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

Story is, almost a month ago I got the March issue of Megami from J-list. The mag came in one piece, but was kind of bent up due to a poor choice in shipping materials (a thin as fuck paper envelope with DO NOT BEND written on it in black Sharpie.) Once I got back into contact with my Friend in Japan, I complained to him, and he in turn complained to the rest of company. Minutes later I received an email from a J-list employee offering to replace the damaged magazine. However, they were out of issues of March Megami (I took the last one w) so he offered to send me the latest issue. I immediately canceled my order for this new issue on Animenation and took up the good man’s offer.

This is probably the most value I’ve gotten out of an issue of Megami, since I hung up all the posters except for one. Pretty good, especially since I paid absolutely zero for it. It is at this point that I’d like note favourite posters, but all of them are so good that I’d just list them all. A good lead up to issue 100, which is sure to be quite epic.

Also, I tried to put all of these up without taking down in posters. After some slight rearranging of things, I managed to get them all up, and as such I’m nearly out of wallspace. Eventually I’ll take new pictures of my otaku lair, complete with the hug pillows and bedsheets I normally hide when I’m at home– just for the full experience.

Liking where the flash is falling in that last pic.

I’d love to put up the Kure-nai poster, but I’m currently in my parents’ house, and the Kure-nai poster is one of a naked seven-year-old taking a bath. I mean, I’m already pushing it with the Kojika and Yotsunoha posters. I also ordered the March Megami from J-List because it had that poster of Kokonoe Rin covered in nothing but chocolate. Won’t be able to put that one up, either.

Yay

I have no idea when I’m going to colour this. Probably soon, though. I’m experimenting with defining various background elements in pencil, rather than drawing the whole background on the computer later. I feel it might make the picture seem more unified, or something. Going to go for a “painted” look here. Colouring would probably be easier with a tablet, but I’ll make due with my mouse… I really need a tablet. I should set up a PayPal donation thing, or something.

Not much now. Will update when new things have started.

Current
Chii’s Sweet Home: Three minutes of stuff.
Ghost Hound: I don’t really care about this one anymore. Almost over.
Hakaba Kitarou: Subs have slowed down. Still decent entertainment with above-average art direction.
Kaiji: HOLY SHIT TISSUE BOXES THIS SHIT IS WILD
They Are My Noble Masters: Bleh.

Finished/Almost Finished
Clannad: Rushed but acceptable ending. I hope this after-story thing won’t be too long… but I suppose having questions answered would be nice.
Dragonaut: One episode to go. As horrible as this show was, I don’t regret watching it, since it was one of the funniest things I’ve seen in a while.
Hayate no Gotoku: I’d welcome 50 more episodes. Nagi~
Minami-ke ~Okawari~: Yeah, I’m thinking asread didn’t get their Shuffle! budget for this one. Looks good, but moves awkwardly. Ending was fine.
Rosario + Vampire: One episode left. Decent for a crappy show.
Shakugan no Shana II: lol
Wolfy Spices: Well thank god that’s over!!
Zoku Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei: Waiting for Strato to sub the rest, but finished it raw. Very difficult to understand raw ;__;

Reading
Shinigami no Ballad: Past the deadline for the review, so trying to finish this one up. Works better as a cartoon.

Reading some KnJ chapters when they surface, and just finished another wonderfully confusing volume of Trigun MAXIMUM. I still have volumes of GSG unread, am almost caught up on OTAKU USA issues and have lots of unread Macias books from Christmas.

Can anyone recommend me any manga series that aren’t adaptations/have been adapted into an anime that I may like? I kind of wanna be an elitist manga reader, hur. Extra points if it’s not shoujo and not over 10 volumes.

Anime World Order may not want to admit it, but lolita characters and the exploitation of said characters have been part of Japanese cartoons and comics since the 1970s, and probably even further back than that. What we can all probably agree on is that at the turn of the century this exploitation became a lot more shameless and rampant– and right now in 2008, such shows have become par for the course when it comes to a season’s anime offerings.

