Why doesn't Edward transmute any large blocks or weapons other than spears and a blade?

Two reasons (one in-universe and one out-of-universe): character definition and familiarity.

Character definition (and easy identification) are part of a good story.  Say you see an image from an FMA:B episode and you see flames shooting across the screen but can't see who's attacking.  Any guesses as to who's lighting it up?  If you didn't guess Roy Mustang, well, we need to educate you in the ways of FMA:B.  See pink sparkles and muscles, who is it?  Major Armstrong.  Red lightning and explosions?  Kimblee.  The list goes on.

By giving each person a distinct fighting style, it does a few things for the story.  It helps people to differentiate characters.  It helps people to find someone they can admire / relate to / enjoy watching.  It also keeps things interesting.  Mustang is an absolute terror to fight against.  Until you get him wet, then he becomes the laughing stock of the show.

As far as in-universe reasons, I'm sure it has to do with familiarity.  For example, Major Armstrong is always shouting about his "alchemical style that has been passed down the Armstrong line for generations".  That's how he was trained to fight.  And he's good at it.  It plays to his strengths.

But think about it.  Could Armstrong create a sword if he needed it?  Sure, draw the appropriate circle and poof, sword.  But I doubt he would be terribly efficient with it.  Look at the way he moves.  He moves like a boxer and wrestler.  Trying to do that with a sword just wouldn't work.  Fighting with swords is different from hand to hand combat.  Which is different from using guns or throwing fireballs or ...

One other thing to consider is the need for transmutation circles.  Most alchemists keep their favorite one handy.  Armstrong's gauntlet things or Mustang's gloves have a circle on them to enable their preferred alchemy.  I doubt most people keep a plethora of those handy for whatever they need.  That would also imply they have the knowledge to use multiple types of alchemy.  While most alchemists can handle the basics, they tend to specialize.  There are multiple mentions of alchemists who specialize in things like medicinal alchemy, chimeras, etc.

I know you've asked about Ed specifically and I'll address that now.  Ed is a special case.  He doesn't need a circle, so he should be able to theoretically do whatever he wants.  But, as stated above, he may not know enough about a particular type of alchemy to use it effectively.  Just because he wants to use a gun in a fight doesn't make it a good idea.  Does he know how to make a good gun?  Ammo?  Can he hit the broad side of a barn even if he had the gun?  No, Ed is going to use what he knows he can be good with.

Not sure if you are there yet, but Ed was trained by Izumi Curtis.  And part of that training was hand-to-hand sparring.  So Ed is trained in and comfortable with close quarters combat.  So his choices in weapons are going to reflect that.  So an arm blade or spear are going to suit him nicely.  A gun or cannon aren't going to make good weapons.  Too much potential for collateral damage, hurting yourself, etc. especially if you aren't proficient with them.  Could he try blowing stuff up like Kimblee?  I suppose, but he's just as likely to wound himself as his opponent if he can't control it well.

TL/DR:  Ed is trained in close quarters combat.  So he picks weapons that play to that strength.  Anything else would like be a burden or liability if he tried it out in real combat for the first time.


I've seen this chapter cover that shows Mr.2 Bon Kurei is alive and is the new Queen of Newkama Land, so most probably he/she survived after Luffy left him in Impel Down. And aside from this I haven't read or seen him in any chapters after the Impel Down arc.


Where to start reading KonoSuba light novel after watching the anime and movie?

The KonoSuba anime covers the first 4 volumes of the light novel, and according to Wikipedia, the Legend of Crimson movie was based on Volume 5 of the light novel, Crimson Magic Clan, Let's & Go!!.
So, you might want to start from Volume 6, but take note that there are always differences between the adaptation.


red-haired crew, no devil fruit, still really strong?

Right now we know very little about their abilities.  We do not know whether they have any Devil Fruits. Even Shanks, who we know did not have a devil fruit when he lost his arm, could have eaten one more recently.

That being said many strong characters don't have devil fruits.  Silvers stopped Kizaru and was shown swimming later. The majority of the Strawhats still do not have Devil Fruits including 2 of the 3 strongest fighters.

Haki (and possibly Sea Stone) seems to allow non-Devil Fruit users to fight evenly with Devil Fruit users. Shanks has been shown to have incredibly powerful Conqueror's Haki to the extent that he damaged Whitebeard's ship with no visible effort or action.  It is likely several others (especially those who halted admirals) have Haki too.

We know that Ben Beckman is the smartest person to come from the East Blue which puts him above both Nami and Captain Kuro (man of 1000 plans). Yassop is a powerful sniper like Ussop (who is more skilled that a platoon of WG soldiers despite appearances).  Rockstar had a bounty of 94,000,000 Beri.

We literally only know the names of 5 of Shank's crew (the above and Lucky Roo) though we have seen several more.  There is no telling what insane abilities each member of the crew might have when we know so little.  The few we do know were able to at least intimidate marine admirals.  There is more out of universe (fan theory really) evidence that one day Sanji will confront Kizaru and Zoro will confront Fujitora. I don't think anyone would doubt that they are powerful crew mates and will likely never rely on devil fruit powers.


I don't think it can.
For instance: in the starting Naruto episodes, when Kakashi was trapped in a water ball by Zabuza, he could not get out until Naruto intervened (the first time it was shown that he could use his brain).

So I don't think Jutsu can pass through a Jutsu created barrier, but can break through if its weaker (kind of obvious). In other words, when Jutsu clash, it must be the battle of chakras between the barrier caster(s) and the one trapped.


What is this manga with a female protagonist that changes genders and personalities based on the rings she wears?

As @Krazer pointed out, your description matches that of the Korean manhwa series PhD: Phantasy Degree, wherein the female protagonist changes genders each time a ring is removed from her finger, as well as each ring having its own "personality."

From the link above:

  A young, spunky, fearless girl named Sang is searching for the Demon School Hades. She runs into a group of misfit monsters who are all ditching classes from the same school. Sang convinces them to take her to the school ... and, since only monsters are allowed in, she 'monsterizes' herself by letting one of the misfits - a vampire - bite her. After the destruction of the Demon School Hades at the hands of the Madosa Guild in volume 3, she moves on to search for more of "Satan's Rings". She meets Chun-Lang, a young swordsman, who also has a Ring, and like Sang, can change genders.


How is Walpurgisnacht's appearance predicted?

As a matter of fact, Kyoko asked Homura the same question regarding Walpurgisnacht's appearance, to which Homura responds with a single word:

  Statistics.

Well... I think you can take Akemi Homura's word for it. She has experienced so many timelines, planning and fighting the Walpurgisnacht witch, gradually learning more and more about it every time.

I suppose she's done a lot of data analytics about the witch with all the information she has collected throughout the timelines! Graphs, annotated sketches of the Walpurgisnacht witch and maps of Mitakihara city feature at Homura's residence. Also note that among the timelines shown, all of them place the fight scene of magical girls vs the Walpurgisnacht witch in one of the lakes/water bodies of Mitakihara city.

Here's Homura indicating the location of the witch...

Edit:

I would suggest that Mami knew about Walpurgis in the first timeline of episode 10 only because Kyubey said so. After all, the Incubators do plant grief seeds across the city, which hatch into witches. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if the Walpurgisnacht was the work of the Incubators. In all their advanced technology and magic, the Incubators may even fabricate grief seeds which has the essence of an agglomerate of regular witches...


Is Super Saiyan 4 Vegito transformation the same Super Saiyan 4 transformation we know or it's an upgrade?

Both Xeno Goku and Xeno: Vegeta were in their SSJ4 forms before and it was more or less established as their maximum level of power. Hence, Xeno: Vegito here is indeed using the same SSJ4 form.


Is there a significance in the names of the artificial spirits?

This is a community wiki starting point of an answer. Feel free to either contribute to this or append your own answer.

Shinku’s artificial spirit is Hollie. This could be connected to Ilex (e.g. Ilex aquifolium), the prickly plant with the red berries.
Hina-Ichigo’s artificial spirit is Berrybell. Potentially a connection of a ringing bell and a (straw)berry.
Kanaria’s artificial spirit is Pizzicato. This is a violin playing technique also referred to as plucking — fitting with the general violin/music theme of Kanaria.
Souseiseki’s artificial spirit is Lempicka. This has the same spelling as the Polish art deco painter Tamara Łempicka, although the katakana spelling of the spirit implies a different pronunciation. I don’t know if a connection exists.
…


Why are cherry blossom so prevalent in anime?

Cherry blossoms are very prominent in Japanese culture. From Wikipedia:

  In Japan, cherry blossoms also symbolize clouds due to their nature of blooming en masse, besides being an enduring metaphor for the ephemeral nature of life, an aspect of Japanese cultural tradition that is often associated with Buddhistic influence, and which is embodied in the concept of mono no aware. The association of the cherry blossom with mono no aware1 dates back to 18th-century scholar Motoori Norinaga. The transience of the blossoms, the extreme beauty and quick death, has often been associated with mortality; for this reason, cherry blossoms are richly symbolic, and have been utilized often in Japanese art, manga, anime, and film, as well as at musical performances for ambient effect. There is at least one popular folk song, originally meant for the shakuhachi (bamboo flute), titled "Sakura", and several pop songs. The flower is also represented on all manner of consumer goods in Japan, including kimono, stationery, and dishware.

1 Mono no aware (物の哀れ) [...] is a Japanese term for the awareness of impermanence (無常 mujō), or transience of things, and a gentle sadness (or wistfulness) at their passing.

So yes, they do have a special significance.


In the Dreamworld, why was Minato and Kushina like how they were when naruto first met them

Based on your description of Kiba being a cat lover, I am assuming you are referring to the Road to Ninja movie. While some characters do contain alternate personalities, not everybody's personalities changed in this world

  The majority of the movie takes place in an alternate dimension known as the Genjutsu World, where almost the entire cast has different personalities and behaviours compared to their actual selves. Despite this, however, some still possess their own personalities and behaviours.

This Genjustu World was created by Tobi's Limited Tsukuyomi in hopes to capture Kurama. While Minato's and Kushina's personalities did not change, their roles change with Sakura's parents

  The illusion is a prototype of the Infinite Tsukuyomi and was influenced by both Naruto's deep desire to have parents and Sakura's desire for freedom from parental control. Their desires, in turn, create a scenario where Minato Namikaze, who never became Fourth Hokage, and Kushina Uzumaki are alive and Sakura's parents, Kizashi and Mebuki Haruno, died defending the village


Where does the term "3D girl" come from?

