FALSE FLAG!!
In an apparent attempt to frame the competition, 2 South African one American and a Dutch V-Tuber have disguised themselves as Hololive and are now terrorizing the necromatically impaired...and themselves...and everybody else.
Posted by: Mauser at Sun Mar 7 00:35:09 2021 (Ix1l6)
2
I watched about the last third. It was live when I stumbled on it at NinaNinNin's place and was still running when I posted.
Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Sun Mar 7 03:22:36 2021 (5iiQK)
3
Streams like this I leave on in the background. Reine from Hololive ID did a seven-hour Minecraft stream which made pleasant background noises while I did other stuff on the weekend.
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Sun Mar 7 18:20:21 2021 (PiXy!)
4
Yes, in fairness "watched" is probably too strong a term, I had it on and kept switching back to it while working in other tabs...but some parts are just hypnotically silly.
Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Sun Mar 7 19:32:21 2021 (5iiQK)
Questions for my Readers: Uncategorized
Isn't LOG HORIZON supposed to be out this season? Did it not get picked up by an English Language streaming service?
What's y'alls recommendation for a VPN?
Any good shows running now that don't involve giving money to Disney?
Ordinarily, when thinking of concealed carry, I assume .380 ACP (9mm Cort). However, unforeseen circumstances have caused me to become very interested in .32 ACP. Are there any reliable defensive loads in that caliber?
Is it safe yet to upgrade to Big Sur? Also, given that I skipped Catalina because of the horror stories, can I upgrade straight from Mojave?
When you eat taoyaki, do you truly appreciate the effort that went into preparing it?
1
I don't think Log Horizon got picked up. Certain Kick Ass Jolly folk have Rogered the need and been supplying on their streaming/DL site. It's been decent so far, with an arc about the evolving politics of Akiba and another about what's been happening with Krusty, Kanami, and co.
For VPNs, I've been running NordVPN and been decently satisfied.
Posted by: StargazerA5 at Fri Feb 26 09:13:06 2021 (ohc1G)
2
It's on Funimation. I haven't been following it, since I never got very far in season 2 for some reason. animeschedule.net has good listings of what streams where.
And you stole a picture I was planning to use next week, darnit. :-)
-j
Posted by: J Greely at Fri Feb 26 09:23:56 2021 (ZlYZd)
3
Related, I don't plan to upgrade to Big Sur, although my work Mac will get it soon; I consider Catalina to be nearly out of beta. Apple's updaters will probably only offer to take you straight to the latest BS, although as always, multiple independent backups are a must.
-j
Posted by: J Greely at Fri Feb 26 09:27:43 2021 (ZlYZd)
Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Sat Feb 27 18:56:22 2021 (5iiQK)
12
Meh, I just discovered that the reason I'd been missing the last few seasons of RWBY is because Roosterteeth took it off their own site and went exclusive with CR.
Posted by: Mauser at Mon Mar 1 23:41:07 2021 (Ix1l6)
13
In general, I wouldn't recommend .32. But I have some knowledgeable friends I can ask.
Being a real niche cartridge though, don't expect to find any ammo until WELL after the shortage is over.
Posted by: Mauser at Mon Mar 1 23:42:38 2021 (Ix1l6)
14
well, .32 FMJ ball ammo falls well inside my personal parameters, which are pretty much "something is better than nothing" with a dose of "so, Smart Person, would you be willing to stand in front of this woefully ineffective cartridge when it is discharged ?".
Mrs Garply has carried an old Walther PP in .32 for many years, and because it fits her hand well and she finds it easy to control, her shot placement is scary good.
As regards ball ammo, the Fiocchi 73 grain load has real good word-of-mouth, and I own a few boxes of it which have functioned flawlessly so far, but then so has all of the W-W and Remington we have run through it.
for "defensive" ammo in .32 there is a Hornady loading with a 60 grain ETX hollowpoint that I have seen and fired. might be others, don't know for sure.
Posted by: quux_garply at Tue Mar 2 11:20:54 2021 (AKJpt)
15
Fiocchi 73gr was the best in the Lucky Gunner test, too. But I just looked through my sources and indeed .32 ACP is impossible to get. I thought the situation with .380 ACP was bad, but this is on another level.
Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at Tue Mar 2 21:34:58 2021 (LZ7Bg)
Most other Cara Dune figures were either sold out, cancelled after I ordered them, or were already going for more that a hundred dollars. I still hold out a very slim hope for the FuncoPops.
RWBY has been a very uneven series, it started out with dreadful production values that were more than compensated for by engaging characters, an intriguing plot and the superb fight choreography of Monty Oum. The series had a lot of potential. Furthermore, it inspired tremendous goodwill as its cast and crew seemed likable and were punching so far above their weight that it was absolutely inspiring.
Mr. Oum's untimely death during the production of season three foreshadowed rough seas for the series, while the last season he worked on was by far the best until then, subsequent seasons were, despite much higher production values, not as engaging cumulating in the inept 4-episode faceplant that was the finale of season 5.
However, the subsequent seasons were, while very different, nevertheless enjoyable and the show has improved steadily; regaining much of its appeal even as Rooster Teeth has squandered much of its goodwill with the public.
Now, with season 8 the show has finally surpassed even the excellent season three, with absolutely brilliant pacing, action and storytelling. Characters develop in unexpected, yet believable ways for both good and ill and the plot has been full of genuine surprises with the action nonstop.
If you dropped the show, I recommend picking it up again, but you'll probably want to at least watch last season, as this one begins in the middle of the chaos that season ended with. Fortunately, with short seasons and 10-15 minute runtimes on most episodes, the show is a quick watch.
1
Season 8? I thought there were 6. And what I thought was 6 was turned into "Season 5 part 2" on the Rooster Teeth site. Is it no longer running there?
Posted by: Mauser at Thu Feb 18 00:33:15 2021 (Ix1l6)
One of the Best Things About Science Fiction
...is how it allows one some escapist respite from any reminders of current events.
If you have not seen Babylon 5 you are wrong!
But, you are also lucky, as it is currently running on HBO MAX where it has been digitally remastered with modern monitor resolutions in mind. It really is one of the best sci-fi series ever.
1
Glad to see this got a 1080p remaster. They don't seem to have worked miracles, but it looks substantially better than the version I watched most recently. (I have the DVD box set but it's packed away somewhere.)
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Wed Feb 17 09:02:11 2021 (PiXy!)
This show has been good from its beginning 5 years ago, but this latest, abbreviated, 10 episode season moves a mile a minute as it twists, turns and shocks the audience. Throwaway world building moments from earlier in the series come out of the woodwork to surprise and astonish.
The fifth season is a 4 ring circus. Since everything in the solar system except Bobbi' and Avaserala's employment situations were, as far as the characters were concerned, going gangbusters at the end of last season, the cast goes on vacation...which is where most of them are when things go pear shaped.
The Expanse is an excellent example of fairly hard sci-fi, but beyond its realistic portrayal of space its characterizations and human drama are much better than most, more mundane series.
The characters include a fellow who has (through either abuse, injury, or genes) basically a psychopath's brain, but who WANTS to be good..so he hangs out with what he assumes to be good people...to aid him in this difficult task. This season finally explains WHY he has this seed of goodness in the vast barren desert of his soul. It's very well handled.
The only even arguably unsatisfying moment in the entire season is an obviously late edit necessitated by production realities beyond the scope of this post, but your milage may vary, and it's a spoiler.
All in all this was probably the best season of this generally excellent show thus far. FWIW I think last season, while very good, was the weakest, though in retrospect, it set this season up superbly.
If you're not watching this show, you are wrong. It's currently available in full, on Amazon Prime.
1
I loved season one but was turned off by the first episode of season two.
Which come to think of it was exactly my reaction to MLP: FIM.
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Thu Feb 11 08:00:53 2021 (PiXy!)
2
The first episode of season two starts off following the cast of a completely different show based very loosely on Starhip Troopers before returning to the story in progress. Those people get Isekaied into The Expanse a couple of episodes later.
It does give a good idea of just how different in outlook the Martians are from the rest of the system.
Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Thu Feb 11 15:56:55 2021 (5iiQK)
3
I'm running a bit behind on The Expanse. And annoyingly, when one hoists the black flag one discoveres that they're sending nastygrams to anyone they catch on the torrents without a VPN.
