Classic Anime Review Corner - El Hazard: The Wanderers [Anime Review]

 Classic Anime Review Corner - El Hazard: The Wanderers

The Wanderers has this Ifurita...

I just finished watching, well re-watching El Hazard: The Wanderers, the first television series. Recently re-released by RightStuf! and Nozomi on DVD since Pioneer / Geneon imploded... or something. I think in 2009 they became Geneon Universal Entertainment Japan, and have no titles in the US market as of this post - it appears to be a branch of Universal in Japan.

Anyways.

I'm calling it a classic and it came out in 1995-6 in Japan. 

and this Princess Rune...

not this Ifurita...

So... 'classic.'

It's not bad - that is to say its rather average for a 90s TV anime. I mean the animation is dated now, there is no CGI - it's actually cell painted, by hand. I own a few, that are hopefully real and not Korean knock offs that I only learned about years after purchase... 

It has almost the same cast of characters as the OVA - with changes involving the Princess(es) and Ifurita. Alielle has some small personality switch as well. With these changes the plot is drastically altered. There is still the search for a way home, but Makoto Mizuhara (our protagonist) has different goals and romantic interests.  

and not these princesses...

  The other main cast is still there, still roughly the same. Masamichi Fujisawa-sensei is still drunk and still over-powered. "Fujisawa KICK!" Nanami Jinnai is still there (her super power is changed), as is her megalomaniac brother Katsuhiko. As are the three preistess: Shayla-Shayla, Afura Mann, and Miz Mishtal (who still chases Fujiawa). 

The worst is really the change between Ifurita OVA and Ifurita TV. She transforms from silver-haired fearsome and lethally efficient demon-god into a dark haired, bumbling cheerful bubble-brain. It's jarring. Thankfully she is only in about half the TV series.     

 It starts off as a story of the dimensionally displaced Makoto and Fujisawa seeking a way home and turns into a grand 'save-the-kingdom' from the forces of evil (the megalomaniac Jinnai). The first half of the series is slow, a step by step search from library to preistess to preistess and so on, seeking the way to cross dimensions. Along the way comical near-misses occur, but eventually Nanami joins the crew. Then it is revealed that her brother, Katsuhiko, is leading an army of Bugrom (the not very mean or monstrous monsters). Eventually Makoto learns that the way home may be locked in a special place normally only reachable by the royal family, and from there the second half of the season begins.

And I'll stop there.


Honestly. It's worth watching, if you've got a few hours to spare. It's not as good as the OVA, most of the classic 90s TV series are not. But I still enjoy going back and watching them again anyways. Also, the English Dub is not too bad. I actually think the insanity of Katsuhiko Jinnai is delivered better in the English.

If you can grab the whole series for cheap on Amazon, or watch it for free on Hulu, give it a try. It's not going to blow your mind, but it is still fun.

Don't even get me started on the weird mash-up the Manga was...

The Final Chapter - A Memory of Light

 

I hate endings. 

No, seriously, I hate endings. 

No matter the subject; be it a saga of movies, a manga series, an anime, a long running series of novels or movies - the ending is rarely ever what you want. It represents an end to all the time and effort that has been invested in the characters, the world, everything. 

This represents decades of material, all at an end now.

The death of a beloved character is often easier to take, as the story, the world, the rest of the characters lives on. There are tales left untold so long as the world continues, so long as there is the potential for more.

But when an ending comes, I realize that all I really want is the next part of the story. There has to be more...

Turning now to A Memory of Light, I knew this was the final volume. We've known that for a while. I was prepared for the end, but at the same time I was wondering what, if anything, would come after.

There was so much in AMoL that it could have, and possibly should have been cut into two parts again and expanded. It is a fast book, for 900+ pages, it is quick. So much happens, so much is jammed together that I would re-read sections to make sure I absorbed it properly. And yet, when the end comes, it comes too quickly. I wanted more, I wanted it to be expanded. Like I've said, I hate endings. I always want more. I still want more.

And yet, I still really like the book. I'm going to be reading it again very soon. I love the series, it created such memorable characters, such a compelling world... so, I wanted more. So much more.

            "The wind blew southward, through knotted forests, over shimmering plains and towards lands unexplored. This wind, it was not the ending. There are no endings, and never will be endings, to the turning of the Wheel of Time.
            But it was an ending." [Brandon Sanderson, AMoL, p. 908]

Now, would someone please, please, please turn this series into either a TV show or a series of movies?

Works for hardcover too...

Why does it have to be over?

Yippie Kai Yay

I had no positive expectations for the most recent Die Hard movie after viewing 4 (which is a special movie in that my opinion of it tends to get worse over time). Thankfully seeing a movie with no positve expectations allows you to be surprised.

There was some good in it. A rather lucid plot, a few twists, and lots of action (which was all I really did expect). So, I'll say this rates up with Die Hard 2. I also enjoy Russian Helicopters - even when they are used for silly things. And a carrot eating bad guy, that had some amusement factor.

