Mistakes of Youth: The Blog (Powered by EXCELLENCE!)

Sunred was forsaken by the fansubbing community for a while after it hit, which is why I am thankful towards ANBU for being heroic enough to make this comedic gem available for English speakers. But along with praising their work, I do have a few bones to pick. Because that’s just how I roll.

But let’s start with the good. The translation they’ve stuck onto this show nearly perfect. While not 100% accurate, it captures the feel of the dialogue wonderfully. This is important, since Sunred derives a lot of its humour from just how conversational the script is, so a translation that reads exactly like normal English does wonders in helping the humour cross that often-difficult-to-breach linguistic boundary. It really is a shame that professional DVD translations don’t often reach this level of quality.

However, I think their translation localizes too much. Another thing that makes Sunred funny is how deep it plunges its heroes and villains into the stereotypically mundane Japanese lifestyle. As such, making the characters pay for things in dollars, as well as citing American brands as opposed to Japanese ones robs the show of its cultural flavour. Sunred thrives on references to local and nationally known things. This is a show that has three songs devoted to the city in which it takes place in, Mizonokuchi. I appreciate that they’re trying to communicate this same level of familiarity to American viewers by switching in American references, but it’s pushing things too far. They also make the characters swear too much. This is what I meant by “nearly perfect.”

Also, if they’re really shooting for professional quality on these things, why are they still doing ugly hardsubbed karaoke? Even the most newbie of new groups have gone to 100% soft subs.

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Tentai Senshi Sunred is, without a doubt, one of my most favourite comedy titles to hit in recent years. Along with all the other elements that come together to make each episode as funny as the last, there are two key things that make the humour really work–the voice acting, and the characters’ body language.

Sunred’s humour primarily relies on absurdity. It is a show about heroes and villains living typical mundane Japanese lives, after all. So rather than opting to have the characters deliver their lines in the typical polished anime voice acting style, they instead deliver with a noticeable level of naturalness. The voice acting isn’t rough or unpolished. Far from it. In fact, the acting is very good. However, the voices coming from the monsters and heroes in Sunred aren’t what you’d expect from heroes and villains, or the typical anime character. They’re the kind of voices you’ll hear if you speak to normal Japanese people.

It’s fair to say that the average Japanese girl does not sound the moe heroines that make up the bulk of female anime characters these days. By that same token, the average Japanese male does not sound like a brooding pretty-boy hero. Rather than mastering voices that are difficult to come by in the real world, the actors in Sunred instead deliver polished and professional performances that sound like, well, your buddies. However, in Sunred each character’s speech quirk is intentional. Things like mumbling are deliberate, and regional dialects are very much written in the script. Sunred’s punk-like cadence and Vamp’s near homosexual tone are especially well done. This perfection in delivering the imperfections of normal human speech is part of what drives home just how absurd the entire show is.

In addition to voice acting, the characters also have their own body language to match. While not the most well animated show, Sunred makes sure their characters express themselves both vocally and physically. In fact, the limited animation probably helps. Characters quickly changing between a few bold poses with no inbetweening does a good job of drawing one’s attention to the body language.

Much like the voice acting, the characters’ body language is also very natural. Convincing awkward mutters are matched with just as convincing fidgeting, and arguments between characters aren’t the typical talking-head shouting match. A great example of how well the body language works in Sunred can actually be found in the latest (not yet translated) episode–Sunred is confronted by another hero in a restaurant, and this hero asks Sunred for an awkward bit of advice. As the sketch begins, Sunred is looking around awkwardly, taking very annoyed puffs from his cigarette. This short cut of him just looking around, clearly looking as if he doesn’t want to be there, sets up the sketch perfectly.

Of course, what makes this all hilarious is that these are a bunch of freaks acting like normal guys. Especially a character like Khamenman, who sounds like some old guy, but still acts like a 20-something loser. The way in which these various factors contradict each other is key to how the show operates. And even though the show communicates quite realistic emotions through body language and voice acting, it doesn’t shy away from sweat drops or other examples of anime visual short-hand, which again contrasts nicely with all the stuff I’ve outlined above.

The are some other reasons why I find Sunred to be one of the best comedies out there, but this more or less covers why I think the show works as well as it does.

The anime calendar has been something of an addiction of mine for the past five years. It has gotten better over time–what was once four calendars a year has now turned into one–but I still love these things as much as I did when my set of coveted anime calendars arrived at my door during my senior year of high school.

For those who don’t know, the made-in-Japan anime calendars don’t really function as calendars. They’re giant B2 pads that contain seven pages illustrations; a cover page, and six other pages that cover two months each. Dates are shoved into a small area of each page, and aren’t easy to mark off to make a notes or something. These calendars are in effect a set of very nice posters that you change every two months, and what makes or breaks a calendar is obviously the quality of the illustrations at hand.