Posted by: Mauser at Sun Feb 14 04:12:43 2021 (Ix1l6)
1
This one probably went right past the native audience as just another drop in the ocean of phonetically-written foreign words this series throws at them.
-j
Posted by: J Greely at Sun Nov 22 15:31:31 2020 (ZlYZd)
1
Not only, or even primarily, a mobile game! I'm playing on my big gaming PC, which makes combat a lot easier. The mobile client is useful for party maintenance and some daily quests, and I did a lot of the early story quests on it, but the controls are a bit awkward. You can switch between clients at any time.
And I've spent exactly $4.99 on the game so far. And my latest free gacha pull included one of these... (which is really handy, because I needed someone with fast Geo attacks to unlock a few chests)
-j
Posted by: J Greely at Tue Nov 3 14:09:42 2020 (ZlYZd)
2
Honestly, it's a really good game up until the content runs out; if your gaming calendar isn't already thoroughly booked, go ahead and try it out. The actual gameplay is quite fun!
Once you HAVE finished the story that's there, it's not that great of a gacha game - very time-throttled as a way to keep you from maxing things out and discovering there's nothing left to do BUT to max things out. It also has a fairly nasty treadmill aspect in that the world will get stronger as you grind - so it's entirely possible that you can get a great character in the gacha and just bench them because the commitment to getting them leveled up to match your current characters is just too much.
So in a very real sense, it's not a bad idea to try it out, finish the current story content, and put it back down to wait for more areas to be developed (supposedly there's a new one coming in December).
I haven't spent any money, mostly because I get the feeling that it wouldn't really make any difference - what you run into isn't a wall to scale and get beyond, it's just a cliff, and even if you get higher up the cliff, you're still climbin' the cliff. It also helps that I kind of enjoy just doing the "hey, here's some free rolls" and working with what I get from that, rather than thinking "my life isn't complete unless I draw this one character at astronomically low rates!"
Posted by: Avatar_exADV at Tue Nov 3 14:29:09 2020 (v29Tn)
3
I have to say...I am intrigued by the game. But so far, the only gacha game I have played at all is Fate/Grand Order (Hi, Wonderduck! I see another person who has max leveled Rider Medusa!). I have Fire Emblem Heroes and Valkyrie Anatomia...But the latter was made by a Chinese studio, and I loathe touching anything from the PRC than I have to, and the former is at the 'dead man walking' stage, given Nintendo's discovery that mobile games that is not named Pokemon GO are not worth the cost.
Posted by: cxt217 at Tue Nov 3 20:00:36 2020 (4i7w0)
Monstergirl Doctor...Almost Over
Well, Monstergirl Doctor has really gone into wilds of nowhere.
Our female protag, putting up a fierce face.
There is a brief moment in episode 4 when one of the protagonoists literally trips over what appears to be the actual plot to the show, but that potentially interesting storyline is resolved in the same episode, mostly off camera. It then muddles along for several episodes with our male protagonist being either a predator, or autistic (or possibly both) and our female snake girl protagonist trying to drive through his thick skull the importance of communication with one's patients, or at least not intrusively examining one's female patients without discussing the matter first and getting consent. (good grief)
Dark secrets are revealed...and then thrown away and due to the lack of actual storytelling, background on the world and characters is provided occasionally by a giant exposition squid.
...and then this happens and there is a...ahem...scene... between these two centaur chicks and our human protagonist and I must say that I have never laughed quite so simultaneously hard and uncomfortably before dropping a show.
This is a medical procedural set in a fantasy world and there has been some exploration of interesting ideas...and there are only three episodes left....so I may finish it...for the sake of completeness....but yeah at this point I'm taking a break and am going to have to say that the show has not lived up to its early potential.
Not a monstergirl any of us were expecting...especially in a bikini.
From episode 2 of Monstergirl Doctor, which follows two rookie doctors, straight out of med-school who are starting out their own private clinic in the town of Lindworm.
One of the doctors is a young man and his business partner is a 24 foot long snake woman. You see, the show is set in a fantasy world populated with sentient versions of the D&D Monster Manual. Both the human and snekgrrl are doctors specializing in non-human races...most of whom haven't historically been serviced by the medical profession until recently.
