ChocolateRob

One relevant thing I did not include in the FFX story description above is the cycle of souls in the world (Spira). Upon death souls escape the body in the form of Pyreflies - rainbow-like glowing wisps of energy that float around. It is the duty of Summoners to put these souls to rest by performing a Sending ritual that ushers them to the Farplane (realm of the dead). As I mentioned above Summoners are basically necromancers that manipulate dead souls, though usually for benign purposes.

Souls that are not sent to the Farplane roam the world resentful of the still living and will eventually coalesce into monsters called fiends that will attack anyone. More powerful people are likely to retain their human form but still be mindless fiends with maybe a few leftover abilities. Those with particularly strong wills however become true Unsent, they retain their human form and their minds, usually powered by a single goal they wish to accomplish before moving on. Even rarer/stronger still are Unsent Summoners who not only retain their human forms and minds but can manipulate pyreflies to alter their bodies into more dangerous monstrous forms while still being in control.

 

With all of the above There are many parallels between the book and the game.

1) First off Brandon has said what he most liked about FFX's worldbuilding is that Yuna has a magical (to us) occupation (Summoner) that is important and necessary to the nature of the world she lives in. In crafting a fantastical world a fantastical occupation in that world naturally arises and becomes a natural aspect of that world. This is how Yuna directly inspires the role and even the name of Yumi.

2) Secondly are the parallels of self sacrifice that both Yuna and Yumi are brought up in. They are taught that sacrificing their own wants for the good of all people is their duty to the world and they never even question it until someone from outside their system begins to influence them.

3) Yumi and Tidas are living in a simulation of civilization that once existed many centuries ago but is now long dead, its presence has become a poison holding the rest of the world from advancing. For Yumi she lives the same day over and over like a groundhog day that she does not remember. For Tidas his Zanarkand is less a prison and we aren't explicitly told if it exists in a looped period or something more organic. Is it only ever the same souls being reborn over and over? Are new souls born into it like a natural world and the city simply prevents its people from looking to its borders? We know little of the details on how Dream Zanarkand operates, only that Jecht managed to leave and ten years later so did his son (probably the Fayth managed to intervene in Jecht's case in order to eventually trigger their own escape/rest).

4) The false realities of both stories are both sustained by the power and substance of trapped souls formed from the 'soul soup' of both the Shroud and Pyreflies.

5) Yumi and Tidas in the end must sacrifice their own existences and everything they grew up knowing in order for the 'real' world and its inhabitants to be able to move on.

6) The souls of the dead are trapped in a half dead state that coalesces into monstrous forms that stalk the living in a near futile attempt to regain their own former humanity.

7) The Spirits/Fayth that power the simulated world are tired from their long imprisonment and beg Yumi/Tidas to free them so they can finally rest.

8) Yumi and Tidas somehow manage to hold on to their existences at the end of the story and reunite with the one they love (In Tidas' case it is only strongly implied until the sequel).  In both these cases there are also strong parallels to the story of Pandora's Box. Pandora is tempted into opening a mysterious box that she should be protecting and she unleashes evil into the previously sinless world (seven deadly sins and all that). After making this costly mistake she recognizes her own folly but hears one last quiet voice from the box begging for freedom. Warily she open the box one last time and releases Hope into the world as well. The reason that I bring Pandora's box into this is that the good intentions of people (building a machine to attract spirits, summoning a city of people back into existence) unleashed catastrophic disaster upon the world but also releases a tiny sliver of hope as well, Yumi and Tidas get their happy endings. These three examples are also paralleled to Cinderella, that one last bit of magic that doesn't fade away and brings on the happy ending, despite everything else turning back to rags at midnight the glass slipper remains bringing hope.

 

There are probably more parallels that could be made but they aren't coming to mind right now. I'll add any more that I'm reminded of while re-reading again.

