Anime and Manga - ゴゴゴゴ

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

38 minutes ago, majestic said:

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.

David Bowie is waiting for you.

However weird you think it looks, I promise what is actually going on is stranger. Which I suppose is normal for JoJo.

42 minutes ago, majestic said:

That's a very low bar to pass, set yourself some loftier goals, hmm (look who's talking, heh)?

If you set low bars, you will always be happy with the result.

And I wasn't really sure how to phrase my feelings politely about the thread. There's something very weird about armchair analysis in a war where thousands are dying. Internet Human Centipede is probably best to leave it.

[Bartimaeus]

Episode 4 of Princess Tutu:

On a side-note, I think I would recommend against Princess Tutu for KP, at least based on what I've seen so far. It's actually really difficult for me to envision him not being mostly bored with it. It's very slow and nothing much happens outside of characters just talking for 90% of the episodes, it has your traditional magical girl "ok time to wrap up the episode" mechanic, and the general type of "crazy" that it has is really more of the "events are weirdly inexplicable and hard to comprehend the meaning of" Utena variety than of the "events are genuinely difficult to predict" Lynch type that KP seems to prefer. This show is not hard to predict (all the episodes I've seen have pretty steadily followed a formula!), and to my knowledge, KP tends to hate predictable formulas. "Difficult to understand" is a very different matter from "difficult to predict": you don't need to understand why things are the way they are to know where they're going, after all.

Edited April 7, 2022 by Bartimaeus

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

2 hours ago, Bartimaeus said:

Episode 4 of Princess Tutu:

On a side-note, I think I would recommend against Princess Tutu for KP, at least based on what I've seen so far. It's actually really difficult for me to envision him not being mostly bored with it. It's very slow and nothing much happens outside of characters just talking for 90% of the episodes, it has your traditional magical girl "ok time to wrap up the episode" mechanic, and the general type of "crazy" that it has is really more of the "events are weirdly inexplicable and hard to comprehend the meaning of" Utena variety than of the "events are genuinely difficult to predict" Lynch type that KP seems to prefer. This show is not hard to predict (all the episodes I've seen have pretty steadily followed a formula!), and to my knowledge, KP tends to hate predictable formulas. "Difficult to understand" is a very different matter from "difficult to predict": you don't need to understand why things are the way they are to know where they're going, after all.

I think I would have liked Utena much more if the Black Rose arc never happened, with the exception of the cow episode. Maybe it's because DIO got depressed and hid in his room, maybe it's because it went into a very repetitive formula at that point, or maybe it was some other thing that subconsciously turned me off. Regardless of why, I think Utena would be much better for me if it didn't have that awful arc. I don't really mind difficult to comprehend, sometimes I think it can be good not to understand something because you'll educate yourself if it was interesting.

While I don't have a top list of anything because my taste changes by mood and situation, the Lynch scene I've  been thinking about lately is the In Dreams lip synch in Blue Velvet. Between the absurdity of Suave Ben singing into a staging light (which I've read was an accident), the captive audience of Jeffrey and Dorthy (and her husband and child in the backroom as hostages), and Frank Booth's discomfort that leads to him shutting down the tape, it works for me as creating a very malevolent situation while making Frank both more humanized and creepy. It's very chef's kiss for me.

The other is the entire 15 minutes of What Did Jack Do?, where David Lynch interrogates a monkey.

I forgot where I was going with this.

Ok then, I'll probably cautiously check out Princess Tutu after I've watched some other stuff, but something like the Sailor Moon episodes without the charming crazy stuff like Usagi turning into a tennis ball sounds like not my thing.

[Bartimaeus]

On 4/5/2022 at 2:38 PM, majestic said:

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

The English subtitles translated it as "jerk", even though it is the word for idiot. I suppose "jerk" is sometimes more accurate than "idiot", just as sometimes "dummy" is more accurate as well, depending on tone and context. Very much looked like he became Major Slappo for it as well.

18 hours ago, Amentep said:

Fun episode; expected that the game would at least be two episodes long.

Yeah, so rug ball does not look like a game I want to play.

12 hours ago, majestic said:

I'll probably go back to slowly working through Futari wa Pretty cure and Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicles now.