2d girls are called as such because they are portrayed through screens, pages and other flat surfaces. Even when made into figurines and other items they are still usually referred to their main medium.

Note that computer generated characters like in Knights of Sidonia are usually treated as 2d persons because of their medium, despite being 3d.

Girls are called 3d by otaku (often derogatory) when they talk about girls in the real world - where there is a concept of 'depth', a third dimension.
Again the term 3d girl is used when they are depicted in photographs or similar, because we reside and interact with these people in a 3d world.

Otaku who prefer 2d women occasionally offensively use the phrase '3DPD', or "3d, pig disgusting"

2d girl vs 3d girl.

I don't believe there is an 'origin' for this, as dimensions are facts and this difference has always existed. However, the term has probably picked up usage with the rise of the internet and raised  popularity of anime


Anyone know what series this image belongs to?

The original uncropped image is from Dorei Kishi 1 「奴隷騎士Ⅰ」, a Fate/stay night hentai manga by the doujinshi circle KUSARI. On a prior page is printed

  陵辱連鎖シリーズ＋オリジナルイラスト集

which translates to:

  Ryoujoku Rensa Series + Original Illustration Collection

Ryoujoku Rensa is another hentai manga by KUSARI, based on the 2005 eroge novel of the same title. It is clear that the image is an original illustration.


You made a small mistake, with regard to the rules of the earth's Dragon Balls, they can be used to grant up to 3 wishes. However, if one of the wishes involves reviving a large number of people, it can only be used to grant up to 2 wishes.With regard to your main question, as to whether the Dragon Balls would work on another planet, the answer is Yes, at least in case of the Namekian Dragon Balls. We know this because they were used to revive Krillin, Yamcha, Tien and Chiaotzu on earth which you can see here.Hence, to answer your wife's question. Yes! It would've been certainly possible. However, there are reasons why that wouldn't work with the narrativeThe first is Frieza's character. Frieza was considered to one of the strongest fighter in the Universe. A Universal emperor and it would be very unlike him to take the dragon balls and hide it when he could take it from anyone he pleases simply because of how powerful he was. The Frieza then didn't fear anyone. Although the Frieza in DBS would do something like that, the Frieza in DBZ wouldn't simply because of how strong he was.Now with regard to Vegeta, he began collecting the Namekian Dragon Balls when he heard about Frieza wanting to collect them. So ideally, Vegeta would want to collect the Dragon Balls immediately before Frieza does and make his wish. At the same time, Vegeta had absolutely no intention of confronting Frieza or engage in combat with him. If Vegeta spent time taking every single Dragon Ball he had to another planet, came back and repeated the process, Frieza would've most likely found a Dragon Ball  during this period of time. This would require Vegeta to confront Frieza and engage in battle with him which is something he clearly wanted to avoid at that point in time. So on account of the situation, it would have been impractical for Vegeta to do this fast enough to be able to get all Dragon balls and wish for immortality.


Who are the four heroes who can face Elder Centipede according to Gyoro Gyoro?

The four heroes that can defeat Elder Centipede according to Gyoro Gyoro:

The Tornado of Terror
Metal Knight
King
Blast

He said it in Chapter 84: Escalation.

Pages that he said it:


Why doesn't Pain use other paths when his bodies are killed?

I don't know for sure but my guess is that Kishimoto did that on purpose because if he didn't Naruto wouldn't have a chance against Pain, so basically it's just his way of making Pain NOT perfect leaving the others with a possibility of revealing his secret(weakness) and getting a chance to fight back (since naruto must win at the end).


What is the Gundam anime and movies and OVA order?

There are 6 different accepted universes within the Gundam Multiverse.
Each has its own characters unique to its timeline, and does not intersect with any other timelines (ex: In Gundam Wing, the events from Mobile Suit Gundam never happened).
They are listed as follows:
Universal Century Time line (Best place to start to get into it, every single Gundam series out there is rooted in characters/gundam from this time line).
In order they are:

Mobile Suit Gundam
Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam
Mobile Suit Gundam ZZ
Char's Counterattack
MS Gundam 0080: War in the Pocket MS
Gundam F91 MS Gundam 0083: Stardust Memory
MS Victory Gundam
MS Gundam Unicorn.
Turn A Gundam (This series is really good and is a huge shift in focus from prior gundams. Its set roughly 1000 years in the future, and Turn A is quite possibly the most powerful Gundam in the entire Gundam franchise).

After Colony Timeline This is probably where most people are introduced into the Gundam world. A group of space colony scientists build Gundams piloted by young boys in hopes of weakening Earths oppressive Government.

Gundam Wing
Endless Waltz

Cosmic Era Timeline If the Universal Century seems to "old" for your tastes, this is a great place to jump into Gundam.

Gundam SEED
Gundam SEED Destiny
Gundam SEED MSV Astray
Gundam SEED Stargazer

After War Timeline Welcome to your post apocalyptic Gundam universe. Basically the series take place after a giant colony is dropped on Earth, wiping out almos the entire population.

Gundam X

Future Century Timeline Instead of giant wars and colonies fighting one another, rulers are decided by a Gundam tournament that occurs every 4 years.

G Gundam

Anno Domini Timeline Several factions are constantly vying for power when a mysterious group known as Celestial Beings creates Gundams that are years beyond an current MS technology.

Gundam 00

That concludes our journey through the very bumpy Gundam multiverse lane. I left out a few movies and tv specials, but I think I captured the bigger picture here. Now go forth, and become Gundam maesters!
The above was found here.


What was Balalaika doing with the porn videos?

The scene in the manga (ch 9 pg 6-7) this is referencing is only a page and a half long and unless the translation I read was wonky the setup is different than the anime. In the anime as you saw Balalaika is using some sort of playback equipment and fiddling with a porn video and she comments about how she has "15 more to do" and she "should've gotten an intern to do it" which makes it seem as though she's editing the videos, that she's kind of a workaholic and didn't outsource this rather tacky job, kind of a weird scene but whatever, there isn't anything deeper going on. In the manga the scene is simpler and I think it makes more sense, Balalaika is actually just watching porn while the Black Lagoon cronies relay their message, there's no editing equipment, just a TV and then either Rock or Revy says that they have 15 errands to do (not Balalaika). There isn't anything deeper going on here either but it does give some fun characterization to Balalaika who is spending her free time watching porn, full deadpan and can't be bothered to pause it when conversing work with the Black Lagoonies


Are the new fighters' names a pun on something?

According to the wiki page, they are named after mollusks.

Saonel's name could reference snail, while pirina's name come from pilina


Who is the guy that Shirou passes in the Clock Tower that he mentions he recognizes?

It seems to be Twice H. Pieceman or someone that looks like him at least.

As for why they decided to show him... I'm not sure, but...

It would seem that he and Shiro (or rather EMIYA) shares some common viewpoints about war (orphaned by conflict), but ultimatly came to different conclusions on what to do.


Does Ira Gamagori have an official height?

The below height chart has been circulating around the internet:

But I don't think it's accurate, so I did some rough calculations using a different source.

The circulated chart puts Gamagori at 2.69m or 8" 8'

KillLaKill.com have some character profiles on their site of the different characters.

If we assume Ryuko has the average female Japanese height - 158 cm (5 ft 2 in), then we could estimate Gamagori's height by resizing the images so that the scale of the characters is more reasonable. I used head size for this, as the differences should be smaller than if we compared other features:

1.58m * 1.66 Ryukos = 2.6228m or 8"7'. This is quite similar to the above image

There are obviously lots of flaws in this calculation. Scaling was based off of visual inspection, Ryuko may not be the average female height, not using the standard Nonon unit of measurement, etc. But it does give a certain range that his height may fall in.


This is going to be all spoilers.

   Those are pictures are from the book Obluda, Která Nemá Své
 Jméno or "A monster without a
 name" by Franz Bonaparta under the alias Emil Scherbe in the Czech
 language. It was first introduced in the anime at episode 37 and in
 chapter 71 in the manga.

 Though the book itself is created by a fictional character from Monster, I believe you can actually buy a real copy of it.

 See also: The nameless monster article.


Have there been any announcements or news as to why the second season of Mysterious Girlfriend X was never made?

I cannot find news regarding this so I think there will never be likely a second season (but I'm constantly hoping it will still happen, too). Possible reasons include:

Money. It is expensive to make anime and if the manga and anime did not sell well, it is highly unlikely they'll get another season. Relevant links: Why don't anime shows finish the manga? How much does a typical anime episode or series cost to make?
Not enough content to cover. But seeing as the manga is finished, it's more likely that reason 1 is the case.

I've finished the manga so if you really want to continue the story, read it because as far as I know, the anime skipped some parts. I'll update this if I find relevant news.


What is the kaioken-like red aura produces by Chichi when she's mad?

It's just for humor. This is seen in a lot of anime, including one piece, where female character appears to be stronger than the protagonist as well when angry, and proceed to beat them up. Don't think too much into it.


Really surprised there isn't already a list of this somewhere. I don't have the manga so I don't know which names are revealed there as opposed to the anime. I went through the scripts for the 25 episode series and could only glean the following:

Satoshi Ideguchi: Catcher
Toua Tokuchi: Pitcher (sometimes 1st base)
Kojima Hiromichi: Clean-up hitter/?
Hideo Arai: ?
Tomioka: Right Field
Fujita: Left Field/3rd Base
Imai: 3rd Base/Shortstop
Nakane: Pitcher
Nishimura: 1st Base
Ishiyama: Pitcher
Nishioka: Pitcher
Mitsui: Pitcher
Kondoh: ?
Whoever wears #19: Center Field
Yuuzaburou Mihara: Manager
Kinosaki: Trainer

In episode 14, when they do the 9 person infield move, you can see a lot of the numbers that some of the players wear, but ti's not clear enough to see any names. Center field and the 2nd basemen weren't explicitly mentioned in the anime. As for Kojima, he's usually not on the field when his team isn't on offense, instead, standing next to the manager in the dugout explaining to the manager what's going on. I'm not sure what position he plays if he was on the field.


How did Kaneki discover Touka was a ghoul?

I've only watched the anime, but Kaneki discovered that Touka was a ghoul when he had just become a ghoul and entered Nishiki's territory. Touka had saved Kaneki from him.


Why do the dogs pet the characters in Nichijou?

I looked up that video by googling the title, and the answer appears right next: Grandpa appears and does the same hand gesture as the dogs are doing with their paws − touches "Takashi" on the shoulder. Grandpa then explains that humans console each other, and dogs do the same thing.


