idiosyncreant | Entries tagged with reviewage

I am rereading Chalice, for the first time, after some time since my first reading.

And it is amazing me. Here is a book that is a maze to get into because it is full of the ways situations can be impossible, and life can be dreadful through a maze of little things.

And this is not something fantasy usually deals with.

It’s a book about the suddenness of having to Become…an analogy for being an adult maybe, but more an analogy of any taking up of a role you weren’t ready for. A working girl. A father. A governor.

Because I am intuitively reconstructing what I had trouble putting together the first time, I’m not distracted by the worldbuilding. I remembered it being a lot about a girl just doing her best, and meaning well, and that being powerful. Like a grown-up version of Wizard’s Hall (one of my favorite of children's literature).

I did remember this text takes McKinley’s parentheticals to a new height. But it’s also grounded in a different way than her earlier books set in the traditional country setting.

McKinley’s always loved the flora and fauna, the real work of the country, but from her gardening and life in England (even just her maturity), it’s taken on a depth, a texture, that is even more genuine. It is integral to the heroine's nature, her ways of thought.

I think the first time I read this I was depressed and overwhelmed enough that the catharsis wasn’t really noticeable—my distance now from the headspace Chalice is in makes me much more appreciative of her quiet heroics. And the slender but growing line of her connection with the Master. It’s really artfully done. And it is probably one of McKinley’s best fantasies (though there are a couple I still haven’t read), in being a story about just about humanity while being set in a fairy-tale sort of world.

seeing

charismitaine geeking out over the Lord Peter Whimsy (on Tumblr and elsewhere) as well as wanting to get a better edumacation

I read Gaudy Night yesterday.

Allow me to backtrack. I was very interested in the series, it seemed like the hero was quite my favorite type. So i got a copy of "Whose Body" and...just couldn't get on with it.

There was a glimpse of the appeal I'd been expecting, but the syntax was cloudy and maybe I also wasn't quite in the mood.

At the library some time later, though, I was in a rare mood for mysteries (though this rare mood has settled more and more frequently until it's becoming more an alter-ego--my mom's genre finally emerging in my blood!) and since the local library I don't love as much as my Heart Library over toward Tulsa has a section full up of them, I looked for one of the series with Harriet Vane

this is actually cleverly put in this edition's heading, for the series "Lord Peter Whimsy mystery with Harriet Vane"

But I looked this one up, and while it wasn't the first book with her, it was the first mystery she's helping to solve that's not her own personal problem, and the opening was less muddy, so I took it home.

Have His Carcase was much better reading, though I found some of the descriptive passages glazed my eyes over. (It's a problem with me. The writing was not problematic, except for my preference.)

I enjoyed it, though I found the Agatha Christie, with Miss Marple, a bit lighter-going.

Gaudy Night was mentioned as a favorite by several people, though, so I went into it quite optimistically, having ordered it because I was in the mood. Also, I was promised a resolution to the love-line, which I must say weighs quite heavily with me...
Now I've read it I'm ready to go back and read all the others.

It is DELIGHTFUL.

And I'm definitely going to say, there's a competence difference. In fact, it reminded me of The Bee-Keeper's Apprentice books, which are some of my top favorites of recent reads, across any genre. Part of this lies in the college-setting. The charm of Oxford becomes a charm of the book, as well as its personality.
If I were to hear Laurie R. King say that Gaudy Night did not influence her series at all I would be very surprised...and a little skeptical.
The Bee-Keeper's Apprentice was the work of a practiced writer, where Whose Body has the feeling of a writer with a definite style in mind but a rather heavy hand with it. In both Guady Night and Have His Carcase, the style works, but is lighter, more natural and fluid. Whimsy's style of speech is an idiosyncracy that does not fool Harriet by this point, so maybe that helps.

I think Harriet is a great point-of-view character for Sayers, too. She's got a different vantage point on Whimsy, and while I had to put together pieces of how that came about, I enjoyed the tension of their close relationship that was to an extent an undesirable for her...and him, too, at times.

I loved the philosophical digressions, so necessary to a room full of professors (and again, one of the things I loved most about A Monstrous Regiment of Women.)

Wanted to write up my thoughts, in case anyone else wanted to discuss any of them! Or just the series in general. I'm going off to order an earlier volume...

I went to see Brave several weeks ago, and meant to post about it soon after.

