Crunchyroll will begin streaming Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood on October 3rd!
Link to the official announcement below:
anime
Pokemon Symphony? Yes, Please!
As a fan of anime we can never neglect the gateway drug of anime for many future otaku: Pokemon.
My boys have been Pokemon fans forever. From the cards (they collected, but never played), the video games, and the anime: Pokemon has been a huge part of their lives, and as a consequence, of mine as well.
I have seen a lot of the various shows (I like the earlier ones best) and played the games a little as well (I am not much of a gamer. I lack the patience).
Pokemon Go, however, has kept me very busy this summer (often helping me neglect doing blog posts). It has been fun and got me out and about, walking and enjoying the summer weather in Wisconsin.
One day something came up on my Facebook feed: Pokemon Symphonic Evolutions.
What this is: It is the music of the Pokemon video games that has been orchestrated. It is then performed by a live orchestra with video screens showing the piece/ period of the video game they are performing. The production works with local symphony orchestras to put on the production.
I took my two boys, one of their friends, and their cousin to this last night.
It was great. The interpretation of the music from the game to symphony was great and loved by all of us.
If this comes by you, give it a look. It is well worth the experience.
Until next time: Happy viewing!
*images used in this post are not owned by the blog*
The Power of Love and Regret
Orange
I loved this show. Being beautifully animated and well written, it was engaging for me both visually and emotionally.
The story begins as a high school girl,Naho Takamiya, starts to get letters written from herself 10 years in the future. All of the the letters are in regards to her regrets having to do with the new transfer student, a boy named Kakeru Naruse.
At first, she doesn’t know what to make of the letters, but as events start to come true that were in the letters, she decides to follow her older self’s advice.
To change the future.
To erase her future self’s regrets.
To prevent Kakeru from committing suicide later that year.
If you didn’t know: could you tell the person in the most pain?
I guess that is what I found compelling (and realistic) about this show to some degree. Behind the masks we wear, each of us, lies some pain.
Some struggle.
Something that we carry that just seems to heavy at times.
I guess the other beauty of Orange to me was that Kakeru had what everyone needs (and ultimately wants): Friends.
Friends who will be in their corner.
Friends who will listen.
Friends who want you to reach out when in pain.
Friends who want you to live and will go that extra mile to make sure you’re okay.
Attention Parents: If you have a teen or tween: please watch this. With them. And then talk about it. Teens go through all sorts of struggles that we, as parents, often have no idea about. They have friends going through struggles. Having talks with them about these kinds of subjects are worthwhile even if they are uncomfortable and scary.
Please, if you know someone in pain: Reach out. Be a friend. Help them get the help they need. Don’t have that kind of regret.
If you are in that kind of pain: Reach out. Someone will listen to you. Life will get better. These feelings will pass. There are (and will be) people who love you in this world.
Please also utilize the resources that are out there if you don’t know what to do.
http://www.suicidepreventionlifeline.org/
http://www.suicide.org/international-suicide-hotlines.html
http://www.mentalhealthamerica.net/mental-health-screening-tools
Sorry to get heavy.
Watch Orange. It is really quite good.
Be well.
Until next time: Happy viewing!
Anime is Beautiful…
As a life long fan of animation I am always astounded at the beauty of the many varying styles of anime.
That’s all this post is. Eye candy.
Anime is Beautiful.
Watch more anime.
Until next time: Happy viewing!
*all images in this post are not owned by this site.
*some of the images may not be directly from the show, but are representative of the show’s art style.
As Relaxing As It Gets.
Flying Witch
One of the highlights of the Spring season for me was this casually paced slice of life.
The show follows Makoto (a young witch) who has just recently moved Aomori to live with some relatives and finish her training. Much of what follows in the show consists of her daily life, spending time with her relatives, and making friends. The witchcraft is ever present in the show, but presented in a mostly low-key manner.
One of the high points of this show for me was the animation. It was consistently excellent and stunningly beautiful at times.
The show was mostly as “slice of life” as it gets. It is a quiet, slow (but appropriately so) paced, quiet show. And this kind of seemingly understated pace is powerful in it’s own way. I found it to be immensely enjoyable.