A manga with a scene of a group entering a city and learning that they have to pay 10 silver to leave

Arata Kangatari is the series you are looking for.
It took some thinking, since I dropped it a few years ago, but what you remember is from chapter 53 of the series.
Here is the last page of the chapter:

Synopsis of Arata Kangatari from mangaupdates:

Every 30 years, a new princess is chosen from the Hime family to serve the Hayagami. The time has come again, but over these past years, records state not a single female has been born, save for one, the 15-year-old Arata. The only problem is, Arata is actually a male! Forced to disguise himself and take the place of the princess candidate until a formal one can be found, he attends the festival only to witness the current princess, Kokuri-hime, murdered, and his own life is forfeit as well, by the hands of the princess' personal guard, the 12 Shinshou. As he runs for his life, Kannagi of the 12 convinces everyone that Arata is the one who has murdered the princess instead, and now everyone in the Imperial Court is after his head! Now, another Arata from our world has crossed over in Arata's place! How did this happen, and how will these two survive?
arata-kangatari


In High School DxD, what does a demon gain by forming a contract with the summoner?

What the demon gains is dependent upon what the demon is willing to trade. When Issei is conversing with Azazel for the first time in Azazel's apartment, Azazel offers his soul to Issei, as this is something that demons have been depicted to want. However, Issei declines and accepts a painting instead.


A Yonko is not an official title that has specific criteria, but rather is one that is attached to extremely powerful and notorious pirates. There is no deep meaning to the title that has been revealed so far, but it does go beyond simply having amazing combat prowess.

Based on the Yonkos we've been introduced to so far, we can see three distinct traits:

Their own abilities are top notch. We've seen them possess immense strength and durability, have great control over Haki and most also possess strong Devil Fruit powers. They are among the top pirates even individually.
They have fleets. Most of their strength is attributed to these large fleets that ally with the Yonko. You can see the exact known stats in the link above, we've seen Whitebeard, Big Mom and Kaido to have huge crews. Each of the Yonkos will have a number of Commanders under them, who in turn have groups of mid-level pirate crews.
They have territory thanks to their influence as a Yonko. They can declare locations as their own, and pirates and Marines can only bend to their will. The people residing in these territories are under the protection of the respective Yonko, and intruders are hunted down.

The Yonko are not a group like the Shichibukai, and each have their own agendas. Whitebeard was not interested in finding the One Piece and becoming Pirate King, whereas Blackbeard and Big Mom are.

While they are the pirates with the best chances to become Pirate King thanks to this much power and influence, the relation between the two titles isn't very strong or clear yet.

So, as we can see, the determination of who is a Yonko is also largely dependent on how notorious they are and how the other entities view them. In Luffy's case, Morgan simply hypes it up in order to make his news more entertaining. The media is not the deciding body for who is and isn't a Yonko, but it certainly shapes public opinion.

The reactions of the current Yonkos when shown, clearly indicate that they consider Luffy nowhere close to their level. Many fans would also agree to this conclusion, especially after

   his fight with Kaido in the latest chapter of the Wano arc.

Now, for the differences between Law and Teach, I'll also throw Luffy into the mix and explain. Being a Shichibukai has nothing to do with Yonko, it is not a required step. Law doesn't have a fleet, and only has an alliance with the Strawhats. And while he is powerful, he isn't exceptionally so.

On the other hand, Blackbeard

   killed Whitebeard during the Marineford war, and took his powers, becoming the first person to have two DF abilities.

After the war, he quickly expands his fleet and takes over almost all of Whitebeard's territories. All of this together is what allowed him to be recognized as a Yonko.

If we compare Luffy against these metrics, we know that he has formed the Grand Strawhat Fleet at the end of the Dressarosa arc (though he doesn't seem to assign it much value right now). We also have confirmation from Oda that the fleet will play a huge role in the future. In addition, when it comes to territories, Luffy has challenged Big Mom over Fishman Island, which was initially under Whitebeard, and he is currently challenging Kaido for Wano.

While he may still be too much of a greenhorn to be a proper Yonko, he is definitely on the path to become one, which is why there are some proper backers (among fans), and his title as the 5th Yonko isn't being dismissed completely.


Was this person killed by someone else at the end of "I Want to Eat Your Pancreas"?

Yes, the main heroine was killed by a random slasher unknown to the main character.

The murderer's name was never mentioned in all media (light novel, live-action film, manga, anime movie), but it's the random slasher that has been mentioned a few times in the story (in the newspaper, on the TV news). It's unknown to the main character as he said,

  山内桜良は、以前から世間を騒がせていた通り魔事件に巻き込まれた。どこの誰だかも知らない犯人は、すぐに捕まった。

  Sakura Yamauchi got dragged into the random slasher (通り魔) case that has been disturbing the society since then. The culprit whom I don't know was quickly arrested.

Since this is a random slasher case, there's no particular reason why they were attacking someone: she was just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

That said, the point of that scene is not about who the murderer was or why she was murdered, but why it happened despite the main topic about "pancreas".


My answer is yes, anyone can be a Shinobi.

All humans have chakra. This isn't exactly something you are born with or without. The latest chapter was a bit confusing, but Madara specifically stated that the Sage of Six paths was the first person to "wield" chakra. That means that he was the first person to be able to use it with skill, not the first person born with it.

Chakra is present in every cell of the body
http://naruto.wikia.com/wiki/Chakra

Anyone can be a shinobi if they are taught how to use their chakra. And even for people like Lee who can't use chakra externally for ninjutsu and genjutsu, he is still able to use chakra in other ways, such as walking on water.

As for the last part of your question "without the ability to manipulate it" , I think this part is probably arguable as the definition of a shinobi is arguable. How exactly do we want to define shinobi. For my definition, a shinobi simply just a ninja. Shinobi in Naruto normally take missions for hire and wield chakra.

However, in Naruto, there should not exist people with no inborn chakra and thus anyone can be a shinobi. People aren't born with the ability to manipulate chakra; they learn how to.

EDIT (My additional interpretation of the last chapter):

Here's the way I interpreted it. Everyone contains chakra, but no one knew how to use it. When Kaguya consumed the fruit, she became godlike with excessive amounts of chakra. She then gave birth to a child, who was born into the world knowing how to manipulate it. From there on, the Sage of Six paths taught others how to manipulate it.

Madara said "Chakra was something that originally only belonged to the Shinju" and I think this is just a mythical explanation of how chakra came to humans. Before Kaguya, no one was able to manipulate chakra and therefore chakra only belonged to the Shinju. "By taking the chakra by force" as Madara said, AKA consuming the fruit, humans could figure out how to manipulate it. This also further explains why the Shinju is taking all the chakra back. If for some reason Kishimoto decides to use Madara's interpretation of the Uchiha Tablets as actual history, there will be contradiction to how Kishi defined chakra in the past.

Asian history has a common tendency to include supernatural/mythical features to its stories, like the Romance of the 3 Kingdoms for China. Although there are some certain historical facts to it, stuff like magic is included and it gets all sorts of wacky if we believed everything that was recorded.


In attack on Titan, what's the point of the shifter Titans becoming soldiers?

For the most part, it's for stealth and infiltration - if Annie, Reiner and Bertholt had walked into Shiganshina and asked to join the survey corp in Titan form, the first arc would probably have gone a lot differently!

As their main objective was to find and capture the 'coordinate', they had to maintain a low profile and draw as little attention to themselves as possible. Gathering information on the situation inside the walls was made much easier by remaining human.


What are the paintings shown in the Classicaloid OP?

The first painting is Carlos Saraceni's c. 1610 painting Saint Cecilia and the Angel. Saint Cecilia is the patron saint of musicians.

The second painting is Caravaggio's Rest on the Flight into Egypt. The flight into Egypt clearly refers to the event in the Gospels where Joseph flees with his family to Egypt to prevent the death of the child Jesus at the hands of Herod. There's not much reason, as far as I know, to associate it with music per se; the angel and its bowed stringed instrument seem to be the artist's own creation.

The final painting is François Boucher's The Music Lesson.


Is there a plothole in Merlin's character development?

Okay, so basically thanks to fellow Redditors, that sounds like a little plothole. The main reasons expressed there are:

It is not an immunity, it is an ability to nullify Commandments.
She forgot that she had this protection on her (the blessing happened 3000 years prior to the main story), which explains why she still suffered the effect.

As for "Is it a valid reason to explain something that should have not happened", it is an open question on which everyone might have his opinion.


This is "The Right Move" sung by Minmei, only once, on the radio in episode 18 of the Macross Saga. It's featured in CD2 of the 20th anniversary OST. Deculture it is not.


What happened to Migi in the last episode?

During his stay in Gotou's collective, Migi was put under hibernation, but with a constant and pleasant flux of information sent by Gotou through Parasyte telepathy.

However, you are mistaken. Migi did not go anywhere. He remained as Shinichi's right arm. Since the beginning of the series, Migi can delegate control of his muscle structure to Shinichi through the nerve connections of the arm stub. So Migi was to be forever as Shinichi's right arm/hand, hibernating.

This connection is telepathic too. Since Parasytes have empathic telepathy (they can convey feelings) and it is shown that Migi can enter Shinichi's dreams, it means Migi and Shinichi share some thought bond, probably through the nerve connections (Shinichi mentions there are Migi cells in his brain since the chest wound).

This could explain why

   Migi temporarily awakens when Murano falls from the roof, extending the arm and lifting Murano back to the roof. Then he tells Shinichi "you can do the work of holding her now" before going back to hibernating.

Keep in mind that the conversation above happened telepathically.

Migi tells Shinichi that it was so pleasant staying in the Gogou's information highway that he would not mind remaining part of Gotou's collective hibernating forever.

After he was reunited with Shinichi, he had a ton of issues in mind. This should be a good point to stress that Migi was a scholar type of Parasyte, similar to Tamura Reiko. So to him, understanding the information was more important than merely subsisting.

Several of the issues that Migi wanted to solve:

Reiko's signal when she died protecting the baby. Migi was bedazzled at this brand new kind of signal. We can think it was maternal instinct, the will to put another's life above one's own (which is unthinkable to Parasyte mindset).
Gotou's information torrent. You can think like Migi downloaded several Terabytes of data from Gotou while hibernating. He wanted to process that information.
Give Shinichi a normal life. By the end of the series, Migi is no longer of that Parasyte mindset, just like Reiko. The fact that he was willing to die in order to allow Shinichi to escape Gotou proves that he too was placing another's life before his own.
Lay low. Since every Parasyte that knew Shinichi/Migi was dead, and all the others were deadly scared of humans in general after the mayor's office carnage (going so far as to change their diets or to stop killing in an obvious way), there was little probability another hostile Parasyte would attack Shinichi. Meditating would turn off his signal, making Shinichi just a normal human, and giving them both peace of mind.
Meditate on the question (the one with the answer 42). Without any imminent threat, having learned almost everything, and with his nutrition granted by Shinichi's body, life for Migi was bound to be Boring with a capital B. So he turned to the higher thought processes to make up for the lack of more physical endeavors to pursue.