Then there was a rage-y discussion among some people I follow on Twitter which disheartened me, and I didn't. But I read a link from

naamah_darling's Tumblr (yes...I only read the link. Heh) and felt better.

So I'm going to do it now!

***

( a side-ramble about the heroine's appearance and its meaning. Because lo, it is actually important )

***

This movie's tone (as far as the history setting) resembled How To Train Your Dragon more closely than anything Pixar's done before. It had a large, communal cast of a specific culture, somewhat cartoonfully drawn.

To me, this was fun, because I ADORE HTTYD.

It was not so much an action epic, but a hijinks tale. And I think that disappointed me a little. However, I really love how exploring different kinds of stories from the Disney formula works for them. And this story was one with a lot going against it--retelling of obscure fairy tale, in a much-storied familiar culture without a clear villain.

I had a *great* time in the movie, though. Don't let this rambling fool you. The soundtrack was just real enough in its Celt sound that my heart soared instead of saying, "Really?" The forest (and hilariously accurate rocky ground) for the setting was gorgeous. The people were caricatured in ways that were cartoony, but believable.

This wasn't a girl-power story, or not in any pre-conceived way. It was focused on family. The main relationship being threatened was that of the heroine and her mother. A conflict, unlike many movie-conflicts, that we all have to navigate eventually as we figure out who we are without just accepting our own mothers' way. One that often means discovering we don't have such great ideas of how to do it ourselves...

My sister was talking about how Merida is a daddy's girl, how hilarious her and her father's interactions are. This is something I hadn't really thought about myself until she mentioned it, but Merida is not just some spunky girl. She's a girl who wants to be like her dad, rather than her mom. Their senses of humor are more similar.

Her mom clearly has to live being the odd man out in their community at large, and yet that's what makes her presence commanding.

I think one of the things that made the movie ultimately satisfying to me was that though it did not turn into a Merida-You-Go-Girl story--she AND her mother discovered different ways of power.
Merida's competence in the wild. Her mother's air of queenliness and comfort with commanding. They both had to recognize these things in the other.

I thought it was great to give the mother a clear role of power from the beginning. I thought it was great they didn't steal away the heroine's long-developed awesome.

Also, this movie has the most beautifully animated horse of ALL TIIIIIIIIME
and one of the most beautiful depictions of a draft horse I have ever seen, period.
So, keep that in mind.

My sister today said, "I've wanted to be in a boy band for a long time" as a response to a K-Pop conversation,

which made me realize OF COURSE that we had to start watching You're Beautiful together immediately.

So we watched Episode 1. Which 1, now I've watched more K-drama, is so much more hilarious! It's one of the episodes I've skimmed through in any rewatches. I also feel sure some of it was a little expanded from the original? It seems plausible, with it's wild success, that they may have cleaned up the editing a bit.

Anyway--she laughed aloud several times, and I admired the costumes aloud even more, and all was fabulous sunshine and unicorns.

"Aha, so SHE'S a noona-killer," sissy commented, and the fact that she knows the phrase noona-killer from me, primarily, made that all the more funny.

***

ETA:
she asked me, a couple hours later:
"Any reason we can't watch episode 2?"
SUCCESSSSSS

I am feeling gross-ish, so I started watching a new shojo anime.

As you do.

I am also watching it on my phone because my computer seems too bulky to be comfortable.

(When did I get rid of my last pair of fat-pants?

Anyway, it looked intriguing and fluffy. Surprisingly good, though in the exactly fluffy way I'd expected (it's amazing how you can do it wrong, yes, I'm looking at you Mei-chan No Shitsuji).

It's got: isolated girl, magical blood, butler guy, elite rich people. It's the remix that's fun.

The heroine is waaaay tsundere, because she's been picked on as the rich girl all her life. Already that's fun, one of those as the viewpoint character, instead of a friend-sidekick. She moves into this elite mansion*...to try and discipline herself out of her sarcastic ways. Finds herself assigned one of the Secret Service guys that are part of the building. Twist: they're all, SS and resident, part youkai.

Slow build-up right now, but that's fairly usual for a fantasy shojo comic, which it is based off. I would actually really like to get my hands on that. I am only two episodes in.

(*accidentally used the Japanese transliteration here: it means apartment, like in a high rise. I'm not sure why that's the word used, or exact application)

Posted via LiveJournal app for iPhone.

