fuuin used on the Hachibi. It is reasonable to say that Hakke no Fuuin Shiki was the strongest sealing technique that Minato knows that he can modify so that it weakens a long period of time.

So, the reason why Hakke no Fuuin Shiki was used with Naruto was clear. Now, to the meat of the question. Why didn't Minato seal the other half of the Kyuubi that he sealed into himself with the same seal and instead opted to use Shiki Fuujin.

Shiki Fuujin was a very strong sealing technique. It was thought to be unbreakable since the technique seals the life of the intended target and caster into the Death God's belly. It was only after an extensive research by Orochimaru that he finally discovered the way to unseal it.

Minato used Shiki Fuujin to seal the more evil, thus more dangerous part of Kyuubi into himself using Shiki Fuujin was probably because he believed that no one can/would be able to discover how to unseal it. Since he was dying and the Shiki Fuujin doesn't weaken over time, the seal was perfect to be used to seal the Kyuubi, making sure that the Yang part of Kyuubi would never shows up on the world ever again.

As can be seen with Nohara Rin's case, if a Jinchuuriki was killed, the Bijuu would also die and would be revived at a random location after a while. This is also consistent with the fact that Akatsuki would only weaken and not kill the Jinchuuriki before extracting the Bijuu.

If Minato used Eight Trigrams sealing to seal the Kyuubi into himself, as sealing the whole Kyuubi into Naruto was not possible since Naruto was an infant, the sealed half of Kyuubi would return to the world after Minato's death, which is should be avoided, as that half would likely to target Naruto to get the other half back. That Yang half would also be in danger of being hunted by other ninja villages and the Akatsuki. That is why Minato opted to use Shiki Fuujin, so that it would be sealed permanently.


What is the name of the guitar song plays in the beginning of After the Rain episode 2?

The name of the song is Saka wo Iku Bus.

I am so grateful for the people who created this beautiful anime and OST.


What is the meaning of the title of "Perfect Blue"?

As for the movie, there is no meaning.

Most of answers given on various forums (i.e. reddit, MAL) are only speculative and theories at best. From an interview with Kon Satoshi himself:

  Andrew Osmond: What is the significance of the title Perfect Blue?

  Satoshi Kon: That’s a frequently asked question and, at the same time,
  one I find very difficult to answer. To be honest, I used it because
  it was the title of the original novel [Perfect Blue: Total Pervert by
  Yoshikazu Takeuchi, published in 1991]. I presume the words had some
  significance, but as I changed the story and probably the subject as
  well, I guess the meaning was lost. I can only guess because I didn’t
  read the novel. I simply read through the rough plot, which was
  described as “close to the original story” in the project plan
  delivered to me. We discussed changing the title, but I like it, it
  sounds significant and mysterious.

It would appear then the meaning was lost to the source material. Seeing that the original is in Japanese book and my Japanese lacking, I will leave it for someone else well versed in Comp. Lit. to interpret the title as used in the book.


Can Logia users be hurt by intangible attacks?

Technically the answer is yes, as any Logia can be hit by any sort of attack if they're in their flesh form, either because they were caught off guard and didn't reflexively transform, or if they wanted to take the hit (for example to shield someone else), or when they are wearing sea stone handcuffs.

I think the answer to the question of whether intangible attacks can hit logia users in general though is no.

Logia users have two ways of evading attacks in general, they can become their element, such as when Crocodlie is hit by bullets and simply becomes sand where the bullets hit and then reforms, or by changing their shape they can avoid the attack, such as when Aokiji opened up a hole in his own chest when Whitebeard stabbed him with a haki infused bisento.

I think the first method suffices for a basic intangible attack, as from what we have seen it is not possible to use haki on an intangible attack.

Sword beams are different, as they look intangible, but other than with Law, who uses his devil fruit, what swordsmen such as Zoro and Mihawk do is swing their sword fast enough to send the air in front of the sword flying at you at very high speeds, and they can transfer haki to the air itself, as when Zoro sliced Monet.

However, proper intangible energy based attack, such as Enel's Lightning, Kizaru's light and possibly Fujitora's gravity have never been shown to have haki infused in them, and Rayleigh's explanation didn't mention this as a possibility.

Also, there are relatively few intangible attacks in One Piece as a whole, some which seem to be such as Ace's hiken are in fact Ace turning his fist into fire, making the fire huge and hitting you with it, so this attack could easily contain haki. Ace's move where he fires fire through his fingers like a gun however, probably could not contain haki.

I don't think it is possible, unless you were to hit them when they are in their flesh form, or with their eleme metal weakness, as the only thing that can normally hit a logia's true body when they are transformed is busoshoku haki.


http://www.wordsense.eu/Suguru/ seems to define suguru as "male given name".
As far as referencing goes, I think it'd be reasonable to say it's just a picture of a guy's face where an equivalent to "guy" is written underneath.


What happened to Black Clover? Was the anime canceled?

Black Clover is trying to avoid having a lot of fillers by giving the anime a break. During the past few months, the anime sped up the storyline which led to it coming close to the manga's ongoing story. Once an anime finishes its manga's ongoing story, it most of the times runs out of source material for newer content. So them deciding to stop the anime was a good choice. All of this is in the black clovers comic book. They are making a currently a black clover movie that continues the series, so that the author of black clover can have some time to write the manga.


Dragon ball super: ep 92 What theme is playing at 21:10?

So i listened to all 140 themes of DBS and found nothing then my small brain finally decided to use shazam and found the theme its the theme of super saiyan 3 and  the reason i couldn't find it is becouse it is originating from dragon ball kai.
Hope you enjoy the theme


To understand the Japanese law, you need to learn the idea of "Antragsdelikt" (親告罪, shinkokuzai).
This means if copyright holder doesn't complain about the doujinshi, it's not illegal.

Most publishers in Japan don't prohibit doujinshi (at least explicitly), thus it's not illegal. It's because many commercial manga authors also create doujinshi, and publishers hire manga author from Comiket, so both are in same ecosystem. If publishers prohibit doujinshi, it also "kills" manga authors.

Some mangas like UQ Holder! or Knights of Sidonia" were marked explicitly to allow doujinshi.

Symbol of Doujin Mark License, courtesy of Wikipedia

Many 18+ game makers like Key, Alice or Nitroplus have explicit permit to create doujinshi based on their game. In this case, doujinshi is totally legal.

But when a publisher starts to complain about it, doujinshi will become illegal. For example, there is a doujinshi that titled "The last episode of Doraemon". The original author of Doraemon died before writing the last episode and no one knows the story of the official last episode. The doujinshi contains a fake last episode. In this case, the publisher of Doraemon complained and the author of the doujinshi stopped distributing it.

The future of doujinshi is not clear. If Japan join to the TPP, it will enforce US style copyright system to Japan. Many doujinshi authors are afraid that it means the end of doujinshi world.


In which anime or manga was there a man who admired a fast killing sword technique but was mistaken

What you saw was an episode of Rurouni Kenshin

Specifically, 63: "The Legend of the Fireflies"

The episode is a perfect match to your description.

In that episode, Kenshin, the protagonist, encountered an old man who told him the exact story that you laid out in your post.

The man was already a hobbyist in swordsmanship, and participated in competitions with a wooden sword.

He saw a robber who killed some people with a technique as "fast as lightning, never eve realizing that it was over for them"

He killed a person, and left his love interest behind because she disapproved of the killing.

He killed more people, and eventually cut down the robber with ease.

When the robber died, the man saw the exact same expression on the robber's face, and he realized that he had surpassed him long ago and that the technique was just imagined, and not even real.

When he got back to his home town, he learned that his love interest was dead.


Why is the ending of Death Note in the anime so different from the manga?

As a few people said in the comments, it appears to be artistic license.

I'll mention first that, like @Deidara-senpai pointed out, there are some general reasons why an anime can differ from the manga. However, in the case of Death Note, there appear to be some unique specifics to their changes as well.

The anime director of Death Note partook in an interview in November 2007 for an issue of Newtype USA. (I don't have a link to an online version of this, I'm afraid.) He speaks a bit on why he made the creative decisions he did. From Wikipedia:

  Tetsuro Araki, the director, said that he wished to convey aspects that "made the series interesting" instead of simply "focusing on morals or the concept of justice." Toshiki Inoue, the series organizer, agreed with Araki and added that, in anime adaptations, there is a lot of importance in highlighting the aspects that are "interesting in the original."

They go on to speak about a few specifics, such as Light's presence in the anime versus in the manga, but in general they also speak about the logistics of converting the manga into an anime, which is a challenge itself:

  Inoue noted that, to best incorporate the manga's plot into the anime, he "tweak[ed] the chronology a bit" and incorporated flashbacks that appear after the openings of the episodes; he said this revealed the desired tensions. Araki said that, because in an anime the viewer cannot "turn back pages" in the manner that a manga reader can, the anime staff ensured that the show clarified details. Inoue added that the staff did not want to get involved with every single detail, so the staff selected elements to emphasize. Due to the complexity of the original manga, he described the process as "definitely delicate and a great challenge." Inoue admitted that he placed more instructions and notes in the script than usual. Araki added that because of the importance of otherwise trivial details, the notes became crucial to the development of the series.

As you can see, the director and organizer of the series seemed to agree that a slightly different feel was needed in the anime, so artistic license was taken. Unfortunately, they don't go into huge detail over the specific changes (except for Light's own characteristics), and particularly not over the ending. I can only surmise that it was altered to achieve the feel they were generally looking for in the anime.


