Category: Whatever

Miscellany

How Obama can win:

Hey, McCain has been ignoring the catgirl vote throughout the primaries, I say Obama should take advantage of this. As a matter of fact, a strong anti-tentacle monster platform would bring in both the catgirls and the Lolis. He could then show show his strength on defense by committing to a crash course of giant robot development. All he would need at that point would be a promise of combat training for all nubile young schoolgirls and he would have the entire geek vote locked up.

On a related note, here’s the most frightening title I’ve heard in a while: The Melancholy of Hillary Rodham.

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That other dealer has Geneon merchandise on sale. Haibane Renmei, Someday’s Dreamers and others are going for $5 per disc, and this time there’s no minimum order.

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Via Pixy, sophisticated technology in the service of sheer silliness:

And some Leeky Star:

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Stranger than anime: the operatic guide to dating.

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Yoshitoshi ABe will be in Minnesota in September. It’s a bit out of bicycle range for me, unfortunately.

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Update: No. No. No. No. No. No.

Miscellany

The inhabitants of the moon never see an earthrise or earthset. However, spacecraft orbiting the moon, e.g., the Kaguya, do. Here is the earth rising and setting, as recorded in HD. (Via Aziz.)

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Speed Racer is probably worth skipping (though I might listen to Racer X). If you’re looking for an exciting race story, I recommend instead the Kuricorder Quartet’s take on “Highway Star”:

Here’s the quartet again with some tunes you might recognize.

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Understatement of the week:

Something tells me the commenter hasn’t met all that many nuns.

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Give peas a chance:

(Via Blackadder.)

Advisory

The good news: Not only can I walk (albeit slowly, and with a cane), but as of today I can ride my bike again.

The bad news: Posting here will continue to be spasmodic. I plan to walk and bike as much as possible for the next several weeks to regain strength and flexibility. Other recreations, including anime, are going to be low priority for a while. Of the current series, I will probably keep up only with Kaiba and perhaps Soul Eater. I’ll catch up with Allison and Lillia and the other shows of interest later this summer. I recently ordered the Fantastic Children boxed set, which I’ll probably marathon the weekend after it arrives, and that’s the only older series I will look at this spring.

Speaking of Soul Eater: a commentor wonders how I can find Toshokan Senkou unwatchable because of Kasahara yet enjoy Soul Eater, in which the male characters are “1000% more stupid and irritating than her.” There are three quick responses:

1. There’s only one nitwit in Soul Eater, Black Star. Soul Eater is a competent enough, and Death the Kid is a mental case, not a moron. If Soul Eater were just the Black Star show, one episode would have been plenty, but that’s not the case.
2. Toshokan Sensou and Soul Eater are different kinds of shows. The latter is much more farcical, and what is annoying in one context can be funny in another.
3. Don’t ever accuse me of consistency.

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Recent search strings:

tomo takino feet
kawaii stalin
bishie mussolini
britney spears mushi
kawaii religion

If you can explain any of these, please keep it to yourself. I don’t want to know.

All this, and Houko Kuwashima, too

… not to mention Romi Paku. Now I’m really impatient to see Kaiba.

Update: Really, really impatient.

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ppgz01.jpg

Psgels gave Demashitaa! Powerpuff Girls Z the surprisingly high score of 88/100. Last night I was in the mood for something silly and frivolous, so I watched the first few episodes. Well, it’s really silly and frivolous. How silly is it? The girls, Hyper Blssom, Rolling Bubbles and Powered Buttercup, and their arch-enemy, the talking monkey MojoJojo, interrupt their battles for ice cream breaks. Tomboy Buttercup catches a cold from wearing the mahou shoujo short skirt. I posted an excerpt from the first episode on the video weblog that might give you an idea of the show’s flavor. It’s not something I could stand to watch much of at a time, but in small doses it’s agreeably ridiculous.

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I also posted a four-minute excerpt from Iblard Jikan, which I mentioned earlier.

