K-On! ~ Cute high school girls + Good music

Season 2 of K-On!! had just recently end its run on Animax Asia and I'm pretty sad about it. It's one of the best anime I'm watching on the channel right now and to watch its final episode was kind of sad and painful. The anime is about 5 high school girls (Yui, Ritsu, Mio, Tsumugi and a junior Azusa) with their school life and their love & passion for music. It's a light anime with no heavy themes, just about their friendship and similar passion for music. They were the members of the school's light music club and with only 5 members (yup, they were the only members of the club) they tried to keep the club alive.

The characters of the anime are really lovable with their crazy and kawai (that's cute in Japanese) personality. You just can't help but fall in love with them. The plot for each episode are really quite simple, usually about them practising their music (or lack of it which drives Azusa crazy), performing at the school carnival, going to the beach, or preparing for photo shoots for their school's magazine. Their music are pretty good too with a lot of J-pop flavour in it. Personally, I love the opening and ending themes for the anime. They are really good.

The series was originally a manga written and illustrated by Kakifly before being made into anime. The 1st and 2nd season of the anime are actually from the 1st series of the manga. The 2nd manga series will continue on their story in college. I can't wait to see them more in the 3rd season of the anime. I'm really going to miss them!!!

Image courtesy of Lightchan.

Pia Toscano ~ What a shock!!!

Pia Toscano had been eliminated from American Idol Season 10. What a shock right? Not in a million years I expect her to be eliminated this early. In fact, I thought she had a great chance to win this season. A great shock indeed.

For me personally, she's one of the perfect singer that had ever been in the competition. She sound perfect, she looks perfect, and she's awesome on stage. What a great loss to the show. I know it's rare for a contestant of the show to have a career if they got eliminated this early in the competition, but I really, really hoping that Pia could get a recording contract and get her singing career going after this. We will miss you Pia Toscano!

The Amazing Race Asia 4 and The Amazing Race 17 winners!

Richard (Hardin) & Richard (Herrera)

I think it's not too late for me to congratulate the winners of The Amazing Race Asia 4 and The Amazing Race 17 winners. Congratulations to Richard (Hardin) & Richard (Herrera) for winning TARA 4 and the amazing doctors Nat & Kat for winning The Amazing Race 17. Both teams have great positive attitudes and I'm glad to see them win.

Claire & Michelle (2nd place!)


Natasha & Hussein (3rd place!)

I would also like to congratulate Claire & Michelle and Natasha & Hussein from TARA4 for making it to the finish line. It was a tough race and they did pretty well despite all the setbacks. It was definitely a fun season and I hope we won't have to wait as long as we had before for another season of TARA. I don't have much to say about TAR 17 because I missed a few episodes of the show but from what I saw, Brook & Claire and Jill & Thomas who came in 2nd and 3rd in the race were good too. So I guess bravo to all of them!

Images courtesy of TARA website.

The Amazing Race Asia 4 ~ Goodbye Jess & Lani

It looks like getting extremely lost is a sure bet to get eliminated from the race. Dimple & Sunaina experienced it in Australia, and now the party girls from The Philippines, Jess & Lani experienced it in South Korea. It was an exciting episode, especially since South Korea is a beautiful country.

It was also an episode where the race started to 'force' the teams to hate each other. That was one part of the episode that I didn't like. It was unnecessary. I mean, it's okay for them to hate each other (for whatever reason), but the show didn't have to push it out from them. It kind of sad. Oh well, it's reality TV.

Aside from Hussein & Natasha, I think Jess & Lani is the team that shown most improvement in the race. Look where they started and look where they ended their race; 4th place. I applauded them for that. Beside that, I also like Jess attitude and personality. She seems like a nice person and she's very sensitive towards animals (sheeps anyone?) and other people's feelings. It's funny how I can see her like that because Lani seems more emotional than her. I may be wrong but with all that editing (of the show), that's how I see them.

Anyway, 2 more episodes and we know who the winning team would be. Great! Can't wait for that! May the best team wins!!!

The Amazing Race Season 4 ~ The journey so far

I completely love this season of TARA (well, I always do actually just like past seasons), and seeing the teams got eliminated one by one got me sad but somehow it also got me excited as we get closer in revealing the winner of this season.



