While I was initially impressed with its characterizations and how well this show handled its ridiculous fanboy affirmation premise, after the unmitigated disaster that was episode 5, I had thrown in the towel. However, a couple of weeks later, I did watch the next episode and it was substantially better, much more in keeping with the tone of the earlier episodes. In it, our hero, who follows sports manga but not actual sports decided that the best way to defuse the growing racial and ethnic tensions between the elves and the dwarves in his class was to have them have a soccer tournament against each other...It goes about as well as one would expect.
After that, the show continued its uneven shuffle towards the end, never quite gelling but every episode had at least some intriguing or at least amusing tangents.
For a show that is supposed to revolve around evangelizing fandom, it can be pretty straightforward in its exploration of that cultures pathologies and dysfunctions.
This, of course, is the gambit of a faction in the Japanese government.. Introduce Akiba culture to rot Eldant's society from within, thereby increasing internal strife, destroying their societies traditional values and sowing discord, which will allow exploitation of the regions rich mineral resources. Generating a literate cadre of consumers for Japanese visual culture is icing on the cake...but lucrative icing indeed. They'll be paying for their manga in Eldant currency....gold and silver coins. Shinichi was chosen not for his knowledge of trivia, but because he can be disposed of without notice.
The show takes a rather different tack in the last two episodes and while it had been telegraphed for quite a while it still feels rather jarring. The ending only partially resolves the various plot threads but I found it more satisfying than it normally would be due to the fact that there was some genuine character development in a couple of characters over the course of the series.
Wildly uneven, Outbreak Company is never great, and the occasional idiocy of the protagonists can be infuriating, but it is often cute, funny and even interesting. It seems to be set up for a second season, and in the unlikely event that transpires, I'll probably at least give it a try.
This "Space Dandy" Thing Looks Like it Could be Offensive
Gloriously so.
More importantly it seems to have considerable potential to be fun...and possibly even good.
The ad is RETRO-RIFFIC...
...beyond that, here is not much to go on, other than reports that the show concerns a bounty hunter in the far future. However, Soul Eater, Full Metal Alchemist, Cowboy Beebop and Samurai Champloo...is a pretty impressive pedigree.
It certainly looks to be one to watch. It's premiering on Toonami this Saturday, January 4th
1
The promo has the exact opposite affect on me. The fact that I enjoyed most of the previous shows mentioned is the only reason I am even going to give this a shot. If all I had to go on was the promo you embedded, I would actually make an effort to avoid accidentally tuning in...
Posted by: Siergen at Mon Dec 30 20:41:13 2013 (c2+vA)
2
If this is going to have a simultaneous dub release, I wonder if anyone is going to bother fansubbing it.
Posted by: Mauser at Mon Dec 30 23:24:52 2013 (TJ7ih)
Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Tue Dec 31 01:44:06 2013 (DnAJl)
4
I'll give it a shot, even if only because it's a change from most of what's made these days. God knows I have little interest in the ninth reboot of Pretty Cure.
I'm mostly worried that it will merely be good, fall short of people's high expectations, and get trashed in the reviews, and we'll have another five years of the same old blah.
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Tue Dec 31 01:49:27 2013 (PiXy!)
Cruise Ship Trapped in Pack Ice
A Russian research/cruise ship Akademik Shokalskiy. has been overwhelmed by a summer blizzard off Antarctica and has become trapped in thickening ice. The Chinese icebreaker Xue Long, unable to deal with the thickness of ice around the ship has retreated to open water leaving the cruise ship's only hope the Australian icebreaker Aurora Austrialis which is moving to assist. .
UPDATE: It looks like Aurora Australis is also being forced off by the abominable conditions.
This is getting serious.
