Brickmuppet Blog 2.0

September 20, 2014

Yeah. I Didn't Think She Had One of Those Either.

From Sabagebu! Survival Game Club episode 5. This was an even more unexpected plot twist than the revelation that

This show is, in some ways, almost as gonzo as Nichijou.

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Watson....

Well, the new Ace Attorney game is a period piece set mainly in Victorian London. The plot revolves around a Meiji Era Japanese law student studying in London and Sherlock Holmes is a major character in the game.

This is actually pretty interesting.

This is actually Pretty Watson.

Wait. what?

Yes. Watson is an 8 year old girl genius.

OK it's a video game, and a Japanese game to boot so extreme liberties, re-imaginings and gender-bending should come as no surprise whatsoever.

Nevertheless, Shu Takumi, the director of the game, states that he wants it to be quite true to the original.

As for the character of Holmes, Takumi, who is also in charge of the game's scenario writing, has stated that he is a fan of the original series and hopes to maintain the sort of Sherlock that he grew up reading about.

On the other hand, that Watson fellow, must have really bugged him as a kid.

There's more here.

Be advised that that link goes to Kotaku, so there could be payola, including the kinds that carry social diseases.

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September 14, 2014

Current Watch List

I've been quite busy of late but I am watching a few things in between schoolwork and work-work.

RWBY has been mentioned quite a bit. It's the only show I actually am able to watch weekly and keep up with in part because its twelve minute run time is easy to justify as a study break. It's really hitting its stride and is amusing me far more than it ought to.

Tonari No Seki Kun is an older series that likewise can be consumed in 7 minute doses. I'm watching one or two a week. It has remained cute and refreshing.

I was quite thoroughly traumatized a while back by Stella Women's Academy Emo Paintball Fight Club With The Ridiculously Long Name That Started Out Really Cool but Despite its Message Of Redemption Was REALLY Depressing and For Some Reason Ended in C-3, so I had judiciously avoided the latest 'cute girls doing cute things in survival club' show. However, despite the subject matter (CGDCT+Guns) it is based on what is ostensibly a Shojo rather than a Seinen manga so this appeared to at least have the potential to be different. Also I've heard some good things about it and the show's name, even with the subtitle, is only 4 words long.

I'm only 3 episodes into Sabagebu! Survival Game Club, but it's pretty enjoyable thus far with a quirky and likable cast, many of whom share my opinion of hornets and natto. I may have to write on this at length in the future.

Dr. Who is a show that I rarely get to watch due to scheduling and a lack of DVR. However, a quirk of fate has allowed me to watch the first 4 Cappaldi episodes and I'm becoming more convinced that the PC venom displayed in episode 2 is not intended to be seen in a good light. It looks like The Promised Land is going to be a new Bad Wolf and Robin Hood was a hoot. I like that the doctor is not completely omnipotent "Wait . You're Right. That's a STUPID idea!" It's interesting at any rate.

In the queue: I picked up the second half of Ghost Hound, and second season of K-On!, both of which which I watched the first halves of YEARS ago.

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September 11, 2014

Dance Dance Infiltration

Well, the latest episode of RWBY answers a question that everyone has been asking since episode 9.

This was a really good episode, it moved the plot, developed the characters and managed to be cute as well as dramatic. The pacing was near perfect.

This show has really hit its stride. Seven episodes in and the season hasn't had a miss yet.

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September 10, 2014

Wild Speculation

Trigger warnings: cis, heteronormative, minor spoiler

OK, the clues are there and I'm thinking that some of these questions will be answered in the next episode so lets speculate on a few things

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September 03, 2014

AMVs From Before Time Began

A bit of Anime Music Video history....

One can certainly do worse than Takahashi and Terasawa.

Neither Space Cobra nor Urusei Yatsura were big hits in the US, both had been off the air in Japan for over 5 years when the videos were made, but the videos did pique some interest in anime at the time as they were shown on MTV.