What is the paper at Saki's desk in From the New World about?

These are all place names. 町 is a marker for a town/block/neighborhood/district or road/street.

夕張 can be pronounced "yuubari." The translators were probably trying to simply the names as if they were actual place names. E.g. "New Amsterdam."

The story is primarily set is 神栖66町 (Kamisu 66th District), there are 8 other districts:

「夕張新生町」（北海道）, Yuubari New District (Hokkaidou region)
「白石71町」（東北）, Shiroishi 71th District (Touhoku region)
「胎内84町」（北陸）, Tainai 84th District (Hokuriku region)
「小海95町」（中部）, Koumi 95th District (Chuubu region)
「精華59町」（関西）, Seika 59th District (Kansai region)
「石見銀山町」（中国）, Iwami Ginzan (Silver Mine) District (Chuugoku region)
「四万十町」（四国）, Shimanto District (Shikoku region)
「西海77町」（九州）, Saikai 77th District (Kyushu region)

These are all named after real life locations, including Kamisu.


Why didn't Makishima spread the video of the Sibyl system?

People would have gone so crazy about this (if it wouldn't be immediately "debunked" as fake by Sybil), and then everybody would be targets for execution or imprisonment.

Or it would not do anything at all. Remember how people sometimes would decide on their own that something that looks horribly wrong can't be real, because otherwise the above would happen, and so they just go on along, like it's a prank or something that doesn't deserve a second thought.

So the more effective way of thinking would not be a risky revolution attempt like this, but a behind-the-scenes action that would definitely do something, without relying on people's thoughts.


Who was this girl by Lucy in special episode 10.5?

She is Aiko Takada.

Five years after murdering Kouta's family, Lucy (or Kaede as her original name was) went around killing and infecting humans. Aiko Takada was responsible for inadvertently stopping Kaede from going on another rampage when she was accidentally hit by a soccer ball.

Aiko is the second girl after the unnamed Orphanage Girl who befriended Kaede. In the anime, when Kaede revealed her horns to Aiko, Aiko found them cool, like how Kouta did back then. She is also a pivotal point in Kaede's/Lucy's life as

   Kurama shot Aiko by mistake when she tried to protect Kaede. Kaede then agreed to go with Kurama to the Diclonius Research Institute because he promised that Aiko could be saved. Later in the facility, he reported to her that Aiko died, leading to Kaede/Lucy hating Kurama for breaking his words and planning to kill all his loved ones while leaving him alive like what he did to her with Aiko (as Kaede/Lucy considers Aiko a loved one of hers).


Which percentage of One for All can Midoriya manage without hurting himself by the time he awakes his black whip quirk?

Midoriya was able to use 100 percent of his power even before awakening his black whips and without hurting himself.

As I stated in my answer here,

   this was made possible by Eri's power so Mizuku's body remains unhurt while unleashing 100 percent of his power.

Also, even before this, with the aid of Melissa, he was also able to use 100 percent of his power via the Full Gauntlet, albeit he is limited to three smashes.

Without any aid, the current limit for his One for All is 15%, as stated here.


Is ecchi used for humor or is it sexually playful?

According to Wikipedia the definition of ecchi is:

Ecchi (エッチ etchi?, pronounced [et.tɕi]) is an often used slang term in the Japanese language for playfully sexual actions. As an adjective, it is used with the meaning of "sexy", "dirty" or "naughty"; as a verb, ecchi suru (エッチする), with the meaning to have sex; or as a noun, to describe someone that is seen as lecherous. It is perhaps softer than the Japanese word ero (エロ　from Eros), and does not imply perversion in the way hentai does.
The word ecchi has been adopted by fans of Japanese media to describe works with sexual overtones. In Japanese, the word ecchi is often used to describe a person's conduct, but in fandom, it has come to be used to refer to softcore or playful sexuality, as distinct from the word hentai, which connotes perversion or fetishism. Works described as ecchi do not show sexual intercourse or genitalia, but sexual themes are referenced. Ecchi themes are a type of fan service, and can be found in most comedy shōnen and seinen manga and harem anime.

This imply's that it can be used for a number of situations including those that are humorous or sexually playful.


All we really know about Shanks and Kaido's skirmish is in these 2 Panels.

Anything said other than the information is merely speculation. However it is not completely unfounded.

Looking at the second panel, Shanks appears at Marineford just a day after his skirmish, with his crew and ship showing no signs of damage or a fight. Considering, what happened to Marineford when Yonko Whitebeard fought we can safely assume that whatever fight, if it took place was likely very minor. More plausible is, Shanks simply being there "stopped" Kaido. Consider the following scenario.

The fight between Whitebeard and World Government threatened to disrupt the balance between the Yonko. Kaido tried to use this opportunately to preemptively strike at his enemy while he is distracted. Neither Whitebeard nor WG can afford war on two fronts. Whitebeard couldn't waste time and resources to thwart Kaido while WG didn't engage Rayleigh (Kizaru said something like do you want to fight 2 legends iirc)

Thus Shanks being a fellow Yonko just simply appeared there and stopped Kaido. Kaido doesn't want to fight other Yonko's head on either. The balance exists because they are all evenly matched. Thus the scuffle between Shanks and Kaido was likely very minor. Seeing that Kaido will not allow him to attack Whitebeard, Kaido retreated while Shanks followed Whitebeard to Marineford.

An interesting parallel to real world, Is Indo-Pak war in 1971. From WIkipedia: Task Force 74

  The US Task Force 74 was a US Navy task force of the United States Seventh Fleet that was deployed to the Bay of Bengal by Nixon administration in December 1971, at the height of the 1971 Indo-Pakistani War. Led by the Aircraft carrier USS Enterprise, the deployment of the task force was seen as a show of force by USA in support of the beleaguered West Pakistani forces. [..]
  To counter this, On 6 and 13 December 1971, the Soviet Navy dispatched two groups of cruisers and destroyers and a submarine armed with nuclear missiles from Vladivostok; they trailed US Task Force 74 into the Indian Ocean from 18 December 1971 until 7 January 1972. The Soviets also had a nuclear submarine to help ward off the threat posed by USS Enterprise task force in the Indian Ocean

Thus without fighting, both US and USSR effectively negated each other's influence on the war. For a more detailed account: 1971 War: How Russia sank Nixon’s gunboat diplomacy


Where is this girl in a maid uniform holding a cat from?

This image is of (spoiler warning in links) Solne and Koma from the 2005 visual novel/eroge Ouka by Carriere. As far as I know, there's no anime or manga adaptation. They also appear in the original game Shinkirou (which Ouka was an expanded remake of), but the character design in the image matches Ouka's. As you can probably guess from the image, Solne is one of the main characters in the game, while Koma is the cute mascot animal (she's not actually a cat).

The plot from vndb:

  The last descendant of a line of mystical protectors, Yuuya Furusaka has received the twin blessing of Life and Death, and now his touch has the power to save lifes or destroy them, although at the price of, respectively, his own life or his own soul.
  But maybe the key for his salvation is hidden in one of the girls around him...

In case you're unsure it's the same character, if you look at the full version of this image, you can see the Carriere logo in the lower left corner. Modified versions of this image have been used for some of their merchandise, e.g. this ZIPPO lighter.


It was a global mission, seems like that every team arround the world has a limit time to help in the mission. Kurono's team were out of time and living ones were teleport back.


Translation of alphabet used in Konosuba

An enterprising person over here has provided a translation table for the letters and some of the numbers, in multiple typefaces:

Someone somewhere may have put together a more complete version; this version is from just after episode 3 or 4, and more sourcetext became available as the show went on.

As you surmise, there is a simple one-to-one relationship between the English alphabet (and related glyphs like punctuation and numbers) and the KonoSuba alphabet. However, beware: the actual text that is enciphered is not necessarily in the English language - some of it is also in romanized Japanese. For example, someone in the linked thread deciphered this part of your image:

As this:

koumazokunonakademouiitsunotensaimahoutsukai. b
akurestumahoutoyobarerusaikyomahounomiruyokunimor
itsukare. soreshikatsukawanaishitukawanai

Which may seem like gibberish, but in (somewhat typo-laden) Japanese, it's Megumin babbling about EXPLOSION. Roughly, "A wunderkind magician, even moreso than the average Crimson Demon. She is enraptured by the mightiest of magicks: EXPLOSION. She won't use any other magic, and plus - she can't." This particular text is cobbled together from various bits of copy about her character, as far as I know.


Why Touma is considered only a level 0 esper when he's clearly so powerful and was able to defeat the most powerful level 5 esper?

For whatever reason, Toma Kamijo's Imagine Breaker ability is not considered an esper power, so according to Academy City's ranking system he's a level 0 esper with no known abilities.  It's also not seen as a magic ability so he's not considered to be on the other side of the technology/magic divide.  The true nature of the power hasn't been revealed.  Its origins are unknown and the series hints that even Toma doesn't know what its fully capable of.

Toma's ranking is confirmed through the annual System Scan tests, which corresponds to the mandatory physical exams that Japanese students have to take every year. The real life exams measure things like height and weight, but the System Scan tests measure student's esper abilities and these tests have always shown that Toma is only a level 0 esper.

