text:
What are the reference of Heaven's Lost Property to the Greek Mythology?
In Heaven's Lost property, there are some obvious references to Greek Mythology, such as Zeus' cannon which is obviously linked to the Greek God Zeus.

What are the references to Sora No Otoshimono in Greek Mythology? Are there any links between the references and the character designs?

This question is intended to be self-answered, but other hints and recommendations are welcome.

Note that the references are sorted alphabetically.
I will use SnO as an abbreviation of Sora No Otoshimono (Heaven's Lost Property's Japanese title).

Aegis

In Sora No Otoshimono, Aegis is a defense system used by Angeloids to protect themselves.
In Greek Mythology, Aegis is a shield made out of animal skin carried by Zeus and Athena.

Alpha, Beta, ...
The Angeloids code name are all greeks letters

Alpha (Ikaros)
Beta (Nymph)
Delta (Astraea)
Epsilon (Chaos)
Gamma (Harpies)
Zeta (Hiyori)
Eta (Seiren)
Theta (Melan)

Oregano is the only angeloid character not code named. This is explained by the fact that she was not designed to be an unique model, but just another medical robot who went out to the human world by accident.
Note that if we follow the order of apparition of the Angeloids, their code names are alphabetically sorted.

Apollon

Ikaros' bow is named Apollon.
It is an obvious reference to the God Apollo. Even though Apollo is known for being the God of Music and Poetry, he also has a golden bow. The bow can cause health or famine, although its main function is that of a regular bow, but with much greater power.
In a similar way, Ikaros' bow is known for having great power, as she could destroy cities and countries with a few arrows.

Artemis

Ikaros has the ability to shoot missiles using Artemis.
Artemis is Apollo's twin sister. She is known as the hunt, wild animals, wilderness, childbirth, virginity and protector of young girls.
She carries a silver bow made to kill without pain, opposed to Apollo's golden bow (see Apollo's reference) which is made to bring great suffering.
The weapon and the divinity are linked on a particular point : Ikaros' Artemis missiles are designed to follow its target until it reaches it. We can link this to Artemis' bow which is made for hunt, therefore for tracking.

Astraea

Astraea is one of the 3 main Angeloid's. She is often represented as dumb.
In Greek Mythology, Astraea, also called Astraia, is the virgin Godess of Justice.
We can link the character and the Godess by the innocence implied by the fact that Astraea, by her virginity, represents innocence, which is represented in Sora No Otoshimono by Astraea's stupidity and innocence.

Chaos

Chaos is the first Angeloid of the second generation.
Chaos, in Greek Mythology, is the first thing that ever existed. More generally, it is often used to represent a gap, a void.
In SnO, Chaos is deeply searching for the meaning of love, and doesn't seem to understand what it means until the very end. This lack of love can be interpreted as a void, linking the character to the mythological notion. One also notices that the SnO Chaos' wings are pretty similar to some representations of the God.

Chrysaor

In SnO, Chrysaor is Astraea's sword. It is referred to as the best weapon ever created for close-combat.
Chrysaor is the son of Poseidon and Medusa. The literal  English translation of his name is "He who has a golden sword".

Harpies

In SnO, Harpies are antagonists. They follow their master's orders until the very end. They are often cruel even though they almost fall in love in the Harpies' arc. They are sent by the Master of the Synapse to kill Ikaros as she had disobeyed her original master.
In Greek Mythology, a Harpy is a winged creature with a human face. They were created by Zeus to go to Earth and punish King Phineus.
Both the mythological creatures and the SnO's characters were sent down as a cruel response to what could be called an offense to the Gods.

Hiyori and Demeter

Demeter is the Goddess of harvest, the cycle of life, death and the seasons.
Hiyori is a reference to this Goddess in some points :

She is doing agricultural work, helping her parents to cultivate vegetables, therefore serving as a link with the agricultural Goddess

Her weapon, Demeter, can manipulate time, just as the greek Demeter would be able to manipulate seasons.

Ikaros, Daedalus and Minos
Those 3 characters are linked by the myth of the Labyrinth and Icarus' wings

Daedalus built the labyrinth for King Minos, who needed it to imprison his wife's son the Minotaur. The story is that Poseidon had given a white bull to Minos so that he might use it as a sacrifice. Instead, Minos kept it for himself; and in revenge, Poseidon made his wife Pasiphaë lust for the bull with the help of Aphrodite, who will later give birth to the Minotaur.
Minos imprisoned Daedalus himself in the labyrinth because he gave Minos's daughter, Ariadne, a clew(or ball of string) in order to help Theseus, the enemy of Minos, to survive the Labyrinth and defeat the Minotaur.
Daedalus fashioned two pairs of wings out of wax and feathers for himself and his son. Daedalus tried his wings first, but before trying to escape the island, he warned his son not to fly too close to the sun, nor too close to the sea, but to follow his path of flight. Overcome by the giddiness that flying lent him, Icarus soared into the sky, but in the process he came too close to the sun, which melted the wax. Icarus kept flapping his wings but soon realized that he had no feathers left and that he was only flapping his bare arms, and so Icarus fell into the sea in the area which today bears his name, the Icarian Sea near Icaria, an island southwest of Samos.

Hereafter the similar naming of the characters, there are some similarities :

Ikaros has wings, like Icarus
In SnO Daedalus is Ikaros' creator, as in Greek Mythology Daedalus is Icarus' father.
In SnO Daedalus is forced to exile and Ikaros is sealed, as in Greek Mythology Daedalus and Icarus are jailed in the Labyrinth.
Sugata always wishes to fly in order to discover the New World, which is a reference to this myth
A reference to Icarus' fall is made in the final arc :

 In the final arc, Ikaros reveals that she was previously ordered to destroy the Synapse. Even though they managed to control it, a security measure was taken : if Ikaros ever flew back to the Synapse without permission, she would be set on fire.

Here is another approach on Icarus myth which is not verified and mostly based on my deductions :
SnO may be intended as a reversed Icarus myth. The Icarus myth moral is

Humans should never try to achieve the dream of getting at the same level as Gods

And the moral of Sora No Otoshimono is

Because they have everything, Gods are inferior to humans as they, therefore can't dream.

Nymph

Nymph is the second Angeloid to appear.
In Greek Mythology, different from other Goddesses, Nymphs are generally regarded as divine spirits who animate nature, and are usually depicted as beautiful, young nubile maidens who love to dance and sing.
Beta is known for loving nature, birds, and singing. On this points, she is quite similar to the mythological creatures.
What's more, a recurrent joke of Sora No Otoshimono is Nymph's little sized breast. In Greek Mythology, nymphs are sometimes represented in the shape of young maidens, which may explained the low developed secondary sexual characters of Nymph.

Oregano

In SnO, Oregano is one of the medical Angeloids.
In real life, Oregano is a healing plant. In Greek Mythology, the Goddess Aphrodite invented the spice, giving it to man to make his life happier. The word "oregano" is actually derived from the Greek phrase, "joy of the mountains".

Pandora Mode

In SnO, the Pandora Mode is a second state mode of Angeloids where all their capabilities are hugely improved.
In Greek Mythology, Pandora is the first woman ever created.

Zeus ordered Hephaestus to create her. So he did, using water and earth. The Gods endowed her with many gifts: Athena clothed her, Aphrodite gave her beauty, Apollo gave her musical ability, and Hermes gave her speech.
According to Hesiod, when Prometheus stole fire from heaven, Zeus took vengeance by presenting Pandora to Prometheus' brother Epimetheus. Pandora opens a jar containing death and many other evils which were released into the world. She hastened to close the container, but all of the contents had escaped except for one thing that lay at the bottom – Elpis (usually translated "hope", though it could also mean "expectation").

I didn't find any relevant link between the Myths and the SnO mode.

Poseidon

In SnO, Poseidon is Minos' weapon.
In Greek Mythology, Poseidon is one of the 12 Gods and is called the "God of the Sea".
He carries a weapon, the Trident.
The Minos' weapon is clearly a reference to Poseidon's trident.
It is funny to mention that in the Myth, Poseidon punished King Minos for keeping a sacrifice for himself (See Ikaros, Daedalus and Minos entry)

Seiren

Seiren appears very shortly in SnO before being killed by Chaos.
Sirens were  beautiful and dangerous creatures who lured nearby sailors with their enchanting music and voices to shipwreck on the rocky coast of their island.
Seiren is an Angeloid designed for swimming, unlike other Angeloids, who do not float (due to the weight of their wet wings), therefore, serving as a link with Sirens which are always in the sea.

Uranus Queen (Ikaros)

Uranus is the Greek God of the sky. As Ikaros is the most powerful Angeloid ever created, the link is pretty obvious.

Zeus

In SnO, Zeus is a weapon created to protect the Synapse against aggressors.
In Greek Mythology, Zeus is the sky and thunder God, ruling the other Gods.
They are linked as both throw thunderbolts and are in the sky


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What did Tsunozaki Taki say?
In chapter 86 of Shokugeki no Soma as Yukihira was about to start whipping up some mad beef stew, this happened (roughly went like this):

Soma: You were Tsunozaki Taki senpai... right?
Tsuno: Huh? (What's with this guy?! He just went and talked to me normally!)
Soma: It seems you've been saying lots about me. I'll listen to your complaints, after I finish serving my dish!!!!

I've read through this bit quite a few times, and I still have no clue what Soma is referring to when he says "seems you've been talking smack about me". I didn't even know she existed until that chapter. Maybe I'm missing something crucial?

In ch 85, pg 6- Taki says that,

"The headband guy comes from a special-of-the-day downtown family restaurant. Moreover, he's only transferred here for only half a year. That's no good"

Soma overhears this and replies in the next chapter that, "I'll listen to your complaints after I finish serving my dish"

I'm a complete noob somehow I skipped chapter 85 and never noticed until now lol

source: Stack Exchange

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

sort: votes


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What is the difference between Shonen'ai, JUNE, Yaoi and Boys' love?
The difference between Shonen'ai and Yaoi as already been asked.
However, I encountered a few more terminologies concerning anime and mangas referring to masculine homosexuality :

Shōnen'ai
JUNE
Yaoi
Boys' love

What are the main differences between those genres?

Boy's Love is, like Girl's Love in Shoujo Ai/Yuri, just another way to describe Shounen Ai/Yaoi.....though i have never seen the term JUNE before

@Makoto why is this a duplicate?

