Persona 5

I have been a fan of the Persona series ever since I got Persona 3 for my PSP many years ago.  I love the music, the stylish character designs, the storylines, and the use of mythological imagery for the plot and monsters.  I'm also a fan of the Shin Megami Tensei Devil Survivor series, which the Persona series spun off from.  When Persona 5 was announced, I eagerly awaited updates on the game.

It was the second Persona game I'd ever completed.  The first was Persona 4: The Golden, but I didn't get the "true" ending to the game and have yet to go back and complete my New Game + run.

Persona 5 uses the themes of outlaws, imprisonment, and corruption in places of authority.  The protagonist is accused of assault and battery of a man who apparently has a lot of power over small-town police, and is shipped off to live with a friend-of-a-friend in Tokyo to live out his 1 year probation sentence.  At his new school, the protagonist is subjected to social rejection as other students have already learned of his criminal record (though not the unjust part), and both the students and teachers are hesitant to get to know him.  To make matters worse, the student body and faculty seems to be under the thumb of an absurdly overly-important athletics department - in particular a rather sleazy volleyball coach who treats his female athletes like eye-candy and male athletes like cannon fodder.  After accidentally stumbling across a strange castle run by a speedo-clad version of the volleyball coach, the protagonist discovers that he has the ability to step between the real world and the "Metaverse" and to take on a Persona, specifically that of Arsene Lupin the famous phantom thief of French literature.  The protagonist decides to use his newfound powers to fight against corrupt adults around him by stealing their Metaverse "treasure" to change their behavior.  He's joined by several other teens with similar motives, but the Metaverse is full of more dangers than just the odd boss-battle - there's some real political conspiracy going on here and if the protagonist and his friends aren't careful, they're likely to end up in some serious hot water.

I loved the stylishness of the game - from character design to menu design to music, this game is just dripping with style.  The controls were also pretty easy to get the hang of.  I also liked how timely and relatable the storyline was - it's not just teens tired of corruption in positions of authority.  It's nice to be able to "fight the power" and see immediate change in the hearts and minds of the corrupted, even if it's just in a fictional world.  Unfortunately, solving problems in the real world isn't as fun or easy as stealing a "treasure" and fighting a boss-battle with a kickass soundtrack in the background. 

I only have a few complaints about the game.  They all occur at about the same point in the story - the Big Bang Burger storyline.  Not only is the inter-group conflict poorly written, but the dungeon related to that part of the storyline has one of the most frustrating puzzles and battles out of the entire game.  Plus, you are given your final party member at this point, but in order to max out the social link with that character, you have to be really, really good at managing your time in-game or have maxed out other relationships earlier in the game to the detriment of non-party (but still valuable) relationships.  Basically, they could have established a social link with Haru a lot earlier in the game and had it change to a party-relationship later in the game (like they did with Akechi).  I mean, Haru was introduced before the class trip to Hawaii, and that would have been a great time to squeeze in a social-link establishment scene. 

A lot of people complained about Mementos, the underground dungeon that basically serves as a level-grinding dungeon.  I actually didn't mind the Mementos dungeon, and I liked how it was worked into the overall game.  It gave me a chance to get Personas I missed in the boss-level dungeons (which become inaccessible once the boss is defeated, unlike the dungeons in Persona 4). Plus, I liked being able to correct small social wrongs as well as tackle the big ones like corrupt politicians and businessmen. 

Overall, though, I really enjoyed this game.  And, perhaps this game will get a similar treatment that Persona 4 got with The Golden, only instead of introducing another character storyline, they smooth out the existing flaws with the latter part of the game.

Blackout - Mira Grant

Because I'm something of a completionist, I am reviewing the third of the Newflesh series. I thought it was just a trilogy, but apparently it's four books now, plus a collection of novellas.  Anyway, this review will contain spoilers for the last two books because, well, when you're reviewing the third book in the series, it's hard not to spoil stuff.  So, if you haven't read Feed or Deadline, don't read this post.  Or do.  What am I, your mother?

So, first spoiler - They cloned George.  I'm actually rather upset about this.  It would be like somehow George R.R. Martin brought Ned Stark back from the dead and sent him out to go talk sense into Stannis or something.  It just...look, if you kill someone, leave them dead and figure out how to get along with them.  Or, y'know, don't kill off someone that's important to the continuation of the story.

So, yeah.  George is alive.  Ish.  Her brother is still acting like a crazy, violent jerk, and he's currently being studied by one of the local Mad Scientists to figure out how/why he became immune to the zombie virus.  Second spoiler - his exposure to George has magically made him immune to the zombie virus because...reasons?  I'm assuming it's because of his sexual relationship with his adopted sister, as I doubt that people that are just regularly in the same room with someone who has dormant zombie virus in their body will trigger the same immunity.

And, yeah, the sexual relationship is confirmed.  I know that they're adopted and not blood-related at all, but it's still kinda squicky to me.

Really, this book should have been chopped up into two shorter books.  The first "half" covers Shaun's team attempting to break into the CDC to get evidence to support their findings about the zombie virus and the CDC's complicity in the spread of the most recent devastating mutation.  In the mean time, Clone-George is trying to figure out how to get out of the CDC's clutches after she discovers that she's going to be used for Nefarious Purposes.

The second "half" of the story is the newly reunited siblings and their friends trying to break the story about the CDC's involvement in the zombie virus's spread and continued evolution, as well as the truth about the possibility of a cure (spoiler: there isn't one, but humans are evolving to adapt to the virus's presence in their DNA).

I'm not going to give away too much more of the ending.  Honestly, it's not going to be a happy one since, y'know, zombie plague.

This book, like the last one, has a lot of repetition and over description of mundane things.  However, when there's something really awesome that could be described, such as the zombie bear attack, the author chooses to gloss over things and scurry on to the next mundane thing.  I mean, how can you introduce a goddamn zombie bear and not have an epic battle?!  I felt cheated by that scene.  Sure, it's minor in the grand scheme of things, but if you're going to introduce something like that for tension, then do it right!  However, the author does choose to describe fights between humans with more tension and detail - I guess they are trying to suggest that humans are a far greater threat and enemy than nature could ever be... but still... zombie bear.

Overall, I felt like I was just slogging through this book to get it over with.  I won't be picking up additional works by this author.  Feed was great, and I really think that expanding the story with these characters as the central focus was a mistake.  I think it would have been better to have each book in the series take place with different characters in different regions, and maybe have a final book where the government and CDC's Nefarious Plans are revealed and dealt with.  But, that's just me.

The Silenced

I stumbled across this movie on Netflix one day.  It sounded like a ghost story - and I am a sucker for Asian horror ghost stories - so I eagerly queued it up to play.

During the 1930s, South Korea was under Japanese control.  During this time, the Korean people were forced to adopt Japanese culture and language.  This is actually pretty important for the plot, and not just some random piece of trivia I'm spouting here.

The story focuses on a young girl who has been sent to an isolated private girls' school outside what is known at the time as Keijyo, but we now call Seoul.  The girl goes by the Japanese name Shizuko, and she is suffering from what appears to be tuberculosis.  However, under the headmistress's specialized treatment, her symptoms quickly disappear - in fact, she seems to be even healthier than she'd ever been before - but it becomes clear that all is not as it seems at this sanitorium/private school. Students are acting strangely and disappearing, and then there's the peculiar way that Shizuko's body is getting stronger...

I don't want to give too much of the story away.  It's not really a ghost movie as I first thought, but there are definitely some supernatural elements going on here.  It's really more of a mystery-thriller with a strong critique of the Japanese occupation of South Korea.

I enjoyed this movie, despite it not being what I thought it was.  It takes a little while to really get moving, but the breadcrumbs of mystery strewn throughout the film keep your curiosity piqued while it builds up steam. I didn't really think that the ending fit with the rest of the film, but then again, I don't know how they could have possibly resolved everything.  The only real complaint I have is that the supporting characters never get a chance to develop beyond "girl bully clique that's prone to violent emotional outbursts", and they're largely interchangeable as far as personality goes.  It's hard to get worked up about the disappearance and possible death of a character that's never done anything particularly notable in the short time she's on screen.

Overall, this movie was about average in terms of horror.  It's not a supernatural thriller like it was trying to appear to be, and I'm a little disappointed on that count, but it wasn't a bad mystery-thriller.  I wouldn't mind watching it again, though.

Rabbits episode 3

It takes me a while to get to these Rabbits posts because I usually have to listen to each episode twice to really catch what's going on.  So, although episode 4 is out already, today's post will be about episode 3.  Anyway, spoilers ahead and let's dive in.

So, in this episode, Carly plumbs the depths of pirate radio while pursuing a lead on an older iteration of Rabbits in an attempt to understand what kind of game it is.  She also recovers a mysterious, impossible photograph from her friend Yumiko's password-locked laptop that holds a secret message encoded within.  And if that's not enough, Concernicus gives Carly some information about her parents' death that....well, let's just say that things haven't been as cut and dried as she once thought.  The episode ends with a dramatic in-person meeting with Concernicus Jones and a cliffhanger (argh!).

