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Take A Pick Tuesday

Take A Pick Tuesday

 

 

 

Every Tuesday we will spotlight an anime that will help you get through that long week, some you might know, some you might not and some you might have wanted to watch for a long time now. This will be an excuse. If you haven’t heard of this hopefully you wonder how come you never have and explore for yourselves. Each pick for each week can be different ranging from one genre to another, from the classic to the fairly recent and somewhere in between.

 

                                                 Gankutsuou: The Count of Monte Cristo

 

The year of its release it was considered one of the best and rightly so. This retelling of the classic novel The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexander Dumas is placed in a far future setting that mirrors the novel by being multilayered, holding on to most of the characters you might be familiar with from the novel but with some interesting twists to them and some you hadn’t read in the novel.  In fact having it loosely based off the novel instead of it as a direct adaption adds to the mystery of the story and gives it its own unique stamp of individuality all the while paying respect to the original. The Count himself appears alien by Earth standards which would make sense in this adaptation that has a science fiction background mixed in it, it isn’t uncommon for people to travel beyond earth, in fact it’s where the main character Albert would meet the Count, in a sort of lunar like mardi gras.

 

 

    Interestingly enough the perspective is focused on the possible victim and center for revenge Albert who has ties to anyone else that Count has on his list to exact retribution towards. Which gives for an interesting relationship, there are times both Albert and The Count really seem like they’ll connect, then there are other times when The Count’s intentions seem to show themselves quite clearly. One instance was shortly after the two had met and Albert fascinated with The Count is invited to watch an execution take place, the excitement is quickly drained when The Count offers him what was in his possession and full pardon for one of the three that are set for execution.  The choice almost seeming like a trap and precursor to what might come shows itself as Albert chooses the most horrible of the three to be pardoned while the others are sent to their death. This plays well against the actual growing bond among the two in the show even a possible hesitation The Count may have to exact the revenge at the cost of Albert and the people he cares about.

 

Along with the powerful storytelling goes the beautiful visuals, the glimmering colors are never repetitive and nearly all patterned. To what the characters wore was actually created by famous fashion designer Anna Sui, helping to complete the partisan look of the nobles, The Count and all the others in between. The wonderful inventive designs don’t stop there, they even dive into mecha like suits of armor and spaceships and somehow go back to normal cars. One of my favorite designs though lies within The Count’s mansion, a place that’s showed that seems to defy  both time and space as if only something powerful like Gankutsuou could make such a marvel. The very thing that aids The Count in his thirst for revenge in fact using it seems to mean that he must exact this revenge. But that is something you’ll have to try to understand as you watch the show for yourself.

 

 

Whether you believe he’s right or wrong it becomes clear that there are many despicable people on his list of revenge, liars and frauds, plenty have skeletons in their closet that The Count is just waiting to open in front of everyone.  Strangely enough it all plays to a love that was forced not to be.  If you want a different pace in Anime, something that seems far from what you’re used to seeing, a breath of fresh air if you will then by all means get hooked on to this show this week. If you find it’s a show that isn’t mentioned in the conversation of anime you have with your friends than watching it is a good excuse for it to become a part of it. If you find you love Gankutsuou: The Count of Monte Cristo and have never read the original source material than I urge you to check it out. Even the crew that worked on the show urges you to!

Christmas In Anime - Quote of the day

Gotta Catch a Break: In Defense Of Pokemon

                                                            Gotta Catch A Break

 

 

It may sound disturbing but many don’t consider Pokemon an anime. How can something so big and so expansive and still ongoing, having influenced so many modern day anime watchers or at least opened the gateway toward it, find itself given the snobby nose. Clearly it’s a part of the genre, it’s been around so long that even people that don’t watch anime or watch Pokémon have accepted it. Maybe because it’s accepted it bothers some fans, I mean this year will be the 14^th year that Pikachu will be a part of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade. In many ways that means it can’t be labeled as a fad, the games are still high sellers even guest staring in games beyond their own world and they’ve introduced a whole new generation of kids while still maintaining a large fan base from when it began. Now let's not forget about the onslaught of cards that continue to come out. So why the critique, some might be scratching their heads, having seeing so many cosplays of Pokémon and never heard anyone say anything of the sort before, well trust me there are people out there saying it and believing it. That brings us to one final question, is it because they believe Pokémon has no substance to it, well that’s where we will definitely have to cry foul.