Generally the illustrations aren’t anything ambitious, but they tend to be a step up from generic stock artwork and sit more on level with anime magazine pinups. In the case of an otaku-oriented program like Sora Kake Girl, the pages of its respective calendar are all about the girls looking cute–often times in very little clothing.

The girls in Sora Kake Girl all sparkle with their own unique brand of cuteness, and each page does well to make sure their good sides are showing. These good sides are of course their breasts, butts and legs. Whether it’s Nami thrusting out her tight body while grinning maniacally, Itsuki adjusting her bikini bottom with her butt to the camera, or simply Akiha striking Japan’s favourite V-sign, each illustration is executed with professionalism.

It goes without saying that the quality of these illustrations is better than a random screencap. What’s on display here happily occupies the realm of DVD cover or Megami poster illustrations. The colours are rich and bright, and extra care is taken with the shading and lighting effects. The highlights glow, and the shades are made deeper with choice use of gradients. Dirty pencil lines are obvious up close, but that becomes a given when one’s room is filled with Megami posters. It’s nothing ambitious–like I said before–but it’s all well done.

There are some issues, however. Firstly, only five of the seven illustrations are originals (to my knowledge) and the remaining two are simply re-used Megami posters. They aren’t bad illustrations, but it is rather lazy. That said, the images are printed in the calendar’s larger dimensions, and their colouring comes out more brilliant than their respective Megami pinups’. Secondly, the paper isn’t really strong stuff. My Hayate no Gotoku and Zettai Karen Children posters from years previous were printed on more resilient stock. Because of this, the pages took something of a beating during shipping, and it shows if you look closely.

Putting those nagging issues aside, however, this calendar is a great buy if you’re both a fan of Sora Kake Girl and need a calendar for the year. It’s not the gold standard of anime calendars that Kyoto Animation calendars are, but it’s a nice set of cute T&A pictures to compliment all the others hanging up on your wall.

And since I couldn’t think of a good place to dump these, here’s some bad photos of each page. There’s no scan of this calendar to my knowledge, so if you want it, you have to buy it! Don’t worry! You still have until the end of February before that first page becomes useless!

Original Post

After running this comic by a few people last night, my hypothesis that I’m the only one who finds this comic funny was proven to be correct. It’s not terribly funny unless you find Shinbo getting on Yamakan’s case for storyboarding an episode of Chu-Bra funny, and I find that hilarious. I also think it’s funny for my cartoon avatar to pop out of the corner of the frame in his continuous journey to stalk Mr. Shinbo.

While I’m on the subject–and since I don’t think it really deserves a focused blog entry–Chu-Bra is somewhat disappointing. It is a little interesting how it’s taken a less fanservice driven route (don’t get me wrong, it still has a lot of panty-shots) and has instead decided to focus on the embarrassment that young girls feel about wearing underwear, as well as the mechanics of underwear. It’s interesting to make a show about these things in theory, but in practice it kind of falls flat, especially when I don’t find the characters to be that enchanting. So long story short, the show should be more about fanservice. I may stick around for Yamakan’s episode, but I’ll probably drop it.

That’s it! There may or may not be a comic next week. I haven’t sketched anything yet so I don’t know!

(Get it? He said “wah!”)

Tonight is Conan O’Brien’s last show as the host of the Tonight Show after just seven months of being on the air. But everyone knows that.

I’ve been watching Conan on-and-off since I was in middle school, and it really hurts to see him pulled in such a haphazard manner. Given that a good portion of my viewing diet is composed of anime series with set run-times, seeing a show I’ve  been watching for a good seven years get knocked off the air–and for stupid reasons–makes me feel a little down.

I won’t be able to watch his last show live as I don’t own a TV, but I’ll be sure to catch it on Hulu. Conan is undoubtedly one of the funniest entertainers out there, and I hope the same show he’s been putting on for nearly twenty years finds its way unharmed to another network.

Anime fans are known to often spout off Japanese they don’t know because they think it’s cool. Okay, sometimes they do know Japanese, and still spout off Japanese words. I do this, too. For instance, when I was in Japan, I’d often comment on how takai (expensive) everything was. While I did it half-jokingly, running Japanese words into your English speech becomes a habit once you spend enough time in Japan. So–as awful as this may sound to some–I think in certain contexts it’s okay to run Japanese words into English sentences. For instance, I think it’s fine to do this amongst other people who know the language while talking about concepts with no 100% direct translation. It’s almost fine in blog posts (though I think footnotes would have worked better).