All right, so let's look at this impossible photograph first.  The photograph is considered impossible because it shows Carly and Yumiko in a Starbucks that had only been in a specific location for a year, and yet Carly is wearing a distinctive t-shirt that she lost three years ago.  Now, you could argue that the picture is doctored, but then doesn't that make it even creepier?  I mean, sure, you could splice a couple of individual photos together, but unless you were a photo editing software genius, I doubt that you could get the lighting and everything just right to make it look right.  Why that specific, distinctive shirt in that specific place?

But the weirdest part of this impossible photo isn't the subject matter, but the extra information encoded within.  Someone has created a "version" of a painting called Christina's World, a painting that Carly has a deep, personal love for, and hidden it within the "impossible picture" of Carly and Yumiko.  Now, like the impossible photograph, this picture of Christina's World is also subtly wrong, but unless you really  knew the painting the way Carly did, you probably wouldn't even notice.  Carly seems to think that these pictures were sent to Yumiko, but, what if someone is trying to get Carly's attention?  Could these pictures be from Yumiko?  Or is someone else trying to draw Carly into something?

Then there are the death certificates that Concernicus sent Carly.  They're extremely suspicious, not just because of the obvious discrepancies, but because of his implication that her parents were involved in some kind of "mysterious underground plot" of some kind.  This, combined with the dramatic cliff-hanger ending, makes me really suspect Concernicus of suspicious shenanigans.  I mean, he's the one who sent Carly the pictures of Yumiko from that escort site in the first place, and he's been her primary source of information about the Rabbits game.  He knows way too much to be trusted at this point.

As for the pirate radio station - I am hoping that there will be more about the connection between Marigold and the game aside from one transmission.  Maybe episode 4 will have more to offer.

So, does anyone have any thoughts about episode 3?  Theories?  Corrections?  Leave me a comment.

Rakugo

A lot of my exposure to Japanese culture comes by way of Japanese anime, manga, and literature.  It's not the most efficient way to be learn - it's kinda like trying to look at a landscape painting through a keyhole.  One of the things that you typically don't get exposed to in the West is Japanese theater and comedy.  Part of this is probably because puns and certain comical trends just don't translate very well into English.

Most anime fans are probably familiar with manzai comedy, which relies on two-man teams.  Think of classic Western comedy duos like Laurel and Hardy - one man is the funny-guy and the other is the straight-man.  We're less familiar with a more minimalist form of performance comedy - the one-man skit performance known as Rakugo.

Rakugo is similar to stand-up comedian acts like Louie Anderson and Gabriel Iglesias.  One man performs the skits and plays all of the parts, using changes in his physical position on the stage, his body language and posture, and his voice and speech style to convey each character.  You may not have ever heard a full Rakugo performance, but if you've ever watched Fullmetal Alchemist, you've at least heard part of Jugemu Jugemu.

Rakugo acts should really be viewed rather than just listened to, but if you can't get to your nearest rakugo performance, you can at least listen to some translated stories here: Rakugo.  Some of the stories do require a little bit of understanding about Japanese culture, but the hosts do a wonderful job of explaining things like the festivals used for backdrops for the stories or cultural practices, and of course the actual performance of the rakugo skits is top-notch.

So far, I think that the podcast has been family-friendly, so it's a good way to expose kids to something outside of their usual culture.  If you have an interest in Japanese culture or stand-up comedy, or you just want something to listen to on your commute that doesn't require a lot of concentration, I think you'll enjoy this podcast.

Rabbits - Episode 1 & 2

I posted earlier about how excited I was that I was going to be able to listen to a new podcast from episode 1.  I did a short post about the first episode, but it was pretty skimpy.  There wasn't much to go on, but now that there's a second episode, I'm going to go ahead and talk a little more about episode 1 before going into episode 2.  There will be spoilers here.

In episode 1, we're meet Carly Parker and learn a little about Yumiko Takata, her missing friend.  She disappeared shortly after getting involved in a game called Rabbits.  (Well, Rabbits isn't exactly its "real" name, but it's the name that it's known by.)  Rabbits is, apparently, related to a category of games called "ARG"s (alternate reality games).  ARG's rely on immersive storytelling and role-playing to progress, and can sometimes trek into "conspiracy theory" territory.  It's a little hard to understand the connection between ARGs and Rabbits, but it seems that Rabbits steers a little closer to "conspiracy theory" than "immersive role-playing game".  Because of the secretive nature of the game, it's difficult to find much concrete information about it, but here is what we know:

• If you play, you cannot tell anyone that you're playing.
• There are Wardens that make sure that you are following the rules and/or honoring the spirit of the game.
• Consequences of breaking the rules while playing can result in serious physical or mental harm.
• The modern version of the game has been played eight times, and this is iteration number nine.

Presumably, the prize for winning the game is worth the potential dangers, but no information about previous winners has ever surfaced.  If Yumiko is involved in this game, did she catch the attention of a Warden? Or is she caught up in the pursuit of clues?  Or could her disappearance be completely unrelated?

The first episode focuses on establishing the relationships and histories among the different characters and giving background information about Rabbits and people that may or may not be related.  At this point, the only things that are known about Yumiko is that she has gone missing, she started acting strangely shortly before her disappearance, and that she visited the Natural History Museum before she disappeared.  Before its ending, Carly receives her first clue about Yumiko - a pin-up girl style photograph of young woman from an escort website - from someone called Concernicus Jones. 

But even as you get that clue, you're left with so many questions:  Who is Hazel, and how were they involved with the previous iterations of Rabbits?  What is Concernicus Jones's angle? 

So, episode two starts with a snippet of a conversation with the mysterious hacker Concernicus Jones.  But, before we can dive into that tantalizing little chat, it's time for a bit more background on the Yumiko situation.

Apparently, before her disappearance, Yumiko had become obsessed with learning more about people who had died while playing video games.  Yumiko herself became so absorbed in her research that, had Carly not had plans to meet with her, she might have followed the gamers who died playing MMORPGs in Korea.  Clearly, something is not right with Yumiko, but she can't talk too much about it.

Carly also follows up on what exhibit Yumiko looked at when she visited the Natural History Museum.  She doesn't learn much, but apparently, passenger pigeons have something to do with Rabbits.  Perhaps it's a clue in the game?

Finally, we can get into Concernicus Jones and his information.  It turns out that he knows quite a bit about Rabbits, and he encountered Yumiko while he was "watching" someone else.  He provides Carly with another lead - a website devoted to reviewing escort services like the one that Yumiko's picture had been on.  This new lead eventually turns up a new clue - "How many steps to the lighthouse?".

The latest episode has made me wonder - is Carly now an unofficial player of Rabbits herself?  How long until the Wardens turn their eyes on her, and will she be in danger if they do?  Or, since she's following another player, would the Wardens just consider her one of the fans/observers that have always existed in the game?

So far, this podcast has been pretty top-notch and interesting.  I am a little concerned, though, that this is going to turn into TANIS 2.0, as it has a lot of the same elements: the Deep Web, conspiracies, a trail of clues that lead to more clues, and hackers that know way too much.  I am hoping that I'm wrong. Despite this, I am enjoying how stimulating this story is.  It's definitely something that I have to stop everything and pay attention to, but I don't mind because it's so absorbing.

So, is anyone else following Rabbits?  Any theories you'd like to share?

The Unwritten vol 1: Tommy Taylor and the Bogus Identity - written by Mike Carey, art by Peter Gross

Tom Taylor and Christopher Robin Milne have a lot in common.  They're both the inspiration for their father's greatest literary works. They both have quite a bit of resentment toward their father for that fame.  But, unlike Christopher Robin Milne, Tom Taylor may not be quite who he thinks he is.

Tom Taylor's father wrote the popular Tommy Taylor series, which follow the exploits of a boy wizard and his friends as they try to survive the rise of a powerful dark lord.  After writing the final Tommy Taylor book, Wilson Taylor went missing, leaving his son to grow into a rude, cynical slacker.  There's no love lost between Tom and his father - his father never seemed especially affectionate toward him and insisted upon drilling seemingly useless knowledge of literature and literary geography into his head at every available opportunity.  Although Tom has attempted to distance himself from his fictional childhood self throughout his life, he always finds himself returning to the convention circuit.

It's at one of these conventions that he encounters two people that throw his life into turmoil.  The first is a very eccentric man who believes himself to be Count Ambrosio, the villain of the Tommy Taylor novels.  He has been stalking Tom Taylor's convention appearances for a while, and his behavior has been getting increasingly erratic.  The second is a woman named Lizzy Hexam, who asserts that Tom Taylor is not the real son of Wilson Taylor - in fact, the boy known as Tom Taylor may not have ever existed at all.  There's no evidence of Tom's existence - no birth certificate, no real social security number, nothing.  So, who is he, really?  Before Tom can fully digest this revelation, "Count Ambriso" kidnaps him and attempts to livestream his villainous triumph over the boy wizard. And the "Count" isn't the only one that seems to be out for Tom's blood.