@MichaelMcQuade:  The duplicate has answers which cover most (if not all) of this terminology.  The fact that a magazine name came up does make the answer below more relevant, but by and large I still believe this to be answered well by the existing question.

Shounen-Ai
Literally translated means boys love. However, in these type of series, it usually represents an innocent, non sexual nature of homosexuality.
Ex- 7-Ghosts.
(Taken from wikipedia)

The term shōnen-ai (boy love) originally connoted ephebophilia or pederasty in Japan, but from the early 1970s to the late 1980s, was used to describe a new genre of shōjo manga, primarily produced by the Year 24 Group of women authors, about beautiful boys in love. Characteristics of shōnen-ai include exoticism, often taking place in Europe, and idealism. Jeffrey Angles particularly notes Moto Hagio's The Heart of Thomas (1974) and Keiko Takemiya's Kaze to Ki no Uta (1976-1984) as being groundbreaking, noting their portrayal of intense friendship between males, including jealousy and desire.

June- This name actually comes from a specific manga magazine and it cannot be said as a genre or demographic per se.
(From Wikipedia)

A manga or text story with male homosexual themes for women written in an aesthetic (耽美 tanbi) style, named for the Juné magazine.

Yaoi

Yaoi (/ˈjaʊi/, Japanese: [ja.o.i]), also known as Boys' Love (BL), is a Japanese genre of fictional media focusing on romantic or sexual relationships between male characters, typically aimed at a female audience and usually created by female authors. Although yaoi is typically aimed at a female audience, the genre also attracts some male readers; however, manga aimed at a gay male audience (bara) is considered a separate genre.

Boys Love
Yaoi and Boys-Love are basically the same thing and can be used interchangeably

Shonen-ai (shonen = boy, ai = love), so it's boy's love.
Yaoi is mostly just the physical side of the relationship between male characters.
June is the earliest yaoi (BL) magazine.
BL means boy x boy relationships.

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


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Where did it become known that Rin's and Len's names have different first letters?
According to the answers here and this chat post

there's one sound in Japanese which is somewhere between L and R, though probably closer to R.

Luffy/Ruffy (One Piece)
Lio/Rio (Kara no Kyoukai)

2 of the Vocaloids are the twins Rin and Len, but given the above, their names could be Rin and Ren, Lin and Len, or even Lin and Ren.
So where did it become known that Rin's and Len's names have different first letters, as opposed to the alternatives that I mentioned?

Probably word of god. Seeing as their names are written on the software box and all.
http://www.amazon.com/Vocaloid2-Character-Vocal-Series-02/dp/B001BIXLOC

These days there's usually a "word of god" official transliteration of character names. In the past though, it could vary depending on who was doing translation. It's more than just L/R as well. The names リン and レン correspond to a number of different western names, like Lynn and Wren.

Also, a theory for this particular case: the name's depict Right and Left speakers/channels/whatever-it-is.

The earliest archived revision of Crypton's page for the Kagamines that reveals details about them has their names in both Latin script and in Japanese.

That revision is from 3 Dec 2007, which is shortly before they were actually first sold later that same month.
So I guess the answer to your question is that it was known to people pretty much from the very beginning.


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Are there other Sharingan users who can copy other jutsu besides Kakashi?
After I have read this question, I remember that Kakashi's epithet is Copy Ninja because he has a Sharingan in his left eye that was given to him by Obito.
But I can't think of another Sharingan user who can also copy other jutsu. So, is that the only special technique that Kakashi's Sharingan had, or there's another Sharingan user who also can copy other jutsu?

Sharingan literally means Copy Wheel Eye. The Eye of Insight and the Eye of Hypnotism are the two abilities of the Sharingan.
The Eye of Insight has different abilities in itself. One of the abilities, lets the user copy any jutsu and utilize with maximum achievable perfection.

The user is able to copy almost any jutsu they see, memorising ninjutsu, genjutsu, and taijutsu with near-perfect accuracy. They can then either perform that jutsu or modify it to suit their needs, as when Sasuke Uchiha bases his Lion Combo on Rock Lee's Front Lotus. Again, Sharingan users need the prerequisite abilities before they can mimic a jutsu they have seen, and for that reason they cannot, for example, reproduce kekkei genkai abilities they do not have or nature transformations they haven't learned to perform.
source: Sharingan

Therefore, every Sharingan user is capable of using the Eye of Insight's ability of copying other jutsu, provided, their Sharingan are matured enough. It is not, therefore, exclusive to Kakashi. Every Sharingan user has this ability. Although, Kakashi is the only non-Uchiha able to perform it successfully.

besides Sasuke that can copy Rock Lee's Front Lotus, is there any other Sharingan users that can copy jutsu shown in the manga or anime? I can't remember about this

@JTR his brother can also do the same.

Itachi? when and what's kind of jutsu that copied by him?

Apparently anyone with a Sharingan can do it, it's just frightfully underused

@JTR: like the other comments suggest, all Sharingan users can copy jutsu. Kakashi and Sasuke are the ones with famous screentime though. Elite Uchiha (Madara, Itachi, Obito) are undoubtedly capable of using it too.


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Why didn't Kizaru engage Beckman in the Marineford War?
In episode 488 of One Piece anime,

During the Battle of Marineford, Beckman prevented Admiral Kizaru from attacking Luffy and Trafalgar Law, telling Kizaru not to move a muscle while aiming his gun at him.
source: Benn Beckman

Kizaru is supposed to be impervious to physical attacks, but he didn't engage Beckman, so was it because he didn't want to fight Beckman at the moment  and thereby starting a war with the Red Hair Pirates or was it because Beckman's rifle is special?

Do you now the concept of Haki(Armament/Busoshoku)? Here>> http://onepiece.wikia.com/wiki/Haki/Busoshoku_Haki

Quoting One Piece Wiki:

According to Oda, Beckman has the highest IQ of all the characters introduced in the East Blue saga. Since he is a first mate to a Yonko, he presumably possesses a great deal of strength. During the Battle of Marineford, Admiral Kizaru chose not to fight him, even though he had just fought the First Commander of Whitebeard's crew and Whitebeard himself.

We see Marguerite attacking Luffy with an Haki infused arrow here:

Benn Beckman being the first mate of the Red Hair Pirates obviously has incredible power and Haki. Since Kizaru as well backed off, it makes it evident that Beckmann can imbue his bullets in Haki as well, although that hasn't been directly shown yet.
Another reason would obviously be to avoid engaging in a war with the Red Hair Pirates/one of the Yonko. We already saw the kind of power the Yonko have when it took the whole of Marine Power to subdue Whitebeard. Needless to say, had they engaged in a war with Shanks, there would have been many more casualties.
As per the Wikia article on Battle of Marineford:

Shanks threatens both the Marines and Blackbeard pirates alike to have his entire crew involved in the fighting, if they chose to continue the war. With the Gura Gura no Mi under his possession, Teach no longer sees the point in resuming the battle and has his crew depart from the battlefield. As Blackbeard leaves the scene, the absence of a designated rival and presence of a powerful Yonko convinces Sengoku to concede to the necessity of a ceasefire, ordering the Marines to tend to the wounded.

The last and final reason I can think of is that the Marines had already achieved their goal of executing Ace and also managed to get rid of Whitebeard. There wasn't any reason to engage Beckman in the first place, unless they were looking for a needless battle.

(+1) ah! you are right about Haki, I did see Silver Rayleigh stop Kizaru with a sword and he mastered the highest level of Haki! :)

Ben Beckman's bullets may have been made of Kairouseki, meaning sea stone. As we all know Devil fruit holders(like Kizaru) are weak against sea stone. No such thing as Sea stone bullets have been explained in the anime yet, it is certainly possible as we are talking about a Yonko here. Everyone is scared of Red Haired Shanks, and he may have even persuaded Dr. Vegapunk to make such things for him. The Navy must know all about this,but cannot go against Vegapunk because he is an essential person for them.

Benn Beckman is said to have the highest IQ in all of East blue and I think that's the case for a reason, let's think what is faster than light, nothing but in a way your mind can be faster for example you can imagine being on the other side of the world in an instant which is faster than light or at least kizaru's speed. So maybe Benn Beckman or Beckmen has some kind of mind mind no mi of mind mind fruit that makes him the most knowledgeable and maybe also grants him the speed of mind which is in theory faster than light.

Welcome to [anime.se], we appreciate your contribution, but pure opinion/speculation answer is discouraged. Instead, please [edit] and try to back up the answer by providing supporting sources/references. Thank you.


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How many characters in One Piece know what happened in the Void Century?
What I found directly on One Piece wiki is the following:

Gol D. Roger's crew appears to have followed the poneglyphs all the way and figured out exactly what the missing history is. When queried by Nico Robin on the Void Century and the Will of the D., Silvers Rayleigh replied to her that he would tell her the history if she wanted to know.
Whitebeard also knew about the truth behind the Void Century and the
Will of D., as Roger told him before he died.  It is unknown whether Whitebeard
shared this information with any of his crew.
The Gorosei have shown to have at least a basic knowledge of the
occurrences of the Void Century, according to their shocked reactions
to Professor Clover's statements.

Is there anyone else who knows what happened in the Void Century?

This is a very interesting question. As you state in your answer, Gol D Roger knew what happened in the Void Century, as did Whitebeard, whom he told, Clover and presumably some of the others on O'hara knew at least a little, and it is very likely that the Gorosei and perhaps some others at the top of the World Government knew.
But it isn't very obvious who else knows. When Rayleigh is asked whether he knows the truth of the Void Century, he replies that they do, but isn't clear who exactly he is talking about. At least he and Roger knew, but it's possible only a few other officers did, and it's also possible that the whole crew knew, meaning Buggy, Shanks, Crocus and a whole load of others. However, I think this is unlikely. The Roger pirates weren't like the Strawhats, Buggy and Shanks were two cabin boys, so it's likely that the crew was pretty large, and if all these pirates knew the truth, then it seems likely that some of it would be out by now.
It doesn't seem likely that the Gorosei have told any others, and neither did Clover, but Whitebeard could easily have told Marco and some of his other trusted sons what Roger told him. Rayleigh was willing to tell the Strawhats, but preferred not to, and had already been pretty impressed by Luffy, I doubt he would have told the secret to anyone else on a whim, as he preferred to keep his head down after the dissolution of his crew.
In summary, the only living person we have confirmed to know the truth behind the Void Century is Rayleigh, but it's strongly implied the Gorosei know, there is a reasonable chance that some other world government leaders, Roger pirates and Whitebeard pirates know, and I would also expect Dragon to know at least some of the truth, as he leads a very powerful organisation fully opposed to the World Government.

