Gen X Otaku 1971: the OG blog

I Want To Eat Your Pancreas / a Review.

If you know me at all as a blogger you know I'm going to spoil the shit out of this 2018 movie so just let this be your warning now.

So I am a little late getting to this one on Blu-Ray....I was originally supposed to see this in theaters as a Fathom Events show with ticketing by Atom Tickets.  But AMC 24 was undergoing renovations at the time and cancelled their screening.....but failed to let Atom Tickets know....so I drove myself to AMC 24 expecting to see this movie only to find out its screening was cancelled with NO TIME left to get to another theater....FUUUUUUCK!

Anyway, supremely miffed by that I defiantly ordered the Blu-Ray for this movie when it came out and then it....sat on my dresser collecting dust until today....

In the meanwhile this film's reputation permeated throughout Anime Fandom....total tear jerker, it will wreck you, etc....I was steeling myself for the experience.

But I have to say having watched it..........I was kinda underwhelmed.  I don't blame the dub actors....it might've been more impactful in Japanese, it's hard to say.....but actors can only deal with the script given to them.....and this one wasn't particularly well written.

And the twist ending sucks.  It totally undercuts the reality of facing a terminal illness.  Seriously, fuck that.  山内桜良, Yamauchi Sakura deserved better.  Released from hospital and suddenly murdered by a random psycho....like, okay I guess.....like you could't even tie it back to the asshole she kicked in the nuts in the market street?  

Also, I don't like how Sakura expects Haruki Shiga (志賀春樹, Shiga Haruki) to also be or become friends with her BFF Kyoko Takimoto (滝本恭子, Takimoto Kyōko) who clearly hates him.  It's not up to you if your friends are also friends with each other....that's on them and has literally nothing to do with you.

I wish Shiga had better defended himself in the cafe the year after Sakura's death when meeting Kyoko formally for the first time.....she gets mad at him for not telling her about Sakura's illness but he should've told her to her face that he was honoring a solemn promise he made to Sakura and that she (Kyoko) should respect it also.

I suppose that a Japanese audience probably more deeply appreciated this film and responded to it....that to them a figure like Shiga is more relatable and not so alien.  But for me to feel for and sympathize with Shiga, the script in English should've been done differently.  He wasn't angsty enough, I guess?  Honestly, he was a blank canvas, a nothing.  How am I supposed to feel for a character who seemingly feels nothing, doesn't WANT to feel anything and keeps his distance?  Like Kyoko, I am mystified by what she saw in him.  He's not a bad guy, for the most part (except for the unsuccessful attempted rape /sexual assault?)...just...I mean, I guess Sakura put a lot of stock into it being him who read her super secret diary about her impending death from pancreatic cancer....it meant so much to her to have him as an outlet without disrupting her other friendships.  I am sad she didn't actually have sex with him....I think part of her really wanted to....but she didn't need to tease him so cruelly like that....but his response also was completely out of line and he only stopped because she started crying....

Sidebar, Hentai is often disgusting and indulges in a lot of gross out humor...it's too blatant and shocking.  Ecchi is often a lot hotter because of how much it teases, walks right up to the line or else crosses the line with grace and sex appeal.  But I think an honest love scene between Sakura and Shiga could've been a thing of beauty if done right....letting Sakura have her first and only sexual experience and orgasm with him.....it would've made for a much better movie.  Horimiya, Scums Wish and Kare Kano are willing to "go there" but not this movie, alas.  Those series at least acknowledge that teen sexual relationships exists and happen...but this movie can't bring itself to.   It's frustrating and annoying.

That aside, this isn't that I'm some cold fish incapable of crying during a sad movie....it's that this particular sad movie was badly written and the dialogue and characterizations awkward....it just failed to move me very much.  I just didn't understand Sakura's attachment to Shiga and we aren't privy to her inner thoughts until he reads her diary...note to the writers:  it's okay for an anime character to have quiet soliloquy by themselves where they pour their hearts out to us in the audience....it's fine....real people really do that in the private darkness of their rooms.  This story would've packed more punch to deliver such revelations while Sakura was still alive and drawing breath...her fears, her hopes, her desires, her LUST even....she was a sexual being with sexual feelings.  It's okay to express them....perhaps more poignantly so while wrestling with a terminal illness.  

Again, the twist ending merely sets up the drama between Shiga and Kyoko later....but I frankly hate it.  I would've much preferred Sakura succumb to her terminal illness naturally....being at her bedside until the last would've given Kyoto and Shiga a more legitimate reason to bond and grieve together...maybe even holding each other, crying together, kissing then one thing leading to another and.....well, y'know, the old Thanatos / Eros dance number, eh?  I mean whatever, the script is what it is, and it's mostly incompetent.  A lot of fans seem to hate Kyoko but I for one do not.  Kyoko is under no obligation to like Shiga....and Sakura kinda did badly by Kyoko, arguably.  Post credits,  Kyoko decides to at least be civil to Shiga.  Which is, y'know, fine, I guess?  I dunno.  It's a weird movie and I definitely felt let down by it.  I was hoping to be emotionally gutted and I just wasn't.

Your mileage may vary.

Alien Nine Puberty is HELL

Content Note:  Mature themes, sexuality, sexual assault, graphic descriptions of sexual acts, puberty, body horror, suicide.

One of the most useful things about Science Fiction is its capacity to enable humans to address difficult subject matter in an oblique, abstract way that is otherwise too painful to confront directly.  Couched in a SF setting with aliens and intelligent robots, it allows for examination at a distance and hopefully yields greater clarity through the act of processing the dramatic tale being spun and interpretive analysis.

I recently watched the 4-episode OVA series Alien Nine (エイリアン9, Eirian Nain) on DVD.  I was guided to this series after finishing Arcade Gamer Fubuki.  This show was featured on that rental disc's "previews" feature.

Don't let the cutesy art style fool you....it pulls the same trick as Made in Abyss on that score. This show is dark and disturbing. It's a coming of age story and uses the Science Fiction genre to explore the anxiety of puberty and how its changes can leave a young person feeling like an alien in their own body. There are even allusions to gang rape and sexual assault, mediated through the SF plot devices that I'll address in more detail below. The main character is on the one hand, a stereotypical "crybaby" archetype...but on the other hand...this girl has BEEN THROUGH SOME SHIT....she's clinically depressed, traumatized, and clearly suffering PTSD.

The main story is set in a world where alien invasions have ostensibly become commonplace and it's kind of like another chore that these 6th grade girls have to deal with; class officers are elected to fill various roles and Alien Hunter is one of them--a student is chosen as the class representative to the "Alien Party"....and it's an almost literal bug hunt....the aliens don't seem to be above average animal intelligence....they're nuisance pests...and the girls are aided by ostensibly "friendly" aliens called The Borg that are symbiotes. Specifically the girls affix them to their heads and wear them like winged helmets, granting them extra defensive and offensive capabilities. The Borg seem to agree with the humans that controlling the alien invasions are an important endeavor...but all may be not as they seem!