The Unwritten may sound like AU Harry Potter, but it's a lot darker and grittier than the beloved children's series.  It's kind of like what Harry Potter would have been like if it had been crossed with Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere.

The first volume's pacing fluctuates.  During the action parts, it's pretty quick, but then there's an entire chapter following the literary life of Rudyard Kipling that's pretty slow.  The Rudyard Kipling chapter isn't included just for giggles - there's important things being established in this chapter - but it's slow and hard to read because you're reading handwritten diary entries.  It was my least favorite chapter, but don't skip it or you'll be confused about the overall "shadowy cabal" stuff that's going on.

I can't say that any characters stood out as being "favorite character" material in the first volume.  Tom Taylor is an unlikable, self-centered jerk, and you don't really know enough about anyone else to really form a strong opinion of them.  Lizzy Hexam is interesting - why does she know so much about Tom, and why was she researching him in the first place?

The real star of this book is the world-building that's going on.  We may think we know what's going on in the modern world, and we may think that literature is just a form of entertainment, but the line between the two may not be as clear as we think.  Authors might be more than just spinners of fanciful tales, but just how much power do they wield if that's the case?

The art is pretty good - it conveys emotion and movement really well.  The action sequences are paced well enough that you can follow what's going on without having to study each panel for five minutes.  You should definitely take the time to study the cover art and alternate cover art gallery at the back, though.  I think that a couple of them would make nice posters.

I think that this would be good reading for older teens to adults who were fans of the Harry Potter series or like darker fantasy stories.  It's definitely not something you'd get for your ten-year-old Pottermaniac nephew for his birthday.  There is a lot of strong language, and it's pretty violent - they don't shy away from committing grisly acts of murder with, for instance, farm tools or nail bombs.  (Okay, your ten-year-old nephew might be mature enough to deal with this, but, y'know, full disclosure and all.)

The Little Book of Hygge: Danish Secrets to Happy Living - Meik Wiking

Before I get started: it's pronounced "Hoo-ga", and you can listen to the pronunciation here. (Incidentally, Forvo is an excellent free resource for language-learners.)  This does not stop me from reading "hygge" every time as rhyming with "pig", and I apologize to Denmark and all Danish speakers in advance.

So, what is hygge?  It's pretty hard to explain, as the word doesn't translate very cleanly into English, but - picture yourself in an overstuffed armchair, your warm beverage of choice within reach, a fireplace crackling and popping before you, the scent of baking bread in the air, a snowstorm swirling beyond the windows, and your favorite comfort-novel in your hand.  That's basically hygge.  You can hygge alone or with a small group of close friends.

The purpose of this book was to explore hygge and give tips about how to add hygge to your everyday life.  After all, if the Danish are frequently ranked #1 in happiness, there must be something to this hygge thing, right?

The book is fairly short, and the chapters are typically only a few pages long.  As I read it, I couldn't help but be reminded of the Marie Kondo books I'd read earlier, as both talk about how changes in one's environment can help change one's mood.  They also both emphasize mindfulness as one of the secrets of being happier.  I got the sense that, once you've gotten rid of your clutter using the Konmari method, you can start introducing some hygge to your life using Wiking's tips.

I would be doing a disservice to the idea of hygge if I tried to break it down into a simple list, but some of the things that Wiking mentions as important to hygge is: candles, food, companionship, and comforting surroundings.    If it weren't for the fact that I don't speak Danish (yet...) and that winter last about eight months up there, I think I'd move to Denmark just so I could be among like-minded individuals.

Fortunately, you don't have to move to Denmark, or make a lot of money, to add some hygge to your surroundings.  In fact, Wiking maintains that the more humble and simple something is, the greater its hygge factor.  A home-made knitted pair of socks is more hygge than cashmere socks, especially if you made them yourself and can fondly recall the experience of learning to turn a heel or cast-on when you wear them.  A humble but hearty beef stew with home-made crusty bread is far more hygge than a gourmet meal at an expensive restaurant, especially when made and shared with friends.  Hygge is about simple pleasures.

I can't say that I see hygge catching on in a widespread fashion here.  We're too addicted to our toys, our noise, and our pursuit of "the next big thing" to slow down and appreciate the simpler things in life.  It would pretty much require a complete cultural overhaul to have a chance of catching on around here.  But, you can at least make your "down-time" more refreshing and pleasurable by taking a few tips from this book.  For introverts, this is basically a how-to book for building the perfect nest, and they might be the ones to benefit most from reading this book.  As for me, well, if you need me, I'll be in my hyggekrog.

Rabbits

It's rare that I get to post about a podcast from its beginning as it's being produced, so let's see how this goes.  So, I'll be following the podcast Rabbits and talking about it on the blog as new episodes are released.

My first blog-along! I feel like a real blogger now!

Carly Parker's best friend, Yumiko Takata, has gone missing.  Carly believes that she has gone missing because of her participation in a mysterious secret-society game called, in a roundabout way, Rabbits.  But, just what is Rabbits?  A recruiting tool for the CIA?  A super-secret club that runs the world from behind the scenes?  A method of uncovering the secrets of the universe?  No one has ever been able to track down previous winners since the game's first iterations in 1959, so it's difficult to tell what the aim of Rabbits is.  Whatever it is, the game has some pretty strict rules, and some apparently terrifying consequences for breaking those rules.

If you listened to TANIS or The Black Tapes, then you'll be familiar with the investigative-report-style used in this audiodrama.  The story is told through first-person narration of experiences and research and supplemented by interviews with other people  who are connected with the game or people who played it.  It's produced by the same group of people behind both, so the production is pretty high-quality.  Not only do you have some good voice acting, but there's background noise layered in under the narration to add audio-depth that emphasizes different parts of the narrative.  It's amazing what stock sounds can do for an audio production.

Since it's only the first episode, you only get a teasing taste of what's to come in the series.  Still, if it's anything like The Black Tapes and TANIS, you'll definitely want to subscribe to this one.

The Fireman - Joe Hill

Draco Incendia Trychophyton, better known as Dragonscale, is the hottest plague to sweep the nation - literally.  Once contracted, it's only a matter of months before the sufferer spontaneously combusts, sometimes setting off chain reactions with other Dragonscale victims and creating conflagrations capable of destroying entire city blocks.  The world has looked on in horror as civilization crumbles into a sea of flames and molten concrete, unable to trace the source of the infection or the method of its transmission.  Amidst the chaos and smoke, a mysterious man known only as The Fireman has emerged like an urban legend.  It's said that he can control the 'scale - bend its flames to his will - without being consumed. He comes to take the infected to a place where they can be safe from the threat of spontaneous combustion, or worse, execution by their frightened friends and neighbors.  Newly-infected Harper Grayson hopes that these rumors are true, if not for herself, than for her unborn child, who may yet be uninfected.

You may recognize Joe Hill from the movie Horns starring Daniel Radcliffe.  Or you may have read Locke and Key, a fantastic dark fantasy/horror graphic novel series.  My first exposure to Hill's work was through Locke and Key, and it wasn't until much later that I discovered that he was Stephen King's son.  (Although I guess if he'd kept his father's name, he'd be Joe King....)

The idea of a plague that not only kills you, but kills you in such a horrific and destructive fashion, was intriguing.  Sure, zombies are scary, but they are a threat that can be contained and dealt with given enough time.  Walking, contagious wildfires, however, are a different story.  I was fascinated by the level of detail and thought that had gone into the nature of the infection, its transmission, and its management.  If not for the whole possibly-ending-in-flaming-death-throes thing, Dragonscale sounds like a pretty cool thing to have.  Unfortunately, Dragonscale was about the only unique thing about this book.

When you get down to it, this book is just Lord of the Flies meets Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix while playing with matches.  People separate into tribes - infected/uninfected, those in the Bright/those outside of the Bright, with us/against us - and try to take over limited supplies for the good of their tribe.  Mother Carol, the eventual leader of Camp Wyndham, is basically Professor Umbridge without all of the pink, and Harper's plucky band of rebels is Dumbledore's Army - complete with its own traitor.

That wouldn't be so bad in itself if the author had just stopped trying to cram stuff into the book to compound the horribleness of the situation. And what would make things worse, you might ask?  Oh, a roadtrip from hell while pregnant and being pursued by your crazy ex-husband might qualify, I suppose.  Really, it's just absurd the amount of awfulness that happens to these people.  Even Lemony Snicket knew to spread the awful out across thirteen books.

Another complaint I had about this book is Hill's tendency to tell readers that a chance to discuss something would never come after all, or that a character was about to act really horribly toward another character instead of letting the action unfold on its own.  I seriously considered making a drinking game out of it.  Authors, for the sake of my liver, please don't do this.  Remember, show, don't tell.

