Gen X Otaku 1971: the OG blog

The Tunnel to Summer, the Exit of Goodbyes (English ReWatch)

So last night I attended an English dub screening of The Tunnel to Summer, the Exit of Goodbyes (Japanese: 夏へのトンネル、さよならの出口, Hepburn: Natsu e no Tonneru, Sayonara no Deguchi) which for me was a re-watch, having seen the world premiere of this movie in original subtitled Japanese at Otakon 2023 in Washington DC this past summer.

The Dub is courtesy of Sentai Filmworks / HIDIVE and features relative newcomers to the industry for the main roles of Kaoru Touno (Gabriel Regojo) and Anzu Hanashiro (Patricia Duran).  As for me I only recognized Shelly Calene Black as the voice of their homeroom teacher.  

For my 2nd time through this story, with the language barrier removed and on the basis of the excellent dub performances, I found the Kaoru & Anzu relationship more believable, natural and plausible.  Just their spending so much time in each other's company, even just scientifically investigating the nature of Urashima Tunnel together, draws them emotionally closer.  Kaoru is grieving the death of his little sister Karin who died from falling out of a tall tree that she was climbing to catch exotic beetles for her brother.  Anzu lives alone in her uncle's condo, having been disowned by her parents for wanting to become a manga artist like her grandfather with only 1 published title to his name who died in poverty and was regarded as a burden and a failure by his family but dearly loved by his granddaughter Anzu.   The legend of Urashima Tunnel is it can grant you any wish but in return you are flung a century into the future....this isn't entirely accurate, as the two begin to discover.   Kaoru's home life is very unstable after his sister's untimely death.  Their mother leaves and his father descends into alcoholism & self-pity and becomes emotionally and physically abusive towards Kaoru, blaming him for Karin's death and wishing Karin had lived instead of him.  He spends long hours alone listening to music by himself to cope.  Meeting Anzu is a stroke of luck and he has in her a friend and confidant he can rely on.  Although they don't get along at first, Karou becomes a familiar face at school and someone to hang out with for Anzu.  

Anzu doubts herself, wrestles with her own adequacy as a mangaka....as an author and illustrator.  Kaoru is slowly able to win her trust and persuade her to let him read the first draft of her manga.  He really enjoys it and wants to read it again.   This makes Anzu very happy and she finally has the courage to submit her manuscript to a publisher, who shows interest and assigns her an editor.  Anzu believes the Tunnel can grant her wish for artistic excellence that will make her work truly stand out.  Kaoru realizes that is not what the Tunnel does and decides to enter the Tunnel one last time....he meets the ghost of his sister and spends some quality time in her company.  His sister is happy to see him but tells her brother it is her sincere wish for him to fall madly in love with a girl at school someday.  This snaps Kaoru back into his young adult form and Anzu's desperate, lonely texts finally reach him in the spiritual beyond.  He learns of her graduation from school, the serialization of her manga, etc. and other milestones of success as she grows into becoming a successful, professional mangaka.  He determines to exit the Tunnel and return to Anzu despite being away for just over a decade and change.  Anzu in the meantime has hit a kind of writer's block and is sinking into a tough bout of depression.  Sitting at the train station where she first met Karou, a random train service interruption announcement takes her back to the moment they first met and she bursts into tears with heavy sobs, heartbroken.  Then suddenly she hears her old High School cellphone ding with a text from Kaoru, announcing his return.  Anzu gathers herself and runs down the train tracks to the crossing where the Tunnel is located....he hasn't emerged yet so she goes in after him, finding him having tripped and knocked himself unconscious.   He wakes in her lap and they embrace then kiss.  Kaoru jokes that with the time dilation effect, their 10 second kiss lasted 6 hours in the real world.

