Artist Profile Zelda Wang (Zelda994612)

Previous Artist: Dan Goodsell (Mr. Toast) 

Today's artist is Zelda wang, who has her own portfolio...

Along with a deviantart if you prefer that

Today I’m talking about an artist I found while attending Anime Expo this year, Zelda Wang, who caught my attention by having a booth exhibiting manga-fied versions of the Greek gods. Having just finished an art history course, and doing my major project on Greece, my first thought was AWESOME!

After getting back from the convention and collapsing, I did some research on this mysterious artist. Here’s a little timeline on her work…

Of course, the first thing that caught my mind was her work illustrating Greek myths. After a little bit more research, I discovered she’s done some short comics on Greek myths. Here’s the cover to one of her books “My Seasons” about how Hades met Persephone (well, her version of it)

While it should be noted that this cannot be an accurate representation of how the Greek gods looked, because they were all 100% manly men with no girly traits whatsoever, except for the women. I am willing to forgive this because Zelda does not give us the candy coated versions of Greek myths where Hades is bad and Zeus is good, but the more diverse pantheon of characters that act very human.

Outside of the Myth story, Zelda has also written a comic known as “Rain of Flowers,” which appears to be a fantasy tale involving wizards.

Upon further research, I have learned that Zelda was the person who created the anime expo mascots back in 2006, back when it was in Anaheim

Overall, Zelda has a nicely rounded portfolio, and manges to do a lot of nice stuff. Not to mention, people versed in Greek mythology are usually cooler than people who aren’t. I am partially tempted to ask her to do a commission of Orpheus and Eurydice, but alas, I’m quite broke right now. I may wind up reviewing some of her individual works later, because those happen to be long enough to warrant their own reviews.

Next artist: dunno. Got some contacts at Expo

Please Comment and Subscribe!

Related Posts:
Fox Announces it's new teen drama: Olympus
What if Star Trek was written in Ancient Greece?
Artist Profile: Andrew Dickman
Artist Profile: Tsuranga

The Wallflower: Yamatonadeshiko Shichihenge (manga) volume 1

 <- Hey guys, it's time to play trap or no trap! Whoever correctly guesses whether this is a guy or girl in the comments section gets a FREE e-high five

I managed to get this one in while I was helping run the manga library at this year’s anime expo. This one is the story about four guys who have been given the task of helping their landlady’s daughter become a socially acceptable person,  in exchange for free rent in an awesome house. Sounds awesome, right? Well, it seems like a great idea until they actually meet the landlord’s daughter, Sunako, the girl they are supposed to help transform. Upon meeting her, they realize that she looks fresh out of a horror movie, and is not amused by their shenanigans. In the first book, we get to know some of the characters, particularly Sunako and Kyouhei, while learning just how daunting of a task this will be.

Right off the bat, the first thing I liked about this book was when we first got a look at the “ugly” girls face. Even I was reeling back and saying “augh.” This is the first time I’ve seen a character who everybody says is unattractive, and the book actually demonstrating it. Most books give the character horrible features like wearing dorky (read: MOE!) glasses. If you think that picture to the right is tolerable to the eyes, wait till you see her face >_< Yes, kiddies, this is not some 10 minute makeover these guys have to perform, they are actually performing a Herculean task for their free rent. Also, if you were thinking “Well, maybe she has a nice personality” well, YOU’RE WRONG THERE TOO! She’s rude, abrasive, and hates talking to people.  These guys are going on a journey to turn a jerk who does nothing but lock herself in her dark room and watch slasher movies while talking to model corpses into something socially acceptable.

Initially, I wasn’t exactly sure what to think of this book. I was honestly looking for something to fuel a rant about Japanese ideologies, but was presently surprised. Upon seeing these four guys embark on their quest to make this girl socially acceptable, it actually felt like they were contributing to society. Although I do question why anybody would have their niece board with 4 guys she hardly knows,, the premise winds up being kind of… cute, in it’s own way. I also think this book is quite solid for a first volume, for while we are shown an introduction to the characters, they manage to do things that are interesting, rather than feeling like an introduction.

I’ll probably be checking out later volumes of the series if I can find them at my library or if I wind up manning another manga lounge.

Please comment and subscribe!

Related Posts:
Revolutionary Girl Utena Volume 1
Being in a harem anime sucks (When you aren't the lead)
Why does my girlfriend want me to be a bishounen?
Being the male lead in a slapstick comedy is painful

Vampire Knight (manga) volume 8 review

Well, it’s been a long time since I’ve read Vampire Knight. Fortunately at this years anime expo, I got to run the manga library during the slower hours and got to do some catching up on the series since I last left off on volume 7. This volume is the book where the **** hits the fan, and everything gets revealed.

People who get grossed out very easily should probably not read the book. This one STARTS by Kaname revealing the big secret from Yuki’s past. First, we find out that Yuki is actually a pure blooded vampire who’s memories have been sealed away. The second secret being that he is in fact her brother, AND her fiancé. He snidely comments afterwards that while this is something that beasts do, vampires are in fact, not human. This, while a bit disgusting amuses me, because it draws a line demonstrating that vampires actual do have a society with vastly different and far more narcissistic standards than that of human society.