The series also tries to portray Toma's encounters against powerful level 5 espers as a David versus Goliath situation.  A mere level 0 who has the courage to take on the most powerful level 5 espers in Academy City in order to protect his friends.  Given how powerful his Imagine Breaker ability is, this lacks some credibility, but it doesn't stop Toma claiming this himself as he punches someone in the face.


Can a person die before their lifespan ends?

The people can be killed before their lifespan ends using Death Note. The lifespan of a person is decided by fate and doesn't keep on changing, like when a serial killer decides to kill that person, his lifespan changes. No, the lifespan is already decided, so if the lifespan is already short the serial killer succeeds; if it isn't, the serial killer fails. Also, if a Shinigami writes someone's name which in turn increases the lifespan of others, that Shinigami dies. Humans don't have this problem while using Death Note.


The bell is called the Ox-Bell.

What does the ringing of the bell signify?

  The ringing of the bell signifies the end of one year and the beginning of another. It is rung eight times to give thanks for the old year, and another eight times to welcome the new year. If it is rung twice, it signifies some sort of disaster or distress.

How others interpreted 16 rings:

  Lieutenant Commander Brandnew of the Marines analyzed it as a declaration of war, and Killer of the Kid Pirates interpreted the meaning of it as the end of one era and the beginning of another.

The real reason behind it:

  Luffy's ringing of the bell was only a distraction, along with his other actions, so nobody in the world outside of the Straw Hat Pirates would notice the real message; in the picture of Luffy after ringing the Ox Bell, a mark is seen on his arm that reads 3D2Y with the 3D crossed out, representing the amount of time the crew would be separated.


Was the Chocobi (チョコビ) snack from Shin Chan fictional or did it exist before Shin Chan?

According to various Japanese sources (Japanese Wikipedia, NicoNicoPedia, pixiv dic, Geocities JP), the Chocobi snack was originally came from Crayon Shin-chan.

However, according to the interview with Mitsuru Hongo (Director of Crayon Shin-chan's anime), it was based from Lotte's Koala's March.

... until 1993, when Lotte did a collaboration with Crayon Shin-chan to produce a peanuts chocolate flavored snack with 2 types: Chocobi, and Royal Chocobi (with almond). However, they're pretty much different from the one in anime. Couldn't find any images of them.

Later on, Orion also produced Chocobi snack with star-shaped, but the package was totally different.

Bandai also produced Chocobi snack, but instead of star-shaped, it's a biscuit stick. The package was also totally different.

Moving forward to 2006, Tohato released a real Chocobi snack.

Lastly, since 2014, Morinaga did a collaboration with the movie to produce Chocobi Ice.


Are there any studios with good working conditions?

In ANN there is an article, written by Jennifer Sherman, which talks about the financial and working condition
issues present in the Anime industry. More specifically, the article talks about a specific episode from a NHK program called Close-Up Gendai+.

Below are quotes from the ANN article which talk about the financial and working condition issues that were aired on that specific episode,

  NHK's Close-Up Gendai+ program aired an episode about the dark side of the anime industry on Wednesday. The episode discussed the
  financial  problems of the industry and exposed animators' subpar
  working conditions. Anime director Yasuhiro Irie (Fullmetal Alchemist:
  Brotherhood,  Code:Breaker), Toray Corporate Business Research
  representative Naoki Atsumi, and announcers Shinichi Taketa and Izumi
  Tanaka appeared on  the program.

  The episode showed a graph of increasing annual profits in the anime industry. The small yellow bars represent the portion that
  anime
  studios  receive. Because production committees hold IP licenses, as
  well as merchandising and distribution rights, profits from anime
  productions fail  to reach studios.

  A 30-minute work requires more than 3,000 illustrations. In-between animators receive about 200 yen (US$2) per illustration
  and can
  produce  a maximum of 20 pages per day. Therefore, they can only
  expect to earn about 100,000 yen (US$911) per month.

  Japan Animation Creators Association (JAniCA) reported in 2015 that animators averaged 11 working hours per day, and they had just
     four
  days  off per month.

  An animator who left his job due to work-related depression kept an overtime log. He reported having 100 overtime hours in one month.
  The
  below image shows that the animator started work at 11:30 a.m. on May
  22 and finished at 5:10 a.m. on May 23.

  Production I.G co-founder, president, and CEO Mitsuhisa Ishikawa remarked that the anime industry lacks people with the business
  skills
  to  successfully monetize the system.

  20-year veteran anime technical director Taiki Nishimura reported in May that his monthly income is 100,000 yen (about US$900) for each
  anime  that he works on. He said that he wants to concentrate on one
  anime at a time, but he has to work on two television anime to have
  enough income.

  JAniCA reported in 2015 that 759 animators it surveyed earned an average of 3.3283 million yen (about US$27,689) per year in Japan in
  2013.

An interesting point to note from the article is following,

  The program presented Polygon Pictures as a studio with better operations. The studio, which focuses on 3D animation, turns off its
  lights at 10:00 p.m. to encourage workers to go home.

There is also another article by Brian Ashcraft, from Kotaku, which details an interview with Thomas Romain, a french animator, and his experience in working in Japan.

Below are quotes from that article that I thought might be useful. Note, I have also highlighted the ones that are relevant to help you answer your question.

  What’s your advice for people who want to work in anime in Japan?

  The first advice I usually give to people is: learn Japanese. Unfortunately finding Japanese production staff who can understand
  English is very rare. You won’t be hired if you cannot communicate
  with them, so if you want to go live in Japan, YOU need to make the
  effort of learning the language.

  Second piece of advice is that the sooner you start, the better. Japanese studios prefer to hire young and inexperienced people. You
  don’t need to have a master’s degree in animation; a couple of years
  of basic artistic training is enough to start as junior animator. But
  the consequence is that the pay is very low. It’s better to consider
  this period as a long internship during which you will be taught by a
  senpai while working on ongoing productions. It’s good to be aware
  that drawing skills are not required to work in this industry. You can
  work as a production assistant, editor, or compositing artist for
  example. None of these jobs require knowing how to draw, even if you
  want to become a director. Lots of anime directors started as
  production assistants and never went to art schools.

  The third piece of advice is to not come with empty pockets. You will not earn enough to make a living out of it until you become good
  enough. This can take a few years.

  What surprised you about making anime in Japan?

  I was surprised by how humble all the anime staff in the studio were, and how terrible their living conditions were, compared to the
  situation in the animation industry in the West. In a nutshell, the
  money don’t flow back to the animators (and other workers)—they are
  poor. Most of them spend most of their lives sat at their desks and
  are single because they have either not enough time or not enough
  money to build a family. Some of them are also extremely shy, like
  they cannot even answer you when you say hello. It can be disturbing
  at first.

  But people are very friendly and intrigued to have foreigners amongst them willing to live a similar life. Most of them don’t
  understand
  why we want to work in anime because they are aware that it is a very
  difficult job with low pay and lot of (unpaid) overtime. For us, anime
  is exciting because it’s exotic, but for them it’s just work as
  usual. I do not think they can truly understand our feeling as
  foreigners working in Japan unless they have experienced the fact of
  living outside of Japan themselves, or even travel abroad from time to
  time, which most of them never did because they cannot afford it.

  I was also surprised to realize that all the Japanese animators weren’t geniuses. You know, because only masterpieces like Ghibli
  movies or series like Cowboy Bebop were released in France before I
  went to Japan, I thought that every Japanese animator could draw like
  a god. I was wrong. There are animation gods like Toshiyuki Inoue, but
  there are also lots of low-level animators who can only survive in
  this industry because too many shows are produced and studios that are
  desperately looking for staff have no other choice but to offer them
  jobs.

  The good thing is that if you are not too bad and have a good work ethic, you will never be unemployed.

  What’s the most difficult thing about working in the anime industry?

  Definitely the large quantity of work to deal with in a short time period. I was surprised by how short the production schedules
  are and
  how scarce the teams are due to the shortage of artists. Studios are
  open 24/7, and people are also working on the holidays most of the
  time. You get emails during the night. It’s totally normal to have
  meetings during the night or the weekends. You really have to be ready
  to work hard, to reach the same level of commitment as your Japanese
  co-worker, otherwise the risk is that they may not accept you as one
  of them.

  I was surprised by the number of production miracles. Japanese have the ability to achieve impossible tasks very quickly, only when
  they
  have no other choices left. Although it would be more reasonable to
  refuse those conditions, everybody complies. This is actually how it
  works all the time. Nothing moves according to the initial planning.
  It’s only when everybody thinks that there is no time left, that the
  project will never be completed in time, that production speeds up.
  People work day and night without wasting a single minute until the
  very last second. When you go see a movie on its release day or watch
  an anime on TV, people were still working on it a few days ago, or
  even a few hours ago. Sometimes it’s not even finished, and the
  drawings are polished for the DVD/Blu-ray release.

  What industry horror stories have you heard?

  It’s not only that I’ve heard horror stories, I’ve seen them. Basically, most of the people are overworked. The problem is that in
  the traditional Japanese way to behave in society, people tend to say
  yes when they are asked to work under impossible conditions. For the
  sake of the studio and the project team, they will do the impossible,
  even stay several days at the studio in a row, and therefore put their
  own health at risk. I’ve seen people going home only once per week, or
  working 35 hours in a row. I’ve even met an animation director who was
  going home only once per year to their parents—she wasn’t renting an
  apartment. She was living at the studio, using the public bath and
  manga cafes to rest a little bit from time to time. A married couple,
  a director and his wife character designer, were camping in a corner
  of the studio, sleeping in sleeping bags until the production was
  finished. Some people also don’t allow themselves to take a break even
  if they are sick, because they don’t want to spend their small wage on
  health care.