The show has a lot of twists and turns, and the end of Ep.3 is just as shocking as Madoka Ep.3--I literally yelled "Holy shit!" out loud watching it.

What's challenging for novice viewers to grasp or even accept is that the entire narrative is basically one long extended metaphor....nearly everything is a stand-in for something else in the real world.  It's not "really" about an alien invasion at all.  It's about alienation and feeling confused and frightened of the changes going on in one's own body...the extreme discomfort of what we call the "tween" years.

I deeply sympathized with main character Yuri Otani (大谷 ゆり, Otani Yuri)…yes, she belongs to the “crybaby” archetype, technically, but when you see the constant trauma she’s subjected to, I can hardly blame her, and it just gets worse as she slides deeper into clinical depression.  She made the impression on me that this is what Shinji Ikari of Neon Genesis Evangelion would be like if he was a girl.

She was essentially railroaded into joining the Alien Party….once instance where student democracy is probably not the best solution! It’s a real “f*ck your buddy” kind of vote and a form of bullying. The truly equitable solution for such an undesirable duty would be for everyone to draw lots and whoever got the short straw has to serve for a specific tour of duty (6 weeks maybe?) then rotate off and another drawing is held and previous person is exempt from the next selection (assuming the “winner” survives the tour). Formal democracy doesn’t always produce the most just result in all instances…the teachers should’ve intervened…but given what we see of how the adults behave, maybe it was they who either intentionally (and sadistically) or thoughtlessly (with blatant disregard for their well-being) imposed the voting “solution” on the class in the first place!  Like in Evangelion, the adults seem untrustworthy and aren't being fully transparent with their students.

Yuri Otani (大谷 ゆり, Otani Yuri) also becomes the target time and again of boys in the class who get possessed by hostile aliens…they start off attacking her one by one…in separate and distinct encounters...and yet even when they are seemingly “freed” from their alien possession, they voluntarily submit to it again for the thrill of it…and decide collectively to gang up on Yuri. The Hunt Club advisor,  Megumi Hisakawa (久川 めぐみ, Hisakawa Megumi), trying to toughen Yuri up, disastrously sends her out on solo missions and she’s ambushed by all 3 boys at once in what is probably one of the most uncomfortable scenes of violence in the whole show…the allusion to gang rape & sexual assault is palpably there…the drill-like appendages of the boys’ aliens are undeniably phallic and Yuri’s terror unavoidably takes on a sexual dimension....


Blogger Kathryn K Williams argues, I think convincingly, that Yuri is absolutely raped in this scene:

"...Now for some more details concerning Yuri's rape. The boys' symbol of adulthood pierces the girl's symbol of adulthood. That's not to mention the inside of the girl's borgu looking, to some, like a placenta, the orientation, motion, and nature of the drills from the boys' aliens, and the nightmares in which Yuri finds herself shivering in the middle of a pool nude and crying, not to mention the nature and focus of the flashbacks Yuri experiences. All these point to a sexual attack....therefore more a symbol of her being raped."

"Regardless of whether you feel the attack is sexual, one point remains. In one form or another, that scene is a very violent and strong depiction of violence of men towards women."

I also read the entire narrative as an allegory for all young women experiencing puberty with their peers and having to adjust to being newly leered at in a sexual way not only by male peers but also older men and how uncomfortable and, well, alienating it all feels. Indeed the whole alien headgear thing is allegory for how the body changes in puberty and how young teens will speak of feeling like an alien in their own body in that liminal space between childhood and young adulthood when you’re not fully either. It’s a brilliant piece of art but so very unsettling and disturbing.

I was pleased to see I reached the same conclusions as Kathryn, who, as a young woman, is speaking from direct personal experience:

"....When I first started to watch Alien 9 I didn't know what I was getting into. The opening made me think it was going to be another silly cute Anime about children chasing aliens, but before I even got ten minutes into the first part, I knew it was much more. I wasn't sure what until much later but felt drawn into the show like nothing else. My first clue was the reaction Ootani Yuri had towards the aliens. The graph/chart that showed the percentage of girls who like and dislike aliens and what they didn't like about them. Yuri states that she doesn't like to be 'looked at, touched, and especially not licked' by aliens. It wasn't until later that I realized that the 'Borgu' is a representation of adolescence or even puberty. The other girls laugh during an examination and talk about how when a girl becomes an Alien Controller they are known to grow faster then normal. To me, this says something about a girl's puberty and some of the things that one would hear in elementary school about girls that have already hit that age. The biggest clue that I was right about the aliens being connected to adulthood is the teachers themselves who have wires for hair..."

Nice to know even as a 50-something CIS white dude I'm savvy enough to reach a similar conclusion out of my viewing and analysis.

Kathryn had further insights, thought, that I admit, slipped past me on first viewing but which I am inclined to concede raise quite valid points.

"...The third girl is Toomine Kasumi, a tiny energetic girl who seems to be perfect at everything. She has awards lining the walls of her room and doesn't seem to be afraid of anything. In fact, she seems to loves everything she does and everyone around her. Her father is willing to let her do anything she wants but will not let her quit until she sees it through. There is one thing Kasumi loves more then anything else and that is her big brother. At first they only hint at this, but later it becomes more apparent that this love is more then just sibling love. Also, she seems to be a lot more adult in way then the other girls, something I'll go into more later...
[...]
...There were a lot of little signs that showed that Kasumi was a lot more "adult" then the other girls. She was eager to become an Alien Controller. She pushed Yuri and Kumi together. The way she told everyone she 'loved' her brother when people asked about him, her bathing suit. To most she just looked like another chipper Anime girl, but to me she seemed much more. While she is inside Yellow Knife, he tells her about how much he loves her and there is a scene where a yellowish white fluid of some kind drops onto her cheek and rolls into her mouth. She licks her lips and smiles, saying 'Yes, big brother.'....":



Kathryn is too reserved to say it directly but I will ... we're talking about incest and sexual abuse of a minor by an older sibling.  At the very least the older brother induced Kasumi to perform fellatio on him that she did willingly (but children cannot give meaningful consent, of course)...but the disturbing vision that Yuri is given suggests their taboo relationship went further:


In Yuri's vision, she sees a Human-Sized version of Yellow Knife literally penetrate Kasumi's womb and she cries out not in pain but in orgasmic ecstasy.  The largely inescapable conclusion is Kasumi had intense sexual (vaginal) intercourse with her older brother, probably multiple times...which made their emotional intimacy and attachments unbreakable.  They were doubtless discovered by their parents and this is the main reason the older brother was sent to study abroad, to put a halt to this unspeakably taboo relationship once and for all....but it was emotionally devastating for Kasumi to lose her big brother (and romantic lover) like that and she's been inconsolable ever since.  The parents weren't wrong in sending the older brother to study abroad...where they failed was not getting Kasumi therapy and just pretending it never happened and focusing on her academic successes instead.  Because therapy would require admitting the truth and that's just too shameful for her family to admit to, that Kasumi's brother raped her repeatedly, taking advantage of her naivete and innocence and exploiting her devotion to him and deep seated need to be praised.  But no matter the accolades and successes, the brother's departure from Japan left a deep hole in Kasumi's soul that she's never been able to fill with any substitute.

