How much is too much?

I’m a fan of fanservice, let that never be denied, but there’s a little (okay, a lot) bit wrong with fanservice as a bunch of pantsu-shots and a pan up from a girl’s chest and the enjoyment or hatred thereof. It’s an art; it’s all about where you look, and it’s done wrong if it’s all you see.

Now, I’m going to sound like I’m whining for a second, but maybe just a few too many anime per season have pantsu-type fanservice as their main focus rather than the characters themselves recently.

I’d say that that’s wrong, but, as with the camera, it’s about where the viewer focuses that changes the picture kaleidoscopically.

Example: K-on!, as much as I love the moé-blob that it is, is simply not about the characters for me. It’s about the moé, another type of fanservice. For once, stop thinking of Yui or Mio (I know it’s hard) and think about what you actually draw from the anime…. you hear that? It’s the sound of a cricket outside my window (very literally, actually). It’s the sound of your eyes focusing on characteristics rather than characters or plot, on sugar rather than seasoning. It’s the sound of eyes glazing over and thinking about how the characters act, which is a totally Japanese fixation that you’ve, sadly, now been diagnosed with.

Now for the opposite: my sister doesn’t get the moé at all. She just likes the songs and the instruments. So when she asks me to watch it with her, it’s a different experience because she’s in the room.

Anyway, this action of fanservice not necessarily being fanservice boils down to a simple question: what do we get from it?

Fanservice is what you make of it. Detailed mechs are a form of fanservice, but I’m not sure all of you watch Gundam and grin, bare-toothed at the loving care put into the plates of armor. Moé is fanservice, but it’s lost on younger viewers who just think ‘cute’ and look straight past it.

The problem with certain forms of fanservice, though, is that the viewer is distracted from drawing any real value from the anime. Take something like High School of the Dead for example and think about the plot rather than the gore and lingerie. Hard, isn’t it? I think it’s probably one of the better thought-out zombie-focused shows/films/anythings I’ve seen in years and that’s nearly all overshadowed by constant panties and gratuitous violence. It’s making up for something that it doesn’t even need to make up for.*

The fact is, Japan’s all about the service (once I got a free tire from a bike shop as 大サービス [great service] for taking my bike there), and every anime has it, but that leads to the final question: how much is too much?

Well, it’s up to you as the viewer, really. For me, it’s nice to have a soda or even a couple of them at a time, as long as they aren’t overloaded with sugar. The best example of this is ramuné, actually… I can’t have more than one of those at a time just because it’s too much sugar in one place, and it’s the same with fanservice.

Too much service and I kinda feel like I need to do something else for a while.

In the end, I’d rather as a viewer watch something like K-on! with my little sister, who, far from caring about the moé aspect, loves the show itself, than watch High School of the Dead alone in the dark with a Mtn Dew for company, no matter how sweet it is.

How about you? What’s your poison and dosage?

*For the record, I’ve read the manga, and I know it’s the same, but I’m of the opinion that the fanservice there was unnecessary in the first place (even if I enjoyed it).

Your palette in Classic.

Normally, I grandstand about all things Japan or anime, but recently I’ve taken a liking to a video game that has very little to do with either, unless you take the fact that people make pixel art of Red Mages in the classic mode.

I’m talking about Minecraft.

This gem is by an indie developer by the name of Notch, and it couldn’t be more perfect for passing the time or playing with friends. Some of you may have even heard of it by way of Team Fortress 2 or some other channel, but the real experience isn’t the fun little Lego-esque mode found free on the site but the paid Alpha version.

While some may whine that I’m suggesting they pay for something they can get for free, let me say fervently that this is far from true. The game itself has changed fundamentally from the cute little block-stacker you once played into a, well, survival-horror Lego game for lack of a better genre. Yeah, you heard me.

If that’s not enough to sell you on it (you’re a really hard sell, aren’t you?), the game’s developer just released an update adding multiplayer functionality to the Alpha mode, so very soon you’ll be able to run from zombies and build fortresses to weather the epic nights in-game WITH FRIENDS!

Yeah, you know you’re sold. Plus, I’ve got a server for the alpha and you’re invited once Notch irons out the bugs and gives me the ability to ban you if I need to (don’t start fires and you’ll probably be fine). Just… play it, love it, buy it, and comment if you want to get in on the server when they release a couple more updates!

<<<Minecraft>>>

Diplomas all around!

Negligence is ugly, isn’t it? The state of the blogosphere is such that if you don’t have anything to say, you poke a hole in the side of your brain and hope that after the blood and fluids run out, there’ll be a few words spilled onto the text editor. That’s not to say I dislike blogging. Au contrare, I’d like to continue this blog. Here’s the first post of said continuation.