There was also some bad.
- The camera man for the car chase scene needed to be thrown under one of the cars... he did an absolutely miserable job. Here's a car racing along, oh and now enjoy this Close Up of a Bumper! Bad cinematography for the car chase... and the constant use of camera motion even in a conversation, and sometimes extreme and unnecessary close ups.
- For a movie that advertised a Die Hard Girl... there really wasn't one. She had a role, it was more of a twist, and almost no screen time. I'd say in a 90+ minute movie she was on screen for maybe a grand total of 9 minutes. Enough time to do a few small things, and then get crazy. Not the good crazy either.
- Gratuitous silly violence for no reason. I expected gratuitous violence in Bruce Willis movies. This one had that, in spades. It also has silly violence for no real reason. And I mean, silly, stupid, just to use gasoline and or mist clouds of blood silly. At least it was better at the blood than Avengers...

I saw a movie.

It was not as good as the Hobbit.

Caprica - First Impressions

Caprica

I'd been looking forward to watching this series since I completed my second straight through viewing of Battle Star Gallactica. I was really interested in the origins of the Cylons, how they came about... what stupid mistakes did humanity make?

What I'm hoping to learn is "How did this...

Now I must confess, I've only watched the pilot so far, but I've got a sneaking suspicion that this series will either be one I absolutely love or abjectly hate. The pilot, "Pilot" (come on, you could have given it a subtitle - 'Choices' or 'Avatar' or something), has already set the ground work. All the pieces are there for me to really enjoy... but I have this innate fear that they will not be put together correctly.

deserve to become this?"

TV does that a lot. Starts with a great idea and fails.

Without giving too much away, since there may be others out there like me who are sometimes slow to watch certain programs, I'll lay out the pieces that are going to make this interesting.

The first piece is a biggie, Ethics (morals). Since this is a BSG precursor we can expect this ethical issue to arise in the form of Religion. And it has. The issues brought up in just the first episode are quite poignant, and I'm waiting to see how they are going to be used, going to unfold.

The next one is, Epistemology. Knowledge. How do we know a thing? What are our grounds for accepting it? This is going to be quite interesting in the series. This will link with the prior issue of Ethics when discussing such things as; 'What is normal/natural?' 'What constitutes life?' 'Abomination or not?'

And lastly, Cybernetics. I love good solid sci-fi. Robots are cool, what can I say? This is the realm of hard sci-fi. The more accurate they portray robots the more I will like the show. It will help though if they actually do research.

I have less storage memory than an old 486.

Yes, Caprica begins by starting us off with a stunning bit of sci-ignorance. They assert that the human brain can only hold 300mb of data. The Human Brain actually holds between 1tb and 2.5pb (that's petabytes) with most estimates between 10tb and 1000tb.1 Even assuming the estimates are being very generous, and we're at the bottom of the scale, 1tb is good for a mass of squishy jelly. 300mb is laughable... its so bad that I'm shocked we've not heard the old chestnut that 'the average person only uses 10% of their brain.' Which is of course terribly terribly wrong. Actively you use roughly 30% at once, and if you are delving into your memory you can use upwards of 70% at once (as memory activates all across the brain with ocular and auditory sensation, etc). 

So we'll see where this goes. This could be very good, this also has the potential to be very bad...

Mass Effect 3: Extended Cut 

I finished my first play through of ME3 back right after it came out. I rushed through, kicked the crap outa the Reapers and was rewarded with... confusion, uncertainity, and a very badly scripted ending that left me wanting something more. Much more.

Hell yeah I got more.

 Fans complained. The Internet did its thing - whine long and loud. And then came the Extended Cut DLC. Unfortunately for me, ME3 was now back burner. I had other games to play; Tales of Grace F and Resident Evil 6.

So it would be months before I'd get back to ME3. But I did. I selected one of my five Shepards from ME2, a Femshep, and started it up. Oh, yeah... I bought all the new DLC too. Leviathan and Omega, weapons packs...

I played. I played for 60 hours. Longer than the first time... I did EVERYTHING (except one mistake on Omega).

Do not cry at my grave.

I beat the game, missing only one paragon option (ruining my 100% paragon rating). Going paragon is about peace, unity, cooperation and respect for all life, synthetic and organic. Oh, and they fixed the issue with your squad vanishing in a Reaper blast before the very end... that was good, if you took your romance option (Garrus for FemShep in this play through) it adds an extra touching scene.

The options always throw me at the end: Control, Destroy, Synthesis. Only synthesis seems right for a Paragon - you've fough the whole game for unity and for both types of life. After seeing the Geth plight, you wonder how anyone could choose destroy. And control seems no better... Both seem evil.

So I choose Synthesis.

Holy Crap.

Stuff Is Added. The whole ending is told by EDI. This is the EDI ending, the immediate future is laid out. You see some of your squad mates from ME2 & ME3 after the war. You get more info, you see what was achieved.

This was an ending. Yes, they left the dippy stuff with the old man telling stories of Shepard in the far future... but the rest of the ending, Much Better.

Not yet, but I'm gonna try and see if one of em can get to me.

I'm getting ready to start my next Shepard, my incompetent dolt who got everyone killed last time, and try again. Then I've got at least 2 more to get through... I'm going to experience this ending every way possible. Even shooting the damn Star Child...