While none of this is stated outright, it is very much the implication of these scenes in the aggregate, remembering again these are all extended metaphors, stand-ins for real world things and events.  It's the most reasonable explanation of what's "really" going on behind the events on screen.

As Kathryn further analyses: 

"...People have asked me where Yellow Knife came from because he states that he didn't want to be there. So who wanted him there? Kasumi. Yellow Knife isn't actually evil; he is just there to protect Kasumi. It is just like the Borgu. This becomes evident when Yuri's Borgu gets in an argument with Yellow Knife about who Yuri belongs to..."

And because Kathryn watched the subtitled Japanese version, she picked up on some additional details that the English dub kind of glosses over.  For example... 

" [an] interesting side note: When she sees Kumi at the door, Yuri says "Kumi-ch... uh... Kawamura-san."  Then she blushes deep red and Kumi stammers and can't look at the other girl in the eyes. This told me so much about how these two felt about each other...."

Kathryn also notes that after Yuri's rape, the girls are better able to experience emotional empathy for each other, to actually feel what the other girls are feeling.  She notes:  "Their shared pain brings the girls a lot closer to each other. Kumi and Yuri stopped referring to each other by their last names at this time and start accepting their feelings for each other. There is a beautiful moment between Yuri and Kumi as Kumi wraps her arms around the little girl and whispered in her ear that she and everyone will always be there for Yuri. She then squeezes the little girl tight. Another during the fireworks festival where Kumi is staring at Yuri who is playing with a sparkler. Yuri looks up and the two girls eyes catch for a moment. They both blush and look away. It looks as though, maybe, these girls have a chance at recovering from whatever it was that was tormenting their young hearts."

The final episode deals largely with the resolution of the Yellow Knife alien crisis....Kasumi Tōmine (遠峰 かすみ, Tōmine Kasumi) violent resistance to being "rescued" from Yellow Knife is understood more clearly once the intimacy of her relationship to her older brother is considered in context.  The alien arrived because of Kasumi's deep need to "see her brother again"...he is a manifestation of the brother, a symbolic "stand in".  They other girls and their advisor Megumi Hisakawa (久川 めぐみ, Hisakawa Megumi) do manage to prevail at last.  

I find Kathryn's summation very insightful and so will quote her at length, with supporting images:

"Back to Yellow Knife for a moment. Each of the Borgu are in a sense a part of the girls. Yuri and Kumi's both are there to help the girls out when they are needed. Yuri's tries to encourage her to be stronger and Kumi's tries to teach her that she isn't alone. So what about Kasumi's Borgu? It agrees with everything she does unconditionally, never disagrees, and even refers to her as Kasumi-ojosama (Princess Kasumi). She needed something that would understand her and protect her instead of something that would follow her ever beck and call. This is where Yellow Knife came in. Kasumi needed Yellow Knife and he appeared. He tried to be the one thing she needed more then anything in the world. Something that loved her as much as she loved him. Yellow Knife filled the gap that was left when her brother was taken away from her. When Yellow Knife frees her the two become one (as shown with Kasumi's hair trick)."

(Sidebar, Kasumi emerges from Yellow Knife and this is what we see.....these are very phallic structures visually...and actually literally as well, as they are part of a flower's pollen producing anther, i.e. part of its male reproductive system!  Kasumi standing in what initially looks like a forest of penises...)

Kathyrn continues: 

"...That evening Kumi calls her mother and tries to tell her about everything, but instead all she can say is that everything is perfectly fine and bursts into tears. Everything is fine; Kasumi is alive (or is she?). Yuri is a bit stronger. Kumi finally can let out her emotions, and her Borgu is recovering in the nurse's room. The sun rises on what looks like another normal day, but Kumi can't stop thinking. She roller blades up and down the library halls, moving faster and faster. Suddenly, her Borgu gets up and struggles to pull itself out the door; Kasumi is looking out a window when she suddenly turns around and starts running. Both find Kumi's body lying on the ground, dead. Yuri is the last to feel Kumi's pain as she bursts into tears and the credits start to roll...."

I admit I myself wasn't sure WTF had happened the first time through....I even thought briefly that Kasumi had killed Kumi out of revenge, but upon re-watching that is not a justified reading.  Kasumi is merely the first to discover Kumi's body:

Kathyrn continues: 

"...I've had many people ask me 'What happened?'. Well, Kumi committed suicide. It is hard to believe, but that is what happened. 'Why?' is the next question. Simple really, she gave herself one last reason to live, to save her friend (Yuri). She could not accept the fact that she wasn't truly alone in the world, so with her friends safe, she decided there was no reason left to live. (But but but...) This is the one thing I liked about the series. The girls didn't suddenly pull back together. They were real. It is not easy to just pull yourself back together after falling apart. I cried for days after watching the ending. I was shocked at first, but then I remembered how I was at that age. I tried killing myself in almost the same manner, but with a bicycle and not roller blades."


(Sidebar:  Kumi built up enough speed, wheeled around to continue speeding backwards on the in-line skates, ramming head-first into the book shelf with enough force to induce massive blunt force trauma to her own head.)

Kathryn continues with her own relational anecdote: 

"...Guess I was lucky because someone found me before I died. Or maybe Kumi was the lucky one because she was finally freed of her pains. The saddest thing for me was I really felt that Kumi and Yuri were finally accepting their feelings for each other. Although I'm not much for happy endings, I was truly hoping that those two would end up together. All of the characters in the series were so real even though the story was wrapped up in a surreal world. For me, it made a lot of sense. It took a moment (a week is a moment for me at times) but instead of getting mad at the film I felt it was beautiful. The emotions showed in Yuri were those of a child struggling and didn't seem false. Kumi's death didn't feel forced or that they were trying to go for shock value but more of a fact of life. It is a sad fact that many children suffer as these girls did, and when they die people are left lost and confused. They aren't sure what happened, or why. The fact that they didn't go out of their way to explain her death is the way it should be. Explaining things away is just a way for people to dismiss what is important: Kumi's pain."


