majestic

Now for the promised reply to other the Escaflowne post. Still feel like a stirred up hornet's nest is in my head, but at least it is no longer on the verge of exploding. The realities of limited ressources. Could have just off-screened some dialogue in and retooled the scene and left the episode with 10 seconds less runtime, but hey, how knows how the production pipeline looked like. The scene itself was fairly harmless anyway - at least in comparison to some others I've seen not so long ago *cough* - it just felt a lot worse because it's probably the most jarring and immersion breaking moment in the anime. Eleventh Hour weapons of mass destructions aisde, of course. Like flying fortresses, a shounen deuteragonist, the show steadily but ever increasingly losing touch with being grounded near the end? Yeah, there's a number of things that would bother me in a different anime, and some silliness that I'd make overy long complain-posts out of for other series. I caught an episode of Voyager on TV the other day, and while I used to think that Voyager is the least consistend and worst of the old Star Trek shows (prior to Enterprise, at least - not counting all the nuTrek), the episode was about some technobabble and Voyager punching a hole into a quantum singularity's event horizon. A hole. In an event horizon. I facepalmed and ignored it. If this happened in Discovery, I'd be here writing an essay about missing science advisors. However, the mainstay of the episode was character development for B'elanna, Chakotay and Janeway and some fun Robert Picardo stuff, so while it was annoying, it wasn't killing my interest in the episode, nor was it egregious enough to warrant massive complaints. In the end, it really is like Jay said when they watched Skyfall - when you're entertained enough and the other parts are good enough then you just won't be as bothered by plot holes, inconsistencies and stupid things. I disagree with them on Skyfall because that film was so bad I haven't even bothered with the newer ones, but I can agree with the point. Guess what I mean is, when you're a good show, you've earned the right to occassional annoyances or dissatisfying results. I've thought about this. I think that's the same reason why the first two seasons of Nanoha were so well received vs. StrikerS, while I would consider StrikerS to be the apex of the series - the complaints by watchers about it mirror those of The Vision of Escaflowne, like trying to cram a storyline barely enough for 13 episodes into a 26 episode anime, and it hence feeling slow. I don't entirely get it, because neither The Vision of Escaflowne nor StrikerS ever felt slow for me, but then again, neither did Sailor Moon (outside of SuperS), and oh boy do people complain about the filler and the storyline not advancing. These people probably have never seen a truly slow show in their life - like the first season of the reimagined Battlestar Galactica where, in terms of plot, literally nothing happened for almost the entire first season and we're not seeing anything but character driven events unfold with people coming to terms what it means to be refugees on a (space) convoy with nothing left. When plot elements begin to happen they ironically lay the groundwork for the failure that the series' last one and a half seasons ended up being. Yeah, well, of course, I can see someone being bored withe The Vision of Escaflowne if they want to keep things moving without much character interactions or don't really care for motivations and moving pieces into place before paying them off, even though there are some instances where I felt the payoff came too quickly, like with Marlene having secretly studied medecine, revealed just in time for her to save Allen. However, with the pacing of the show as it is, I'd almost be inclined to diagnose someone who thinks it is too slow paced with shounen attention deficit syndrome (SADS). Allen's part, particularily that flashback episode with an entirely new character that just happened to fly by is something that should have annoyed me, but didn't. Between reading of the troubled production and the rest of the show being as good as it is, well, there's plenty that can be more readily forgiven than with other shows. Allens arc also feels somewhat unfinished. It isn't, not really, because he resolves his issues, but there still could be something, like, more. He feels a little like Makoto in Sailor Stars. Has anyone ever complained about Evangelion being tediously slow? Because I feel like that has roughly the same pace, except it has a little more* action maybe. To be honest, I think these people just notice that the plot is a little slower because they don't have animated fanservice to keep them entertained. NGE might not be the fastest paced show either, and it doesn't even get a semi-rushed conclusion in the same way The Vision of Escaflowne did, but there's enough of Misato's and Asuka's assets to gawk at, I guess. I think SADS might be held off by copious amounts of masturbatory material. An arguably unfinished anime based on an unfinished manga - hard pass, unless you try it and think it's the best thing ever. Otherwise that's a minefield I'm not deliberately stepping into. *Maybe not more, but longer action sequences, at least. The fights in The Vision of Escaflowne have a certain weighty feel to them and have no lack of tension (in spite of always kind a knowing that everyone of the main characters will pull through by the end), but they're generally pretty short and to the point, unless there's a reason for them to not be.