However, it may be surprising to learn that that in 1991 AMVs were not really new. In fact fans had been making them for some years (mostly via Betamax), trading them and occasionally showing them at cons.

Due their existing long before internet streaming video existed in it's current form, and the limitations of magnetic tape as a medium, very few of the really early AMVs can be found. However, this faded, umpteenth generation copy of one I saw between 1989 and 90 is on You Tube...

It's been 24 years so I'm not sure WHO did it, but I think it was either Pam Buck or Keith Mayfield.

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August 30, 2014

Railgun S Ends

Well, the second half of A Certain Scientific Railgun S has finally been released and arrived last Friday. Like its predecessor, it's a 'juvie', though rather dark at times. It's also more thoughtful and entertaining than most.

Because of the ongoing spoiler tag issue, I'll conceal my shameful fanboy prattlings below the fold.

I'd wondered what that .gif was about...now I know.

more...

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August 28, 2014

Pluckiness Defined

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August 21, 2014

Well. That Was Underwhelming.

This weeks episode of RWBY seems to have been eaten by ants. Instead we were presented with a 2 minute 16 second slideshow explaining the show's main deus ex machina, 'dust'.

Narrated by "Mysterious Narrator" (playing herself) it tells us, the poor hapless viewers very little save for one tantalizing detail.

It does pose some interesting questions, certainly more than it answered.

more...

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August 20, 2014

A Caption is Needed

Art by Jittsu.

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August 15, 2014

Star Wars: First Impressions

No, not by me.

I was sent this by Wonderduck and it is an oddball thing of beauty.

A 19 year old athlete who had previously ignored Sci-Fi recently started doing RPGs and on the advice of some friends, he decided to see Star Wars for the first time.....and he Live Blogged It.

Then he decided he needed to see both of the sequels.

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It's the Quiet Ones You Have To Watch Out For

The last episode of RWBY ended with a huge "revelation"...that surprised absolutely no one1. This episode is just full of surprises...

more...

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August 14, 2014

A Question For My Readers

Does anyone know the name of this show?

ISTR it being fairly recent, but an image search does not yield anything useful.

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August 08, 2014

Thoughts on Guardians of the Galaxy

A review...

I have nothing to ad, except this... Go see this film.

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August 07, 2014

Episode Title...Or Error Message? As of this Post, the Jury is Still Out.

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Well. This Looks Whacked

Via Midnight Tease

While I'm pleasantly impressed with the attention to detail that the pink shell splashes represent, you can color me skeptical on this one.

And yet...it looks SO...gloriously...whacked....

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August 05, 2014

It's Finals Week, So In Lieu of Content, Here is a Helpful Demonstration of How Not to Handle 71 Different Types of Firearms.

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August 03, 2014

August 3rd: An Ill-Starred Day

But perhaps not as Ill-starred as some seem to think.

The US anime community was rocked earlier today by a press release from Studio Ghibli indicating that the beloved studio was closing up shop.

However, those stories are apparently due to a mistranslation. The company is taking a pause and a shutdown is possible, but there are no reports yet of it's closing in the Japanese media.

Thankfully I was doing homework when this wave crested otherwise, I'd be posting a retraction right now.

Given that they are assessing the performance of their post Miyazaki films, I'll try to see the next two Ghibli films multiple times.

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July 31, 2014

"Welcome to Beacon"

In the last episode of RWBY, the plot advanced a bit before being interrupted by spectacular action that was basically gratuitous albeit entertaining. By contrast, this episode is a series of quiet conversations interspersed with teenagers playing something akin to Risk. This was the better episode.

They've really come a long way from last season with both the animation and in particular the pacing....

...which is finally achieving a sort of balance.

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Railgun S First Thoughts

Having watched episode 1 of A Certain Scientific Railgun S I have a couple of very preliminary observations.

First, I'm struck by the fact that this does not feel like a different series at all. This episode is following right on the heels of the finale of the previous series, for instance Uiharu and Saten still have Haruue as their roommate and the three of them have enlisted Misaka to help them respond to one aspect of the previous show's aftermath. This series is NOT a standalone purchase.