The characters are developed easily and well done. They are all likable and not a collection of poor anime tropes.
I really enjoyed the show. It was beautiful, quiet, and casually paced.
Attention Parents: There is really nothing objectionable in this show unless you are morally opposed to witches or magic, but if that is the case you may want to re-consider watching anime as a hobby.
Until next time: Happy viewing!
Another Year Older
Today is my birthday. This is not to get well wishes, but to provide context.
My older, the “Youtaite”, recorded another song for my birthday.
Last year he had done the T.V. size version of Bakemonogatari’s ED: “Kimino Shiranai Monogatari” by Supercell ( Nagi Yanagi).
This year he did the full song.
He knows it’s one of my favorites.
It’s pretty great.
I then showed him why I loved it so much.
Go watch Bakemonogatari.
Thank you son.
When Memory and Trust Fails You…
Here is less of a review than a tale of well intentions gone awry.
It is the story (less of a story more a brief anecdote) of myself, younger son, and two anime.
The shows:
Mawaru Penguindrum (image from Wikipedia)
and,
Kuma Miko- Girl Meets Bear. (image from Funimation)
As past readers of my blog will know, I am often “vetting” shows for my younger son. Seeing what is appropriate, what is not, what his mother may yell at me for letting him watch, etc.
Readers will also know that I am human and fail at this sometimes. These are my two most recent examples.
Mawaru Penguindrum.
This show is a favorite of mine. It’s weird. Perplexing. Stylish. All the things I could want. I even have a figurine from this show. And part of me really wants Himari’s penguin hat so I could start out my days by putting it on and yelling: “IMAGINE!”. But, I start my days at 3:30 in the morning so my neighbors might not be amused.
So, I had seen news that HULU was removing a bunch of it’s anime catalog due to low viewership and just keeping the more popular shows. I decided to see if Penguindrum was on the chopping block. It was.
It had been a couple of years since I watched it and I had only remembered a few bits why I didn’t let my son watch it at the time. But, I figured: “He’s older. And he sees as bad on One Piece, it should be fine.”
So with only a couple of days of availability left I figured I’d let him watch it. I watched some of it.
The funny thing is: you can’t trust your memory. Memory is faulty.
So I’m watching it with my son. First couple of episodes, mostly fine. And then we come to Ringo’s storyline…poor deluded, psycho-stalker, Ringo. Ringo stalks her teacher and wants to make him fall in love with her. Ringo camps out under the crawl space of teacher’s house and eavesdrops on him. My son was watching this girl with shock, saying: “Oh my god! She’s nuts! She’s a crazy stalker!”
I cringed at this and proceeded to make my next mistake. I thought to myself:”Yeah…I think that’s as bad as it gets. This little Ringo arc should be over soon.”
I thought. Like I said memory can’t be trusted.
However, I did tell my son: “Wait, and watch this with me so I can monitor it.”
My son had other ideas. He was on a mission to finish it before HULU took it off their service. So he proceeded to watch it at his mother’s house without me there.
I, then, get the following texts from his older brother:
“Father there is a lot of sexual harassment in this show what the fuck are you even thinking letting him watch this”
“TWO PEOPLE HAVE BEEN ROOFIED”
At this point I was thinking to myself:” Oh, shit. I had forgotten so much.” and I get more texts:
“the sensei’s wife drugged Ringo cause she’s like ‘omg become Momoka'”
“and the clothes come off.”
“Oh dear god I think the dad is going to rape her or try to kill her wtf”
” Okay the father only stabbed her or something and mentally abused her telling her she was ugly but still wtf”
At this I replied and told him to have his younger brother Facetime me. He did. And I told him to stop watching the show and explained that the themes were too adult and not appropriate for him. He agreed and thought everyone on the show was nuts.
This is where memory failed me… I needed to remember all the reasons why I didn’t let him watch it in the fist place, but I (obviously) didn’t. My parenting fail…Oops.
Kuma Miko- Girl Meets Bear.
A failure of trust.