7 hours ago, KP wants Blue Velvet said:

While I don't have a top list of anything because my taste changes by mood and situation, the Lynch scene I've  been thinking about lately is the In Dreams lip synch in Blue Velvet. Between the absurdity of Suave Ben singing into a staging light (which I've read was an accident), the captive audience of Jeffrey and Dorthy (and her husband and child in the backroom as hostages), and Frank Booth's discomfort that leads to him shutting down the tape, it works for me as creating a very malevolent situation while making Frank both more humanized and creepy. It's very chef's kiss for me.

I have literally zero recollection of that scene, and I saw Blue Velvet only a few years ago. Then again, I didn't like it, so I suppose it got ejected from my brain as such things tend to do. Black Rose arc was pretty bad, but I didn't think any of the story arcs were really any good - way too much repetition and it was borderline impossible to care or be interested in what was happening in the story itself. A number of good individual episodes and moments, mind you, but the main story was decidedly not for me.

Edited April 7, 2022 by Bartimaeus

[Bartimaeus]

Episode 20:

Spoiler

Poor Van and Merle. Merle pretends that she doesn't like Hitomi, but it really seems from the way she acts and phrases stuff that she actually does like her - she just hates Hitomi hurting Van a lot more than whatever that's worth.

The duality of the cat sisters embracing like that, I thought I was in a very different kind of show for a moment...and then it was immediately redeemed with the very sad conversation about Folken and how their hopes and dreams of loving him had been dashed. Alright, you're forgiven, show. Then all that was then followed up by the mole guy hiding in Princess Millerna's room while she was trying to figure out her wardrobe, and I was like "oh no, here we go again"...but no, even HE subverted it. Well, that's just fine, show - keep it up, I have my eye on you! Two of them, in fact.

Oh man, literally right as I thought "I really hope Hitomi gets around to that reading before the wedding", the princess appeared behind her and asked for it. Yes, it's predictable, but also yes, it's right and satisfying. And of course, Hitomi made the right decision. Uh...oops. Selfishness seems to rarely pay off in fiction, as opposed to reality, where the complete opposite seems to usually happen.

Episode 21:

Spoiler

Poor kitty cats, . Oh wow, Naria is still alive - that's my shoujo! Was pretty sure she suffered the same fate as the doppelganger for a moment there; now that they've become actual characters, I don't want them to die. Although she just murdered a guard by cutting his throat with her nails, so uh...yeah. And now she just successfully kidnapped Hitomi. Well, okay, but I'm assuming it's all going to work out...eventually.

Maybe Folken should try doing something himself for a change, that lazy bum - sending his girls out to die over and over while doing nothing himself! Hey, wait, I just remembered that Van can do the dowsing thing - why didn't he use that to try to find Hitomi? Eh, maybe he did, and the whole luck aura shielded her from him.

Okay, I reiterate: poor kitty cats, . That's not my shoujo! Also, lmao, Folken basically gave Isaac the old White Diamond treatment.

 

Edited April 7, 2022 by Bartimaeus

[Bartimaeus]

Hey, what in the hell happened to Dilandau? Dude just disappeared off the face of the Earth (e: oops, Gaea, not Earth) when he was the primary immediate antagonist for most of the show. Last we saw him...well, we won't talk about that.

Episode 22:

Spoiler

Was that...Allen's sister, kissing a snail, as a vision on the part of the Zaibachian general? What the hell was that scene?

There's something hilarious in Van starting off full shonen, slowly becoming less shonen, eventually going full Shinji halfway through the show, then ratcheting it all the way back up to full shonen, and then now being asked to go Shinji again by his brother and Hitomi.

Episode 23: Merle continues to be great. Kind of wish we'd gotten to see more of her recently.

Spoiler

Oh no, Allen's going all control freak! Classic. Well, there had to be something to eventually drive her back to Van. Seems a little contrived, particularly given all the insanity they've collectively faced so far. Hey, maybe they'll surprise me and she'll fall in love with Folken instead - now that would be a surprise.

Wow, Dilandau is alive! I really typed the first sentence of this post before I even started this episode, I swear. I thought for sure the show had just forgotten about him entirely due to the Dilandau/Folken split. Also, who in their right mind would give this guy a Guymelef again? One with flamethrowers again, no less... Lmao, we're doing the whole "I have a friend" thing again. Oh good, the show realized it too.