Oh yeah, that’s just chapter one. During all this, some Vampire hunters have noticed Zero’s recent boon in his ability to maintain his sanity, and a new villain has been taking to the field. One of the members of the Night class is currently being possessed by one of Kaname’s enemies that he killed who wants to take Kaname’s title as leader of the Kuran house.

This volume manages to get together everything I love about Vampire Knight. The plot twists, the drama, and vampires that actually act vampiric a lot of the time. It came out before Twilight, and doesn’t act like Twilight at all. Characters backstab each other, manipulate each other, and play politics like the conniving bastards they are. The people who don’t care about this (Aido, Zero) have been brushed by the wayside in this volume, as the political power players take center stage. I certainly hope in the next volume the book maintains it’s absolute deliciousness, because this world needs more vampires with teeth.

Please Comment and Subscribe!

Coming Sometime! Other volumes

Related Posts:

Revolutionary girl Utena volume 1
Vampire Hunter D Volume 1

My Experience Volunteering at Anime Expo 2010

 <- This year I donned the yellow vest and helped run Anime expo. While cosplaying while volunteering was totally acceptable, I found wearing my Yasogami High Uniform quite distracting.

While I did spend a lot of time doing standard issue convention shenanigans at this year’s Anime Expo, I also spent some time volunteering in order to get a free pass. This is because I sort of had a financial crash, and not going to expo was simply not an option in my book. While I initially applied for a staff position, upon realizing that I was not going to get the position, I immediately applied to volunteer, in order to have a something to convince them to put me on staff in the future.

While I was contemplating this, I realized it would give me much more expertise on the ways of the anime convention, and make me get one step closer to my goal of becoming an Anime Expo sage. Furthermore, it would allow me to have a much deeper knowledge of the inner workings of the convention. Hence, on day 0 I set out on my journey to work at the convention.

I worked at quite a few postions, including registration, the manga lounge, bag stuffing, and guarding a choke point. I rate these postions as follows:

Manga lounge > Bag stuffing > Registration > Standing in line at a con > Choke points

Choke Points: This position was possibly the most banal thing I’ve ever done. I only did it for two hours and avoided it like the plague afterwards. The job consisted of sitting at a position in the convention center and preventing anybody from getting through, to ensure that the people at a real checkpoint had an easier time checking everybody’s badge. Unfortunately, I was guarding the top of a stairwell that leads to a shortcut to the movie theaters. People’s reactions to me not allowing them to go through ranged from moderately irritated to downright hostile. Furthermore, there was nothing to do besides sit there and prevent people from going through. This job REALLY sucked.

Registration: I spent a good 6 hours of my required 16 working with the people in registration. For two of them, I was working as backup in case somebody needed help. This is because the computers in registration had technical difficulties, and the system prevented non- staff (I.E. volunteers like me) from handling any form of money. This resulted in me only being able to tell people where stuff is, and not being able to do much. These people were not in a good mood, because they had to wait for their badge due to technical difficulties, and I was unfortunately not given the means to acquire the badge for them. I really should have gotten the phone number of the girl I was working with though, hehe

The other four hours I spent in registration were not that bad really. I was assigned to hand out goodie bags to people who got their badges on day 4. Unfortunately, only a select few suckers show up to a convention on day 4, so I didn’t do much. At least I was doing something, rather than sitting there hoping for something to do, and I got to see all the people who were attending that day.

Bag Stuffing: I wound up spending about 2 hours stuffing the registration bags I would wind up handing out on day 4. This job would seem incredibly boring, as all I was doing was picking up an item, putting it in a bag, and passing it to the next person, like an assembly line. However, I got to wave at AKB48 (yes, one of them waved back) while running it, because they wound up going past the staff-only area where we assembled bags. Also, I wound up working with a couple of attractive girls dressed as vocaloids, which was nice. It’s always better to work with people than sitting by yourself, like at the chokepoints.  However, one guy I was working with was a little…. dense. He seemed to think my telling the vocaloids I’m working with about the when and where of the official rave was connected to work at all, and that I should quit it and get to base so I can do better stuff.

Manga Lounge: This was definitely my favorite place to work during the convention. One time I worked here for two hours, and just had to ensure that the books were in their proper locations. Although it never stopped, I was never bored.

The best part was when I was checking people out of the library in the morning. Since the library wasn’t very crowded at that time, I got to spend a good portion of that time reading. I managed to get through both “Vampire Knight” volume 8 and The “Wallflower” volume 1  in between signing people out. Also, I ran into a few of my friends while working the library, which was nice.

Staffers: Time to gossip about the rest of the staff! The rest of the staff was hardworking, hardcore, and definitely overworked. I got this vibe during the volunteer orientation when the person in charge of telling us what’s going on picked up a megaphone, said hi, and nearly collapsed right there. This was very discouraging, but it also told us that the staff was willing to work to that point, making them seem slightly crazier than the rest of the people at the convention. Upon chatting with them during the course of the convention, I’ve gathered that there were major staff cuts, which made running the show a bit more difficult, but the people who remained seemed entirely capable of stepping up to the challenge. Although the workload does intimidate me a bit, some part of me wants to find out if I’m capable of joining those fools crazy enough to try to run this convention. Hats off to them BTW, I know the people at my regular job probably couldn’t pull this type of thing off for the perks they got.