The two emerge from the Tunnel where a light rain is falling, and Anzu returns Kaoru's rusted umbrella to him which he opens for both of them; they can resume their relationship anew....we just kind of have to hand-wave away the awkwardness in age difference....a woman in her 30s taking a boyfriend who is still a teenager physically.  Not unheard of but perhaps a little scandalous.  Reminds me of the same dilemma for Haruka Shitow of RaXephon...and in the RaXephon movie she even bears him a child.... 

But you know, time dilation, undying timeless love, yada yada....awkward, sure, but the do still love each other and the age gap wasn't their fault, etc.  Once the younger person is 18 and a consenting adult, it's all cool, technically.  They were technically born around the same time, etc.

All told, the story takes place between the years 2005 up through 2013.

Anyway, The Tunnel to Summer, the Exit of Goodbyes (Japanese: 夏へのトンネル、さよならの出口) is a good movie, beautifully animated.  In subtitled Japanese their relationship felt under-developed and unearned somehow, but re-watching in English made their dynamic feel more believable, at least to me.  I'm glad I watched it again, and I'm always happy to support anime on the big screen. 
 

The saddest Side Story of Outlaw Star

I recently finished the series Outlaw Star on Blu-Ray, and while I'm undecided if I will do a full series review, I did want to zero in on Episode 20 of Outlaw Star for starters.

As my Bloghandle indicates, I am a Generation X aged Otaku;  Cowboy Bebop was a foundational anime for me, especially when it aired on cable television for the first time.  My Millennial co-workers on the other hand were very drawn to Outlaw Star, which is a product of the same era.  But while Bebop is arguably aimed at adult audiences, with more mature storytelling and plots, Outlaw Star is clearly aimed at adolescent boys.  I tried to start Outlaw Star over a year and change ago but just couldn't get into it and bailed around episode 5 or so.  I returned to it after finishing live action Cowboy Bebop on Netflix.  I did ultimately enjoy the series the deeper I got into it, but it remained top of mind for me that this is a show for teenagers and not adults....best not to think to hard about it!

However, I do want to single out Episode 20 for excellent storytelling and for reaching Cowboy Bebop levels of sadness, despair & regret.

This is the saddest shit in the whole damn show....

Jim is sad because he thinks Hanmyo stood him up.  He doesn't even realize he killed her.  At least mercifully Hanmyo never knew Jim was a part of Gene Starwind's crew.  Gaah....this episode broke me.  It was so sweet and so fucking sad at the same time.  Cowboy Bebop delivers this kind of sad irony and despair in spades.  Outlaw Star manages this at least.

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.

Heart in a Heartless World or Helpful Fox Senko-San

So I finally finished watching the recent Simuldub of Helpful Fox Senko-san via the FUNimation streaming service that I subscribe to.

It was very adorable and endearing....the titular character Senko is an 800 year old Fox-Spirit Demigod who has decided to take pity on a hapless salaryman in modern Japan who apparently does some sort of unspecified business work in an office involving information technology and handling lots of spreadsheets & reports.  Voiced in English by Kristen McGuire.  I couldn't help thinking about Marx's pronouncement about religion while watching Senko....which is actually more compassionate towards religious folk than most later Marxists realize or are willing to acknowledge...

Marx wrote:  "Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people". 

If you've watched Helpful Fox Senko-San,  see if this paraphrase doesn't fit her...she is, after all, a quasi-religious saint-like figure for the Japanese context....a handmaiden of the gods, effectively.

"Senko-san is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions."

Kuroto Nakano (中野玄人 Nakano Kuroto) is definitely the poster-boy for alienation under modern capitalism, and he seeks comfort in Senko's busom and fluffy fox tail.  She is his refuge and solace in the cruel modern world.  She represents traditional Japanese womanhood, the loving wife, etc, only minus the serving the sexual needs because that would be kinda gross for a Loli-esque character to do....this is teased a little for laughs but never pushed because the creators are aware that'd be crossing a line.  And Kuroto Nakano (中野玄人 Nakano Kuroto) is enough of a gentleman not to lust after Senko in that way.  And in any case, each day at work beats him down so hard his libido is probably suppressed in any case because he's just too tired for sex or sexual thoughts.  If only Senko were more like Shinobu of the Mongatari franchise with an "adult" form she could transform into at will.  But that's not what this show is about.  (Sidebar, Shinobu definitely likes to tease Araragi-kun in her Loli form and getting him beaten up by his sisters for being a creep around Shinobu even though she actually sets up him, e.g. getting into the bathtub with him, etc....and even though she has that full-bodied Adult form, she prefers existing in her cutesy Loli form, devouring doughnuts.)