I only posted about the 1st team eliminated from the race in my blog before, so here I'm gonna post about the rest of the teams that had been eliminated so far. First off was the 2nd team who got eliminated, in Sri Lanka, which is Alan & Wendy. Aside from constant bickering, this team just plain unlucky; they did got on the 1st bus to go to a designated place for a task, but unfortunately they were the last to arrive. That just proved that luck plays an important role in the race.



The 3rd team got eliminated was Manas & Sahil. Booted off in the Philippines, this team just...I don't know...seemed to lost their will to race. They looked tired. Maybe the race had taken a toll on them, I mean the race was pretty intense.



Next to went off the race was Ivan & Hilda. I kind of like this team, they were very entertaining. To see them packing in New Zealand was quite sad for me, since they are also Malaysian like me. I like Ivan spirit, competitiveness and over-much love for his wife. Some might labeled them as annoying (poor Hilda) but I think they just a loving, harmless couple. Very cute. ;-)



Sunaina & Dimple, the 5th to get booted off the race, was eliminated in Australia. I see them as a smart, independent, strong and very competitive team. They always try to be at the front of the pack. Unfortunately they got lost, really really lost, and this lead to their downfall in Australia.



The latest team who got eliminated from the race in this week episode of TARA was Ethan & Khairie. It was kind of shocking for me because I really see them as one of the strong team who got potential to get to the top 3. They made a bad choice in Detour, and couldn't bounce back ever since. I was quite sad to see them leave not just because they are Malaysian but also because they are one of my top 3 favourite teams. They were eliminated in Indonesia.

And now they are 4 teams left. I'm glad 2 of my favourite teams are still in the race, hopefully they will be in the top 3 as well. It has been a fun, exciting and entertaining race so far. Lucky for us fans there are more to come. May the best team wins!!!


Images courtesy of AXN.

The X Factor - Matt Cardle

OMG, I love this version of ...Baby One More Time. And I really like this guy's voice. He's amazing. Matt Cardle is one of the finalist for The X Factor seventh season. Thanks Rickey for posting this. Click here to watch the clip. Enjoy!

Nadine & Yani are out from TARA 4

Yes, the lovable and dramatic duo Nadine & Yani is the 1st team to be eliminated from The Amazing Race Asia season 4. I was kind of sad to see them leave as they add quite a drama to the season. They work well together, unfortunately not well enough to avoid elimination.

I was beginning to warm up to the teams for this season after watching episode 2, and to be frank, they are all very entertaining. All of them have their own strengths and weaknesses. The Malaysian teams (Ivan/Hilda and Ethan/Khairie) did pretty well thus far and the Singaporean girls (Claire/Michelle) and the Indian teams (Dimple/Sunaina and Manas/Sahil) were pretty good too. But the team to watch this season, in my opinion, is the Philippines boys (Rich/Rich). They argue a bit here and there, they got lost easily, but they still manage to come in 2nd place for both 1st and 2nd leg of the race. If they keep up the momentum, they could win the race.

I do have a bit of a problem though about this season of TARA, I can't remember the contestant's names! I have to search the internet every time I want to type their names. The only teams that I remember are Ivan/Hilda and Rich/Rich (the latter team is easy right?). I don't think I have much of a problem in last season. Either their names are hard to remember or I am getting old. I'm not that old right? Right?

Anyways, it's a great season so far and hopefully things will get more and more exciting.

TARA 4...coming really soon!!!

Here something to post about.

The Amazing Race Asia Season 4 is coming!!! It will premiere on 23 Sept. 2010 on AXN Asia at 9pm for Singapore, Philippines, Malaysia and India; 10pm for Hong Kong; and 11pm for Taiwan and Korea.

The racers had been revealed a week back and as usual, they took a couple of local celebrities for this season (they always does!). So far, the teams that I'm quite interested in are Claire/Michelle from Singapore, Nadine/Hilyani from Indonesia and Richard/Richard from Philippines. I wonder if they will go far in the competition. Overall, this season have 2 teams from India, Indonesia, Malaysia and Philippines each, 1 team from Singapore and 1 team from Hong Kong.