However, when Jake Adelstein quotes his buddy as saying, “Omae, I’ve never seen anyone do that before and live to tell the tale.” in his book Tokyo Vice, I think something is wrong. Yes, he explains what omae means and its connotations (it’s a rude/familiar way to say “you”), and I can see the kind of tone he’s trying to convey with his translation, but this just shouldn’t be done in a professionally published book for mainstream readers. It would have been far better just to use “you” then note that in Japanese, the guy was using omae, and what omae means. People who don’t know Japanese won’t ever fully grasp the tone the man was taking whether or not omae was used in the translation, and those of us who know Japanese will be able to imagine said tone if “you” was used instead, and a note about the use of omae followed afterwords.

The book also uses fansubber favourites like senpai, kohai, as well as the infamous gaijin. I don’t think gaijin is even explained–it doesn’t really need to be, considering the book’s target audience–but it doesn’t hurt to be safe, right?

That said, about a fourth of the way in, Tokyo Vice is a pretty interesting look into a side of Japan that I don’t see talked about much, so to that end it’s a pretty good read. And it’s not like it’s badly written either, it’s just Adelstein’s use of Japanese puts me off, especially when he uses “comic book” as opposed to manga.

I’m sure he appreciates some guy on a blog that has a “Lolita Appreciation” category getting on his case over something so trivial!!

Orginal Post

You know, I’m not even going to say anything about what’s going on this fucking comic strip. I mean, it can easily just stand on its own without any explanation or commentary. But before anyone gets the wrong I idea, I did very much enjoy the first episode of SHAFT’s Dance In The Vampire Bund anime, and enjoyed the second episode even more. I’ll expand upon why I like them in a post that will hopefully materialize later on.

I’m quite happy with how the artwork turned out on this one, save for Rets’ dirty pose in the last panel, along with the fact that the background perspective may not make too much sense. If anyone who knows how to draw (Why would you be subjecting yourself to my crap if you knew how to draw?) has any tips or crits, drop ‘em here. Crits are welcome for every comic, actually. That’s how you get better, after all.

Next week’s comic isn’t sketched, but with hope I can get something out. I think we’re due for another Life and Times of Akiyuki Shinbo…

Having never seen nor read any of Higurashi no Naku Koro Ni, I had very little interest in Umineko no Naku Koro Ni when it was set to hit Japanese airwaves. However, while I was in Japan, a friend of mine insisted that we catch the show’s premier on TV, so I figured it wouldn’t hurt to give it a spin. Two cours later, despite the animalistic moaning of fanboys, I found the Umineko TV series to be quite good. Perhaps it’s because I have not yet partaken of the original visual novel, but I found the TV show to be a not-bad way to spend 24 minutes each week.

Before listening to a review of Higurashi, all I knew about the show was that it was a series of stories featuring recurring characters in which the continuity was reset each time. I just assumed all of these stories were standalone, but apparently they all have something to do with one-another. This being something of trademark for Ryukishi07, a similar thing is done in Umineko, and it happens to be one of the things I find the most fascinating about the series.

The way in which the story moves from a simple murder mystery into a Death Note style battle of wits between people who can walk between different thinly defined realms of existence while privy to the details of alternate continuities is really neat. The politics between the witches isn’t really focused on too much, but their interactions add another layer of intrigue to the story. The entire thing is underscored by unclear definitions of what’s real and what’s not, which serves to make things all the more exciting. All of this mixed together with some nice plot twists here and there makes for something of a satisfying viewing experience.

Fans of the novel complain about the show’s direction, putting forth that it doesn’t communicate the “feel” of the novel well at all, but I love it. I think the over-the-top handling of every ridiculous plot twist is part of what makes the show so entertaining. It’s kind of like Code Geass, I guess.

Umineko does suffer visually, but the novel does as well. For the anime, the character designs are actually drawn by a professional, but they just look generic. The actual animation really isn’t that bad, but it doesn’t stand out either–it’s simply average. It doesn’t really effect things much, except for the laughable fight scenes. The only real notably bad part about the show’s animation is how awful the colouring is. It really is just hideous.

One area in which the show does suffer in is characterization. The characters are merely meant to push along the narrative, and don’t leave much of an impression beyond the fact that some of them have nice tits. I suppose this is one area in which the novel is a lot better, since people seem to be quite attached to some of these characters, and I don’t understand why from just watching the anime.

I don’t see myself sitting down to watch this again, but it’s a good page turner for what it’s worth. If inspired I may pick up the visual novel, but I prefer sitting down and looking at moving pictures to sitting down and clicking through text on a screen.