Not gonna lie, got a little something in my eyes as Hitomi got sent back, even if it was a bit of a Shinji moment.

Episode 24:

Spoiler

Lmao, for some reason, I feel kind of bad for Dryden, who got thrown into this ragtag band at the last second. He was just out there living his best life, and now stuff is just constantly happening that is completely out of his control and he's been thrust into a leadership position...

Are my eyes deceiving me, or...is that Dilandau? What the hell happened to him? Oh, no, Celena just looks a lot like Dilandau from a distance, okay. Man, that would've been super weird.

Merle is the best. Uh, what the hell?

Uh, that's...a creepy Dilandau smile if I've ever seen one. Um, wait a second...

Yukari and Amano going through this the second time again:

I'm farming that sweet, sweet majestic karma for these doubleposts. If the morons in the politics threads can do it willy-nilly, I should be able to do it over here too!

Edited April 7, 2022 by Bartimaeus

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

17 minutes ago, Bartimaeus said:

If the morons in the politics threads can do it willy-nilly, I should be able to do it over here too!

I'll save you from yourself. A quad post is an unforgivable sin, unless it's for comedic effect. A long time ago on a forum far, far away, me and some other fellas spammed a thread with riffs on The Planet of the Apes. The Good, The Bad, and the Planet of the Apes. There's Something About Mary On The Planet of the Apes. Silence of the Lambe on The Planet of the Apes.

Oh to be young and dumb(er) again.

4 hours ago, Bartimaeus said:

I have literally zero recollection of that scene, and I saw Blue Velvet only a few years ago. Then again, I didn't like it, so I suppose it got ejected from my brain as such things tend to do. Black Rose arc was pretty bad, but I didn't think any of the story arcs were really any good - way too much repetition and it was borderline impossible to care or be interested in what was happening in the story itself. A number of good individual episodes and moments, mind you, but the main story was decidedly not for me.

Re: Utena... I think it got much better in the last part. I don't have anything else to add.

[Bartimaeus]

Oh, you've seen double posts, maybe even triple posts...but a quadruple post? We're in uncharted territory here...what the hell, KP? I was working on something great here. Now I have to start all over!

Episodes 25 and 26:

Spoiler

Did you ever figure out the meaning of the random highlighting in the episode titles? I have no idea what it's supposed to mean, but it is in Japanese, so...

Allen accepted losing Hitomi more gracefully than he accepted winning her. ...Dryden sure is a weird guy. Musical chairs of people falling in love with each other here, and yet, somehow, it doesn't feel obnoxious.

Man, Dilandau is really not doing well - that is not a face anybody should ever make. Looked like the middle of a dementia episode.

Why does that new weapon almost look like a nuclear bomb? Very reminiscent of control rods going into a reactor... Uh, gas masks? Oh come on, it can't be... Oh, yeah, yeah it is. They freaking *nuked* Zaibach? What the hell? Where the hell did that come from? How in the hell does that thematically fit? Alright, reshape the world, Hitomi, it's all up to you, just like your grandma has been saying from the very beginning.

Okay, now I kinda get the idea of the nukes: it was needed to show how things will escalate the moment Zaibach was defeated. Still feels a little unnecessary, but whatever. Good lord, Dilandau's face gets creepier every time I see the bastard...and his face started off creepy back in episode 2 or whatever.

That almost got really dumb for a moment there with Allen and Van. The shonen moments in this show always feel like they eventually get subverted by the shoujo...sooner or later.

Lmao, seeing Folken with Eriya and Naria all smiling and happy was somehow great. The poor catgirls...just like real pets, they're always the forgotten victim of wars and disasters, .

Solid ending, especially given the circumstances. Surprise! The girl doesn't end up with anybody...kind of.

 

41 minutes ago, KP wants Blue Velvet said:

Re: Utena... I think it got much better in the last part. I don't have anything else to add.

Was kind of the opposite for me - the longer the story went on, the more disinterested I was in it. By the end of it, I was actively yelling at Utena to drop Anthy off the ledge and was disappointed when she didn't, .

Blue Velvet: I recognize a lot of these characters, but I have literally zero memory of this scene even after re-watching it just now. I don't know what to say.