Senko tries mightily to be a good wife to Kuroto and the show is basically a slice of life showing the different ways she pampers him and comforts him after a hard day at the office...and also tries to teach him to relax and enjoy life more along the way....learn to set boundaries between office life and home life, etc.  But Capitalism is a dark, malevolent force and the Gods at one point charge that Senko isn't actually successful at helping Kuroto.  Senko protests that she IS making a difference, every day, and announces her intention to stay by Kuroto's side until he grows old and passes away...even though it will break her heart all over again just like the last time she pampered one of Kuroto's ancestors a century or more ago.  Senko is selfless and giving.  

The anime is somewhat inconclusive and I'm sure the manga goes into greater detail and has a longer story arc.

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: 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.

Finished Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence

Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

So I devoted Saturday night to watching in full the Blu-Ray edition (from Bandai Entertainment) of Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence.  I paid a hefty sum to acquire this Blu-Ray, and I'm happy to report it did NOT disappoint.  The visuals are simply stunning, with jaw-dropping detail, a carefully crafted blend of 2D animation and CGI 3D animation.  Definitely watch the "Special Features" included on this disc, they are well worth your time.

Of course I watched the English dub version, which utilizes the original television cast from Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex.  That said, this movie, according to Mamoru Oshii, is a direct sequel to the original Ghost in the Shell movie, which I own and have also seen.  Or more precisely I've seen Ghost in the Shell 2.0 which was a re-release by Oshii utilizing more CGI, with mixed results.  I saw this version on Hoopla Digital some time ago, but I also own a copy of the original Bandai release of the original Ghost in the Shell movie without the "2.o" edits.

Having just finished the movie Ghost in the Shell: Solid State Society, which is set 2 years after the events of Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, 2nd Gig, in my own "head canon", although the actual movie of Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence was released before Solid State Society, and even though the movies and the television series are supposedly separate fictional universes, to my mind, and given the chronology of all the fictional iterations of the Ghost in the Shell multiverse, the events depicted in Innocence, in particular The Major's ongoing evolution into ever higher states of being, are logically consistent with the directions indicated by the conclusion of Solid State Society, such that Innocence is a perfectly plausible future for Solid State Society as well, besides serving as a sequel for the original movie...at least to my mind it is.  The only plot wrinkle that would need to be hand waved away is that Tohgusa is in a greater position of authority in Solid State Society than he appears to be in Innocence.  But in any case, the real stars of Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence are actually Batou, Tohgusa, and Ishkawa, and to a lesser degree Chief Aramaki as well.  The Major serves more in the background as a "guardian angel" type figure, her ghost fully merged with the future internet without corporeal form, guiding the protagonists along but avoiding direct intervention until the very end.  This is a film about a series of murders by malfunctioning gynoid sex robots (a callback to Season 1 of Stand Alone Complex, incidentally) that points to a wider conspiracy.  Batou, Ishkawa, and Tohgusa must join forces yet again to unravel the mystery and stop the conspiracy, which seems to involve foreign threats emerging from the nearby Chinese mainland.  There is plenty of philosophical musings that are on par with the original movie as well as other anime shows like Serial Experiments Lain, which Innocence triggered many memories of, for me at least.  My words can't do justice to just how breathtakingly beautiful and complicated the visuals are in this movie.  I easily see myself watching it again and again for the visuals alone.  There's just so much there to take in that I doubt one sitting is enough to do it justice.  This should be enjoyed at home on a widescreen HD television off the Bandai Blu-Ray.  The music used is a callback to the original movie, with the score partly reused but also expanded for this film.  The special features are well worth watching in their own right, with extended interviews with Mamoru Oshii and his animation staff and also his Japanese voice cast.  The English television cast does a great job with their performances as well.  It sent chills down my spine the first time I heard Mary Elizabeth McGlynn's voice as The Major in Innocence.  It's a very short line and you can miss it if you're not paying attention, but I was and noticed immediately.  I recently watched the next Arise film and enjoyed it, and I understand why Mary Elizabeth McGlynn was not cast to voice the younger version of The Major for those prequels, but it is nice she was recast as a rival character to The Major, as a way to symbolically pass the baton, so to speak, by playing a slightly older and wiser "noble adversary" type character.  The third Arise film's concluding shot is a hat tip to the original opening of the original Ghost in  the Shell movie.  Watching Innocence fills a gaping hole in my knowledge of the Ghost in the Shell fictional multiverse.  I feel I belong to a special class of anime fan now, to have seen all these different iterations.  I have yet to read any of Shirow Masamune's original manga, however.  I hope to remedy that someday.