Fun, tax comparisons. I'm currently sitting at 40% of my income going towards taxes and social security. For that I get commie stuff like universal healthcare, pension plans, good public education, no tuition fees at our universities, decent roads, a power grid that doesn't explode when usage spikes, not the worst deal in the world.

Lady Asuka 16: Court intrigues and a pair of scammers. Looks like high society has not changed in 250 years. Know what else has not? This is still riveting beyond ken.

No, it's not, but I'm not sure what my support is worth. I hate most controllers layouts, think the GameCube controller was the best, and I'm using a Logitech M1 laser mouse to play games and want my PS/2 ports back. I'm clearly not the target audience for any modern input device.

Sure thing. The hardware I'm currently using is 10 years old, except for the 970 GTX , that one's slightly newer - but not much.

Finally decided to buy some hardware upgrades. Going from my trusty old Western Digital WD10EALX to a Samsung 980 PRO SSD should be, let's say, slightly noticable.

God damned Mari.

Lady Asuka, Episode… whatever. Marie Antoinette frets about not having calved* yet. I guess that is a fair worry for a queen. She is wasting taxpayer money on gambling and pretending to be in calf. Riveting. *Is that the right term? The common people litter and royalty calves right?

Picard or whatever. Garbage is pretty much right. Edit: How does Ms. Estonian Capital know what a mind meld is? At the current time it is still a taboo on Vulcan. Or should be, at any rate.

Cannot argue with that. They're all set-pieces for the tale Drosselmeyer wants to tell. Ahiru is the only one who truly has any agency at all, as the tragic heroine of the story he is imagining, but even she can only work within the confines of the setting... or can she? There's certainly a meta aspect to the entire anime that ends up making several of the moving parts feel really strange. In a way, seeing the world through Ahiru's eyes and it being strange makes sense, she's a duck, after all. On the other hand it's not really conducive to liking any of the characters except Ahiru, and that's actually what happened for me. With the exception of Rue, because I'm just like that, I guess. Rue's story ticks off all the right boxes, but oh boy does it takes a while to get anywhere. So yeah, what I'm saying is, I guess - don't expect that to change for some more episodes. For some characters it will never really change, I guess. Will reply to the other stuff later, when I no longer feel like I'm going to get an aneurysm.

Finally got some time to reply to posts. Man, everything just sucks right now. This was the episode where Rue and Tutu go looking for Mytho, right? I thought it was the first one that was nicer than the others, if only for the limited interaction between the two. Escaflowne stuff from here on out: So now, what to think of The Vision of Escaflowne? For a moment, like the first four episodes, I was wondering if something went wrong and I'm beginning to like animes I shouldn't like. Really, like, barely anything in this is something I should enjoy. I already saw myself watching Naruto, or liking some silly shounen sport football anime. Gotta admit, you liking this as much as you did allayed that fear. Apparently this anime is really good. No, actually... it's great, and I'm not a complete hack fraud or turned shounen lover. I've browsed through some reviews on Amazon and some of them say that the storyline has potential, but is told in such a boring manner. Others complain about the characters. I really have no idea why either of these criticisms come up. Oh, sure, there's a lot less action than I expected, but the anime is never once boring, nor does it move slowly. If anything, it sometimes is too fast paced. Not sure yet, but I think I'd rank this pretty high on my list of best shows I've watched, although I'll wait a bit for the final judgement. Not sure how much of that feeling of having loved almost every second comes from it being surprisingly good in spite of what it is. Much like StrikerS probably wasn't as good as it appeared to be on a first watch. Unlike StrikerS though, this doesn't fall appart at the very end. Actually contemplating if I shouldn't get the director's cut blu rays. Feels like they deserve it. Probably a recommendation for @InsaneCommander because I think he also likes these sort of adventure animes (and this one is special!) and perhaps for @Amentep as well. Not sure about the others. Yeah, max speed ahead, alas, I haven't found a "play faster" button on Amazon Prime Video and I refuse to watch this outside of the hour a day I have to waste on cardio anyway. Might as well kill two birds with one stone. Total classic, yeah. Fun fact, this still has five starts on Prime Video. The Vision of Escaflowne has 4. Because. Because people are idiots.