By the way, you can watch the premiere episode for this season on their website starting today! Click here to go to the webpage. May the best team wins!

Alchemy + maid cafe. Awesome anime on Animax!

Here are two anime series that I currently followed on Animax Asia (Channel 715, Astro Malaysia).

Source: click here

Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood

So far, 52 episodes had been broadcast. So if you just about to tune in to the show, your kind of late, but it's better late than never right. It tells the story of two bothers, Edward and Alphonse Elric, who lives in a world where alchemy triumph over science, and their journey to claim back their missing bodies (Edward's left leg and Alphonse's whole body) after attempting (and failing) to bring back their deceased mother to life by performing a forbidden alchemy transmutation.

Sound a bit complicated but trust me, it's a very good anime series. There was a same anime series called Fullmetal Alchemist (without the word Brotherhood) by the same animation studio that made this one, called Bones, but Brotherhood is more faithful to the manga storyline compared to the former that went a completely different path starting from its mid-season.

Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood is a part of the same-week telecast program by Animax Asia that features anime that will be aired in its channel in the same week that it debut in Japan. It airs every Friday on 8.30 p.m. with the last week episode aired on 8 p.m.. It is one of my favourite anime series of all time and judging by the great story and high-quality anime production, you wouldn't be surprised why.

Source: click here

Maid Sama!

A romantic comedy anime based on a popular shōjo manga series of the same name. The anime is about Misaki Ayuzawa, the first female Student Council President at Seika High, who secretly works part-time at a maid cafe to support her poor family. Being a very fierce and dictator-like president, especially towards the boys, she cannot let her part-time job being known to the others due to her image in school. However, things got out of hand when one of the most popular boys in school, Takumi Usui, found out her secret. Lucky for Misaki, Takumi is a cool guy and he keeps her secret. And their friendship grew as Takumi find an interest in her after seeing her working in the maid cafe and often give her advice in handling the unruly boys at school.

I rarely watch anime based on shojo manga, not that I hate them but I rarely exposed to them. But Maid Sama! has the kind of vibe that I like. I think I mostly like it because of the humor element in it. It's really funny! I tickles me when I see Misaki turning into jelly-like thing in the maid cafe dressing room, or when she becomes panic when she heard other boys saying the word 'maid' in their conversation, or even when she just walking around after school for inspection with her big, loud footsteps. The show is really relaxing, and I like it.

Maid Sama! is also a part of the same-week telecast program by Animax Asia. So far, 3 episodes had been broadcast. You can watch it every Sunday on 8.30 p.m.

Glee mania!

If you love singing competition like the Idol franchise, then you would love Glee. Glee is an American musical-comedy drama that I believe not only popular in the US, but also in other countries that airs it. The second part of season 1 had just started airing in the US but for people in Malaysia, the mid-season finale will air tonight at 10 pm on Star World (Astro Channel 711).

I've been a huge fan of Glee and I will definitely not miss tonight episode. For those of you that had never seen a single episode of Glee, I suggest you watch the mid-season finale tonight. Maybe it will change your mind. And if it did, hopefully Star World would air re-run episodes of the show so that you can catch up with it.

And for all the Gleeks (Glee + geek, that's what fans of the show are called), I hope you enjoy Glee tonight!

My thoughts on American Idol Season 9

AI9 had been criticized as the weakest season so far by so many news, articles and comments I read online. To be honest, I don't think it's the contestants' fault that this season is deemed as the weakest season ever. They are, after all, very good singers. But I do admit that the show do seemed to lost its spark a bit. Maybe because the show had already produced such huge talents like Kelly Clarkson, Fantasia Barrino, Carrie Underwood, Chris Daughtry, David Archuleta and Adam Lambert that people seemed to under appreciate this season's batch of new talents.

For me, this season does have several disappointments. First, the exclusion of Lilly Scott from the Top 12. Second, the elimination of my favourite contestant Didi Benami so early in the show; and third, the use of judges' save on Michael Lynch (in my opinion, he doesn't even suppose to be in the bottom three). Who knows how many 'surprises' will this show brings.

Let's just hope that the best man (or woman) wins.

TARA 4 is coming!!!

