Bahaha?

So, Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei episode 4! Some authors find it easier to write (melo)drama than it is to write comedy, but similarly, I find it difficult to write about comedy. Perhaps I lack the necessary vocabulary to articulate a humourous situation.

Humour can elicit uproarious approval, a chuckle, a smirk, a facepalm, or nothing at all. I just can't tell you why. Even describing the gag is usually inadequate, as to port comedy from one medium to another usually involves nothing less than a complete reinvention of the wheel. The extent of my description may as well be approximated along the lines of,

It was funny. Go watch it and see what I mean.

And so it is with Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei. It's fairly grim humour, but it works. So go watch it.

The rest of this post is a collection of a few points that I found interesting.


If you check out the WTF section of your favourite news site or sites, you may have come across a story about cardboard being mixed into meat buns in China. While a hoax, it came at a time when China's problems with quality control for agricultural exports gained mainstream attention in North America. It's probably going to be one of those simmering problems for years to come.


Surprisingly not random or flippant flavour text. Nothing like a healthy dose of pessimism to put overachievers in their place. Likely to find better application with something like the economy though. Economy expands too fast, raise interest rates. Economy goes into a recession, lower interest rates.


It's coming down to at least one Gurren-Lagann gag per episode, but this one was strangely appropriate to the scene.

Continue Entry......

Byousoku 5 cm: Giving up, but unable to let go

Physical distance. Emotional distance. Temporal distance. Too enthusiastic with the rush of scene cuts towards the end. I think that about covers the more apparent things. If you have yet to see it, read no further. For everyone else, read on.

* * *

Most people consider Byousoku 5 cm to be bittersweet. I found it much more bitter than sweet. Tragic, even. Part way into the first installment, Oukashou, I kept wondering about what kind of possibilities awaited Takaki had he not been naive, or was not punished for being naive. But then, this came along:


Did she forget? Or, like Kanae, did Akari come to the realization that there was no point? Takaki felt that something had changed between them following their kiss. Perhaps Akari felt something too: a sense of finality. She did not look nearly as anguished as Takaki at the train station.

At the end of the final installment, however, Takaki and Akari take turns telling the same narrative, and she got to say that they had promised each other with so much certainty at that train station so long ago. It punches a big hole through my hypothesis.

Still, I can't help but feel that Akari came out the better of the two at the conclusion of this movie. I found the following shot to be particularly painful.


Akari's wedding may be scheduled within the next six months, but there's no way Takaki is receiving an invitation. For one, there's no way she would know his mailing address. For another, most would have second thoughts inviting someone like Takaki after seeing his present condition. He's in a pretty bad way, drinking and smoking, possibly freelancing from home or even unemployed. His place is a mess and he lives about the same.

Sadness piles up just by living. So does the trash.

And that's what is probably eating me the most about Takaki: his inability to pitch the emotional baggage. I only look upon Akari with a bit of hostility because Takaki is so much worse off, and it has come about as a result of his own machinations. As evidenced in the second part, Cosmonaut, Takaki has given up yet can't let go. I'm loathe to speculate as to who stopped sending messages first, but I can't imagine Akari being so insincere and just severing ties. Regardless, Takaki continues sit in limbo right to the end of the movie.


Perhaps it's why he seems to identify with the space probe, superimposing its noble cause onto himself. Like a program (a not very robust one at that), he will pursue a path that will ultimately see him stagnate and loop endlessly. This opens up the whole, man vs machine can of worms. The result, though, is that Takaki does become a shell of his former self, something that he acknowledges before noting that he resigned from his employer.

I do take issue with the whole, "I can't tell you how I feel because what's the point" mode of thinking, especially after having come off the "No regrets!" charge that was Hitohira and Planetes. We can now count Kanae, Takaki, and probably Mizuno(?) among its victims. It happens all the time, in art and real life. It doesn't make it any less depressing to watch.

There's a ray of hope at the end. Were Takaki a real person, I'd wish him the best. Oh, who am I kidding. I wish him the best, anyway.

Continue Entry......

Blurring fantasy

This has been a trend in progress for a while, and I wonder how everyone feels about it. I speak of what appears to be a movement towards an increased sort of hyper-realism. Maybe we should just call it Shinkai-ism, since he has been this towering figure as of late.

Come to think of it, Voices of a Distant Star was what got the ball rolling for me, followed by The Place Promised in our Early Days. I saw a reference to Chiaroscuro in a comment, but I can't remember where (doh!). And lest we forget already, trains and train stations have never looked so good.


But the emphasis isn't purely on visuals in Byousoku 5 cm. The sound effects, when present, may well have been enhanced audio recordings of the real thing, from the Doppler effect as a train moves away from a crossing signal, to the distinct tone of a cell phone on vibrate.

Toki wo Kakeru Shoujo makes use of filtered photographs, as does at least the ending to Manabi Straight. Less extreme might be Kyoto Animation, but do we not laud the studio for its attention to detail precisely it looks so realistic? Is the concept of quality in anime, in the current vernacular, linked to how closely animated entities resemble their real world counterparts?


Anyone with more viewing experience should feel free to contradict me, but my impression is that this obsession with realism is beginning to pick up steam, whether it be filtering a photo or meticulously drawing scale models of the here and now. Dennou Coil is also insanely detailed, and even Sky Girls is getting more detail than the premise deserves.

You may feel that it cheapens the viewing experience, i.e. "If I wanted a dose of reality I'd just leave my basement house", but the plausibility and consistency that these constructs lend generate a lot of goodwill from viewers with less sophisticated tastes in art (i.e. me).