Lady Asuka, Episode 14: This is as bad as I left it. Oh my. Asuka gets slapped by her father and the mother of boring side character #5 is run over by a horse carriage. What joy. I think I would rather rewatch the Black Rose arc than this. Not even the change of directors in 4 episodes can save that. No way.

Modern English doesn't have any grammatical genders at all. Were you thinking of the articles (the / a)? The morphological case system that is present in other Germanic languages is by far and large gone - what's left are the personal pronouns and a vestige of the genetive case (even that can be replaced by "of", i.e. the color of my car, rather than my car's color). There is some very limited conjugation and declension based on person, tense and number, but most of it is also simply adding an -s, 's or -ed. The language is well on its way to become analytic rather than fusing - one might argue that it is already more of an analytic language than a fusing one.

That's a very low bar to pass, set yourself some loftier goals, hmm (look who's talking, heh)? That's on my list too, I just don't really, ahm... I really should stop watching new things and finish what I've started. I'll probably go back to slowly working through Futari wa Pretty cure and Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicles now.

Keeping this thematically separate, so a justified double post, I think. Not that it makes any difference seeing how the human centipede ouroboros (have fun with the mental image guys!) in the Ukraine thread gets away with regurgitating their excremental ramblings in triple and quadruple posts for pages on end. Just finished with episode 24 of The Vision of Escaflowne, and I'll probably be off after this post to finish the series tonight. There's some more fraying in regards the timeframes involved and parts of Allen's and Falken's storyline keep feeling rushed due to what more and more looks like a middle part missing. Not surprising with 13 episodes missing from the run, but even so, the quality of the show remains high even though some parts of what happens in Zaibach are a bit ludicrous. At least until it reaches the end of episode 23 and all of the 24th episode, where it suddenly reaches a point that even the really good episodes prior didn't. That was just pure magic. The only problem is now that I don't see how the finale can live up to that, but let's see. edit: Uhm... huh? What the hell was that now? edit 2: Okay, done now. Spoiler for the what the hell moment: Okay, so that was a pretty good finale, all in all. A few things could have used some more setup, but in the end it's fine. Tired and it's a little late, so more tomorrow or maybe after @Bartimaeus caught up.

Oh, yes, you should also enjoy these two: Indeed, I've watched my fair share of weird stuff, and I enjoyed a good deal of it, all in all. I just get the impression that you've watched more of them. Discovery isn't strange, it's just really, really stupid. It sure is strange that it exists, I'll give you that. Reboot on the other hand is one of the best shows I've ever watched, and well worth the effort of tracking it down. I've heard tales of a decent DVD transfer. I haven't checked it out, but that's probably a whole lot better than that NTSC resolution transfer that was the sole source for a long while. The first season is mostly standalone comedy bits with a younger target audience in mind, but no less funny - assuming one likes IT nerd humor and pop culture fun* - and it becomes more story and character driven in its second season, and even more so after the show "left" ABC (the end of the second season makes fun of this when a part of Mainframe, the "ABCs" start attacking the residents - Bob yells "The ABCs, they're turning on us!" ). I have no idea if I can suggest Princess Tutu or not. At its core, it's a magical girl show about a duck who transforms into a human who then transforms into a super-heroine whose superpower is being so good at ballet that she just dances every problem away - or in other words, what's usually the action part of magical girl shows is replaced by ballet dance battles. The overall storyline is about (spoilered mostly for @Bartimaeus' sake) A fairy tale of princes, princesses, ballet and antropomorphic animals that sometimes are anteaters who lack the grace for ballet. Why? I have no idea. Anyway, ReBoot had a reboot too, or rather, a sequel show that's so bad it broke reality and made me love every second. It's the worst thing ever made, probably. It's about a hacker in dark hoodie whose hacking powers are so powerful that he can create Dark Code, and then he steals a computer that can connect to the internet without wi-fi and begins to wreak havoc on the world... the name of the hacker? The Sourcerer. Posted a bit about it before, way back when it aired, in the TV thread at the time. *I guess people are tired of hearing it, but the moment when Fax Modem is sitting together with Bob the Guardian and Data Nully, telling them his conspiracy theories about the Guardians and how there are no users and they're just made up by the anti virus thugs to supress the residents of the computer world is one of the best laughs I've ever had. Bob turns to Data Nully and in complete exasperation says: "Is your partner completely random?"