I'll keep this one short and sweet, but I'm sorry guys

I'm pretty sure Sokka is the best, and the Avatars and bitter Firebending princes (that...sounds naughty to me for some reason) can go off with their emotions and heroics while we giggle in an igloo.

Just so's you know.

***
OMG
I JUST FIGURED OUT
HE'S JIRO WANG
like if there was a t-drama of this he would play Sokka, if he wasn't already a leads actor, sob, though, sob he could also totally play Aang

because the Taiwanese specialize in agebending

Posted via LiveJournal app for iPhone.

I watched Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull last week, and it was fun, Shia was adorable (can't say the same in this latest Transformers, he's kinda an ass) and the aliens camptastic...

I think I know why people didn't think it was awesome.

I think it's because they forgot that the originals were kinda cheesy and politically incorrect, since they've lasted long enough to become iconic.

There were definitely some problematic things (seriously? indigenous peoples as props?) but I thought it was on about par with the first, which I watched earlier this year. LOVED the library parts.

full disclosure: this is the level I've played and won on Lego: Indy, before I saw ANY of the movies.

***

TRON
was fascinating, because I knew it was prime nerd material, but that somehow had not prepared me for the utter seriousness of it. It's a movie that was quite as earnest about it's SF plotline as Star Wars, and played off the limits of its CG as a sort of aid to the atmosphere.
It also starred an adorable Jeff Bridges (to think I'd ever say that! ...I met him as Obadiah in Iron Man, so) who was completely wasted once in the program-gladiator suit, because his dimples were only rarely in appearance and his face desaturated, and there was no awesome 80s curls...

I'm planning to watch the recent sequel soon. Don't bother saying don't bother, it's RESEARCH.

Posted via LiveJournal app for iPhone.

rhinemouse recommended Puella Magi Madoka Magica (or, as subtitled in Japanese, Magical Girl Madoka Magica) and I realized, okay, I'm almost out of Maid-sama! episodes, lets look at whether Crunchy roll has it.

Wow, Rose. I deserved the agony of a new thing on my roster of things to watch, it's karma--but this is a much better anime (even just in the first episode) than I have seen in a long time.

It's creepy and beautiful. The portrait of her life and city and school is so idyllic it screams horror, because soon there must be blood everywhere, it's just the narrative law.

It's also the first time I've ever been able to hear this particular kind of cutesy girl voice in a main character and not shut the window down--it works somehow in the dream world (in several senses) that this story is in.

I'm already afraid of finding out about the destruction of this magical girl trope I was warned about--the sinister edge of the magic world so far is less of an edge and more of a cleaver-blade.

I'm sure I'm the last one to have anything to say about this, but

THE NEW JANE EYRE

is bloody beautiful, to start, much like the newest Pride and Prejudice. Only less warmly lovely. The differences reflect the differences in tone, just as it should. A harsher, more glaringly lit beauty, with deeper shadows.

Not too on-the-nose Gothic, but as much as is necessary to be true to the storyline...

Another young director, trying to produce an artsy film, and succeeding pretty well, by getting the resources for doing a big book-to-film project, it seems. I've seen parts of several adaptations, so in a way I had to notice the craft, the way it went together. But for a story I know so well, the storytelling completely sucked me in.

Oh, can I tell you? The way they decided to script this movie is BRILLIANT.

Like a modern Gothic, we have an opening that's really in the middle of the story, that slowly shows the background which the older form of novel would find necessary to set landscape, social context. It also brings in sweeping color, and emotional tone, right from the start.

The casting is likewise clever. One of the stumbling blocks for Jane is the "little and plain" descriptor. And yet we have to believe she's captivating. Mia Wasikowska is a kind of pretty that would probably have decimated the Season of bachelors for other girls, and so we can watch her, but she doesn't have the "I'm beautiful" awareness of a more trendy beauty. She has the capability to be odd and fey. I never questioned either her silences or her outbursts. Which is kind of amazing. It's a range a little hard to follow on the page, honestly.

And Michael Fassbender is chilly, manipulative, and yet heated on a physical level where he sells a man who hates himself, and yet is willing to go to all lengths to provide himself a happiness. The contrast and yet connection between them is something he creates so well (as Rochester is supposed to) and his manic-depressive range makes sense of things the way Mia's acting does for Jane.