Edited April 7, 2022 by Bartimaeus

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

14 minutes ago, Bartimaeus said:

Oh, you've seen double posts, maybe even triple posts...but a quadruple post? We're in uncharted territory here...what the hell, KP? I was working on something great here. Now I have to start all over!

Go for a dozen post. That will break reality as we know it and condemn us to the anti-universe, which at this point is probably better.

14 minutes ago, Bartimaeus said:

Was kind of the opposite for me - the longer the story went on, the more disinterested I was in it. By the end of it, I was actively yelling at Utena to drop Anthy off the ledge and was disappointed when she didn't,

It would have been much better with significant cuts, but Akio had a magnificent bastard energy that went well with DIO and the green hair guy. But by then it had gone off the rails and I am very fond of that in general.

14 minutes ago, Bartimaeus said:

Blue Velvet: I recognize a lot of these characters, but I have literally zero memory of this scene even after re-watching it just now. I don't know what to say.

Maybe it left you in a dream? For me, that and the joyride immediately after where

Frank puts on lipstick and kisses Jeffrey before beating him while the lady who went with Raymond dances on the car are the most memorable scenes.

[majestic]

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.

Edited April 7, 2022 by majestic

[Bartimaeus]

26 minutes ago, KP wants Blue Velvet said:

Go for a dozen post. That will break reality as we know it and condemn us to the anti-universe, which at this point is probably better.

If I put every single poster in here besides myself on the forums on my super ignore list, I can make myself have like 20 posts in a row...although they'll still be inexplicably separated by pages.

26 minutes ago, KP wants Blue Velvet said:

Maybe it left you in a dream? For me, that and the joyride immediately after where

I actually remember that part even without re-watching it, but this singing part never happened according to my brain, .

12 minutes ago, majestic said:

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 wo would rather rewatch the Black Rose arc than this. Not even the change of directors in 4 episodes can save that. No way.

You better be watching this crap at max speed.

(e); butt on the other hand, its uh shoujo classick of classix

Edited April 7, 2022 by Bartimaeus
I accidentally a word

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

15 minutes ago, Bartimaeus said:

If I put every single poster in here besides myself on the forums on my super ignore list, I can make myself have like 20 posts in a row...although they'll still be inexplicably separated by pages.

I'd say that doesn't count, but if a user is super ignored do they even exist?

15 minutes ago, Bartimaeus said:

I actually remember that part even without re-watching it, but this singing part never happened according to my brain, .

It happens, maybe your brain was trying to stop you from feeling sorry for Frank, given that he is a huge piece of ****. 

[majestic]

Finally got some time to reply to posts. Man, everything just sucks right now.

19 hours ago, Bartimaeus said:

Episode 4 of Princess Tutu:

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:

Spoiler

 

7 hours ago, Bartimaeus said:

The duality of the cat sisters embracing like that, I thought I was in a very different kind of show for a moment...and then it was immediately redeemed with the very sad conversation about Folken and how their hopes and dreams of loving him had been dashed.

 

That's the weird scene I mentioned. It suddenly has focus shots of the cat girls spandex unitards, their butts and breasts, and then it almost devolves into hot twin sister lesbian action, only to do a full 180° turn and becomes a sad scene about unrequited love. It's pretty out of place, I wonder if that somehow was overlooked in the cuts, because that's probably something left over from the initial version, and oh boy, good thing we didn't get that...

5 hours ago, Bartimaeus said:

Not gonna lie, got a little something in my eyes as Hitomi got sent back, even if it was a bit of a Shinji moment.

I absolutely loved that scene, Hitomi essentially wants back into her shoujo anime because this shounen world sucks, and off she goes. Or at least she thinks she does, but she's still needed to make the place less shounen-y, of course.

5 hours ago, Bartimaeus said:

Episode 24:

The previous episodes have shown that time doesn't really matter when teleporting back to Earth, so I wasn't surprised when Hitomi came back at the point when she had passed out. That seemed like a natural place to return to right from the start, so much so that for a tiny bit I was worried that the anime might pull off an "it was all just a dream" moment, but that went away after a handful of episodes.