 

 

 

     There are plenty of thought provoking and tear jerker scenes in Pokémon. No I’m not talking about the early reminders by Ash’s mom for him to put on and keep clean underwear though laughter from tears really should count.  I mean certain scenes that can capture the questions we probably would start to wonder or maybe bring up when we’re talking to a buddy of ours. You got to respect a show that knows how to turn things serious when its least expected. How can we point out our proof of this without addressing the elephant in the room, the Butterfree effect. That’s right folks we got hit with it pretty early in the game especially considering the episode count now. Looking back though it shouldn’t bother us so much, doesn’t Ash (using his English name for consistency here all you purist out there) give all of his Pokémon to Professor Oak in order to start fresh each time he enters a new region. Well nearly all besides Pikachu of course. So hindsight we shouldn’t still look back at it and feel so sad and yet we do. That might be because it was his first official loss of a Pokémon and after all the raising he put into it.  Well I suppose we have to accept it, there was a special girl involved. No doubt a tear jerker but shouldn’t we have seen it coming, look no further than the first episode and Ash and Pikachu’s rocky start to a friendship.  Inexperienced and attacked by Sparrows Ash tries to protect Pikachu who refuses to go inside his pokeball.  It would show Ash doing something that is a habit of his and was definitely something he did during the start of the show, put himself in harm’s way for his Pokémon.

 

     A good example of Ash risking his life, the first movie in which he tries to stop the battle between Mewtwo and Mew and is turned to stone, Pikachu crying over him and trying to shock him back to life. It’s to me one of the saddest scenes, up there with the waiting Dragonite episode and the farwell to Butterfree. The movie itself also raised some interesting questions, should trainers be able to possess Pokémon, after all Mewtwo is basically a genetic experiment that Giovanni tried to control. I suppose though that Ash could be the other side of the argument, his devotion as contradicting as it can be is usually touching. Just remember when he gained Charmander, who was again raising a question on the treatment of Pokemon by humans with him abandoned by a previous trainer, left in the rain until the fire on his tail nearly went out until Ash rushed him to the Pokemon center. An interesting back and forth of treatment in the relationship of human and Pokémon. Some love them, others try to steal them, sell them or twist them into weapons for their own gain. To be able to question the very foundation of the show speaks in truckloads of the substance you can find in the show. Of course all of them leaving an emotional connection toward it, sometimes it can be just among the humans, think Brock’s starving brothers and sisters that he left behind for long periods of time.  How’d they survive without him so long anyways? Somehow all of the characters in this show maintain themselves, their made of sturdy stuff with their natural survival skills apparently.  I mean Ash and the gang or just kids and they somehow learned how to camp out for days at a time and probably not shower and still can stand to be around each other. Knowledgeable indeed.

 

 

     The point I’m making is that there’s so many memorable moments, even after all the shows we’ve seen since how can we say Pokemon is not an anime. The lost on the mountains cave scene people with Ash and his Pokemon people!  They’ve got actual Pokemon Centers in Japan for crying out loud.  Do the good guys always win, maybe but maybe not, how many Championships has Ash won besides the Orange League, not many. Let's face it Ash loses a hell of a lot and there were plenty of times he didn't take it all that well. So not everything comes up roses but he has his friendship with other humans and Pokémon to rely on. There’s you’re proof. Need more? Want an appreciation of characters, time or simply friendship itself then check out Pokemon 4 Ever and it proves that the show pulls on the emotional strings just like some of the others shows we watch. I figured one last example couldn’t hurt.  So bring on the proof by saying what your favorite scene in Pokemon has been.

Good Old Fashioned Breakdowns In Anime: Part 1

Good Old Fashioned Anime Breakdowns

 

 

Anime characters are awesome but even the ones we love sometimes aren't glued together all that tightly. Sometimes this means witnessing one hell of a nervous breakdown or psychotic breakdown that makes you suddenly feel like your Sigmund Freud.  Watch people unravel sometimes literally as it transforms or scars them forever. Here's just a couple that make the list of our first part of: Good Old Fashioned Anime Breakdowns.

 

 

Kiddy Grade – Memory is a tricky thing especially when it’s been rewritten so many times, so it’s harder to remember that voice inside your head  telling you no matter how many times you do, the past will always come back to haunt you. Add in a little political mistreatment toward people and you might find yourself on the run, being hunted from the very place you worked for.