(By the final look on Kumi's face, the tears that welled up and fell down her face as she lay dying....her death was not immediate and it was probably quite physically painful, on top of her emotional anguish that drove her to this final act.)

Because of their enhanced empathetic connection, even though they're not in the same room inside the school, Yuri can feel Kumi's pain and death...and cries uncontrollably just before the final credits roll because she knows in her heart that her friend is dead...



Oooof.   This show is ROUGH, man.  It's a beautiful piece  of art that's got so much more inside it than the surface would lead you to believe.  Like FLCL, it's an extended Sci-Fi driven metaphor about the experience of puberty.  But it has the weight and seriousness equal to a Neon Genesis Evangelion.  FLCL is at bottom a joyful romp, while Alien Nine is anything but.

 

Kill Me, Baby! : Just embrace the stupid.

So I finally finished the comedy series Kill Me, Baby! , adapted from a 4 panel "gag" manga.  I remember actively disliking this show when it first came out but it finally dawned on me you just have to be in the right headspace to enjoy this kind of dumb humor.  It is what it is and it mostly makes you chuckle at Yasuna's idiocy and Sonya's deadly seriousness in a school setting that definitely doesn't call for such over the top hyper-vigilance. 

They make for a perfect comedy duo....Yasuna (left) the goofball, Sonya (blond twintail, right) the "straight man".  Yasuna is voiced by Hillary Haag in English, whose normal speaking voice is naturally very child-like.  She's earnest and friendly and likes to joke around but she's more than a little dumb.  Sonya is a world-weary Child Assassin who totes knives & guns and is an expert in several martial arts.  Another part of the humor in the English dub is that Sonya is voiced by Luci Christian using her normal adult speaking voice in a very dry, sarcastic tone throughout the whole show.  Hearing this very adult sounding voice coming out of a child's body is inherently funny.  In the fiction of the story these are supposed to be "High School Girls" but as a practical matter the character designs make them look like Elementary School kids...they're the ultimate "moe blob" stereotypes.

They are sometimes joined by Agiri Goshiki (ごしき あぎり, Goshiki Agiri), voiced by Rozie Curtis in English who is reputed to be a Ninja Girl but mostly just seems to be a crafty con-artist always trying to make a fast buck.

Agiri is friendly but also a little "spacey" and kind of a easy-going airhead.  Like Kenny from South Park, she also seems to die a lot and come back using "secret clone technique", etc.  She exists to poke fun at Ninja anime cliches, basically.  She seems to be a little older and wiser than Yasuna & Sonya, though they usually see right through her attempted scams.

In the backgrounds we sometimes catch glimpses of the redheaded and very spirited "Unused Character", voiced by Brittney Karbowski...she keeps trying to enter the story but gets foiled by rotten luck and the main characters moving on to the next scene before she can make her grand entrance...

She too is obvious meta-commentary on silly anime tropes, seemingly cool characters with wasted potential, etc.  They literally don't even give her a name.  It's pretty funny as a concept but the joke is very subtle.

The show is completely episodic and could potentially be watched in any order.  There's no over-arcing plot progression, it's just the daily life of a Child Assassin and her dimwitted School frenemy and their daily shenanigans. 

The final episode is a nice series capper and actually emotionally sweet.  In an emotional outburst Yasuna pleads with Sonya to stop killing people for money and expresses her anguish at the thought of losing Sonya and never being able to see her again.  Sonya is sufficiently moved to change her schedule for the day and drops down a rope to pull Yasuna out of the pit she fell into.  It's one of the few glimpses we get that Sonya does actually care about Yasuna, however much Yasuna gets on her nerves sometimes (read: nearly always).

This is the kind of series you put on after a hard day at work to chuckle at cute girls doing stupid things and watching an overly serious, stressed out character (Sonya) lose her shit over and over and exact revenge on hapless Yasuna.  Sonya's deadpan seriousness is completely ridiculous in the laid back School setting and is part of the humor.  The opening sequence shows the girls fighting UFOs and Aliens but this never actually happens in the show.

The OP is very grating on the ears and takes some getting used to...makes my Ears want to bleed is how it feels.  The ED is much more listenable with a nice steady beat and comedic images of Yasuna & Sonya doing ridiculous workout moves in their school gym clothes.

A farewell to Zac Bertschy

I don't know where to begin.  I never met the man in person and yet through his podcast, ANNCast, I felt like I knew him better than I know a fair number of people I've met face to face.  If there were an entry for "Anime Journalist" in the OED, Zac's picture would be there.  

Although I was chronologically just slightly older than Zac, he had been an anime fan far far longer than I, and knew far more about the art form of Japanese Anime than I could ever hope to master.  He was passionate, sarcastic, sometimes infuriating, but I always respected the man, even when I disagreed with him.  I knew he took his work seriously and his opinions were formed from years of study, observation and experience.  Zac knew his shit forwards and backwards.

I was a listener of ANNCast from the very early days when Justin Sevakis was Co-Host, and I still cherish those very early episodes.  I began avidly listening to ANNCast probably some time around 2009 or 2010.  So for nearly 10 years now I've worked as a library clerk in a public library and sometimes weekly, sometimes monthly, but always eventually, I'd eagerly anticipate the next ANNCast release for Zac & his Co-Host (Justin, Jacob, Lyndzee) to drop some wisdom on me and make me a more informed fan and appreciator of art by episode's end than I was on the other side.  If you love anime so much as to listen to a serial podcast about it, you are among the anime SuperFans.  I also love the highly irregular Anime World Order and the even more infrequent GME Anime Fun Time; I'm a long time fan of the Anime Addicts Anonymous podcast and some older Anime podcasts that have long since pod-faded like 2Lazy2Botaku.  But ANNCast was always my North Star, the creme of the crop.  Nobody did it better...nobody.

Co-Hosts came and went by Zac was a constant.  He shaped and crafted my love & passion for anime into a mature and considered thing.  He challenged me, he made me think, reflect, consider, appreciate.  He was an educator and journalist.  He was unabashed humanist and outspoken lefty progressive.  He was a member of the LGBT+ community and proudly pronounced himself "Queer".  He hated Nazis and Edgelords and felt such deep empathy and compassion for people and valued artistic expression that captured the profundity and full gamut of the human condition.  He was a man of letters and learning with a keen eye and a kind heart.  He inspired so many other writers to do their very best, no less than any other Shonen Action Hero you might find in the pages of Shonen Jump or any anime adaptations thereof.  He never took himself seriously and had a playful, irreverent sense of humor.

