Setsuled's Journal

I picked up the final volume of Maison Ikkoku yesterday. An ending of a Rumiko Takahashi series! A real ending, too, not just a last episode where nothing changes. Which I guess is the advantage of reading the manga--although the Ranma 1/2, Urusai Yatsura and Inu-Yasha television series have no proper endings, supposedly their manga counterparts do. And so, from what I hear, does the Maison Ikkoku television series, which adheres closer to the manga than any other. But I have to say I was somewhat disappointed by the one episode I saw.

Tim copied a bunch of anime for me on Saturday. This time he gave me the movie Jin-Roh, two episodes of Top o Nerae 2, and all twenty seven episodes of Noir.

I watched the first episode of Noir and was pretty heavily disappointed. There seems to be a frightening thirst for the homogenous in anime these days, and Noir is a good example of the trend. I think it's meant to be film noir-ish, but it's not easy to tell with its very standard and dull J-Pop theme, hazy story, and hazier characters. Animation is very, very slow--which I might forgive for a presumably low budget if the compositions weren't utterly bland and coloured with boring pastels worthy of a Hallmark shop before Easter. The main characters apparently are a blond assassin and a girl who wants her help because she has amnesia. "But," the assassin says, "I don't help people. I kill people," and tells the kid that, once they find out the secret of the kid's identity, the assassin's therefore going to have to kill her. Er, yeah. This after they've been in a gunfight with your standard mysterious thugs in black suits and sunglasses. A fight that had all the excitment of blank postcards falling through a mailslot.

But I'm excited about the Top o Nerae 2 episodes. These are episodes three and four of an OVA series probably destined never to be released in the U.S. If it is, it'll probably be under the title of Gunbuster 2, as Gunbuster was the English title of the first series, a classic from the 80s. Directed by Hideaki Anno who, apparently, has recently done a tongue-in-cheek live action adaptation of Cutie Honey, which I'm afraid to see.

Top o Nerae 2 is produced by Gainax, the same company as produced the original series. The director's different, and the show has a different sensibility, but it's especially after viewing Plain Jane Noir that I appreciate it very much. It's a lot of fun, and interesting. Why are people so afraid of Interesting?

Anyway, I didn't do very much else yesterday. I'm making grand plans, mainly. I want to get started on the next Boschen and Nesuko chapter early as there will be a lot of things I need to work out. Plus I'm working on another project which needs a whole lot of groundwork laid, but I like the daydreams I'm having about it.

But for now, perhaps, I'll sleep . . .