Other Volunteers: The volunteers were consistently less competent than the actual staff. I believe this is due to requirements for being a volunteer include willing to put on a vest for 16 hours and helping run the convention. This allows several slackers to get on board. However, a good amount of the volunteers were very good, and willing to get the job done to ensure that this convention was good for the people who showed up. Because without them, the con would collapse from all the minor tasks that need to be done.

Mostly, volunteering at Anime expo was pretty fun, considering I got inside information on the infrastructure of the convention, got to contribute to the actual convention, and got in free. Also, since I worked mostly morning shifts, I didn’t miss any important stuff, like the AMV contest and late night raves (Hey, sometimes you just have to cut sleep out of your schedule to get the most out of your convention.) Assuming I don’t get a staff position, I will most likely be volunteering at the convention again next year! Look for me in the green vest!

Please Comment and Subscribe!

Related Posts:
My Journey through Anime Expo 2010
Getting the most out of an anime convention
Convention Trances: Drawing on the Essence of an Anime convention
Anime Expo 2009

My journey through Anime Expo 2010

 <-Here's a picture from the Persona gathering of me with some guy dressed as Izanagi. Man, that gathering was awesome

Awww yeah, it’s that time of year again. Just got back from Anime Expo, which managed to be awesome despite the change in management (I won’t blame staff, they’re kinda cool) This year managed to trump the previous year, putting it on par with the convention in 2008, where I first met the love of my life, Persona 4. On another note, this was my first year actually working at the convention as a volunteer, which will warrant another post.

This year I decided to stay at the Clarion Hotel, which is about a mile away from the convention center. The rooms are nice and VERY cheap, to the point where you assume it is too good to be true. This is all fine and dandy until you drive to the Hotel, and look at the nice view of…. much better hotels. I could see the incredibly phallic Ritz Carlton that is still being worked on, along with other gigantic super hotels. Furthermore, the walk there forced you to go through a rather…. suspect neighborhood. Would NOT walk through there at night. Now then, this conventions highlight reel…

Cosplayers: Holy crap, cosplay was nice this year. I attended the Persona, Super Smash Brothers, and Pokemon gatherings. My favorite cosplay gathering definitely goes to the Persona gathering where there where not one, not two, but FOUR girls dressed as Chie there. I could have sworn I died and went to heavean. Even better, unlike last year’s Persona gathering, the entire party from Persona 4, plus a few side characters showed up (no main villain though >_>)  Pokemon gathering was really fun, and one of my favorite cosplayers was at that gathering…. Wobbu Fett. As you can see in the picture, it’s a combination of Wobbuffet and Boba Fett. There were also a lot of people dressed up as Pokemon, using a lot of creative costumes, such as this Bellossom.

AMV Contest: This year beat the stuffing out of last year’s AMV contest. Although no AMV was better than some of the best in 2008’s contest, the average AMV was better than the average in 2008. This contest started out strong by showing a video about Hitler and his generals in their bunker, and Hitler explaining how his AMV is going to make the finals. Then the AMV staff tells him he lost the finals to a no-edit video, and he then proceeds to go on a rant, and explaining how he is going to raise hell on the forums. Unlike previous years, I felt comedy was the weakest category, rather than the strongest, mostly because the comedy videos consisted mostly of Internet memes. There were a couple of exceptions, one being “Common Accident” which featured characters from Evangelion, which I’m not linking to here. My other favorite in comedy was “An Alchemist named Sue,” featuring Full Metal Alchemist. My favorite action video was “Switchback,” which was played to clips from black cat. Strangely, drama was my favorite category this year, featuring the videos “Setsuna of Arabia” and Alchanum, which were both very solid. Strangely, although the AMTV Pro category is usually the weakest, I found most of the videos, particularly “This is Halloween” to be very exiting. It should be noted that the trailer to Space Pirate Captain Harlock, shown before the contest was simply amazing. Most of these videos can be found on Youtube, although the experience is not nearly as exiting as seeing them in the Nokia theater.

Programming:  I didn’t go to that many panels this year. I went to the Legend of Zelda panel out of curiosity, and saw some information on the new Zelda game coming soon. It is apparently going to have an incredibly precise sword system that will demand that you REALLY make an idiot out of yourself in front of the TV. Furthermore, you’re going to have to actually do a longbow like stance in order to fire the bow. Looks REALLY fun, and looks like it would make you look REALLY stupid. A more surprising panel was the Chibi Masquerade, where I saw two rather interesting things. One was a lady wearing a well-made Vivi (Final Fantasy 9) playing Suteki De Na (Final Fantasy 10) on a violin. On another note, a guy I happen to know proposed to his girlfriend during the chibi masquerade. Thankfully, she said yes. Finally, I went to the AX forum meet and greet, where I failed to answer a question correctly, and was forced to sing the Pokemon theme  in front of the crowd there. I felt heroic. I was a little miffed that I didn’t know the answer to the questions, because the questions other people were asked were from anime I love, and I could answer instantly. I’m sure some guy thought that about my question though, hehe.

Exhibition Hall: This year’s Exhibition hall wasn’t very exiting. Freebies were scarce, I didn’t see many raffles, and it seemed emptier than last year. It should be noted that the most awesome booth in the universe belonged to LITTLE ****ING KURIBOH himself, who was selling T-shirts and meeting fans of Yu Gi Oh abridged. Thankfully, I was able to get a picture with him. I wound up buying a couple T-shirts, but I spent more time in the Artists alley next door. There the convention’s finest artists vied for people’s attention in order to make a living. There were some strong performances, and I will be featuring some of the artists I saw there in later posts.

