majestic

Oh, I thought the guy on the bus that was just a throwaway stupid reference, given the time difference, or is that something that's coming up? Not finished with the episode yet, just felt like venting. Also wanted to hit Jurati with something for telling Picard that he's a regular Dixon Hill. edit: Picard doesn't tell Guinan his name so it doesn't mess up the timeline that's messed up, but if it is fixed, she'd know Picard, Data and a bunch of others in 1893 from Time's Arrow. Yes, time travel makes for silly contrivances and paradoxes, but this... this is actually dumber than season one's mechanical space Cthulhu.

In the middle of the new episode of Picard, and I had to stop and post about it. I know I should expect dumb things from this dumb show, but this is yeah, well, dumb: Hey Alex Kurtzman, please go and copulate with your knee. Thank you. edit: Guinan ends up having a nervous breakdown and starts crying over unequal wealth distribution, climate change and wars. Okay. Thanks, I hate it.

Once had a teacher who managed to find out that we got a hold of a copy of the upcoming exam and had a couple of days to prepare for it - she came in the with the graded exams, looked at the class and said in a somewhat disappointed tone: "I was told that you had the questions three days in advance and to be honest, I found the quality of your answers wanting even before I realized you had ample time to prepare. Tell me, please, how not a single one of you managed to get an A? Therefore, I have decided to accept what you turned in. Rest assured that I will take better care in the future, you will not be able to copy the questions prior to the exam a second time. Now, the grades are as follows..." Just need to do badly enough even with cheating, might amuse the teachers.

To paraphrase Garak: "Are you sure that's the point, teacher?" Maybe she just needs to get better at cheating.

Went over it in my head before releasing it.

Currently compiling a system update. I even tested it this time, it was... the least I could do, right?

So, a while back @KP wants Blue Velvet mentioned the "unaired" episode of the first season of Dropkick on my Devil, and I watched that to be done with it. Even amongst the otherwise weird episodes of this anime, this was... really, really weird. Also had a hearty laugh at Jashin's insane opening dropkick and how it ended. It was better than some of the regular episodes of season one, that had a bit of a stale spell in the middle. Relevant reference of the show award goes to:

Yeah, so I looked at the other pieces they auctioned, and found this one: https://comics.ha.com/itm/animation-art/sailor-moon-sailor-moon-and-leshy-production-cel-setup-with-key-master-background-toei-animation-c-1992-97-/a/7254-18132.s?ic4=OtherResults-SampleItem-071515&tab=ArchiveSearchResults-012417 Fun button. Make the owner an offer, at least 19,800$. Yeah. Uhm...

Yeah, well, if they ever auction off a Sailor Moon Crystal cel... Wonder how high that'll go, I'm almost tempted to bid on it, but I have no real place to store a cel properly, and that's just not worth it. I mean, that probably doesn't make me any different than Toei because I can't for my life figure out why there's not one single decent HD transfer of Sailor Moon, but that doesn't mean I should try to acquire something that'll just eventually fall apart in a box, or worse. Generally I'm not overly fond of isekai no matter its origins, but there are some exceptions. Stephen King's Dark Tower series, for instance. Escaflowne was apparently relatively popular everywhere except Japan. I honestly don't know if I'll enjoy it for the entire run and I'm certainly not sure why I even actually enjoy it. I shouldn't, but somehow, I do. It's weird.

Fresh out of the oven:

I guess there are a few things in this game I'm not really going to try out. Being terrible to Ember or Aru are the top entries I guess, but romancing the cat-girl spider thing is a serious top contender too. I read a reddit thread about this romance, and someone called it "extremely well written", and once again, I think it's time to let the world burn. That romance reads like it was written by E. L. James. Fifty Shades of Wenduag, and you're playing her Christian Grey. Including the creepy stalking. Not sure about the horse sized male organ, but the money aspect works out all right as well.