 

 

Neon Genesis Evangelion – Being sent into a machine  that might be more than it seems, forced to link your already fragile mind with it and fight there seemingly indestructible creatures from outer space that have already ravaged where you live once before can wreak havoc on your mind. Especially when the person on the top that recruited you is your father, a man you are pretty sure despises you and wouldn’t know affection when it came to you if it hit him in the face. Then again you’re not alone everyone around you is on the verge of a breakdown and might have already go through one. Don’t worry if this still makes you feel isolated group sessions can be help just as much and by the end of this show that’s basically what you’re watching. It’s up to you if you call it a silver linings by the time the credits roll.

 

 

 

 

Yu Yu Haksuho- Chapter Black Arc- We’re spotlighting the baddie in Chapter Black of the long running series, Shinobu Sensui.  Trying your best to protect humanity against demons since you were wee boy,believing through the horrors of what you were forced to be aware enough of in the first place that you were doing the right thing. Only to break in on a strange ritual by rich humans that are torturing and killing demons in ways you could never imagine, hundreds of times worse.  Well that would send anyone off the deep end I suppose and killing every human you could find in the place wouldn’t be enough, you’d find a hatred for humans especially when you find a tape called Chapter Black with the proof of it. That just makes a person want to open a tunnel from demon world to the human world to erase his own kind now doesn’t it? Not before you show six other humans the same thing, after all everyone needs to be enlightened.

One that followed in his footsteps that had a moment of going completely bonkers was The Doctor, a real doctor who had seen death on a daily basis and Sensui showing him Chapter Black seemed to give reason to something that at a certain point just doesn't make sense anymore. So he decides with his new psychic abilities to infect an entire hospital with the virus, give people several foot scars and convince the Spirit Detective trying to stop him, to kill him, only to see what he believes is the reasons all humans should die. He's definitely cuckoo for coca puffs. That's why he also makes the honorary list of anime breakdowns.

 

 

Fruits Basket – Who would have thought of all people Tohru Honda could be prone to a breakdown, one of the nicest characters in anime period. To her credit she did see a person turn into a very large cursed creature that despite them being turned into a cat when hugged by the opposite sex (outside the Sohma family), it looks like a giant evil rabbit. Oh but not so evil a victim really, yet it doesn’t stop her from throwing up all over the place. Hard to talk to somebody after that, well why not have the evil head of the household whisper in your ear that it’s what you get for helping out members of the family. You just can’t make anyone happy these days it seems.  I guess that could mess with your mind a bit.

Then again Akito is hanging on a thread to sanity as well and he's been the cause of quite a few people to come undone. Even without his/her little touch you still have people reacting in all sorts of messed up ways to the Zodiac curse. Like Momiji's mother for instance after giving birth to him, yeah never let it be said that anime characters have it easy. What...a....bummer.

 

Full Metal Alchemist- Trying to bring your mother back to life using alchemy is a serious no no but if you’re a kid you feel like you should be able to after all it was wrong she was taken away so suddenly in the first place isn’t it.  However instead things take a turn for the worse, you lose your arm and leg, your brother loses his whole body saved his soul which you have to attach to a suit of armor in blood and man that thing you’re looking at it totally not your mother.  That would make you prone to a breakdown.  Of course that isn’t enough is it? Somehow being the older brother you try and become a state alchemist to find a legendary stone with the power to hopefully restore your bodies. But oh the revelations along the way. The ones you bring as well, revealing a priest to be false and a woman who hoped her lover to come back from the dead to really be nothing more than a meshed up, flesh from various things, not really alive and not really dead.

 

X- Here’s an interesting one after all there’s the TV show and the film both have alternate endings. The TV show introduces all the characters with a steady pace, so you get to know them all so it hurts more if something bad happens to one.  The movie brings things in faster but the ending at least the first time I saw it felt kind of haunting, like a sad ending to a horrible nightmare.  For all the devastation the main character was put through emotionally perhaps there was sense of healing by the end. Notice how I devoid from the dirty details. Spoilers abound in all these but with a movie and a TV show there’s a chance that one hasn’t been seen before.

 

 


Berserk- Having a breakdown could literally be the end of the world sometimes. At least that's the case for Griffin. Whose destiny seemed broken and allows him to tap into something far more sinister that unleashes hell on earth. Killing and raping along the way, allowing one that survives to mentally be broken and the other haunted while fighting for revenge.

 

Attack On Titan- Seeing your mother murdered isn't going to do well for your mind. It's happened often in anime but the way Eren's mother goes out just isn't right. While he snaps, it's one that would drive him to kill these titans. Along the way though he sees many people have breakdowns because truly it isn't easy to kill titans. People die constantly and it makes it very frightening to live in there world. To be honest seeing these large naked things run around would give anyone a nervous or psychotic breakdown.