Thanks. The part about Dragon makes sense. It never crossed my mind that Dragon may also be one of the person who knew about it.


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An unfamiliar logo "uap" on the DVD label
What logo is this? It's printed on an anime's DVD label. Reverse image search shows this, anyone knows this logo?

It's vap, not "uap"

I believe VAP is what that actually is. Their website is here: Vap, according to animenewsnetwork:

VAP is a subsidiary of the NTV (Nippon Television Network) Group.

Here is the animenewsnetwork page that lists all of the anime's Vap has been involved with.

Simple answer, yet is what I want!

Yes I know this logo it's from the VAP entertainment company.
It's not very clear from their Wikipedia or ANN page how many branches this company has and what they do exactly but they seem to be involved in broadcasting and obviously operating as a music label besides production or licensing and distribution of anime and games.

The logo is a script typeface with serifs and swashes. In script the lower letter v is connected at the top where the lower letter u is connected at the bottom, similar to the a. That's how you usually can tell them apart.

Using reverse image search for fonts and logos can be tricky. While kerning shouldn't be a problem for OCR, these letters are melted together and baked into artifacts and noisy background.
Another option to avoid misinterpreting logos would be too look for product codes or URLs on the disk or jacket and look these up instead of reverse image search.


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What is the total runtime of One Piece up to this point?
After reading this Question and the ingenious answer from Dimitri mx (kudos) and a related comment, I came to wonder how One Piece would compare.
The anime was launched in October 1999 and is still ongoing.

Ill see if I have the time to answer this one tonight (if nobody else did take the time to do so off course) :)

Considering that comment, One Piece is far from being the longest running show. Imagine binge watching Sazae-san, with its 29.9 days worth of watching...

@Dimitrimx just read your answer for naruto on similar question. and after reading that m excited to get stats for one piece as well. That was really a great job done :):)

Before I start with the actual comparison, I would first like to note that in the current point in time, Naruto and One piece do not differ to much in run time. But taking into account that Naruto is running towards the end, and Oda Eiichiro said that he is about the half way mark, we can safely assume that in a near future this will change. With that said.
Just like in my mentioned answer, I have been using Myanimelist as a source of times. And came to the conclusion that it would take you
18945 Minutes of non stop watching one piece (excluding cross-overs)
which equals to 315.8 Hours or 13.2 Days
making the difference in time about 1620 Minutes
which equals to 27 Hours or slightly more then 1 day
This difference in run time is caused by One piece having:

220 more episodes
4 (soon to be 5) more movies
7 more Ova's
1 More special

Where as Naruto only beats one piece in

Having a second season
Having a spin- off series.

Actual Serie
One Piece 710 episodes (currently), roughly 24 minute's/Episode*
~17040 Minutes or 11.8 days
Movies

One Piece  50 Minutes
Nejimaki Jima no Daibouken 55 Minutes
Chinjuujima no Chopper Oukoku  55 Minutes
Dead End no Bouken  95 Minutes
Norowareta Seiken  95 Minutes
Omatsuri Danshaku to Himitsu no Shima 6  95 Minutes
Karakurijou no Mecha Kyohei  94 Minutes
Jango no Dance Carnival  6 Minutes
Yume no Soccer Ou!  5 Minutes
Mezase! Kaizoku Yakyuu Ou  5 Minutes
Strong World  115 Minutes
Film: Z  107 Minutes
One Piece (2016) Unknown
TOTAL: 777 Minutes or 13.0 Hours

Movies (Summary's)
All tough most of the ones listed under this tab are officially known as specials, I still decided to list them in their own sub-category of movies as I found it to be more fitting.

Episode of Alabaster - Sabaku no Ojou to Kaizoku Tachi  90 Minutes
Episode of Chopper Plus - Fuyu ni Saku, Kiseki no Sakura 113 Minutes
Episode of Nami - Koukaishi no Namida to Nakama no Kizuna  106 Minutes
Episode of Merry - Mou Hitori no Nakama no Monogatari  106 Minutes
Episode of Sabo - 3 Kyoudai no Kizuna Kiseki no Saikai to Uketsugareru Ishi  105 Minutes
TOTAL: 520 Minutes or 8.7 Hours

Ova

Taose! Kaizoku Ganzack  28 Minutes
Umi no Heso no Daibouken-hen  49 Minutes
Oounabara ni Hirake! Dekkai Dekkai Chichi no Yume!  46 Minutes
Romance Dawn Story  33 Minutes
3D: Mugiwara Chase  30 Minutes
3D: Gekisou! Trap Coaster  12 Minutes
Romance Dawn  30 Minutes
Episode of Alabaster - Prologue  15 Minutes
Recap (10 year recap, from start up to Impeldown)  29 Minutes
TOTAL: 272 Minutes or 4.5 Hours

Specials

Mamore! Saigo no Dai Butai  45 Minutes
Nenmatsu Tokubetsu Kikaku! Mugiwara no Luffy Oyabun Torimonochou 42 Minutes
Straw Hat Theater (5 eps. 3 Min/ep) 15 Minutes
Episode of Luffy - Hand Island no Bouken  102 Minutes
Glorious Island (2 eps. 5 Min/ep) 10 Minutes
3D2Y: Ace no shi wo Koete! Luffy Nakama Tono Chikai  107 Minutes
Cry Heart (3 eps. 5 Min/ep) 15 Minutes
TOTAL: 336 Minutes or 5.6 Hours

Small side note: All tough I taught it was said for Naruto fans to wait a whole week, One piece fans had a even harder time having to wait 832 weeks or 16 years! With the sole exception being Hinati Fujinamai Ending revealed to severely sick boy

JapNation AniManga reports that Eiichiro Oda was glad to tell the kid how One Piece ends and that he was holding back his tears upon seeing the condition of Hinati Fujinami.
  While Oda was fine with Hinati Fujinami learning about the One Piece ending, Oda requested to talk to the child alone so that details about the One Piece manga ending wouldn't be leaked while he jokingly pleaded to Hinati to not reveal it to the press.
  JanNation AniManga noted that at the end of their talk, Hinati Fujinami was reportedly seen smiling but crying at the same time as he told the people that One Piece is "beautiful".

Again a well researched/written work of diligence!


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Why don't Ikaros & Tomoki use more the Transport Cards to solve their problems?
Even thought in the first episode, Ikaros used her cards to accord every single desire of Tomoki, bringing to what looks like the end of the world, then the use of those is reduced to 2 times (I may have forgotten one or two occurrence(s)).

Episode 2 : Not intentionnaly when Tomoki wishes to make Sohara's underwears fly away unless it is the underwear Tomoki wants;

Episode 4 : Sohara borrows a card from Ikaros to bring all the panties in Tomoki's house to explode, Tomoki should look at them or touch them.

Why didn't Tomoki use more those cards to grant him what he wished?
Even if you take apart the opportunity of destroying/neutralizing Chaos by a single wish, he could have used it in some similar issues of the one mentionned above. Just as an example :

In episode 9, Tomoki spots an erotic DVD at a booth, but cannot afford it because Ikaros broke some other item.

It would be logical from Tomoki to use a card to get this DVD.

In episode 2 Tomoki can't use the cards to stop it because, a masters choices are absolute. Cards can't undo what other cards have done. And in the manga it says you can't use the same Transport twice, thats also the reason why tomoki has a limited amount of money, even though he got so much in the first episode.
And if you're thinking now that in the first episode this was not like it, well they made it a dream, they didn't undo the card.
Episode 4: the same reason, and Tomoki hadn't any cards near him to teleport away or something like that.
Episode 9: Even though Tomoki is a pervert, he would never wan't Ikaros to do pervertet Stuff, so he doesn't wan't her to get the dvd for him
The autors actually thought about this things, but you only see it if you read the manga, because in the anime there are to many scenes witch don't exist.

Hope my answer was helpfull, and sorry for the bad english :D

I'm not sure to get it, because Tomoki wished everything that happend in ep.1 was just a dream, it did change the cards nature? Do they mention the change in the manga? :) Also "He would never wan't Ikaros to do pervert stuff", in the ep1 also, he used Ikaros cards for this kind of ideas, but as @thePiGrepper suggested, it is possible that "Tomoki learned that he shouldnt use the cards for trivial stuff". Interesting anwser tho!

It's better explained in the manga, and no it didn't change the cards nature: Tomoki just set it all to a dream, he didn't undo or change what happened. I don't think you saw season 2 and the movies, so go ahead and watch it, then you'll realize that tomoki doesn't want Ikaros to do anything pervertet himselfe. He loves Ikaros (Not in the I love you, lets be together forever way) from deep down in his heart, and he wants her to stay pure. Thats also why in season to he goes to this temple, shrine thingy to clean up his mind. Hope you understand what im trying to say. Ps SoNoOt is MyFavAnime :D

Yeah you're right about the temple part. What disturbs me is the part about not using the card twice while they do it ALL the time with the same card in the first episode. And yeah it's a great one!

I don't mean they can't use the new card  models twice. If you look at the things cards do as "magical spells", they can't do the same spell twice. But some cards (the newer models) are able to do more than one spell.

Oh okay. Accepted then!

By the way, do you know when the second part of the secon movie is comming out?

Didn't watch the movies already! If you want to keep discussing, consider joining the main discution room ;)

Okay, i'll consider it. Have a nice day :)

Well, I think many can agree that SoraOto is a series which displays a comedy side and a serious side, and sometimes (many times actually) the comedic parts, like the first episode for example, serves, in the best case, for character development and, in the worst case, just for laughs. Most of the information thrown at us in the comedy parts aren't really used on the serious parts, especially when it comes to plot solving. I personally think it is just the author's decision NOT to do this.
Also, I think that at the end of episode one, Tomoki learned that he shouldn't use the cards for trivial stuff, especially after everything that happened in that first episode. Maybe that was actually the author stating why everything shouldn't be solved by a deus ex machina-like device.