I can’t really talk much about the manga side of things, but when it comes to modern anime, the types of lolita fanservice you get can be divided into roughly two groups: 1) Older characters who look younger than they are (your Manabi Straights and your Lucky Stars) or 2) Characters who are actually proper children and look it (your Kyou no Go No Nis and your Kodomo no Jikans). There are various ideas and thought processes that go behind the exploitation of these characters as sexual objects– in the case of number 1, the fact that they’re actually older is meant to lift that latent feeling of guilt. It almost makes it ok for one to be attracted to them, since after all, they’re 18! Number 2 is meant to cater to the more hardcore lolicon, the guys that want as close to the real thing as possible without sharing a cell with the other Miyazaki. But this entry isn’t really about that kind of stuff at all– what I want to talk about is the honesty lolita/pedo fanservice.

When I say honest loli fanservice, I mean stuff that’s true to life. In the case of number 1, this doesn’t exist at all. It’s meant to pander– pure, simple and guilt free. However, in the case of number 2, there is a degree of honesty. Not just in the fact that the characters are proper kids, but in that kids actually do talk about sex a lot.

The kinds of discussions found in Kodomo no Jikan and 5-2 are played up as lead up and/or accessories to the fanservice, but I don’t think anyone can really deny being at least interested in such things when they were younger. I remember being as young as 7-years-old when the word “sex” first made its rounds throughout the classrooms. In grades 3 through 6 we would often ponder this mysterious act and its ramifications with a great amount of interest. Shows such as KnJ and 5-2 really do a good job of bringing back this feeling of wonder and interest in things such as the idea of sex to a young kid. Probably more so with 5-2, since the sexual element in KnJ is played up more for the boners than anything else.

I’m not really saying normal people shouldn’t find such fanservice any less reprehensible, but there is something to be said in the honesty in shows such as KnJ and 5-2. Sure it’s for perverts, but it’s true! And that’s part of what I like about it.

2007 was really fucking uneven. The first few months got by on the better titles that carried over from 2006, but between April and August it was something of a wasteland. I managed to get my fix for good modern anime by way of genius works such as Gurren Lagann and Hayate no Gotoku, but all the other offerings during that period of time where somewhere between mildly amusing to plain bad. Thankfully, August saw the debut of Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei and Zero No Tsukaima 2, both of which restored my faith in the industry somewhat. October once again impressed with Minami-ke, Kaiji and Clannad.

What follows will be something similar to my monthly posts, but for the Year In Review, I’ll be ordering things by quality using letter grades, starting from the worst to the VERY BEST. I cover a lot of shows in the post, but it’s not everything I watched during the year.

Here’s my rankings.

(more…)

Anime sure has changed over the past 25 years!

Wow, I decided to watch Cobra on the year of its 25th anniversary and totally didn’t realize it. Spooky.

Trailer

A very promising trailer which gives me high hopes for the animated series. All the animation looks very fluid and energetic, and it should be given the manga it’s based off. Actually, provided the production values stay high, and they don’t botch up the story, this may be better than the manga! The manga fails on some counts simply because it doesn’t move. KnJ is a work which demands movement. I’m still a little unsure on what the overall quality will be, given it’s coming from newbie Studio Barcelona. The did a passable job on Dai Mahou Touge, and seem to be doing a fairly exceptional job on Nanatsuiro Drops four episodes in. Let’s hope they keep getting better.

Here you are

Is this a lost cause yet?

Sorry for the delay, but here is chapter 12!

Here is a scanslation

Mention SaHa and I’ll black list you as spam

Go nuts.

Here you go you disgusting lolicon perverts who fap to images of little children being sexually handled by adults you bunch of disgusting weirdos

Also, you may notice there’s no comic today. Sorry.

Here.

It actually went up yesterday. Silly me. 8 in the works.

Chapter 6 can be acquired like so.

The super secret scanslation group does it again! Second prototype chapter is available for download.

Type setting was so much easier in Photoshop 7! I guess my CS2 getting mad at me was a good thing.

Be sure to give big thanks to the translator and editor! They did most of the hard work :)

Super Secret Scanslation Group has put out the “test run” chapter of Kodomo No Jikan. The second “test run” chapter is on its way, then after that we’ll do the rest of the series. Nothing to fear though, I’m just the typesetter. Someone who actually knows Japanese is doing the translation.

Also, if you missed chapters 1-5, they can be acquired thusly.