Category: Anime

  • Serial contest Lain

    AICN is hosting an essay contest about Serial Experiments: Lain.

    Serial Experiments Lain is a work designed to be discussed. To commemorate an anime that affords the opportunity for significant inspection, AICN Anime is welcoming readers to submit their thoughts and interpretation of the series. Between now and October 31st, write up your view on the work and send it to animecontest@gmail.com. With any luck, Harry Knowles will also be putting together some thoughts on the anime. Interesting submissions will be posted on AICN.

    The prizes include a limited edition of the art book Yoshitoshi ABe Lain Illustrations ab# rebuild an omnipresence in wired (see here for more details).

  • new Miyazaki

    AICN has a scoop – there’s a new Miyazaki (Hayao, not the son) flick in the works, scheduled for Summer 2008. No details are known.

  • Even haibane need some motivation

    via Shamus, this postermaker tool at Despair.com is just too cool. Here’s my contribution (click to enlarge).

    Haibane - motivator poster: Circle of Sin (wide)

    another version:

    Haibane - motivator poster: Circle of Sin (tall)

  • Ramadan roundup

    ok so this time I have a good excuse for not posting! the first week of fasting is always the toughest 🙂 The funny thing is that I’ve found myself thinking about adding a food category to the blog (primarily a paean to Chipotle). But food blogging during Ramadan would be just masochistic, so it will have to wait until Eid.

    There has been a lot of stuff going on though. Galactica season 3 starts soon, and there have been online “webisodes” at Scifi.com that have a very interesting prequel storyline to the season that really delves into the resistance fighter mentality – with our own sympathetic and loved characters making decisions that we would normally decry. It’s odd how I am willing to give a fictional character more slack and make excuses for their behavior that I condemn in the real world – like strong weapons in a shrine. Of course the Cylons are Evil Incarnate (or are they?) so the universe of Galactica is more black and white (or is it?).

    Also the Intel Developer Forum is going on and has all sorts of awesome, sharikou-head-exploding stuff like 80-core chips, roadmaps to 45nm processing, and laser FSBs (from Day 1 alone). Anandtech has probably the best coverage. Yesterday during Day 2 they also talked about the Santa Rosa platform, one of my particular interests. One tidbit I’d missed earlier: the FSB clock frequency will also be adjustable, to further improve power management. Right now on the new Centrino platforms running Yonah/Merom, only CPU clock speeds adjust, but the FSB runs at full all the time. And there are even cooler innovations to reduce power that I won’t spoil. The promise of all-day computing gets stronger and stronger.

    Shamus’ “DM of the Rings” comic is awesome. I almost choked with laughter at the whole “Leggo my ass” thing. It reminds me of Summoner Geeks – but better.

    And Sugar is still losing to a demented penguin. Oh, the humanity!

  • Attention

    (bumped 9/15) The fiends!! Chiyo-chan partisans are stuffing the poll! vote for Sugar and reclaim the title!

    (bumped 4/22) If you don’t vote for Sugar, you’re a commie. Got that?

    Sad Sugar
    VOTE FOR
    SUGAR

    come on, you bolsheviks! get your rear in gear! You can vote once a day, you know!

    (poll results)

  • the Geneon fire sale

    Both RightStuf (via Don) and Bob’s Corner Store (via Steven) are having a huge fire-sale on Geneon titles. $5 per disc! This includes Haibane Renmei and Sugar: A Little Snow Fairy, the two titles that I think everyone should own. I personally prefer Bob’s but his website is blocked from work so if the 4-year old permits me ten minutes, I’ll try from home.

    At the very least I want to buy Someday’s Dreamers and Bottle Fairy. Both of these were “loaned” to me and I want to get my own copies, primarily because I enjoyed them with my daughter. I also want to see if the Sugar: Summer Special is on the list, and I am also considering Serial Experiments: Lain.

    Other than these though I am still (as mentioned earlier) in a bit of a quandary as for what to try next. What I hate more than anything is getting into a good story and then having it end sour, which is what lies in store it seems for both Kamichu and for Last Exile. Mike Kerpan cautioned that Kino’s Journey is good but not really for kids, so I might be better off renting it (if I can find it).

    Still, anyone else looking to add some solid titles to their shelf should check these sales out for sure. I recommend Haibane and Sugar at the bare minimum, and Someday’s Dreamers if you want to experiment more.

  • worst anime blog ever

    that would be this one. I’ve just got no time. I’ve got the reviews for Someday’s Dreamers, Mononoke Him and Howl’s Moving Castle all prewritten in my head but haven’t actually put them to blog yet.

    In terms of new material, I’m still interested in Kamichu, mainly because it’s the kid-friendliest of the lot, though it looks like it can’t sustain the initial tempo. Last Exile looked interesting, but Shamus was down on the ending. And there’s not much to look forward to either – Gedo Senki looks to be a wash.

    Hmm. Maybe Kino’s Journey?

  • anime mashups

    This is really a new artform. I agree with Scott’s comments at DW – the sum of the source materiel is truly greater tan the whole. And remember that this is possible despite the insane content-control regime imposed on end users… remember how easy it was to create audio mix tapes? Doing that with DVD source material is orders of magnitude harder, yet people are doing it anyway, and with brilliant results as above. Still, just imagine the explosion of creativity were these strictures to be even marginally looser…

  • In the Toxic Forest

    Here is Steven Den Beste’s review of my favorite Miyazaki, Nausicaa of the Valley of the Winds, too many words.
    I disagree (a lot) about Nausicaa.

    In some ways this is the most horrifying of his films, because of the general hopelessness of the overall situation. Humans are fighting a rearguard action against the advancing fungus jungle; but it’s a battle of attrition that the humans will eventually lose. It’s revealed that the fungi are purifying the planet, but part of what they’re purifying is the presence of humans, and it’s difficult to see how humans will be able to survive the overall process.
    Still, there are some idiotic humans who are keen to make it happen faster, as long as they can make it happen to their enemies first. Naushika and her people, by contrast, try to get along with the fungi and everyone else, but eventually their valley, too, will be consumed. All they can hope for is to delay that reckoning as long as possible.
    There’s something of an upbeat ending: the fungi are charging towards Naushika’s valley to destroy it, and are turned away at the last minute. Disaster is delayed — but not denied. It only takes one undetected spore for the valley to be spoiled and all the humans there to either die or have to flee. And the film overall has a feeling of gloom and doom because of the inevitability of this destruction.

    Feh. Did we see the same anime? I found Nausicaa to be overwhelmingly hopeful. Nausicaa and Monoke are very nearly the same anime. The protagonist refuses to fear and hate, and instead shows by example. In Nausicaa’s underground laboratory she proves the seeds taken from the toxic forest (the Sea of Corruption in other translation) grow clean and non-toxic in clean water and soil. The toxic forest is purifying the poisoned ground left from the Seven Days of Burning. Nausicaa controls the ohmu by being unafraid of them, and by using scientific knowledge of their behavior response. She is safe in the toxic forest through both knowledge and refusal of prejudice and fear.

    Lady Eboshi and Princess Kushana are the same character. A powerful evil woman finally persuaded to good by the examples of Ashitaka and Nausicaa.

    I found Nausicaa profoudly hopeful, the triumph of science over superstition, the triumph of love and courage over hate and fear.

  • Last Exile

    I am definitely adding this to my List. Shamus posted some screengrabs and they remind me of Myst, brought to life. There’s an over-exposed quality to the artwork that adds a layer of both realism and fantasy at the same time. He found the ending to be unsatisfying, but maybe this is one of those anime where the story just takes a backseat to the craftsmanship.