  Life expectancy amongst animators isn’t very old. I’ve seen people passing out at work. The worst has been people dying from
  karoshi
  (death by overwork). One of my colleagues died from a stroke 10 years
  ago while he was working in a different studio (staff working for
  several companies at a time is rather common). Another one barely
  recovered from a severe stroke as well. Recently I’ve heard of the
  death of an animator working on a pretty famous show in another
  studio, but everybody kept it secret, probably not to damage the
  company.

  This said, people are very friendly to each other, because basically everybody knows they are more or less experiencing the same
  very hard conditions. People share the same fate, working in this
  terrible industry but doing a work that they deeply love. Work
  meetings are fun. We are laughing a lot and enjoying creating
  anime.

From what I have researched, I can somewhat say that there are probably only some studios which have a bit more better working conditions than other studios. But, overall, I think most studios have subpar working condition and some even lower.


What are the exactly the powers of Athena?

Athena is a real god in the series, Poseidon is her uncle.
However in Saint Seiya, she is actualy reborn as a mortal every 200 years or so. Her incarnation in the 20th century was taken from the Santuary by Kido Mitsumasa and adopted under the name Kido Saori. The other gods in Saint Seiya aren't reborn, they just posess mortals instead and can use their powers imediately. She is not initially aware of her identity/powers as Athena, but as the series goes on she shows all sorts of abilities, like telporting, healing, bestowing long life, sealing away other gods and fighting using her god cloth, staff and shield.


What is the game where you strike a stack of discs to knock one out?

The game is called Daruma Otoshien.wikipedia (だるま落としja.wikipedia)

Let me quote Japanese Wikipedia, since the text on English Wikipedia might be inaccurate at the time of writing of this post.

  弾丸の先端に形状が似ただるまの下に、薄い円柱を数段重ね、それを横から1段ずつ木槌で叩いて抜き、倒れないようにうまく一番上のだるまを落とすという玩具・遊びである。胴を素早くたたくのがコツである。

Rough translation (I'd appreciate it if someone can edit it with a better translation):

  (Skipped text) Under the daruma head are several thin cylinder pieces stacked on top of each other. The game involves hitting the thin cylinder pieces from the side with a mallet one by one, bringing down the daruma head without the rest toppling over. The trick is to hit the body quickly.

Image retrieved from Wikipedia at File:Darumaotoshi.JPG


Can anyone steal the powers of Devil Fruit from another?

You can if you don't already have a DF.

Usually if you want a person's DF power, you kill that person.  The power will transfer to a nearby fruit and that fruit will become a DF.  Once you consume that fruit you have their power.

If you want to take the power by another means.... we don't know.  It is currently unknown how or if Devil Fruits can transfer from one living person to another without going through the normal cycle. There are two suspicious cases of DF transfer: Blackbeard obtaining Whitebeard's power and Lin Lin Charlotte obtaining Mother Caramel's power. Several details about both mysteries seem intentionally obscured so that no answer to this question is possible yet.

Similar discussions could be had about multiple DF powers, objects eating DF, or limits of speculated DF powers.  At this point though the discussions are largely fruitless (ironically) as the answer has to be "we don't and can't know yet".


Which Trinity Universe Characters belong with each developer?

I haven't played the game, but according to its English-language Wikipedia page:

Demon God Kanata
Valkyrie Rizelea
Fox Spirit Tsubaki
The Dark Hero Lucius
Treasure Hunter Recit
Managraphic Artist Miyu
Mizuki
Suzaku
Macaroon
Shuten
Ashura

are all original characters.

Flonne
Etna
Prinny

are all Nippon Ichi characters from Disgaea: Hour of Darkness. (I can personally vouch for this one, since I've played Disgaea.)

Pamela Ibis
Violet Platane

are Gust characters from Atelier Viorate: Alchemist of Gramnad 2.


How did the World Government know about the clash between Revolutionary Army and Blackbeard Pirates?

I can think of one possible solution. The black den den mushi which can spy on people's conversations. I'm guessing that the world government (CP0 or the Marines) were either near Blackbeard or near Baltigo originally spying on either Blackbeard or Baltigo (since it is a suspicious country). Once they tapped into the conversation, they got confirmation of Dragon's location.

The other assumption is that CP0 followed Sabo from Dressrosa to Baltigo. After following them and finding their hideout they planned a full out attack but got there to meet the place in ruins due to the Blackbeard pirates. I doubt that they followed Sabo since the Revolutionary army were secretive and careful about everything they did.


Do anime with more ecchi scenes pay their seiyuu more than non-ecchi anime?

From what I have read, eroge voice-work is not a desirable path. The pay is less, although I'm not sure how much exactly. I think voice actors are generally paid by the word, and long/complicated lines are not usually required in eroge. I don't know how they would measure a payment for just breathing and other sounds.

Most voice actors are similar to celebrities, in that they want to become well-known and gain reputability for their skills. This will give them higher paying jobs in more popular series, and their demand will grow. However, eroge work is probably viable if you need to make money or start out. A lot of well known voice actors have done eroge work before becoming more established and moving away from it. The voice actor for Vegeta in DBZ apparently did eroge at one point. A lot of "voice otakus"? will try to match eroge VAs who used pseudonyms to their real names, which is a deterrent for some VAs to even do any eroge if they care about that.

I am sorry I don't have any real sources to any of this, so take it with a grain of salt. I've just googled through some message boards about this topic, like the one below

Url may contain content not safe for work

http://blog.livedoor.jp/myonkui/archives/5522517.html


Why does the Hero Association ratings have several S-Class Heroes to be more powerful than Tatsumaki?

It's possible that the translation of that stat as "Power" is a (slight) mistranslation.  I have seen it alternatively translated as "Instantaneous Power/Speed".  If we assume that is a more accurate translation, then it means it's a measure of how quickly they can utilize their power/speed. As such Tatsumaki's rating may be lower than max if it takes her a little bit more time to unleash her strength; at least as far as the association thinks/knows anyway.  Martial combatants like Atomic Samurai can use highly trained reflexes to react powerfully with little to no thought, while Tatsumaki, presumably, needs to actively think/concentrate for most situations.  This seems supported by an important plot point later:

   Espers must choose between offense and defense, as they can only use one power at a time.  This creates an exploitable gap where you can land an attack while the Esper is trying to attack. This pops up near the end of the Garou/Monster Association arc.  We are also told during that sequence that her barrier remains up and effective even when she's unconscious (and apparently concussed).  As such it seems to be Tatsumaki's default state to be in defensive mode, and she must consciously and actively switch to an offensive attack.


What happens when a member of the main house of the Hyuuga clan marries a member of the branch house of the Hyuuga clan?

At the end of the day, both are still "Hyuuga".

We remember from all the way back to Hinata vs Neji that his father cries and says "I wish I bore you into the main family". Then, even if his father was a branch member, had his wife been a main member, Neji would be a main member as well.

Other than that, their problems were settled after Naruto puts Neji's mind back in his head after they fought in the Chuunin exam. In the flashback as well, Neji's father asks Hinata's father to tell Neji the full story when he gets older but at first, he refuses.

Hinata's father apologizes to Neji after his fight against Naruto and it is implied that there is some harmony between the 2 families. After that it seems that the tension between the families calms down.


Can anyone tell me the name of this manga?

The manga is

Shin Am Heng Eo Sa (Shin Angyō Onshi) Manhwa

Check here


The people writing the wiki on Sengoku just forgot to link the rank's name to it's corresponding wiki page, because if you read the wiki page on General Inspector you can read the following:

  "General Inspector" (大目付 Ōmetsuke?) is a special rank which has the duty of detecting and investigating instances of maladministration, corruption, or defection in the Marine organization. The only known General Inspector at the moment is the former Fleet Admiral Sengoku.

So I was wrong in my comment, thinking both Garp and Sengoku received the same rank. In chapter 594, as shown in the picture, Kong indeed suggests Sengoku to stay for the young marines, the same way Garp did. And according to the wiki Garp supposedly became an Instructor, while Sengoku became a General Inspector. Both cases have not been verified by the manga though.


The item, which appears to be a 60's Gibson SG, sold for 500,000 yen.


Based on Torisuda's clue, Figuma is a reference to Figma, a company that sells action figures. Higuma sounds similar to Figma and it means Sun Bear (hi/日 = sun, kuma/熊 = bear). Thus, Miss Monochrome turned into a sun bear.


Which music theme plays at the end of the Naruto vs Sasuke fight?

I couldn't find the exact version of the track during the scene you linked, may have been an unreleased variation of the official track. This is also played during Sasuke's flashback when he's pinned down by Naruto.

The title of the official track is Oh! Student and Teacher Affection (Aa, Shiteiai) and appears on Naruto OST 3, track 9.


If the universe seed is for creating universes, why does Hearts think he can destroy the Zenos with it?