Yeah I guess you're right for the first part, was just searching if there was a "rationnal" explanation :) Even if you can't use the synapse against itself, in the DVD example I gave, it would still have been possible tho!

hmm, yeah that's true, it would have been possible. but i think that at the end of episode one, Tomoki learned that he shouldnt use the cards for trivial stuff, especially after everything that happened in that first episode. Maybe, that was actually the author stating why everything shouldnt be solved by a deus ex machina-like device.

"Tomoki learned that he shouldnt use the cards for trivial stuff" Actually that's kind of a great idea, you should add it on the answer!

Ok, I added that last part and deleted the other reason becsuse it didnt applied to your particular example.


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Why does Kumagawa talk in Japanese quotation marks?
「In the manga, Misogi Kumagawa talks with his words inside quotation marks, just like this.」
「Here's a typical example:」

「Why is this? Is there a specific reason he has this notation while talking?」

I believe it has to do with his "All Fiction", which allows him to deny reality. 「So basically, what he says is not real, hence the quotation marks.」 Maybe?

@Nolonar I thought that, but he still has that notation when he swaps "All-Fiction" for "Bookmaker", so I don't think it's that. I know he still technically has it, but it's sorta locked away until that specific incident later in the story.

I guess it's to indicate a different style of talking? Like how Yotsuba in Mahou Sensei Negima speaks without text bubble.

The reason why Kumagawa's "speaks" in brackets is a bit of a pun (see 『カギカッコ』). The context here implies literally [括弧]{かっこ}つける (kakko tsukeru), meaning "to add brackets/parenthesis (to something, e.g., a sentence)." The pun involves a well-known expression [格好]{かっこ}つける (kakko tsukeru), meaning "to show off or try to look cool." Kumagawa speaks in the way he does because he is trying to sound cool.
One thing to note about 格好 is it's a kanji with irregular kana usage. おう (ou) like えい (ei) is what's called a "long vowel." The おう (ou)  is essentially a long "oo" sound.  Historically [格好]{かっこう} (kakkou) is the correct spelling, however in certain, more colloquial contexts the う is omitted for purposed such as brevity.
In chapter 88 of the manga, when Kumagawa returns to the dream classroom and ask Ajimu for his original Minus back. Ajimu asks him to express himself sincerely, without brackets if he wants it back.

He replies w/o square brackets.

It should be noted that he speaks using "double square brackets" (二重鉤括弧 『　』) used to mark quotes within quotes. In Japanese fiction this type of square bracket is often used to denote something heard through another device. It's implied in the case of Kumagawa that what we are seeing is essentially subtitles. We're hearing the literal meaning being his cool words.

I haven't read the manga (only watched the anime), but I have heard this explanation, and I've always found it a little dubious. 格好 is pronounced かっこう, whereas 括弧 is pronounced かっこ. Similar, but not quite the same.

@senshin While the kanji 括弧 is pronounced かっこう, it seems that the non-kanji form often drops the -う. (additional ref: weblio)

格好 has irregular kana usage, so you see both in various places and in various capacities. A lot of time the う is omitted, usually for brevity, since the "-ou" is basically a long "-oo".

There is a common mistake by the translator in the words of Kumagawa. The origin of the meaning of parentheses, whether in the anime or manga, has two reasons in the Japanese language. The first reason is that the words inside the brackets are all lies. The second reason is that the words inside the brackets are said in a single tone of voice without any feelings, whether anger, sadness or joy, and I think that Kumagawa uses both reasons

Welcome to Anime & Manga! Do you have a manga chapter/anime episode reference to support your answer?

Please add further details to expand on your answer, such as working code or documentation citations.

Your edit hasn't added anything of value to your answer.


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Why does Eighth have such an oversized head?
All the characters in Mirai Nikki follow more or less the same style, with one exception - Eighth, who has a strangely oversized head.

Spot the culprit

Why is this? Is there a specific reason Eighth has this appearance?

I wasn't able to find anything that explicitly stated as to why her character design is that way. It is apparent that a lot of the fans do not understand why her design is that way and do not like the way she looks.
I will try to explain my interpretation as to why she might have been created to look that way.

Character Impression
During the series, a good number of the diary owners are sociopaths that enjoy killing other people. There are a few exceptions to the trend like Yuki, Keigo, etc. Kamado is also part of this group not wanting to have anything to do with the game, but her orphan children want her to win and form a little army to protect her. The character design that was chosen shows that she doesn't look threatening in any way and leads most people to believe she is harmless.
Motherly Figure
As we all know, Kamado runs an orphanage that caters to quite a few children. This design could imitate how some children perceive their mother. A mother or father is a very big presence in a child's life, and this over inflated head design can reflect how a mothers head may look to a small child when she is bending down talking to a child or infant.

Taking those factors into account, that could lead to an exaggerated character design. Note that this is in no way 100% fact, as it is my general interpretation as to why the artist may do this.

That's a fairly good interpretation, I like the point on the motherly figure side of things. I'll accept this if nothing comes along with a canon reason.

@Matt Thanks, Im still trying to search for a hard reason as to why they drew her like that If I find anything else that can shed light on it I'll add it to my answer.


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What is meant by Nagato when she mentions the 'Big Seven'?
While attacking the Airfield Princess during the final episode, Nagato and Mutsu turn up midway through the fight. After firing a volley of shells at the target, Nagato says out loud, "Don't underestimate the power of the Big Seven!"

What significance does this hold? There are more than seven ships present, so it's unlikely to be that, and the ship Nagato has more than seven guns both in the anime and in real life.
So, what is Nagato referencing when she mentions the 'Big Seven'?

This is a real life reference, and not an in-series one. The 'Big Seven' refers to the 7 battleships that, under the Washington Naval Conference, could mount 16 inch guns. As such, they were the only battleships to have a 16" armament prior to the outbreak of World War II, and the dissolution of the treaty.
Two of the seven ships feature in the Kancolle anime and browser game (Nagato and Mutsu), with the other five being from the US and UK. They were:

Nagato (Imperial Japanese Navy)
Mutsu (Imperial Japanese Navy)
HMS Nelson (Royal Navy)
HMS Rodney (Royal Navy)
USS Colorado (US Navy)
USS Maryland (US Navy)
USS West Virginia (US Navy)

This quote also features in the browser game of Kantai Collection during the 'Battle Start' event, where Nagato says the same quote: "Don't underestimate the power of the Big Seven"
Additionally, in the Kantai Collection set of the card game Weiβ Schwarz, there is a card titled "Do not look down on the power of the Big 7", which features a picture of Nagato, as well as the aforementioned quote:


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What happened to Berg Katze?
Before Berg Katze went to fight OD Hajime asks him if later they can meet up somewhere. after everything has clamed down Berg Katze is trying to stir up trouble by shape shifting and attempting to get people to turn on each other using the Crowds however after that fails be leaves disappointed.
After that Hajime is seen waiting for him where they agreed to meet before calling her mother, during which the scene is focused on her chest.
After the credits when Hajime goes to leave there are shots focusing on her chest with sometimes tapping/pointing to herself. as she walks out she is announcing her plans before we hear Berg Katze reply acting all negative about it by saying it'll suck.
This answer confirms that is it Berg Katze that Hajime is talking to but I am wondering, what happened to him which cased him to now be with Hajime like this?

related: http://anime.stackexchange.com/questions/5339/who-was-hajime-talking-to-at-the-end-of-gatchaman-crowds

@LoganM all that question does is confirm that it is Katze but it seems though i asked what Jon Lin is asking (to be honest i didn't know of the question)

TL;DR: Berg Katze's note (and himself) was absorbed into Hajime. He is currently trapped and powerless inside her "chest". Your confusion stems from the fact that the scene never made it to the TV series.

Episode 12 has two versions. There is a "director's cut" version that was shipped as an OVA, showing the confrontation between Hajime and Katze, when she gains control of Katze's golden note (I did not watch it).
From wikipedia:

OVA          "Embrace"           January 22, 2014
  Director's cut of episode 12. Scenes about the civilians and the Crowds are expanded on, while the battle between Katze and OD is cut. An added segment shows Hajime's face-off with Katze, with her fusing herself with them by absorbing their NOTE into her body.

Alas, Katze is not that powerless, since it seems he can take over Hajime's Gatchaman form:
Again wikipedia:

Her original NOTE and Gatchaman form takes on red accents after fusing with Katze, and her Gatchaman form's face switches from blue eyes to a red smile when Katze is in command.

IMO, it was a bad choice to leave Hajime's showdown to the OVA (even if it was financially good for them), since it is important to the Crowds-Insight plot.


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Why is altering the future limited to diary users?
Throughout the episodes, there are several scenes that play out in a similar fashion:

Static is heard and a diary's contents are updated to reflect the updated future.
Person 1: "Did you hear that?"
Person 2: "There must be another diary user nearby"

But sometimes the things that alter the future are incredibly trivial, (like travelling to a different floor on the elevator, or not eating a salad) and theoretically anyone should be able to do them. The main reason the diary users change the future more often is because they can see certain events in advance and consciously decide to change them, but other than that, they are visibly no different from the rest of the population.
Everyone seems to have free will, and so everyone should be able to make a spontaneous decision and affect the timeline. For example, Yuki altering the future by opening the door at Yuno's house was down to his curiosity alone and not related to his diary, so surely a non-user would have altered the timeline in that same scenario.
Granted, for a diary to display the altered future, it has to correspond with that diary's output (e.g. something in close proximity to Yuki, something affecting an escape for Ninth), but that alone doesn't isolate changes to only other diary users.
So why are the diary users so confident in proclaiming the proximity of another diary user when the future changes? Why couldn't it just be a regular person altering their schedule, coincidentally coinciding with the user? And doesn't Akise change the future (as a non-user) in chapter 14 during the coin game?
Example 1

Chapter 11 page 27
Example 2

Chapter 14 page 33

I always considered this a bit of a plot hole in the series. I think the author was trying to have everything besides the actions of the diary owners pre-determined, even the things you consider "spontaneous decision".