The animation is diffident though the art itself is good. The character designs are by Z-Ton, and the stories, while fairly anodyne are low level medical mysteries. But there's a difficulty: This is set in a medieval fantasy world with little or no magic. They understand germ theory and are practicing "medicine" as we understand it (with reference books, medical exams and treatment) , but their tech level is otherwise is high middle ages or renaissance. Which is kind of interesting and weird.
Despite the hype (and the first minute of episode 1) Monstergirl Doctor, is, perhaps surprisingly, both SFW and wholesome. So, yeah, it subverts expectations...but in a good way.
My only concern after two episodes is that I'm not sure it's going anywhere. Still, it's a pleasant enough 30 minutes.
Posted by: Mauser at Tue Sep 22 23:22:19 2020 (Ix1l6)
2
Some people were saying that the "doctor" setup is just an excuse to fondle beast girls under a pretense of exam. A similar charge was leveled against Gift, for using blindness of the MC.
Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at Wed Sep 23 09:07:03 2020 (LZ7Bg)
3
I'd agree wxcept that while the first 60 seconds of episode 1 look like they belong in Ishizoku Reviewers. That scene (which has an innocent explanation) is so different from the rest of the series in tone that I suspect executive meddling. Of course I'm only 2 episodes in so I could be wrong, but after that, the most lewd thing in the two episodes was the Selkie's outfit, and she was just a non-speaking background extra sitting on the pier. I don't think this show is actually Echhi.
But then I'm a 50 year old weeb so I don't really know where the line is anymore.
Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Wed Sep 23 10:02:23 2020 (5iiQK)
Re: Zero is back! Actually, it's BEEN back for 10 weeks but I'd missed it while fighting off harassment and distractions foisted upon me by a nefarious group I'll refer to henceforth as the I.R.L.
Anyway. The first two episodes of the lates installment of this excellent show are quite solid. At this point, understanding that I'm 8 behind, I'm recommending it heavily.
Heck, even the most annoying lesbian in all of the future gets an awesome scene.
There are several other shows that look to have promise and the I.R.L. is being less obnoxious...at least with my internet connection, so tardy reviews may be forthcoming.
1
If Re:Zero is up to the point I think it is, Subaru gets a break from dying for a while, and it turns out the story isn't nearly as interesting when he's not dying regularly. I don't know how long that will last though because I've only read a few chapters past where last season ended.
Back for ten weeks? Got you beat. WHY DID NO ONE TELL ME THERE WAS A SECOND SEASON OF GATE!
Seriously, I need to haul myself out of my hole more often.
Posted by: Ubu at Sun Sep 20 06:31:12 2020 (UlsdO)
4
Not relevant after all. I was mistaken; was thinking of 13-24 as part of season 1, not a second season, and didn't remember the clip I saw. Back to my hole....
Posted by: Ubu at Sun Sep 20 07:37:43 2020 (UlsdO)
Here's a quick overview of what may or may not have happened.
Cooking Mama CookStarwas announced for the Nintendo Switch and in its promo materials an offhand mention was made that it would employ blockchain technology. (For some reason).
This led to crazy conspiratorial speculation that the game was an elaborate and cunning crypto-currency mining scheme.
It was available at some point, because there are people who have physical copies that are playable...if not connected to the internet.
There are unconfirmed reports that the game is a terrible power hog and reports that an early version could damage the Switch. (How?)
There were reports (read anonymous posts) on Discord that the crypto-mining software was also forwarding user info to nefarious people for nefarious purposes. (A source quoted in the IGN article invokes the Kochs).
Nintendo assures everybody that there never was no-way no-how any crypto mining software on their game.
Analysts who have examined one of the few extant examples of the game claim there is evidence that crypto-mining software was removed...clumsily, which accounts for the games reported poor optimization.
Other sources say that there's nothing in the code that is indicative of crypto-mining now.
It's unclear, however, who actually developed this particular game. There are three companies denying any responsibility for it and another sketchy address in Connecticut. It's also unclear at what level of development blockchain technology was considered. Nintendo says it wasn't but it clearly was considered seriously somewhere at some point was it was mentioned in the promotional materials. (along with the vegetarian option...which may or may not be significant)
So what really is going on here?
No one who's asking knows and no one who knows is talking.