Two top of the line icebreakers have found conditions too dangerous to proceed. The weather has deteriorated to the point that helicopter rescue is currently unsafe. If the ice is really over 4 meters thick, the cruise ship (which draws
4.5m) is not really floating any more. There is the very real
possibility that the ship might be crushed. Complicating matters is the fact that the 'expedition' is a political stunt and PR is everything for the expedition leaders. Reports from the Akademik Shokalski indicate that those being interviewed are in denial of the gravity of their situation.The optics of this incident as well as the political and financial implications for the members of the voyage, may well be influencing them to deny the inevitable until lives are at risk.
Irony is a dish best served cold.
2
Yup, it's a bunch of tourists and reporters, led by a warmologer. The ship is reportedly well-equipped and cozy, so they can relax in the bar and ignore the irony.
-j
Posted by: J Greely at Sun Dec 29 11:47:53 2013 (+cEg2)
Posted by: Mauser at Mon Dec 30 01:29:03 2013 (TJ7ih)
4
Of course, I'm sure they are already drafting up press releases blaming the extreme weather conditions on climatic instability fueled by global warming...
Posted by: Siergen at Mon Dec 30 16:13:24 2013 (c2+vA)
5
Climate change, forcing normally docile Ice to attack shipping in Packs!
Posted by: Mauser at Tue Dec 31 07:50:12 2013 (TJ7ih)
6
Shokalsky is probably going to pop up like Fram. The hull ought to be designed with such eventuality in mind.
Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at Wed Jan 1 00:35:46 2014 (RqRa5)
7
Good point, but I'm wondering how well they will be able to cool the engine. Perhaps the vessel has air cooled ship service generators.
Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Wed Jan 1 00:52:43 2014 (DnAJl)
Well This Looks Sketchy
Work, school and family matters have meant that I've not been minding my E-mails like I should for nearly a month. I'm on several mailing lists that are concerned with news, science, defense analysis, politics, and frothing fanboy recidivism. So today...my first day really OFF in a long while. I started to slog through nearly 400 E-mails.
Among them were, to my great astonishment a handful of E-mails from actual human beings with whom I have spoken...offline even.... as well as a couple that just...wow.
I received that one ostensibly from Amazon, which didn't fool me since I never order from Amazon. But just out of curiousity I did download the zip file. What it contains is a file called "amazon.exe".
2
Now the strange thing was that it got scanned by Microsoft Security Essentials after I downloaded it, and I didn't get any alert. That's a bit of a concern...
That's one good thing to have an ancient mac around for though. If I were ever actually curious, I could move the file over there and open it, where nothing would happen.
Posted by: Mauser at Sun Dec 29 01:36:15 2013 (TJ7ih)
4
There was a fake Walmart.com one going around also, with a threat that if you didn't fill out the form, your Christmas order would be canceled and your money refunded minus 17%, as a penalty for Christmas handling.
It was a big lie, but the 17% part was really nasty social engineering, because it made people anxious about it.
Posted by: Suburbanbanshee at Sun Dec 29 21:18:41 2013 (cvXSV)
Just South of Europa, it Gets Kind of Humid
One of the Brickmuppet's Crack Team of Science Babes seems a bit excited about a recent discovery by NASA.
"It's just a water vapor cloud..BUT IT'S IN SPAAACE!!!"
While examining an aurora near Europa's south pole, astronomers using the Hubble Space Telescope discovered that it is associated with a faint cloud of water vapor, presumably venting from cryo-volcanoes on Europa that have plumes 201 kilometers high.
It seems likely that the 'cloud' deposits snow on Europa's south pole. NASA scientists take the plumes as further evidence that Europa is home to a vast subterranean ocean.
The astronauts on the International Space Station just successfully replaced a coolant pump via an emergency Christmas Eve spacewalk. There have been several issues, not the least of which was a potentially dangerous malfunction yesterday in one of the 35 year old suits.
As I type this, they are decontaminating in the airlock prior to re-pressurization. It seems that there was an ammonia leak while they replaced the pump.
If You See a UPS Driver Today
....be nice to them.