Now I've slept properly and moved the above into its own thread. Time to be on with it. Going forward with this thread there is no point not spoiling the events of FFX as this whole thread is about them. I'm leaving the spoiler tags in place for the initial comment above because 1) Members can understand the point of this thread by reading it without getting into spoilers of the game if they choose not to and 2) It nicely breaks up the structure of the gargantuan post into easier sections.

So be warned. Final Fantasy X spoilers will not be hidden ahead.

I commented this thread into the reactions thread last night (under too little sleep) before this morning (better rested) realising that it should be its own thread so I'm moving it here. But basically Yumi and the Nightmare Painter shares a lot more DNA with the game Final Fantasy X Brandon has so far implied. I'm not saying anything crass about it being a knockoff of FFX's plot (because it isn't) but there are strong parallels between them throughout.

(copied over from my firstpost) - Well I've not been on these forums since the start of 2019 but finishing this secret project makes me want to discuss it. Mainly due to the DNA from Final Fantasy X weaved throughout it. For those of you who are involved in the 17th shard podcast you should really include someone with a good understanding of the thematic content of FFX when you film the Yumi and the Nightmare Painter spoiler episodes.

(Copied from the much longer second post) - OK, so below are massive spoilers for the game Final Fantasy X. Brandon has made clear how it was an inspiration for this project (one of many) in the section after the epilogues and has also spoken of the game recently but there are further parallels than the ones he has mentioned. I'll try to sum up the plot and themes of the game both for anyone who has no interest in ever playing it and therefore won't care about being thoroughly spoiled as well as those that do know the story but might want a reminder of some points. Definitely not for anyone who may want to play it for the first time in the future without knowing spoilers for the major plot points, so be warned.

The following paragraph is mostly spoiler free as it covers the beginning events of the game, I'll spoiler tag the few spoilers that are at the end then the second paragraph will break the narrative of the game in a Very spoilery way.

The game itself it told as a story from the perspective of the main character Tidas to his companions as they approach the end of a long journey they have been on, he is telling them how he got involved in their lives and reached this point (not particularly relevant to this thread but as good a starting point as any). His story begins in a futuristic fantasy mega-tropolis called Zanarkand where he is a famous sports star, he is in the middle of a game when the city is attacked by a gargantuan creature with devastating gravity powers which quite thoroughly wrecks his home city. During the attack he is guided by a friend of his missing father towards the creature which he names as 'Sin' and both of them are pulled through it into a dreamy reality before Tidas wakes up alone in the middle of nowhere by an abandoned temple. After managing to start a fire he is 'rescued' by strangely garbed people speaking another language, after finding one who speaks his language he explains how he got here but is told that Zanarkand was destroyed by Sin 1000 years ago. Before he can really process that he is somehow 1000 years in the future the ship they are on is attacked by Sin and he gets separated. This time he washes up on a small tropical island called Besaid. Here he meets a few more people who he will end up traveling with, primarily a woman his age (17) called Yuna (the character whose role Brandon has spoken on and even based the name of Yumi on). She has trained as a summoner and is about to embark on a strengthening pilgrimage that will end in the ruins of Zanarkand far to the north where she will gain the power to defeat Sin which has been devastating the world for the last 1000 years. The full details of the pilgrimage are only drip fed to Tidas/us but basically

So this is Yuna's story as much as it is Tidas'.

Time to break the narrative by handling them chronologically rather than how the story tells them to us. -
 

OK that was a lot. This last section is about Tidas' story and ties together the above two sections.

So that was all a very long recap of Final Fantasy X with oodles of the game missed out but gimme a break, its a 45 hour game. I think I've recapped it thoroughly enough to show the similarities it shares with Yumi and the Nightmare Painter for those who can spot them, along with enough that its story hopefully makes sense to those unfamiliar with it.

but now it's 2:30am and I've been typing for way too long, maybe with this as a base I'll be more specific with the similarities tomorrow

 

edit - Moved to its own thread. Simply put my reaction to this book was to think on its connections to FFX, a game that I know very well. Brandon was clear that it was a major inspiration and I was struck with an urge to discuss it.

edit - moved to its own thread. Yumi and the Final Fantasy X connections.

