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I feel like Shiki is one of those series that could be great if they did a rewrite. It suffers from bad writing with the Monk guy.

I think it’s bad translation, but his Cain and Abel story and what he says to the head vampire always came across as self-serving from a tortured artist wallowing in self-pity. Every interaction he had with the head vampire, I’ve heard is a bad translation because it’s supposed to paint them as the same type of person: a massive cunt. They view themselves as being abandoned by God when in reality they are both afraid to face their sins.

The Doctor is totally in the right. The monk isn’t taking a moral stance because it cares about the village or can’t justify defending it via killing, he wants the village gone because it’d mean he doesn’t have to be a monk anymore. His father is a straight parallel where he viewed becoming a vampire as a new start (and still ends up a cripple in a worse position.

The ending where the big man of the village starts going psychotic also just feels like the author was told that Total Vampire Death was not allowed.
 
I'm watching the Cyber Formula OVAs, starting with the first one. Fukuda's style is more readily apparent in here than the TV show -- the TV show was basically 0079 with racecars, but here there's lots of WHY ARE WE ENEMIES moments, the ED has a scuffed-up car, there's flashbacks, and in the first episode Hayato faces a harsh defeat like Kira in Freedom. I've also heard that the later OVAs introduce Newtypes/SEED mode, that the Foundation waltz was ripped off from a scene in the OVAs, and that the last Cyber Formula OVA is a proto-Destiny (lots of stock footage, flip flopping between who gets to be the main character). These will be very interesting indeed, and hopefully they'll shed some light on what SEED is supposed to be.

Also I recently learned that the original Asurada got a Japan-exclusive Hot Wheels release, alongside other franchises popular in Japan like Kamen Rider, Sentai, Ultraman, Metal Hero, Kikaider, Thunderbirds, Captain Scarlet, and Chargeman Ken. It would be amazing if these were more readily available to buy; they're vehicles from all my favourite weird Japanese stuff in one of my favourite toy formats. Sadly, nobody cares about this stuff and if Hot Wheels were ever to do something like this, it would probably be character cars of popular Shonen Jump characters (though I wouldn't mind a Dragon Ball capsule vehicle). They don't even have Tomica of Ultra science patrol cars anymore; it's just weird trucks. Cyber Formula Hot Wheels/Tomica would be amazing, as would ones for all the Ultra vehicles, Sentai vehicles, and Kamen Rider bikes like in this line. They also did Gundam Tomica which were really cool; the Gundam car even homaged the Clover DX Gundam!
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I watched Ergo Proxy recently. That shit was so cash. It having Paranoid Android as it's ending credits song was a neat little bonus. Love that song.
 
Space Police said:
Sadly, nobody cares about this stuff and if Hot Wheels were ever to do something like this, it would probably be character cars of popular Shonen Jump characters (though I wouldn't mind a Dragon Ball capsule vehicle).
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Mattel (as opposed to Bandai under license from Mattel) put out one vehicle from a Japanese tokusatsu TV series in a 2023 Hot Wheels Entertainment line: the Spider Machine GP-7 from the 1978 Japanese live-action Spider-Man TV series.

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Despite the katakana on the card, this one was sold at normal retail in the U.S. and Canada.
 
BiggestKai said:
The final chapter's finally translated. I did have two months to think about the plot and the only way it could have really ended so it's nothing truly wild but I feel a bit underwhelmed, like they really wanted to zoom to a conclusion and were getting tired.
Still highly recommend reading it.
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Alright ending, manga felt sort of grounded so yeah once the events of 22 happen the conclusion needs to be immediate. It ends up being the usual "criminals are scum, but still human underneath" and the police being corrupt (though it's really not comparable). I wonder what currently goes on with Yakuza in Japan now that a lot of their known tactics no longer works and the police have tons of tools to fuck with them.
HodgePodgeRogerDodger said:
I feel like Shiki is one of those series that could be great if they did a rewrite. It suffers from bad writing with the Monk guy.

I think it’s bad translation, but his Cain and Abel story and what he says to the head vampire always came across as self-serving from a tortured artist wallowing in self-pity. Every interaction he had with the head vampire, I’ve heard is a bad translation because it’s supposed to paint them as the same type of person: a massive cunt. They view themselves as being abandoned by God when in reality they are both afraid to face their sins.

The Doctor is totally in the right. The monk isn’t taking a moral stance because it cares about the village or can’t justify defending it via killing, he wants the village gone because it’d mean he doesn’t have to be a monk anymore. His father is a straight parallel where he viewed becoming a vampire as a new start (and still ends up a cripple in a worse position.

The ending where the big man of the village starts going psychotic also just feels like the author was told that Total Vampire Death was not allowed.
Click to expand...
The whole Monk subplot was the author going into his own ass. If he wanted to make the Vampires likable he shouldn't have them do a ton of the cruel shit they did. By the end Total Vampire Death was warranted and extremely satisfying.
 