Our journey towards enlightenment may take us to many unexpected places. And then did Tyolus say to the people of the low plains: 'Seek not the wickedness amongst your neighbors, lest it find purchase in your own house'. So basically that's just us in the thread then? Minus the rabble who still refuses to watch Sailor Moon, of course.

The heads show up when you have him in the group anyway, that was just... some silly fun. Wenduag is really a romance option and you call her silly little cat... that's... that's... okay, I give up.

Make yourself one with the Path, and the journey will lead you to eternity.

I was sitting here, reading this wrong for a while... but yeah, the chopped heads crop up regardless, of course.

That's fine, just go Winter, add Winter Witch levels and use Polar Ray for the big ones, spammable Hellfire Rays should be good enough even without that, assuming that fix doesn't come from a tweaks mod, although without loading dice rolls it's not going to have as much oomph... pity, that takes the entire fun out of it. Could of course use Arcane Trickster instead, but where's the fun in that, endgame feels like everything and the kitchen sink is immune to sneak damage. Sure it works, it's just not really worth playing a Devil MC for. edit: Leyline Witch with Winter Witch should get some really crazy high caster levels for Polar Ray with the overcharge ability active. That should one-shot everything in the game that's not scripted to survive a fight. Don't necessarily need to play the moonlight romance with Aru, could always just love Cammy the crazy pants, or perhaps Daeron, he'll probably gift you a chopped off head or two.

I'm semi-partial to trying the Viz dub, all in all. Not so sure about the original English, but maybe afterwards. As much as I like how over the top whacky Minako is, I don't know about the name changes and the cousins thing. Calling Usagi Serena was better than our dub's "Bunny" at least. Also, on becoming one with the fandumb. Remember, they usually like the manga and Crystal season 3. Heh. @Amentep's post about the anime make me facepalm and laugh almost every time, I'm almost tempted to watch it myself. Seems like some typical 80ies goof show. For the English dub, probably, for the original I guess not so much. パアル (Paaru) is what that would end up being, I guess... Japanese Engrish is a lot less fun once you understand how and why it happens.

Successfully romanced the resident ワイフ, so that worked out well enough and one more achievement down, and I told Camellia to go stuff herself in a box, although I don't think she'd going to do that. Greybor's quest bugged out and it finished without the prelude to the final part, which was pretty strange. Yeah, no, I don't think any Hellfire Ray spamming Witch wants to go with Aeon.

The Sailor Says channel mit be gone, but there's still some old dub stuff to be found. Granola bar!

Started Chapter 5 now. Ended up giving most of my party Last Stand because it stopped the "hilarious" accidential critical hits from leading to instant reloads and characters with Last Stand can tank anything in a pinch. Ember has a Greater Bolster, Greater Maximize (well, the artifact that converts all damage done to unholy to boot - not that it was necessary with the Ascendant Element) and Greater Quicken Rods by now. Got her Improved Critical: Ray, Mythic Improved Critical: Ray and Loremaster'ed Improved Improved Critical: Ray and gave her Red, Gold and Brass bloodlines. Even on Unfair, enemies need to get really, really lucky to survive going against her. Or, as it happened in case of the [Chapter 4 Final Boss], when Ember was up, he got really unlucky and ate a 1200 damage crit from her Hellfire Ray, pretty much ending the fight immediately. Oh, and yeah, the Hellfire Rays added by Blackened and Red Salamander are of different spell levels, meaning she now has three spell levels (6, 7 and 8) worth of Hellfire Rays. That pew pew lasts for a while, and in between she sets enemy caster stats to 1, inflicts excruciating pain on enemies and conjures up cannon fodder if needed. Could debate the finer points of nothing of that fitting her character, but hey... who cares. Almost tempted to make myself a Leyline Witch going Devil at some point. That just must be completely hilarious with the Devil's unlimited Hellfire Rays.

Why? The obvious name of choice is Shady Deals, ideally with a stylized picture of him on the logo.

