001 - Ouran High School Host Club
100 - Shugo Chara!! Doki
200 - Paradise Kiss
300 - Ano Hi Mita Hana no Namae wo Bokutachi wa Mada Shiranai.
400 - The iDOLM@STER
500 - K-On! (Movie)
Hahahaha, I think my earliest reviews were like that. But I think I went on to explain at some point why they were cool or give examples of how it was pretty.
/sigh
I miss writing. Most of my focus right now is on my puppy and the video gaming community. I don't play video games very much, I actually SUCK because my hand-eye coordination has never been good and I have delayed reaction to everything. Not to mention, I've grown up pretty... lacking funds to play games.
But I'm pretty well-versed in the culture. I tell people I'm a theoretical gamer -- I study game history, pop culture, some indie developments. Video games cost money but knowledge was always free.
I try to think of it as being an art aficionado without ever knowing how to actually paint.
Meaning like Saori and yeah, Mako. Then you have tertiary ones like the tall girl who used to dress as a boy just because she felt like doing that. And the jerkass who used to bully Nitori and then seems to have some kind of weird fascination with him now. (I haven't read this manga in a year, so I'm out of the loop currently.)
Fumi won't come out to her parents. It's not necessary for her to do that and I don't think it's important for her to. It was a major step to admit it to Akira and then in her final year of high school, to her friends. I just now realised I don't think I've seen any birthday chapters in this manga. But Fumi's basically aged from 15-17 roughly. We have a nearly 18 year old woman on our hands here.
If we're modelling the coming out to parents situation like Hinako and Orie, then it won't be until adulthood that it would seem relevant for someone to come out. Adulthood is in its own way safety. You don't have to worry about being abandoned or kicked out. You'll be old enough to find your way then.
Oh of course, saying that all manga is of course better than its anime is ridiculous. An interpretation can surpass an original in terms of how the audience responds to it. K-ON's anime is vastly superior to the manga in this regard. It can even be for regular films. The Perks of Being a Wallflower was to me an average shitty book, but the movie was an average good movie. One Piece to me works better as an anime and I usually find shounen adaptations in particular to be suffering and poor in quality.
HM is basically Shimura's magnum opus. It has dedicated readers, and I think it gets monthly releases as opposed to Aoi Hana's bimonthly ones. It also has a gigantic cast of side characters by now, two protagonists and one heavy deuteragonist. Aoi Hana has more or less have Fumi and Akira... there's Kyouko and for a short time, Yasuko as primary main characters, and lovely but really secondary side characters. Shimura has opted not to tell their stories any more. And to be honest, Aoi Hana has always felt like and focussed on Fumi's story.
And to be even more honest, it always seemed like the series was a side project for Shimura that she just wanted to have some fun with, to just write something with some charm. But then Aoi Hana became a kind of beast, with its sharper and sharper writing, intense complexity and changing ideas. I know some fans of hers think Aoi Hana has become sloppy or unfulfilling, meandering... but I think Shimura's done her best writing in the last two or three years. If I ever need to remember what a fantastic writer and artist this woman is, I just need to re-read that chapter where Chizu visits Fumi for the first and last time since she "dumped" her. It's poignant and compelling and so multifaceted, that chapter.
And happy ending, hmmm. Will it have Fumi and Akira as a couple? I really doubt it. But that doesn't mean either one of them will be unhappy in the end.
God. I don't even know how to handle this news right now.
Aoi Hana has been a part of my life since, wow, what 2006? 2007? I can't really remember clearly. I do know I was a teenager. And for at least for 7 years of my life, it's been something that was very near and dear to my heart.
I'm just a bit worried that it's ending in July and don't know what kind of conclusion that could mean for the series.
On the one hand, they already made some huge strides with Dipper accepting that Wendy might not be into him because of the age difference but he's still being that hopeful with wanting her to NOT be with anyone, or at least not with Robbie because he is really a tool. The closest I think we got to Wendy telling him off was the latest episode where she just couldn't believe that Dipper proving Robbie was a turd was more important to his ego than Wendy's feelings about being lied to by her boyfriend. And ultimately, I think Dipper should come to understand that aspect of his feelings. So far his crush has mostly been a projection of emotions rather than actual emotions. I mean, he does have real feelings for Wendy, but it's not mature enough for him to accept and let go and hope for the best. He is a kid, after all, as smart and intuitive as he may be.
If anything, there MAY be a love interest closer to his age. I wouldn't be surprised if it did happen and I wouldn't be disappointed either if it didn't happen. They can basically do whatever they want.
As for crushing the bubble, it may happen but for that to occur, Dipper's crush will have to end.
Yeah, I guess you can say I've been focussing a lot more on cartoons and video games lately than anime and manga.
Oh, Wendy will never go to Dipper. I mean, he's just a boy at the end of the day and she probably sees him as this cute little kid. He won't ever be a serious love interest to her, and in the grand scheme of things, they'll never be together. She's from a little honky-tonk town and he's basically a city boy who has a summer crush. We more or less have had something akin to that experience-- a summer love.
