Author Archives: Joanna

In-flight movies – quick review

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Recently travelled overseas. On the way there, I watched a Japanese film starring Hiroshi Abe (Thermae Romae) and a princess-themed Hollywood movie (Snow White and the Huntsman). On the flight back, I watched another Japanese film starring Hiroshi Abe (Cheers from Heaven) and another Hollywood princess movie (Brave).

Thermae Romae (2012)

  • 3 stars (out of 4)
  • An ancient Roman bathhouse architect gets magically and repeatedly transported to modern-day Japan; and a somewhat parallel story about a manga artist he encounters there.
  • Best parts were the fish-out-of-water scenes. Great camera work and expressions on Hiroshi Abe. Makes you appreciate the wonder of modern devices, but also pokes fun at the silliness of some of them. Hilarious!
  • Waaay too much censorship in the modified version that I saw; even a nude painting was censored!
  • Some parts at the end may have dragged on a little longer than necessary, but I might have just been starting to get tired at that point.

Snow White and the Huntsman (2012)

  • 3 stars (out of 4)
  • Thankfully, not really about romance at all. Really about Snow White’s plight to free her people from the tyrannical rule of her stepmother, the queen.
  • Elements from the original fairy tale were mainly cursory. For example, there didn’t need to be seven dwarfs, but hey, this is “Snow White”, after all.
  • Small airplane monitor didn’t do justice to the special effects.
  • Great nuanced performance by Charlize Theron as Queen Ravenna
  • Great costuming on Snow White. Even though Kristen Stewart spent the movie grimy and tattered, her clothes looked really good!

Cheers from Heaven (2011)

  • 3 stars (out of 4)
  • Based on a true story.
  • Bento caterer suddenly decides to build a music studio for the local high school kids, borrowing money and volunteering his own time and effort. Basically, one hell of a random act of kindness.
  • Well, there are no special effects, so it isn’t necessary to see this on a theatre screen, but it is well-executed, with solid scripting and acting and an uplifting message to boot.

Brave (2012)

  • 2 stars (out of 4)
  • Some superficial similarity to La storia della Arcana Famiglia anime – a princess wants to participate in the contest for her own hand in marriage.
  • The original marriage issue resolved relatively easily, though. This film turned out to not really be about romance either! Like Snow White, it’s actually about the conflict between mother and daughter; except, of course, in Brave they are learning to understand each other, not trying to kill each other…
  • Many scenes in the second half were so dark that I couldn’t see anything on the small airplane monitor. Admittedly, that might have contributed unfairly to my low opinion of the movie.
  • Maybe I expected too much from Pixar, but I found the whole film to be mainly a yawn. Merida was a pretty good heroine, but there was nothing particularly original or amusing here.

SWORD ART ONLINE (Ep. 1-9)

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Instead of SWORD ART ONLINE, I’d rather be watching…

DARKER THAN BLACK. While the basic premises of the two series are completely different, they do share some similarities, which I’ll elaborate on.

First of all, I’ll state that I’m one of those complainers who has no experience with MMOs. So I admit that I have difficulty comprehending things like why a player would need to have the option to level-up their cooking skills in an action game, but I guess that’s just how it is. Point being: I am not the target audience for SWORD ART ONLINE.

SWORD ART ONLINE and DARKER THAN BLACK each feature an incredibly powerful male protagonist who has dark hair and likes to wear a long black coat. Both guys inadvertently accumulate a harem as they move through their respective shows, since the girls they encounter can’t help falling for them, even though they themselves seem to have no interest in romance.

So why does it work for Hei in DTB and not for SAO’s Kirito? Personally, I appreciate that Hei is an adult. His maturity, skill, and intelligence are portrayed in a convincing manner. And unlike Kirito, Hei actually has faults. His gluttony is played for laughs; and his comrades find him peculiar because he doesn’t always behave in the logical way that a contractor is expected to. Kirito, on the other hand, is just perfect and all-powerful. Supposedly, he’s battling bosses on the front lines in his spare time, but we never see it.