I’ve graduated. Yeah, you heard me. Maybe not from anime, maybe not from my own nerdy-ness, but I’ve graduated.

Man, it feels good to say that.

But saying that leaves a couple of as-of-yet unanswered questions: where do I go after this? What’s an anime lover to do in the real world, at least for a few years?

Let me first talk about the state of this blog and what I’d like it to morph into. Yeah, it’ll stay the same as far as my talking about this, that and the other somehow related to Japan and my everyday experiences as an otaku and tech lover viewing the world around me with wide eyes and a loose wallet.

That said, I’d like to get your opinion on what kind of jobs would be good. I’ve applied to the big names despite pretty much knowing they wouldn’t take me fresh out of college. Square? Yeah. Nintendo? Sure. Valve? Not yet, but maybe if I really feel like pitching myself.

The truth is, jobs aside, I’d like to get more of a grip on Japanese as a language, and at this point there’s only one way to do that: self-study and motivation. I can do the former, but the latter? Judging by the fact that I haven’t posted in a while, you guys will probably rolls your eyes and make me 絶望する.

Which is why I’ve decided to do a bit more fan-subbing than the amateur stuff I’ve done a bit earlier with a group (I’ll never divulge the name, mostly because after about 10 episodes of subbing, it dissolved out of bitterness about the hierarchy and editing). So yeah, watch out fall anime season, here I come!

I say that, but even though I can translate, typeset, time, and style on my own, the fact is that it’s an utter bitch doing each and every one of those things over and over again week after week (it’s called a fansub ~group~ for a reason, right?). So, I need people to help on a weekly basis!

If you’re reading this and saying “huh… I’ve got experience translating, editing, or timing” or saying “hrm… I’ve got a fast internet connection for distribution or access to telesyncs” then I’d love to hear from you and hear why you’re good at what you do. If all that went over your head, then I’ll write another post soon!  お休み、皆さん！

A nice woodblock print, don't you agree?

Some links may not be safe for work, though all are tasteful, and reading the post itself will, of course, be fine for your health.

Recently, I’ve had some experience with Asian cinema that have led me to believe that the whole establishment has something to it. Influenced by postmodern views on the meaning of story and plot, the films have turned an eye inward and seriously examined themselves as singular works before considering what the audience wants as American films are wont to do.

Further than anime, which has intrinsic value as entertainment even when I’m just watching something more fanservicey than deep, and some Chinese action flicks, before recently I’ve found most Asian films to be, well, rather trite. However, my experience with Oldboy, as mentioned a couple of posts ago, started a sort of butterfly effect that ended with my downloading about seven Korean films and one Taiwanese film to round it off a bit and make it a nice, even number.

You’d think that, living in Japan at the moment, I’d have downloaded a couple of Japanese films.

That’s not the case. In fact, I’d venture to say that Japanese films, single-handedly, had turned me against the vast majority of Asian cinema by virtue of being the pithy works I referred to earlier. As a matter of preference, these campy films, interestingly so influenced by anime as a genre, have failed to capture my imagination in an inexplicable manner.

There can never be enough Eva in this blog

J-drama? Cute, but not my cup of tea. Live-action anime adaptations? I’ve seen enough of them to keep my cup full for a century.

However, Korean postmodern works? Chinese ones of the same persuasion? Absolutely wonderful.

I’m totally aware that Japanese cinema isn’t limited to what I’ve come to think of it as, but as a rule, I’ve come to force Japanese films into two categories. First, the psychological/classic (I’d sort most of them as falling somehow into the psychological category in one way or another) genre, covering such classics and singularly disturbing flicks as Noriko’s Dinner Table, Battle Royale, and a smattering of Kurosawa films. Secondly, the wannabe cartoons, which, in addition to any popular movies in Japan, include any tv programs as well and have effectively turned my attention far away from Japanese film, at least when they’re not personally recommended to me.

That manifesto so greedily eating up this post, let me move on to the reasons why Asian cinema, specifically Korean, has captured my imagination so fully in the last couple of weeks: just drawing from a small pool of movies that have come out in the last few years, I’ve managed to find myself enthralled more than once, saddened to the point of tears a couple of times, and, finally, thoughtful when I reluctantly reach the end of nearly all of them.

One thing I’ve found that I love about these movies is the lack of a cohesive ending. American movies, as a friend pointed out once to me, have some sort of obsession with ending. It’s as if wonderful characters and plots have suddenly fallen from His (the almighty and powerful American Viewer’s) grace. You’d be surprised how many people I’ve met who have literally staked all of their thoughts about a movie on its ending and if they didn’t like the ending, they’ve somehow managed to forget all the labors of love that have been put into the filming, the little moments, and the characters themselves who, more often than not, are their own works of art in a good movie.