The Universe seed could also be considered as an energy source of sorts and we see hearts supposedly generate these boxes which can trap people or objects in from which energy is absorbed by the Universe Seed until nothing remains as you can see here, from the 6:00 mark.He threatens to do the same to the Universe 6 fighters, Trunks and Vegeta until Kamin and Oren stop them. I believe the Universe Seed here acts as a massive energy source which can perhaps be used to destroy Zeno or resist their power.For instance, a similar comparison could be made to an experiment performed by Fu in Xenoverse 2. While the character would distort time and create alternate scenarios to simply absorb energy for experimental purposes(Note: He doesn't get stronger by absorbing the energy). He is able to pass this energy on to the Future Warrior, who with his help, is capable of pushing SSJB Goku into turning Ultra Instinct and is also capable of holding his own against Ultra Instinct Goku.


Who is the voice actress for the 'young' Nori-chan from the anime Kiznaiver?

They aren't played by the same person.

  Who is the voice actress for the 'young' Nori-chan?

Teenage Sonozaki is played by YAMAMURA Hibiku, but child Sonozaki is played by 財前咲良 (probably read "ZAIZEN Sakura"). She's credited in episode 1 as "girl" (少女).

In episode 9, she's again credited, this time as "Sonozaki (child)" (園崎（幼少期）). Curiously, her name is spelled 財前咲来 this time. She has barely any internet presence, but judging from this page, I think the episode 9 spelling is correct. (The same spelling is used when she's credited in episode 10.)

  I'm sure I've heard this voice before, it is incrediby irritating.

As near as I can tell, this is her first role in anime, so you probably haven't heard her before.

It does appear that she voiced young Cinderella in the Japanese dub of Disney's 2015 Cinderella, though, and I imagine she might've had some other minor gigs (commercial voiceovers, etc.) too.


How does a Yardrat know that Vegeta became faster than Goku?

This is a mistranslation.
The official translation (found on Mangaplus, page 6) clearly says (in Elder Pybara's words) :

"Your spirit is now more polished than Goku's, and you managed it in no time."

Elder Pybara was comparing their respective trainings' duration. As stated within Dragon Ball Super (chapter 53, page 48), Goku spent 150 days meditating upon a training spire and Vegeta had to achieve comparable results in only 10 days. Elder Pybara's reaction clearly indicates that Vegeta did train quite faster.


First of all, not all Nomu have their so-called brains exposed. Their description hints that they are "mindless" soldiers that  need specific orders to function. Only the High-Tier ones have the capability to think for themselves. On the same note, you could wonder why they don't target the eyes of Nomu.
On one hand, giving that they all have muscle augmentation and others physical quirks, one could reason that the visible "brain" tissue is just a protective layer for the brain itself. On the other hand, it could be that the Nomu are aware of this "flaw" and one can't easily target that area, being direct attack or range attack. Also, most fights in manga/anime don't revolve around the characters targeting the weak spots of the body, meaning that even in BnHA, the Heroes don't go for the head when fighting any other villain to give them a concussion or something like that, the fights are a display of abilities and power.
And finally, my opinion is that it's just a design trait that Horikoshi - the author - liked and incorporated in the making of Nomu.


Why is the average number of suspects three or more in Detective Conan?

Three is a number that would make the story go more smoothly. If there were only 2 suspects, the evidence would continuously weigh one one another, making the case go for 5 chapters compared to the usual three. If there are four, or more than such, it would be like watching longer replays of the 50 million suspects case, but these are fillers with no specific information that is important to the timeline, so they should not go longer than 3 chapters.


The anime Gungrave was made off a game from what I can tell, it doesn't have much thought into its original setting or a place.

Based off of how the anime is set up, I'd anticipate 70's or 80's era in some part of Japan or Italy, but there isn't a real answer to this.


What Idol Groups in Love Live have real life counterparts?

In Japan, they are generally called as seiyuu unit (Japanese Wikipedia) when a music/acting unit (group) consists of voice actors. For a special case where a group also works as a real-life idol, it is called seiyuu idol unit.

According to the Wikipedia, there are 3 units, but only 2 are seiyuu idol units:

A-RISE (created for Love Live!, no live event/talk)

Kira Tsubasa: Sakuragawa Megu
Toudou Erena: Matsunaga Maho
Yuuki Anju: Ohashi Ayuru

μ's (created in 2010 for Love Live!, 6 live events, 4 live talks, 18 guest appearances)

Kousaka Honoka (Leader/Printemps): Nitta Emi
Ayase Eli (Bi Bi): Nanjo Yoshino
Minami Kotori (Printemps): Uchida Aya
Sonoda Umi (lily white): Mimori Suzuko
Hoshizora Rin (lily white/NikoRinPana): Iida Riho
Nishikino Maki (Bi Bi): Pile
Toujou Nozomi (lily white): Kusuda Aina
Koizumi Hanayo (Printemps/NikoRinPana): Kubo Yurika
Yazawa Nico (Bi Bi/NikoRinPana): Tokui Sora

Aquors (created in 2015 for Love Live! Sunshine!!, 2 live events, 5 live talks, 3 guest appearances):

Takami Chika (Leader/CYaRon!/Gu~RinPa): Inami Anju
Sakurauchi Riko (Guilty Kiss): Aida Rikako
Matsuura Kanan (AZALEA): Suwa Nanaka
Kurosawa Dia (AZALEA/Gu~RinPa): Komiya Arisa
Watanabe You (CYaRon!): Saitou Shuka
Tsushima Yoshiko (Guilty Kiss/Gu~RinPa): Kobayashi Aika
Kunikida Hanamaru (AZALEA): Takatsuki Kanako
Ohara Mari (Guilty Kiss): Suzuki Aina
Kurosawa Ruby (CYaRon!): Furihata Ai


Ok, there will be spoilers for Steins Gate 0 so be sure to watch that before reading this post or just read the overall part.

In Beta timeline Kurisu is dead. The Beta timeline is the timeline we start to watch. Okabe goes to the Alpha timeline where Kurisu still lives. The Alpha timeline is where Mayuri destined to die. This is also the timeline we see the most in OG Steins Gate. All the experiment on D-Mail, stuff like changing the gender of Ruka, done in this timeline and get reverted by Okabe in order to save Mayuri.

In the end, Okabe understands that there is no way to keep Mayuri alive in the Alpha timeline. He goes back to the Beta timeline in order to save Kurisu. He fails once and this is the start of Steins Gate 0. In S;G0 Okabe chooses to stay in this timeline and keep Mayuri save by sacrificing Kurisu so Kurisu is still dead in this timeline. We also saw a small segment in the middle of S;G0 where another version of Okabe chose Kurisu over Mayuri. That is the Alpha line.

So overall:

The alpha timeline is where Kurisu lives and Mayuri dies.
The beta timeline is where Kurisu dies and Mayuri lives.

Because of two distinct timelines, there are actually two different versions of Suzuha.


According to the plot of the serie, Sai realized his role was not to achieve the Divine move (also called "hand of god") but that he was just there to transmit all his knowledge of the game to Hikaru. Having no more regrets, he can leave the world. So Madara Uchiha's answer is correct.

Also, in a public interview Yumi Hotta (scenarist of the "Hikaru No Go") gave during European Go Congress 2011 (in Bordeaux, France), someone asked her "Why did Sai disappear?". She answered that Sai had a role similar to a father to Hikaru, and that you cannot live your whole life with your parents following you. At some point, you have to grow up and become an adult. So, the fact that Sai disappeared is a symbolic way of saying that Hikaru is (on his way to) becoming an adult.

Hikaru "finds" Sai later when playing go. This has the same meaning as saying that even if you leave your parents, you will always have in you what they told you, what they taught you, and the values they transmitted to you.

And, in fact, by the end of the series Hikaru looks a lot more mature than when he was with Sai.

According to Yumi Hotta, "Sai had to disappear", otherwise he would be blocking Hikaru from becoming an adult, in the same way a mother or a father would if he or she was always protective about his/her child.


What are the requirements to be a warlord?

The Shichibukai, the full title being Oka Shichibukai (王下七武海 Ōka Shichibukai?, literally meaning "Royal Seven Military Seas"), are seven powerful and notorious pirates who have allied themselves with the World Government.

So to answer your second question, Yes they can NEVER be more than seven. But mostly there are less than seven because of inherent nature of Pirates. Law, Blackbeard, Crocodile etc. are former warlords who joined just for furthering their own goals. The current members of seven warlords are Mihawk, Kuma, Hancock, Buggy and Edward Weevil.

   Law and Doflamingo have left their positions after the events in Dressrosa.

To become a Shichibukai several criterias maybe looked upon but the final decision is taken by the Gorosei (Citation needed, but Gecko Moriah's termination etc. points to this direction).

A space must be vacant for a new Shichibukai to be selected. If there are already seven no new names would be considered.
A exhibition of strength against pirates is a must. Example. Blackbeard handed over a 550m Bounty Ace to the World government. Law gave 100 hearts of pirates. This is seen as a sign of pledging loyalty to the World Government.
Since Shichibukai are used as a tool of intimidation, the shichibukai are usually well known pirates with high bounties and potential, Blackbeard being a notable exception. Buggy despite being a weak pirate was recognized as a warlord because of the following he generated as well as his name being associated to Pirate King Roger and Yonko Shanks.

However, once admitted Shichibukai have some duties that are expected from them in order to continue as a Shichibukai. So if they don't do this their bounties may be re-activated.