When I began working for the current public library system I still work for, I had an absolutely bully tyrant of a boss who took joy in making my work life a living hell.  I endured a great deal of emotional trauma and suffering working for a manager I still believe was a low-grade psychopath.  All I could do was outlast her....and I did.  Ultimately her own hubris got the best of her and she got fired and I stayed.  Living well has been the best revenge.  But those first few years were made tolerable by the temporary escape afforded to me by a deep dive into ANNCast, where Zac and Justin would do deep dives discussing anime and the art of film generally.  They provided a temporary refuge in a terrifying work life that helped me hang on to my sanity.  I can't possibly thank Zac & Justin & Jacob enough for this.  I learned so much from them and vow to continue learning as much as I can about the art form we both love(d).  If I ever learn even a sizable fraction of what Zac knew I'll be a happy man.

I logged on to my work computer  this morning and scanned Twitter briefly, seeing a tweet from Mike Toole that made my heart sink.  I quickly consulted Anime News Network to get confirmation.  I then sought out the tweets of Justin Sevakis, Jacob Chapman, the A.W.O. crew, et. al.  I had just been thinking this week that "boy it sure has been a long time since the last ANNCast episode...." and now I had a better idea why.  As I worked today I gave that final episode a listen...and it made me want to cry to hear Zac's voice one last time....especially his closing remarks to his loyal listeners, dispensing heartfelt advice to his listeners that he himself doesn't seem to have been able to follow himself...that made my throat catch a little.  He never knew me, he did read a few of my questions on the air a few times...and sometimes I was so caught off  guard and embarrassed I skipped past that part of the episode to the next question after mine because I'm a self-conscious freak that way.  But I am going to miss this man so very much.  I'm sad I'll never get the chance now to see him at AX or Otakon.  I always stuck to Texas cons and was going to branch out to other Texas cons this year and maybe hit AX and Otakon in 2021.  May yet someday, but it just won't be the same without Zac potentially there.

This evening I treated myself to some HEB Sushi (Salmon special plate) and took my evening walk listening to J-Pop tunes including some of the best songs from the Evangelion soundtrack.  This evening I plan to devote to watching anime that I love.  I think that's what Zac would've told me to do if he could.  I do plan to get around to watching/re-watching some of his favorites...I may at least start Wolf's Rain in his honor, I do own it on Blu-Ray re-release.  I already recently re-watched Evangelion via Netflix though I suppose I could pull out my Platinum Box set and watch THAT, with the original ADV Films dub (though I know neither Zac nor Justin are fans of that original dub).  But anyway yeah, I'm going to enjoy MY anime tonight, even if Zac himself would turn up his nose at my particular shows (as he often did).  He would still counsel me to follow my bliss, and so I shall.

Thanks for everything, Zac, and say "Howdy" to Satoshi Kon if you see him up there, buddy.   

Black Lives Matter in Anime Too

Really enjoying Carole & Tuesday so far on Netflix, with English dub.

It’s a great show and I binged the first 8 episodes non-stop one night earlier in the work week.

Had to look it up, and no shade on the actual VA, but since Carole in Carole & Tuesday is clearly (see top 2 images above) a person of color (POC), I’m a little disappointed a POC actress wasn’t cast. Japanese anime regrettably doesn’t offer that many POC characters and thus when a show presents you with some, I think ADR directors should bend over backwards to cast POC actors in those roles.  It lends authenticity to the work of art and deepens the ethical commitment to representation that many ADR directors now profess to sign on to in the area of LGBT+ representation.  If you also believe in and stand with Black Lives Matter, then hire more black actors for explicitly black roles, especially when the representation is such a positive one like Carole in Carole & Tuesday.  I could understand it being a harder sell for an ADR director to convince a black actor to audition and accept a more caricatured and borderline racist portrayal like Sister Krone (bottom image) in The Promised Neverland.  It would be an awkward, difficult conversation and if I were in an ADR Director’s shoes I would be up front about how that portrayal is problematic and I would encourage dialogue with potential actors even at the script writing stage how we can manage the balance between an accurate translation from the Japanese and a story that’s still relatable to a multicultural English speaking audience, and to black audiences in particular.

The easier thing to do is just cast from your pool of regular (mostly white) actors and get the show done and onto the next project, right?   

I know one of the beauties of voice acting is you can “….play anyone in the booth not just someone who looks like you!”…. but c’mon, man, that’s a cop-out and you know it.  Please try harder to cast black actors for explicitly black characters in anime.  It matters, it really does my dudes.  Cast more black actors in roles where it shouldn’t matter who voices the character, like aliens and monsters and demi-humans.  Don’t fetishize black performers but don’t alienate them completely either.  

Was told by one VA “dude, they try” last time I complained about this on Facebook regarding a black character voiced by a white male actor in a Sci-Fi anime re-licensed by Funimation that he himself had a bit part in.  I won’t name the actor in question but I’ll reiterate what I said then, too: THEY don’t try NEARLY hard enough to cast black actors for roles like this and they damn well should.

Anime has a lot of talented Asian-Americans (Stephanie Sheh, Xanthe Huynh)    in voice roles and some Latinx too (Christine Marie Cabanos, Cristina Valenzuela, Lisa Ortiz) and that’s great but I can count on one hand the number of black actors I know working as VAs in anime, and that’s just not right.  Beau Billingslea, Jovan Jackson,  Dani Chambers.  Beau’s voice is iconic and established.  Jovan is an up and coming voice actor mainly doing roles for Sentai Filmworks…he has a deep, sexy baritone voice that I always enjoy hearing in my anime.  Dani Chambers is very new to the profession as far as I know and voices the younger sister of the two main Tachibana brothers, named Otome, in the new simuldub baseball anime Mix: Meisei Story.  I would not have known she was a black performer from Otome’s voice alone, but thanks to a FUNimation YouTube clip featuring the cast.  Khary Payton is well known as the voice of Cyborg on Teen Titans and has moved on to mainstream television but I’ve always felt it a shame that Khary has never been in any anime productions that I’m aware of; it could be that anime just doesn’t pay well enough for Khary to audition for at this stage in his career and I can respect his broader ambitions if that’s the case, but the anime world should’ve recognized his bona fides from his success in Teen Titans and cast him in anime roles shortly thereafter.

To circle back to Cristina Valenzuela, she began working in the anime profession under the stage name Cristina Vee (read: Cristina V.), presumably to avoid drawing attention to her Latina heritage in order to have greater success booking roles.  It’s unfortunate she had to do that, but you can’t argue with success…it clearly worked for her and now that she’s established her own bona fides as a voice actor and ADR Director, she feels comfortable dropping the stage name and just going by her real name of Cristina Valenzuela in the credits of her shows.  She has enough fans who know and follow her work (yours truly included) that she’s able to reassert her Latina identity at this stage of her career.