The Dance: Well, I got to go to the rave for a couple of nights. This year’s rave was at Club Nokia, which was roomier and much closer to the convention than the Westin, where last year’s raves were held. The first night I refered to as “The Bro Rave” where I went with my friends in cosplay (Me as the Persona 4 guy, my friend as some guy from Blaze Blue, and the other guy as Barry from Resident Evil) This rave was really exiting, and I got to dance with quite a few people. The second night of the rave I went with some friends out of cosplay. Although I danced a lot, the most memorable part for me was when I asked a girl dressed as a Vocaloid to dance with me, and I got stopped by some guy she was with who looked like he was going to punch my face in. I found it amusing.

Overall: This year’s convention was really fun, and gives off a bit of hope for Anime Expo’s future, despite the change in staff. My favorite parts were the AMV contest and the Persona gathering, by far. Of course, I’m saving my opinions on staff for a later post on my experience working at the convention, which will be posted later. I will definitely be going to the convention next year, and will hopefully be playing a bigger role in its success, whether it be as a volunteer, staff, or managing an artist alley booth for my local anime club.

<-Anime Expo 2009

Related Posts:
My Experience Volunteering at Anime Expo 2010
Comic Con 2009
Getting the most out of an Anime Convention
Convention Trances: Channeling the essense of an anime convention

Wolverine: Prodigal Son (manga) review

Like X-Men Misfits, this series got canned, so this is the only book in the series. Kinda sad, since I liked the book.

You know, after watching that absolutely horrid movie in 2009, you’d think that I’d be permanently turned off from Wolverine. Alas, I decided to pick this book up from ye not so local library, and was actually quite surprised by it. An important thing to remember is that like the introduction says, you really shouldn’t hang on too much too you’re previous knowledge of the character.

This story starts with a rebellious teenager in a martial arts school somewhere in Canada. We see him beating the crap out of pretty much all of the other students, with the exception of one who breaks his leg. He manages to pin her just like all the rest of the students, just  with more trouble. We find out that the girl is known as Tamara, the headmaster’s daughter, and the guy with the long black hair is Logan, which as we all know is Wolverine’s real name.

After a bit of angst about how Logan’s a freak because he healed that broken leg up in a few minutes, then a major trial that Logan and Tamera have to face, and Logan and the sensei wind up in New York City. This leads to Wolverine realizing that the world is much bigger than he thought it was. Finally, some ninjas break things up leading to Wolverine hunting them down.

The first thing that struck me was “WHY is there a hardcore Japanese martial arts school in the middle of Canada?” something just felt a little shoehorned to make it feel more “manga.” Another thing, if Wolverine has lived his whole life at a martial arts school, how come he knows how to hotwire a car and is a great driver? Little things like this frustrate me a bit, but they don’t necessarily ruin the book.

Overall, this is an interesting alternate take on Wolverine, without worrying about about a million years of continuity. Along with that, the author’s wouldn’t have had to worry about stepping on anybody’s toes if they continued the plot, meaning Wolverine’s actions could have larger consequences than they do in the Marvel universe. They haven’t even made any references suggesting that the X-Men would be involved in this book.

While the plot takes very few risks, I did not find myself wanting to put the book down, which is a solid sign. The art style is a bit rougher than X-Men Misfits, although Wolverine looks a little too bishounen for my tastes, since Wolverine is the paragon of manliness in the Marvel Universe. However, this is an origin issue, so it is quite possible that they could have planned to turn him into a much gruffer, beefier Wolvie we know and love. Alas, without the universe binding the authors, they could go any direction they would like, creating this thing called SUSPENSE, which every project involving Wolverine lacks.

Since this series did not get continued, I would only suggest the book if it was on sale, or checking it out for the novelty of it. Definitely better than that atrocious movie that came out in 2009 though, so I will give it that.

Please Comment and Subscribe!

Related Posts:
X-Men Misfits Review
Artist Profile: Andrew Dickman
Artist Profile: HakuBaikou

X-Men Misfits (manga) review

Please note that although this book says volume 1 on the cover, it got canned due to sales not being high enough. It actually sold a lot, but not enough to make the greedy moneygrubbers at Marvel happy.

This one I found at my local library. After about 10 pages in, I began to question whether this was a new take on the X-Men, or a really elaborate practical joke. If not for the production values, I would simply assume that Marvel had released this on April Fool’s day just for the sole sake of pissing off comic book guys everywhere.

Alas, upon checking up online, this is not so. So Del Rey went out and made a shoujo Harem using the X-Men cast, and stripped everybody of any signs of masculinity. My first reaction to some characters was just “Wow… what have they done to you man?” This double true for Magneto (shown right) who is a physics teacher who likes to go on about Human rights and hangs around with the juvenile delinquents known as the “Hellfire club”

Before I discuss plot, it should be noted my familiarity with X-Men mythos extends to having seen the first X-men movie (loved it btw.) and a couple of O.K. comics I read at the library. Anyhoo, this book is about high school student Kitty Pryde and her getting transferred to a new school because she doesn’t seem to fit in at her old one. This is because a few people seem to have noticed that she has this weird ability to phase through objects. (although her skills are unrefined) This has garnered her the attention of a recruiter for Professor Xavier’s academy for “gifted” youngsters. Anyway, being a mutant has forced Kitty Pryde to be transferred to one of those rich kid schools where everybody wears a fancy uniform. Oh yeah, and she’s the only female student in the school. This garners her the attention of a whole bunch of incredibly pretty male students, such as Pyro, Angel, and Alex. I was about to gouge my eyes out from all of the bishounen. Oh yeah, she doesn’t get any attention from the Icy-demeanored Bobby (Iceman,) but seems to get along well with all of the other students. Furthermore, the book seems to focus more on the day-today life of the high school students, such as Kitty Pryde’s relationships and fitting in, with a small thing about mutant rights during the last chapter.