Misaka thus far remains one of the more likable anime heroines I've seen.

On the other hand the episode introduces Shoukuho Misaki and in 2 minutes manages to establish her as of the most repulsive and genuinely scary antagonists I've ever seen.

This girl needs to die a lot.

She's arrogant, presumptuous, cruel, has no respect for personal space, thinks of people as objects for her amusement, and, being absolutely gorgeous, has a fawning cadre of "retainers". It's unclear if her fans are simply poor judges of character or are victims as she is a level 5 mind controller. She seems particularly upset that Misaka is immune to her talent and in a momentary fit of pique demonstrates that "Level 5" and "Mind Control" should never be allowed to overlap.

Which begs the question. What the hell were the people who study and train these kids thinking? Gracious!

Beyond that the premiere is a standard Railgun episode establishing what decent people Misaka and most of her friends are and why they tolerate Kuroko...because she is very useful to have around when Misaka needs to do something gratuitously awesome.

This sequel is off to a really fine start.

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The good news is that Misaki (aka "Mental Out") doesn't show up again in the series except for a cameo in the last episode.

Which is good because in the canon she eventually does something really foul to Mikoto, which they didn't include in this series. I thought Mikoto would kill her for it, but I guess that's a step too far for Mikoto, who seems to be the only Level 5 who isn't a sociopath.

Misaki is a sociopath, and there's a strong implication that she is too old to be in middle school, but stays there by using her power to change everyone's memory, including administrators. (And if you think Misaki is a monster, wait until you see Accelerator.)

Her fawning cadre aren't that way because she's beautiful. She uses her power to rewrite their memories to make them that way.

The first 16 episodes this time are the Sisters arc, which is dark dark dark but has a good ending. The rest of the series (beginning ep 19) is the SIlent Party arc, which is great from start to finish.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste at Thu Jul 31 10:36:58 2014 (+rSRq)

2 I don't buy the party line on the protags in Railgun. In my opinion they are pretty awful [1], with lower ranks being less so. Railgun's lesbian friend is the only anime character ever who made me consider how I should kill her (my answer is the poison: can't teleport out of that). Of course, any such thinking is pointless and the main character magic will make them triumph. For that reason I'm not going to root for any antagonists like the girl pictured in the post: they are all puppets of the screenwriter, made to be sacrificed.
At least Naruto and Goku used the main character magic for good.
[1] (with the exception of a techer woman that seemed human)

Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at Thu Jul 31 14:38:26 2014 (RqRa5)

3 Oh you get no arguments from me on Kuroko. She's a rotten human being. In an earlier post I lamented

(*She tries (and fails spectacularly) to drug and presumably molest Mikoto at least twice...I mean good Lord, she's pretty much horrible. The only reason she's a "good guy" is because she feels personally invested in her identity as a Judgement officer, likes the power she gets from the job and is the vector for getting Mikoto and the others involved in the larger story. Yes she's comic relief, but.... )

However, I think Mikoto is pretty decent. She's not perfect but just the fact that she's fairly she's down to earth is a major accomplishment given that everyone else we've seen on her level is corrupted by their power and they do not seem to be discouraged from that.
She's also a "good guy" for the right reasons, as opposed to Kuroko who is on a power trip.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Thu Jul 31 16:46:37 2014 (DnAJl)

4 What were they thinking? Something like this. (spoilers for Index, also quite dark...)

"The supernatural exists, including literal angels and literal demons. Some of these supernatural entities have as their objective the complete extermination of humanity. Those are -angels-, the demons are considerably worse. Disaster has so far been staved off only by the intervention of a power-mad church willing to plumb any depths of sin in order to preserve its own secret mastery. Humankind is at the precipice over a sea of horrors where the living would envy the dead.

We have discovered a method by which psychic powers can be induced in test subjects. The method only works on children. Our theories for why it works at all, and exactly what it does, are incomplete and patchy.