However the game existed at some point as there are "let's plays" on You Tube:
Nintendo says all is well. Buy their game. Which you can't get.
UPDATE19:39April 8: It now appears to be available via the game's website. They are only selling physical copies though (which is not in and of itself a bad thing)
1
Huh. Best Buy's got a hilariously wrong result for "cooking mama cookstar", Walmart has all 800+ Cooking Mama games except this one, and there's a dozen sellers on Amazon who'll send you a copy for $80 or so.
Posted by: Rick C at Wed Apr 8 22:42:53 2020 (Iwkd4)
2
Do any recipes for cooking mama include fava beans and a nice Chianti?
Posted by: David at Thu Apr 9 00:42:29 2020 (UmjNG)
3
It's in the news again:
https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2020/04/cooking-mama-creator-threatens-lawsuit-against-unauthorized-switch-launch/
Posted by: Rick C at Wed Apr 15 10:40:32 2020 (Iwkd4)
The first episode is one that could have been from the first season, except that it seems intended to introduce a new character to the crew. About 7 minutes into episode 1 I was like: "So THAT'S where that character is from!"I don't know much about the game this is based on other than it is popular and has several former Square Enix people working on it, but I do note that Alizia, appears to be a real fan favorite, because unlike the previously introduced characters, her fan-art is all over the place.
Probably because she knows Kung-Fu.
Aliza is a Draph, this IPs equivalent to dwarves at 4 and a half feet tall, she's easily underestimated. However, after discovering that she's about the most formidable hand to hand fighter they have ever encountered and after Aliza finds herself being genuinely impressed with the heroes idealism, and courage...and discovering that they have not identical, but overlapping goals and motivations and that the superpowered shortstack only lacks for transportation...they go their separate ways, making the episode essentially a pointless throwaway which doesn't actually advance the plot at all.
The next actual arc starts off dumb, with everybody acting dumb and saying dumb things while forcing the audience to flash back a decade to Katalina's training...which was exactly like a Japanese high school except for the trial by combat part.
However, this weird four episode (!) flashback to high school angst does end up advancing the overall story in spite of itself and it is kind of poignant towards the end.
The episode between 5 and 6 is a Netflix adaptation.
Allow me to explain:
Apparently, in the Gacha game this is based on you can play one of two characters, either Gran or a girl in the same village with a similar backstory named Djeeta (on the left).
Between the two seasons, Djeeta has had 3 episodes dedicated to her reality and apparently she's much better at this than Gran is.
Djeeta possesses fashion sense and commands a larger, hand-picked crew of snappierdressers than Gran does and it can be assumed that she's been waltzing all over the map rolling critical successes because her ship and crew does not have any of the money or maintenance problems that drive much of the decisions made in the main show*. The episode between five and six is a light hearted Halloween episode where Djeeta's crew discover a mystery involving animated dead people and everybody has a good time.
In stark contrast the actual episode 6 involves Gran and his smaller, fashion challenged crew stumbling upon a mystery involving animated dead people and it is a genuinely scary and fast moving three episode arc in which they come very, very close to dying while dealing with some very grim things, with nothing but their wits.
Despite being rather dark, it's in this second arc that the show actually regains its footing and from that point on GranBlue Fantasy is back up to its old standards.
This is a very atypical pattern nowadays with the first half of the series being an incoherent dumpster fire and the two arcs of the second half being quite solid.
The characters remain likable and the show's production values remain high. In fact, here's no noticeable change in look aside from a slight increase in quality despite switching studious from A-1 to MAPPA. That may account for the rough start in the scripting though.
CyGames has their own animation studio now (Which also did Manaria Friends, set in the GranBlue universe) and they've been very fastidious about the quality of their animation adaptations. I wonder if the sharp increase in script quality midway through was due to an intervention.
In any event, while I can't fully recommend the series given its rough start, I can say it gets better, and left me still interested in the story and hoping for a sequel.
* Though it is possible that the expense of her crew's solid gem and bronze armor caused them to skimp on the abdominal plates.
1
Djeeta has earned her way into about a dozen of my cheesecake roundups, based on her extensive Pixiv portfolio ("all ages" link, which is not the same as SFW...).