Been a year or two since I was last here but my understanding from way back when was that hemalurgic spikes could steal multiple attributes from a person (assuming they had more than one attribute relevant to that spike's metal) but the restriction was that the spike will only grant whichever attribute was relevant to the bind point it is placed in. So if you used a bronze spike on a mistborn you would steal all their mental allomantic abilities (rioting, soothing, smoking and seeking) but you could only use that spike to grant one of them to someone else depending on where it was placed (the 4 mental powers having separate bind points).

If this is so then using a lerasium spike would have the same restriction, it can steal all the abilities but only grant whichever one is relevant to the bind point it is placed it. Making it a colossus waste of potential (like nuking Scrooge McDuck's money bin to hide that you stole $5 from it).

As no-one seems to have mentioned this I assume I've misunderstood somewhere or the rules changed when I wasn't paying attention?

12 hours ago, Retsam said:

I really feel like I should be enjoying Re:ZERO a lot more than I am.  

Mostly, I've just never cared for (or cared about) the main character.  His background is generic and handwavey ("Good thing I lifted enough weights as a shut-in to be able to wield this giant club!"); no one seemed to react appropriately to his occasionally ridiculous behavior, and his main character motivation revolvs around a relationship/crush that's both abruptly started, and oddly possessive and once again, goes back to the "nobody reacts appropriately to his ridiculous behavior" thing; Emilia should be way more weirded out by this guys who, from her perspective, she just met, declaring his undying love for her.  

Recent episodes have started to call him out for his behavior, which I've appreciated... but then recent episodes have been essentially a nonstop procession of Subaru, in my view, behaving like an idiot (and occasionally, like a child), which hasn't been the most enjoyable thing to watch, either.

What I appreciate is that he believes he is in One Piece (or the like) but he's found himself in the Game of Thrones. He is woefully unprepared for everything he faces and it is taking a very realistic toll on his sanity. While I'm also getting annoyed by his attitude I find it very realistic of someone whose mind is hanging from a thread. He's denying to himself and the world how out of his depth he is, he has a very heavily overpowered advantage but it has an equally overpowered price. The things that he has endured and seen could break any person, he is literally unable to speak with anyone about what is happening and he doesn't even have the option of suicide to escape. His handwavey grip strength isn't really anything, it was mostly surprise that gave him a brief advantage over the three thugs and lifting the club barely did anything either, all the real threats his faces are well over his threshold. Recently Emilia has been questioning who he is and what is going on but he's unable to tell her and so she is suspicious of the situation

I can ignore a lot of the generic traits that are found in anime, I just expect to see them there, it would be nice without them but nothing is perfect.

Is anyone watching Re:ZERO Starting life in another world?

Holy Crem! That show can be intense. It starts out ordinarily enough; a teen is out getting groceries when he suddenly finds himself in an alternate fantasy world, you know, the usual stuff. At first he acts like he's in a videogame/anime and tries to find out what his superpower must be and where the beautiful girl that must have summoned him may be, he quickly gets himself in trouble. However it turns out he does have a power which (as Firefight would agree) really sucks despite its advantages. Whenever he gets killed he mentally time travels back to a previous checkpoint. He has no power over where and when he returns to, he experiences the full agony of his death, everyone forgets everything about him as he keeps meeting people for the first time over and over again and he is literally unable to tell anyone what he can do. His inherent goofiness is played off against an increasingly brutal world and the story pulls no punches as to his mental state as he works through his ordeals. He's died some hideously brutal deaths and seen his friends go through the same (eg his first few deaths are because of a character known as The Bowel Hunter).

One of the best Anime's I've seen in ages, real nail-biting stuff at times (some comedy too).

The best two I read are Girl Genius and Namesake.