Where can we find dialogues related to anime?

Depending on how you get your anime fix...

DVD/BD

In my experience, while most Japanese DVDs do not have subtitles in Japanese, some do. It is usually easier to find movies than TV series subtitled though.

Streaming

Online streaming services such as Viki have some Japanese shows with Japanese subtitles. Most of them non-animated TV dramas though. But perhaps you can find some anime with the services available to you. Or you could watch a TV drama based on a manga/anime... (Below a screenshot from the Sherlock Holmes puppet show on Viki.)

Other online resources

Around the millennium shift some websites offered fan translations of Japan-only anime shows. That is, you could try to get the Japanese VHS/DVD and follow along with the translated script. If I remember correctly at least one of those websites had the Japanese script as well. This was before the fansubs found a home online. Maybe something similar exists today. I am not aware of any such resources though.


What novel's introduction was Shiori imitating?

I believe this is a reference to the novel "I am a Cat" (吾輩は猫である, Wagahai wa neko dearu) by author Natsume Souseki. It's opening sentences are the following:

  吾輩は猫である。名前はまだ無い。

which, translated into English, is:

  I am a cat. I don't yet have a name.

The reference is more apparent if we compare the two in Japanese. The grammatical structure of the sentences is very similar:

TWGOK:

  吾輩は 女装男 である。名前は 桂木

I am a cat:

  吾輩は 猫 である。名前は まだ無い。

All the words other than the nouns are the same. The use of 吾輩 (wagahai) for "I", である (dearu) as a sentence-ending phrase would both be strange in modern writing. In addition, the general structure of the two sentences are similar enough that this is almost certainly not a coincidence.

The novel is very popular in Japan, being Natsume's first major literary work and one of his top three most read (the other two are Kokoro and Botchan), and Natsume himself being in all likelihood the most important writer in Japanese history. It would not be strange at all for it to be referenced here.


In JoJo: Diamond is Unbreakable, why didn't Joseph use Hermit Purple to find Kira's new identity?

It's because Joseph Joestar is growing senile.
Stands are the manifestation of the user's spirit.
Remember that episode when Polnareff became young because of
Alessi's Stand? Silver Chariot was weak when he was a kid.

Durability or Permanence is a category in a stand stat which also affects stands as they age too or when not in practice. (A great example would be Star Platinum's initial 1.5 second Timestop turned 2.0 seconds by the middle of Part 4. After the events of Part 6, Jotaro trained himself again to protect those he needs as he have learned in Part 4. He later regained his 5 second time stop, the maximum seconds the human body can achieve.)

So in a sense, if a stand user grows old, it affects also their stands. Likewise, if a stand is not used that much, it gets weaker. Hermit Purple is the stand manifestation of Hamon. As there are no more threats, vampires, and Aztec demigods, Joseph Joestar didn't use it that much (also Joseph Joestar isn't the kind of person to practice. He relies on his cunning). Should he still practice it, I bet he'd still look young even on his 50s in Part 3 just like Lisa Lisa.

On a hindsight, Hermit Purple's ability to search Stand Users was hazy because there are a lot of Stand Users in Morioh. Just like when he tried to divine Kira but found Angelo instead.

TL;DR Joseph Joestar can't use Hermit Purple efficiently because he is old and doesn't practice it that much.


As I get it, it is just part of their moral code never to fight innocents including NPCs. I don't know why but they say "must not" so it has to be a rule and it is the SSS so it can't be a "Word of God".

There is (as far as I know the anime and the fan wiki) no canon explanation. Maybe they give respect for the possibility of real AIs or that they can't be 100% sure not to missjudge a human for an NPC.

When the Shadows appeard, they had no problem fighting this mutated NPCs but at this point, they could be sure not to deal with a human like consciousness or a real human.


Why do the Marleyans turn Eldians into titans when exiling?

They used to turn eldians into pure titans and release them in the island to serve as both punishment and to ENSURE no eldian would leave the island.


Why do almost all anime series have a "going to the beach" episode?

Is is just for fan service (showing boobs and bikinis)?

Mostly yes. Occasionally there are plot points or setting circumstances that require a scene be on a beach (legitimate reasons that is, like a romantic beach walk with an imprtant conversation, rather than poor excuses for bikini parades)

For example, the Pretty Cure franchise has one Beach Episode per season, but, it's not for fanservice. The girls never wear swimsuits and they don't swim at all. [TvTropes]

Sometimes it is used as a 'breather episode' to let the audience take a break from the intricacies of the plot.

  Is it related to a strong cultural interest?

Many Japanese will travel to the beach on a trip during the summer. This is common in many modern cultures. However, the Japanese have their own beach traditions too, like smashing watermelons at the beach, which is not common in the West.

  Or, is this because of a psychological project of the Japanese government for encouraging Japanese youth for swimming? (This reminds me of USA TV series: In almost all shows, it is a must that at least one episode must be dedicated to a gay character, one episode for a Jewish character, and all good working computers are Apple (except for the ones which get hacked or broken).)

I think you're over thinking this a little :P If the Japanese government wanted to encourage youth to swim - they wouldn't be targetting the otaku demographic, which are stereotypically stubborn basement dwellers who don't go outside much


Why was anime produced on 24fps film, when Japan is a NTSC country?

It's not really a matter of it being shot in film, but rather how your typical TV works.

This video gives you a bit of an explanation of why NTSC runs at ~30 fps (PAL is 25 fps in comparison). While this is for NA NTSC, this is still applicable generally to Japanese televisions.

In the age where analog TV is deprecated (just just removes certain technical barriers, allows for more bandwidth), the frame rate used in analog video systems are still used and incorporated into DTV and HDTV standards. For the interlaced 1080i format, each frame is composed of two fields, each displayed every 60th of a second with a complete frame displayed every 30th of a second, using an NTSC ~30 fps frame rate. Alternatively, with the progressive scan format (720p/1080p) it is displayed twice every 30th of a second.

Television programming (at least with the NTSC standard) is broadcast at 30 fps (actually 29.97 fps), because traditionally television sets were 60 Hz, and would display 30 fps in an interlaced format, which mean the in one cycle, these sets would draw half of the lines of the picture, then they would interlace the missing lines. Therefore 60 Hz divided by 2 cycles per frame equals ~30 fps.

Playing film content (24 fps) has some quirks on a standard 60Hz TV, after all how would you do about dividing the 24 frames into the 60Hz? The TV industry this thing called a 3:2 pulldown that essentially would use 3 cycles for one frame and two for the subsequent frame. This is done to shoehorn 24 frames into 60 slots and produces some unnatural jitter that usually goes unnoticed to the untrained eye.

Anime, in general, is done at 24 fps and 3:2 pulldown-ed to 30 fps. Actually doing animation at 24 drawings per second, is very costly and generally inefficient. Most High quality animation is animated at 12 fps/8 fps (depending on if it's in the foreground or background) or by 2's/3's. This means there are 12 (or 8) drawings per second, each held for 2 (or 3) frames to make 24 fps. Anime takes shortcut for labor and budgetary reason and most foreground scenes are animated by 3's/4's (sometimes 2's depending on the amount of action). CGI anime on the other hand is a whole other beast and best left for another topic for another time.

Much of the 30 fps movies you see are telecined and made from a 24 fps master (i.e. not typically shot at 30 fps). So  out of 15 frames (of 30) you'll notice that for every 5 frames, there are 2 frames that are interlaced.

The 24 fps standard was the smallest number that was easily divisible by 2, 3, 4, 6, and 8, which allowed editors to quickly find where to make their cuts which proved to be very cost effective production wise.

There are rare instances where animation is comes in 1's but it's rare. Bubblegum Crisis 2040's opening sequence consisted of some shots that were sped up to 29.97 fps. But the animators were not trained to animate at that fps, so it came out very weird with some parts being a little bit too fast while others being too smooth for a typical anime of it's time. During the pre-HD era, anime was shot at 24 fps and then interlaced to 29.97 fps and then blended with 3D CG at 30 fps, which looked fine on older TVs of it's time but come out looking pretty rough when converted to more modern and progressive formats, esp for blue ray

A notable example is in Disney's opening segment of Disney's Beauty and the Beast, where Belle gets on the wagon. These are high budget productions of with your average anime budget pales in comparison. In the past, anime was shot on 16mm film and was of comparatively lower resolutions compared to Western counterparts.

Early animators and filmmakers figured out to create the perception of motion through much trial and error. What they found was that somewhere between 12-16 fps would do the trick. If you fall below that threshold your brain just percieve it as a series of images displayed one after another. If you go above it, you get moving pictures.

As post people know these that while this illusion of motion works at ~16 fps, more frames makes for better (i.e. smoother) quality. Thomas Edison found what he believed was optimal frame rate 46 fps. According to him, anything lower than that resulted in discomfort and eventual exhaustion in audience. Which led Edison to build a camera and film projection system that operated at at a high frame rate.

The slowness of film stocks and high cost of film (35mm was the norm) made this not a good standard or starting point. It was more shooting closer to the threshold of the illusion of moving pictures as most silent films at the time were filmed around 16-18 fps and then projected closer to 20-24 fps. This is the reason while old silent films seem sped up, sometimes used for comical depicts like with Charlie Chapman.


Why is Rin's butler Emiya Shirou in UBW true ending?

There are 2 possibilities. Either they made a mistake or they changed it. They've made quite a few changes and Nasu said those changes are canon (an alternative universe) so it could very well be a better adaptation of their situation in London in which both Rin and Shirou spend a lot of time together.

If that's the case I'd say there are 2 reasons.

Because she's crazy possesive and selfish. I lost count of how many times she said "You're mine" in the VN, even outside her route.
This is IMO 90% of the reason. Because of Shirou's personality and circumstances. From the very beginning in the VN Shirou is doing part-time jobs to be able to pay for his daily expenses. It is stated he could stop doing them but he doesn't want to be a freeloader.
What happens in London is that he feels compelled to pay for the food, travel expenses... and he no longer has the part-time job income as he's not in Japan doing them. It would only be natural for him to look for work in London.