It's not a seamless film, there was no way around the awkwardness of arriving back at a point we'd previously seen at the beginning, in chronology, but it was an artfully arranged one.
The weird interlude at the Rivers' is one that feels so abrupt and far from the rest of the narrative--and the movie plays this into a bridge that while still a little weird, is thematically apt.

I think this is fundamentally why I'm so thrilled with this movie. It made me believe in the story again, feel the power and emotion of it, which some of the awkwardness and realities of it had stripped down. The deftness shown here in making Jane Eyre a real film, standing on its own, just makes me nerd out about stories all over again.

(also this bonnet is *gorgeous*--the way they chose to do period with this was just enough it felt a little alien to the usual BBC Regency, since it's NOT, and just that step further into a different world)

The exact moment they chose to end it was just right. It left out a part that some may feel important to the book's story, but essentially didn't matter to this version. It's bold, and I thought, "Yes, good job."

EVERYONE

THIS SHOW
THE FINALE IS AMAZING

AND NO ONE IS WATCHING IT

I should have just watched it at the time, but even watching it, what? A year later? It's moving, and pitch-perfect, and just as sad and happy as the opening episode was, all at the same time.

gah.

What am I going to do with myself now?
It's the kind of finish to something that destroys you and also fills you with a relentless energy.

Actually, the only thing I could possibly face doing right now is setting the twist on my yarn and then writing.
Which...
is not a bad deal.

STILL
CITY HUNTER

I actually watched the first fourth of this last, due to a screw-up on the upload of subbed videos. I think this may have been a good thing, for reasons I'll explain later...

This show promises to be compelling. Not in a sudden, plot-racing way, but in treatment and mood. I've wanted to check out this director's work after hearing about Vampire Prosecutor (which was not as camp, but also not as humorless, as you might think from the title. Apparently) and the posters for this were so...evocative.

It's a time-travel drama in a season of time-travel dramas, but this has the personality to pull it off...

A hero who, when transposed in time, reels a second, but then carefully asks a question to try and discern what's happened, knowing it's something outside his experience. He's an intelligent, intuitive person--he's not going to crash around, flailing through his assumptions.

The heroine is apparently ditzy, if resourceful, and dedicated to being an actress (which, no doubt on purpose, never looks too distinguished onscreen) but her cute manner belies a sharp edge that can cuss out an ex--and accept a job got through his connections.

The thing with the opening: sageuk, the Korean equivalent of a Western, or more realistically, wuxia drama, is fond of its trope-laden openings. I watch fusion sageuk for the crossover fantasy elements present in the ones I've picked out. I haven't yet learned to enjoy the sameness.

This is where the service of missing the actual opening lies: when I got plopped down into a political debate first moment, I knew I'd missed something, figured an intro got cut off. I am pretty quick on the uptake, and know a bit about the premise, so it wasn't a problem. The beautifully lit moonlit horse-chase wasn't particularly new, but I liked the next library fight (in the familiar Scholar's Library of Sungkyunkwan). Despite the fact that I wasn't sure any scholar would allow wreckage of such hard-won manuscripts...

Anyway. I will not make big claims for this show yet, but I have a feeling it's going to be nuanced enough to really hit a spot that nothing I've watched recently has... Being unimportant but not dumb.

Posted via LiveJournal app for iPhone.

I~nteresting.

I can see why they altered the time-line of the initial part a little, to make it more punchy, and maybe going a bit more toward the cliche action anime opening is why it grabbed its audience.
However, I do kind of enjoy the bizarre set-up stage, and thought this episode lacked a little of the personality and mystery of the original.

I think the English translation smoothed out some of the odd clashes of diction. Then again I do NOT know much about genre conventions of language in Japanese. I just know how delightfully odd they are transposed into English...

I do like the Japanese voice actor, though his voice is SO familiar it's a little startling... And yet, I don't think I've watched anything else he's done. Just one of those voices, I guess. Rukia? I'm going to have to adjust. I have a suspicion I'd like her better in English.

[ETA: The second episode delves a little into the life Ichigo has, but again, lacks a little of the commonplace atmosphere in the nuance of the original. I'm ENJOYING it, it's just interesting because usually I don't like the original manga so clearly more than the adaptation...]

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Unlike Greygallows,

timeripple's romance recommendation, "Lord of Scoundrels" did not arrive with a horrifyingly gauche cover. I was a bit disappointed. It also was not a large-print edition. There is always a trade-off...