Black performances in anime shouldn’t be confined to niche, fetishizing projects like Afro Samurai.  No disrespect to Samuel L. Jackson, and that anime is supremely bad-ass and iconic, but it’s also a one hit wonder.  No other anime is quite like it.  Because black performances in anime are so under-utilized and rare themselves it adds to the mystique and mystery of a show like Afro Samurai.  The individual show benefits, perhaps, but the industry as a whole suffers.  English dubbed anime performing is still so overwhelmingly, painfully white.  It doesn’t have to be this way, not for a country so richly diverse as the United States of America.

 

 

Binged & Finished Anohana via Netflix

I finally binged and finished Anohana in English via Netflix after adding it to my Crunchyroll queue ages and ages ago but never starting it.

You know from the very first episode which includes a ghost girl, Meiko "Menma" Honma (本間 芽衣子 Honma Meiko), that this anime series is going to be about grief, loss, depression, survivor's guilt and recovery.  The Peace Busters Gang were a bunch of childhood friends.  One of their members seemingly took a fatal fall from a nearby bridge and died.  They never really spell it out entirely....either that or she slipped on a wet rock and took a fatal blow to the head.

The gang grows apart and we rejoin them near the end of their High School years.  The former leader of the gang, Jinta "Jintan" Yadomi (宿海 仁太 Yadomi Jinta), has grown moody & distant....not only did he lose the childhood love of his life but he also lost his mother, presumably to cancer or some other unspecified terminal illness.  He lives alone with his widowed father who works construction jobs to support the both of them.  Then one day a ghost version of his dead childhood friend appears...only she's aged up to perhaps (late) Middle School age with hips and developing breasts.  He can see and touch her as if she's alive, and she's a very boisterous and energetic spirit, literally.  She even gives him an involuntary erection in one early scene that is laugh out loud funny.  He doesn't want to tell anyone about his ghostly visitor but eventually spills it.  His former friends are skeptical and think he's hallucinating.  He thinks so to and yet Menma persists.  He knows that a ghost that hasn't passed on is haunting him because she has some unfinished wish that she has to see through before she can ascend to the great beyond.  The series is basically a journey of discovery into finding out what that final task for ghost girl Menma actually is...for most of the series Menma is only visable to Jintan.  She is basically an unseen poltergeist to the rest of the Peace Busters for the vast majority of the series.  They can begin to detect her presence indirectly, but some are more accepting of her ghostly existence than others.

My favorite character far and away is Naruko "Anaru" Anjo (安城 鳴子 Anjō Naruko), who has been secretly in love with Jintan all these years and still loves him even though it hurts sometimes.  

In time we learn that Jintan's mother didn't want her son to embrace a kind of sullen "macho" facade to deal with her eventual death.  She doesn't want her son falling into a form of walled-off, closed-down toxic masculinity to cope with the loss.  So she makes Menma promise her she won't let that happen, that she'll make sure Jintan learns how to cry and be okay with his emotions.  Menma is only a little girl and doesn't fully understand what has been asked of her by this dying woman, but she takes her mission very seriously and tries to devise a scenario that would provoke tears from Jintan.  She basically sets him up into being pressed to confess his real feelings for Menma (which she suspects already) in front of the group, figuring the surprise and stress will provoke the tears Jintan's mother asked for.  Instead, Jintan has an angry outburst and says meanly that Menma is "ugly" (she's beautiful) but then blushes and storms out of the clubhouse....confirming for all present that yes, he loves Menma.  Menma, concerned for Jintan, goes racing after him.  Another boy who also loves Menma and has been hiding his feelings takes the opportunity to confess to Menma when they have a quite moment alone on the trail.  This is Atsumu "Yukiatsu" Matsuyuki (松雪 集 Matsuyuki Atsumu) who in the present still resents Jintan and is particularly incensed that Menma's ghost chose to appear only to Jintan and not to HIM.  He is college bound and arrogant and lords his academic success over Jintan to taunt him.  This is all the precipitating events that lead to Menma's untimely death at the riverbank so many years ago.  This anime is very much a tear-jerker and at times seems to milk it a bit excessively....but I still enjoyed it for all the character interactions and rooting for my favorite ship (Anaru x Jintan).  Binging this series is probably not the best idea, but once I started it on Netflix I simply could not stop until I was done at last, even though it meant staying up until 2am Sunday morning.  You will definitely have a good cry watching the series.  The characters are all suffering, even years and years later.  But one gets the feeling that one of Menma's undying wishes post-mortem is for her friends all to be friends again like they were in the old days.  The conclusion does involve a small miracle but it doesn't detract from the loss & pain.  Memna is finally able to ascend to heaven to seek reincarnation, but at long last she's finally able to give a tearful goodbye and ALL of them can finally see her in the fading light of twilight.  Not sure I would bother to seek out the movie version of Anohana but I definitely enjoyed the series in English.

SOUND! EUPHONIUM - OUR PROMISE: A BRAND NEW DAY -- English dub (7/15/19) reviewed

Just got back last night from the English dub screening of Sound! Euphonium The Movie - Our Promise: A Brand New Day 

It’s really good, y'all!  It took me a little bit to get used to hearing Erica Mendez’s voice coming out of Kumiko Oumae but I warmed to it quickly.  I was especially gleeful to hear Christine Marie Cabanos join the cast as the new freshman Euphonium player Kanade Hisaishi.  While I was a little sad Cristina Valenzuela didn’t reprise Reina Kousaka, I thought Laura Post did a fine job.

Apparently this story runs basically in parallel to the drama of Liz and the Blue Bird and carries beyond, since both Mizore and Nozomi pass their auditions and are on stage for the final performance and Mizore once again delivers her amazing oboe solo even more impressively than in Liz and the Blue Bird.  Neither have speaking parts in this movie but they are there.

The Kumiko x Reina moments in this film are simply precious and worth the price of admission alone.  They love each other so much…

My only quibble with the ADR direction is having the characters pronounce the name of their school as “Kita Oooh Gee” which kind of drove me nuts since I know in Japanese it’s much closer to approximately “Kih TAU gee”….why they couldn’t have just gone with that in the dub is beyond me.

Also, before the main feature started there was a 10-minute SUB ONLY recap sequence of Season 1 & 2 highlights which was a little unsettling since it made me wonder if I was actually going to get to watch the dub tonight or were they going to force me to sit through the sub even though I specifically paid for the dub.  I didn’t really need the recap since Seasons 1&2 are still fresh in my memory.   There’s also a post-credits stinger so be sure to stick around.

All in all I am very happy this movie got an English dub and felt very entertained throughout.  The material could definitely have been stretched out to fill a complete 3rd Season but I’m still pleased this film exists.  A 3rd season would’ve probably stayed sub-only.  By dubbing this movie it adds more weight and social interest in perhaps one day dubbing the whole series, perhaps via Kickstarter.  The original season sold like gangbusters so I think they’re leaving money on the table by not dubbing it. 