I initially had that right at the start and then figured I finally found a useage for that image from the TNG gag reel/outtakes. Yeah, I got enough trash on my plate right now and should not star new series until I've reduced the load a little, but I've been progressing through a couple of things without mentioning it. It'll be the last new thing for a while, I think. I mean... at least as long as I keep adding new stuff I don't need to finish whatever the hell that was I randomly picked on Amazon Prime Video a while back. Kazaka... kama... erm, *looks up* kemurikusa. Well, no. It's a German "Merle" in the dub and in the original Japanese that I've started to use simply because whatever Amazon did to the German dub made it randomly switch to the original in between in both the browser and on my TV - I can only surmise that the original TV version was cut for violence for the German market and had scenes removed that were never dubbed and then restored for a digital release but left original with subtitles, have not done any research in that direction - comes out more like Merure (me like in men) with a semi-dropped u, which makes sense (all Japanese syllables end on a vowel, except for the single n). Not making any promises for the English dub, not sure if they could resist making a cat girl be called Mearle as in M-Earl. Could be worse, she could be called Purrrrrrl, huh? /bows and leaves. I could make an effort and compare them, but I'm pretty sure Amazon Prime Video is worse than the Blu Ray version. It always is. It doesn't look so bad on the 4K TV, and by that I mean it beats the digitalized TV PAL copies they have for other anime (*cough* Attack No. 1 *cough*). That's from the fourth episode. Both Merle and Hitomi have been exposed to a poisonous plant during their escape (Merle was captured by Allen's guard, and Hitomi just collapsed after a vision). Shounen dolt runs off to make medicine, and they both wake up and have internal monologues about finding the other girl weird. Hitomi is weird because she's dressed like a school girl and has short hair, and Hitomi thinks Merle is weird because she's a cat and has a tail. Merle has also typical cat mannerisms - that picture alone is showing that, but she eventually also raises her hair. I really should be annoyed, and I really should not have laughed at the scene, yet I was not annoyed and found it funny enough. Something's wrong with me. Help me. Please. edit: It must be said that cat girls aren't as inherently out of place in a silly fantasy action anime than say, Komi's cat ears or girls cosplaying as cat girls (hello Steins;Gate). Or wearable cat ears like Azusa was forced to wear by Sawako. Ah, stupid Sawako.