They can't show open defiance to World Government. They can attack only other pirates and may be needed to pay some "tax" to the government. They shouldn't be defeated since this will malign their reputation which is one of the main requirement to intimidate other pirates.
They may be asked to do some tasks for the government, like fighting in wars (Example: Boa Hancock may have lost her seat as a Shichibukai if she declined to fight at Marineford Summit War), liberating islands etc. But their main purpose is to fight against other Pirates.

For more information of benefits of Shicibukai and how they are dismissed etc. refer to the wikia, One Piece - Shichibukai. There are some uncited claims so take them with a grain of salt.


How Did Krillin Get Stronger After Potential Unlock in DBZ?

Well the same could be said about Ultimate Gohan. The Elder Kai basically brought out Gohan's untapped potential. However, the  Ultimate Gohan in the Universal Survival arc is a lot stronger compared to the Ultimate Gohan in the Buu Saga. Even during the course of training, Picollo stated himself that Gohan could get a lot stronger.I believe a good explanation or the way to look at it would be this way. Fighter A is only using 75% of his power X when there is 25% of untapped power. However, the X can be modified by training. A good analogy would be comparing it Cell vs Gohan. Gohan's wasn't using all of his true power while fighting Cell in the start until he tapped into SSJ2. However, SSJ2 wasn't obviously the maximum level of strength Gohan could attain as he grew a lot stronger.


What kind of power does Charlotte Cracker have?

It is implied in both in the anime and the manga that the Soru Soru no Mi's power involves fear...

During Big Mom's first shown tantrum, Mascato had lifespan taken partially because of fear.

It is explained in the anime that if the person subjected to the Soru Soru no Mi attack had any trace of fear he or she would have his or her life span taken away.

So, although it wasn't explicitly stated in the manga or anime, Cracker probably did a power gush to induce fear in the soul implanted objects, causing them to lose the implanted "soul"


What are the differences of anime in 1990s and 2000s in terms of technology used?

This is a fairly tough question to answer, as most changes did not just apply to Anime, but to how movies, series and even advertisements as a whole, and the way they got made.

It is however an interesting time period you picked, considering the economic slump of the 90's, which they only started to recover from in 92

  A slump in advertising revenue, dwindling birthrates, and the popularity of alternative forms of entertainment like video games and cell phones have led to sluggish prime time ratings and a decline in the number of anime since the peak in 2006... ...The Japanese anime industry is at a turning point. - Nippon, 2013

Rise of 3D animation and CGI

All though 3D animation was already existent around the 1940's. It had a 'said' breakout year in 1991. As more and more studios started to adapt the technology, we can slowly see it replace older, more Traditional Animation techniques throughout the 90's and during the beginning of the millenia.

Due to these changes, there where also significant advances in the field. Such as the 2000 breakthrough in capturing the reflectance field over the human face, being the final breakthrough to making digital look-a-likes of actors, Or the 2001 Motion capture, photorealism, and uncanny valley.

The later of which was applied on the 2001 Japanese-American Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, which was the first photorealistic computer-animated feature film and remains the most expensive video game-inspired film of all time.

Besides obtaining a first in Photorealistic computer animation, Japan can also claim the title for being the first in using cel-shaded animation, with Appleseed.

  "innovative use of out-of-the-box animation software to create Hollywood-style effects at a tiny fraction of Hollywood budgets."
  Mark Schilling, The Japanese times & Toshio Suzuki president Studio Ghibli

Death of traditional animation

Traditional Animation, also known as hand drawn animations, or cel animation.

During the 90's as more and more studios started to adapt digitalized animation, the art of traditional animation started to slowly die out. Some studios dived straight into the deep, leaving traditional animation behind almost immediately, while others started by mixing the digital and traditional ways.

This would continue till FujiFilm, one of the major cel production companies, announced they would stop cel production, leading to a industry panic, hastening the switch to digital processes

Around the early 2000s most studios left behind traditional animation for the more modern, digital animation.

There was however 1 exception to this, Sazae-san. But even though it was the sole survivor, they also gave in to the modern age in 2013. When even they said goodbye to cel animation.

  "It's the culture of Japan. We want to continue making the paints even if that cuts into our profits."
  Taiyō Shikisai head Shigeji Kitamura

http://www.nippon.com/en/features/h00043/

begin 90's turning point facial animation
Historically speaking, the first SIGGRAPH tutorials on State of the art in Facial Animation in 1989 and 1990 proved to be a turning point in the field by bringing together and consolidating multiple research elements and sparked interest among a number of researchers
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_animation


Nenesha's soul was partially transmigrated into a Heart of the Land because despite Metafalica failing, the EXEC part of it was fully executed regardless because Raki just killed her and that didn't keep the song from fully manifesting its effects. (ref: Ar tonelico II Setting Encyclopedia, History section)

And Frelia couldn't even have created a Heart of the Land because her Tower was made by making the particles in the air vibrate to transform them into the materials that make up the Tower, which is an inert land made entirely from metal (ref: Ar tonelico III Setting Encyclopedia, Wave Theory section). A Heart of the Land proper creates a fully living land and requires far more complex processes and facilities for its creation.


What is "The Miracle" that 10,000 fans of KimiUso voted for?

There was the KimiUso Staff Talk Event at 2015/05/16 in Tokyo Japan.
"The Miracle” was explained by the staffs of KimiUso in this event.
http://live.nicovideo.jp/watch/lv218533566

We can not watch this live streaming already, but we can read the viewer's blog.
I reprint and translate the important point.

Japanese

  宣伝Aさんいわく、「何も考えてなかった」と。

English

  PR staff A told us to "I was not thinking about anything".

As it turns out, there was no miracle.
This is the most official conclusion.

We Japanese fans are thinking that the Miracle was the staff A's Uso = Lie :p


Can wearing sunglasses prevent sharingan?

The only known way to avoid the effects of the Sharingan have been to avert or completely cover one's eyes, or at least be able to block out the vision/chakra reach of the technique.  However, it's not necessarily the case that just doing that alone will help.

Given that the Sharingan's main strength are powerful genjutsu (illusion tactics), it's well within the realm of experienced/expert Sharingan users to be able to control more senses than just vision, and thus, averting eyes alone isn't quite enough to protect from the illusions.  I don't think sunglasses would help - you can still see through them, after all, so you would be able to have your vision compromised just as if you weren't wearing any.

Since you're still getting through the series, I won't spoil anything for you, but the fact that averting eyes isn't enough to avoid the powerful genjutsu produced by it plays a pivotal role towards the end of the series.


Why did Naruto need to summon his Shadow Clones during his fight with Pain?

Answer A: The one you are saying "releasing" the jutsu with the clone isn't possible. What Naruto trying to do is to release the Reverse Summoning which is a Space Time Ninjustsu not the Kage Bunshin.

It is said in the wiki that:

"all summoning-based techniques are space–time manipulation related, as they warp the targets through a dimensional void to the summoner's location. It appears that each specific space-time technique has its own unique dimensional void that no other technique can access."

That means you can't release technique from another (void) dimension wherein the clones are like sealed in a container.

Now to release the reverse summon, well that answers B:
You need the signed contract(scroll) which serves as the passage way in order for the user (like Naruto) to release the Reversed Summoning then release the Kage Bunshin.


In Monogatari, why is the boy with the reverse jagirinawa still alive?

Because Jagirinawa tried to kill Nadeko when the ritual was performed, there are 2 snakes on her body. The ritual of removal can be done only for one snake, the ritual is not strong enough to remove 2. So Araragi forcefully removed the rest, but was not strong enough and was stopped by Kanbaru by letting it go. Nadeko only have the pain from the curse, the boy didn't die because he's not doing the removal ritual and have no two curse in his body. So if the curse returns back to the boy, he only gets the pain.


What actually happened with sword maiden and her goblins?

What is it? Well, the following conversation happened on the same chapter, Chapter 29:

Goblin Slayer: You knew everything, didn't you?
Sword Maiden: What do you mean 'everything'?
Goblin Slayer: The cause and the extent of the goblin nest in the sewers. Maybe even who's behind it.
Sword Maiden: Yes...Yes, I did.

Contrary to the other answer, the Sword Maiden did not tell Goblin Slayer's party that they were doing a rat-related quest. Rather, it was implied that they were doing a goblin-slaying quest from the very beginning and that they were already told so before arriving in the water town. From Volume 2 Chapter 2 of the light novel:

Sword Maiden: Goodness. Who might you be...?
Goblin Slayer: We've come to slay the goblins.

If the Sword Maiden knew that and didn't tell the adventurers wouldn't that mean the Sword Maiden risked the adventurers' lives unnecessarily? Isn't that betrayal?
The Sword Maiden, as it was eventually revealed, is traumatized by what happened to her. She still fears the goblins. She said this herself:

After all, if goblins attacked, I’m sure I would just…break down weeping.

Why did she blame the murders on the goblins, when they were just underneath the town? It was revealed that she wants to pin the blame on them because she wants to instill the same fear she had of the goblins to the townspeople. Personally, it would be much simpler if she told Goblin Slayer's party everything since it still concerns goblins and he would not deny the quest.
She probably thought of hiding these details due to the expectations she had of Goblin Slayer. This might be proven by the existence of the ballad about Goblin Slayer, which she heard. Dwarf Shaman revealed to him that 'when word of your doings gets around, everyone will want you to slay their goblins for them!' People would expect someone as strong and capable if his/her deeds are sang and spread as ballads, and Sword Maiden probably expected Goblin Slayer to easily deal with them.
Are the goblins brought by the Sword Maiden? Did the Sword Maiden betray all the adventurers? No, she did not betray them nor bring the goblins. Remember that she was once captured and tortured by goblins. Goblin Slayer noted that the way they (the women) were killed could not be possibly done by goblins. Also, in Volume 2:

Goblins are cowardly, cruel, brutal, and not very smart. It would probably never occur to them to linger in human territory to vivisect and devour their prey. Their unfortunate captives were always taken back to the nest, to be diligently stripped of their virtue there. Or, if the prisoners were numerous enough, the goblins might simply toy with them until they died.