They are having a hard day. They cannot return to the building until all residential packages on their trucks are delivered.
They have quite a few this evening.
OK This is New
One of The Brickmuppet's Crack Team of Science Babes takes time from her eggnog to alert us to a surprising development in the fight against terminal decrepitude.
"Sadly it does not seem to regrow limbs"
Human
trials of NAD+ treatments will begin in 2014. If the results are
anything like what was experienced by the mice, it will be the
equivalent of a 60 year old having the fitness of a 20 year old. - See
more at:
http://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/anti-aging-formula-slated-begin-human-trials#sthash.RBZvhED8.dpuf
For years we've heard stories about how some mouse had its lifespan radically extended by something or other...however, this never seems to result in any human trials...until now.
Human trials of NAD+ treatments will begin in 2014. If the results
are anything like what was experienced by the mice, it will be the
equivalent of a 60 year old having the fitness of a 20 year old.
- See more at: http://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/anti-aging-formula-slated-begin-human-trials#sthash.RBZvhED8.dpuf
Human
trials of NAD+ treatments will begin in 2014. If the results are
anything like what was experienced by the mice, it will be the
equivalent of a 60 year old having the fitness of a 20 year old. - See
more at:
http://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/anti-aging-formula-slated-begin-human-trials#sthash.RBZvhED8.dpuf
Human trials of NAD+ treatments will begin in 2014. If the results
are anything like what was experienced by the mice, it will be the
equivalent of a 60 year old having the fitness of a 20 year old.
- See more at: http://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/anti-aging-formula-slated-begin-human-trials#sthash.RBZvhED8.dpuf
Human trials of NAD+ treatments will begin in 2014. If the results are anything like what was experienced by the mice, it will be the equivalent of a 60 year old having the fitness of a 20 year old
Human
trials of NAD+ treatments will begin in 2014. If the results are
anything like what was experienced by the mice, it will be the
equivalent of a 60 year old having the fitness of a 20 year old. - See
more at:
http://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/anti-aging-formula-slated-begin-human-trials#sthash.RBZvhED8.dpuf
Human trials of NAD+ treatments will begin in 2014. If the results
are anything like what was experienced by the mice, it will be the
equivalent of a 60 year old having the fitness of a 20 year old.
- See more at: http://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/anti-aging-formula-slated-begin-human-trials#sthash.RBZvhED8.dpuf
Human trials of NAD+ treatments will begin in 2014. If the results
are anything like what was experienced by the mice, it will be the
equivalent of a 60 year old having the fitness of a 20 year old.
- See more at: http://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/anti-aging-formula-slated-begin-human-trials#sthash.RBZvhED8.dpuf
Of course the treatments will be hideously expensive for the foreseeable future and they are tests...so they might not pan out. However, human tests of a life extension treatment are going to be conducted next year! This could be very, very big!
"Science Babe" is actually Rin Tezuka, from Katawa Shoujo.
1
Not only that, but some great advances are being made in breaking up blood clots, post-stroke. As in, a few hours post-stroke unfortunately. Would have been nice if someone had thought to hit me with tPA that first time in ER, instead of just letting me lay there for six hours until they got a room available. "Hm, yes, it looks like you might have had a stroke." Gubberment is supposed to make this all better? Tell me another one.
Two visits after that was even worse, if you can believe it.
Posted by: ubu at Fri Dec 27 00:10:35 2013 (GfCSm)
Amazon Has Doomed Us All
Last night I checked to see if the hard to find second half of Last Exile 2 is available there. It is not. I did see something there unrelated...Perhaps in an effort to make good on what has been an off year in retail sales, Amazon was announcing that he deadline for free shipping to be delivered by Christmas had been extended...to midnight last night.
I took this as an ill omen.
It was.
I've been at UPS 22 years, I've never seen a day like today. I imagine tomorrow will be similar.
Aren't We Lucky?
