Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: anime, douchebaggery, failure, freedom, letdowns, madness, magic, reviews, satire, surreal
Anime >> Abenobashi Magical Shopping Arcade (Vol. 4)
It’s no use, Sasshi. No matter how big a tantrum a kid like you throws, nothin’s gonna be changed or resolved by it. The only thing that changes is what’s in your head, in your imaginary world. But this is reality, and you can talk about all the Omryou science and spells you want, but it won’t move a single pebble. In the end, it’s nothin’ but a toy… and you’re just a kid who stayed out too late playin’ in the dark after the sun’s gone down.
–Sasshi’s Dad, Delivering the Serious Closer Lines Every Comedy Must By Law Contain
This volume begins with a witty realization of the emotional battle between the two protagonists into a literal war in Episode 11, in which almost every other major character in the realm of Abenobashi is implied to have lost their life due to the hellish nature of their conflict. You’ve got your tanks, your World War II-era fighter planes and, of course Sasshi fighting his way through a Catch-22-style military bureaucracy from hell.1 Extremely entertaining though annoyingly rough around the edges would be a good way to describe this set-up to the tragic failure that Episode 12 becomes. Ostensibly a wry look at those retarded Americans and their wacky cinema, Episode 12 quickly devolves into a wheels-off debacle that invites more pity than anything else.2
Good God, I actually frowned while watching this episode… not a good sign!
Episode 13 brings us back around to the underdeveloped “serious side of Abenobashi” and the repeated conflicts related to Sasshi’s profound selfishness and his attempts to shield Arumi from the harshness of reality, even though she seems far more capable of handling it than he is. I won’t spoil too much, but the quote box at the top of this article plus an in depth understanding of the prefix “meta-” should help guide you in the right direction.
What really, really annoyed me about the ending of this series was not that it “was too sad,” but that it almost validates Sasshi’s douchebaggery to some extent. For one, he actually succeeds in reversing Grandpa’s death in the “real world” (yeah right), keeping the shopping arcade open, and even keeping Arumi in Osaka.
ARUMI: It’s a shame I won’t be moving to Hokkaido. I was really looking forward to it!
SASSHI: I see..
See that? He wasn’t even able to make her truly happy! That little b*****d ran amok through at least fifteen different universes and learned absolutely nothing!
And what line did it end on? Something like, “Well, at least you’ve got your health”?
…
Dang it!
Had enough yet?
Final Grade: C+.
1Cartoons can be literary, too!
2Like, say, laughter for example.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: failure, free speech, satire, sexuality, technical difficulties, the internet
I was a-pondering as I so often do, and I thought I’d share my observations with you all. You see, I’m at a rather conservative university, and much of the Internet’s terrible bounty is unavailable to us. Unfortunately, this often includes some relatively innocuous material like LastFM (user-built radio stations) or Gaia Online (roleplaying game bulletin boards, I think?). Here’s a handy-dandy chart–charts are always funny, right?
| SITE BLOCKED | THE BLOCKER SAYS… | THE REAL REASON | WHAT ISN’T BLOCKED, STRANGELY |
| Xanga | Social/Dating Site | Socialize somewhere else, socialist. | Facebook (It’s what the kids are into these days.) |
| Anthro subsection of deviantART | Nudity; Gay/Lesbian | Yiff in hell, furfag. | Disney |
| Russian musician OMFO | Pornography | OMFO (“Our Man from Odessa”) could be an anagram for mofo, which is a sexual term I believe. | Actual pornography, or so I’ve heard… through the grapevine… |
| YTMND [unblocked] | Tasteless | You, sir, have appallingly bad taste. Shame on you! | Fox News |
| Some manga site | Sexual Materials | At least it’s human… but it’s still not American. You lose. | The Fox News Sexologist (She’s not board-certified, fellas…) |
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: failure, manga, reviews, sexuality, surreal, the trap
Manga >> Ken Akamatsu’s Love Hina and Negima!: Magister Negi Magi
“What? Keitarou, you want to see my panties?!”
–A Caricature of a Thirteen-Year-Old in Love Hina
To be honest, I’m really only reviewing the first volumes of Hina and Negi, with a nervous peek at Volume II of the former. This was a powerful lesson to me: the first ten pages do NOT necessarily set the tone for the rest of the work… also, always order online if you can. That way, you can get Love Hina in a paper box tied with string to cover your shame. Seriously, everything I had heard heretofore about this series had been nothing but how life-affirming, yet raunchy, yet precious it was. It entranced female readers, and caused male ones to clap their hands with joy at the glory of it all!
Boy, was that ever crock of s**t.
Here’s the plot–no doubt you’ve heard it before if you are familiar at all with the ignoble harem plot. There’s this kid, Keitarou, who’s basically an unbelievably sad sack of a man. He’s not very bright, not very athletic, not incredibly cute2, nor is he assertive… and guess what, he’s not good with women either. When his parents kick him out of the house, he discovers his grandmother has decided to bequeath ownership of the bizarrely secluded Hinata Inn to… him. So he’s the landlord of an all-girls dorm!3 And you know what… that girl who promised him in kindergarten that they’d go to college together and get married and live happily ever after? She’s living there too! How can hijinks not ensue?!
Unfortunately, the much-lauded formula of Keitarou continually barging in on the girls in various stages of undress, falling on top of them, or having them fall on top of him gets repetitive to say the least. After a beat or so, the girls would punch him in the face or otherwise beat the snot out of him so he wouldn’t do it again. But, try as he might, he just can’t shake his bad luck… and thus it continues for fourteen volumes or twenty-four episodes, depending on which medium you prefer. Everyone has notoriously short memories (and tempers), so this cycle of love and loathing occurs quite often. Also, when he gets within a few feet of junior high students, he makes them weep with his propensity for sexually suggestive accidents.
But there is a modicum of sweetness, in a dystheistic sort of way: they’re just a bunch of people thrown into this crazy world, watched over by that malevolent Demiurge, Akamatsu Ken.
…You know, that actually makes me kind of sad now to remember that.
As for Negima!, for the last time: it’s not Harry Potter. Nor is it even a pervy Harry Potter. Nope, it’s about a ten-year-old boy who teaches English to fourteen-year-olds. But there’s only one problem… whenever he sneezes, it causes their clothing to fly off! And it only works on girls, apparently!4 Hobotaku gives a pithy value judgment on this less-talented sibling of the Love Hina franchise:
…Be forewarned, do not read this in a store. The last thing most people want is to stumble over someone in a Dragonball Z shirt that’s looking at middle school girls’ underwear. Trust me, it’s creepy, and you’ll end up dying alone.
Final Grade: D-. Revised: C-.
3Many of whom are underage! Are you giddy with joy yet?!
4If it worked both ways, that would just be gay (and sexually egalitarian).