Volume 2 of the light novel explains this properly, I suggest reading it if you have the time. To, again, quote from there:

Sword Maiden was quite aware of the movements of the Evil Sect, against which she herself had once stood. When she had learned of the ghastly rituals of living sacrifice they were performing, she had a good idea of what they wanted to achieve.
Revenge on her.

The goblins were most likely just a tool used by the sect. Aside from revenge, it was also hinted that they plan to do something with the Gate Mirror, albeit it was not specified.
They mentioned something about no rat quests. Why? Is it related? When Sword Maiden asked why Goblin Slayer suspected her to be hiding some information, he told her it was for a number of reasons. One being that he didn't think the encounter with the white alligator was not planned, simply because it chased them away but attacked the goblins, and another being the town having ruins yet there were no maps, rat-killing quests, adventurers nor patrols underground. He said it was impossible and that there had to be something standing guard down there, leading him to the conclusion that the white alligator was a familiar, guarding the ruins.


How did Alphonse rebound his soul to his previous body?

So here's a summary of the timeline/trades:

Ed trades his leg for their mother. The leg ends up with Truth in the white space outside the gate.
Al trades his body and soul for their mother. Body and soul end up with Truth in the white space outside the gate (different white space than Ed's).
Ed trades his arm for Al's soul. Al's soul comes back to the real world. Ed's arm ends up with his leg in the white space.
Most of the series happens here.
Ed's automail arm is destroyed. Al trades his soul for Ed's arm (reversing the trade in 3). Al's soul goes back to the white space and merges with his body, Ed's arm comes back to the real world.
Ed trades his alchemy for the entirety of Al that's still in the white space with Truth: Al's body and soul.

So, Ed never gets his leg back (you can see he still has the automail leg at the end post time skip). Al does a trade himself in 5, which merges his body and soul and gives Ed his arm again, and then Ed brings all of Al back by trading his alchemy.


What is the title of this song on the Pupa OST?

Pupa's OST was composed by KONISHI Kayo and KONDO Yukio (who, together, make up the musical unit MOKA☆). Unfortunately, I think that's as good an answer as you're going to get, given that the soundtrack hasn't been (and, I'm guessing, never will be) released.

If you liked the music in Pupa, perhaps you would like to listen to the soundtrack of Elfen Lied, which was also composed by Konishi and Kondo.


Are all the Initiators/Cursed Children 10 years old? Were there none born after that?

According to the Black Bullet Wiki, the births of the Cursed Children are listed as a single year - 2021 - with Enju and Satomi pairing up in 2030.

So I guess the answer is yes, they're all 10 years old +/- 11 months.

The Initiator page also claims that they're all 10 year-old girls.


Okay here's the deal! Though his elemental chakra nature is unspecified ....since he uses a spiritual jutsu we can say that his chakra nature or more specifically his jutsu nature is "yin release" ..... (Like that of shadow bind of nara clan)
Update: It is not only yin but also "yang release" cause he share his physical damage too ... so it might be a "Yin-Yang release"


How did Luffy get the scar on his chest?

I think Luffy got the scar during Marineford War. It's on Vol. 59 Chapter 578 and Episode 487.
After his brother Ace died, Jinbe carried him and tried to escape to Akainu. Jinbe jumps into the sea but finds the water below to be frozen. Akainu manages to strike Jinbe and harm Luffy at the same time. Jinbe apologizes to Luffy for letting him get injured.

It can be seen in this image that Luffy's chest is burning after Akainu's punch past through Jinbe's body.
One Piece Wiki also did mention how Luffy got the X-Mark after the time skip

After the Timeskip
After those two years, a few things have changed. Luffy wears an open, long-sleeved red cardigan with four buttons (which shows the X-shaped scar covering most of his chest he received by then-Admiral Akainu), with a yellow sash tied around his waist, somewhat reminiscent of Gol D. Roger's outfit. He has grown slightly taller and is shown to be significantly more muscular due to his training. This can be seen in his slightly thicker neck, more pronounced deltoids, and better-defined chest.
(Emphasis mine)


Why do we not see spiritual powers run in human families?

Fullbring is not a genetic trait, being a Quincy is one.

A person get Fullbring if his/her mother survives a Hollow attack while being pregnant with the person. Period. The actual manifestation of the power is, like all almost super powers in Bleach, only limited by what Tite Kubo could think of.

I don't know what's the deal with Shinigami families, though. And Hollow families are even more complicated, because they fuse from time to time.

Then there is the Dragon Ball, err, the Hougyoku. Grants deepest desires. Orohime's power comes from that. In fact we do not now if it is know genetically anchored within her.

So besides Quincy/Shinigami and maybe Hollow powers, simply no genetically anchored powers are shown in the series.


Why do some translations call them "Queerrats", while others call them "Monster Rats"?

This is purely a matter of different translators translating a word in different ways.

The Japanese word in question is バケネズミ（化鼠） bakenezumi. This can be taken as "monster rat1" (化物の鼠) or as "transformed rat" (化けた鼠). It is quite reasonable to translate bakenezumi as "Monster Rat", but it is also easy to see how a translator wishing to be a bit more flashy might choose the term "Queerrat" (with "queer" in the classical sense of "weird, peculiar", not the modern sense of "homosexual").

This latter choice makes some sense insofar as bakenezumi is (I believe) an original coining for From the New World, and so it is not a bad idea to coin an original English word to correspond to it.

It seems unlikely to me that the translators who chose "Queerrat" did so as a form of social commentary.

1 Technically, Japanese nezumi can refer to mice, rats, and a number of related rodenty organisms. If you've watched the entire show, you will understand why "rat" is the correct choice here.


Tokyo Ghoul Re: Anime what part in the manga?

Since the fourth season, the anime covers all of the manga story (with a gap between seasons 3 and 4, on the other hand).


Why Merus didnt fight Moro along with Goku, Vegeta and Buu?

Chapter 55 explained that Merus was an angel-in-training, whose laws forbid them from fighting.

As explained by the Grand Minister and Whis, angels are ruled by several laws designed to prevent undue intervention within mortal events. They are to stay as neutral as possible, and are not allowed to use their angel powers as long as they are in training.

Merus acting as a Galactic Patrol agent was allowed as a "grey-area" type of behavior, since he only used standard-issue guns, armors and gadgets to complete his missions (along with his natural fast speed). Likewise, Merus training Goku was allowed as he didn't use his angelic powers and only imparted knowledge upon a mortal.

You can read about these laws and restraints in Dragon Ball Super 55's official release on Mangaplus.


Mercury, Mars, Minerva, Diana, Apollo, and Vulcan are all Roman deities, yes. In particular, they are six of the twelve Consentes, the Roman counterparts of the twelve major Olympians of Greek myth. What's a little bit weird is that while there are six female Consentes, that set of six isn't the same as the set of six represented as the "Jupiter sisters" in TWGOK. Minerva and Diana are female in Roman legend, but the other four are male. (I suppose this is in keeping with the time-honored anime tradition of gender-bending.)

Some of the traits of the sisters described on the wiki page you linked are traits that were associated with the deities with which they share their name. For example, legendary Mars is the god of war, while TWGOK Mars is "adept at combat"; legendary Apollo cures illness in many legends, while TWGOK Apollo is "adept at healing spells"; etc.

The same wiki page you linked suggests that the picture you included in your question might be a reference to the caryatid statuary at the Erechtheion.


How to explain to my 10 year old niece that Puella Magi Madoka Magica is not a kids show?

Perhaps by letting them know that in Japan, Puella Magi Madoka Magica is a late night anime, not a children's anime?

Children's anime in Japan is an anime that caters to audience from baby up to middle schooler. Examples are Pretty Cure series (and most of magical girl anime), Doraemon, Hello Kitty, and Pokèmon. The screening times are either morning (weekend) or evening, where children are on their free time (not school time).

Late night anime, on the other hand, tends to cater to audience from teenage to young adult, usually with more serious & in-depth plot, and even violence and sexual topic. Other examples are Cowboy Bebop, Rozen Maiden, and Attack on Titan. The screening time may start as early as 10pm, up to 2am, the time which children should have been sleeping.

For your 10-year-old niece case... I think I can agree with other answers: let her watch it with  parental guidance (though I wish their parents should have known about this anime first), then let her judge the anime by herself.

P.S. Sailor Moon series is also listed as children's anime, and I could argue with myself that the series sometimes also has dark and adult-oriented theme that can only be understood by older viewers, so...

Most of the info was taken from Japanese Wikipedia, not its English counterpart, since it's more descriptive.


The way I see it, Life Force is a completely different energy from chakra.

Chakra can be depleted and restored (even though if you deplete it too much, you die). When Life Force gets used in a technique, the user's vitality usually takes a hit, as well as his life-span. (Nagato was left completely drained, and never recovered from using the Gedo Mazo in battle).
Life Force was seen to be transferred and infused in other individuals to revive them. Both "super healing" and actual bringing back from the dead was seen. Mere "chakra" does not have this property.
Life Force seem to have some sort of connection with the Yang (or physical) energy your body produces, and mixed with Yin to form chakra.