Finished Antique Bakery

Antique Bakery (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I managed to finish the short 12 episode series Antique Bakery, which is the story of four men; the owner, the patissier, his apprentice, and the owner's lifelong bodyguard/butler.  The owner, Mr. Tachibana, is a scion of a wealthy Japanese family who grows bored of his life as a junior executive and decides to try his hand at managing a small business instead.  His first new hire is a former High School classmate, Mr. Ono, who is now a renowned patissier.  Ono doesn't recognize Tachibana at first, but Tachibana does remember Ono.  Ono is openly gay, but he came out in High School and declared his love for Tachibana, who did not take this very well at all, cursing Ono with hateful, homophobic slurs.  Tachibana reminds Ono of this incident, which Ono of course never forgot.  But Ono is desperate for work and is willing to forgive his former classmate, and even rationalizes that the harsh rejection forced him to dig deep within himself and reinvent himself and fully accept himself as a homosexual.

The next hire is a up and coming young boxing champ, Eiji, who is forced to leave the sport due to a deteriorating eye condition; if he continues boxing he could go blind.  Reluctantly he hangs up his gloves and as fate would have it he walks by the new bakery and applies to become an apprentice patissier.  He's immediately smitten by Ono's charisma and demands to become his apprentice.  Tachibana doesn't like the young man's freshness and disrespect, but he also implicitly trusts Ono's professional judgement and reluctantly agrees to hire Eiji.  

Lastly there is Kobayakawa, the strong silent type who was Tachibana's childhood companion and later became his butler and bodyguard.  Kobayakawa feels duty bound to stay by his young master's side and so begins hanging around outside the shop in one of the family vehicles.  Tachibana finds this ridiculous and decides to employ Kobayakawa as a waiter.

After the first 2 episodes, I assumed this was going to be a farcical BL romantic comedy, but it turns out this series is much more complex, with multiple stories intersecting.  It handles emotional topics sincerely and with great sensitivity.  Kobayakawa is a closeted homosexual and totally Ono's type.  In time and as their friendship deepens, Tachibana asks for Ono's forgiveness for his cruel words in High School.

The episodes cover the day to day running of the Antique Bakery, but also the lives and tribulations of the four men who work there.  Past loves, new customers, and the owner's dark past all interplay in this story.  It seems Tachibana was kidnapped as a child and forced by his captor to only eat cakes and sweets.  He managed to stab his captor in the leg and escape but was so traumatized by the events that much of his memory of it was blanked out.  One motivation for starting the bakery was as a tool to find his original kidnapper and confront him, even though the statute of limitations has long since expired and no prosecution today is possible.  Then suddenly young boys begin to be kidnapped again and worse, some are turning up dead.  Could these be related to Tachibana's cold case?  Tachibana is haunted by nightmares from his childhood kidnapping ordeal, even into his 30s.  He agrees to do his part to aid in the police investigation of the latest string of kidnappings when new evidence comes to light about the last meals of the deceased boys.