Absolutely loved 24. From Merle's interactions with Van, to everyone confronting their feelings, even Hitomi replaying the day, the way the scenes were constructed, the music, everything created a perfect moment within the show. The only thing that interrupted it a little was the weird Dilandau subplot that, like everything that has to do with Allen's family, feels rushed.

4 hours ago, Bartimaeus said:

Did you ever figure out the meaning of the random highlighting in the episode titles? I have no idea what it's supposed to mean, but it is in Japanese, so...

No, not really, because a lot of the kanji went over my head. A couple I could read, but not enough to see if there's any sort of pattern or sense behind it.

4 hours ago, Bartimaeus said:

Why does that new weapon almost look like a nuclear bomb? Very reminiscent of control rods going into a reactor... Uh, gas masks? Oh come on, it can't be... Oh, yeah, yeah it is. They freaking *nuked* Zaibach? What the hell? Where the hell did that come from? How in the hell does that thematically fit? Alright, reshape the world, Hitomi, it's all up to you, just like your grandma has been saying from the very beginning.

Okay, now I kinda get the idea of the nukes: it was needed to show how things will escalate the moment Zaibach was defeated. Still feels a little unnecessary, but whatever. Good lord, Dilandau's face gets creepier every time I see the bastard...and his face started off creepy back in episode 2 or whatever.

That almost got really dumb for a moment there with Allen and Van. The shonen moments in this show always feel like they eventually get subverted by the shoujo...sooner or later.

Lmao, seeing Folken with Eriya and Naria all smiling and happy was somehow great. The poor catgirls...just like real pets, they're always the forgotten victim of wars and disasters, .

Solid ending, especially given the circumstances. Surprise! The girl doesn't end up with anybody...kind of.

She really doesn't end up with any of her options. It's probably for the best, Van is still king and Hitomi wouldn't make much of a queen, although I wonder why Hitomi couldn't just stay on Gaia.

I really would have liked for the nuke to have some setup. A joint research project from the alliance, for instance, or perhaps they could have helped them build it, then agreed to only use it if Zaibach can't be defeated conventionally. They could still have used it unilaterally, but at least it wouldn't come that out of the blue. In a fantasy setting with swords and mechs with liquid metal weaponry powered by dragon energy cores, a nuke isn't as strange as it might initially appear.

Not sure I liked Dilandau's arc, or at least the ending of it. Him being a transformed girl and Allen's sister is a little strange and also misses some more setup. He was a wonderfully insane villain and could have just gotten a regular villain's fate and it would have been good too.

As far as I understood the fighting between the former allies and between Van and Allen, it was Dolunkirk's machine that caused the issues, by giving thoughts a way to affect reality. Van and Allen still wanted to duke it out over Hitomi, after all, and Van also really wanted to smash Dilandau's face in. The nations looked out for their own gain, trying to seize a decent moment to gain the upper hand with the power vacuum. That's why it only stopped after Van finally got rid of his desire to fight. Not afraid of fighting, no, but not wanting to unless it is absolutely necessary.

The ending was pretty good, but maybe because I was expecting the worst. I thought it would fall apart in the home stretch, like so many other things.

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.

3 hours ago, Bartimaeus said:

You better be watching this crap at max speed.

(e); butt on the other hand, its uh shoujo classick of classix

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.

Edited April 7, 2022 by majestic

[Gorth]

Argh... looks like Ergo Proxy is only available on NetFlix... and not the Australian Netflix (which means subscribing for a month to NetFlix and using my vpn to pretend I'm Canadian or American or some such)

Not going to pay a fortune for Amazon Blu-Rays (edit: which will be the wrong region anyway)

 

Edit: It was on Crunchyroll until 2017 when it got removed, but comments suggests it may now be on Funimations Youtube channel. I'll check it out there

Edit2: Looks like Funimation has folded and Crunchyroll is the only one left. I'm screwed

Edit3: Looks like most, if not all of the episodes are on Youtube, just not through official channels

[Sarex]

6 hours ago, Gorth said:

Argh... looks like Ergo Proxy is only available on NetFlix... and not the Australian Netflix (which means subscribing for a month to NetFlix and using my vpn to pretend I'm Canadian or American or some such)

Not going to pay a fortune for Amazon Blu-Rays (edit: which will be the wrong region anyway)

 

Edit: It was on Crunchyroll until 2017 when it got removed, but comments suggests it may now be on Funimations Youtube channel. I'll check it out there

Edit2: Looks like Funimation has folded and Crunchyroll is the only one left. I'm screwed

Edit3: Looks like most, if not all of the episodes are on Youtube, just not through official channels

If you already have a VPN, I mean... Why watch it in **** quality on youtube.