Because one diary user is trying to kill another , i think so

The future only changes when a diary owner acts against the "reality" which their diary foretells. So the future for everyone is predefined, because they already decided if they want to eat the salad (but they don't know they did). Only if you know for sure that the current future contains you eating a salad are you able to change the future.
EDIT:
About the Akise thing: No,  Akise didn't change the future. Yukiteru's diary never really tells the truth. It just tells what Yukiteru is/was/will be able to see. (It was the same thing when that little kid, Fifth, attacked them. Yukiteru was in the toilet and his diary didn't "say" anything except that it was quiet at the toilet.) So, Akise won the coin game, but he told Yukiteru that he lost, his diary will "think" he lost even though he didn't.


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What is the current serialization status of D.Gray-Man?
I realize this question has been asked before, but it was 9 months ago and more information has come out since. Here's the information I've compiled so far.

I've been searching on DGM Hiatus Thread (Manga Helpers)
I've also looked at the Jump SQ Site, but my Japanese is rather poor and I find it hard to navigate.
I've also been looking on Katsura Hosino's Instagram, not sure if it is verified that it's her's on not.
Finally I've also seen things on /r/manga that say that it's coming back.

The problem I have is that I can't find anything definite. I also wouldn't care if it started back up in either Japanese or English, I would learn Japanese if it meant I was able to start reading D.Gray again! Just wondered if you guys knew about anything more about it. Anything would be appreciated! Thanks!

According to this article dated July 4th, 2015 on Anime News Network (which I believe is a reliable source):

Jump Square Crown will launch on July 17. The new magazine will publish Katsura Hoshino's D.Gray-man and Yasuhiro Nightow's Blood Blockade Battlefront Back 2 Back.

So D. Gray-Man is going to be serialized again, but it is going to be serialized as a quarterly manga, so it will be something like 4 chapters a year of about 100 pages each
Edit:- D Gray Man Chapter 219 has been released, 53 pages of content excluding the announcement, Color page etc.

I can deal with four chapters a year! As long as it's coming that's all I care about! I'm going to have to start reading from the begging again to relive all of the fun! I'm going to choose your answer, but I want to check things out too! Just want to read up on the subject some myself!


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Which is the series "Lost Sheep" of which plush doll Subaru Konoe is fan of?
While searching for the answer of my question What do the sheep dolls represent in Mayo Chiki? I found out that the plush doll is from the the popular series "Lost Sheep" as stated in Wikipedia.

she enjoys instant noodles and is also a fan of the popular "Lost Sheep" series of plush dolls.

When I searched for the series "Lost Sheep" I found about the Parable of the Lost Sheep. I tried to search using different Keyword but the result is same. It leads to the Parable of the Lost Sheep but in different site and presented in different manner.
Is this the series that is stated in Wikipedia Or there is another series?

I believe the '"Lost Sheep" series of plush dolls' is a line of toys that exists only in the Mayo Chiki universe, something like gashapon vending machine toys. (If I recall correctly, the Lost Sheep toys are larger and come from a crane game machine, though.)
Toys like this are fairly common in anime and manga since the characters are often teenagers who spend time in game centers, and they're quite common and ubiquitous in real life as well. From the Wikipedia article on Gashapon:

Gashapon toys are often licensed from popular characters in Japanese
  manga, video games or anime, or from the American entertainment
  industry. These highly detailed toys have found a large following
  among all generations in Japan, and the trend is filtering to the
  world, especially among adult collectors. It is not uncommon for sets
  marketed specifically for adults to feature risqué female figurines.

(By the way, if you go through to the original article, do not click on the citation for that last sentence unless you are alone in a dark room, preferably about forty miles from the nearest civilization.)

Skimming over the localization fact (a wordplay from the original title? "Hesitant Butler" → Mayoeru Shitsuji → Mayoeru Hitsuji → "Lost Sheep"?), the original Japanese name for these plush dolls is "Silent Lamb" and indeed, an original in-universe toy.
There was never a "Silent Lamb" plush doll as a prize in real-life crane games/other toy-looting games, except for a licensed plush doll sold on Animate Online Shop (Japanese, dead link) since 15 December 2011 for an unknown period.

(From a blog entry by kurokogeunagi on Ameba (Japanese))

(From a tweet by @IEEE80211 on Nov 2, 2011)


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Which was the first anime to receive a English dub?
With this question and this question both receiving some attention recently, it made me think - which anime was the first to receive a dub?
Some of the first anime available in western countries such as Astro Boy had dubs produced in the 1960's as stated in the linked wikipedia article, but which show was the original one to have an officially produced English dub?

According to Wikipedia, the earliest anime to air dubbed in English is Tetsujin 28-go (known in English as Gigantor), which started airing October 20th,  1963 in Japan on Fuji TV and then the dub started airing in 1964 in the United States on WPIX New York and, according to page 319 of Watching Anime, Reading Manga: 25 Years of Essays and Reviews by Fred Patten, was distributed by Trans-Lux Corporation. Since the English dub was so heavily re-written, 13 of the English episodes were dubbed back into Japanese and aired in Japan from September 1st, 1965 through May, 1966 as if they were a reboot or sequel.  It was subsequently broadcast in Australia and New Zealand.
According to Japan's Agency for Cultural Affairs Manga, Animation, Games, and Media Art Information Bureau's Japanese Animation Guide: The History of Robot Anime, Tetsujin 28-go is considered "the ancestor of all giant robot anime shows." The anime was black and white, and a radio drama and a live-action series had been adapted from the manga previously.

Whether the dub was recorded first or not is unknown, as four TV anime were dubbed into English and started airing overseas in 1965 (in other words, they could possibly have been voice recording at the same time). These are Tetsuwan Atom (known in English as Astro Boy), Jungle Taitei (known in English as Kimba the White Lion), Wonder 3 (known in English as The Amazing 3), and 8 Man (known in English as 8th Man): 3 out of 4 being from the "god of manga" Tezuka Osamu.


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What were the first official English-translated anime and manga?
There is a previous question about the first anime and manga ever, but I was wondering when the English-speaking world got introduced to the world of anime and manga.
There were comics in the English-speaking world for ages, but at what point did we decide to try out the comics in the East?

The first signs of manga in the western world came in through magazines - Much like how manga first came to Japan before being compiled into full books.
Occasionally publications would include smaller works or partial translations of a larger manga. Notably (as @krazr has pointed out) Concerned Theatre Japan's second volume, 2nd issue 1971 is a manga special with 3 short works translated.
This issue features Sakura Gaho (Eng. "Sakura Illustrated" - excerpt) Akame (Eng. "Red Eyes" - Part One)," and "Nejishiki" (Eng. "The Stopcock" - Short work)

The first fully independent manga series that was translated into English and published was Barefoot Gen in 1979.

Barefoot Gen is an epic 10 volume manga of the story of a boy during the Atom bombing of Hiroshima. The piece takes many sections from  Keiji Nakazawa's own experiences as a Hiroshima survivor. Feeling the work should be spread for the largest impact, a pacifist translation charity Project Gen starting working on translating it into English in 1976.
The first two translations were published in 1979. Unfortunately, it wasn't as successful as first thought and no more volumes were published. It was only in 2004 that the full 10 volumes eventually got fully released (by Last Gasp).
Prior to this, there was a comic adaption of Astroboy redrawn by Americans in 1965. Barefoot Gen retained the original artwork, so is usually considered the first.

Astroboy was the first anime series to be brought overseas, in the same year as it was televised nationally (1963) and much like today - it was seen a definite secondary market to Japan. An earlier 3-part work, Three Tales was released 2 years beforehand in 1961 (A year after it aired in Japan)

Hakujaden was one the first Japanese animation films to make it to the US under the title Panda and the Magic Serpent (and also the first anime movie) in 1961 along with two other titles - Magic Boy (premièred a month earlier) and Alakazam the Great
Additional References

Schoolgirl Milky Crisis: Adventures in the Anime & Manga Trade (Book)
Frederik L Schott (Translator of Astroboy, Barefoot Gen and many other works) 's Site
Anime: A History - Jonathan Clements

Note that Barefoot Gen was the first full-story manga translated and marketed in English. Three short works ("Sakura Gaho," "Akame," and "Nejishiki") published in Concerned Theatre Journal (CTJ), Volume 2, Issue 1, predate it by 7 years. Furthermore, the short manga "The Bushi" appeared in Star Reach #7, about a year before  Barefoot Gen.

@ʞɹɐzǝɹ huh, I didn't see those other translations. Do you mind if I incorporate that comment into my answer, or would you like to post an answer also

Additionally, Alakazam the Great, Magic Boy, and The Tale of the White Serpent came out in the US in 1961 and are probably one of the first anime films in English.

@ʞɹɐzǝɹ  The tale of the White Serpent == Hakujaden


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Why is All Blue not part of the 8 Seas?
While exploring this site, I came across this particular question: What are the 9 mountains and 8 seas?
In the answers however, I did not see anyone mention All Blue. So my question is why is All Blue not a part of the 8 Seas that Zoro mentions?

Because All Blue is not a sea in itself, but the point of union of all 4 great seas where every kind of fish of every sea can be found.
Source: One Piece wiki


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What are those zigzagged folded paper things you see in supernatural anime?
In a lot of supernatural anime, like Shin Sekai Yori, or Tokyo Ravens there often appear these large ropes with folded paper things hanging from them:

As far as I can tell, they serve to seal or mark places that are sacred or in some way supernatural, like shinboku, or holy trees:

What are these folded paper things, and what purpose do they really serve?

It's a shide. You question is also off-topic, unless you care to rephrase it in the scope of an anime or manga.

Sadly we're not Japanese Culture.SE

Oh.. I looked and couldn't find anything like that >.<

This question primarily pertains to Japanese Culture rather than Anime or Manga. If you would revise your question to be more about the use of this in anime and manga subculture or a particular series you saw it in, it might be more on-topic for this site.

Well, you basically gave me the answer, so the question should just be closed or deleted

I personally think that if you could rephrase it it would be useful to a lot of other people. Having it as it right now might give other ppl the idea that it's okay to ask stuff about Japanese culture that they just happen to see in a manga. It's like asking on Stack Overflow about "code" you saw in a movie.

edited to put it more on topic, or something

The first image does not show up with anything other than some warning about "bandwidth theft" to me.