-j
Posted by: J Greely at Tue Mar 31 14:52:16 2020 (ZlYZd)
2
Heh. I wasn't aware of her until the bonus episode (#13) last season where they took half an episode explaining who she was before shoehorning in a rather incongruous beach episode, because, reasons.
Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Tue Mar 31 19:58:47 2020 (5iiQK)
3
The joke is that Djeeta is playing the same game, but has money to roll on the gacha a lot.
(Playing the actual game, they're identical - you pick Gran or Djeeta, everyone calls you "danchou" anyway, and any time you feel like a gender change you just mash a button. Only difference is around Valentine's Day, where Gran gets a lot of chocolate and Djeeta gives a lot of it.)
Draphs definitely aren't dwarves - the guys range from "beefy" to "extra beefy" to "the difference between a meteor and a meteorite is if I punch it before it lands!" Just really extreme sexual dimorphism. Au Ra in FF14 except even more so.
Posted by: Avatar at Wed Apr 1 01:13:26 2020 (v29Tn)
Ka92 sums up the astonishment felt by many in the gaming community upon learning that the new Animal Crossing not only has giant spiders in it, but that they can totally kill you.
At The Intersection of Vigilanteism, Consumer Advocacy, and Internet Videography
In a world that is enmeshed in stupid regulation those who expose the corrupt can find themselves breaking the law.
Then there's these two loons from the current arc of My Hero Academia.
"While we wait for the cops to respond, let's read the super-chats."
Gentleman Criminal and LaBrava are two obnoxious LARPers who stream their petty (Ever. SO. Petty.) crimes in pursuit of clicks. Being supervillains, their campy videos keep getting deplatformed, which is playing havoc with their income stream. Given that monstrous propoganda videos by actual psychopaths continue to stay up (and get more clicks than the silly antics of these two) it seems that their targeting by content providers stems mainly from the fact that they keep embarrassing bad actors who have a lot of clout.
I'm 3 episodes behind, but this subplot now looks to be rather more consequential than it first appeared. This show, an ode to American comic books, has had some villains that are both well realized and truly terrifying, so I find myself both surprised and amused that this world actually has some 'silver age' villains running around.
Granblue Fantasy aired in 2017 and I did not really pursue it at the time.
Well, I noted that the show features many elements that can be considered to be warning signs in media, much like brightly colored coral is underwater....such as...
*It's based on a video game.
*Nay, a GACHA game actually.
*It's set in a sort of steampunk Middle Earth.
*The initial set up appears to be a series of bromides, bound together with cliche's served on a bed of tropes.
*This thing exists, and talks...
Vyrn is completely off model with the rest of the show. Even the other cute animals don't look like this.
...and that's where I initially stopped watching, because with all the other warning signs this just did not seem promising.
However, there is a sequel series out now, and, given the slim pickings of this season I decided, to check it out and to that end, I decided to give the old series another shot.
I'm glad I did.
Meet Lieutenant Katalina Alize. Until a few hours ago a highly skilled and decorated soldier of of the Erste Empire who was (until a few hours ago) in charge of security for an undisclosed research project. This involved undisclosed badness being perpetrated on Penny Plot Device Lyria (the young girl in the background). We join our statuesque heroine in the process of rescuing Lyria from her own troops, on a flying battleship. In the process of this unorthodox personnel transfer, Lt. Alize demonstrates that she's not a diversity hire, but rather an example of authority being derived from asskicking ability. Katalina is an accomplished spellblade who makes short work of her former shipmates until a particularly smarmy example of effete' aristocracy unleashes a magical weapon upon the young lady she's trying to rescue, precipitating an explosion, that results in Lyria falling from the ship, into the forest of a floating sky island near...
Gran, who, as we are introduced to him, is chopping wood in full plate armor, not because they have only one Gran model, but because he's a little fanatical about his swordsmanship training. Upon seeing the Battleship fly overhead, suffer an explosion, and drop what they took to be flaming debris in the forest, Gran and the off-model pokemon noted above rush to the scene of impact to see what happened (and if necessary work to control any forest fires). They find Lyria, unconscious outside the long sealed shrine to the island's god (called Bahamut). They note that the long abandoned and off limits shrine is...glowing. Lyria awakens, and after virtually no exposition is found by Katalina, as well as imperial troops. After a brief fight Gran, realizing that the two ladies are actually fugitives, takes a moment to ponder who the bad guys are in this situation, a question that is helpfully addressed by the Imperial troops as they interact with the locals...