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I spent the morning at the hospital getting a three-inch screw removed from my ankle. I can now put weight on my left leg, and this afternoon, for the first time this year, I walked. It will take a few weeks to regain full use of the ankle, but at least I can return the wheelchair to the shop now.

366 days ago

Today marks three anniversaries. The Kawaii Menace is one year old. Note that it’s not my first anime weblog. It was preceeded by the defunct Beware the Kawaii, begun on April 19, 2006. The curious can find a selection of the less-embarrassing posts from the earlier weblog in the sidebar listed under “ancient texts.”

It was five years ago today that I began my first weblog, Mixolydian Mode. It focused on music, books, the decline of civilization, and silliness. At that time I hadn’t yet seen any anime beyond Miyazaki, ((I did see Shonen Sarutobi Sasuke a long, long time ago, but I was very young then.)) and it wasn’t until I discovered Serial Experiments Lain a year later that I began writing about anime. Eventually my posts on anime threatened to overwhelm the rest of the blog, so I started Beware the Kawaii, devoted to animation, Japan and women with blue hair. Mixolydian Mode is defunct now, replaced a year ago today by Scuffulans hirsutus.

Musical clues

conley.jpg

Bishop-elect James Conley. (Photo by Chris Riggs.)

If you want to identify the priests in a diocese most likely to be named bishops, see which ones attend bluegrass festivals. In years past, when I went to Winfield, I would find Fathers Paul Coakley and James Conley there, too. Coakley is now the bishop of the Salina, Kansas, diocese, and Conley has just been named auxiliary bishop of Denver.

Odds and ends

Studio 4°C has posted a trailer for Genius Party Beyond. It looks like a mixed bag, but the range of styles should hold my interest. I figure that the chances of either of the Genius Parties being licensed for region 1 are close to nil.

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I used to be a busy costumer back when I active in the SCA. I sewed mainly for myself, and I still have a closet full of 14th- and 15th-century clothes, most of which I can’t fit into anymore. When I became interested in anime, I naturally was curious about cosplay.

I discovered that there are significant differences between the historical recreationist and the anime universes. Costumers in the SCA have 1,000 years of fashion to draw upon. No matter what your age or shape is, there is something elegant for you to wear in any period, and there are plenty of options for both men and women. Cosplay, however, is the province of the young and thin, and females have a definite advantage. ((I once saw a picture of an “Ah, My Goddess” group, with girls in pretty robes and a guy in street clothes. It took me a moment to realize that he was in costume, too, as Keiichi.))

There’s also a greater degree of freedom in SCA costuming. If you could document the elements and show that the combination was plausible in a particular time and place, you could design a outfit to suit your fancy, and that was fine. In cosplay, however, you try to duplicate a particular outfit as closely as possible. There’s far less room for idiosyncratic variation.

I’m not all that young and skinny anymore, so, rather than turn stomachs, I stick to photographing good costumes. (It’s probably just as well, though I’d be interested in sewing for someone with a better figure if I could find a willing victim (and the time).) I enjoy good cosplay photography, so I was interested to learn today that the cosplay magazine Cosmode has announced a bilingual, sorta, online version. There’s a preview here. The gimmick is that, although the Japanese text remains unchanged, you can read translations by positioning your mouse over a block of text. I don’t know if it’s worth the subscription price, but I’ll probably check out the free first issue.

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Today’s quote:

Anime titles are eminently sensible, fairly representing their content. I mean, who can look at titles like these without knowing exactly what they’re about: DearS, Angelic Layer, All-purpose Cultural Catgirl Nuku-nuku, Bubblegum Crisis, FLCL, Chobits, Cutie Honey, Green Green, Bleach, Kiddy Grade, Divergence Eve, Dirty Pair, Hyper Police, Happy Lesson, Club-to-Death Angel L’il Skull, Mysterious Hats of Twin Princesses, Excel Saga, G-on Riders, Lime-colored War Stories, Gals!, and of course, Mai Highly-advanced Materializing Equipment. (only four of these are translations, the rest are the original titles…)

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A few non-anime links of note:

Blogging is a hazardous occupation.
The patron saints of graphic design.
The fifty most powerful blogs (yeah, right). None of them are about anime.
(Via TSO and MCNS.)