Girl Genius (updates every mon, wed, fri) is set in a madcap alternate Europe where mad scientists (Sparks) run the world (badly). The story begins when a clumsy inept student called Agatha Clay is mugged by some soldiers and has her locket stolen, what she does not know (at first) is that she is the lost heir to the Heterodyne family of Sparks, the most terrifying of all Sparks, and that her locket was designed to dampen her brain down to keep her hidden and safe. The authors coined the term Gaslamp fantasy to describe a world part steampunk and part supernatural. There are monsters, robots (clanks), undead, minions, monstrous robot undead minions and just about anything else you might expect to find in a world where Mad Scientists can truly warp the laws of physics.

Namesake (updates tue, thur, sat) is based on the idea that the titular Namesakes get pulled into other worlds when they are young adults/children, have an adventure and return to find their Writer who tells their story, in this way stories keep spreading and strengthening magic/reality in all worlds. They are called Namesakes because children of particular names will always be pulled into the same world – a Dorothy will always go to Oz, a Wendy to Neverland, an Alice to Wonderland etc. Any child of the appropriate name could have their world turned upside down in this way.  The story starts when a girl called Emma goes to pick up her sister, Elaine, from the library and ends up being pulled through a portal. Emma ends up in Oz and Elaine is picked up by an organization called Calliope comprised of former namesakes and Writers who are very confused that an Emma has disappeared when there is no record of Emma being a Namesake name and so they don’t know where she has gone. Emma is confused herself as everyone keeps referring to her as ‘The Dorothy’ (as well as the fact that she is in Oz and a purple witch immediately tries to turn her into a handbag).  It has great humour too (eg when one character learns about magical, reality warping Writers he asks ” Is Terry Pratchett one of you guys too?”)

Both are excellent full-page comics, I'll also recommend - Freefall, Fey Winds and Gaia.

Well I just bought the kindle version but almost immediately returned it for a refund. I was only around a quarter of the way in when I realised the formatting was a complete failure. I imagine it works well enough on kindle fire (feel free to correct me if I'm wrong there) but on kindle for PC or paperwhite/regular it does not work.

The problem is double pages, the formatting shrinks down large landscape images to fit into a portrait size, rendering pictures blurry and writing illegibly pixelated. I suspected beforehand that this may be a problem with my regular kindle so I downloaded kindle for PC before even trying to read this book, unfortunately the PC version is just as bad, there is no zoom option at all. I used the computer's magnify function but that just gave me a larger blurry, illegible image. Double pages are supposed to be where the best art is, not the worst.

I don't really want this book in hardback so I guess I'll just have to wait for paperback instead.

Feel free to rant with me on this subject (restrict fire to amazon though, it's not Brandon's fault).

We are caught up on Erased. Time travel stop-a-serial-killer show. It's pretty intense, and I hope no good guys die permanently.

 

Erased is easily the best anime I've watched this season (probably the best I've seen in the last year or two). Some of those cliffhangers are heartrending. I really hope the quality runs through to the end, I'd hate it if it suddenly went X-MenLastStand/Spider-Man3 on me.

Ok so I've never played Halo but I've watched enough Red vs Blue to realise that with the output level that Brandon has managed to reach in the last few months he is clearly starting to enter the Rampancy stage. His output level will continue to grow increasingly haywire in size and imagination at a faster and faster rate until he self destructs, long before actually completing the Stormlight Archive. We can only hope that he somehow manages to break through into the theoretical, stable 'Meta' stage. Our (slim) hopes are with you Brandon.

1. Marasi or MeLaan left the cube for Irich to find because they figured he would immediately put it somewhere safe, that somewhere being wherever they were keeping ReLuur's spike. Basically they did not know where to look so they tricked him into going wherever the important stuff is kept so that they could follow him and pinch it all (getting the cube back in the process).