The issue thus resolved, he lends his pitifully non-magical swordsmanship to the two young ladies, and, while nowhere near as skilled as Lt. Katalina, he proves to be quite impressive in his own right, punching well above his weight.
Well, until the forces of villainy unleash a 5 headed dragon that proceeds to disembowel him.
Then he's dead. The end.
Until, Lyria, in a fit of anguish resurrects him, calls forth the god of the island to smite the enemy and in the process he ends up with some of the power the power of Bahamut, the island's god, fused with him.
"Yay! superpowers!"
Except for one minor detail...scarcely worth mentioning
Lyria is indirectly powerful, She has something to do with a Imperial project to enslave dragons and even the gods of the world (these are thought to be similar to Japanese Kami, but in fact were created as weapons by a much older pantheon) However, Resurrection is not actually allowed by the laws of magic. Lyria has merely animated Gran's corpse with half of her power. If the two of them are separated by an arbitrary but as yet undetermined distance, Gran, and the little girl, will die.
Upon recieving a bit of exposition after the Imperials withdraw, Gran decides it's a really good idea to accompany these two young ladies on their quest, which currently is to get as far from this island as possible, and ultimately is to...
Umm..
They are going to work on that while flying away in their airship.
But first...
...they must find a work around for the fact that Katalina's skill-sets include, swordfighting, healing magic, small unit tactics, logistics, bartering, diplomacy, linguistics and thinking on her feet...
...but not piloting airships (there were always enlisted guys for that before she deserted)
To my astonishment, GranBlue Fantasy is a hoot!
For all it's many many cliche's this series actually manages to work and not be boring. The pacing is solid throughout and most of the characters are nicely fleshed out. This is a remarkably ensemble cast, with everyone bringing something to the table and as the party grows over the series, they all complement each other well and compensate for each other's weaknesses.
There are consistent and nice character touches too,
Regarding visual quality, there a few off-model scenes and the 12th episode seems to have been rushed, with some of the VFX not up to the series' usual high standards. The art direction is gorgeous, and the animation appears to mostly be cell animation. As often happens, the CGI doesn't quite mesh and this would normally be jarring. However, the computer animation is used mainly for unearthly/ supernatural things where the "off" look actually works very well.
I watched it in two sittings and found it quite enjoyable. the climactic episode (12) is a little odd, and as mentioned earlier seems a bit rushed. Perhaps it was intended to be two episodes. However, it definitely sets the stage for another season, and while it does advance the plot, it really seems more like a mid-season climax than any sort of denouement. This would probably have infuriated me in 2017, but as GBF2 is currently airing it means I have something to look forward to.
There is an episode 13, but it is essentially a Netflix adaptation.
All, in all, I was quite surprised how enjoyable and engaging this show is. It is basic fantasy with a side of steampunk, but it is quite nicely executed and has me hooked for more.
Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Mon Feb 24 19:49:27 2020 (5iiQK)
4
GBF probably shouldn't be as good as it is. When I first saw it, I bounced off the first ep of the anime... "This is kinda generic-looking, meh." Got back into it when I found a bunch of my old buddies playing the game. That was what, 3 years ago? Lots of fun since.
The end of season 2 is... maybe a bit less than halfway through the First Big Arc of the story? (So far there have been two of those, with the third one pretty solidly underway at this point.) But it's the side events that are really charming, since they really throw anything and everything in there. Moody character pieces? Bollywood homage? Cooking showdowns? There's a series of events that's literally three bro-types sitting at a cafe and shooting the breeze about how they wish they were awesome, living rich fantasy lives while everyone else is off fighting dragon gods or something.
(Ancient dragons have notoriously poor chopsticks skills. Bring a spork!)
Posted by: Avatar at Tue Feb 25 05:48:53 2020 (v29Tn)
5
This is streaming on AnimeLab here in Australia. I haven't tried that since I got fiber internet and wow is it better. Doesn't hurt that they seem to be running out of Amazon's datacenter right here in Sydney.
They also have Interspecies Reviewers.