Finally, there are the characters. The titular Fireman is actually only in about a third of the pages, and he spends almost all of his page-time recuperating from injuries or doing something that gets him injured.  I was kind of hoping for a cool superhero-like character, but instead I got an angsty Brit with broken ribs, so that was disappointing.  Harper is pretty bad-ass, but after a while her obsession with children's literature and movies got annoying. It seemed that she couldn't be on-page for a few paragraphs without making reference to Mary Poppins or some other sugary-sweet children's story.  The only characters I felt were even remotely believably written were Allie and Renee.  Everyone else, even the side characters and villains, felt like strawmen or caricatures rather than real people.

Fans of Stephen King may enjoy this book, if nothing else than for the shout-outs to King's works. I've only ever read It, so I couldn't tell you any specific references that I noticed, but I did feel like this book had a lot of the same pacing and ending issues that It had.  Around the second third of the book, everything slows to a crawl and it's really hard to keep up the desire to keep reading.  The action picks back up toward the final third, but then you get to the end and it sort of fizzles out like a wet match.  There is an afterword hidden in the author acknowledgements at the end that may be setting up for a second book, so if you do decide to read this one, make sure to read it all the way through.

Overall, I thought that the book had an interesting premise, but the execution was lacking.  It may just be that it was being executed in the wrong medium.  This story makes for a long and laborious read as a novel, but the visual language used to describe the ways the Fireman can manipulate fire, as well as the shoot-outs and car chases, make it ideal for making a graphic novel or t.v. series out of it.  I mean, with fire, it's more captivating to watch it than to read about it.

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them: The Original Screenplay - J.K. Rowling

One of the most anticipated films of 2016, at least in my circle of friends, was Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.  It was the first Harry Potter universe film to be set fully outside of Hogwarts and the English countryside, and it gave fans another glimpse into the fantastic world of magic that might exist right beside them on the subway platform, on the street, or even in line at the local deli.  For those of you who were unable to get to the theater, or who just want to relive the movie before its home video release, the screenplay was published and released in an attractively-bound book just in time for the holidays.

It's a turbulent time in the 1920's magical community.  Notorious criminal Gellert Grindelwald has evaded authorities, Second Salemers roam the streets calling for the execution of witches and wizards, and Newt Scamander has accidentally unleashed a suitcase full of strange and fantastical creatures on the unsuspecting city.  With the aid of a No-Maj/Muggle named Jacob Kowalski, Newt must round up his wayward creatures before attracting more unwanted attention on the magical community and the ire of MACUSA (the American Ministry of Magic).  

The best part of this movie was the world-building.  J.K. Rowling has created a colorful world with its own culture and mythology, and I have wanted to ramble around in it ever since I read the first chapters set in Diagon Alley.   In this movie/screenplay, we get more exposure to different aspects of the wizarding world that Rowling didn't get a chance to explore in the Harry Potter series.  Sure, we know that magical creatures, mind-reading witches/wizards, and other magic schools exist, but this movie gives us more exposure to the magical-using world and culture outside of England.  

However, I felt like the darker part of the story involving the Obscurus wasn't developed very well.  There's this monster tearing apart parts of New York, but it's basically background noise for about two-thirds of the movie.  Gellert Grindelwald is mentioned at the beginning and in an argument later, but he doesn't seem to be too important until the very end, and even then it's unclear how Newt was able to figure out that he was there in the first place.  

I had hoped that the screenplay would have more detailed information, or even some "deleted scenes", that might help develop some of the characters and world a bit more.  I would have been happy if it had at least explained/developed Grindelwald's involvement a little better than the ending's "I would have gotten away with it if it hadn't been for you meddling kids" moment.  Sadly, this is pretty much a direct transcription of the finished film, so you really aren't missing anything if you don't read it.  

If you're a film student, you might benefit from reading this because it has some pretty detailed information about the types of angles and directions used in the film, as well as some cues for the timing and delivery of certain parts of the script, and there is nice glossary of terms to explain some of the specialized vocabulary.  If you're a collector of Harry Potter books and memorabilia, I think you might like to add this to your bookshelf for continuity and collection's sake.  However, if you were hoping for a novelization or fleshing-out of the movie's skeleton, you should skip this one.  

Rune Factory 4

For the last few weeks, I've been totally wrapped up in playing Rune Factory 4.  I love games that incorporate role-playing and making stuff, so games like the Alchemist series by Gust and the Harvest Moon series are a slam-dunk for me.

The basic premise of any Rune Factory game is that you have to farm and kill monsters to save the world.  In Rune Factory 4, you are trying to save the land of Selphia by replacing the Guardians with Rune Spheres so that the land won't shrivel up and die.  Like any Rune Factory or Harvest Moon game, you can interact with the townsfolk, participate in events and competitions, farm, create and upgrade items, and start a family.  In Rune Factory 4, you can play as either a male or female protagonist - a departure from previous games.

As in nearly every game, your protagonist starts out as a blank slate, unable to remember his/her past or name.  In this one, you're amnesiac because you were attacked while enroute with a mysterious package that you were taking to Selphia, and then to add insult to injury, you were pushed off of your airship to drop to your death.  Fortunately,  you were saved by a lucky landing on top of a dragon - yes, a dragon.  This dragon is the ruler of Selphia, and is called Ventuswill, or Venti for short.

Venti decides that you're the visiting prince/princess that they were expecting, and promptly puts you to work promoting Selphia and farming vegetables to nurture your Earthmate powers.  However, Venti has a darker secret.  For generations, she has been the force keeping Selphia vibrant and living, but the years have taken a toll on her. In the past, Guardians had sacrificed themselves to keep Venti alive, but even their sacrifices and powers have limits, and it soon becomes apparent that if you, the heroic protagonist, don't do something, Selphia is doomed.

The game itself is a good balance between farming/life simulator and role playing game. You fight monsters, complete mini-quests, and save the world by degrees.  If you are constantly being defeated by the same dungeon, you can increase your stats by sleeping, farming, creating and upgrading equipment, and even eating dishes with specific properties that give you resistance to ailments or elements. You also build relationships with the residents of Selphia Town, which allows you to invite them on quests or start a family.  Some relationships need to be built to a specific point before the game allows you to progress, so make sure that you talk to residents daily, complete their tasks, and give them their favorite items.

The game has flaws, though.  The only way to learn most of the recipes for food or items is by consuming "breads", and after a certain level, you can't learn anything new from these breads.  You have to get access to the post-game activities to get full completion of your various recipe books.  Some of the recipes require rare item drops, or in some cases, oddly specific items (ex: medium size milk) to create.

Another flaw in this game is that you practically require a game guide in order to complete some of the main-line quests.  Some events don't trigger unless specific conditions are met, but it's not immediately obvious what sets them off.  There are three main story arcs, but the trigger for the third one seems to be especially difficult to set off.

It's also really challenging to find all of the fishing, mining, and drop items for some of the recipes.  You don't necessarily have to have those recipes to beat the game, but if you're a completionist, this game is going to be a bit of a grind-fest for you.  I still haven't managed to catch a sunsquid or a blowfish despite hours of fishing, and don't even get me started on trying to find light ore.  I beat the game, but I admit that the higher level equipment recipes and upgrades probably would have resulted  in less cussing and trips to the infirmary.

Some of the things I liked about this game is the adjustable level of difficulty.  If you're not sure about your coordination in the fights, or you are just tired of the same boss one-hit-k.o.'ing your party, you can easily bump your difficulty down to Easy, or you can set it higher if you want more of a challenge.  You also have a wide variety of weapons that you can master, and a ridiculous number of skills and spells you can use, so there's a weapon and skill-set for every gaming style.

The art and character designs are up to the usual standards of the Harvest Moon and Rune Factory games, making the game visually appealing as well as fun to play.  Finally, the characters in Selphia are fun to interact with.  I enjoyed going around town getting to know everyone and their favorite items, and the town events involving each character revealed a different side of everyone.

If you're new to Rune Factory series, I'd recommend this one as a starting point because of the adjustable difficulty level and more streamlined controls.  It's not a perfect game, but despite my complaints, I did enjoy my time in Selphia.  The three story arcs, and post-game Sharance Maze, give you hours of play-time and probably the most bang for your gaming buck.  Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some squids to catch.

Deadline - Mira Grant

Because this is a review of the second book in a series, this review contains spoilers.  If you have not read Feed, don't read this review.  I will also be spoiling this book, as there are some things I absolutely have to get off my chest about it.  So, you've been warned.

One year after the events of Feed, Shaun Mason is in charge of After the End Times.  One year after the events of Feed, Shaun is still deep in mourning over the loss of his sister, Georgia "George" Mason, and he's hell bent on discovering who really killed her and why.  He gets his first solid lead one day when a scientist from the CDC shows up on his doorstep with a gift-wrapped package of information and data - a scientist that's supposed to be dead.  And the implications of the data she's brought with her are too terrifying to contemplate.

This book is told entirely from the point of view of Shaun Mason.  Unfortunately, Shaun isn't a very good narrator.  He's a thrill-seeker turned investigative reporter, and he's not very good at making incisive observations or asking the questions that need to be asked.  To shore up his weaknesses, his dead sister has taken up residence in his skull to provide insight and prompt him to ask about things.  At first, this seemed like a normal coping mechanism, but after a while it just felt like the author was regretting her decision to kill George off in the first book and was looking for a way to bring her back into the action.