One evening, younger son and I were looking through some of the more recent shows out on Funimation and was seeing if there was something new he could watch without much vetting.
I came across this one.
I figured: “Oh. It’s a cute show about a country shrine maiden who wants to move to the city and her talking bear friend. Sounds cute. What could go wrong?”
And I’ve watched a bit of it and it is mostly fine. But the first episode I watched with my son.
Dammit anime…I trusted you. But you had to go there.
In the first episode there is an explanation by the village officer to the younger children about why the villagers and the bears in the area co-exist so peacefully. He tells a tale about how a villager (long ago) and a bear fell in love. But they couldn’t leave it there. They made the sexual part clear. Bear-on-human cunnilingus is directly implied, and almost shown (not to mention the kids imagining the Miko having this kind of relationship currently).
It was over in a moment, but all I could think at the time was:”Damn it! Why did it have to go there?!”
After that episode I told my son, no more of that show until it was fully “vetted”.
This was a failure of trust.
As a parent you try. You try and sometimes you fail. These were two such failures. A failure of memory and trust. Live and learn.
Until next time: Happy viewing!
*images contained on this post are not owned by this blog*
What Happens In Dimension W, Stays In Dimension W
Literally…
I found the dub of this show on Funimation. It is enjoyable, although not what I’d call a perfect show by any means.
Set in the future, humanity has found another dimension (which they obviously refer to as Dimension W) and they have found a way to harness limitless energy using an invention called “coils”.
The story follows Kyouma Mabuchi, an ex-military special ops soldier, who now shuns this new technology and hunts illegal coils for money. On a job, he encounters an android, Mira Yurizaki, who happened to be the android to the father of the coil technology. And from there the story develops.
Overall, it’s an enjoyable ride. I did find the finer details towards the end dealing with what Dimension W actually is, and what happened to the protagonist there in the past, a little convoluted and found myself hoping for more (and clearer) explanations. Also, another reviewer pointed out the fight scenes with Mabuchi throwing his darts with the wires attached could get a bit perplexing (where were those long wires??!!).
I liked the animation style overall. It was well done.
What I did find irritating (and this is a “me” thing) was the fan service with Yurizaki. It wasn’t extreme, and I know they do it so all the young otakus will buy her figurine later, but I found it pointless and distracting.
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I know, I know…It’s just what you find in anime, but it’s not always necessary.
I watched the dub of this, and it was very good. Christopher Sabat voiced Mabuchi and Jad Saxton voiced Yurizaki. The complete dub is available on Funimation’s streaming service.
Attention Parents: Overall the show isn’t too bad. There is some violence, but not excessive or bloody in particular. The fan service is mostly a half naked Yurizaki, which isn’t horrible, but I found it distracting and annoying more than anything. It does have a few disturbing ideas towards the end of what happened to survivors of an experiment gone wrong that might not be good for a young viewer.
Aside from some minor points, I enjoyed this show. The story is interesting, characters enjoyable, and the voice acting and animation were well done. A good watch over all.
Until next time, Happy viewing!
*the images used in this post are not owned by the blog*
My Older Son May Want To Kill Me, But…
As many who have read this blog before know that my son is a “You-Taite” (see Son Hacks Dad’s Blog Pt 1: Utaite/Youtaite – Basic Cover Stuff, I Guess) .
He just did a pretty good cover of the Kiznaiver OP! Check it out!
I’m a proud dad.
“Manny Tomoe” Will Debut At ACEN
There is something wrong with me… I accept and know this.
I got this idea last year that it would be really funny if I cosplayed as a magical girl, but didn’t even try to pass as female.
So who did I choose as my cosplay? Mami Tomoe!
Now, don’t get me wrong. This is no instance of disrespect. I love Puella Magi Madoka Magica. It is one of my favorites.
So much to both of my son’s horror and my delight, I went through with it. I have the whole outfit now and I will be wearing it next week in Chicago at Anime Central for the first time.
There are a lot of people who have been wanting to see this so, not knowing if I’ll remember to take pictures of myself while I’m at ACEN, I took a few today.
So Enjoy! and if you’re at ACEN, say “hi”.
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