Oh, great. I'll find another one soon

Alright there, first image fixed

Though this question has been edited, the current version still isn’t asking about a facet of shide that, rather than being cultural, specifically pertains to Shin Sekai Yori or to Tokyo Ravens, or to some plot element that both series feature, so I don't think it fits as on-topic yet. Perhaps expanding on the "What purpose do they really serve?" part of your question would help (something along the lines of "Do they succeed in protecting something in this story, or are evil/impure forces still managing to wreak havoc even though they're hanging there?" or "Are shide generally . . ."

“. . . portrayed as effective or non-effective [benign] as purification or protection in anime series? Do characters rely on them or feel a need to supplement them with other items/abilities/training? Are antagonists concerned about their goals being thwarted by the presence of shide?”).

The zigzagged paper streamer things you mention are called "shide." They are in essence wards for purification. They are often seen with the rice straw rope they are attached to are called "shimenawa." Together they marks the boundary to something sacred (or rather mark the boundary between the sacred and that which is not) and can typically be found can be found on torii gates, around sacred trees and stones, etc. They are intended to keep impurities out and purify the space within.
As the same time, they can also be use to prevent, or rather seal the passage of gods. According to the Kojiki (a oral collection of myths forming the basis of the Shinto religion.), shimenawa was first used to prevent the sun goddess Amaterasu from re-entering a cave to save the world from eternal night.
In the Shin Sekai Yori anime, it's mentioned "evil spirits" and "monsters" are roam outside the town and any child who ventures out alone would suffer terribly. Hacchijoume is the shimenawa that encircles Kamisu's District 66, erecting a sacred barrier that protects the town from outside forces.

The Zigzag-shaped paper streamers are called Shide and are used in Shinto rituals. They can be seen in many animes that are located near Shinto shrines. To create one you can cut out a piece of paper like the diagram below and fold the paper along the dotted lines.

authors: เบียร์ เลิศศักดิ์


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In what order were the Servants summoned for the 4th Holy Grail War?
Similar to this question, but focusing only on the Servants of the 4th Holy Grail War featured in Fate/Zero.
Likewise, it would be also be good to list when the Servants were summoned if possible, though I am unsure if there was any date notation of any Servant's summoning to use as an approximation unlike that of Saber's summoning in Fate/Stay Night.

Based on skimming the light novel and the Wikia, this is what I could come up with about the summoning order of the Servants in the Fourth Holy Grail War. Fate/Zero doesn't give actual dates, but it does count down the hours until the start of the Holy Grail War, although the novel only gives them at the start of a chapter, so there's a certain amount of imprecision. We also don't know exactly when Assassin and Lancer are summoned, since those summonings happen offscreen, although we have some pretty clear indications of where their summonings fall relative to the other Servants.
Assassin is summoned first. This is mentioned in Act 1, Part 3 of the first novel. It happens offscreen, sometime before that chapter, so we don't have an exact time, but Kirei tells Tokiomi that according to Risei, whose ability to detect Servant summonings is infallible, no other Servants have been summoned.
Rider, Berserker, Saber, and Archer are all summoned in Act 1, Part 5, which takes place at -268:22:30. Their summonings are stated to be "almost simultaneous" and no exact times are given.
As far as I can tell, Lancer is summoned near this time as well, but we don't see his summoning onscreen. I give my reasons for thinking so below.
Caster is summoned in Act 2, Part 3, which takes place at -222:24:48, about two days after the summonings of Rider, Berserker, Saber, and Archer.
It isn't clear exactly where Lancer's summoning falls. We know it was after Assassin's, but we don't know how much time it took Kayneth to discover that Waver had stolen his artifact and prepare a different summoning. But after stealing the scrap of Alexander's mantle from Kayneth, Waver runs off, flies to Japan, and sets himself up in a house before summoning Rider. It probably took Kayneth around that much time to make his own preparations. Also, the first time we see Lancer is just after Saber and Irisviel arrive in Japan. Saber is summoned at the Einzbern Castle in Germany, and she and Irisviel arrive in Japan by plane in Act 3 Part 2 at -167:27:03. They meet and battle Lancer that very night, so Kayneth, who flew in from England, must have arrived around the same time or a little earlier. So my sense is that Lancer was summoned around the same time that Rider, Berserker, Saber, and Archer were summoned. It may have been a little earlier since Kayneth was already in Japan when Iri and Saber arrived, but I don't think it could have been later.
So, in the end, we arrive at this list:

Assassin
Lancer (?)
Rider / Berserker / Saber / Archer ("almost simultaneously")
Caster (two or so days later)


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Why does Luffy use Gear Second so much?
As mentioned here, Gear Second decreases the user's life span. When he first used Gear Second, it was a really important decision to make since it's side effect is so brutal. But after Enies Lobby Arcs he started using it casually. What changed and made Gear Second from a very risky technique to a casual technique?

The main cause is training, and mastering of the technique.
After the timeskip:

 After training with Rayleigh, Luffy is capable of using Gear Second with specific body parts, activating the technique without using the stance we see in Enies Lobby Arc. This way reducing the strain he imposes on his body, making him able to use it withouth the side-effects, it is even stated in the manga that he could use it on his entire body with only the hungry side-effect.

This only explains why he is able to use Gear Second so many times.
The real reason for using this technique so much is because of the formidable opponents he faces. He needs to be able to match or overcome them.
Sources: Manga, http://onepiece.wikia.com/wiki/Gomu_Gomu_no_Mi/Gear_Second_Techniques

...are we sure that's a new side-effect?  ;p

Now that i think about it i explain why he is abble to use it so many times not why he uses it so many times, well in short we can say because he needs to? seeing his more recent enemies

@xerido Could you add that into your answer? It seems like it would improve the answer if you would :)


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Killing Conjoined Twins using Death Note
There are Mr. A and Mr. B. They are conjoined twins who each has their own set of organs except for the heart. I write the name of Mr. A while imagining his face, with the cause of death being falling from the top of Tokyo Tower head first. Let's say the difference in height between the two is less than 1 cm. Will Mr. B also die?
According to How to Use: XXVI, item 2:

Even though only one name is written in the Death Note, if it influences and causes other humans that are not written in it to die, the victim's cause of death will be a heart attack.

However, a heart attack will also kill Mr. B.
Additionally, How to Use: X, item 2 stated:

Whether the cause of the individual's death is either a suicide or accident, if the death leads to the death of more than the intended, the person will simply die of a heart attack. This is to ensure that other lives are not influenced.

This question is a bit different than the one proposed as possible duplicate. In the proposed question, the death of the pilot or the surgeon doesn't necessarily means that the people in the plane or the one in the surgery will 100% die. There is a delay before they actually die. Surgery is rarely done by only one doctor. It usually is done by a team of doctors, so the other doctors can still save the patient. Flying a plane is also the same. There is also the co-pilot. In the case of my question, killing Mr. A is the same as killing Mr. B since they share the same heart with no delay whatsoever to save Mr. B.

possible duplicate of Can writing in the death note influence others?

I know this might come across as tasteless, but it is certainly possible for a co-pilot to crash a plane without the pilot being able to interfere and vice-versa.

Even though only one name is written in the Death Note, if it influences and causes other humans that are not written in it to die, the victim's cause of death will be a heart attack.

Does rule XXVI not answer your question? Mathematically speaking you could rewrite it as follows.

Causes others to die => (Cause = Heart-attack).

Here you could see that the heart attack would be logically implied as the cause of death if others are influenced, regardless whether they take others with them. Therefore they would both die. Mr. B would also be killed. Remember that this rule does not say that if you would cause another human to die, that you would stay alive. It only says that the cause changes to a heart attack, which in this case would kill both, so the death of the other would be unavoidable in this case.
If this would not have been true, Light would have been able to make himself completely immune to the Death Note, even making it impossible for Ryuk to kill him. Light could have implanted a bomb inside a few people, that would all be triggered when either his heart or their heart stopped beating. He would repeat this over different groups of people. By doing so, Ryuk would be rendered unable to kill Light as it would be impossible to kill any of those with a bomb implanted, as it would kill the others and he would not be able to kill Light as it would kill all of them. This would make Light immune to the Death Note, which I found very unlikely to be true, because it would completely contradict the first and most fundamental rule of the Death Note namely

The human whose name is written in this note shall die.

It contradicts How to Use X:2. I've added that to the question.

@SakuraiTomoko It does not contradict. rule X:2 says that the victim will die of a heart attack and that is exactly what will happen. Like I said in my answer, rule X:2 does not say "If a person is influenced, the victim will stay alive", the victim will die of a heart attack and there is just no other way for B to stay alive, but that does not contradict any of the rules. A will die of a heart attack as mentioned in both rule XXVI and X (taking B with him)

It contradicts the second sentence of the rule. This is to ensure that other lives are not influenced.

@SakuraiTomoko That is the reasoning behind the rule, but the actual rule is not contradicted. The reasoning is that a heart-attack would not influence others, but this is obviously not true in many cases. Imagine another case, where we want to kill a pilot in mid flight. This would make the plane crash and kill lots of people. If at that specific time, the pilot could not be killed, it would contradict one of the most fundamental rules namely every person whose name is written down will die.

Wouldn't the bombs just malfunction if Light dies from a heart attack?

@Gao Unless you could proof otherwise, there has not been any proof of the Death Note actually changing objects in the world. It just lets people do things, but it does not change objects itself as far as I know.

@Gao I now noticed that you linked to your comment, that linked to that duplicate question and accepted answer. Since that answer never gave any canon proof, how can you be so certain it is actually canon?

Although Peter Raeves has given quite a good explanation as to why they will simply both die, there is also the possibility that rule XXVI does imply that no other people will die because of the person's death. In practice, this would be a hard rule to follow (pilots dying whilst flying, doctors dying whilst operating, a conjoined twin...), but for the world of fiction, it of course wouldn't.
You can always think of a scenario where no other people will die. The bomb scenario in Peter's answer, for example, can be debunked with simple technology malfunction. Every time Ryuk writes down a name, there is the extreme coincidence that the bomb on that person disables for what seems to be no reason.
For the conjoined twins, they can have a heart attack, yes. However, you can be revived after this. So people try to revive them both, but only Mr. B gets to survive, and the other dies.
Every thinkable scenario can be debunked in the world of fiction :)

Are you saying that the Death Note would take A, but magically create a scenario where B would be brought back to life, without bringing A back? If that were the truth, then I guess we cannot solve this discussion without further proof.

I don't claim for this to be the truth. I thought I'd just bring up my thought. We do indeed need some more information.