[Gorth]

16 minutes ago, Sarex said:

If you already have a VPN, I mean... Why watch it in **** quality on youtube.

I'm not really that interested in a NetFlix subscription, not even for a month or two to be honest (because I know I would feel compelled somehow to waste a lot of time watching NetFlix for a while, because of the time limitation). YouTube videos I save in a  folder and watch when I have the time and inclination to do so

Having VPN is nice though, even if most of the time it just masks my IP with another Brisbane IP (I use NordVPN, no idea how it compares to the competition, but it was what looked the easiest to use for me a day when I really needed one)

[Bartimaeus]

11 hours ago, majestic said:

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.

Something about the dialogue of the characters that are not Ahiru feels...artificial, almost like everyone except for her is just a weird set-piece caricature. It's probably because nobody except for her speaks naturally or acts like an actual character (i.e. somebody with thoughts, feelings, goals, agency...). I know I'm still only four episodes in, but her two friends are basically exaggerated Tomoyos that do not exist except as an extension of Ahiru (as far as I can tell, they could be figments of her imagination and nobody would notice except for her if they suddenly vanished into thin air), Mytho is a zombie (albeit a slowly recovering one), Fakir is pure "possessive sibling" without anything else going on, new characters are introduced for an episode before being dumped unceremoniously in typical magical girl fashion...Rue is probably the closest thing to feeling like another character, and even her, when she talks to like Fakir, it's like they're both mysteriously trying to avoid talking about something obvious that the audience should know, but which the show has declared is off-limits for the time being...which would be fine, except that it's making their conversations sound really strange. It all creates a weird feeling where every time I think I'm starting to get into the show, the general weirdness of how it's doing everything quickly jolts me back out of it.

11 hours ago, majestic said:

It's pretty out of place, I wonder if that somehow was overlooked in the cuts, because that's probably something left over from the initial version, and oh boy, good thing we didn't get that...

"Okay, we need to have the two sisters, who have only ever had each other to rely upon their entire lives, have a sad conversation about how no-one else will ever love the either of them because of what they are, while also intercutting with flashbacks to when their parents were horrifically murdered when they were small children. We don't have enough time to animate all it from scratch, so let's just cleverly and not jarringly at all re-use some of the animation we made of them from the incestuous ecchi scene they were going to have back when this was a shonen and before we decided they were going to be actual characters. Sound good to everyone? Great!"

11 hours ago, majestic said:

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.

What's funny is that I still think there are certain things about it that should annoy or dissatisfy me, that definitely would with other shows...but for some reason, they don't here. When you're a special exception, you just are, even if the reasons aren't perfectly understood, . Though I can definitely see the show not being for everyone, and I think that's okay - focusing too much on characters and their thoughts and feelings instead of the "epic" world-building and plot and action and really just all the stuff that I normally don't care that much about unless I already like the characters... Honestly, it makes perfect sense that if we really like it, a lot of other people wouldn't - isn't that usually the case?

I'll also forgive a few things not being set up quite as well as they should've been - poor Allen and his family kind of got the short end of the stick all throughout the show in that regard, but ultimately, it was in favor of Hitomi, Van, and Folken, all of who were simply more important, so I can't really fault them too badly given that they lost 13 episodes' worth of runtime. It is funny that the show being tediously slow seems to be a common complaint - if your main point of interest is the plot, I can see that being an issue, because the plot generally does move pretty slowly outside of a few occasions, but it is certainly not what I care most about. The reason why something like this or Evangelion works at all for me is because there was such a heavy and meaningful focus on the characters that makes the plot and world worth caring about - without the former, I won't stick around for the latter. It seems like a lot of other people are wired to be the other way around, .

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Just finished this, and disappointed to say I really didn't think much of the series. I was hoping for some fantasy adventure on-par with Twelve Kingdoms (or close to it) but personally I think Escaflowne fell short in every category.