Spoilers:

   Not to mention humans once lived without chakra, and it was given to them by the God Tree, the term "Life Force" indicates that without it there can be no life, hence the two are different.

So what is Life Force?

The term is very hazy, it wasn't explicitly explained or discussed in the series, but from what I get, it's a completely different energy, closely related to the Yang energy, and it determines your vitality and life-span.


Preventing manga books from having yellow pages

Although I have no manga, I do have a large comic book collection. I protect them with "comic book bags" (or sleeves) and anti-acidic cardboard.  They are stored in special boxes designed for comic books.  These supplies are also available and fitted for manga.  You can store 1 or 2 books per bag.  If two, you place them back to back, with an anti-acidic card in-between.

There are several vendors.  The one I use is Bags Unlimited, which has been around since 1976.  They have a huge number of "archival supplies" for comics, books, CDs, magazines, you name it.

I just read @Maroon's comment. Once yellowed and brittle, you can't do much about it.  But the purpose of the anti-acidic paper is to minimize damage to the books in the first place by helping neutralize the acids in the paper stock of the books.


What happened to the Japanese Task-Force building after L's death?

Ohba never has stated what happened to the Task-Force headquarters. If L left a will, his assets would have to pass to his heir (I doubt he had a legal document for that case with all that secrecy around him, but who knew). Even if L died without a will, that building still could be one of the properties that his succesor Near inherited, like the money he literaly thrown out the window. Maybe the building is now administrated by an executor (maybe Roger) or a frontman.


Fu is a character who made his debut in Dragon Ball Xenoverse 2. He is a mutation of the 2 main Antagonists of the game, Mira and Towa. He comes from the Demon Realm and was considered to be Dabura's successor, (Note: Dabura is the same Demon King from Dragon Ball Z whose sister happens to be Towa).Despite being an antagonist and having a rather evil appearance, you couldn't necessarily call him evil. He is a very powerful being and inherited his power from Mira and at the same time, he also inherited Towa's  intelligence, hence making him very interested in science. He was originally created in Dragon Ball Online and made an appearance in the guidebook, however, his first debut is in Xenoverse 2 in the latest DLC. You can find out more about the character by playing Fu's arc in the game.


At some point in the Fate/Stay Night game, it's revealed that the holy grail can be summoned without having sacrificed all of the necessary servants. The grail won't be all-powerful, but it should still be plenty powerful for most wishes. Because the grail was activated while some of the servants were still alive, it was not at full power, hence the destruction (the only wish it is able to grant in its current corrupted form) is less than what it could be.

Spoilers for F/SN game:

  The fact that the grail wasn't all-powerful and yet still caused so much destruction is why Kotomine sets in motion the events of the 5th grail war. By keeping Gilgamesh and beating the newly summoned servants, Kotomine would be able to see the grail at full power. In fact, six servants would be sufficient for any wish "within the limits of this world" (whatever that means), but Kotomine wants to know what would happen with all seven.

This is also important for at least one F/SN route:

   On the UBW good end, the grail is summoned while both Saber and Archer are present. The fact that Archer is still alive is not known at the time, even to Gilgamesh. In this case, the grail was summoned into an impure vessel as well, because Gilgamesh believes that the more corrupt the vessel, the greater the destruction it can bring.


Well as far as at the end of DBZ, we can concluded that all of the saiyans including Vegeta are pure hearted. This is because one of the condition of the Super Saiyan God transformation was that 5 pure hearted Saiyans needed to come together and since the transformation worked, it can be concluded all of them are pure hearted post Z.

Secondly, The Omni king isn't powerful in terms of raw power. What makes him terrifying is his position and the ability to erase anything from existence. Even the angels and  the grand priest and of course the gods, the strongest beings of the universe bow down before him so what makes you think Vegito blue could stand up to him.

Goku on the other hand has no evil in him. The only reason for him wanting the tournament is his addiction to battle and at the same time his rather naive and careless nature could be considered at fault for the tournament of power.

However, it was implied that goku did actually do the other universes a favour(Although he didn't intend to) as Zeno was about to erase the rest of the universes with a lower mortal  ranking.


What character is this man with a gigantic, red-white-black, mace-like weapon cosplaying as in Hyper Japan?

Asking around on Discord, that character is actually not from an anime or manga but rather from a game titled League of Legends. It's a skin from one of it's characters named Jayce. Not sure if this would be considered on topic, then. I'll leave it up to those who know better.

Anyway, here's a picture for comparison:

Credits goes entirely to Discord user 'Untarnished' who identified it.


Which Trunks is stronger in Dragon Ball Heroes, future Trunks or Xeno Trunks?

Xeno-Trunks most probably is quite stronger than Future Trunks.

First, it should be noted that the Dragon Ball Heroes continuity (from which Xeno Trunks comes) is wildly inconsistent when it comes to scaling and power levels. All battles and transformations shown are created for the sake of game promotion and fan-service. So every feat must be taken with a grain of salt. Depending on whether you use the game, the manga or the anime as a basis for your comparisons, results can vary. I have chosen to rely on the DBH anime here since I am most familiar with that source.

The Super Saiyan 4 and Super Saiyan Blue are considered among fans to be roughly equals. This was implicitly chosen as true by the DBH anime : in episode 1, Xeno SSJ4 Goku and SSB Goku have a short skirmish, which concludes as a tie. Granted, their fight didn't last and they didn't go all out, but this can be interpreted as the anime deciding those forms are roughly equal.

Meanwhile, within the (canonical) Dragon Ball Super anime, we can see SSB Vegeto against Fused Zamasu. The saiyan warrior doesn't crush Zamasu, but still handles himself fairly well. On the other hand, Future Trunks is unceremoniously blown back, even with an enraged power boost. Future Trunks only slays Fused Zamasu after creating the Sword of Hope, which is basically a fortuitous Genkidama created around Future Trunks' sword. Trunks doesn't know that technique, and only used it by accident in extremely specific circumstances. We can conclude that Future Trunks is weaker than SSB Vegeto.

Now, what about Xeno Trunks ? The climax of the Super Dragon Ball Heroes anime involves Mechikabura, the Demon King, fighting both against Xeno SSJ4 Vegeto and Super Saiyan God Trunks. As we have previously established, Xeno SSJ4 Vegeto should be comparable to SSB Vegeto. Moreover, Xeno SSG Trunks is essential in sealing Mechikabura, as he deals a crucial blow to his torso and allows Xeno Vegeto to conclude the battle. We can infer from this battle that Xeno Trunks is stronger than Future Trunks, at least if Future Trunks doesn't have the Sword of Hope.

It should be noted, however, that SSG Xeno Trunks wielded the Key Sword against Mechikabura. That relic was supercharged by Demigra, Chronoa and Tokitoki, who all possess god-level ki and powers. If SSG Xeno Trunks didn't have the Key Sword at that time, he probably wouldn't have fared as well against Mechikabura.

In the end, we can only remember that anything related to Dragon Ball Heroes or Dragon Ball Xenoverse is fully non-canonical, and that their sense of scaling and relative power levels is fuzzy at best.


Why do anime production studios never seem to announce if they plan to cancel a series, often just leaving it in limbo for years?

This is because, from the perspective of production, not planning to make more episodes is not the same as definitely will not make more episodes.  In the same vein, not planning to drop your phone on concrete is not the same as definitely will not drop your phone on concrete.  There is always a chance that an anime series can come back or make more episodes, in the same way that there is always a chance that you will drop your phone on concrete.

Anime production is quite expensive, often with narrow green-lighting windows to actually make content.  So, the main hope is that the show that you're producing can gain and garner enough support to justify the expense that it's going to take when it's produced.

If it doesn't...then it makes logical sense that it won't have a continuation.  No funds to continue production is a sure-fire way to have a one-and-done anime.

(This is why it's especially important for you to support the series you want to see more of by buying the DVDs/BluRays and the merchandise.)

I would argue, though, there have been very few - if any - animes that have actually been outright cancelled.  Because of the narrow way that animes are produced to begin with - only enough budget for a single cour which may cover a portion of earlier work - it's always been, in my experience, either delays or hiatuses or something else besides an outright cancellation.

Furthermore, you never know what the future holds.  Some voice actors who weren't available or wouldn't be available to take on those kinds of roles in the moment may free up at some point in the future, so there's always a possibility that the work (if there's more reference material to go off of) could be continued in the future.


How is there a McDonalds in Weathering with You?

According to an interview (credits to reddit for the source) with the author, Makoto Shinkai asked for permission to use McDonalds within his works. After some time, his request was granted.

You feature McDonald’s at one point. Did you want to convey the city in an almost photo-real way?
MAKOTO SHINKAI: I wasn’t aiming for photo-realism, but I did want the audience to recognise the places and recognise that this Tokyo is the place where they live. For global corporations like McDonald’s, there are actually a lot of restrictions about featuring them in animation. You need permission, for example, if you want to draw their logo. I approached McDonald’s Japan and asked them if I could feature McDonald’s in my film, because I thought it was essential as part of the real Tokyo that I wanted to show. They initially refused because there is a gun in the film, but I went back several times and I eventually managed to convince them.