2/3/4. A Kelsier did it. It is implied that after the world was remade Kelsier managed to get a body back somehow and with a better understanding of the metallic arts he went south to save the people there, then finally made the Bands of Mourning and let everyone believe that they were the Lord Ruler's Bracers.

5. Who on Earth (or Scadrial) can ever guess what Kelsier is up to? Though Hoid obviously just wanted Wax to know that Kel is still about

 

The Bandits threw Irich and themselves off the train as part of their escape (they threw him because he is too feeble to make the jump himself). Can't remember what they landed in or on though.

I'm a big fan of RWBY, I have both volumes and their soundtracks. A quick look on my Ipod tells me that Red Like Roses part II and I Burn are in my top 25 most played tracks (previously it was the trailer versions of both). I also really like Caffeine and Die from vol 2. Really enjoying volume 3 (on crunchyroll) the latest episode (6) was really different to any of the previous ones in that it actually explained a lot more about the over arcing plot and world building. Before this one it was all very teen heroes going to school genericness (but with awesome choreography and weaponry) but this one episode made the world more unique. It is better to look at the first three volumes as one series (as they were imagined) and having reached the middle of the third we are entering what would be the Sanderson Avalanche.

One thing I am addicted to is TV tropes and whenever I read or watch anything new I always look them up there to see what I missed. Lots of useful extras to be found there (I altered the RWBY character page during vol 1 to have the weapons treated like characters).

 

The wizard of OZ allusions for the characters mentioned above are on the nose (and not spoilers as they have been discussed since the start). Most of the characters in the show are allusions to stories in our world, often grouped into similar themes.  The most obvious being Ruby, Weiss, Blake and Yang as Red Riding Hood, Snow White, Beauty & the Beast and Goldilocks (fairy tales).

Team JNPR has an interesting theme that is far less obvious - they are each gender flips of ancient heroes who disguised themselves by cross-dressing.

Jaun Arc is obviously Joan of Arc

Nora is based on Thor (disguised himself as the goddess Freya)

Pyrrha is based on Achilles (pretended to be a woman named Pyrrha to avoid the trojan war)

Lie Ren is based on Mulan.

Other random ones: Cinder Fall = Cinderella, Cardin Winchester = the Cardinal of Winchester (oversaw the trial and execution of Joan of Arc), Penny = Pinochio, Roman Torchwick = Alex from A Clockwork Orange, Velvet Scarletina = the Velveteen Rabbit (ps Team CFVY are all named after cakes).

Another thing you can get from TVtropes (or the RWBY wiki) are the names of the weapons, in the series only Ruby's scythe has been named (Crescent Rose, a High Velocity Sniper-Scythe) but most do have interesting names and descriptions.

Weiss - Myrtenaster, Multi Action Dust Rapier.

Blake - Gambol Shroud, Variant Ballistic Chain Scythe.

Yang - Ember Celica, Dual-Ranged Shot Gauntlets.

Jaun - Crocea Mors. (Yellow Death, supposedly the weapon of Julius Caesar).

Nora - Magnhild. (translates from Norse as Mighty battle).

Pyrrha - Milo and Akouo (Speak [the sword] and Listen [the shield])

Ren - Stormflower.

Sun - Ruyi Bang and Jingu Bang (the weapons of the original Sun Wukong)

Adam - Wilt (the sword) and Blush (the sheath)

 

The geek world lost quite a few big names this year (Leonard Nimoy, Christopher Lee, Sir Pterry) but Monty Oum's was the saddest for me as he was only just starting his career and his best was certainly still to come. Volume 3 is still excellent but I can't help but wonder how it would be different if Monty were still with us.

Enough about Dalinar the Awful, how about the description of the Thrill sounding just like a Parshendi rhythm. Do the Listeners have their own name for the Thrill? The Rhythm of Fury/Conquest/Slaughter?

Point 1 - When Wax first hears Bleeder's voice the governor is talking with Steris. Doesn't this mean that he/she is having a mental conversation at the same time as a normal one without missing a beat? Either that is incredible mental discipline or the voice is coming from whichever Shard is interfering, not Bleeder herself.