Watched two more episodes of The Vision of Escaflowne. After getting used to what this is - and as that was in the same package of recommendations as Lady Asuka (or for those that didn't follow all the other threads, that's Rose of Versailles), I should have expected it to be anything but what it was recommended for - it's actually... more on that later! The anime follows Hitomi, the girl in the middle of the image here on an adventure she gets acidentially swept up in after a vision helps her save a strange boy from a dragon's attack. Said boy is Van, prince of some kingdom or another, and before you get the idea that Van is the princely looking blonde guy on the picture, nah, that's Allen. I used to be a prince and was even crowned king for a bit, but this is a fantasy anime, and as such now I'm just a nobody. Van is your average shounen character. Brash, always on the attack, wants to die for honor and glory and reacts to having his life saved by Hitomi in the only way a shounen character can, by telling her that he doesn't need help - and for sure not from girls. I said that before, but Hitomi just slaps him for the comment, which he so readily deserved. Hi, I was just trying to run 100m in under 13 seconds, and suddenly everything is weird! Hitomi is a nice school girl with an interest in track and field, specifically the 100m sprint. She also likes fortune telling and has her own tarot deck and a pendulum - or better put, an heirloom pendant that can double as pendulum. She does that for fun, knowing it's a tad silly, but she realizes pretty quickly that she's got more than a knack for the arts, particularily after she's whisked away and the world where she ends up enhances her abilities to actually having visions of the future. Now, the first episode, sans the appearance of the dragon that ends up being slain by our shounen dolt up, isn't much more than three quarters slice of life and one quarter fantasy action. That changes pretty quickly after Hitomi accidentially accompanies the dolt back to Gaia, a planet apparently close to Earth as both the Earth and the moon are visible in the night sky, and frighteningly close. Well, it's fantasy, don't expect gravity to work as it should. After returning home by being escorted by a group of wolf-men, having slain the dragon, the dolt is quickly hailed as the whatever it is they hail him as, beause it really doesn't matter. He's crowned King of Fanelia, and we're treated to the first really strange deviation from regular fantasy tropes in the anime, the kingdom is attacked by stealthed mechs. King Dolt runs to his own mech while his Samurai Guard is slaughtered in theirs, which is revealed to be Escaflowne and powered by some crystal thing he took from the dragon, but all he can do is watch how Fanelia is burned to the ground. Hitomi does something with her penadant and they're again whisked away... Mechs aside, there's also a slight break with the usual high fantasy population. No dwarves or elves so far, but cat girls, wolf men, mole men (no really, there's a guy they call mole and he's digging tunnels alls day long) and lots of weird technology. It takes the occasional dip into having a JRPG story because the enemies that burned down Fanelia have a... a... well, a flying fortress, pretty much a JRPG staple. There's always and airship or a flying fortress. In fact, The Vision of Escaflowne has both. I wonder if they're looking for the mana tree here? I'm an airship! Luckily I'm not piloted by Oswald Fiddlebender, because that wouldn't go so well... To round out the flying, some of the mechs can fly, and Escaflowne has a dragon mode where it turnes into a mecha-dragon that can be ridden by King Dolt the Shounen. Now, to document the sad decline of anime in the 2000s, look at the screencaps above and know this was animated by Studio Sunrise, who later went on to make this pearl of animation in 2013: Today I ran into some incredibly big boobs! -- Tamako Guys, for the love of god, do not just search for images entering Love Live! Nozomi boob rub gif. I mean, yeah, there's the boob rub from the Love Live! anime, but that's not the only thing you'll find. A whole lot of: Well, and worse. Have this here gif from Love Live! just in case you missed my posts about it: Dancing, dancing, non-stop me dancing! Yes, actual lyrics. So, where was I. Finish an already a little structureless post about a whole lot of nothing, the bad guys are commanded by a mysterious figure who said they're trying to restore Atlantis. Since the planet they're on is called Gaia (or Gaea, which is the same thing, anyway), I'd say they all came from Earth at some point, or are some reflection from Earth, or something. The four episodes have breakneck pacing, some mech action that's pretty bloody - people get speared to death, burned to death, hacked to death and there's some fun blood splatter going on, but it's not full Blood-C level. It's pretty violent. The shounend dolt is pretty shouneny, and the other main character that was introduced aside from the villains who are either mysterious, traitors or guano-insane is Allen, a chivalrious knight, and someone Hitomi pretty quickly develops a crush on. There's also a cat girl. To sum up, we have a nice girl lead character who does fortune telling, a shounen male lead who is shouneny, a knight in shining armor (well, shining mech), breakneck pacing, JRPG elements all over the place, a high fantasy setting with lots of out of place looking technology and pretty much no time to breathe for anything, which makes my conclusion at the time being all the more strange, I guess. Because, really, when watching this, what I should be doing is this: Or, maybe this: In reality, while watching this anime, I'm looking more like this: Yeah, no, I'm serious. I think I actually like this, and I have no idea why. With Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha StrikerS, at least, I knew why. That was just great entertainment and more of a special ops / superhero squad fighting of a villain with decent quality world building, great pacing and quite decent writing (I'd say more than decent, but some problems crop up at the end). With this? I have no idea. I should be groaning and facepalming throughout each episode, but I don't do that. Not when King Dolt does something stupid, not even when the Cat Girl (well, her name is Merle) is on screen and jealous of how much King Dolt likes Hitomi, as if she'd be interested in that dweeb. To his credit, Chivalrous Knight in Shining Mech explains to King Dolt that honor and bravery are all nice and fine, but surviving to fight another day beats pointless last stands, and dishonor can be carried with dignity if it means saving your people. I guess he's not a complete moron. I'm kinda hoping that'll change and the show will do something inexcusably dumb soon so the world rights itself.

Are you all right good sir? That's almost an exact copy of your post from the other page.