Well, to start with, from the outset this was Not Your Georgette Regency. Though it maintains a certain composed diction that one expects (and can relax into) from this set of historicals, it also established right from the prologue that it was going to be unflinching about the realities usually alluded to more coyly.

( the meat of the matter )

I know that I've talked exclusively about the hero. The heroine was markedly well-adjusted for a romance heroine! In a way, it was a story about the making of the hero, as opposed to the romance making the heroine. Bravo for that: it's one of the stream of choices made to not go the easy route but go the INTERESTING one.

Having a hero get all the complexes? LOVE IIIT.

I've been working through this book, which was a gift from

fabricalchemist some time ago.

Long overdue for some kind of structure to push through a dry spell, and not finding anything in my usual avenues, I cracked it open at the same time I decided to cut my Internet entertainment way back for a while.

I hadn't looked at it at all, but finding out it was going to involve journaling a significant amount, I was okay to try it. I would have time freed up anyway.

It's got a pop-psychology tone, but at the same time it jives with what I know already about the creative pursuit:
If you don't make yourself sit down to it, nothing happens.
If you sit down, but you just live in a state of criticism about what you do, it doesn't go anywhere.
Using your creativity is a mandate, not a luxury.
And most importantly, if you don't take care of your own soul, your own self, you are fighting a deficit from which to try and create.

I'm in the middle of week three, continuing to be surprised by how relevant it is to me, and how much a little attempt to change my attitude can lighting things up.

I think just whining into a diary for a while every morning let's me start thinking about something else the rest of the day, for starters...

( some more personal realizations--weight, guilt topics )

Eggs Under the Moon by Elizabeth Barette
a light poem that borrows recognizable Earth-imagery for a fantasy concept, to bring home the importance of that same seed.

This poem is on the YA podcast my story is going to appear in, "Cast of Wonders". So yay!

The True Poem by Serena Fusek

This is a story of when I read this poem, I immediately thought of one I wrote and said to myself, "This is what I was trying to do, but didn't make it." Which is an odd mix of envy and inspiration, but not a bad thing. A visceral song of the making of songs.

(from the link you'll need to scroll down to see the one I am commenting on: both are excellent.)

***
And lest you think I was becoming too serious for you,
let me introduce B.A.P. They're a new baby boy-band. I want to adopt them and steal their clothes.

Aren't they cute? The one vocalist with that fantastic gravelly voice is actually an adult, but the other rapper is about 15. eeeeeee. Behbeh rappers!

...I know. Something is wrong with me.

This is my per-episode check in to tell you what is awesome about this show.

I've been keeping a gleaming eye on the department's Old Guy, and today he's taking the two young heroes to his contact about a tip. BEST HERO WALK ENTRANCE EVER.

He's so chill and grandpa-like and yet even just standing there you know he's awesome. For what besides his level-head and unnatural lifespan for a policeman in this city? I don't know. YET.

***
They're going to kill that cute undercover guy, aren't they. HE MENTIONED HIS KID does he not know how shows like this go?

***

Ahaha, it is MOST EXCELLENT how Chen Lin can walk into a room, totally cool, and both the boys start squirming. A very welcome power-dynamic...I will miss it when people start really pairing up. If they do.

Posted via LiveJournal app for iPhone.

Noona is one of those brilliant words that will never quite translate into another language, it's so tied up in its culture's own dynamics.
It sounds a little funny on the English tongue, but you hear cute young Korean boys say it enough times and all those objections to double "oo" sounds...
down the drain.

Noona means "older sister" but it also can mean "foxy older lady" by way of being a term of affectionate respect from a younger male.

Girls call older girls "unni" which also looks and sounds misfortunate in the context of English and even in Japanese, my other language, where it strongly savors of fish, if not worse. Again, it's super-cute sounding in the context of the actual Korean language.

So noona romances are the ones where an older woman gets together with a younger man, or at least thinks about it..
Do you know Kimi wa Petto/You're My Pet? That's a noona romance.

hairwashing: sexy or maternal? different every episode!

I find these dramas very therapeutic. Usually the younger man is closer to my age, and the older woman is 30 or above. And yet, of course, I identify with these older women.

They're single* at an age where they're expected to be at least going on matchmaking dates, hopeful to have something more exciting in their lives but also wanting to know their futures are settled securely...