Oddments

Media Blasters has rescued Seirei no Moribito. Further good news: the first novel in the series that Moribito is based on is scheduled to be published in June. The series also will be shown on Cartoon Network. I look forward to apoplectic reactions from the “meat is murder” crowd when the twentieth episode airs.

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Quote of the week:

As regards Go Nagai, I’m not sure that the creator of Kekko Kamen and Cutey Honey is really the father [of anime] we want to acknowledge. He’s more like the creepy uncle who goes around wearing the trench coat.

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So far, the only upcoming series I plan to watch is Allison to Lillia. The main reason, of course, is that it is based on books by Keiichi Sigsawa, the creator of Kino no Tabi. I recently discovered that the opening and closing themes feature the Kuricorder Quartet, who, as the Kuricorder Pops Orchestra, did the music for Azumanga Daioh.

Update: Astro has posted the opening.

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A few notes on the Anime Blog Awards before I drop the subject forever:

1. As I mentioned before, Rule #10 disqualifies me from participating:

10. You do not have to nominate blogs for all the categories. However, you are required to fill in at least 9 nominations in 9 different categories in order for your nomination to be accepted.

Let’s see: I don’t read manga; I don’t obsess over particular seiyuu; I’m not interested in fan art, doujinshi or visual novels; I don’t collect figurines; my main sources of anime news are not blogs; and, for humor, satire and comics, I’m too spoiled by David Burge, Randall Munroe and their peers to have much interest in their otakusphere counterparts. That leaves at most eight categories in which I might be able to make knowledgeable nominations. Owen, in a comment on my earlier post, says

I got clarification: it’s a guideline, not an absolute rule. It was made in order to scare off those who’d vote in like 1-2 categories for 1-2 people or something. Perhaps you have like 5, 6, 7 potential nominations? That’s fine.

That implies that there are two sets of rules, the official ones posted on the site, and the real rules, which are secret. If that’s the case, then I’m really not interested in being part of this.

2. The categories are rather arbitrary. I can think of several not included that I would rather have seen than some listed, and I expect that you can, too. The worst omission: there should have been a category for “best reviews.” The single most useful service an anime blogger can do is to identify what’s worth my time and explain why. Those who are good at it deserve recognition.

3. The list of blogs nominated so far suggests that the inhabitants of this region of the otakusphere are rather parochial. The awards are popularity contests and you’re inevitably going to see the same sites over and over, but I expected a broader range of nominees. Many of the sites I find most interesting were still missing from the lists last time I checked. Surely I’m not the only one who finds the infrequent updates at AniPages Daily worth the wait. There was exactly one nomination for a mee.nu blog. There is one site in particular I have in mind whose absence from four of the listed categories is inexplicable and renders the competition meaningless (not that that particular blogger gives a damn).

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Nick has posted a collection of short works by Makoto Shinkai on his site.

Grumbling and muttering

So now there are Anime Blog Awards. Too bad I can’t participate. According to the rules, “… you are required to fill in at least 9 nominations in 9 different categories in order for your nomination to be accepted.” Unfortunately, there aren’t nine categories of anime weblogs with which I am familiar enough to make nominations. Thanks a lot, guys. I notice also that there is no category that applies to The Kawaii Menace, no “most eccentric,” “most frivolous” or “most desultory.”

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One more peculiar search term: “maoist anime.” I can’t think of any series offhand that reflects that point of view, and I’m not particularly interested in finding one. However, if you’d like a maoist interpretation of an anime, here’s a review of Serial Experiments Lain:

A further serious flaw in “Lain:” it makes no references to reality outside of imperialist-countries. The decadence of imperialist society is not just a matter of internal ennui, violence, and f******-up gender relations: it’s also predicated on the imperialists’ oppression and exploitation of the colonies and neo-colonies. “Lain” assumes all of humynity can connect to “the wired.” In our world, less than 10% of the world’s population has internet access (619 million of 6.23 billion).(1) For that matter, countries like Afghanistan, Burma, and Liberia have less than one telephone line per 100 population, and only 28% of India’s population has access to improved sanitary facilities.(2)

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Garfield minus Garfield. (Via Eve Tushnet.)