Of course, the bishounen who irritated me the most was MAGNETO, the physics teacher. He generally looks too young to be the holocaust survivor he is in the comics, and just lacks that aura of badassery he seems to possess in almost any other representation.

This book does have its plus sides, aside from making me want to gouge my eyes out from all the bishounen. (Seriously, what about women like Ohno from Genshiken? She’d love it if they took the time to make Proffessor X and Magneto look like the masculine older men that they are) Due to generally throwing away all the old continuities, you never get that feeling of missing some details you get with the mainline X-Men, which lets you relax a bit. Furthermore, there is no sign of the rest of the Marvel universe, which makes me breathe a sigh of relief knowing that they can do what they want with the plot (if they went somewhere) The artwork has a lot of detail put in it, although I would greatly appreciate more character variation, and I would love it if some people managed to look a lot rougher. (This is a bit of an issue in Wolverine: Prodigal son, which I will be reviewing next, but they got character variation better there.) Unfortunately, there is no second volume to this plot, so all we have is an introduction to characters, which will never be fleshed out. Might be worth checking out if you’re into shoujo stuff, but since it wasn’t finished, I have an easier time recommending it to people if it continued, so it’s much easier to show to comic book guys to make them RAGE!

Please Comment and Subscribe!

Related posts:
Wolverine: Prodigal Son
Why does my girlfriend want me to be a bishounen?
Being in a harem anime sucks (When you aren't the main)
Artist Profile: AndrewDickman

Revolutionary Girl: Utena (manga) Volume 1

Well, I was at my not-so local library, where I found out they have a gratuitously large selection of manga. Although not all of it piqued my interest, I had heard of this one by reputation by a friend…

*flashback*

“Dude, you should totally check out Utena man. It’s got like deep references to Buddhism, philosophical implications, and LESBIANS”

*end flashback*

Based on the criteria above, I decided that this was totally worth checking out. After, I like deep plots (when they aren’t pretentious) and I haven’t read a girl’s love book yet, so why not, right?

Anyway, this story starts out with an introduction to our main character, Utena Tenjou, a self absorbed girl who will stomp through any person in her way. While she does irritate me as a whole, a lot of main characters do at the start. The first chapter is about Utena uncovering a conspiracy set up by her prince charming in order to get her to go to some weird school in another part of the country.

After all that, we find the whole thing was a prologue that has very little to do with the rest of the book, aside from establishing Utena’s motivations in a long winded manner. We then skip to her being at an entirely different school, which looks a lot like Cross Acadamy from Vampire Knight, minus the vampires. (I know this came out first) We are then shown some guy slapping some girl around. We later establish that the guy is known as Saionji, an egotistical jerk, and the girl is known as Himemiya, who is apparently a magnet for being slapped. Based on this volume alone, I would infer that her face has a special property that causes people’s hands to be attracted to it in a violent manner.

Utena ends up challenging Saionji to a duel, which leads to him drawing a live blade against Utena (wielding a wood sword.) Utena manages to win the duel for some reason, which seems to have repercussions later. But for now, due to some weird contracts, this leads to Utena being engaged to Himemiya. Himemiya seems to have no issue with this, making her seem kinda creepy…

Anyway, despite getting a slow start, I believe this book may or may not have potential. I was not greatly feeling this first volume, due to the slow start. However, I will probably get the second volume from the not so local library next time I am there, just to see where this winds up going.

Coming soon: volume 2!

Please comment and subscribe!

Mythology and its relation to Modern Anime Entertainment

 <-Did you know GAR and general manliness was invented in Greece

Kids, it’s time we discuss how little attention you pay during your history class, A great majority of the fantasy anime you watch is unsurprisingly unoriginal. Not unoriginal in that every anime takes elements from another anime, unoriginal in the sense that most things take elements that are about as old as dirt.

I’m not about to go about calling everybody unoriginal, today at least. Instead, I am going to discuss how knowledge of ancient mythological concepts will actually enhance your anime experience, making being an anime fan a much more enlightening. Your conversations with other fans will suddenly have more substance, as you will have a wide array of things to talk about and expand on your favorite series. This is fun for both the optimist and the pessimist, as the optimist can find deeper meanings in everything he does, while the pessimist can find further things to complain about.

This becomes apparent with some of the more mythology based series, such as Neon Genesis Evangellion. Knowledge of Christian mythos will help you realize that the concept presented as deep actually make no sense when applied to the mythos, and that cross shaped lasers are just dumb. Furthermore, while Shinji gets crucified in the end, casting him as a messiah figure just makes me facepalm. It would make more sense if Koworu was placed as a messiah figure, placing Koworu as the Christ figure, and Shinji as the Jewish leaders who killed him out of fear.