At last! After a long wait, The Amazing Race Asia 4 is finally going to happen! You think you got what it takes to win this race? If your answer is YES, then apply to be one of the team for this incredible adventure. Just click here to learn more about it.

The Amazing Race Asia always give me a different kind of excitement compared to its original US counterpart. I'm not sure what, but it surely felt different. I wonder why it was delayed for so long?

Wonder Girls on US television

Image source: Asia enews

Yup, the girls have been busy promoting their music in the US. They already had their hit single Nobody in the Billboard Top 100 back in October, had joined the Jonas Brothers on their North American leg of the Jonas Brothers World Tour 2009 and recently they have performed on So You Think You Can Dance. You can watch the video of their performance here. So cute!

For those of you who don't know, Wonder Girls is a South Korean girl group. Some of their popular songs are Tell Me, So Hot and Nobody. Yay to K-pop!!!

What's happening in December 2009?

Mmm...a lot of things happening around me in December 2009.

1. Britney Spears' birthday on December 2, 2009.
- It's today! Okay, as a fan, I just have to make a shoutout...Happy Birthday Britney!

2. My friends' wedding
- Two of my friends are getting married in this month. Well, I can only go to one event since the other one is too far away. Still planning on what to wear, I don't have much suitable clothes for weddings.

(image from Bleach 7)

3. Bleach premiere on Animax Asia
- Finally...Bleach anime will premiere on Animax Asia (Channel 715 on Astro Malaysia) on Dec. 18, 2009. I can't wait! I really hope they enable bi-lingual audio since I like watching it in Japanese. But of course they need to provide subtitles as well since I cannot understand Japanese. :-P

4. My niece birthday
- I MUST NOT forget this. My niece is turning 2 this 23rd December. Now...what should I give her? I cannot decide!

(image from Wikipedia)

5. Avatar coming out on Dec. 16, 2009
- I had promised myself that I will go to see this movie. I must! I feel like I will be missing something totally amazing if I miss it. Sometimes I will feel very excited about a movie but when the movie comes out, the excitement died away and I will have no interest to watch that particular movie anymore. So hopefully this time I will not disappoint myself. And I'm also hoping that Avatar is as good as it looks in the trailer.


Mmm...so far, that's all I can think of.

Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood on Animax!

Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood had premiered on Animax Asia last Friday, 10 April 2009, at 8.30 pm (Astro Malaysia, Channel 715). So tonight would be the 2nd episode of the new series. If you missed it, don't worry, Animax would have a repeat broadcast. Unfortunately, I don't know the time, so you better watch Animax to know the time schedule. I tried to find it on the Animax website but failed. I guess they never list it. Or maybe I just suck at finding information. :-P

Also note that Animax would also have a monthly recap marathon of past episodes on the last Saturday and Sunday of each month. So I don't think you have to worry anything if you miss a few episodes.

I hope Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood would do well because I really, really love the previous season, so I hope this season would be great too.

Finally I'm here! ANTM Cycle 11 final episode

Finally, I'm reviewing the final episode of America's Next Top Model cycle 11. I can almost hear some of you say "Thank God!". I know, I know, I'm a bit late but I was so caught up with work and personal things that I can't really post much. Anyway, back to business.

At last, the final 3 had their final photo shoot in the competition; the Cover Girl shoot! I must say that all three of them did really well but the picture that I like most was from McKey. The judges had to eliminate another girl before they can move on to the fashion show. And the girl who was eliminated was...Analeigh! I was screaming "NOOOOO!!!" when the judges announced that but nobody heard me of course 'coz I was only screaming in my head. I was so sad to see Analeigh being sent home.

McKey

Analeigh

Samantha

Then, the fashion show. The runway was a bit weird though, it was wavy and...bumpy. The models had to literally run to go up then slowly walk down the stairs. Odd.

I think both Samantha and McKey did good during the runway show but I like McKey more. I know she's gonna win this. And she did. McKey was the winner for America's Next Top Model cycle 11. Her pictures were always great and she can walk. She truly deserved it.


Cycle 12 is still airing in the US. So I guess I had nothing else to do other than wait for the next cycle to premiere in Asia. That would be a long wait....

Windmills!