Action Orange said:
I watched Ergo Proxy recently. That shit was so cash. It having Paranoid Android as it's ending credits song was a neat little bonus. Love that song.
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I don't get how older and far lesser known anime back then would have songs by relatively lesser known but still high profile western bands.
Like you had Juno Reactor for Texhnolyze
Or a Durant Durant song for I think it was called Speedographer or something along those lines.
All I know is it was sick as hell, even though speedgrapher or whatever the hell it was called was pretty meh.
 
BiggestKai said:
I don't get how older and far lesser known anime back then would have songs by relatively lesser known but still high profile western bands.
Like you had Juno Reactor for Texhnolyze
https://youtube.com/watch?v=u3SzOzm8lmoOr a Durant Durant song for I think it was called Speedographer or something along those lines.
All I know is it was sick as hell, even though speedgrapher or whatever the hell it was called was pretty meh.
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Going back further, the second opening for the Maison Ikkoku TV series used Gilbert O'Sullivan's 1972 hit song "Alone Again (Naturally)"


and "Get Down"


Not quite so far back, The Legend of Black Heaven used John Sykes "Cautionary Warning"

 
BiggestKai said:
I don't get how older and far lesser known anime back then would have songs by relatively lesser known but still high profile western bands.
Like you had Juno Reactor for Texhnolyze
https://youtube.com/watch?v=u3SzOzm8lmoOr a Durant Durant song for I think it was called Speedographer or something along those lines.
All I know is it was sick as hell, even though speedgrapher or whatever the hell it was called was pretty meh.
Click to expand...
Holy shit that opening is awesome. I think I've heard the name Texhnolyze but I've never seen it. Is the show as good as that opening? If so I will download it immediately.
 
I finally understood the whole noble family shenanigans in Apothecary Diaries. The previous Empress looks really young though, the youngest age I can put her is 40 if both she and the Emperor had their kid super early.
 
wtfNeedSignUp said:
The whole Monk subplot was the author going into his own ass. If he wanted to make the Vampires likable he shouldn't have them do a ton of the cruel shit they did. By the end Total Vampire Death was warranted and extremely satisfying.
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Author's a chick, dude. Same person who wrote Twelve Kingdoms.
 
Ensok said:
Author's a chick, dude. Same person who wrote Twelve Kingdoms.
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The whole Monk subplot was the author going into her own ass. If she wanted to make the Vampires likable she shouldn't have them do a ton of the cruel shit they did. By the end Total Vampire Death was warranted and extremely satisfying.

Fixed.
 
wtfNeedSignUp said:
The whole Monk subplot was the author going into her own ass. If she wanted to make the Vampires likable she shouldn't have them do a ton of the cruel shit they did. By the end Total Vampire Death was warranted and extremely satisfying.

Fixed.
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I think the author tries to portray them with some sympathy, but the monk is not supposed to be sympathetic. The little girl head vampire and him are kindred souls, but they are both absolute cunts. She comes there because of him and his self-pitying books.

The Cain and Abel story he wrote is literally about him and wanting to be told that’s he’s cool for being a cunt. It’s why the head vampire likes him. He’s already damned by his own hand before the story begins. My issue is that the author does a poor job of showing this and the ending feels tacked on.

This isn’t a Joshua Graham and Daniel play where one side is treading a line between being a realist and giving into bloodlust while the other side is optimistically trying to preserve innocence and naively trying to be the bigger person. The monk hates the village, he’s alienated from them and doesn’t actually try to tend to their needs.
 
Finished Cyber Formula 11. This was so, so good. I especially liked Schumacher's character development (he's a Char clone played by Show Hayami, because you'd be a fool to expect anything less from Sunrise) and the new racecars and super modes. They even had a nod to Newtypes. This is like reliving when I was 4 and obsessed with anything racing-related. I'll probably periodically rewatch these OVAs for the races; they're pretty much everything I like in media combined into one. The Fukuda-isms I've found so far concern Schumacher and in one of the middle episodes, they recreate Athrun and Shinn's conversation in the sunset. When will Fukuda make a Dendoh FINAL?!
 
Action Orange said:
I watched Ergo Proxy recently. That shit was so cash. It having Paranoid Android as it's ending credits song was a neat little bonus. Love that song.
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The OP and the game show episode are all-time greats.
BiggestKai said:
I don't get how older and far lesser known anime back then would have songs by relatively lesser known but still high profile western bands.
Like you had Juno Reactor for Texhnolyze
https://youtube.com/watch?v=u3SzOzm8lmoOr a Durant Durant song for I think it was called Speedographer or something along those lines.
All I know is it was sick as hell, even though speedgrapher or whatever the hell it was called was pretty meh.
Click to expand...
Gunslinger Girls' op was by The Delgados.
 
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