Now then, knowledge can be used for more than nitpicking. Granted, even doing the most basic research shows the mythological references in Fate/Stay Night (Great Demon Hercules…?) are wildly inaccurate, doing that research ensures that you can converse with others and tells you how little research your average writer does.

An underappreciated set of mythos belongs to the Greek pantheon, which basically ran a divine soap opera of betrayal, seduction, and just plain weirdness that inspires people to this very day. Alas, people insist on taking out the shades of gray and turning it into a bunch of black and white battles between good and evil, portraying Zeus as a good guy with Hades as a jerk, when both of them had about the same moral fiber (No, really, go read into them and get back to me.) The shades of gray nature is a section of mythology that largely goes unnoticed, despite Greek mythology being one of the most frequently used mythos in modern media. At the same time, it suffers the greatest amount of adaptation decay (Okay, I admit, I loved Disney’s Hercules, but nobody acted like they do in myth) At the very least, it allows you to perform intelligent sounding conversations comparing the mythos modern media bases things on, and how they interpret it.

The main reason I like to encourage researching mythologies of various cultures, is that it is just plain good fun. It’s like reading a comic book before comic books were invented. It’s not like the philosophers in ancient Greece, the Scandinavians, or the Celts had anything better to do besides survive and tell stories. I’ll admit, to really appreciate mythology you should probably look up a version with footnotes, but once you fully understand the concepts, it’s like doing research on a comic book universe. Anybody who enjoys watching high fantasy anime or manga would get a great deal of enjoyment out of researching the world’s mythologies that inspire fantasy anime and manga.

Please comment and Subscribe!

Why not do some research?

Vampire Hunter D Volume 1 (Manga)

For the record, this is my first exposure to Vampire Hunter D. I believe this to be the last of the comic books and manga that I picked up at ye local library.

This book starts off with an exposition explaining how society succumbed to a nuclear apocalypse, and later rebuilt itself, except run by vampires instead of humans. After thousands of years a select few humans got sick of vampires running everything, and organized themselves as hunters. So it’s a post apocalyptic world run by freaking vampires with lazer beams on their castles.

Anyway, on to our main character. Here we’re introduced to D, a rough and tough vampire hunter wearing a cowboy hat riding on a cyborg horse. Despite being the prettiest looking character in the book, he is also clearly the manliest. While riding on his robotic horse, he encounters another lead, (in this book at least) Doris Lane, a rancher who weilds a whip and isn’t afraid to use her looks to get stuff done. Doris is looking for a vampire hunter in order to slay a vampire that bit her recently. Hence, she hires D to slaughter the animal.

Plot is kind of generic, silent protagonist comes in to save some girl from the horrible monster, fights ensue, yada yada yada. What’s REALLY interesting about this book is the setting. Here we have vampires who manage to be total bastards, (why is that so rare?) freaking robots, and a wild west setting. Also, the fights are pretty entertaining, although they lack any sense of suspense. Designs look cool though, and a lot of the concepts introduced are pretty interesting.

The characters are sort of interesting. Nothing too memorable, but at least nobody does anything so stupid you want to facepalm. I like the combination of wild west with European knights and castles. The sci fi puts it directly into really awesome territory

Overall, This manga is really interesting, mainly due to the scenery being very unique and interesting to look at. Exposition starts out strong, no part really struck me as dull, and it ended in a nice spot. An overall very interesting book to read.

Blood + Volume 1 (manga)

 <-See that wicked ass sword? Only comes out like twice

To start, I haven’t watched the anime. All I did was pick this one up in the local library (occasionally has nice stuff.) This book didn’t really grab me very much. I really think it was all over the place.

We start out with this being the story about a girl who has amnesia living with her adoptive parents. She has problems with the fact that she does not remember anything of her life for the past year, and serves as a central point to her character for the first part.

This leads to the main character, Sayu to having a great deal of emotional stress, particularly when dealing with people who have a larger set of memories. Her adoptive family, however, still loves her nonetheless…

Anyways, more interestingly, some Vampire who looks like he’s about thirteen is looking for Sayu. Also, some mysterious guy who plays a cello appear to have known her from before she came down with amnesia.

Anyway, about halfway in we learn about the main plot. Sayu is apparently the only person capable of killing Chiropterans, weird blood sucking thingies. Interestingly, this is because they take damage from coming into contact with her blood for some reason.

Anyway, I think the book suffers severe pacing issues. Based on people who’ve read the other books in the series, the author apparently has a story to tell, but it really isn’t moving very fast. Also, I think it spends too much time on the mundane details of Sayu’s life. I’m not sure about you, but I’d rather see giant monsters get slain and ancient evil conspiracies than the day to day life of a person when they AREN’T slaying monsters. Alas, a good portion of the book is dedicated to Saya’s school/family life, which frankly, isn’t as interesting as the monster plot.

I dunno, first volume went too slowly and was kind of watered down, so I’m not going to actively hunt the second. I’ll review it if my library gets it though.

Please Comment and Subscribe!

The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzimiya (manga) volume 1

Contrary to popular belief, I do NOT worship every item the Haruhi has touched, thankyouverymuch

Well, I actually did NOT hit gold while scouring my local library for comic books and manga to review. As the college priest of the Eastern Orthodox church of Haruhi Suzimiya, I was utterly compelled to pick this up. Unfortunately, my expectations were not met.