My guess is that in the anime Rin pretty much forced him to take the job. That way everyone wins: Rin gets to spend a lot of time with Shirou (otherwise he'd be all day working outside the magic lessons), he takes her to places to spend time together, he does things like cooking and Rin would paying for everything while they're together in London.
I'm pretty sure Shirou would have accepted even if he wasn't paid, so I wouldn't say Rin is taking advantage of him.

Edit: I've been looking for it for 15 minutes and finally found it. Just so that you know the jobs he's doing in Japan are not a breeze, this is one of them:

  A simple loading job from five to eight o'clock. Even though it's only three hours, there's six hours worth of work to do. They make you run around without a minute's rest.

Moreover, Fuji-nee is constantly telling him not to arrive too late at night because of work. The only reason you don't see him working in the VN is because he gives up those part-time jobs because of the war (it makes sense...) but in reality his time is 99% school, part-time jobs and chores he does for free.


Do I need to catch up on anything before watching Dragon Ball GT

Yes, you need to watch Dragon Ball Z to understand GT. Watching the original Dragon Ball is also helpful, but not strictly necessary. If you want to skip the filler, you can watch Dragon Ball Z Kai instead.


Boogiepop and Others Promotional Trailer references

Those scenes are highly possibly original materials created exclusively for the trailer.
A comment by 'foq fiq' on the Japanese version of the trailer mentioned

放送決定のイベントでプロデューサーが最後に
「あくまで『このくらい本気で作りますよ』ってことを伝えるために作ったティザー用の映像なので本編には出てきません」って言ってた
見覚えのない合成人間は原作にも登場しないPVオリジナル

At the end of the event for the broadcast decision, the producer said
"After all, because some scenes created for the trailer were to convey that 'we are making it like this seriously', they do not appear on the main story".
The unrecognizable characters are trailer-original that do not exist on the source material.


Anima was indeed the final aeon. As for why Seymour didn't use it, well, Seymour started the pilgrimage when he was still very young with his mother and he was not aware of the final aeon and the final summoning back then. When his mother finally revealed her plan to become the final aeon so for the sake of Seymour, it left him devastated. He broke off the pilgrimage there and didn't proceed any further and thus didn't fight sin. This can be verified from the wiki as well.


What does genki (from genki dama) means?

http://dragonball.wikia.com/wiki/Spirit_Bomb:

  Spirit Bomb (元気玉 Genki Dama, lit. "Energy Sphere")

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/元氣

  From Middle Chinese compound 元氣 (ngjwon khjɨjH, literally “first, fundamental, source + vapor, spirit, energy”) In Chinese cosmology, this represented the fundamental force that permeates all matter and life. Early Japanese borrowed this word and meaning. Later, this spelling was conflated with the meaning of homophone 減気 (genki, “recovery from illness”), adding in the modern senses related to healthy and wellness.


How does Yuka stealing Narumi's Alice take away his ability to love?

When Narumi used his pheromones to make her love him. That made her lose control of her Alice, which had the result that not only Narumi's Alice was stolen, but his love-feelings, too. It seems that the Pheromone-Alice is connected to the emotions, and an out-of-control-stealing-Alice steals more than it's supposed to. If Yuka had retained control, Narumi would still have his ability to love.


About the artworks used in the Elfen Lied opening scenes (contains nudity)

The Elfen Lied OP Code

This original analysis is built on previous works by Anime Afterglow, 莉露兜 and 知日部屋. For the meaning of Kaede's hand gesture that was once popular in manga, see What's the significance of the 'w' finger position in Elfen Lied and In the opening of the Elfen Lied anime why does Nyu/Lucy have her fingers positioned in a certain way? All names and dates of Klimt's artworks are taken from the Klimt Museum.

The Elfen Lied OP animation is sequential storytelling beginning in medias res:

   Kaede sheds her tears as she and Kouta embraces. (Episode 13)

  os iusti meditabitur sapientiam et lingua eius loquetur iudicium — Psalmi 36:30

  The mouth of the righteous speaketh wisdom, and his tongue talketh of judgment. — Psalms 37:30

As the vocal sets in, we have a zoom out shot of Kaede hugging a mannequin (dummy). A close-up view reveals an uncomfortable suggestion that it is a headless dummy. If you still don't know what to make of the headless dummy, take a look at the surrounding black ravens: they signify death.

   Lucy killed Kouta's father and sister, thereby killing his feelings for her. Now, only death awaits her as the armed forces are soon approaching.

In the background, we can see ripe cereals ears, which are ubiquitous in Klimt's artworks presumably as phallic symbols, decorating the Tree of Life. The Tree of Life grows through reproduction and evolution, and bears its fruits, the ravens (deaths), that rest on its branches. Is the human race at the end of one of those branches? Or is it the Diclonius?

Stoclet Frieze — The Fulfillment (1905)

  beatus vir qui suffert temptationem quia cum probatus fuerit accipiet coronam vitae — Iacobi 1:12

  Blessed is the man that endureth temptation: for when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life. — James 1:12

From here on is a flashback to the very beginning of the story of Elfen Lied, when Kaede was first conceived as a child. The first appearance of the title can be seen behind the rustling ripe cereal ears.

Notice here the horns on the female dummy whom we may identify as Kaede's mother. Despite being a human, she gave birth to the 'Queen' Diclonius and therefore is the true originator of the virus. The mysterious 'blemish' on the mother's abdomen may be tied to a manga-only plot:

   After Kaede's mother committed suicide, her abdomen was cut open and her ovaries and womb taken by Chief Kakuzawa.

However, this is not certain as the information was only revealed almost a year after the airing of the last episode of the anime, in Volume 11 of the manga, which was released on August 19, 2005.

The phallic symbols (which almost lit up completely before dimming again) around the private area of both the unconscious Nyu and Lucy, the Eve of the Diclonius race, allude to

   Professor Kakuzawa's unsuccessful attempt at raping Lucy/Nyu.

We can make one-to-one correspondences between the females in The Three Ages of Woman and Kaede, Lucy and Nyu. Out of the three, only the cuddling one is making the hand gesture, so she is Kaede, as she is the only one out of the three asking for forgiveness. Then the unconscious one is Nyu, and the facepalming one is Lucy.

Another possibility is that the baby girl is Nyu, the young woman is Lucy, the fertile Queen of the Diclonius, and the old woman is Kaede, who lost her favor with Kouta.

On a related note: Gustav Klimt uses circles, triangles and squares in his artworks, as does the famous Sengai Gibon, who might have had an indirect influence on him because Klimt also studied Japanese art profusely, but I don't have a source to cite for this. Sengai is well-known for his Circle, Triangle, and Square painting, the base of design for the Circle-Triangle-Square Garden at Kenninji, the oldest Zen temple in Kyoto.

  In Zen Buddhist philosophy, the Circle, Square and Triangle represent these three elements [ten-chi-jin 天地人] and their relationship to each other: the square signifies Earth, the circle refers to Heaven, and the triangle is man, or the potential of humankind to stand on the Earth and reach toward Heaven – both physically and metaphorically. — Spirit of the Man: Mario Uribe

  Sengai left the painting without a title or inscription (save for his signature), however the painting is often called "The Universe" when referred to in English.

While we don't know what Klimt had in mind when he drew those circles, triangles and squares, the workings of the universe do seem to be personified by The Three Ages of Woman and also Nyu, Kaede and Lucy. Isn't it interesting that the Fates also come in threes?

Bottom: The Three Ages of Woman (1905)
Top: Adam and Eve (1917), altered to look also like Medicine (1897) (image)

Then comes an interesting sequence of introductions to three important characters in the series: Yuka, Mayu and Nana, of ages approximately 19, 13 and 7 respectively (according to Wikia). In other words, from elder to younger, from least unfortunate to most unfortunate, and in the order of first appearance in the anime. It is curious to see three females of different ages (adulthood, adolescence and childhood), each getting their own portrait shots, make their appearances in The Three Ages of Woman scene, out of all scenes. Is this incidental or intentional?

Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I (1907)

The origin for Mayu's portrait is not without much contention. It had been suggested to be Lady with Fan (1917), Portrait of Ria Munk III (1918) and Portrait of Serena Lederer (1899), but I concur only with the suggestion that is The Girlfriends. The two women, possibly lesbians, in The Girlfriends are close to each other just as Mayu is close to Nana whose portrait appears immediately after hers. The fact that Mayu prefers to be with girls lends more evidence to Mayu's artwork being based on The Girlfriends. However, instead of a naked Nana, we have the recurring phallic symbols in the background, which tell us some backgrounds about Mayu:

   She was subject to rape and sodomy by her stepfather.

The Girlfriends (1916)

  Mäda Primavesi was, by her own account, an independent, assertive young girl, qualities amply captured in this portrait of her at about nine years old. — The Metropolitan Museum of Art

The age and personality of Mäda Primavesi indeed fit Nana's. It is the director's sympathetic portrait of a very real and willful little girl.

The lyrics sung just before Yuka's portrait, "beatus vir qui (blessed is the man)", refers to her good luck, while the lyrics before Mayu's and Nana's, "suffert temptationem (that endures temptation)", signals the pass in Mayu's and Nana's life challenges and in their resisting the temptation to give up and die.

Portrait of Mäda Primavesi (1912)

  kyrie ignis divine eleison — ΚΑΤΑ ΜΑΤΘΑΙΟΝ 20:30–31

  O Lord, Fire Divine, have mercy on us. — Matthew 20:30–31

Kyrie eleison is a common name of an important prayer of Christian liturgy. The "ignis divine (Fire Divine)" line is added as a trope because "kyrie eleison" is too short.

  A specialized use [of a trope] is the medieval amplification of texts from the liturgy, such as in the Kyrie Eleison (Kyrie, / magnae Deus potentia, / liberator hominis, / transgressoris mandati, / eleison).

The prolonged singing of a single syllable of text while moving between several different notes in succession is called melisma. As a side note, quoniam is used in the song in favor of quia because it means the same and sounds better.

This is the only artwork with moving characters: Kouta turns his face away from the viewer and kisses a dummy. Take notice of the human-like dummy Kouta is kissing: judging by her height and bust size, she is around 10 years old, clearly someone from his childhood memories. Is she child Yuka? Or is she child Kaede whom child Kouta treated as a human being?