 

Point 2 - There seems to be a fair bit of discussion about how sane Bleeder is (or isn't) and using it as evidence for her having one normal and one whateverium spike. I'll just point out that sanity is more than just the ability to make clever plans and follow them out, horribly murdering people and nailing them to walls could easily be evidence of insanity even if there is some logical chain of thought behind the act. Sanity is not cleverness.

It seems to me that Harmony had put himself in a position where he had something that Wax needed to know but he knew the damage it would do, so he kept putting it off until it was too late. Harmony should have let Wax know that Lessie was a Kandra a long time ago but when is a good time to find that out? We don't know enough about the Bloody Tan incident to know who was manipulating whom at that point but by the time of this book things have suddenly snowballed in completely unpredictable ways. Harmony knows that the truth would utterly wreck Wax at this point, it is way beyond a reasonable time for Wax to find out how he has been manipulated. If Wax knows that the enemy is Lessie he would not be able to function enough to stop her so Harmony cannot risk telling him.

 

It is similar to Dumbledore, he always had information about Voldemort that Harry absolutely needed to know but he kept putting it off for a better time to tell him, too late does he realise that the time has already been and gone.

 

So in answer to the survey, Harmony does the best he could during the two day period that the book covers but only because he should have done more at the earlier end of the last seventeen years.

 

That's how I see it most likely being.

Whether they are for breeding a full mistborn or mistings for harvesting (somehow even creepier) those women really need to be found (or at the absolute least - remembered).

Anyone else wanting to know what happened to the missing women from Alloy of Law?

 

Whether they are dead, rescued or still missing I would expect some kind of reference to them, or having fulfilled their purpose of showing how evil The Set are do they no longer matter?

 

If Harmony started talking to me their location would have been my first question. Considering Marasi's hypothesis of why they were taken the passing of months would not make their chances of still being alive any less but their situation would be increasingly desperate. There is reference to Wax causing The Set plenty of trouble but mostly from a financial and personnel perspective, no reference to rescues.

 

Assuming the location of Wax's sister comes up in the next book maybe the other women will at least get a mention but from all the attention they get in SoS they may as well not exist. Is this an example of the disposable woman trope or will it be followed up later?

 

(PS. For those confused, the phrase 'what happened to the mouse' is a trope about smaller plots that are just forgotten once bigger things start happening. Brave TVTropes at your peril.)

Mac really is just the worst at his new job of keeping artifacts secure. Gemma gets sucked into the thing but has security on it improved since...   Nope!

Shotgun skeleton key and no guards, monitors or alarms.

I assumed she screamed because the Stormfather pulled her away from Kaladin and she was sobbing because she was unable to get back to him. Just a theory though really.

My impression was that the Stormfather used the weakening of their bond to snatch her away 'for her own safety' and then tell Kaladin that she died. I assumed that she became especially vulnerable at that point (due to the sudden, urgent surge of stormlight) and the Stormfather overpowered her to hold her in Shadesmar away from Kaladin before it got any worse. To be fair Kaladin was killing her by degrees so the SF was pretty justified.

I've always been on the ropes about Arrow. I was annoyed by Sara's death but I abandoned it completely when I discovered the who, how, why and response to. That was one of the dumbest plot twists I'd ever heard of. I've really enjoyed all of The Flash though and I'm interested in Legends but wary of it too.

um...

Sarah Connor

Emma Peel

Fred Flintstone

Sarah Connor

Richard Sharpe

 

Hmmm, I'll not post a question as I'm pretty sure I'm wrong. (Fred Flintstone and Richard Sharpe both died in the first book didn't they?)