Sadly, this wasn’t nearly interesting as the anime version of this series. Haruhi just isn’t nearly as interesting panel by panel. I dunno, it just lacks… energy. It doesn’t help that the anime uses a lot of bright colors, which doesn’t translate will into black and white. So, this is Haruhi with much less vibrance. Also, the characters are drawn a bit differently, while not always a problem, they actually look a bit bland. Haruhi’s enthusiasm isn’t something that translates well onto paper, so she just comes off as a sociopath. Ya know, Haruhi could very well be an antagonist if the franchise took a different direction…

Anyway, the plot… It’s kind of a jumbled mess, if you don’t know what’s going on from the anime. Kyon is a high schooler who has resigned himself to a boring life until he meets Haruhi, a wacko who wants to turn this boring ass school into something more interesting, with Aliens, time travelers and espers. Haruhi decides that Kyon gets to be her bitch and makes him do all her dirty work. They then conquer the literature club and assimilate its only member into a society known as… the SOS brigade.

Same plot as the anime, except that fiasco with Ryoko~chan happens before Mikuru joins the Brigade. I highly recommend you watch the anime instead, since the three dimensional medium allows the characters to be fleshed out more. You know, I’ve been a bit disappointed with this franchise lately. Maybe I should check out the novelizations, I heard those are pretty good.

Oh yeah, don’t buy this on Amazon, I heard there was a screw up and this got confused with the light novel. Customers were happier with the product they got though, so I guess they win?


Please comment and subscribe!

Why the economic environment in Japan ensures that manga remains Awesome

I like manga more than American comic books. This is in general, of course, for some comic books (particularly ones from non-mainstream companys) manage to break free of the convoluted mess that American comics love and just write a plot. However, an advantage of manga is that they are like samurai.

Alas, the comic market in Japan is very different than the American comic book market. In Japan, manga gets published in magazines before collected volumes get produced. This increases the competition to force people to work harder. Also it enforces the samurai philosophy of “remember that you will die.” Since all manga artists accept that their work is going to die at some point, they are able to make a series unhindered by trying to prevent their work from dying.

Alas, there are exceptions, such as Dragonball Z. These series manage to break the mold, and in doing so remove that inevitable death that the author’s work will receive. This is like the issue that American comics have: stagnation. This is where the author receives money based on writing a longer story rather than a better one. This causes problems like status quo. This usually means that characters will go on and on to an apparent “goal” that the author will drag out until sales drop. This is that oh so ugly point when sales are dictating the direction that a story goes. Like in American comics

Now then, a big issue is that a good portion of American comics suffer from this problem. I’m not talking something like Watchmen or V for Vendetta. Those wrap up everything in the context of their universes quite nicely. On the other hand, we have the DC and Marvel universes, which are still ongoing, and do crazy stuff like explain why Batman stories exist with him in both the 1950’s and in the modern world. This is because Batman artists realize that they are not going to die, and hence do not write as if they will. This continued existence spreads on over to Batman’s enemies, who also don’t need to fear dying. However, since they have no chance of dying, they instead live in an existence ruled by status quo and retcons. Ruins the suspense, because even if somebody does die, they’ll probably be back from the dead.

Because most American comics are not like the Samurai, they are destined to live lives of stagnation and complacency. A few brave souls, such as those at Image or DarkHorse, make their comics follow the samurai philosophy. Alas, our industry is ruled by businessmen that have lost their warrior spirit, and have removed that fight that ensures that comic books maintain a solid edge.

Yaoi Fangirls are evil

To start my triumphant return, I’m going to start by responding to a fan letter about a problem he’s been having

Dear BryAnime,

Hello, I was wondering if you could help me with a problem I’ve been having lately. My girlfriend hasn’t been paying attention to me lately, and all she wants to do is look at “boys love” doujinshi. It seemed harmless when she first starting reading it, since it was just a comic. Later though, she started asking me if I would consider kissing my best friend. I told her it was the most ridiculous idea I had ever heard, and she seemed to be legitimately disappointed by it. Later, I tried holding her hand and she wouldn’t let me. Later that night, when I proposed we have, ahem, intercourse, she denied me and instead told me all about what was going on in a manga she was reading. All she did was go on and on about semes, ukes, which of my favorite anime characters (male) look good together, and all kinds of horrible things. Then she showed me a scene from this book she was reading. I was shocked and appalled by how hardcore the material was.

Needless to say, I didn’t have intercourse that night, and instead got to hear about “boys love”…. Gross. In fact, whenever I hear her talking to her friends, she no longer mentions me as a person, and instead talks about how cute I would be with my best bud. To make matters worse, when I had my best bud over, she asked me to kiss HIM. It’s really making me uncomfortable. BryAnime, is there any hope of me getting my girlfriend back?

Sincerely,
A Neglected Boyfriend

Dear Neglected Boyfriend,
I’m sorry to say she’s probably a lost cause. Did you try talking to her about this? How bout’ suggesting she kiss one of her female friends? How about discussing Yuri with her?

If all else fails, you can rest assured knowing people like her will never breed.

Sincerely, BryAnime

Next Letter: My Boyfriend is a Furry

Related Posts:
Why won't my boyfriend stop looking at Hentai?
Why does my girlfriend want me to be a bishounen?
Why does my girlfriend enjoy crossdressing so much?
Why Weeaboos really grind my gears

Star Trek- The Manga Kakan Ni Shinkou review

Well, I’m still borrowing as many comics from the library as they have. Leading me to Star Trek the manga….