Both series progress in a meandering fashion, where the things that happen in most of the episodes have little bearing on the overall plot. This doesn’t have to be a bad thing. If handled effectively, the mini story arcs can accomplish world-building, show character development and be thought-provoking. Needless to say, DARKER THAN BLACK does it right, in my opinion, while SWORD ART ONLINE fails.

Instead of SWORD ART ONLINE, I’d rather be watching…

La storia della Arcana Famiglia. Like SAO, Arcana Famiglia is another currently-airing anime series on CrunchyRoll. Both start with a promising first episode before heading directly to filler-like material in episode two. Both are finally starting to maybe address their original storyline now, in episode 9.

The difference? I have very low expectations of Arcana. The animation is low- budget and it looks like some crappy reverse-haremy anime about an Italian family whose members are contracted to tarot cards. SAO is the opposite: slick and high-budget with promises of action and adventure. However, it is SAO that manages to offend. Female lead Asuna is supposed to be one of the strongest players in the game, and yet she needs a bodyguard? Wouldn’t she be protecting him? It would be more believable to me if the two characters had simply made a pact to watch each other’s backs instead. And then, she allows two guys to fight over her. At least in Arcana, the heroine intends to fight for herself!

Instead of SWORD ART ONLINE, I’d rather be watching…

GUILTY CROWN. Okay, no I wouldn’t. Nothing’s gonna make me want to watch that piece of crap show over again. But certainly SAO is becoming this season’s GUILTY CROWN for me. It’s nice to look at, but the story is deeply disappointing and the random fanservice shots are always gratuitous and inappropriate.

I’m in too deep to stop now, so I’ll keep watching. As with GUILTY CROWN, I will be hoping that the show will redeem itself somehow, even if I fully expect a train wreck. At least SAO is an adaptation, not an anime-original story, so there’s some reason to hope, right??

BLANK SLATE manga review

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BLANK SLATE, by Aya Kanno

I picked up this manga almost on impulse. I had some money on a gift card that I wanted to use up. The art looked pretty and dark. And, the whole series is only two volumes long, so it fit my budget nicely.

Zen, our main character, is an amnesiac, cold-blooded killer who reluctantly ends up investigating the mysteries of his past. Be prepared to leave your moral expectations at the door before reading these books, because there’s a lot of senseless violence perpetrated by the “good guy”.

It turns out the first chapter is its own stand-alone story, then the rest, chapters 2 to 8, represents the main story.

Volume one (chapter 1) – brief impression

The protagonist of this first tale, Russo, bears some physical resemblance to Takumi from NANA, with lighter-colour hair. I remember Nana (Hachi) used to say that Takumi might have become a yakuza if he hadn’t found an outlet in music.

Well, imagine Takumi as an underworld hitman who meets his match in master criminal Zen. Pretty. BLoody. Good!!

Volume one (chapters 2 to 4) – brief impression

The main story starts here and it’s somewhat milder than the first chapter. There’s less violence and the relationships between the characters are a bit more predictable. The artwork continues to be attractive, despite some instances of shrunken head.

The main characters spend much of chapter 4 in military uniform, so that’s some nice fanservice right there.

Volume two (chapters 5 to 8)

Good, focused, plot developments. Some of the translation work seems a little weak, making some lines difficult to understand within the narrative. Also, Zen apparently hasn’t lost the “last 20 years” of his memory, since he can remember back almost 10 years! Don’t know if that one’s the fault of the author or the translator.

As before, all of the characters are attractive, even the bad guys. Of course, once you get familiar with this manga, you’ll know that there are very few non-villian characters to be found.

Fairly satisfactory ending, though there could have been more story still. I felt some of the deaths were a bit unnecessary and illogical; even though I originally expected an even higher body count after that first bloody chapter.

BLANK SLATE would probably make a good anime. There’s enough material for 12 or 13 episodes, maybe with room for quality “filler” like chapter 1.