We do not have the luxury of time. We require that this potential be developed into weapons - weapons stronger than nukes. Your mission is to deliver those weapons in time to save the world. Any means will be tolerated. Balk at no ethical considerations. The only unacceptable outcome is failure. Get to work, Dr. Mengele."

No, of course not literally. But that's essentially a good description of the situation - in Index, the world is literally one Touma away from apocalypse at one point. If you were the sort of person who can be a nuclear strategist, this is kind of the ultimate nightmare scenario. Threats you do not understand, popping up according to logic you do not understand, responsive to no pressure you can bring to bear, some of which are pinpricks and some of which are mortal blows, and your only defense is an organization who won't talk to you and is willing to kill you just to hide its own existence...

In that situation, the existence of Academy City can be understood - a kind of Manhattan Project that refines little kids instead of uranium, ghastly if you have the right details, but happy enough on the surface that most people can fool themselves into thinking that everything is all right. Of course the scientists are evil - who else would, or could, do what they do? Yet if you believe that those things must be done, then all you can do is tell them to get to it and try not to watch how much fun they're having.

Railgun is about Academy City itself; Index sets it in a world that almost, almost justifies how monstrous it is. It's a shame that Railgun is just a much better show; by itself it's incomplete, but getting through enough Index to get the background means, well, slogging through Index...

Posted by: Avatar_exADV at Thu Jul 31 18:33:28 2014 (zJsIy)

getting through enough Index to get the background means, well, slogging through Index... [/quote]
I was afraid of that.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Thu Jul 31 21:00:45 2014 (DnAJl)

Railgun S pretty much overlaps the first Index series in time. Ep 15 of Railgun S covers the same event as ep 14 of Index. (Though there's a bit of Rashomon difference in the telling.)

I watched the first Index series but didn't watch the second one. And I didn't have any trouble keeping up with events in either Railgun series.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste at Thu Jul 31 23:37:57 2014 (+rSRq)

7 My headcanon for Index/Railgun (not having read the books), is that they live in a lesser creation - one in which the Creator left a crazy number of backdoors in his code, which angels, demons, and people have been using to run amuck throughout history. Touma is a "reset" - his Imagine Breaker is identical with the intent of the Creator, which means only reality survives his touch. All the various hacks, backdoors, and cheats, which the espers and magicians and so forth are using to work their will on the world, are egotistical alterations to the Creation as intended, perversions of the literal will of god, and are negated by his right hand.
He's pretty much a walking relic, a saint. It's a hell of a thing to hang on a teen protagonist, aligning him with the original will of god. And people complain about "Jesus Yamato"!

Posted by: Mitch H. at Fri Aug 1 09:21:03 2014 (jwKxK)

8 They discuss that in pseudo-scientific terms in Index, actually. Essentially, the theory is that the esper generates a "personal reality" in which their power can function, and that the strength of the esper is largely related to how successful they are at superimposing that reality on consensus reality.

By extension, Touma is either extremely powerful, OR his power just has a much easier time of it (because he's not really modifying base reality, just reasserting it or disrupting the modifications to it that are made by others). Difference between pushing the boulder uphill and pushing it down, maybe?

Of course, that might not be what's actually going on (and, frankly, it's not directly contradicting your theory either, just couched in different terms.)

Posted by: Avatar_exADV at Fri Aug 1 17:47:04 2014 (zJsIy)

9 So (says The Brickmuppet, oblivious to the grammatical error he is committing), there's this new character that's been introduced (says The Brickmuppet with a hint of unease in his voice), and her first job is to clean up a "mess"in the testing room (says The Brickmuppet with a rising intonation). Oh my God, this just got grim (says the Brickmuppet unimaginatively blaspheming to emphasize his discomfort.)

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Sat Aug 2 01:04:27 2014 (DnAJl)

Surprisingly, that verbal tic doesn't become ridiculously annoying.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste at Sun Aug 3 10:29:43 2014 (+rSRq)

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