*the ones where women of middle age who have been married are caught up in a new romance are ajumma romances. "Ajumma" sounds just the same in Korean, where it means mother-aged woman, basically.

can I handle this kind of flirtation at this advanced age?!

Anyway. The kinds of wish-fulfillment involved is geared toward the mature woman. The guys tend to be less perfect (I mean, except for the second-lead guys, sometimes barfingly ideal, just like in any k-drama) because half of the tension is in "NO NOONA CAN'T" feelings.

I've watched *several* of these lately, and I haven't really reviewed all of them. So here's a little round up.

( Scent of a Woman )

( What's Up, Fox? )

( ETC )
Next on my list is

darkeyedwolf 's highly recommended Dal Ja's Spring. Which has a siren call, shipwrecking my queue...

You all *loved* Chime, so I felt bad to not fall in love with it. In fact, I'm pretty sure I should have fallen in love with it, but I'd just read the very different Folk Keeper by Billingsley and loved THAT, and for some reason, the overall scheme of the book was reminiscent of Among Others, so it got unfairly compared.

I am going to try it again sometime, because I skimmed over the first half of the book after the first chapter, and got caught up in it several chapters out from the end and actually read that carefully.

It's gorgeously set, with intriguing characters, and a fascinating world. I know I like it, it was just bad timing.

***

Entwined was

rhinemouse 's recommendation that languished in my in-box until I was trying to find some gem of critique or something in our correspondence and came across it again.

This book suited me better, though I still didn't fall in love as much as I wanted to. I loved the family dynamic of all the 12 sisters (sure enough, when I read the back flap copy, Dixon cops to being one of many siblings--six sisters and then four brothers) and how we meet some of them at different points to get to really know them.

I did find it a bit uneven, evident of a new though talented writer--the dancing details were lovely, but it didn't really have a connective tissue with the poor, small country society in worldbuilding. (This is a nitpicky thing that didn't make me stumble at all while reading, but was realized when I was thinking about it later.) The denouement was a little hectic.

Overall, though, it was both charming and deeply felt. A good balance. There was dark magic, but light society scenes, in the vein of Regency-styled fantasy though not at all identifying as such.
(Forget the lovely (clockmaker!? SILAS, YOU LAYABOUT, you've been one-upped!) love interest, I want to marry the king and give him a couple of sons...)

Her blog, likewise, is charming with a dash of dark magic. ;) I do look forward to seeing more of her work! And...is it fair for her to be great at drawing as well as writing?
Just a point to ponder...

timeripple, I have finally started Black&White!

Uh, for the first episode I wasn't sure if I admired Vic Zhou's acting choices or abominated them. Now that I know the character was actually *supposed* to be high for part of that episode I have come to a truce with myself... (Similarly, Kingone's character. CREEPY, dude.)

It's intriguing to me that while they've made very different choices in editing, it *does* have a certain similarity to City Hunter in overall vibe--especially as contrasted with the bulk of the dramas in that vein, in their respective countries. City Hunter was slick in every respect, and high-def of sound and filming.

Black&White isn't so slick, but instead chooses to be stark. The camera doesn't change vantage point often in a scene, and usually there's only one other angle. A perhaps-intentional effect is that of being a witness, someone reviewing the surveillance, instead of being the usual tag-along on the shoulder of a character.

Mark Chao is a hot sonovagun in this, but in the second episode I'm getting tired of the unabated hostility--and his character is bearing the brunt of this. It's a weakness of T-drama in particular, and drama in general that I am perhaps a little more allergic too than most. But his acting isn't really helping.

...I am as curious as anyone how Vic's character got a hit of the Mighty Mutant Marijuana, but he was in a whole bunch of things he shouldn't have been in that lab, and bumped into a lot of people along the way. It's kind of adorable, in retrospect.

It's kind of trippy to watch Ivy Chen be the toned-down mob-boss daughter right on the heels of seeing her as Kyoko...

But so far so good. It's trippy because she's doing a good job, but I recognize her face and am like, "Waaaait a minute..."

***
I live-blogged my experience with the first three eps of Shut Up: Flower Boy Band, and my review thoughts on Dream High 2 on a Tumblr I created for the purpose. More collected reviews will certainly be still appearing here.

It is a rare illness that can make me unable to accomplish at least something while sick.

This has been the case for almost 2 weeks, so the only redemption has been blogging about all the stuff I was watching, etc. Just thought I'd mention it, in case you were wondering what was wrong with me...I mean, with the posting so much.