From all the photo shoots the girls had in Amsterdam, this one is my favourite.

For episode 12 in America's Next Top Model cycle 11, the girls had a photo shoot at a farm, a Dutch farm to be exact, complete with windmills. There were 4 girls left; Marjorie, Samantha, McKey and Analeigh.

For this photo shoot, my favourite has to be from Analeigh. She looks gorgeous and her jumping pose was perfect! I like her photo a lot. Some girls (Elina and Lauren Brie were some that I remembered) said that she doesn't have what it takes to be a model and I had to disagree with them, she DOES! This shot proved that she can model. She was called first to received her photo during the judging. Yay!

Analeigh

The judges didn't like with Marjorie's photo but I kinda like it. I don't know, it kinda works for me. McKey did quite good too. Well, she always take great pictures, so I know she would be fine in this photo shoot.

McKey

Marjorie

My least favourite is from Samantha. She looks dull. Sorry....

Anyway, like I said, the judges didn't like Marjorie's picture. She was placed in the bottom 2 together with Samantha...and Marjorie was eliminated. Poor Marjorie. She tried to gain more confidence but ultimately that was the cause of her elimination.

Do you prefer soft and gentle or over-the-top?

In episode 11 of America's Next Top Model Cycle 11, the girls went on go-sees in Amsterdam with small boats and hunks as a guide. Wow, that's pretty unique. McKey would have won the go-sees challenge (as I expected) for being booked in all of her 4 go-sees but she was disqualified for being late and so Analeigh won it instead (yay!).

For this episode, the girls had a double photo shoots; 1 in heavy make-up and fancy clothes while another one with a natural look and no make-up.

In my opinion, all of the girls did quite good for the photo shoot with no make-up with Samantha and McKey producing the best pics. I love Analeigh and I really want her to win but I have to be honest, her pic along with Elina's are my least fave from this photo shoot. Sorry Analeigh, I still love you though.

Samantha- Gorgeous!

McKey- Wow!

Marjorie- Odd but pretty.

Analeigh- Not so strong this time.

Elina- Average.

For the photo shoot with heavy make-up and fancy clothes, I have only 2 pics that I love; Samantha and Marjorie. Both girls look stunning especially Samantha with her posing.

Samantha- LOVE THIS!

Marjorie- Fierce!

Elina and Marjorie were in the bottom 2 and Elina was eliminated. Well, like the rest of us, I think she saw it coming.

The girls in Amsterdam!

Let's continue on to episode 10 of America's Next Top Model Cycle 11. I skipped 2 episodes because episode 8 is a recap while episode 9 has no photo shoot but only commercial shoot. Joslyn was eliminated in episode 9 by the way, and this left us with 6 girls.

Joslyn

The girls went to Amsterdam for this cycle and they sure were excited. For this episode, they had a photo shoot in a couture gown on a boat. Two girls really stood out for me and they were Analeigh (I always love her!) and McKey. I think showing some legs really helps a lot. ;-)

McKey

Analeigh

I think Samantha did quite good too, although not as good as Analeigh and McKey.

Samantha

Sheena and Elina (again) landed in the bottom 2 and Sheena was eliminated for not being consistent enough. I kinda agree with that although she did have some photographs which were quite good. Sadly, she was not good enough for the competition.

Sheena

One funny thing that happened during this episode was when Elina totally ignored Jay during her photo shoot. Focusing too much? Sometimes I was like that too when I'm concentrating too much. Hopefully I didn't annoy anybody like Elina annoyed Jay.

By the way, Cycle 12 had recently premiered in the US. So I think it will take some time for it to be aired on television in other part of the world. I'll be waiting....

American Idol 2009

Who will be the next American Idol??? It's still a long way to go but there are already some names that emerged as favorites. But still, it's too soon to tell coz' some will improve and some will fall. We already have our Top 36 and soon the Top 12 will be revealed. Group 1 already performed and from what I've read, some were disappointing and some were quite impressive.

American Idol Season 8 aired on StarWorld (Channel 711, Astro Malaysia). I will not post as much as I did during AI Season 7 coz I'm quite busy with my work in the office lately, so to get instant news on your favourite show, just visit the official website or this awesome fansite.