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Where is this picture from? How do I use Reverse Image Search to find the source of an anime/manga image?
So I see an image that I believe is from either an anime or a manga. What are some ways that I can go about finding what series it's from?
Try these options:

Google reverse image search (browser built-in support and plugins)
Other reverse image search engines: TinEye, SauceNao, iqdb
Search engine tailored to searching anime by screenshots
Search for an anime or manga character
Technique: Cropping the image
Animated GIF: Picking the right frame

Note: Please note that as of May 9, 2016, ALL identification-request questions are now off-topic. Therefore, you can't ask an identification request question on this site.
However, such questions are still welcome in our main chat for users with at least 20 rep (globally on StackExchange).

Protip: If you are using Google Image Search in a non-English language, change your language to English or just use Google NCR for better, more accurate results.

Also if the image has a border, it might not be recognized correctly right off the bat. You could try cropping the desired part using MS paint and googling that.

There's a similar issue with GIFs - when you reverse search from a gif, Google seems to "freeze" the GIF to the frame it was on when you ran the search (at least in Chrome - not sure how it works elsewhere) so you may need to "time" the search properly.

Google reverse image search
Chrome for desktop
Let's say you saw an interesting image online and you want to identify the anime it's from. To do this, you'll have to:

Right-click on the image.

Click "Search Google for this image" (or for later version, "Search image with Google Lens").

and here it is:

Using another desktop browser

Note: If you are using Firefox, you can download the Search By Image (by Google) plugin and search for images like when using Chrome. If you use a Chromium based browser (like Opera), you can download the same extension from Chrome Web Store.

To search for images on browsers other than Chrome, you'll have to:

Go to Google image search.
Press the camera button.
Paste the image URL, or upload a file from your computer.

Using Chrome for mobile
Just press and hold the image and click "Search Google for this image".

Using another mobile browser
Switch your browser to desktop mode, and then follow the steps in Using another desktop browser.

Search parts of a larger picture
Sometimes you find a huge image, or an image consisting of several characters whom you want to identify. In that case, you will first need to crop the image for the search to work correctly.
Cropping the image
First you will need to crop the image. For example, let us use this picture from DeviantArt:

Suppose we want to find out who the top right character is, and from which anime he is. First, you need to single his picture out. You can do so by importing the picture into a picture editor such as Paint or Photoshop, or an external screenshot device such as Gyazo.
After cropping the image you should have a picture similar to this:

Having the cropped the image, you can follow almousawi's guide to reverse image search it.

This can also be done with GIFs. Some GIFs on the internet do not have much movement, and it's usually safe to run those through the reverse image search without more extra work.
However, other GIFs involve a lot more motion, and so it can be trickier (particularly since some of the frames can be useless). This can sometimes be done by "timing" the search right (by clicking just before the right frame) and trying a different points in the GIF, but this isn't very efficient, particularly since it can be hard to get the timing right.
A better tactic is to first break down the GIF into all its frames and search some of the more promising ones. There are a number of websites where this can be done, such as gif-explode. We can then run a couple individual reverse image searches, and some frames might work better than others.
Demo
For example, this GIF does very poorly at certain frames, yet as I stated in my answer in this question, some of the frames do work.

Running this through gif-explode, I get the GIF broken down into its frames. (Click on the image to get bigger picture.)

I pick a couple of frames and run them through Google Reverse Image Search, and the frame boxed in red gives me the very useful result of illya archer, and some links to the Fate series.

Meanwhile, other frames in this GIF give me no result, so it can take a couple of tries.

Other reverse image search engines
Aside from Google, there also exist TinEye, SauceNao and iqdb.
You can either go to these links and upload your image for search, or if you want to search an image that is already published on the internet, copy the following links into your browser's address bar and add the image link at the end of it.
http://tineye.com/search?url=
http://saucenao.com/search.php?url=
http://iqdb.org/?url=

TinEye shows better search results than other engines for images that look like screenshots from anime tv series and gifs from social networks and blogs.
SauceNao and iqdb are usually better for searching original artwork that does not come from anime movies, series or manga.

Caution: sometimes search results contain NSFW images, especially for very low quality images.

If unsure, use all reverse image search engines listed on this page until you find your source.

Note: I'm unfamiliar with TinEye and SauceNao, but IQDB can contain NSFW results without much warning (although it's probably possible to turn those off somewhere).

SauceNao used to return NSFW images at seeming random as well; dunno if it still does. TinEye is more like Google Images in that it veers family-friendly.

I have developed a reverse search engine tailored for searching anime by screenshots.
Try this yourselves at https://trace.moe
You may also search by right clicking any image after installing the chrome extension.
Demo screenshot:

Searching Anime Character Database
Sometimes you don't get results from an image search(Fan Art, Cosplay etc.) or you just remember the character but don't have any images.
You can search in the Anime Character Database for the physical traits of the character.
For example let me use the image from Dimitri mx's answer (sorry, but I couldn't think of an example image), taken from DeviantArt:

Suppose we want to know the second character in the last row.
We note that she seems to be female, has white hair (length we can't say for sure), blue eyes, and looks to be a teen or child.
Now go to the Anime Character Database Search, enter the traits and press search.

There she is, as the first result

Clicking on the result will give further details about her like the anime in which she has appeared, etc.

You can also use tags like Armor, Hair Ribbons, etc.

Note: You can use filter to show safe images only, questionable only or everything.


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Mecha anime where boy pilots small, somewhat feminine robot that can teleport to him
I found one post on this site that might be about the same anime that I'm looking for. It's not answered and already closed.
From that question, https://anime.stackexchange.com/questions/19036/help-identify-this-mecha-anime:

It was about a boy who gets involved in some kind of (military? government?) mech program. There are already some other people there piloting mecha. The boy forms some kind of connection with a mecha that is smaller than the rest, and also somewhat feminine-looking. At least, it seemed to have high heels on its feet.

Not sure but I think I watched it the late 1990s.
Now, what I remember is that, that boy also gets another, big yellow robot. Once, when his fraction is under attack and he gets cornered in a corridor, he steps back and surprisingly appears in that yellow robot, it turns on and he starts fighting.
The small robot isn't usual. It's not just standing there and waiting for that boy to drive it. Boy and small robot, they have some kind of spiritual connection. Boy can call him and the robot somehow teleports to him. He also can combine that small and big yellow robot.
And I also remember that scene when that boy is stack in a big spaceship, which is about to explode and he calls that small robot but it's not teleporting.
I think these shows are the same; does anybody know it?

I was going to edit this post to clarify some misspells, but it turned out to be too difficult for me: there are way too many sentences where I have no idea what are you trying to say.

@Lohoris A perennial problem for me too when I attempt an edit.

I think this might be Ninja Senshi Tobikage(Ninja Robot)p?

This might be the feminine robot or the one which has the capability to connect with the mind of the protoganist (Joe maya). As for the yellow robot , it maybe Golden lion

just a small figurine version to show the size difference and that they can combine together to form another robot form.IT was aired first in late 1980(1986 to be precise). But many people including me watched it in the late 90's .

This is it. Thank you so much.
Please also post this answer on another post that i have linked. Who knows maybe that person is still waiting for it.
Thanks again.

Unfortunately the other post is closed.But i have added it in the comments :D


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Is a person who wasn't named by his/her parents immune to the Death Note?
If a person's parents didn't name him/her, does this make him/her immune to Death Note? What would a Shinigami contractor see looking at this specific person?
By the way, nicknames don't count as real names according to this post.

+1 Good question. I just wondered the same thing recently. That question also answers your second question btw.

@PeterRaeves your link does answer my second question. Still wondering the first. Since the birth name doesn't exist the person can be considered nameless.

@Thellimist The person is nameless for a human without Shinigami eyes. But for a Shinigami or a human with Shinigami eyes, no human is nameless, at least after 780 days of his/her birth.

How to Use: IX

The Death Note will not affect those under 780 days old.

How to Use: XXX

The names you will see with the eye power of a god of death are the names needed to kill that person. You will be able to see the names even if that person isn't registered in the family registration.

The name to be written in the Death Note to kill a person isn't relevant until the person turns 780 days old. Moreover, even if a person changes his name and/or uses aliases multiple times during his life, there's only one name which can kill the person, and it is known to the Shinigami (as well as a human who has the Shinigami eyes).
From this, it appears that for each person, the name which can kill him is decided at a certain point in his life, and then it is never changed. Since the person has to be "killable" on the 781st day of his life, this "christening" (for the purpose of the Death Note) happens before that day.
Further to avoid confusion, this christening is presumably done by the Shinigami King or automatically handled by the Death Note system somehow. Of course, who would go through the trouble of choosing a unique name for every person? Thus, for simplicity, the person's official name is chosen for this purpose.
Most people are given some official name by the time they are 780 days old, so this won't cause a problem. For the rare cases where a person doesn't have a name by that day, the Shinigami King or the Death Note system presumably picks some random name on the 780th day (to satisfy the rule IX/1).
With this arrangement, the Shinigami and humans having the Shinigami eyes know the name required to kill the person. Humans who own the Death Note but do not have the Shinigami eyes cannot kill the person using the Death Note because they don't know the name required to kill him.

Obviously the name that kills you is the one that whoever, disregarding their relationship to you, be it blood relation, friend of family or mere acquaintance, gives to you before the time period of immunity to Death Note wears off. If for whatever reason it may be and absolutely no living being names you in said safe period, the second that said safe period runs out the Death Note's king of gods of death shall pick a name of his choosing and then assign it to you, this shall then be from that moment on and until the day of your death the name that will cause your destruction at the hands of the person writing said name into any Death Note that has come into their possession by whatever means that led them to it/them.

Do you have any sources to back this up, it doesn't seem as obvious as you claim. Also could you edit your post to be a bit clearer, it's hard to read.

I think this point is already mentioned in the accepted answer, in the paragraph next to last.


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What's with the taped over speech-bubbles in the preview?
I just finished episode 24 of EVA, and I noticed that the last two previews I'd seen looked a lot "rougher".

The preview after episode 24 consists of a series of what seem to be rough drawings or sketchs over a voiceover.