***

Kaichou wa Maid-sama!

This is an anime based on a manga I've read the first several volumes of. In a way, it's nothing out of the ordinary (which is why after a certain point I was done with it). In another way, it's the kind of premier fun that Ouran and Skip-Beat are. Not the same excellence of plotting that Skip-Beat has, not quite the same level of tongue-in-cheek trope twisting as Ouran, but the gleefully ridiculous storyline that only manga can get away with.

I think this anime seems to have been created by the same people who did the Skip-Beat anime. Something I...am kind of surprised to notice.

I like the anime a LOT. It has the kind of playful touch that makes the kind of drawing-related humor only more funny in animation. (Part of the reason I suspect the same hand as in Skip-Beat--way similar treatments of manga-to-anime visual gags.)

I think the charm of the story set-up lies in it's balance. Though later it falls into "too much boyfriend, not enough roller-derby" territory, toward the beginning, the main character has a job that she does well at, also a school government role that has her really active around the school, and this threads through the plots nicely.

Wallflower -- Yamato Nadeshiko no Shichi Henge*

Oddly, I didn't really get into this, though

timeripple high recommended it, and I both love the source manga and enjoyed the flawed live-action show.

I think it's actually that it went too far in trying to capture the manga's visual humor and didn't do it with as light of a touch. I plan to watch a couple more episodes (the opening of most mangas are a bit rough, and anime is not exempt from awkward adaptation jitters) but I was alternatively surprised to go try Kaichou and find that I enjoyed it so much more.

Maybe different expectations going in has something to do with it. (-_-;)

*This title phrase involves two Japanese terms: first, a woman embodying the Japanese ideal, and then the "Seven Changes" a dance in which a Kabuki actor changes clothes seven times. So, in a word "The Transformation to an Ideal Woman" which is completely colorless next to the original...

Just in case you were, you know, curious what all that word-stuff trailing around with it was when it had a perfectly descriptive English title.

Fullmetal Alchemist, Vol. 27

Okay, I really want to sit down with the last 5 volumes or something, to really read the whole ending arc over. I can't really comment on it, just this last volume except to say

10! for the graceful dismount...

Seriously, I can only hope and pray that Arakawa has another fantastic idea she's been dying to work on to follow this, because the series ended just as it should have, just when it should have, but I am not going to be happy to live in a world where she's not coming out with more manga.

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fantasy literature for grown-ups: CHALICE by Robin McKinley
Gaudy Night - Dorothy Sayers
BRAVE - or, an open apology for distracting people from this movie
I think Mi Nam makes such an awesome gateway drama, but I WOULD think that
Inu x Boku SS
Unpopular Opinions -- Avatar TLA version
unpopular opinions! on nerd specialty subjects
Magical Madoka
Cary Fukunaga's "Jane Eyre"
City Hunter: Episodes 19-20
Queen In-Hyun's Man - first episode rave
BLEACH - episode one
LORD OF SCOUNDRELS - not your grandma's silver fork
The Artist's Way - a peek inside this creativity counseling course
Some Recommendations, Literary Rather
Black and White, Ep.6, requisite squee
The Noona Romance
Red Reviews: Chime + Entwined
Black&White: initial impressions
Maid Cafes, Brilliant Boys, and FULLMETAL ALCHEMIST OMG

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Ever Bethany

do we make it out alive?

Entries tagged with reviewage

fantasy literature for grown-ups: CHALICE by Robin McKinley

Gaudy Night - Dorothy Sayers

BRAVE - or, an open apology for distracting people from this movie

I think Mi Nam makes such an awesome gateway drama, but I WOULD think that

Inu x Boku SS

Unpopular Opinions -- Avatar TLA version

unpopular opinions! on nerd specialty subjects

Magical Madoka

Cary Fukunaga's "Jane Eyre"

City Hunter: Episodes 19-20

Queen In-Hyun's Man - first episode rave

BLEACH - episode one

LORD OF SCOUNDRELS - not your grandma's silver fork

The Artist's Way - a peek inside this creativity counseling course

Some Recommendations, Literary Rather

Black and White, Ep.6, requisite squee

The Noona Romance

Red Reviews: Chime + Entwined

Black&White: initial impressions

Maid Cafes, Brilliant Boys, and FULLMETAL ALCHEMIST OMG

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June 2022

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