The other reason Shaun isn't a good narrator is because his emotions range from "brooding" to "angrily punching walls" without a lot of in-between.  Some of it, yes, can be related to grief, but in a world dominated by grief and loss on a daily basis, it seems unbelievable that someone can be so dysfunctionally grieving a year after a loss.  I'm actually surprised that his coworkers/friends have stuck around him for a year without holding an intervention meeting.  Even under non-zombie apocalypse circumstances, there's only so much that people will put up with.

The world-building is fleshed out a bit more in this book, and readers get their first glimpse at how the Rising was handled overseas.  The virus is also somewhat "fleshed" out as well, and we learn a little more about how it ticks and why it's so difficult to contain.  (The short answer is: because of government conspiracies...)

Unfortunately, as a sequel to Feed, this book falls pretty flat.  The pacing is far too slow, and too much time is spent having the characters argue with, distrust, and complain at each other.  In addition, like Feed, this is a zombie outbreak story without a lot of zombie action,.Unlike in Feed, it doesn't make sense that there are so few zombies showing up.  I mean, there are points where the characters are on long, deserted stretches of road that would be prime zombie hoard locations in any self-respecting survival horror game or horror movie, but the worst they encounter is lousy convenience store food and the odd zombie deer.  For a world overrun with zombies, it's pretty convenient that our intrepid heroes never actually have to deal with them.

Some of the "emotional impact" moments felt pretty hollow, too.  Characters die, but they don't have the same emotional punch as the deaths in Feed.  I think this is largely because the supporting cast doesn't get very much fleshing out due to Shaun's disconnectedness from them.  It makes sense that he's disconnected - after all, he's suffered a great loss and he's hesitant to let anyone else get that close again - but when you kill people off and lock readers into the point of view of someone who doesn't have strong connections to the people that were killed, it's hard to get the readers to care about the loss.  Sure, it's sad that someone died and left people behind, but there is nothing to give it that personal sense of impact.

The book also goes a long way to try to either undo what Feed was trying to accomplish, or create "edgy" complications that there isn't any need for.

First, there's the Targaryenesque relationship between George and Shaun that was never, ever mentioned in Feed.  I mean, I guess it isn't technically incest because they're not blood relatives, but if something like that was going on, you'd think that George, a trusted Newsie narrator who never shied away from divulging uncomfortable details before, would have dropped a few mentions of this relationship during her narration in Feed.

Next is the introduction of Shaun's plot-armor, er, I mean, strange immunity to the zombie virus.  Sure, he can still be killed in other ways, but taking away his infectability removes a lot of the tension and risk for him. Suddenly, the Big Bad's most dangerous weapon is rendered completely useless against him, so they'll have to try more conventional - and harder to cover - ways to get rid of him.

Finally, there's George's resurrection as a clone.  Even if I were willing to believe that they were able to create a complete clone - aged up to the proper age and everything - and memory transfer of a young adult in a year, I feel like it completely undoes the impact of George's death in Feed.  What was the point of killing her off if you were just going to bring her back at the end of the second book?  Did the author realize she'd written herself into a corner by removing her only good narrator?  Was she just checking "edgy" boxes?  How do they even manage to transfer George's memories, anyway?  No technology is ever indicated to exist that would allow human brain data to be transferred  between brains - I mean, they're still basically using technology similar to 2014-era technology.  It leaves a lot of questions to be answered in the next book, and I'm not sure that everything will be answered satisfactorily.

Overall, I'm really disappointed in this installment.  I'll probably still read the third one in order to complete the series and find out the answers to some of my questions, but it won't be for a little while.

Lego Batman - with pictures!

Lego Batman is everything you could want from a Batman movie, plus a few other movies.  Following closely on the success of The Lego Movie (who would have seen that coming?), Lego Batman tells the story of brick-ified Batman learning to move past his painful experiences and let people get past his cape and cowl again, all while kicking butt and laying down some sick tracks.

This was a great movie for families, though I think parents will probably enjoy it more.  There are a lot of references and jokes aimed at the older audiences, but everything stays child-friendly in terms of language, violence, and message.

For my part, I enjoyed the continued characterization of Batman as a self-centered narcissist, since it gave room for the character to grow and change, unlike the Batman I grew up with.  Plus, you get to have super mature moments like this one:

Batman is a super mature superhero, really.

Lego Robin/Dick Grayson was totally adorable, too.  I mean, look at this face!

I dare you to say no to this face.

Of course, adorableness is not just limited to orphan sidekicks.  Even The Joker, a self-actualized super-villain (think Doctor Phil in clown makeup), gets to look vulnerable and cute for the camera.  

I mean, you shouldn't make the clown cry, right?

The Joker isn't the only villain threatening Gotham City.  Every villain Batman ever faced (including obscure c-listers), and villains from other franchises come in to get a piece of the action.  It's like The Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny but without Mister Rogers coming out the victor.  However over-the-top the action gets, the movie doesn't lose its light-hearted tone, and there are plenty of jokes and visual gags for audiences.

As far as weaknesses go, there is so much going on in this movie that at times it feels overwhelming.  The action scenes are very, very active and it's easy to miss stuff.  There's also the odd inclusion of live-action video in the movie - as in clips of Jerry Maguire directly imported into the movie instead of being converted to Lego minfigs.  It's a little jarring, and feels kind of lazy compared to all the other complex stuff they did in this movie.

I would love to go see this movie again, as there were a lot of jokes and visual gags I'm sure I missed, but that's what home-video releases are for.  If you're trying to decide what to go see this weekend, I highly recommend Lego Batman.  

Uprooted - Naomi Novik

In her quiet, valley village on the edge of the dark and dangerous Wood full of shadows and corrupted things, Agniezka knows what her future holds.  She and the other girls of the valley will stand before The Dragon on the Choosing Day, he will choose one of them to live in his tower for the next ten years, and she will go on with her life in the valley, same as always.  Everyone knows that the local beauty, Kasia, will be Chosen, and Kasia has been training for the duty her whole life.  Agniezka's path may be boring and well-trod, but at least she knows what to expect from it.

Until she's the one that's chosen.  Until she shows magical aptitude.  Until she's the only one who can stop the Wood's sinister plans.  Until everything she thought she knew about her future is uprooted and tossed aside like so many weeds.  Now she's treading a path so overgrown that the last person that could have possibly walked it was Baba Jaga herself, and the Wood is closing in.

I picked this book up after a patron recommended it to me a few years ago.  I had been lamenting the lack of many fantasy novels built up around Russian and eastern European folklore and mythology.  Fantasy is full of stories based on the Grimm Brothers and Hans Christian Andersen, and more diverse folklores and mythologies are being introduced these days, but eastern Europe is only remembered for its vampires.  The patron, an English teacher and fantasy aficionado himself, recommended that I give this book a whirl, and I'm grateful for his recommendation.

The book uses Russian folklore as a trellis on which to hang the vines of the story.  The Dragon, Sarkan, immediately calls to mind the story of Koschei the Deathless (and if you haven't started listening to the Myths and Legends Podcast where this story is recited, you really should).  He is a powerful wizard-lord that takes young, beautiful women away with him, imprisons them in his tower and...well, no one really knows what he does with them, but they assume that they're not playing endless hands of euchre.  The heroine, Agniezka, sets herself to mirror Baba Yaga, although not the scary wicked witch Baba Yaga that I'm familiar with.  Her "Jaga" is more Granny Weatherwax than Wicked Witch of the West.  But it quickly develops a lore all its own that's both new and familiar at the same time.

I liked the pacing of this book.  Novik doesn't get bogged down in intricate world-building and political machinations, so she's able to keep the story chugging along at a regular pace that rises and falls in a natural rhythm.  I get the feeling that she is able to do this because she is locking the reader into the point of view of Agniezka, whose magic and experience of the world is more in tune with the natural rhythm of life and the world around her.  Had she chosen to tell the story through The Dragon's point of view, we probably would have been subjected to endless lectures of history and political affiliation, but that's just my own speculation.

I enjoyed the way that the characters grew and changed over the course of the story - Agniezka went from a self-doubting peasant girl out of her element to a confident witch-woman who fully embraces her magic and way of doing things, and The Dragon goes from an aloof, arrogant jerk of a wizard to the more approachable, fallible man Sarkan.  Even minor characters showed development, or the consequences of arrested development in the case of Prince Marek.

The only thing I didn't like about this book was the way that the romance, and I use that term hesitantly, was developed.  I didn't feel like it was really "love" so much as "magic-based lust" - mingling of magics creates a similar desire to mingle other things, so it wasn't so much that the characters were in love as it was that they were intertwined by other intimacies.  It wasn't bad writing, I just felt that there wasn't any necessity to include a sex scene.  It always feels voyeuristic to read them, and an exhaustive description of a sexual encounter rarely furthers the plot.  Still, it's only three pages you have to skip instead of half a chapter, so it's really just a minor complaint.