Continue Entry......

An infectious jam session

I only recently got on to the LP bandwagon. Well, only really Your Song, again via U.Blog, which from my limited Love Psychedelico sample size, remains my favourite track. Still, there are any number of solid, laid back jam session tracks. It has all the common traits: catchy guitar riff, plenty of texture in the riff, snug backing vocals in the chorus, strong rhythm everywhere. So why Your Song in particular?

The vocalist is bilingual and really sounds like she has an english inflection in her japanese singing. While intriguing, it's only a point for novelty. The real answer, is this:



There's just something deal sealing about an awesome live performance. I've been sold on Hikki's Distance/Automatic work when she went Unplugged. Ditto FictionJunction YUUKA when they performed in a studio session. Basically the artists that have received the most play on Winamp are solid live performers.

This Budokan 2005 performance of Your Song features a sharper guitar, an extended solo section to close off the song, and the obvious enthusiasm of the audience. The vocalist sounds strained and nasal, especially after the first verse, but the song isn't really about her. It's a jam session, after all. Nor does her singing take anything away from the fact that the band is having a blast.

This isn't a song about perfection. It's about performance. And what a monstrous performance at that.

Continue Entry......

New Evangelion Footage with Beautiful World

Via U.Blog. I'm still trying to sort out how the music fits with Evangelion as a whole. I'm learning toward the side that says that it doesn't really. Both are epic, but Beautiful World's ethereal atmosphere is at odds with the grim war being fought on the ground.

Combat is shaping up to be pretty intense.

Continue Entry......

Utada Hikaru - Kiss & Cry

Lyrics translation and DDL, if it's still up.

I don't suppose the PV was included in that promo package sent out, because it has leaked as well. See jpopsuki. The PV itself is pure footage from the Freedom OVA, which is partly an advertisement for Nissin. The only modification to the animated scenes were split mirroring and applying component R/G/B filters. It appears that quite a bit of effort was put into synchronizing the mouth flaps with the lyrics.

As for the song, it's a throwback to Hikki's Automatic and Distance days. The opening, with its brass fanfare, muted and old (as in analog old), is reminiscent of the bold days of experimental remixing. It didn't quite matter if the spliced in material was at odds with the main body of music, it was the point. Ditto the bridge, which contains the chorus material from Hotel Lobby.

Kiss & Cry sounds early 90's. It just has that classy, glamorous and bold feel of rappers and R&B singers living it up and "featuring" on each other's work. The brass fanfare and interjections help, as does the shiny synthesizers and strong, if minimal, rhythm support.

Looking at both A-sides, Kiss & Cry tops Beautiful World as the better written and produced track. Hikki is very much in her element with the former; she even sounds stronger. Kiss & Cry also benefits from being much less ethereal. It's brash, it's in your face, it's got attitude.

Still, this being almost a period work, I'm not too big a fan of Kiss & Cry just like I tend to prefer ULTRA BLUE/Deep River Hikki to Distance/Automatic Hikki. I'm enamored by the fact that it's well written, but that doesn't necessarily endear me to it. I still have my electronica leanings.

For me, the single is shaping up to be a bit inconsistent, but at least it'll have something for the experimental/electronica fan, the R&B/Hip-hop fan, and the Evangelion fan.

I can't really comment on Fly me to the moon. It's been done to death, and Hikki's R&B cover of it is a radical departure from the original as well as the Evangelion version. The ballad style introduction is fine, if standard, and the jump to the R&B part is somewhat sudden.

Continue Entry......

Why take pride in anime?

When you can take pride in Popeye?



How timely. Via BoingBoing.

For the record, I am fairly indifferent when it comes to pride. I am of the view that enjoying anime is something that is a part of me, and I feel no particular pride or shame in what is basically a fact. It's a weak, fence sitting position to take, sure to draw fire from those who fear being looked down upon, and those who think fans are clearly not hardcore enough.

Does it make sense to take pride in other people's work? Or the talents of others? To take pride in something that is not you or not created/accomplished through some contribution by you, is not unlike propping yourself up. And so it is that while the anime studios and their staff may take pride in anime, I merely like watching it and respecting their work.

Another related notion that I do not subscribe to, although maybe I should if only slightly, is pride in country. Why should I be proud of my nationality? I am certainly not ashamed of it, but I refuse to exist vicariously through the great deeds of others. On the flip side, I do not wish to be viewed as someone greater or lesser for being from some country. Nationalism's flip side is racism.

Pride is also exclusive. If you take pride in some sports team, can you objectively watch a match in which they come out the loser? Can you honestly watch such a match for what it is, a display of talent and organization, as opposed to some affront or vindication of your very existence? It's just not healthy. Sometimes, it leads to riots. Combine nationalism with soccer sports, and…

But by extension, I have a dislike for this Anime-ism; the implication that others may or do look down upon you, and for the backlash that in response, one must be a fan unto hooliganism [I know, the entry was in jest]. It engenders dishonest notions that one form of art and entertainment is superior to all others. It makes people want to keep anime to themselves, where it can remain in the hands of those with superior intellect and moral fibre.

This is not the first time that this closeting effect has come up to haunt the anime fan. Perhaps it's a common symptom with movements that have not (yet) gained mainstream acceptance, a collective self-consciousness among its many constituents.

The world doesn't need more silently oppressed people any more than it needs hooligans and soccer riots. Anime is not such a big deal that you have to keep all to yourself, nor should it be rubbed into the faces of everyone you come across. Be passionate, be dignified.

Continue Entry......