I would definitely watch Liz and the Blue Bird before this movie, because as I stated, the stories run basically on parallel tracks.  The actions that conclude in Liz and the Blue Bird must take place someplace only around the midpoint of Our Promise--A Brand New Day.




Mizore's most detailed and realistic character design is in Liz and the Blue Bird, because she is the protagonist of the film and Reina Kousaka and Kumiko Oumae are relegated to being supporting characters in the background.  Mizore is the achingly shy oboe player, the only one in the entire band until this year.  She's had an on again off again complicated relationship with her friend Nozomi, a flute player, who is a bit of a social butterfly but also kind of, well, flighty and unreliable.  In Season 2 we get a lot of backstory with these two.  Nozomi's gentle peer pressure is the only reason Mizore joined the band at all, where her hidden talents were allowed to flourish.  Then all of a sudden in Middle School, Nozomi quits the band without warning and without telling Mizore.  Mizore is very hurt by this betrayal and holds a grudge that stretches well into Season 2 of Sound! Euphonium.  Indeed, their reconciliation takes up a lot of the overall action in Season 2, which Kumiko is instrumental in brokering.  

Interestingly, Mizore's character design in Our Promise--A Brand New Day goes back to the simpler television version seen in Season 2, probably owing to animation budget constraints, and the fact that she has no actual lines of dialogue and neither does Nozomi.  But both are clearly identifiable on stage in the final set piece.  

While I do annoy some of my more close minded fellow anime fans on Facebook when I point this out.....this franchise is hella gay...in the best possible ways.  In Liz and the Blue Bird part of why Mizore suffers is because of how unequal her relationship is with Nozomi.  Nozomi likes Mizore, yes, but no more so than any other casual friend of hers.  While Mizore, by the time of Liz and the Blue Bird has gone back to regarding Nozomi as her one and only true friend in the world, without whom she would feel lost and completely alone.  It's unhealthy and co-dependent.  But also one gets the feeling Mizore doesn't just regard Nozomi as a casual friend....she LOVES her, as in possibly also romantically.  And Nozomi doesn't seem to want to reciprocate their friendship at that level of intimacy that Mizore craves.  Nozomi doesn't owe Mizore anything, but the two keep failing to have an honest conversation about their feelings until nearly the end of the movie.  Mizore feels so very alone and pities herself but initially fails to notice her new Kohai who desperately wants to be friends with her too.  Eventually Mizore relents and invites the eager young freshman to a pool party and we see them conversing after, the freshman so very grateful her senpai noticed her and invited her and what a good time she had, etc.

Reina Kousaka has a perhaps unhealthy obsession with Taki-sensei.  She's in love with him even if it's taboo and impossible right now.  But at the same time her one and only best friend is Kumiko Oumae.  Kumiko and Reina are utterly devoted to each other.  It's clear their relationship transcends mere friendship...they definitely love each other.  And Kumiko clearly and repeatedly really isn't into guys at all, unlike many of her cis het friends.  She does go on a few dates in Our Promise--A Brand New Day but only "as a friend".  Her heart's not in it.  Indeed she gets a look of surprise and nearly disgust when one boy confesses to her in the opening scene and later a boy wants to kiss her and Kumiko reacts violently and angrily to this unwanted advance and runs off into the night crying to find solace by Reina's side.  Reina is surprised to see Kumiko but happy in her own reserved way to see her.  They meet on the same hillside where they began their friendship in earnest during the series.  Reina talks about wanting to go professional but expresses her fears about it because she admits she wants to be with Kumiko forever.  They share a bite from the same candy apple Kumiko brought with her from the festival.  This is a romantic yuri couple, and this is the closest they've come yet to acknowledging that about themselves.  There was even some yuri tension between Kumiko and Asuka-senpai at the end of Season 2 that I did not expect but was pleasantly surprised by.  Asuka is another character that you never see with a boyfriend or express any interest in any guy ever.

Asuka-san enjoyed teasing Kumiko all during Seasons 1 & especially 2.  But the more Kumiko learned about Asuka's troubled home life the deeper Kumiko's empathy and affection grew towards her senpai.  And with Reina being often distracted by Taki-sensei, it's only natural for Kumiko to feel increasing love feelings for Asuka that she finally gives voice to in the concluding finale of Season 2 in a bitter-sweet scene after graduation, where Kumiko confesses "I love you, Asuka-senpai!", her voice nearly cracking.  Asuka looks startled and surprised by the love confession but she doesn't reject Kumiko either.  She just smiles and accepts her kohai's feelings as valid and is basically like "see you around, kid.  and good luck to the band next year!";  I personally think Reina is bisexual but I also believe she's utterly devoted to Kumiko, who is a lesbian.  I think Asuka-san is a lesbian as well, but the show never directly states it...it must simply be inferred from context and from absences, from what *isn't* there...no boyfriend, no overt interest in guys, no guys hitting on her, etc.  Reina x Kumiko are the OTP of this franchise, but if Reina ever did end up marrying Taki-sensei and Kumiko were heartbroken, I think Asuka would welcome Kumiko into her life with open arms.  Reina may low-key be aware and thus does put in the work to stay emotionally close to Kumiko in this newest movie, and indeed deepens the connection.  On the other hand, Reina does act strangely clueless at times during this movie....seeming willing to let Kumiko pursue dating guys if that's what she truly wants....as a bisexual girl herself she can't exactly say anything...but doesn't get until later that Kumiko has always been just platonic friends with these band guys and doesn't want a romantic relationship with any of them.  I hope one day the franchise will let them acknowledge how much they love each other and and be able to declare that love to the world and be accepted.

This is a really great franchise and I hope that if the dubbed movies above do well the Japanese owners will re-consider and dub the original television series as well.  The first season sold so unexpectedly well I think a dub would be surprisingly popular.  We can only hope.

Whelp, there I go publishing an essay length anime thing out of the blue....it's been awhile.

Yami to Bōshi to Hon no Tabibito (a review)

Per Wikipedia, Yami to Bōshi to Hon no Tabibito (ヤミと帽子と本の旅人?,
translated as Darkness, the Hat, and the Travelers of the Books), also known as
Yamibō/Yamibou for short, is a Japanese adult visual novel published in December 2002 by Root. A 13-episode
anime series produced Studio Deen aired between October and December 2003.[1] Although the characters and their relationships remain
basically the same in the game and anime, the storyline is quite different.
 
This anime adaptation was recently added by Hoopla Digital as part of their television anime offerings under the shortened title
Yamibo.
 
It involves a main heroine character, Hazuki Azuma (東 葉月 Azuma Hazuki⁾ engaging in a search across various dimensions for her lost younger sister, a mute girl named Hatsumi Azuma (東 初美 Azuma Hatsumi^?), who completely disappeared the night of her 16th birthday bathed in a mysterious green light!