If you were a fan of the Tiffany Aching books by (GNU) Terry Pratchett, you'll enjoy this one.  Agniezka and Tiffany have a lot of similarities, particularly in their intuitive understanding of magic.   For readers looking for a good fantasy read that are unwilling to commit to a long-running series that might not get finished anytime soon, Uprooted is a good choice because the whole thing is contained in a single book with no dangling threads to hint at a second or third volume.  For those of you who lamented, as I did, that eastern Europe is only known for vampires - check this out.  You'll be glad you did.

Livingstone vol 1 - Kataoka Tomohi

Have you ever wondered if life, the cosmos, or whatever you believe in, has a plan for you?  If you're conscious and over, say, 16, I'd say you probably have.

The central idea behind the Livingstone manga is that, yes, every soul has a plan.  This differs significantly from a "life" plan, as a soul plan can span across several lifetimes.  When you deviate from your soul's plan, your psycholithe, basically a stone that contains your soul, can shatter and leave behind wicked, evil feelings that can taint an area and affect the soul plans of others nearby.  The story's protagonists, Sakurai and Amano, exist to save psycholithes whenever possible, and if not, then to clean up the fragments of the psycholithes to prevent further damage.

This isn't really a new concept for supernatural/paranormal manga.  The idea that areas carry negative energy, and that things like murder, suicide, or sudden accidental death can compound that negative energy, is really common.  I haven't seen a lot of "clean-up crews" for this kind of energy, so that's why I picked this one up.

The characters of Sakurai and Amano are complete opposites of one another.  Sakurai is a straight-laced, professional whose job is to basically convince people not to go against their soul's plan.  Amano is a bit childish and impulsive, and he frequently pushes people in the opposite direction of Sakurai since it doesn't matter to him whether souls get to reincarnate or not.  This might be because Amano isn't even of human origin, whereas Sakurai is (though it's not really explained in the first volume). I didn't really find their "odd couple" dynamic to be endearing, but their out-of-syncness was different and unusual.  I did not get the feeling that Sakurai and Amano were ever going to come to a grudging understanding/respect for one another in the next two volumes.

The art for this manga wasn't very good. The artist, Kouji Seo, is known for hit series such as Suzuka and Fuuka, so I suspect that this three-volume manga was just a filler-project for him.  It wasn't bad art, just not especially good.  It could also be that, because the story itself is about things that aren't visually or psychologically appealing, neither is the art.

The stories were hard to read, too.  Sometimes they were funny, or the author tried to inject a little humor into the scenes to lighten them up, but more often than not, they were emotionally uncomfortable.  The things that cause a psycholithe to shatter are traumatic, horrible events, and part of the clean-up process involves Sakurai reading (and viewing) these events.  If you are even slightly the squeamish type, I strongly recommend avoiding this manga.

Overall, I can't really say that this was a great manga or one that I would recommend to a lot of people.  Clearly I wasn't the right audience for it, but I couldn't really get a sense of what the ideal audience would be.  This was only the first volume, too, so it's possible that the author hadn't really formed a clear idea of what the story was going to be when it was published, but it didn't show enough potential for me to want to continue the remaining two.

Tenchi Muyo!/Tenchi Universe

A long time ago, in the 1990s, there was a little harem anime called Tenchi Muyo!. It centered around the misadventures of young Tenchi Masaki, a typical high school student.  One day, he finds himself surrounded by alien women - somewhat terrifying alien women.  Suddenly, Tenchi's ordinary, boring life becomes a 24/7 carnival of weird, inter-space madness.

The Tenchi storylines are difficult to keep track of.  The creators apparently liked to tell the story over and over again with little twists in each "timeline", but the main idea is always the same: boy meets girl, girl, girl, girl.... you get the idea.  Also: space alien god-royalty bloodlines are Important and Mysterious.

Now, this particular incarnation of Tenchi Muyo is 26 episodes long, and you would think that this would give them enough time to build something resembling a plot.  You would be wrong.  The first six episodes are devoted to introducing each of Tenchi's potential girlfriends.  So, you have:

Ryoko - hot-headed sexy space pirate who likes booze, guns, and committing crimes.

Mihoshi - ditzy galaxy police officer who likes....well, pretty much anything, but especially karaoke and slacking off.

Ayeka - haughty space princess who wanted to take a vacation from the duties of being princess of the entire universe.

Sasami - Ayeka's adorable little sister, who came looking for Ayeka and got stranded on Earth

Washu - Mad scientist with a huge ego.

Kiyone - Mihoshi's long-suffering partner. All she wants is a normal life as far away from Mihoshi as possible.

Now, of the cast of potential girlfriends, only two of them actually express clear interest in Tenchi, the world's most bland and boring male protagonist.  I mean, entire episodes can go by where he barely makes an appearance.  I guess this is why the show's (and manga's) title was also called No Need for Tenchi.  Despite that, the whole reason for the girls to be on Earth in the first place is some tie to Tenchi.

After the introductory episodes, all of the characters have to start interacting, so they go on wa-ha-ha-cky space adventures until suddenly (Dun-dun-duuuuun) a Wild Plot Appears!

Apparently, Ayeka's royal family, the Jurai family, has some unresolved issues regarding succession to the throne.  In order to secure the order and restore normalcy to the royal family, and the universe, Ayeka had been sent to meet potential suitors when she decided that she was fed up with princessing and wanted to give loafing around a try.  In the mean time, one of the lost Emperors of Jurai decided to show up and declare the members of the AWOL royal family criminals, so everyone has to go to Jurai to clear Sasami and Ayeka's names and figure out who this usurper actually is.  More wacky space adventures ensue until finally, ta-da, they arrive to find out that Evil Usurper is actually Legitimate Heir to the Throne who Caught the Evil and is now hellbent on RULING THE KNOWN UNIVERSE.... unless his long-lost brother who was the only one who ever matched him in power makes a sudden reappearance.

What does this have to do with Tenchi, you  may find yourself asking? Well, (spoiler-alert) it turns out that our bland, boring hero is actually a direct descendant of the Long Lost Prince, and somehow, mysteriously has awakened his own ability to manipulate Jurai energy and must carry out a Fight To The Death against his Crazy Evil Uncle (Great Uncle? I'm not even really sure at this point).

Honestly, this show was a lot better when I was in middle school.  I mean, the plot is kind of...non-existent.  But, it does have some good elements.  I was particularly impressed with the space ships.  Jurai space ships are grown like trees, so they can crash land on an alien planet and still repair themselves by (eventually) growing a new sapling space ship.  Another space ship design is the Ryo-ohki space ship.  When not being used to fly through space, the space ship runs around in this cute meowing rabbit form that likes carrots.

The character designs were pretty distinct, too.  I loved Sasami and Ayeka's clothes, and if I had a better figure, I'd totally cosplay the bounty hunter Nagi.  This show had a lot of characters, so it was nice to be able to easily pick one out based on a silhouette or color palette.

I did enjoy some of the humor of the show, but mostly this was all about nostalgia for a simpler time.  I suppose exposure to this show did kick off the whole harem-anime craze in the States, whether current fans are aware of it or not.  It wasn't the first show to feature a boring male protagonist that pretty, somewhat odd women are mysteriously attracted to, but it was the first one to really gain a strong foothold in the States because it was broadcast on the Toonami block back in the 90's.

Unless you're totally into retro anime and have a high tolerance for fillers, I really can't recommend this anime to most people.  They really could have done a lot more with the pacing and world-building than they did, but I suppose they were trying to play up the fan service and fun of the series.  Tenchi Muyo can be a really fun series, but it doesn't handle plot/drama very well.

Podcast round-up

In case you were wondering, I'm not dead.  To make up for my absence, let me give you a podcast round-up.  These are the podcasts I've been listening to:

Limetown
Limetown, population 300 0.

Limetown was a small, prosperous community nestled near the limestone caves of Tennessee.  It was made up of a collection of brilliant minds, and was entirely self-sufficient.  Everyone there had a purpose, a role.  Although no one outside of town knew exactly what was going on in Limetown, it appeared to be humming along quite happily - a model community.  Then, 10 years ago, 300 men, women, and children disappeared following a panicked 9-1-1 call.  How can 300 people just disappear without a trace - no bodies, no notes, no...nothing?  American Public Radio journalist Lia Haddock is determined to find out just what happened in Limetown all those years ago.  But, perhaps some mysteries are best left undisturbed.

This is a short podcast audio drama that is good for newbies to the genre.  It's paced well, and the story keeps you riveted.

Uncanny County
Uncanny County is a collection of short audio drama stories similar to The Twilight Zone.  The stories are funny, touching, disturbing, and of course, uncanny.  The stories are loosely connected, but each chapter can stand alone on its own.  I listened to this while I was waiting for the next installment of King Falls A.M., and in fact, Sammy and Ben make a guest appearance in one of the episodes.