Yeah, if you watch anything like that before Sailor Moon, we'll uninvite you from our thread over there. *points*

Spelling and pronunciation are pretty confusing in English, but I found every aspect of English grammar to be easier than its German counterpart, including the tenses. Inflection in English is so wonderfully limited. That might say more about German than it does about English though, so take that with a grain of salt.

Not quite that bad, but let's say he has no idea how to read other people. Well, Ergo Proxy by your posts about it, Utena, the surrealist hellscapes of Madoka, David Lynch films, and so on and so forth. @Bartimaeus there's a leftover shouneny weird scene with the cat hunter-killer squad that sticks out like a sore thumb and then suddenly segues into a regular dialogue in, uh... episode 19 or 20, I've lost track because I watched too much all at once. You'll immediatly notice when you see it though.

Van is such a Shinji sometimes… that is all, for now. Hitomi even calls him an idiot for it. Heh.

I'd watch an The Adventures of Shezar Sr. anime. That looked like it could have been a fun show all on its own, crammed into one episode. Rushed is a little bit of an understatement. Yeah, I actually just extended uhm my usual cardio time for episode 17. I wanted to keep watching. Forgot to reply to that - well, assuming that by episode 13 your mind hasn't changed, the final episodes won't either. Out of all the strange things I've watched, which are probably not as many as @KP wants Blue Velvet did at least, this is certainly the one I can make both the most and the least sense of. In a way, Princess Tutu is more confusing than Revolutionary Girl Utena insfoar as that I had no idea what I was watching at the time, and I still really don't. I mean, other than the most surface level idea - a fairy tale that's based loosely on a couple of (Central) European folk tales and Swan Lake. For Utena I figured by the time the Black Rose arc rolled around that they're all in some form of purgatory or limbo and that turned out to be pretty much what it was. Tutu? Tutu I don't even know if there's some deeper meaning to it all, or if it's just... you know, whatever it is. Out side of the cat teacher. I have no idea what his deal is, and I don't think anyone involved in the production did either.

I can get behind that. I'm not getting all the time back I've spent having to support systems with AMD (or prior to the buyout, ATi) trash in them. Guess things changed in the past decade or so and the hardware works fine and the drivers won't crash more often than they work, but as in this famous movie poster: God forgives... I dont.

Well, there goes my idea of getting some sleep before midnight for a change. Time to watch. edit:

Or it'll introduce a plot element that was barely a hint before and show some other issues that came from the retooling of certain aspects, and the time passed between scenes feels a bit off. I've read that initially Dilandau and Falken were the same person and that later in production it was decided that there should be two antagonists. Mild spoilers for episodes 15, 16 and 17 (should be safe to read, regardless, I'll just mask them): Spoilers for these in more detail: Non-spoiler version: Hopefully all of that means the missing runtime was cut from a now somewhat missing middle section in between the ending of the first major plot point (Zaibach finding what the Emperor wants in Fraid) and the finale. If so, then the ending might be fully there. Yep... well, I'll see soon. It becomes even harder with episode 17. I had to pause and compare when this episode and certain others from NGE aired, and the time difference is like three months. It's not impossible that they've been inspired by what they saw, but that's cutting it really close to come up with episodes and animate them (in this quality) and fitting them into an established story framework that was in preproduction much earlier than NGE's first aired episode and probably adapted before too. It sure looks like that is what happened though. I also have a massive deja vu right now. I feel like I've seen myself writing this post before. Huh. Bizarre. Anyway, it's possible that the more NGE-ish elements were added to the original concept, that would make sense assuming the first ideas were much more like other shounen mech shows. Spoilers for 17 (hard ones): Not sure what to think of the episode. On the one hand, it was fantastic, on the other hand, it's... ah, yeah. Let's call it inspired by something else, right?

Quotes be pretty broken in this here thread right now. I always thought the forum software is just extra buggy in Firefox, but I'm using Chrome right now and it's not really any better. Fun! Yeah, I don't know where it could go from here with him, I guess I'll see sooner rather than later. Also, going by the production team information, this was in production two years before it came out and was retooled before release, so that's even before NGE came out. We also probably dodged a bullet here (emphasis mine): So yeah, this really is what happens when you take a shounen series, strip the shounen elements down a little and bring in something more interesting.