The popular leader of a comedy troupe that looks like a zombie version of ZZ Top has made a somewhat edgy and vulgar comment that has the ministry of acceptable discourse all in a tizzy. The fellow has been fired. There are thoughts i generally agree with on this matter of great importance here, here, here, here and from the always interesting Camille Paglia here. This is at once silly, disturbing and perhaps even a bit heartening...
You see, so quiet is the domestic and international stage that it is the only news story worth talking about.
1Fortunately we live in a world where the top story is that a Duckhunter has been fired by a TV network.
I for one approve of this.
Posted by: Wonderduck at Sun Dec 22 19:07:52 2013 (Izt1u)
2
There was no "edgy and vulgar" comment. The interviewer asked: "what do you consider a sin", and the dude replied with a fairly standard list, for a bible-thumper. It's like Bush's WMD that were #16 in the Colin Powell's List Of Reasons To Remove Saddam. Suddenly it's the only one anyone know about because MSM decreed so.
Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at Mon Dec 23 14:45:29 2013 (RqRa5)
3
I stand by it. His attempt to explain why straight men might find the topic icky did stray into vulgarity. Also, any speech in a national venue that does not treat said topic with fawning adoration is pretty edgy nowadays, as his firing demonstrates.
("Edgy" meaning skirting at or just over the edge of cultural acceptability.)
OTOH, as for the networks cherry picking his words and rearanging them to make the statement maximally 'ungood'...well yeah. You get no argument from me.
Your comparison to Bush's many reasons for removing Saddam is pretty close to the mark. I was particularly offended that his closing quote on the matter was so thoroughly excised from the reports that I didn't even read it until Sunday night
Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Mon Dec 23 16:11:44 2013 (DnAJl)
A Blitzkrieg of Boxes
...continues . Yesterday nearly a fifth of our workforce called in sick, I was, for several hours, the only person processing the "irregulars"....that's parcels that are really big, sharp edged, cutty, painful, and/or 70-150 pounds. This is normally a six person job and usually doesn't involve me in any way, or any of my blood. Yesterday and today were complicated by the fact that a weather delay earlier in the week caused three quarters of a metric buttload of parcels to show up all at once. Today may have been the longest day I have ever worked at UPS that I was not driving.
A few minutes ago, I got home, changed my bandages and discovered via Don that some quisling has revealed by dark secrets to the world, resulting in my being struggled against.
This could potentially complicate my plans to steal the Pueblo next summer.
I feel as sore as I was in boot camp...I'm gonna go to bed. Blogging will resume briefly this weekend.
Oh look:
A Santa hat...
...though despite the exquisite rendering of said headgear, I'm not sure that Panderion has captured the essence of the holiday.
..not that I'm complaining.
2
Actually, it will be about three weeks before things get back to normal. There used to be a huge drop off after Christmas, but due to a terrible and onerous recent development (the Amazon Gift Card) things continue at a somewhat reduced but still well above average pace for about three weeks. This will of course be done without temps as any temps carried past the 24th are contractually permanent hires, leaving the inside operation slightly shorthanded.
Still, that will be far less than the next two days and a day like Friday is very unlikely.
Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Sun Dec 22 14:13:40 2013 (DnAJl)
Here we have a guy with actual super-powers and he's using them to fry fish instead of fight crime.
One can only assume that this is just a cover for his secret identity as Asbestos Man.
1
Video won't load for me, but is he dipping his hand and removing it fast enough for that whatchacallit effect used when demonstrating liquid nitrogen (or was done with boiling lead by the Mythbusters a few years ago?)
Posted by: RickC at Tue Dec 17 16:37:00 2013 (A9FNw)
2
William Seabrook writes in his biography of Robert Wood that when they got acquianted, Wood handed him a handful of flames. He took it, and surmised he would not be writing the biography if he didin't. The fire was "not hotter than a cucumber".
Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at Tue Dec 17 23:48:30 2013 (RqRa5)
3Surely you're Joking, Mr. Feynman has a hilarous anecdote where Feynman, as an adult, remembered doing as a kid magic tricks, and doing one where he dipped his hand in rubbing alcohol or something and lit it on fire, and didn't burn himself. Nobody believed him, so he tried it again and discovered that as an adult, it doesn't work, because the hair on his hand and wrist wicked up the alcohol.
Posted by: RickC at Wed Dec 18 20:45:56 2013 (swpgw)
4
RickC - the Leidenfrost Effect, that's what I was thinking too. It's hard to judge from the video, but he doesn't seem to be doing it that quickly.
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Thu Dec 19 06:56:04 2013 (PiXy!)
Hobby Space News of the commercial space industry A Babe In The Universe Rather Eclectic Cosmology Encyclopedia Astronautica Superb spacecraft resource The Unwanted Blog Scott Lowther blogs about forgotten aerospace projects and sells amazingly informative articles on the same. Also, there are cats. Transterrestrial Musings Commentary on Infinity...and beyond! Colony WorldsSpace colonization news! The Alternate Energy Blog It's a blog about alternate energy (DUH!) Next Big Future Brian Wang: Tracking our progress to the FUTURE. Nuclear Green Charles Barton, who seems to be either a cool curmudgeon, or a rational hippy, talks about energy policy and the terrible environmental consequences of not going nuclear Energy From Thorium Focuses on the merits of thorium cycle nuclear reactors WizBang Current events commentary...with a wiz and a bang The Gates of Vienna Tenaciously studying a very old war The Anchoress insightful blogging, presumably from the catacombs Murdoc Online"Howling Mad Murdoc" has a millblog...golly! EaglespeakMaritime security matters Commander Salamander Fullbore blackshoe blogging! Belmont Club Richard Fernandez blogs on current events BaldilocksUnderstated and interesting blog on current events The Dissident Frogman French bi-lingual current events blog The "Moderate" VoiceI don't think that word means what they think it does....but this lefty blog is a worthy read nonetheless. Meryl Yourish News, Jews and Meryls' Views Classical Values Eric Scheie blogs about the culture war and its incompatibility with our republic. Jerry Pournell: Chaos ManorOne of Science fictions greats blogs on futurism, current events, technology and wisdom A Distant Soil The website of Colleen Dorans' superb fantasy comic, includes a blog focused on the comic industry, creator issues and human rights. John C. Wright The Sci-Fi/ Fantasy writer muses on a wide range of topics. Now Read This! The founder of the UK Comics Creators Guild blogs on comics past and present. The Rambling Rebuilder Charity, relief work, roleplaying games Rats NestThe Art and rantings of Vince Riley Gorilla Daze Allan Harvey, UK based cartoonist and comics historian has a comicophillic blog! Pulpjunkie Tim Driscoll reviews old movies, silents and talkies, classics and clunkers. Suburban Banshee Just like a suburban Leprechaun....but taller, more dangerous and a certified genius. Satharn's Musings Through TimeThe Crazy Catlady of The Barony of Tir Ysgithr アニ・ノート(Ani-Nouto) Thoughtful, curmudgeonly, otakuism that pulls no punches and suffers no fools. Chizumatic Stephen Den Beste analyzes anime...with a microscope, a slide rule and a tricorder. Wonderduck Anime, Formula One Racing, Sad Girls in Snow...Duck Triumphalism Beta Waffle What will likely be the most thoroughly tested waffle evah! Zoopraxiscope Too In this thrilling sequel to Zoopraxiscope, Don, Middle American Man of Mystery, keeps tabs on anime, orchids, and absurdities. Mahou Meido MeganekkoUbu blogs on Anime, computer games and other non-vital interests Twentysided More geekery than you can shake a stick at Shoplifting in the Marketplace of Ideas Sounds like Plaigarism...but isn't Ambient IronyAll Meenuvians Praise the lathe of the maker! Hail Pixy!!