The Box
Addison Gilmore is a college drop-out working in a book shop when she discovers a huge, heavy box hidden behind dummy books on the shelf.  When she finally gets it open, she finds that it's crammed full of journals kept by people called "Operatives".  These Operatives investigated strange phenomena across the country, and some of the journals date back to as far as the 1800s.  If they're real, that is... The tales inside are so unbelievable - strange, horrifying, and unexplainable.  Like a good journalism student, Addison decides to try to verify the contents of these journals before dismissing them as some strange, elaborate, long-running fiction project.  But the closer she gets to the truth, the closer something seems to be getting to her.

I thought that The Box had some good stories, but it falls short in a few areas.  One of the biggest is the poor sound balance.  The sound quality of the readings is great, but you have to really crank the volume up to hear the parts where Addison is talking about the stories and her research.  You end up with an effect similar to the late-night infomercial: quiet t.v. show that you have to crank up to hear followed by "BILLY MAYS HERE....!".  My other gripe with this show is that it doesn't spend enough time actually focusing on the journals and the entries within.  The latter half of the show is mostly about Addison trying to get away from whomever or whatever is trying to get the journals back while she tries to track down some of the people related to the journals.  I was hoping for more stories like Stretch and Bridget.

Wolf 359
My latest obsession.  If you liked Red Dwarf and Mystery Science Theater 3000, you will love Wolf 359.  The crew of the Hephaestus is orbiting a distant red dwarf known as Wolf 359 seeking signs of alien life.  Communications Officer Doug Eiffel is our main point of contact, and through him we get to know Dr. Hillbert (crazy Russian mad scientist), Hera (sarcastic A.I. autopilot), Minkowski (gung-ho scary commanding officer with a soft spot for musicals) as they try to stay sane for their two year mission.  This might be difficult, considering the mandatory weekly chess tournaments, a killer plant monster lurking in the air vent system, and the fact that their only entertainment is one VHS copy of Home Alone 2.  Not to mention there's something....off about the whole mission in the first place.

This series balances humor, action, and drama really well.  It starts out funny and light, but it sets up darker story elements early in the series and, even when things start taking a serious turn, it never goes completely grimdark.  I highly recommend this one.

The Bright Sessions
What do you do if you're a young adult and you suddenly start feeling other people's emotions, hearing voices in your head, or time-travelling whenever you have a panic attack?  Well, if you know how to use Craigslist, you seek out Dr. Bright: Psychotherapist to the Talented.  She specializes in helping young people deal with their emerging Talents, no matter how strange and unexpected they may be.  She's part of a larger network of an underground network dedicated to seeking out Talented people, but the network....might not have the Talented's best interests at heart.  Dr. Bright certainly doesn't seem to think so.

The Bright Sessions follows several of Dr. Bright's patients.  The best part of this series is that you get to watch everyone grow and learn to accept their Talents and who/what they are in more ways than one.  If you've ever felt different and/or hoped that you had superpowers, you will like The Bright Sessions.

And that's all for now.  I hope you find a new favorite podcast to listen to through this post.  Hopefully I'll be back on track with some other reviews here soon.

Totto-chan: The Little Girl at the Window - Tetsuko Kuroyanagi

Our story begins with a train ride and a little girl.  Totto-chan is a first-grade girl on her way to a new school.  She's a lively, inquisitive child who talks a mile a minute. She doesn't know it, but she was recently expelled from her last school for being too disruptive.  She and her mother are on their way to a new school, where her mother anxiously hopes she will be able to continue her education.

Tomoe Gakuen isn't a typical school.  It's made up of a collection of old train cars in the forest, and it has about fifty students all together.  Instead of a gate of stone or concrete pillars, Tomoe's students pass through a gate made of living trees.  Instead of a stern-faced headmaster following a rigid rubric of Reading, Writing, and 'Rithmatic, Tomoe's principal is a jolly older man who lets children's natural inquisitiveness lead them to new discoveries.  Students learn without realizing that they're learning, and the staff's role is to support the students' exploration rather than drill facts and figures into their heads.

Tomoe sounds like a dream school in some suburban paradise, but it was actually an experimental elementary school that the author, Tetsuko Kuroyanagi (Totto-chan), attended in the years leading up to World War II in Japan.  Many of the students at Tomoe were children that wouldn't fit into the normal schools of the time for one reason or another.  At a time when Japan promoted worship of the Emperor as a divine figure, encouraged cultural uniformity, and shunned the physically handicapped, the headmaster of Tomoe is a revolutionary figure who teaches children to embrace differences in culture, religion, and language, and who cared deeply for his physically handicapped students.  Although World War II doesn't leave Tomoe untouched, the school stands as an oasis of idyllic calm amidst a raging sea of war and intolerance for the time that it existed.  And, when the school was destroyed in a bombing during the war, Mr. Kobayashi watched his dream project burn and cheerfully planned to create a new and better school after the war.

The short chapters follow Totto-chan from first grade through about third grade.  They tend to be rather calm and sometimes funny stories, but sometimes an element of drama slips in.  Sprinkled amongst lighthearted chapters where children take walks to the local shrine on sunny afternoons or have a camp-out at the school to watch a new train car get added to the school grounds are somber moments where Totto-chan learns about mortality or when students have to say goodbye to a staff member being sent off to war.  Totto-chan's family and school life is somewhat insulated from the harsher realities of WWII, so aside from the air raids and events in a few other chapters, Totto-chan and her fellow elementary students are relatively untouched by the war.  I got the feeling that the headmaster was deliberately trying to protect his students from that reality for as long as he could and inoculating them against it through his unusual teaching methods.

I truly enjoyed this book.  It was hard not to smile when I read about Totto-chan and her various adventures.  In some ways, it resembles the popular slice-of-life manga Yotsuba&, but the humor is more subdued.  Other episodes reminded me of Anne Shirley's adventures in Anne of Green Gables.  In fact, I have a feeling that Totto-chan, Yotsuba, and Anne would probably get along like a house on fire.

I'd recommend this book for audiences of all ages.  It'd be a perfectly appropriate story to read to children, especially if you are trying to instill the same values in them that Mr. Kobayashi was in his students.  Adults will find Totto-chan familiar in her mischief and innocent exploration, and I think they'll enjoy watching her grow over the course of the book.  Anyone considering a career in teaching would certainly benefit from reading about Tomoe and its effects on the students, even if modern education may not allow for a complete recreation of the school's methods.

A note on the title: "the little girl at the window" refers to a Japanese saying about people who don't fit in.  They tend to stand apart, like people who tend to lurk on the edges of the room (by the windows, for instance), and don't belong to main mass in the middle.  I find this kind of interesting, since a common anime trope is to have the main character's desk by the window, and they're usually the focus of a lot of unusual activities.

Sailor Moon Crystal

When I was in middle school, one big gateway anime was Sailor Moon.  This was back in the days of Geocities and Angelfire websites and dial-up internet connections, so streaming and widespread distribution wasn't really an option.  Anime was purchased on video tapes (either dub or sub) which had a maximum of four or five episodes on it.  Anything animated was still considered "for kids", so shows like Sailor Moon and Cardcaptor Sakura was pretty heavily edited to make it kid-friendly.  And let's not get started on the dubs...

Anyway, the point I'm making is this: I remember when Sailor Moon was first becoming popular in the U.S.  When the announcement came out that they were rebooting the series, like many Moonies, I got kind of excited. When it was also announced that the original series was going to get a full release in the U.S., including the final Stars season that had never been released in the U.S., it was like I had died and gone to nerd heaven.  So, like other Moonies worldwide, I eagerly counted down to the day of the new Sailor Moon Crystal premiere.

And... well, let me get this out of the way - the reboot was not everything I imagined it would be.  The episodes were clearly rushed through production, as several shots are off-model and sometimes even the wrong animation is used for specific attacks.  The computer animation used for the transformation sequences is pretty underwhelming compared to the original.  The characters don't get a lot of development time, either.

But for all of its flaws, Sailor Moon Crystal did hit a few high points for me.

First of all, we get to see Takeuchi's original character and costume designs in action.  The original series put all of the senshi in identical costumes to present a more unified front against evil, and it was probably easier to reuse the same design template for each character and change the colors a little bit.  But, each senshi's battle costume represents part of her personality and character, so it was nice to see those touches restored in this version.  You also get to see each small evolution of Sailor Moon's battle costume, including the small morphs her tiara undergoes as she comes one step closer to her full awakening.

Not only did they keep more of the original character designs and costumes, but more of Takeuchi's art style seems to have made it into the overall look of the show.   The characters are almost ethereal and goddess-like, hinting at their otherworldly origins.  The colors are muted and lines tend to be long and flowing.  Hair is luxurious and impossibly shiny and orderly (seriously, no one has bedhead).  Now, seeing those tall, willowy girls in action, especially seeing Barbie-doll-like Usagi trip and fall on her backside, is a little strange and unnatural, but when they're posing against the full moon, you have to admit that it looks really impressive.  And, of course, they are tailor made for the Art Nouveau inspired promotional art.

