Global Shinkai Day: revisiting Hoshi no Koe

by dm00

I haven’t watched Hoshi no koe in years — probably not since it first came out, or perhaps after the DVD release. So I took a look at the Crunchyroll offering (making sure to log in, so they’d know that paying members like this sort of thing, and encouraging them to do more of it).

Before, I was so taken by the story that I never even noticed how off his character designs were throughout — not even on model all the time.  They bear a family resemblance to the characteristic designs that are handled more competently in his later films, but here they look primitive, and no match for their setting.

Still, that Shinkai sure knows his hot sky porn.

Not like in the later films, of course, but still hints of what would come.

Kokone delivers a message to Alpha

by dm00

Kokone, a messenger android, delivers a message to Alpha in Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou

Photoslop and bad puns

by dm00

There's no Yotsuba! anime, but you could vote for Yotsuboryzae in last year's AGP.

Omo has already blogged about this, and Schneider has given a personal view of the first round.

It’s a lot of fun, with people finding ways to promote their favorite characters and anime — sometimes with text, sometimes with images, sometimes with faked newspapers, and sometimes with the surreal.

Once, with a series of recipes.

Last year, the AGP was taken a bit by surprise when a mob of cosplaying microbes suddenly appeared.

You couldn't vote for Akari (she'd lost in an earlier round), but you could vote for Akoryzae.

The whole thing was inspired by the already-almost-oryzae Aria super-deformed style.

Anime wins Oscar

by dm00

“Anime”, that’s Japanese animation, yes?

Kunio Kato’s (Fantasy Story, The Apple Incident, The Diary of Tortov Roddle) film La Maison en Petits Cubes won the Oscar for best animated short film this evening.

It’s a sweet little film about an old man remembering his life — as he swims down through the flooded layers of his house, at first chasing a dropped, favorite pipe, but then chasing the memories conjured by the abandoned rooms.

It’s not a surprising story, but it is well done, and manages to touch the viewer’s heart.

Like Kato’s earlier films, this one shares the appearance of being done on ancient paper (and shares his storybook imagery).  Unlike Kato’s earlier films, which take the form of separate chapters, often complete with turning pages or title-cards, this film is a single story around a single incident — though, of course, each room, deeper in the water, and deeper in the past, contains its own episode.

If you’ve liked Kato’s earlier films, you should definitely seek this one out.  Even if you didn’t care much for the slow pace and general artiness of the earlier films, you might enjoy this film.  I think Kato has improved his pacing.  For this viewer, it also helps that the film is a bit less surreal and more human.

Two Years Down, X More To Go

By TheBigN

So Drastic My Anime Blog has its second anniversary as of today. With it comes three authors. 189 published posts including this one. 1600+ comments. 5000+ pieces of spam apparently blocked. 310,000+ hits. And so on. And while I guess quantifying the stuff that’s been here is all well and good, I can’t really quantify the many thanks I have for everyone that has had something to do with this blog directly and indirectly, be it reading, commenting, linking (or being linked), criticizing, praising, dropping by randomly, leeching (though not necessarily this last one), and so on. Nor can I fathom how things are still going on  here fairly regularly (give or take a week) with how much harder things have gotten for me in med school (and they’ll get even tougher still), how a lack of motivation has always threatened to fatigue me even though I don’t do much here, and how I still wonder where this blog is in terms of the anime blogging community.

But DMAB has managed to get through two years of stuff, and it’s been a fun ride.  I don’t see why it can’t continue on forward as it has. I won’t say expect great things from this little blog here in the future, but I feel like I can say that it will keep moving forward at its own pace. Thank you for stopping by. :3

Thanking you from the apex of her heart.

Looks Like There’s A Finish Line For The Yotsuba&! Watch After All.

By TheBigN

Remember the hubbub in wondering about the status of Yotsuba&! 6 a couple of months back? Now, I wouldn’t say that people listened to us bloggers directly, but I think that people listened to the Yotsuba&! fan collective as a whole, because someone apparently decided to pick up the slack where ADV left off. As I already didn’t have enough reason to love Yen Press.

Hell, I feel like singing myself now.

Listen To Their Podcast!

By TheBigN

So, I was part of a podcast by Super Famicom recently, where 5 to 6 of us talked about a veritable potpurri of items, and it’s fun times.  It was the first time I was involved with a podcast, and it was a fun experience. I found that my built-in microphone on my laptop is apparently pretty powerful (enough that others can hear background noise from my family outside of my room for better or worse), that my voice is lower than I thought it would be, and that by laughing more than pretty much everyone else on the podcast (combined?), I’m basically confirming that the emoticons I type everywhere apparently reflect my actual personality, which isn’t good.

So anyway, go listen to Cuchlann‘s awesome insults, SDS‘s prodigious propensity for puns, Pontifus’ bringing us down to earth every once in a while, Lelangir‘s interesting interjections for the brief time he was on there, TheKittymeister holding down the fort and providing the laughing when I wasn’t doing it, and me not knowing what the hell I’m talking about. Check out welcome datacomp if you have the time.  And when you know what I’m talking about, please vote on what Cuchlann should watch next.  Fun times for all! \o\

Enjoy the show.

Does “Show Moé” Work?

By TheBigN

Let’s start from illicit behavior and work from there, as I’m sure this topic has been done to death before. Throughout my time on forums, blogs and Twitters, something I keep noticing people say has only just started to perk up my ears. It usually comes in the form of “there shouldn’t be porn of X show” out there, and how Rule 34 always proves them wrong in that aspect. In the case of ARIA (as with other shows, I’m sure, but this is the one I know), this comment is prevalent as well, but now this prude reaction has seemingly been extended into the realm of subtext that is or isn’t there. Now I agree when people say that there’s no hint of yuri in the show (even though I don a pair of yuri goggles every now and then to “make believe” there is), and I can agree that wondering about it is a waste of time (albeit a fun waste), but it gets interesting when I hear people criticizing both the thought of subtext that might or might not exist in addition to the people themselves who have those (apparently wrong and scandalous) thoughts.

It takes a rare show to have both types.