The third and last scene of Kaede forgoing the hand gesture, and this time she is Kaede herself, not Lucy or Nyu. Ironically, Kaede finds her own fulfillment (not) in the event of The Fulfillment where she still had the hand gesture and where Lucy fulfilled her own desire and duty to kill humans, but in that of The Kiss. You could imagine the dummy kissing Kaede is God or the hypothetical Kouta who loves her / would have loved her in a different universe.

The Kiss (1908)

   Kaede's realization that Kouta had cheated on her by going out with Yuka drove her into a deep pit of sadness and madness.

The Three Ages of Woman (1905)

Fire Divine! Kaede was engulfed in a burning rage for revenge! The background is the same as Mayu's. This scene, the only other that looks like the one where the title is first shown, also marks the end of the flashback.

This and the first scene (tear drops) are the only two non-filler scenes without any known reference to an artwork. The two scenes both serve as section stops (almost perfectly at the 0:00 and 1:00 marks in the 1:30 long OP) that fade to black in similar ways, and therefore this is the end of the story of Elfen Lied.

  Oh, quam sancta, quam serena, quam benigna, quam amoena! Oh, castitatis lilium.

  O how holy, how serene, how kind, how pleasant! O, lily of chastity.

  — Ave Mundi Spes Maria

From here on, the scenes are all about depicting Elfen Lied the work. The lyrics in this last section may also be a praise of the series.

Originally, Klimt named his work Water Serpents I as a pretext to show the feminine body in an erotic context without fearing censorship. The anime is certainly challenging and pushing the boundaries of censorship with its gore and nudity.

Water Serpents I (1904)

The last scene may have borrowed ideas from Water Serpents II (1904), but ultimately this is just a 90 degree rotation of The Fulfillment, with a slight change in Kaede's head and hands.

Stoclet Frieze — The Fulfillment (1905), altered to look like Water Serpents II (1904)

If you count the number of unique dummies that have appeared in the OP, and the number of artworks referenced or the number of appearances of Kaede, Lucy and Nyu, you get these numbers.

Walter De Maria once said,

  "Every good work should have at least ten meanings."

In this regard, Elfen Lied is a good work of art.


How can Oga be separated from baby Beel?

I think it depend on Baby Beel maturity. As long as Beel world's is wider, The Range become larger either. In Baby Driver Chapter, It extended to 15 meter and 8 centimeter and more.


Why are shows like Gundam and Dragon Ball not available on iTunes (or other services)?

Any question of "Why hasn't X happened?" tends to be tricky to answer, because there isn't really much information on it unless there were already plans to do something (it's like asking "Why hasn't my favourite manga/light novel/video game/ukiyo-e been turned into an anime?" - the answer is just that no-one's bothered doing it yet and there's no real way of knowing if anyone even tried).

That said, here are some reasons that are mostly speculative:

The distribution rights are complicated, because of the way that international distribution rights work (which, if you were wondering, is "poorly") or because iTunes isn't a streaming service so the way licenses work is likely to be different to something like Crunchyroll.
The distribution rights are currently tied up in other licenses (e.g. perhaps Crunchyroll or some other service has exclusive rights to online distribution).
Apple are asking for too much money and the distributors don't think they will make a profit from it.
The distributors really hate Apple.
The distributors don't actually have the rights to release the shows on iTunes for some reason (see also the first point).
The distributors don't know that iTunes does TV shows now (just covering all possible bases, however unlikely).
The distributors are in talks with Apple to put the shows on iTunes, but for various reasons they're stuck in negotiations.

I'm sure there are more reasons, but hopefully those are enough to go on for now.


Although what you said is write but think about this "Coffee is not just made up of only coffee beans, it contains water as well".


Ougi is Araragi's youthful foolishness manifested as persistent self-doubt and lack of love for himself.

This idea is transient throughout the occurrences of Ougi. She initially spawned after the events of Shinobu Time. That's when Araragi registers the idea that he could criticise himself just like how the Darkness criticises the world as the "principles of the universe". After her creation, Ougi spars with Araragi, nudging out fears and doubts he has had about his decisions and actions. He wants to make himself feel guilty for the events of the series because he chose to save Kiss-shot, Senjou, etc. This was the main theme for the Sodachi arc, in which Ougi was actually right, that he knew the reason for Sodachi's suffering all along but hadn't acted. Of course, this isn't always the case. Why was this important in the entire series? Because Ougi had the ability to undo what she thought were the mistakes that Araragi had made, even when the mistakes were natural to make; Gaen's gang knew this. There are some plotholes though, but those will be up to your interpretation of the story.

Secondly, Ougi being his lack of love for himself an important developmental point in Owarimonogatari 2. In Bakemonogatari, his lack of love for himself allowed him to be so selfless in saving the 5 girls that it caught even Meme off-guard, which is a reason why Meme left, sensing that an abberation like Ougi might appear. Throught the series, Araragi gets beaten and cut up in many ways to save others. In Owari 2, Araragi also foreshadows his inability to love himself in Hitagi Rendezvous even when he was able to love Senjou.

His development was in the subsequent arc where he saved Ougi from the darkness. Choosing to sever his arm to save Ougi was the ultimate act of loving himself, to finally hurt for no one but himself. This was when Meme finally comes back, to signify that this huge Arc that started with Bakemono has come to an end.

Ougi also tries to sabotage the relationships between Araragi and the girls. I'm not sure whether this has been explained so I will only speculate that I feel this is because Ougi reflects Araragi's childish mantra that "friends decrease my power as a human". Another hint that Ougi is Araragi's childish foolishness.

Ougi Dark is really similar to Suruga Devil and Tsubasa Tiger. They are stories about growing up by recognizing a part of themselves. Araragi recognises that he is someone who can criticise himself and hate himself, Kanbaru sees the fears she has harboured reflected within Numachi and Hanekawa embraces her imperfections (jealousy in this arc). Accepting this as a natural part of growing up brought the stories to their conclusions.


What are the Guardian of Earth's tasks in Dragon Ball series?

As is mentioned on the wikia site,

Guardian (神様, Kami-sama; lit. "God") is the title given to the individual protectors of planets in the Dragon Ball series.
Despite their names, the Guardians' role is closer to that of an overseer.

As the Guardian of Earth (I will be using GE as an abbreviation), Kami or Dende have to protect the human beings from evil. A few examples being

Kami training Goku during the Piccolo Jr. Saga.
Kami training the other Z Warriors during the Saiyan Saga.

Kami and Mr. Popo spreading the Sacred Water throughout the entire world using the Seven Air Currents located inside Kami's Lookout in order to cure the Earthlings from the effects of Garlic Jr.'s Black Water Mist.

To expand a bit more on their job,

Guardians have an indirect reporting relationship to one of the Kais (in the case of the Guardian of Earth, this is King Kai).
Another way of looking at this is that Guardians are more supervisors than they are managers.
They have many of the powers associated with Gods, including the ability to see and sense events around the world, to travel to and guide souls to Other World, and to be a general protector of the people.

This concludes the tasks of the GE.
Now to answer your other questions,

The GE doesn't necessarily have to be from Namek. The reference being that

Kami was the first Namekian GE.
Kami asks Goku to replace him as the GE after the World Martial Arts Tournament in Piccolo Jr. Saga.

As the GE doesn't have to be Namekian, they don't have to create the dragon balls.
They do grant human wishes if they are appropriate. An example being when he gave a new life to Shenron on Goku's demand after he was destroyed by King Piccolo.

I believe this answers all your questions...


What's this anime film involving a phone's ringtone?

Harmonie is the anime you're looking for.

Synopsis (MyAnimeList)

Every person has his or her own little world. Among the 34 bustling students of classroom 2-1, there are many such worlds.
Honjou Akio's world—my world—is filled with passionate talk about last night's anime with Yoshida, Watanabe, and other friends. It's an fun, comfortable place... But, I always wonder. Wonder about the world of Makina Juri, smiling and surrounded by gorgeous friends on the other side of the classroom.
One day, I enter her world. But it's not as simple as it sounds.

Synopsis (IMDB)

A girl's phone rings during a class. A boy tries to reproduce the ringtone and this becomes the spark that makes them meet, dream together and discover each other personal world.


Which came first, the LRIG or the Selector?

The LRIGs came first.

In Season 2 episode 8 "This World is My Property" it is revealed that:

   The first LRIGs, Tama and Iona (then known as Shiro and Kuro) were created by Mayu to begin the LRIG and Selector system. These LRIGs are suggested to have special powers, compared to normal LRIGs. Mayu created more original LRIGs past the first two. Whenever one of these LRIGs loses three battles, they are not simply returned to the system to find another Selector; instead, they disappear. Tama and Iona are the only remaining original LRIGs.

Quoted from the Selector WIXOSS wikia & confirmed from viewing the episode in question.

Also, from another Wikia entry:

   Mayu created two imaginary friends, Shiro and Kuro, in order to play the game with them, then proceeded to conjure up the idea of the Selector Games in her mind strictly for her own amusement, creating yet more imaginary friends which served as the first Selectors and LRIGs. Eventually, Mayu's make-belief games became so realistic that the imaginary friends took a life of their own. Mayu proceeded to send them out to WIXOSS players in the outside world, effectively "infecting" the game with her own, selfish desires.


Which of Usopp's lies have not come true?

I'm using the youtube link OP provided in one of the comments to answer this question.

Basically the lies that haven't come true according to this video are:

(Conqueror's) Haki.
Having 8000 followers.
Medicine that cures all diseases
Brave warrior of the sea
King usopp from hell
Beating ten giant shadows
Assisting in bringing down a bombman
Descendant of Noland
Being born on sniper island.

Personally I believe three of them have been verified in recent chapters though.

  - Haki could be considered as truth as he indeed unlocked (Observation) Haki and  he will most likely not discover Conqueror's Haki.
- Law's DF could be considered the medicine that cures all diseases as he could cure fatal diseases as lead poisoning and could even cure the terminal illness called death...
- Assisting in bringing down a bombman is probably referring to the fact that he sniped Sugar the second time bringing down the giant toys that were aiding.