I was really impressed with Antique Bakery.  Even though I'm a dub fan typically and this show was sub-only, I was still thoroughly entertained by this series and it even provoked a few tears watching it.  Love is universal, whether straight or gay or anything in between.  I give it a thumbs up!

Gasaraki completed

 
So, I finally finished the 1990s Mecha series GASARAKI. It does a good job of trying to depict the combat robots realistically, the actual problems they would face on a real-world battlefield, and what would be needed to overcome the inherent
difficulties of the bipedal design. The series interweaves Japanese mythology and Medieval History with the present day, hints at reincarnation, etc., and even integrates cultural practices like ceremonial dancing in very awkward and unintentionally comedic
ways. I might react differently if I were Japanese with a better understanding of the social and historical context, but as an ignorant
Gajin, I can only point and laugh and snicker at some of the clunky dialogue. The ADV Films crew deliver their lines with sincerity, it’s not their fault that what they’re saying is at times patently ridiculous. 

 
The film is also very politics heavy and the greatest weakness by far is just how goddamn talky the story is; it really wrecks the pacing of the anime and there are many extended scenes of characters sitting across from each other giving
deeply thoughtful lectures to each other about the philosophical underpinnings of their project and their critical analysis of what’s wrong with contemporary Japan and how it can learn from the past to build a better future for itself.
 
The villains of the story are Japanese elites of a very traditionalist and nationalist mindset, very arch-conservative and right-wing, but the story lets them expound their views and seems to lend some tragic sympathy to their views. Indeed,
there is a possible segment of the audience who would view the villains as tragic heroes who fail rather than cheer for the ostensible young protagonists. The main antagonist, Mr. Nishida, wants to provoke a confrontation with the United States and also usher
in a period of economic devastation to Japan that he hopes will break the amoral, narrowly consumerist ambitions of contemporary Japanese and return them to a more noble, purposeful agrarian past that eschews technology altogether. However, he’s undermined
by an ally, the head of Gowa clan, for whom although they share a common goal to smash the existing Japanese state, and launch a coup’d’etat together, their ultimate goal is the advancement of their own power and absolute dominance, much in the manner of his
medieval ancestor. His ambitions are stopped by his brother, Yushiro, and a female mech pilot, Miharu, who have a special affinity beyond normal humans for piloting the robot mecha.
 
It seems in this version of Medieval Japan there were terrible Mecha-style monsters resembling Golems, known as the Gasaraki, that could also be piloted by a certain class of knights and were capable of wreaking great destruction upon the
land. These Gasaraki were sealed away deep underground, never to be used again, but the Gowa Corporation has uncovered their ancient burial grounds and brought these Gasaraki back into the modern world. The ancient, Golem-like Gasaraki are even more powerful
and terrifying than modern Mecha known as TAs, or Tactical Armors. There are a few flashback episodes of the Gasaraki operating in Medieval Japan, and we can see that Yushiro and Miharu lived in those times as well, their contemporary namesakes being reincarnations
of their ancestors. Yushiro is a civilian contractor and test pilot assigned to a JSDF mecha unit testing their TAs. He is more skilled than any of his military counterparts and the Gowa Corporation tries and fails to find a way to reproduce Yushiro’s special
abilities via drugs, with disastrous results for the unfortunate test pilots.
 
The Gasaraki re-enters the plot one final time, but more as a gateway to a mystical realm than as an actual combat unit. Mystical things happen and the heroes are judged worthy and returned to earth to live out their natural lives, while
the wicked are annihilated by divine judgement. 
 
It’s a really weird show and worth watching, I guess, but I only saw it because it’s available on Hoopla digital through my local library. I wouldn’t recommend going out of one’s way to acquire used copies of the original ADV Films DVD
release.