This is what you expect from your endings, you pervs.

Sometimes, in the movie theater at home in America, I find myself watching a movie over and over again in the theater not because it’s such a wonderful movie, no, but because I find the treatment of the characters entrancing, or the journey that they go on intriguing, and usually I tune out the ending so much that I could only maybe give Cliff’s notes on it if pressed.

It’s surprising that someone such as myself who’d like to pride himself on his memory of trivial details finds himself rewatching a movie and struggling to remember how it ends, but that’s where my appreciation for anime and, yes, postmodern influenced cinema comes into play: the end is rarely what matters.

“What does this add up to, though?” you ask patiently as you’ve read this. “More than that, though, where are the names of these movies that you’ve so rabidly recommended so I can see if I agree with you at all?”

Okay – I’ll admit it. I seriously considered just ending this right there as a practical joke. Can you blame me after my rant? However, every one of the movies I’ve talked about in abstract here has an ending, thus I’ll give you a rundown of a couple:

This is what you get, and Im pretty sure some of you are still seeing something similar, you pervs.

First, Oldboy

Psychological, surreal, and supremely disturbing at times, this movie is the gold-standard for a true revenge film. It ends with a silent question: what is revenge and what constitutes the right to judge and subject another person to revenge, when few are guiltless, and many are more guilty than we even knew?

Second, Green Chair

Subtly psychological, slightly surreal, and always emotionally interesting, Green Chair, another Korean film, has an odd question it poses: what are the limits of age and experience on love? What exactly constitutes the choice to be in love as opposed to being controlled in a relationship by factors such as being misled by an older partner? The premise tells the viewer a little of what to expect: a 30-something woman and a 17-year-old man start a relationship which lands the woman in jail for seducing a minor, but to her surprise she finds him waiting for her as she exits the prison. The rest is a thoughtful treatment of a hard subject, and despite some jarring and dreamlike sequences, proves to be a movie worth watching, provided you can take the multitude of sex scenes (don’t worry, it’s tasteful).

Finally, 2046

Let me start this off by saying that Wong Kar-wai is a masterful director, even if you haven’t heard of many of his films. 2046, in my opinion, is one of his crowning works and can easily be compared to many great classics of the western world on equal footing. 2046, like the others, is very surreal. In fact, if you want coherence, this may not be the movie for you at all. Dark, scifi-esque, and tortured, the movie twists and turns and drops you off at the end slightly dizzy but begging for another ride, like any good roller coaster. However, if you’re one for easy-to-follow films, cross this right off your list. On second though, though, maybe you just need a hard kick to get you moving in the right direction…

Your choice, your opinion, and, hopefully, your comments will add a nice dénouement to this, so….

Visual Style? Check.

Before I go into my deeply personal confession of my love for something only slightly related to anime but totally related to Japan, I’d like to note that since the style has changed, back posts will be evermore oddly formatted. I’ve tried a couple of changes to offset this odd and noticeable change, but I’d like you as the reader to bear with it. That in mind, これを始めようか？

I noted to a friend a couple of days ago that I’m an absolute whore for the Final Fantasy series. Anything they throw at me I hoard greedily like some sort of dragon.

The most recent example of this was when I borrow my brother’s Final Fantasy XII and, after playing about 15 hours, realized my abiding love for it and immediately went out and bought my own copy. Was this necessary? Of course not! Buying an extra copy of any series of games, especially when your brother isn’t going to ask for his copy back is ludicrous.

Or is it? If you’ve been keeping up with your Squenix (because I’m guessing that’s how you actually write that bastardization of Square-Enix), you’ll know that the company’s been struggling to put new IPs on the market. Sure, they have a thriving business at the moment, but also, if you’ll note, that’s been from nice products like FFVII:AC on PSP, FFVII on PSN, FFIV:The After Story on WiiWare, FFIV on DS, and… are you noticing a pattern here? That’s right. They’re all old news. Maybe new takes on old news, but if I wanted that I’d go to a fan fiction website and read to my heart’s content.

No, this isn’t right… what happened to the Squaresoft I knew and loved? Nothing, it seems, as you’ll soon know if you

Let there be no mistake: I bought a PS3 for FFXIII. Maybe I’ve been partly betrayed with the whole cross-platform thing, but I’m all for the single-disc, Japanese voiceover, bluray durability of the PS3 release, so I’m willing to mostly overlook that horrifying E3 announcement of yesteryear. However, since then, the game itself has been fading my mind more and more until it’s just become a “sometime in the near future” sort of thing.