The preview after episode 23 was animated (in that there were some "moving" frames), but looked unfinished - the colouring and lining looks incomplete. Moreover, some of the images look like they come from a manga (in terms of, for instance, speech bubbles, or hiragana/katakana given for some kanji - although it seems possible to me that the bubbles might just have been taped on so as to give people involved in production some idea of the dialogue in each scene). For example:

Comparatively, the artwork in prior episode previews seemed somewhat more "finished", and, at least in my memory, was usually animated. This I presume is probably because of the fact that EVA had production issues toward the end of the anime run.
But less obvious to me is this: what are these speech bubbles that show up in the episode preview for episode 24 actually for? Are they something that feature in preliminary anime sketches?

Update: there isn't much animation in the preview for the last episode (we just pan across an image), but the drawing at least looks pretty "finished" compared to the previews for 24 and 25.

It's probably a bit of being behind schedule and an artistic decision, how much of each I don't know. Note that there are 2 different previews at the end of episode 24, one for episode 25 (On-Air/Video) and one for End of Evangelion (Director's Cut).

The shots from the episode 25 preview seem to be shots from the storyboard, an artifact created in an early phase of animation production.
After writing the script for a scene, the next step in the production of an animated work (and sometimes also in live-action movies) is the creation of a storyboard. A storyboard shows the scene similar to a comic. The purpose is to give the animators instructions how the individual shots of the scene are going to be arranged (during this line close-up on character A, this line reaction-shot from character B, this showing both in a wide-angle shot etc). For dialog scenes it is not uncommon to add speech bubbles so the animators know which line from the script corresponds to each shot (although it is more common to place the dialog below the panel and focus more on the visual arangement).
The "barely animated" pictures from the episode 24 preview seemed to be from one step further in the animation production process: The keyframing phase. During this phase the animators only draw the most important frames of the animations in a very rough manner.
What follows then is the inbetweening phase where animators draw the frames between the keyframes to create fluent animations, and then the inking and coloring where the rough scetches are redrawn properly to production quality.
During the last episodes of EVA, the production drastically fell behind their schedule. When the last episodes finished, some WIP artifacts seemed to be the only parts of the next episode which were ready to be shown.


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What exactly happens to Kyuubei at the end of Rebellion?
Note: this topic was somewhat addressed in this question, but remained unclear to me after reading the answers to it.
At the end of Rebellion, after Homura has rebelled and created the Homuverse where everyone can have their desires for love and friendship fulfilled, after the end credits, we see Homura in a field, holding her new soul gem and dancing around a mangy, scruffy, miserable-looking Kyuubei.

As the movie ends, the camera closes in on Kyuubei's face, and we see its eyes seem to be ringed with the same black field as the witches' curses.

What exactly is going on here? It seems clear that Homura is torturing Kyuubei for its many crimes, but what exactly is she doing?

By the way, I have a theory about this, but I'd like to see what other people have to say.

They are burdened to deal with the world's curses. the reason why Wraiths existed was because of the world's curses that normally was reflected with the Witches

During the conversation near the end of the series between Kyubey and Homura, Homura mentions that although Madoka's wish prevented witches from being born, the curses of the human world still remained and continue to haunt humanity in the form of "magical beasts" (魔獣), demons of unknown origin.

Soruce - ʞɹɐzǝɹ's Answer
When the Universe was being recreated Kyubey laments that it's kind should never have messed with Human Emotion when Homura reveals that her Dark Gem is the pinnacle of human emotions. When Kyubey tried to flee Homura catches him and says she still needs it's existsnce to deal with the curses of the world. after all, in Homura Universe, Magical Girls don't seem to need to fight anything anymore

As she swallows the dark orb, she claims it is the pinnacle of human emotions, something more passionate than hope and deeper than despair: Love. Kyubey says Homura is no longer a magical girl or a witch, and asks what she is becoming. Homura transforms into a new costume and grows a pair of black wings. Homura says that since she is a being that brought down and imprisoned a god, it's only appropriate to call her a demon. Kyubey exclaims that his kind never should have experimented with human emotions, as this is a result they can't handle. Kyubey attempts to run away but Homura, now a giant, catches him. She claims that she still needs his existence to deal with the world's curses, and says she'll make Kyubey cooperate.

Source - Madoka Wiki: Rebellion/Synopsis

So Kyubey, or the Incubators in general, now exist to deal with the world's curses thus eliminating the existence of Wraiths and the need for Magical Girls to fight.
I assume at the end of the move where see a disheveled Kyubey Homura was forcing it to deal with said curses or even punishing it more, after all it's new existence is a form of punishment in itself

I like to think that Homura beat the living shit out of the Incubator in that last scene, to punish it further for everything it has done to keep her and Madoka apart

I love how Homura's response to Kyuubei's declaration that they should never have messed with human emotions is Hitagi Senjougahara's "Ara, sou?"

@Torisuda thanks for the image you added in

It think that the part where she becomes a "giant" is a visual representation of how the tables had turned against the Incubators. The audience can thus relate strongly with Homura when she catches Kyubey effortlessly and shows it it's place!  xP


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Who are "those guys from Season 4" that Yu-Gi-Oh The Abridged Series references?
In the Yu-Gi-Oh! The Abridged Series stand-alone video Pharaoh's Throne, Yami Yugi sings the lines:

♪ Not for nothing but your nonsense is kind of a bore ♪
♪ I was more intimidated by those guys from Season 4 ♪

While the lines are very clever-sounding and inherently funny IMO even without context, I am curious as to who it is referring to.  Who are "those guys from Season 4" that the song references who are apparently a joke?  Unfortunately, the YGO:TAS is a very extensive series at this point, and I am not familiar with all of the episodes.

I assume it's talking about the people in the Leviathan/Orichalcos arc - Dartz and his goons.

@senshin If you feel confident about your statement then feel free to make an answer.

Not too confident about that, I'm afraid. I'll think about this next time I watch through YGOTAS, though.

@senshin I appreciate the thought, but I was definitely looking for a more... immediate answer.  While the question is still current, as opposed to "someday."

There is no YGOTAS season 4 yet, so "these guys from season 4" are from the actual show when it starts getting all trippy and Egyptian.


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Roronoa Zoro's boasts
I'm quite interested in Zoro's personality, especially when he boasts to others about his powers. Can someone list out all or some of Zoro's lines so far in the manga?
I can only remember two:

In Dressrosa arc:

 During his fight with Pica, he said "Only if your Haki is stronger than mine".

In Punk Hazard arc:

 When he and Tashigi are fighting with Monet, I can't remember exactly.

I don't have an exhaustive list of Zoro's quotes, so until someone comes up with such a list, I'll give you the ones I could find googling this problem. Keep in mind that these are translations and he might have said it differently in Japanese. Have fun reading.
His most recent one liner on Dressrosa is:

Over the 9 mountains and 8 seas... Throughout the world itself... There is nothing I cannot cut.

The quote you were looking for when fighting Monet is:

You've underestimated me, snow woman. When you thought you couldn't beat me, you should have run. Of course, there are things that I don't wanna cut. But... let me ask you something. Have you ever seen a fierce animal you were sure would never bite? Because I haven't.

You can find 29 quotes on less-real. They don't say when he said them though.

If I die here, then I'm a man that could only make it this far.
You need to accept the fact that you're not the best and have all the will to strive to be better than anyone you face.
Bring on the hardship. It's preferred in a path of carnage.
Either in belief or doubt, if I lean to one of these sides, my reaction time will be dulled if my heart thinks the opposite of what I choose.
I don't care what the society says. I've regretted doing anything. I will survive and do what I want to.
You want to kill me? You couldn't even kill my boredom!
You sure can talk the talk, but you're not quite ready to walk the walk. Time's up, it's my turn.
When the world shoves you around, you just gotta stand up and shove back. It's not like somebody's gonna save you if you start babbling excuses.
So, are you stupid enough to fall for such a stupid trap that such stupid people set up?
I'm a pirate hunter.
A wound that'd make an ordinary man unconscious... I won't lose to it. A wound that would kill an ordinary person... I won't lose to it! To face one who is extraordinary, Hawk Eyes... I can't allow myself to be ordinary!
There should be a limit to how similar a couple looks like.
When I decided to follow my dream, I had already discarded my life.
If you kill yourself, I'll kill you.
Well, how about this. My "luck" versus this thing's "curse". Wanna see what's stronger..? If I lose, then I'm just that much of a man anyways...
There is someone that I must meet again. And until that day...not even Death itself can take my life away!
I don't know. I'm not sure why myself. But if I were to take even one step back, I believe that all those important oaths, promises and many other deals 'til now, will all go to waste and I'll never be able to return before you, ever again.
So what if you're a girl.
If I can't even protect my captain's dream, then whatever ambition I have is nothing but talk...
When you decided to go to the sea, it was your own decision. Whatever happens to you on the sea, it depends on what you've done! Don't blame others!!
You'll never understand...your swords will never be as heavy as mine!
If you do anything that would cause me to abandon my ambitions... You will end your own life on my sword!
Fine! I'd rather be a pirate than die here!
I am always serious.
I do things my own way! So don't give me any lip about it!
I'm going to be the world's greatest swordsman! All I have left is my destiny! My name may be infamous...but it's gonna shake the world!!!
If you die, I'll kill you!
Bring on the hardship. It's preferred in a path of carnage.

More quotes can be read on animequotes.

There is someone that I must meet again. And until that day… not even Death himself can take my life away!
Well, how about this. My “luck” versus this thing’s “curse”… wanna see what’s stronger…? If I lose, then I’m just that much of a man anyways…

There is also wikiquote, which has a compilation of quotes, phrases, dialogues from One Piece. You could search for Zoro in the page for more dialogue from him, but I'll stick to his single quotes here.

I will... I will never... LOSE AGAIN! Until I defeat him [Mihawk] and become the world's greatest swordsman, I'll never be defeated by anyone!
This is the burden of a captain, you can't doubt yourself. In times like these if you lose your confidence, then who can we have faith in?
When the world shoves you around, you've just gotta stand up and shove back. It isn't like you can do anything just by giving excuses. If I die, then I am just a man who can only make it this far.
I'll get strong, stronger than she[Kuina] ever was, you hear me! Strong enough that my name reaches up to the heavens! I am going to be the world's greatest swordsman. I promised her... I promised.. I did...

I tried to weed out the doubles, but forgive me if I put the same quote more than once.

You can read more one liners of One Piece on reddit, but they aren't all Zoro's.