Wow, this must be the dorkiest thing I’ve ever laid hands on. C’mon, both Star Trek and Manga? Honestly though, when I think about it, it appears to be a GREAT idea, hypothetically. Manga is a medium known for high fantasy, Trek is high fantasy (IN SPACE) Both have fantastic creatures, characters, locations, really they should get together much better than they did…

Anyway, I accidentally started with the second volume, which didn’t make a difference, as this manga is every bit as episodic as the original series of Star Trek (which usually didn’t require that you watch any previous episodes) I actually didn’t like that aspect of Star Trek, as I thought it would do great as a serial….

…. And that problem is inflated here. I was hoping for a serial, and instead I see a bunch of disconnected chapters that have nothing to do with each other. Yep, this feels just like watching an episode of the original series. Everybody manages to stay in character, and I could picture most of them saying this stuff. The plots… I could totally see them happen in the original series. Which means they range in quality, have tons of cheese, and have all kinds of crazy instances. This is both good and bad, as it doesn’t get better than the original, and it doesn’t alienate the fans of the original. However, I would have preferred for a plot that was much more connected.

Art Style varied between chapters, as this was a collaborative project. I liked some of it but other parts were a little…. eh. I noticed the tradition of having tons of one-shot characters dieing continues. I wonder where the federation gets people for these missions, seeing as they die so often. Another gripe is that the individual stories seem far too short, and could have used a little more development. Although flawed, this manga is still readable, but comes off as a lighter version of the Trek universe.

Overview: Get it if you want a quick introduction to Trek, or need a quick Trek fix, but if you aren’t into Trek, you should probably pass.

5/10

Fruits Basket 21 review

Well, I’ve been really busy studying and playing NeverWinter Nights, so I haven’t been able to update this blogue. Fear not, for Winter Break is coming up, and I should not only have more Manga and Anime reviews, and I may even find the time and inspiration to write some Dungeons and Dragons stuff… YAY!

SPOILERS for Fruits Basket 1-20 YE HATH BEEN WARNED

Well, actually you should have read those if you we’re planning on buying this one. Not that I’d be able to stop you from buying it. Anyhow, Fruits basket is getting closer to it’s climax, as made obvious by such signs as the curse weakening, and Akito going bat-**** crazy about it. Its getting good, although I would like a good reason for the curse weakening

This one’s been pretty exiting, but really, it’s been picking up speed ever since Haru attacked Akito. Shigure’s proving himself to be evil to the core, Akito has been getting actual DEVELOPMENT, rather than being a malevolent force, Yuki, Kyo, and Tohru all grew spines, and Haru wants pizza. Rin has sadly been contributing NOTHING to the plot, which is a shame, because I liked her character. She seemed kind of relevant, but she’s in the background doing nothing. I guess that happens when you have a cast that’s only second in size to Negima. Well, that is if you spend as much time developing them as Fruits Basket does.

In this volume in particular, we get more development for Tohru and Akito. Also, we get a bit of backstory between Kyoko and Kyo, and Yuki has a discussion with Kyo about their relationship. No Yaoi though, obviously.

Well, I like Fruits Basket, and this is definitely not a good starting point, and really if you’ve come this far in a series, might as go all the way, right? I’ll have more to write about for the climax when it comes out, and if it keeps going like this, it should be quite good.

Overview: Good, but everybody who has come this far will read it no matter what, so who cares what I say?

XXXHolic Volume 1

Wow, I’m broke. Well, not really broke, cuz I can still pay the bills, and buying people Christmas presents shouldn’t be much of a problem. Actually, I just don’t have enough spare money to go blow on a ton of Manga. However, since I AM the guy who wrote “Dude, you’re paying too much for anime”, I really shouldn’t make a fuss about this. No, instead I used my massive resourcefulness to conjure up manga from nowhere. Nowhere, in this case meaning a library I normally don’t borrow from, and some stuff I have lying around I haven’t got to watching.

Bringing us to the title of this post, XXXHolic. I picked this up from ye local library, and am currently at the mercy of whoever is borrowing it if I want more. They only had the first volume, and if they actually carry the second, it is probably in the hands of some creepy CLAMP fangirl/boy. *shudders*

Which may force me to go borrow the next few volumes, because this looks like it could go somewhere. Maybe. As a first volume, not much happens, we start with a plot, introduce some characters, yada yada yada. Our lead appears to be spineless boy #3012, who has a crush on cute girl #7123. Spineless boy has the unique feature of being able to see spirits, who bother him greatly. He really wants to get rid of them , leading him to Yuko, the hawt hermit/witch. She claims to be capable of removing his little curse, but it will cost him… HIS SOUL! MWAHAHAHAHA!

After selling his soul to our hawt creepy witch, he gets to endure the strenuous torture of working for her as an assistant. Now he is forced to help her in her shop where she grants people favors in exchange for things that they find valuable. This could lead somewhere interesting, as we have one interesting cast member, and the potential for a great deal of interesting stuff to happen. Alas, my library only had volume 1, so I can’t tell you any farther. Tune in tomorrow for my views on Fruits Basket 21!

Opinion: Might go somewhere, might not.

Related stuff:
X (another project by CLAMP)