However, E3 2009 happened to drop this by:

Now, I’m not one to gush, but that single-handedly sold me on the Japanese voiceovers and secured my purchase of the game in Japanese as well as English (another time a pointless purchase will burrow deep into my wallet because of Final Fantasy). And you know why this is?

It’s not for the games, no.

It’s not for Japan, no.

You’re right. It’s because, if I could, I’d have Square’s baby.

Another masterful piece of cinema, though, was… I’ll give you a hint:

Is that a new Eva pilot?

For more on that, take the jump and

Another Mari pic, because I want to see more of her

So, if you haven’t yet realized, what I watched, on opening day, giddy with excitement and munching on the first real popcorn I’ve had in months, was none other than Rebuild of Evanglion 2.0: You Can (Not) Advance, which, I must say, was one of the most masterful anime films I’ve ever seen. Also, fans of the original will be surprised that this isn’t just a simple retelling of a tired story. No, this is something different.

If you’d like to talk about this with me, please send me an email at zjheines@(nospam)gmail.com and I’ll discuss the movie with you in full detail, but for those of you waiting for a shaky cam release, all I can say is that I salute you, and whenever the Blu-ray comes out in Japan, I’ll be the first one to have a watch party back in the states.

Because it’s just that beautiful.

In case some of you weren’t aware, and you really should have been, Zach has recently gotten himself over to Japan (Kyoto, specifically).

I don’t know about you, but for him, it’s basically a dream come true. This semester is like an academic wet dream for him, come to life. The difference? It’s not just in his pants. It’s everywhere.

That sounded wrong.

Anyway, I’m pretty sure we’ll all be seeing tons of new content from him. Zach will be on anime/manga/Akihabara overload, and I somewhat selfishly expect to benefit from it. Consider this a challenge to our favorite geek of all things Japanese; I’m not sure if it’ll see the light of day, as I’m just a contributor for the blog and have to submit everything for review from Zach, but if so, more power to him. That’ll mean Zach has balls… otaku balls. Made out of old crushed up old Nintendo cartridges, or decapitated pokemon, or something.

You’d be surprised exactly how much an ending can make or beak an anime. As I began to rewatch Evangelion, I mentioned to my friends who I watched it with that how they felt about the anime would be almost completely colored by their feelings about its ending.They looked at me skeptically, as if I was telling them something kind of preposterous, especially since they were enjoying it so far.

But as the End of Evangelion ended last night at 2am, and Asuka uttered “Kimochi warui,” the looks on their faces said it all; they weren’t sure about whether they liked it or not. The truth is, they felt betrayed. They understood a good part of what was said, but on the whole, they didn’t feel like it provided the closure. This begs the question, though: is “closure” owed to us? Do all great animes even have “closure”?

The answer here is probably “no,” not at all. I won’t tell you any spoilers, but many great, great animes have endings that could be considered “disappointing” or “unresolved.” Though, that isn’t the problem with Evangelion, is it? No, the problem with Eva is that we feel it’s superfluous. All we want is characters that fall in love and a superficially happy ending. Not a psychological breakdown, not symbolism, not the director’s vision of what a “true” ending should be.

And thus, “we,” the otaku fanbase, sent our hate-mail to Hideaki Anno. We watched the last two episodes of Eva and we got a headache. We want our quick fix, not something we need to sit down and talk about afterward.

Another story that has done this to me recently, once I think about it, is Persona 3. The ending wasn’t a mind (insert expletive), it was an emotional catharsis based on what you had done so far in the game and the connections you made. Having it any other way would have not been true to the game, and thus I argue that the ending of Evangelion was true to the show.

Don’t get bogged down in the symbolism, the angels, or even the side-characters. Evangelion was about Shinji Ikari and how he viewed the world. In fact, we have a couple of episodes where we just see Shinji indulging in his emotions, running away, or being scared. As much as we love Asuka and Rei, they’re just the musketeers to Shinji’s d’Artagnan. While we may love them for all their flaws and antics, they’re not the main story.

The main story is Shinji’s circumstances and whether he will accept them for what they are or, well, run away. If you view it this way, even the Angels are a side-story, as are all those awesome battles. I’m not going to explicitly state that this is an apt metaphor for life, because that would take too much time to do justice to, but I will, however, say that when you watch a show, try to think of what it’s really about and whether the ending truly fits it as it presented itself, or whether you were fooled into liking a show because of an ending catered to you.

Anyway, here’s a shoutout to great endings, in no special order:

1. Here’s lookin’ at you, Mahoro.

2. I’ll always love you, Chise.

3. I’ve got a feeling.

And, of course, Eva.