Finally, we get to see the original Sailor Moon story, almost shot-for-shot, as it was in the manga.  No filler, no side-quests, no "gotta find the rainbow crystals and sell more Sailor Moon toys" story arcs.  Just a straightforward story of "girl meets magical talking cat, girl becomes superhero, girl saves Tokyo (and possibly the world) and her boyfriend from the forces of evil".  Sure, the original story has some flaws, but it struck a chord with readers for a reason and it's great to see it adapted directly.

Overall, I have to say that Sailor Moon Crystal is a flawed gem, but a gem nonetheless.  I haven't seen the dvd releases yet, but I would hope that most of the animation flaws were fixed by the time they released them for home viewing.  If you were a fan of the manga, you'll definitely enjoy Crystal for its faithfulness to the source material in both plot and art style. However, if you were a fan of the original 90's anime, you probably won't enjoy this series as much because it lacks many of the visual gags and development that the original had.  Try to enjoy it for what it is.

Working!!/Wagnaria - Season one

Anime has the ability to make the most mundane thing seem interesting - even fun.  Sometimes, it's a little over the top (Yakitate!! Ja-pan springs to mind), and sometimes it manages to educate the audience about a hobby (G.A. Geijutsuka Art Design Class).  Sometimes, the focus is less on the setting and more on the people who do it (pretty much every High School Club comedy show).  In the latter category is where you'll find Working!!, also known as Wagnaria.

Anyone who has ever worked in food service knows that it's anything but fun.  The hours are long, the pay is low, and usually the management is pretty awful.  If you're lucky, you might have good coworkers.  The family-style restaurant Wagnaria (think Denny's without the night-blogging social media account) is sort of an idealized version of what working in food service would be like.  If every restaurant were like Wagnaria, I'm not sure that very much work would get done, but at least working there might be bearable.

The main character is a young man named Souta Takanashi.  He is your average high school student who loves small, adorable things (small children, stuffed animals, water fleas).  One day, he's approached by adorable, undersized upper-classman Popura, who convinces him to work at Wagnaria with  her.  It seems like a perfectly normal job for a high school student to do to earn some extra pocket money, but the staff of Wagnaria is anything but normal.  It's staffed by an information merchant, two former banchou gang members (juvenile delinquents), an androphobe who suckerpunches men on sight, and a girl who carries a katana around in her apron straps for no apparent reason (but it does keep the customers from misbehaving, so I guess it serves some purpose).  Compared to his coworkers, Souta's cuteness obsession is pretty normal.

This is one of those extremely popular "slice-of-life" shows that has no central plot.  It's basically just the staff of a restaurant getting into strange situations.  Occasionally, they will get together outside of work, but most of the story takes place either within Wagnaria or in Takanashi household.  It's difficult to really describe this series without it seeming rather boring and one-note.  I'll admit that most of the characters don't evolve much past their initial quirks in the first season with the exception of Inami, who is working hard to overcome her androphobia.  But, this isn't a show that you watch for plot and character development.  You watch it because it's funny and you don't have to think too much about it.

The animation is done by Studio Deen, who was responsible for at least the first few seasons of Axis Powers Hetalia.  It's easy to imagine the Hetalia crew working in Wagnaria, and I wouldn't be surprised if there was a few galleries of crossover fanart.  Fans of Durarara will also be pleased to recognize the voices of Izaya and Shizuo working together in similar, though probably less destructive, roles.

Overall, Working!!/Wagnaria is a fun show.  It's not overly complicated to watch, the characters are pretty distinctive, and it's enjoyable to watch how they interact with one another.  Like I said, I can't imagine that a lot of actual work gets done there, but at least they seem to be enjoying themselves. It doesn't make me want to jump up and get a job as a waitress, but if there were a Wagnaria restaurant where I lived, I'd probably drop in for a meal.

If you're interested in catching this show, it's currently streaming for free on Crunchyroll.   

Feed - Mira Grant

Feed is a story of politics and internet journalism.  And zombies.  It begins with an idiot poking a zombie with a stick, so you know that it's not your typical political pot-boiler.

The Mason siblings are bloggers in a not-so-distant future when the world has been overrun with zombies.  It's actually a pretty lucrative career, since bloggers have become more trusted news sources than traditional journalism.  Bloggers were the first to break the news of actual zombie infections back when media outlets were still dismissing zombie videos as the product of too many George Romero movies.  There are three types of bloggers: Newsies - who report on the facts, Fictionals - who write poetry and short stories about the state of the world, and Irwins - who go around in infested zones poking zombies with sticks to get a reaction (and a lot more website traffic).
After a particularly successful and suspenseful day poking zombies, the blogging team of the Mason's website After the End Times receives a much-anticipated message - they have been selected as the exclusive blogging team to follow Senator Ryman on his campaign to win his party's presidential candidate nomination.  A chance like this only comes along once in a lifetime, and is the sort of thing that will set the Mason team up for life.  The campaign trail of the post-Rising era is fraught with drama and danger, and politics post-Rising have taken on an additional tint of paranoia with the threat of zombie outbreaks at campaign locations.  In fact, it was almost brushed off as routine when zombies broke through the defense lines at a campaign stop in Oklahoma.

And then a zombie outbreak occurred at Senator Ryman's home just as he was receiving the party's nomination.  The Masons soon find themselves gripping the zombie tiger by the tail, and the consequences of the presidential election might have greater worldwide repercussions than ever imagined.

Just remember, folks, the election cycle last year was pretty rough, but at least no one had to deal with the infectious undead at the polls.

I really enjoyed reading this.  It was just the right balance of zombie action and behind-the-scenes drama.  The first chapter is a dramatic chase scene where the Mason siblings try to escape a small horde of zombies who have managed to sneak up on them in an infested zone.  If two people on a small motorcycle trying to escape a group of flesh-hungry undead isn't enough to grab your attention, then you may possibly be a zombie yourself.

The characters are fleshed out fairly well, though you are limited to interactions from the point of view of Georgia "George" Mason.  This means that the only characters you really get attached to are the Mason siblings themselves, since the other members of the cast don't interact with her as much.  The restriction to her point of view works well to develop the central mystery of the book, too, since her limited interaction gives you a good list of suspects for who is trying to sabotage (and possibly murder) Senator Ryman.

The setting is interesting, as the author chooses to set things in a modern world where humans haven't totally lost control of the situation.  Sure, there are areas that are completely overrun by the undead, but things haven't deteriorated to the point where we aren't able to get things like electricity, internet, gasoline, ammo, or groceries.  There was an initial panic, sure, but after that, things settled into a routine that just happened to involve zombies and a healthy dose of paranoia.  The virus itself has limitations built into it, so the only threat comes from things that are over 40 pounds in weight.  This means that, unlike other zombie novels I've read, there's no risk of infection from something like a zombie squirrel or a mosquito bite, but it doesn't rule out interspecies transmission entirely.

The only criticism I had for this was the identity and motive for the "bad guy".  I don't want to give anything away, but when I got to the part that revealed the "who" and "why", I admit that I did roll my eyes a lot because it was a little one-dimensional.  Believable, sure, but in a way predictable.  I was expecting more of a twist than what I got.

I'd recommend this book to people who liked Max Brooks's World War Z, or to young adults who enjoy stuff like The Walking Dead and are waiting for the next season to start.    As a zombie novel, it's pretty tame violence-wise.  There's minimal description of gore and guts, so squeamish readers don't need to worry.

I am looking forward to reading more books in the Newsflesh series.  I am hoping that other books will detail how other countries and areas handled the zombie outbreak.  Unfortunately, I have another library book that's due in a few days, so I won't be able to jump immediately into the second book, Deadline, so look forward to that later.

First post of 2017!

Ah, the feeling of posting on a fresh year.  It's like being the first person to walk across a fresh field of snow...

Speaking of snow, we are currently expecting Snowpocalypse 2K17.  I have already made the customary trip to the grocery store for milk and bread.  Hopefully, we won't lose power.

So, the first read of 2017 will be Feed by Mira Grant.  Nothing says optimism for the new year like a zombie novel.  So far, it's pretty good, and I'm looking forward to reviewing it.

I have been listening to a lot of podcasts lately, too.  My new favorite podcast is King Falls A.M. . It's  a lot like Welcome to Nightvale, but more X-files and supernatural activity and less Lovecraft and government experimentation.  I love the interaction between Ben and Sammy.  They play well off of one another.  But my favorite interaction was between  Ben and the crew of Mission: Apparition, where they had an argument entirely in boy-band song quotes.

Another podcast I enjoy listening to is The Myths and Legends Podcast, which I may have mentioned here before.  These are basically bedtime stories for adults.  The stories are well-researched and told in a fun, approachable manner.  It makes for great supplementary material for college literature classes, or just to have something to listen to when you're cleaning the house.  There are a lot of Western myths and legends, but he does take suggestions for non-Western stories, which he then researches and presents.  Even if you think you know a story, you should listen to his version of it - you're bound to hear a new twist on it.

Hopefully in 2017, I'll be able to post more often.  I want to talk more about books, and other things, too.  Do you have any requests or suggestions for posts? Drop me a comment!