The episodes are reminiscent of the old science fiction live action show Sliders. However, the younger sister’s own story is more like that of
Quantum Leap, for she is actually the biblical Eve, but assumes a new persona in each new “book world” she enters to engage with. The older sister is aided by Eve’s sister Lilith, who is, like Eve, depicted as a good witch wielding powerful magic.   The main character’s younger sister was but one of these assorted personae of eternal Eve.

It's basically a trans-dimensional "road movie" as the search continues across the dimensions of time & space, from Feudal Japan to a strange Science Fiction story.

Lilith and her companion cockatiel, Ken (ケン), especially are the comic relief of the show.  Hazuki eventually catches up with Eve, who is actually able to speak.  Eve explains she cannot go back to being Hazuki's little sister but when Hazuki threatens suicide from having a broken heart, Eve reluctantly agrees to be reborn as Hazuki's daughter in the future.  It's a strange relationship because Hazuki's feelings for Hatsumi are clearly overtly sexual and erotic and romantic.  Lilith seems bisexual and flirts with Hazuki in a teasing manner but Hazuki rebuffs Lilith's advances and stays focused on her beloved Hatsumi.   The various characters are redeemed by being granted  a "do over" at very critical decision points in their lives.  For her part, Hazuki uses her second chance to finally kiss her beloved Hatsumi, who reciprocates.  Hatsumi still disappears the night of her 16th birthday, just as in the first time continuity, but Hazuki is at peace with this because at least she finally got to kiss her beloved and show the depth of her feelings for her....and she hazily remembers the promise Eve made to be reborn to Hazuki as her daughter in the future, which Hazuki accepts and looks forward to.

It's a very entertaining series but also quite strange.  It is a sub-only show, no dub was ever produced, to my knowledge.

Completed: Deltora Quest (via Crunchyroll)

I finally completed the rather lengthy series Deltora Quest (with Canadian English dub) via Crunchyroll.  It was definitely a fun ride.  It is aimed at children, so some of the violence is blunted and nerfed, but it is still an engaging story from start to finish.  Deltora Quest is originally a book series from children's fantasy author Emily Rodda.  It was adapted as an anime, specifically as a Japanese-Canadian co-production.

It is a High Fantasy adventure story with Knights and Magic and Dragons.  A young Blacksmith's son, Lief, is sent on a quest to retrieve the 7 sacred magic gemstones of the legendary Belt of Deltora, which is the only device capable of fighting back against the evil Shadow Lord who currently holds dominion over all the land.  He is joined in his quest by former royal guardsman Barda and later by the roguish heroine "wild girl", Jasmine.

Each arc of the story relates Lief's quest to obtain the next gem for the belt, one after the other, each of which is kept hidden away by a powerful guardian, each more terrible than the previous one.  The belt, once complete, must be turned over to the one true heir to the Kingdom, who can then use the belt to defeat the Shadow Lord and restore freedom to the lands of Deltora.  Each quest is an opportunity for Lief to learn and grow and become a better person.  His relationship and emotional bonds with Barda & Jasmine deepen as their quest continues.

I watched this series' entire English dub run on Crunchyroll (alas the original Japanese subtitled version is not available for streaming nor is it included in the physical release, which is a shame because it includes extra OVAs that continue the story beyond the original); I liked it so much I bought a copy of the box set to own.  The characters are very likeable and the visuals are compelling, as are the stories contained in the quests for each individual gemstone.   Jasmine is very independent minded and is never used to only be a damsel in distress nor as Lief's love interest.  Jasmine has her own agency and her own agenda.  I think she has feelings for Lief but she does not pursue a romantic relationship with him in the context of the story.

Emily Rodda teases us with the prospect of a Queen Jasmine but then throws in a twist that defaults back to the least surprising ending.  I think an actual surprise that delivered us a Queen Jasmine would've been a much more interesting tale, but I'm sure the more predictable ending is what Emily Rodda intended and the anime was constrained by the source material.  In any case, it's a fun fantasy yarn and definitely worth watching.

Completed: Strawberry Panic!

I first encountered Strawberry Panic! in the Hastings Books & Records anime rental section in Denton, TX; I didn't realize it was a sub only show until I got home and tried to watch it.  I returned it unfinished well before its actual due date.

Fast forward to 2016, it finally shows up unexpectedly on Hoopla Digital via my local public library, so I decide to give it a go.

This anime is perhaps a "classic" in the Yuri genre and should be watched mainly for historical interest.  It is all about the drama and emotions and peoples' inability to communicate their feelings; there's very little actual kissing or nudity/implied sex.  Shizuma is supposed to be this dark, brooding heroine...but she came off to me as kind of a creepy bully who is a little fuzzy on the notion of consent.  It's still gross & rape-y, even among lesbians.  

It's not a bad show, it's just that there are two other, more recent shows I can name that are so much better than this one, namely Sweet Blue Flowers and even Sakura Trick.  Sweet Blue Flowers actually delivers on everything Strawberry Panic! aspires to but fails to reach.  The characters of Sakura Trick have the same innocent appeal as Nagisa of this show, but there's more genuine warmth and emotion and their love feels more real and genuine than any of the relationships in Strawberry Panic!.

Also, in Strawberry Panic! there's a plot driven use of temporary amnesia that's completely ridiculous, targeting a very specific set of memories from blunt force trauma to the head...for which the character doesn't even go to the hospital (!) and which the show dialogue informs us later that doctors have said the effects are only temporary (but the show doesn't show that character actually being examined by any doctor!); Minor nitpick but I found it to be laughably bad writing.  Another character suffers from what I jokingly call "unspecified manga disease" that is of course fatal.  Strawberry Panic! suffers from a number of such cliches.  It's melodramatic and overwrought.  The only good love story is that of Hikari and Amane-senpai.

Amane-senpai is the champion horse rider of the school(s) and slightly reminiscent of Lady Oskar of The Rose of Versailles.

I might have appreciated the story more if I knew more about the French Catholic educational model, but the whole office of "Etoile" was vague and confusing.  It was intended to be a two-person leadership role, like President and Vice President, I think, but the story seems to imply that the Etoile pair should also be romantic partners??  Also, the main rivalry seems to be between the Schools of Miator and Spica, while Le Rim is content to sit out the conflict and not put up any candidates for the Etoile.  The Etoile is the titular head with authority over all student council presidents of the three schools, and has a whole host of administrative and ceremonial duties, as well as to serve as a shining example of excellence & grace.  Apart from the romance drama, the show is otherwise just "moe" slice of life, with cute girls doing cute things.  There are certainly worse shows out there, but Strawberry Panic! is definitely inferior to more contemporary Yuri shows.