I'd not watched a great deal of anime until I signed on to Crunchyroll last November, the few I'd seen were mostly from the nineties - Gundam Wing, Legend of the four kings, a few other random bits here and there. I felt like checking out Attack on Titan and Sword Art Online then just kind of got stuck there and have done a whole lot of bingeing since then. So here are the ones I've been enjoying since Nov 2015 -

 

(PS they say you can't judge a book by its cover but I will bring up intro titles and music a lot)

 

 

Attack on Titan -

I'd heard it mentioned a few times so I thought I'd try it. I tend to avoid depressing tales (like a song of ice and fire) even if they may contain much awesomeness (I gave up on Brent Weeks Lightbringer) but despite knowing that AonT fits this category I watched it anyway. It is certainly unique enough to be interesting and as anyone who has seen it knows - it really has some seriously bombastic opening titles! (No seriously, just watch the titles even if you don't watch the series).

 

Sword Art Online -

OK so I actually started watching this one just because I saw Man at Arms forging Kirito's Elucidator on YouTube and thought it looked interesting (Man at Arms is a show where blacksmiths take requests to recreate iconic weaponry from anime, films and computer games). I enjoyed it overall for its premise and the action but the characters can be annoying at times and there is an over-reliance on Deus Ex Machinas. I'd have though the premise of the first arc could have lasted a lot longer too, the stakes just keep dropping with each arc. The best way to enjoy this would be to watch an episode then watch the abridged version of it, 'cause the abridged version is just plain awesome even if it's only 7 eps so far (it quickly managed to improve Kirito's character arc). Titles are pretty good and evolve as things unfold.

 

Hunter Hunter -

I heard the RWBY crew mention this a few times so gave it a go and was not disappointed, I was leery of starting any series with episodes in the hundreds but this one (148 eps) did not seem too high. Enjoyable all the way through, interesting magic system, fun intro song (though not after the first few dozen times) and while Gon is the youngest hero I’ve seen in a while he can be quite terrifying when he wants to be, I do like the ‘something awesome is happening’ music too.

That Chimera Ant arc really dragged on though.

 

One Piece –

Speaking of arcs that really drag on… I finally finished my epic One Piece binge a few weeks ago 700 episodes since Januaryish. So much to get through but it was made a lot easier by the fact that it repeats itself so much - if you skip the intro/titles/recap you can chop about seven minutes off some episodes, then the end titles and next episode preview and you’ve lost a third of the ep that was just wasted. Then there’s the eps randomly set in feudal japan and other fillers and you’ve cut out a few hundred episodes worth of wasted time. I had about 30 eps to go and thought ‘well that’s not enough to wrap up this story arc’, seriously guys cut some stuff.

One the other hand it is a great series, loads of fun.

 

Fairy Tail –

I thought it looked interesting but Crunchyroll only starts at season 2 so I had to look elsewhere for the first. Only to discover that season 2 actually start with episode 150ish. Titles range from good to bad as they change quite a bit but the main theme is always good. Interesting magic systems, imaginative world, goofy cast, all round fun.

 

Bleach –

I only got till the middle of season 4 before calling it a day, it’s good but I’ve watched too many long runners and had to call it quits somewhere. I have to say though that this world has the second worst afterlife since the Earthsea books. Season one ghosts were told that Soul Society was where they would be at peace with their families…

Nope, come season 2 and you see it’s actually a slum - a literal slum – and good luck finding your pre-deceased family members.

 

No Game No Life –

A very weird one but mercifully brief. I really liked the titles and all the game theory but the main characters are downright obnoxious. It’s the creepy Japanese over sexualised ecchiness (and not in a good way…) knocked into high gear, but other than that I quite liked it. I had to repeat the Janken negotiation a few times before I got it and the Shiratori game was interesting (if you ignore the juvenile pervyness laced throughout) to see translated.

I should mention that all anime I watch is subtitled rather than dubbed, dubbing never seems right. Only 1 season of 12 eps (so far).