I can only assume that this comment I read about it was written by HoonDing. I'm gonna have to try an episode of this Twelve Kingdoms just so I can predictably hate it.

Edited April 8, 2022 by Bartimaeus

[Sarex]

1 hour ago, Gorth said:

I'm not really that interested in a NetFlix subscription, not even for a month or two to be honest (because I know I would feel compelled somehow to waste a lot of time watching NetFlix for a while, because of the time limitation). YouTube videos I save in a  folder and watch when I have the time and inclination to do so

Having VPN is nice though, even if most of the time it just masks my IP with another Brisbane IP (I use NordVPN, no idea how it compares to the competition, but it was what looked the easiest to use for me a day when I really needed one)

I was thinking more of some higher quality copies that are available for download not really netflix.

[majestic]

1 hour ago, Bartimaeus said:

Something about the dialogue of the characters that are not Ahiru feels...artificial, almost like everyone except for her is just a weird set-piece caricature. It's probably because nobody except for her speaks naturally or acts like an actual character (i.e. somebody with thoughts, feelings, goals, agency...). I know I'm still only four episodes in, but her two friends are basically exaggerated Tomoyos that do not exist except as an extension of Ahiru (as far as I can tell, they could be figments of her imagination and nobody would notice except for her if they suddenly vanished into thin air), Mytho is a zombie (albeit a slowly recovering one), Fakir is pure "possessive sibling" without anything else going on, new characters are introduced for an episode before being dumped unceremoniously in typical magical girl fashion...Rue is probably the closest thing to feeling like another character, and even her, when she talks to like Fakir, it's like they're both mysteriously trying to avoid talking about something obvious that the audience should know, but which the show has declared is off-limits for the time being...which would be fine, except that it's making their conversations sound really strange. It all creates a weird feeling where every time I think I'm starting to get into the show, the general weirdness of how it's doing everything quickly jolts me back out of it.

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?

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"May those who accept their fate find happiness. May those who defy it find glory." -- Edel

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.

[majestic]

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?

 

Edited April 8, 2022 by majestic

[Bartimaeus]

10 hours ago, majestic said:

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?

gifs unrelated, I just felt like posting empress nanami

Edited April 9, 2022 by Bartimaeus

[Gorth]

Finished Ergo Proxy episode 4... completely hooked on the story

 

Not really what i would think of when people say "Anime", which I normally associated with a few stereo types when it comes to art direction. Looks more like an animated version of a Jean Giraud ("Moebius") comic!

Too much happening already to make a coherent summary of

 

[Lexx]

So you're saying I should actually watch Ergo Proxy?

Tried first episode once, but it felt so ehh.

[Gorth]

4 hours ago, Lexx said:

So you're saying I should actually watch Ergo Proxy?

Tried first episode once, but it felt so ehh.

I can't really separate events out into their episodes, but the story as I get it so far has two protagonists... Vincent the immigrant and Re-I, the granddaughter of the "administrator". They live in a city, which later turns out to be a dome existing in a wasteland, sustaining a kind of utopia/dystopia kind of society, complete with constant messages bombarding the "model citizens" with how they should behave and act like good little consumers. AI "people" are everywhere and serves many purposes. It immediately made me think of Bladerunner. A virus, called "cogito", is spreading amongst the AI's (called "autoreives") and causes havoc. On top of that, the bureau of security as well as Re-I's grandfather have gotten their hands dirty with some unsavoury research just referred to as "Proxy". The results of which escapes a lab/holding facility and goes on a killing spree. Vincent manages to escape from the city using a vent, that cogito infected AI's has been using to escape the city and ends up with a small group of people living outside the dome. One of them wants to be more than a "dome parasite" some day (being people who lives off the sewage and waste of the dome). That's where I got to. Leaving out a fair number of details and characters.

 

Edit: Looks like I got the name of the female lead wrong... the last letter is not an 'I' but a lower case 'L', i.e. 'l' (Re-l).

[HoonDing]

I thought it was completely forgettable except for a couple of character driven episodes and one creative game show infodump episode.

Oh, and I laughed out loud when that rape monster accosted goth girl in her bathroom in the first or second episode.