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Wed Feb 26 01:33:46 2020 (PiXy!)
RWBY Season 7
RWBY's 7th season having just wrapped up on Crunchyroll, it warrants some comment. But first a brief review is warranted of this shows history. Initially started with a pilot that showcased its tragically low budget, superb voicework, spectacular fight choreography and great promise, the show proceeded to be almost schizophrenically uneven but maintained interest with its interesting characters and its setting, while something of a cliche' buffet, was genuinely intriguing. The first season was enjoyable despite itself and showed real promise.
The next two seasons got better, surprised its audience, and while the action animation never recovered from the death of Monty Oum midway through the production of season three, the other production values, story and characterizations got exceptional. ...until the season 5 finale which was a fight spread out over approximately 377,482 hours of tedious soliloquy and nothing happening. Season Six was much better, the production values being incredibly good and the story itself having regained its stride, though the finale was a soft cliffhanger.
Rooster Teeth has had its issues of late and its management has seemed to go out of its way to antagonize some of its fans. The company is no longer the 20 or so people punching above their weight but is rather, now, a division of AT&T which makes this seasons enhanced production values pretty much expected and the production problems reported in the media fairly inexcusable.
Given the internal issues being reported and the various clashes with the fandom, one ought not be surprised if the show is a dumpster fire.
Instead, the surprise comes from Season 7 kicking ass.
This season gets right almost everything that slipped through the cracks in season 5. In particular the pacing is solid throughout, building tension throughout the story to a genuinely gripping season finale.
Even the fight choreography has improved to the point that it's finally
approaching parity with the late Monty Oum's work in season's one and two, as this two minute clip from the season opener shows.
This is, hands down, the best season of this show ever. Story wise, the show manages to throw all manner of curve-balls while still retaining its internal logic. There is a little bit of perfuntory advancement in episode two '"Hey! Everybody gets new uniforms!" but almost everything else is beautifully paced and even the surprises (and boy are there surprises), make perfect sense as they're bringing together threads from six other seasons.
This brings us to the two minor quibbles with the show, one is that a lot of the plot is not fully understandable if you haven't seen the previous seasons, (which, sadly means watching season 5). Oh you'll be able to figure it out, but you'll lack that delicious moment of realization when the waiter smiles.
There is also another issue which has caused some consternation in some circles.
Illustration is non-canonical
Now, Yuri is not necessarily a bad thing and its a shame that it has become co-opted by those who are aggressively obnoxious. Indeed Yang and Blake, (who at this point need to call a moving van) in the absence of context make a cute couple.
However, in the context of the series, you see, they've both been canonically straight for 6 years. Blake has a boyfriend (Sun), one that she met in season 1 and who dropped everything to help her out at great personal risk, nearly died for her, whose life she saved and who she had a very well established mutually respectful relationship with. She even rebuffed advances from a gay friend, because she 'did not swing that way'. Yang, is introduced in season 1 as decidedly heterosexual.
Now both characters have a close bond as the source of much of their personal traumas was Adam (Blake's psychopathic ex boyfriend...who Blake had because Blake is straight) and their teaming up to deal with him last season was immensely satisfying. However the idea that this made them gay is kind of bizarre, and since this development was so obviously forced that it might behoove us to revisit an important fact.
Women can be friends with other women...and not be gay for them.
I know that's a hard concept for the allegedly woke to grasp, but it's true.
One more thing: There is one individual in the show who could have been gay as there is no previous indication of their orientation and there wouldn't involve retconning 6 seasons of canon. That would be...Ruby. So no, you're not stunning and brave, you're just virtue signalling quislings. Fortunately, the rest of the season was well written enough to allow us to ignore this silliness and hope that the lack of any formal announcement on their part indicates that the rest of us are just reading too much into the obvious gay baitng and are just pervs.
Also, let's hope that Blake and Jaune can do something to fix those terrible, terrible haircuts.
but honestly even that development doesn't really detract from the show this time around.
This was just a really solid season and I find myself looking forward to the next (probably last one) with genuine eagerness.
1
They also screwed up the model of Blake's face. It's like they slid her nose and jaw down and forward. It really stands out at the final image in the OP.
Posted by: Mauser at Tue Feb 18 17:43:30 2020 (Ix1l6)
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