If you don’t know it the basic premise is that two shut-in siblings are pulled into a fantasy world where all conflict is settled by games since Tet the God of games became the One True God. These two are champions of any game in our world but just don’t quite get real life, this new world is perfect for them so they want to stay and decide to game their way to the top of it.

 

Parasyte - The Maxim –

A gory one now, recently finished, 1 season 24 eps. A teenager gets his arm consumed by a shape shifting parasite, it was after his brain but did not get there in time and is now stuck as his arm. Not my usual type of thing but so well told, true masters of cliff hangers here. Really disliked the opening titles but the end titles are much more to my liking. Hero with eldritch abomination for an arm tries to battle evil but his arm is far more interested in self-preservation and keeping a low profile. Not a series that shies away from blood and gore, heartbreaking at times, great action but the environmental message seemed kinda random.

 

Yona of the Dawn –

A very pretty one now, recently finished its first season of 24 eps. Princess Yona has to flee her castle after the assassination of her father and embarks on a quest with her bodyguard to gather the descendants of the four dragon warriors of her country’s origin myth. Pampered princess learning to be strong and realising how badly her country has been run. Beautiful animation this one, the music is pretty good especially the end titles of the second half (worth seeing just on its own). Last Airbenderish aesthetic to the world.

 

Is It Wrong To Pick Up Girls In A Dungeon? (The Familia Myth) –

I know I know, just try to ignore the stupid title. This one recently finished its first season (13 eps). It is set in a world where the gods have decided to give up their divine power and live as mortals with all that it encompasses, the only power they have is to bless their mortal followers (familia) the ability to… well basically level up RPG style. They explore the titular dungeon to defeat monsters and collect treasure and then their patron god updates their status via a power tattoo on their back. The main character is a new adventurer called Bell Cranel who believes (thanks to his recently deceased grandpa) that romance is saving a weaker adventurer in the dungeon who will then fall for you. Unfortunately he quickly gets into trouble and has his life saved by a girl who he then falls for. The story is about him trying to get stronger to catch up to her level. The story is fun, the titles are perky, the fights can be very impressive and the humour is great.

 

Gate –

Currently part way through its first season. A very interesting idea around this one – a portal to a medieval fantasy world opens up in the middle of modern day Japan and an army immediately charges through and starts slaughtering civilians. Said army has the tables turned quite rapidly when the Japanese army arrives with modern weaponry and wipes them out. After some debate the Japanese government sends the Special Defence Force through the gate to investigate the other world it leads to, the plot is basically how modern soldiers and a fantasy medieval world react to each other (here’s a hint, people on horseback should not pick a fight with people in tanks). The main character is a perfectly normal 33 year old, fully trained soldier (and geek) which is very refreshing as everyone else in this list is a teenager.

Great concept and very watchable but the violence has been toned down way, way too much from its source manga, the titles are fairly ‘meh’ too.

 

Rokka no Yuusha – Braves of the Six Flowers –

Also in the midst of its first (only?) season. Starts very generically in a very nicely designed Mayincatek style fantasy world but takes a sudden swerve a few episodes in with a genre switch. Demon King rises to destroy all humans every few centuries and six mighty warriors (Braves) are selected by the goddess of fate to destroy him first. This time when they gather there are seven instead, which one is an imposter/enemy? Starts with a standard epic fantasy quest but the focus suddenly becomes a paranoia fuelled locked room mystery in an enclosed area.

Beautiful animation, beautiful titles and interesting character designs.

Suggested drinking game – take a shot whenever the main character calls himself ‘the strongest man in the world’

 

 

So that’s my japanime selections for the last half year. I’d also like to mention The Legend of Korra, it had its ups and downs compared to the original but was mostly great never the less.

Also a special mention to RWBY from Roosterteeth, It was a terrible wrench to hear of creator Monty Oum’s death at the start of the year, we geeks have lost a lot of greats so far this year – Leonard Nimoy, Christopher Lee, Sir Pterry - but none quite so tragic as the loss of someone at only the beginnings of greatness.