And yeah, she's Velma! She was also on Regular Show as a one-off character :P
Summerween Trickster was terrifying. When he ate that kid, I was like WHAT.
I don't want Gravity Falls to go on forever. If it's only two seasons or three seasons long but they have a full story, I'd be pretty happy.
When I heard Candy's voice for the first time, I had a nerd heart-attack because I recognised her as BMO from Adventure Time. And yeah, they're pretty awesome side characters. Actually, all of the cast is pretty golden. Everyone adds something to the show. Like, I like for instance that Wendy isn't just immortalised as an unattainable love interest for Dipper. People tend to paint things in a way where we only see their side of things, so if this was an 80s movie, Wendy would have no personality and literally music would start playing every time she showed up onscreen. But she isn't like that. She's fun, she's a terrible worker, and she makes bad decisions but is ultimately a cool person. Which justifies why Dipper has a crush on her! And that to me is super awesome. That being said, I love Wendy :P (She has such an 80s name too omg.)
I like that the two policemen also seem to be a gay couple if not really good friends. If there are any characters I don't like, it's Robbie and Gideon but they aren't bad characters. They're just sucky and annoying but that's deliberate, so I can't deduct points for that.
It seems that the last couple of episodes have been fillers, but there have been one or two small hints that surround the books. For instance, Grunkle Stan hiding away that pair of old glasses of his during the body swap episode. There's a picture of those glasses in the symbols on the book, I think. So it has to have some kind of importance. And continuity is a major part of this series, so I think everything has a major master plan, and I hope Alex Hirsch isn't pressured or his writers aren't pressured to stretch things out for the sake of Disney money and politics. But he claims Disney has been really supportive of him, and watching the series, I am inclined to agree. I can't believe they let him air some scenes from it!
Adventure Time is fantastic. It's the best cartoon I've ever seen. Ever. It might not be for everyone, but the thing that made me fall in love with it was later realisation.
Gravity Falls, Adventure Time, Regular Show and My Little Pony are what I'd call the generation defining cartoons. I'm ignoring the Nickelodeon fare for now-- there's nothing on Nick compelling me to watch their cartoons, not even Avatar.
What I like about GF, AT and RS is that they're all interconnected in a way. Like how T.S. Eliot and E.M. Forster and Virginia Woolf were connected. Pendleton Ward (AT) and J.G. Quintel were roommates, Alex Hirsch (GF) worked with Quintel before. It's like that literary connection... just with animation instead. Anyway I like to call these series the Big 3 because they're intensely personal projects for all the creators.
GF, it's clear how it relates to Hirsch. He has a twin sister, they used to visit an old relative when they were young, and he was always interested in the mysteries of the places they passed by on those road trips.
RS is based on Quintel's expression of his college experiences and you more or less understand the characters' behaviour to be that of young twenty-somethings and a lot of the things in the world are things that would have inspired or been part of Quintel's adolescent, teenage and young adult life.
As for AT, I've come to realise that it's basically Ward's childhood fantasies in the ruin that is adulthood. His environment basically reflects that-- you have swordplay and princesses and clearly good guys versus bad monsters but they all exist in a world that will shock you when you realise what it is. The main character is basically Ward, in a way. He was previously named Penn (after Pendleton) and he's blond, blue-eyed and pudgy. But he's the hero of the day. I'm starting to think that this was exactly the hero out of a child's imagination preserved to be a part of his adult imagination.
In short, both of those other series are fantastic. Regular Show might take some time to get into but who knows? I had hated it when I used to see it on TV. I thought it was forced and unfunny and for that intellectual-wanking 20 year old crowd. But it's not. Or maybe it is and it just doesn't matter. It's smart, it's funny and it gets better and better and better.
It's a fantastic, fantastic series. It's the perfect blend of nostalgia, modern and retrospective comedy, it's got a lot of heart and a surprising amount of insight.
I've been on a cartoon binge lately. Right now I follow Adventure Time, I've watched three seasons of Regular Show in like a month, and I'm following Gravity Falls too. I stumbled across a scene from The Time Traveller's Pig on YouTube and I thought, "Hmm, this looks interesting". I loved the art; it's beautiful. So I got my hands on the first episode. I thought, hmm, seems all right. I thought the first couple of episodes were getting there, getting there. And then it hit a perfect stride and has been rolling since. It's one of those shows that picks up really well. And it gets better with re-watches. The last episode wasn't the best it could have been. I really hope the show doesn't overdo some things. But yeah, Disney knocked me off my high horse.
I know right. It's so darn mediocre... I was really hoping Kirino'd be less of a bitch after S1 and the specials, but she's not.
OreImo is pretty much the only show that disappointed me, the rest is better or just about what I expected it to be. Maou-sama is glorious. I'm also really liking Aku no Hana.
What's your opinion on this season?
Ha, well, a list is made to be stalked. Probably done the same to yours before, since I see your posts on the forums quite a bit.
I've seen the first three episodes of Railgun, and someone actually recommended the exact thing you did to me on Wednesday, so I think I'll save Index for later. But thanks! I always appreciate thoughts on things I should watch, or the order to watch them in.
If you have any more thoughts, feel free to share them =)