For completeness, here are the lies that have been confirmed according to the same video:

Pirates came to Syrup village (Black Cat Pirates)
Saved a whale from North Blue (Laboon)
Fought a huge goldfish with poop as large as islands (The goldfish at Little Garden killed by Brogy and Dorry. The same goldfish had pooped the island called nanimonai)
"Honestly, I know I'm a man amoung men, but you can't fall in love with me, girl. Not my fault if you get burned." (Basically what Sanji told the Okama)
A big condor, flying through the skies (The big condors Chopper met during the time-skip. Usopp rode one during the reunion)
Abominable snowman (Rock and Scotch, the Yeti Cool brothers)
A beautiful female swordmaster that brought a lot of meat (Rebecca buying Luffy three bentos at the Colosseum)
A huge mole inside the mansion (Miss Merry Christmas from Barocque Works)
During Syrup village arc, they pretend to chase "Cerberus", while chasing a regular dog (Usopp met a real Cerberus at Thriller Bark)
They also pretend to capture a dragon (The Straw Hat Pirates actually capture (eat) a dragon on Punk Hazard)
Country of dwarves (Tontatta country)
Legendary hero Usoland (God Usopp)


Are there really differences between the story lines of the Rahxephon movie and series?

The storylines are different.

From Nirai Kanai Online's FAQ:

  the movie is an alternate re-telling of the story. ... In other words, the movie and TV series are not in the same timeline, each one tells its own different version of the story. ... It is not a good idea to use the movie to find answeres (sic) raised in the TV series. They're two different universes.

As a concrete example:

   In 1998 the twins Ayato and Itsuki were born, they were brought together by Quon's and Shirow's DNA --in essence, Ayato is Maya's nephew.

(in the anime; from NKO's page on Maya)

   in the movie Ayato was her (Maya's) real son

(from the FAQ again)

A note about the source: The site is by far the most exhaustive reference for RahXephon I've found, but it doesn't cite any sources. It could, theoretically, be nothing more than an elaborate fan wank.


What are the deeper meanings in Berserk?

This is a very wide question and will draw much opionated answers. But it is interesting to note that Berserk is not just your run of mill manga. I'll try to keep my answer limited to the Golden Age Arc (Spoilers for Golden Age thus are inevitable) and try to reference an Interview I'd read from Miura - Berserk artist Kentaro Miura interview. Also note, The links provided may not be spoiler free, but are here as source and additional reading RELATED to the answer but not a answer to the question.

Inspirations: Berserk in itself has many concious and sub-conscious inspirations,

  I was a manga reader. There are things that I’ve consciously borrowed from, but there are also things that have sunk to the bottom of my consciousness and pop up out of nowhere later. They’ve become part of me. Violence Jack and Guin Saga are things I was obviously really into, and I do think that Guin Saga was the biggest source for this fantasy universe. That atmosphere it has just stuck with me and now I think of it as the standard to measure things against, so I suppose you’re right.

In that interview Miura mentions his high school life and themes of friendship and goals in life.

  I don’t know what relationships between boys these days are like, but back in the eighties, boys were really obsessed with stuff like how good their friends were at things, how highly they “ranked” in comparison to their friends, etc. For boys, friendship isn’t about consoling each other. Sometimes you even try to take the other guy down a peg or two. But to break away from those friends would feel like admitting defeat, and you do help each other when you find some sort of goal. That’s where the Band of the Hawk comes from.

Going from there, the major theme in Berserk is about your dreams. The complete Golden Age Arc is about the purpose of life, fulfilling your dream and price of achieving them.

Guts and Griffith are polar opposites of each other, but draw close enough for Griffith to make him privy to details he had never told anyone, his dreams. These dreams put a rift in Guts own idealogical framework leading him to leave the band. This reversal of roles from the start of series leads to Griffith's downfall. After his rescue, he decides the "price of achieving his dreams" and activates the King's Behelit.
What we see is

Quality of life: If you don’t pursue your dreams, then you live the mediocre life, being more susceptible to become affected by those that are ambitious, but it’s safer and less risky.  (Peasants, villagers, small-role characters)
Purpose in life : Guts realization that Grifith's dream doesn't give his life the purpose he wants drives the interlude of the first arc. He leaves the band to find his dream
However, it also points to what is really important in life. To complete your dream you shouldn't lose sight of whats truly important. Minor Spoilers.

   Guts dream is to kill Griffith, but in his anger he leaves Casca alone who is the one person above all he values. This is covered in the future arcs and the 2016 Anime. He also gains new comrades (kinda).

Griffith lost sigh of this and in the end lost himself. He later sacrificed everyone in order to achieve his dream. The ending shows that the dreams/desires can corrupt even the best of men.

There are other minor themes that come into play are

Berserk and Friedrich Nietzsche: This is something that is well documented. Miura's Berserk is very similar to Nietzsche's philosphy.
Struggler Skull Knight's name for Guts is very apt. It is a commentary on the Nietzsche philosphy above. How guts struggles and survives.
Religion. We see many religious symbolism and analogies in Berserk. https://www.reddit.com/r/Berserk/comments/1wvqit/thoughts_on_religious_analogies_in_berserk/
War and History: Berserk is a fantasy manga with Historical overtones (set in a medieval like period) But it does provide an insight into how wars were fought. A little of tactics, diplomacy, motivations of different individuals and the human nature itself.
Fate/Free will: Are we bound by fate or we have our own destiny in our hands. Are there forces dictating the flow of our lives?
Idea of Evil: Evil comes from inside or outside? Godhand, Behelits etc.


Can 3 people fuse using the potara earrings?

After doing some research to be sure, I came to the conclusion that there is simply nothing that proves or disproves this possibility. The potara may retain their power to fuse people multiple times over, or just as likely may not.


How did Aokiji survive Whitebeard's attack; observation Haki or something else?

Although we never got any official confirmation, it is heavily hinted to be similar to Katakuri's technique. Haki punches won't work if there's nothing there to hit.

The animation difference is just due to those scenes being hundreds of episodes apart. The red eyes are also something the anime started doing after the timeskip.


Is Akira the only anime produced in 24fps?

From what I can tell (according to this):

  Practically all hand-drawn animation is designed to be played at 24 FPS. Actually hand-drawing 24 unique frames per second ("1's") is costly. Even in big budget films usually hand-draw animation shooting on "2's" (one hand-drawn frame is shown twice, so only 12 unique frames per second)[6] and some animation is even drawn on "4's" (one hand-drawn frame is shown four times, so only six unique frames per second).

Other sources (of varying degrees of reliability) say:

  Japanimation runs at an average of 24 frames per second, with main objects animated at 8 to 12 fps and background objects as low as 6 to 8 fps.

(Source)

  Decent/high quality animation in general is done at the 24 frames/second rate (this also includes animation in other mediums, such as claymation and CG'd work). Now, depending on the 'look' and 'feel' they are aiming for--all of those 24 frames may be slightly different (in succession) than each other, to give 'movement' to the object on the screen (as in, none of the frames look exactly alike. There are slight variations between all frames), or only 12 of them may be different from each other--every other frame (in succession with each other) being varied, with an exact copy of the last frame before it acting as the ‘filler’ frame. So it's like 12 pairs of different frames--the first frame in each set varied from the last and its copy behind it to lengthen the time the image is on the screen.

(Source)

A general consensus, from the little that I can find, is that most anime now seem to have a frame rate of 24, but they often are 2s, which means that every frame is doubled so there are 12 unique frames per second. For example, a torrent site for Claymore lists the frame rate as 23.9, which is really 24 fps. So to conclude, Akira is not the only anime to be produced at 24fps.


Well, what did you expect of the world of the Gods that govern the dead? Historical speaking, the world of the dead and their gods live in a somber place. The author itself seems to just picture it like that without a real "motif" of the why but simply because it should be do like that:

  Obata said that he used "no real design motif" for the Shinigami Realm, and that he never settled on any concrete appearance; Obata described the Realm as changing appearance in each instance in Death Note, with it sometimes appearing as a dry field and sometimes appearing as a room "full of cookies." Obata says that he likes to think of the Shinigami Realm as "an abandoned building with chunks of chocolate sitting around." Obata said that he thought of the realm as being "inside something" and having a "claustrophobic feeling." Obata added that he would like to develop the Shinigami Realm further if it was used as the setting for a story.

I don't have the "Takeshi Obata Production Note: Characters." Death Note 13: How to Read. book to verify the Wikipedia source but if you buy it it should tell the same.


What is this jazz song in the first episode of Gundam Thunderbolt?

This one that maybe your looking for :3

Gundam Thunderbolt OST 01 - Thunderbolt For Main Theme (Io Fleming Song)


Why did Lelouch and Nunnally allow themselves to be seen in public?

The risk really wasn't all that great. Without the geass power, Lelouch never would've met Cornelia or Kirihara or any of the others that recognized Lelouch (Clovas, Euphy, etc...). Cornelia because Clovas would've stayed alive so there would've been no need for her to become Viceroy. Kirihara because he wouldn't have needed to meet with the 6 head families, remember he only meets Kirihara/reveals his identity to secure support for the Black Knights.

To expand:

While they lived at a school for Brittanians, Brittania is very caste based, and the castes don't mix much, besides a few outliers like Euphy the royal family doesn't mingle with commoners. Which is what the Knights of the Round call Ashford Academy when they transfer to it. So no real chance of running into someone who would recognize them there.

As for those few - and it was very few - Japanese who knew their secret, they also all knew that he hates the empire and why he was exiled to Japan in the first place. So they are far more likely, if they ever ran into him, to support him and hide him from the Brittanians then to out him. As can be seen by Kirihara immediately throwing his support behind Zero when he learns that Zero is Lelouch.

Finally: (This block doesn't actually effect Lelouch's decision to be in public since it's not known to him at the time, but it's interesting to note for us viewers, since it explains why they were so safe for the 7 years before Lelouch gets geass.)

   At the end of Season 2 we learn that none of Lelouch's siblings were actually after him and his sister and mother when they were younger. In fact from their reactions they all actually seem to miss them. We also learn that the Emperor wasn't after them either and in-fact exiled them to Japan to keep them "safe" from his brother VV. And as far as we know VV wasn't actually hunting them again until CC came into their life and gave geass to Lelouch.  So no one in the Empire was actually hunting them at all.


Is it common for light novels to have animated commercials?

I wouldn't say that it's common, but it does happen. Here are some examples:

Musaigen no Phantom World had a PV in Jan 2014, which preceded the announcement of its anime in Aug 2015. Likewise, Kyoukai no Kanata had a PV some time in 2012, prior to the announcement of its anime in Apr 2013. I think the same thing happened with Free! / High Speed!. However, all of these are published by Kyoto Animation's in-house publishing division (KA Esma Bunko), so they may well have had not-yet-publicized plans for these works by the time they put the PVs out.
Heavy Object, Intellectual Village no Zashiki Warashi, and some other Kamachi LNs showed up in a Sep 2014 PV of Kamachi's various works (the best known of which is, of course, A Certain Magical Index). Of the non-Index works, only Heavy Object has been animated, and it was not announced until a month later (though, again, it was presumably in planning at the time).