Definitely kowai

Every time I check the search phrases that lead surfers here, I learn once again that there are some really strange people in the world. Most frightening recent query: “‘president aria’ image gallery hentai.” Then there’s “keroro gunso doujinshi yaoi download.” Yaoi is distasteful enough when it involves humans. Let’s leave the frogs alone, okay?

Other search phrases from the past few weeks worth noting:

shounen comedy martial arts romance action fantasy ecchi harem schoolkids anime — Could you be more specific, please?
bleah — I agree
how to be haruhi
crunchy vs smooth peanut butter personality variables
nekomimi quartet
autistic catgirl
jack the ripper was autistic
sailor moon as a religion — it beats Scientology
transforming boys into girls — there’s a bit too much of that going on
creamed colored precalculus textbooks
are you kawaii or kowai?
kowai clothing
paranoia agent sounds like strawberry fields forever — not really, though “Maromi’s Theme” is a good lullaby for psychotics
rube goldberg clothes in basket
cyberpet adoptions japan wolves

And more variations on the usual theme:

kawaii crimson
kawaii closed roads
kawaii in chicago
kawaii badger
kawaii weather in june
kawaii horror

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Another item for the “ducks in anime” file:

tenduck01.jpg

Ten’s spaceship in episode 2a of Urusei Yatsura.

Wish list

Things I’d like to see:

Dirty Pair TV: This should have been licensed ten or twenty years ago along with the OVAs and the movies, but there isn’t even a fansub currently available for most episodes.

Yasutaka Tsutsui: Salmonella Men on Planet Porno demonstrates that he is at the very least a capable satirist, but almost none of his books have been translated into English. The recent films Paprika and Toki wo Kakeru Shoujo were based on novels by Tsutsui. In the former case, the orginal was probably better.

Divergence Eve and Misaki Chronicles: I’d like to see a remake, with the same script and cast, but without the pointless fanservice, and with better computer graphics. It’s a pity that one of the best science fiction stories in anime looks like porn.

Petitnone: This was a short CD included as a bonus with the third disc of the Japanese edition of Haibane Renmei. If one were to add some of remaining uncollected background music, such as the solo harpsichord in the third and fourth episodes, the resulting disc would be worth releasing in its own right.

Binchou-tan: One of the very few series that deserve good English dubs. This is an excellent show for small children, but most haven’t learned to read subtitles yet.

Kino no Tabi, vol. two and beyond: Evidentally there’s a licensing snafu and the rest of the books may not be released here after all (see Astro’s note on the previous post). This is criminal.

Ribon no Kishi: Besides its historical importance as the first shoujo anime and, if I remember correctly, the first anime series produced in color, the first episode is also quite lively, looks good and promises an interesting story. Yet the first episode is is all I’ve ever found.

Bandai Visual: Hurry up and go bankrupt, please, before you license anything else I want to see.

Vocaloid: Please port this to Macintosh so I can annoy people with Hatsune Miku.

Alfred J. Kwak: The first four episodes were subbed last year, but there haven’t been any more for several months now. This looks like another good show for kid and adults.

The KuriCorder Quartet: Masaki Kurihara composed and performed the music for Azumanga Daioh with his KuriCorder Pops Orchestra. He has released many other recordings in Japan, none of which are available in the west. The music he wrote for Yotsuba&! is as good as that for AD, and I’d like to hear more.

Mojos: I’m not really into plushies, but I wouldn’t mind a couple of Isako’s helpers to sit on top of the monitor. While we’re at it, let’s have a Guchuko plushie for Steven. (Densuke and Oyaji plushies are available in Japan but not here.)