But after a fair bit of searching, I didn't turn up any other properly-animated PVs (rather than just videos with static images wooshing around the screen). I find this unsurprising: for a properly-animated PV, you need a proper animation studio, and without a pre-existing relationship with a studio to produce material for the franchise in question, a PV is probably unlikely to happen.

So why do these few examples even exist in the first place?

The case of Kyoto Animation is unusual, in that they have a light novel publishing house as a subsidiary (or something; I'm not sure what the exact business relationship is). Naturally, this provides KA Esma Bunko with ready access to an animation studio. As far as I know, KyoAni is the only animation studio with this kind of very tight-knit relationship with a light novel publisher.

In the other two cases - Okitegami Kyouko and the various Kamachi things - the animation studio connection comes through the studios in question (Shaft and J.C.Staff) having already animated other cash cows by the same authors (Monogatari and Index, respectively). There aren't very many other authors in the same position (existing animated cash cow + high productivity on other light novel series); the only one who comes to mind off the top of my head is Narita Ryohgo (Durarara!!, Baccano!), and I didn't find any PVs for any of his other stuff.


Where did the concept of multiple endings originate?

In terms of games, it normally extends from the player having choices, these choices affect character relationships and events which change the the story to try and give a normally linear plot some openness or when there isn't too much game play involved.

For example, in Fate/Stay Night, in the Heaven's Feel Route, if you don't build up enough of a relationship with Sakura, when the time comes you are unable to go against your ideals of being a "Ally of Justice" and get a bad ending. By building up on the relationship, you abandon your ideal and instead stay by Sakura's side and help her

In the example above, the endings are decided by choices you make. In some cases, it's how you play the game:

For example, in Mugen Souls, by increasing the level of all of Chou Chou's forms and then viewing all the scenes in the Mugen Field where her different forms take over and speak, you see a final scene where all her forms reveal that they feel now that they no longer have a purpose as they were created by Chou Chou to fill the loneliness she felt, and now she had so many friend, they wasn't needed. However, the crew tells them that Chou Chou would still be sad if they disappeared and the decided to remain, and this leads to a scene in the final battle where Chou Chou plans to sacrifice herself to save Belleria from Vorgis, but is stopped by her other forms, since the level of these other forms is dependent on the number of Shampuru you have collected you also hears the voices of the people that have been turned into Shampuru and however even though they were forced into servitude they will fight and serve Chou Chou loyally and launch a separate attack at Vorgis to weaken him ready to the final-final battle

There are also some games tend to only have 1 ending and numerous bad endings as like a game over, these are normally backed up by a mechanic that enables the choice to proceed further into the game.

For example, in Sekien no Inganock ~What a Beautiful People~, if you don't form a solid image of both characters in the Inner Voices section in most chapters you will not have the 3rd option to extends "your right hand" and the options you have will always lead to a bad end (exception is the REBORN edition which you have the option to skip this section).

In terms of origins, while I'm not 100% sure, the earliest I have seen is in visual novels which were practically just text based with CG in the background so the purpose was to make a game that was still interactive.

Nowadays, unless it's a normal text based visual novel like Canvas 2, it's used as a form of replay value with a normal ending leaving the plot open-ended and the true ending bring about a conclusion, a bad ending also exists as a means to tell the player they majorly stuffed up how they played.

I should point out that all this information is first hand experience with English games and English translations of visual novels


What is the name of the OST playing at 18:40 in Shingeki no Kyojin Episode 1?

The OST you're looking for probably XL-TT.

It's on album by Hiroyuki Sawano, Attack on Titan (Original Soundtrack) track #14

See this YouTube video

Album Cover


Does anyone know what's written on the Funtom's Bitter Rabbit ear?

According to the official merchandise on Square Enix store,

it's Funtom.Co[...]. There are 2 possibilities:

FUNTOM.COMPANY
FUNTOM.CORPORATION

Considering the rest of the spaces, I'd believe it's FUNTOM.CORPORATION since for half of the tag's length, FUNTOM.CO takes 9 characters, and RPORATION also takes 9 characters.

There's a Wikia entry on Funtom Corporation, but I'm not sure if it's the official translation, since the name in Japanese is ファントム社【しゃ】, with 社 usually translated as company.


How does the Grail choose the participants?

The exact way in which the Grail picks Masters is not well-understood, as far as I'm aware. It's a fuzzy process even to the participants themselves.

To try to address your specific questions:

  Do you need to descend from a mage bloodline? Did the murderer guy (the one who got Caster in Fate/Zero) have magical blood?

I'm not sure whether you strictly need to descend from a mage bloodline (this is probably addressed in side materials I haven't read), but Ryuunosuke did have a mage somewhere in his ancestry, and as such, he had a small number of Magic Circuits (this is mentioned in the light novel, but not the anime). The magic tome he had on hand when he murdered that one family right before summoning Caster was apparently something he found in a storehouse belonging to someone in his family.

  It seems like you don't need to be aware of the existence of the Holy Grail war (Shirou and the murderer guy were both pretty clueless).

This is true.

  You do seem to need an heroic relic... or do you? When Kotomine was surprisingly chosen in Fate/Zero, did he have one already? What if you lose the relic before the summoning occurs?

You don't need a relic to be granted Command Spells by the Grail. Having a relic helps with the summoning further down the line, but even then, you don't strictly need a relic. If you don't have a relic, the Grail just gives you a Servant who is "compatible" with you or "similar to" you in some sense.

  The Matou were disappointed that Kariya left behind their magical teachings, so they decided to adopt Sakura to prepare her for the next war. When Kariya returns and chooses to fight, he successfully becomes a master. This suggests that there is a way to opt out/in from the war (?)

Kariya had no guarantee that he would be selected as a Master during the fourth war. He was essentially gambling, hoping that by undergoing the worm treatment, he would be picked by the Grail.

Practically, I get the impression that there are usually few enough mages in the Fuyuki area that most mages in town during a Grail War end up becoming Masters.


Why don't characters teach each other techniques?

This isn't necessarily the case. It depends heavily on the personalities of the characters using the technique and the character who wants to learn the technique.Krillin wanted to learn the Kaioken at the time Goku first revealed it. Although, he never followed through.Vegeta is too prideful to have Goku teach him how to use instant transmission or any technique for that matter. However, if you recall, after Namek, the latter was in search of Goku to ask him how he managed to turn into a Super Saiyan. It would be against Vegeta's character to ask Goku to teach him very simple techniques when Vegeta himself is a battle prodigy and could figure them out or come up with variants himself. That didn't stop him from asking Whis to train him as the Vegeta clearly knew how strong Beerus was and the former's teacher would be very experienced and significantly more powerful.Goku on the other hand, despite having the power of a God in Dragon Ball Super, still goes to Master Roshi to learn the Mafuba. He later adopts a technique he watches Krillin use in his fight against Jiren. His character has been written in such a way.In conclusion, it simply comes down to fighter's particular character. That said, the only convenient technique Goku has which the other fighters could find useful is instant transmission. Not to use during battle as it can be easily countered "We watch Frieza easily counter the Yardrat using Instant Transmission in the tournament effortlessly". It could be convenient for travel. The show has kind of adapted the attack as one of Goku's signature attack for the sake of plot convenience. That said, Goku says it took him  1 year to perfect instant transmission. It makes sense for Goku to have spent a year to master the technique based on the circumstances he was in at that point in time. Goku is also superior to the rest of the Z fighters as far as the technical aspects of Combat is concerned(Disregarding Whis and maybe Beerus of course, if you consider them to be a part of the crew). So it doesn't really make sense  for the rest of them, to spend a year or possibly much longer, to master a technique simply for the sake of travel.


When do Japanese high schools have midterms?

Your quoted info is right.
Most high school have first mid-term exam around May 20th.

The problem is magazine system.
As you think, most magazine's release date of issue 7 (July issue) is some day of June,
because no one buy July issue in August.

But some magazine have more wider shift from titled date.
JMPA (Japan Magazine Publisher Associates, which most Japanese magazines are members of) has the less than 40 day guideline for monthly magazine.
Publisher (and book store) can sell magazine 40 days before the titled release date or month.
(Weekly magazine have 15 days guideline.)

If the titled date is July 1st, publisher can sell the magazine after mid May.
Of course, this is most extreme case, but it's possible that people can read issue 7 in May.

To evidence, you can find example from Amazon.co.jp magazine corner.
For example, this magazine is July issue (07月号) but Amazon starts sending that magazine mid May (2014/5/17).
(Yes Amazon starts earlier than 40 days rule, and some book stores are angry about this, but Amazon says customer will receive the magazine after the date).

I think fashion magazine has earlier selling start date.
Using the above example, the magazine features topic on how to select swimwear, which most people prepares before summer but uses it in summer. The date rule fits the use case.

Weekly Shounen Jump is officially release on Monday, but some store selling it from Saturday.


Can someone explain Leorio's wager with the prisoner?

You missed some parts. In Chapter 20 of the manga, when Leorio proposed the bet, the prisoner said:

  Prisoner: All right...I'll bet 20 hours...that he really is out cold.

This would mean that Leorio's bet automatically is that he's not out cold. When Leorio was about to let go of the guy playing dead, the prisoner changed his mind.

  Leorio: Look, if he yells out while falling...we'll accept that Kurapika's lost on a foul. You'll get the win. That seem fair to you?
    Prisoner: Yes, quite fair. But I'd like to change my bet. Let me put 40 hours on him waking up.

So, Leorio's bet was changed to the guy not waking up due to this last minute proposition. Therefore, he lost.


Why is it both "Mai" and "My" used for the title?

There doesn't seem to be any official word on why both romanizations are used. However, Funimation's official name for the show is My-Hime, while the technical romanization of 舞 is mai. As such, it seems as though sites use Mai-Hime because that is the technically correct romanization of "舞 Hime" and use My-Hime because that's the title that companies such as Funimation and Bandai use for the show (just as how Attack on Titan is also listed as Shingeki no Kyojin).

EDIT: to add/expand on what Aki Tanaka mentioned from Japanese Wikipedia, it seems the name is also a pun, where because it's about moe characters, the creator wanted people to "please find (My) princess (HiME) for oneself" (approximate translation, because my Japanese is rusty and direct translations are hard). HiME is also a backronym for Highly-advanced Materializing Equipment, which is the ability that the main characters have.