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Dated 3 August 2001: Originally posted "August 3, 19101"

I got the Nausicaa manga box set and an Eva DVD.

Just out of curiosity, I listened to the English language track on the DVD to see if the dubbing was any good. Holy Christ, it's freaking bad. No surprise. They shouldn't even have bothered - dubs are for people who can't read. Think of it this way: Listen to a dub with your eyes closed - if you can still tell that it's dubbed (or it sounds like total ass), then it's a typical dub - crap. The Spanish and French dubs on the disk, however, aren't quite as bad.

Sadly, the Japanese Asuka can't speak German for shit (and she's supposed to be fluent), but I already knew that.

Dated 30 April 2002: FLCL

Mamini
Mamini

Okay, FLCL is like the coolest thing, ever.

Being an OAV by Gainax, the creators of Neon Genesis Evangelion, comparisons between FLCL and Eva are natural. Eva was a grander, more ambitious project, with arching storylines and heavy Judeo-Christian metaphors. FLCL, on the other hand, while not exactly whimsical, has a better sense of humor and carries a lot less emotional baggage. The characters are more straightforward, without the hidden agendas and closet-stuffing skeletons of Eva. After all, it is only six half-hour episodes long.

Naota, the lead in FLCL, is essentially a younger version of Eva's Ikari Shinji reimagined with more testicularity and self-assurance. He's also much more astute when it comes to appreciating the bizarre events surrounding him and understanding the motivations of the people in his life. He's also much more resigned to his fate, whereas Shinji never missed an opportunity to waver or whine.

Naota
Naota

Actually, I guess Naota's not really much like Shinji at all, except for the fact that he is a young boy forced to accept fantastic responsibilities and faced with mad circumstances beyond his control. Like Shinji, Naota's world is one largely shaped by the various women in his life. In that sense, Naota and Shinji, in their own uncertain sort of way, echo Tyler Durden's views on the challenges to expressing masculinity when the immediate influences in their lives are predominately female. Both Naota and Shinji respond to this frustration through their performances as reluctant robot pilots, although Naota is more successful than young Ikari in defining himself outside of this station despite the fact that the male role models available to Naota (his father, grandfather, and the guy with the eyebrows) are essentially worthless. Nevertheless, Naota, in his epilogues, demonstrates a mature resignation and understanding that belies his frantic posturing and completely escapes Shinji's gutless desperation.

Thematically, FLCL is much more straightforward than Eva, despite the fact that both shows rely heavily on symbolism. The sexual metaphors in FLCL are obvious, but (for the most part) tastefully executed.

Perhaps the most obvious difference lies in the emotional content. All of the characters in Eva (except Ayanami Rei, arguably) are generally unhappy, whereas the leads in FLCL are generally glad for their adventures, despite the troubles they produce.

Haruko
Haruko

Unfortunately, it's not really possible to describe what the show is about in a way that does justice to its brilliance. My Not Quite Yiddish NoCal Friend aptly called it "basically a perverted Mary Poppins, coming-of-age story with some robots thrown in." That's about as good a nutshell description as I can come up with.

Frankly, I consider the plot to be a rather trivial element largely unnecessary in the appreciation of FLCL.

If you must know, Naota, a twelve-year-old boy, is walking home with his older brother's girlfriend, Mamini. An older girl, Haruko, comes out of fucking nowhere and drills him with her Vespa, then clocks him in the head with her gas-powered bass. Haruko ends up sharing Naota's bedroom while serving as his family's housekeeper. Then the robots show up and it starts getting weird.

Haruko's Vespa
Haruko's Vespa

But really FLCL isn't about robots or aliens or thinnly veiled erection metaphors, it's about style and flash and music. FLCL swirls in a St. Vitus' Dance of visual and stylistic changes evoking anime standards, manga art, and comic book staples with a little bit of South Park, the Sunday funnies, and Schoolhouse Rock thrown in for good measure. Driving it all are the underlying alt-rock, punk riffs of The Pillows, joyfully and enthusiastically echoing Naota's resignation, Mamini's irreverence, and Haruko's subversiveness.

All in all, it's like the coolest thing ever.

Dated 8 January 2004: Kare Kano

So, I bought The Right Stuf's boxed set of His and Her Circumstances (A.K.A. Kare Kano, A.K.A. Kareshi Kanojo no Jijou). I'm only a couple episodes into the DVDs (although I've seen the show before), but I'm still pretty impressed with the work The Right Stuf did on the show, including multiple subtitle streams for all the on-screen text that appears.

Unfortunately, the DVDs do have some fairly significant problems. For example, my Pioneer DV-563A-s positively choked on the multiple subtitle streams several times within the first two episodes alone. This usually manifested as severe lag in the subtitle streams, but the subtitles themselves also "freaked out" (a very technical term, I know) a few times, and danced entirely off-screen at least once. This is apparently a known problem that happens to other players as well, particularly when there is a lot of on-screen text. For example, I gave the first disc a try in my old Sony, but that player choked on the tougher sections as well. [Update: I had no problems at all with my HTPC.]

But anyway, if your DVD player is up to the task, it's a great buy. Hell, it's practically worth it just for the fact that they set the original Japanese language track as the default setting. Man, that never happens.

The other problem I have with the discs is that the video quality is not particularly good. In fact, it's downright poor for a DVD. The worst problem with it is the visible interlacing that plagues many motion scenes.

Still, despite these problems, it is a good deal, and it is a good show, so I still recommend it, and aside from the technical problems, the DVDs themselves are quite nice, particularly the aforementioned perks.

Dated 6 July 2004: The Melody of Oblivion

Toune and Bocca
Toune and Bocca

The "other" Gainax show this season, Boukyaku no Senritsu (The Melody of Oblivion), has not been getting as much attention as Konomini.

The Melody of Oblivion is a bit hard to describe. I guess I could call it a futuristic science fiction story that takes place after "monsters" have enslaved the planet, and say that it follows the adventures of Bocca Serenade, a Melos Warrior who fights as part of a small band of independent rebels. This description, however, fails to adequately communicate what the show is really about: Cool music, archery, motorcycles, and FREAKY, FREAKY SHIT.

Dated 20 October 2004: The Melody of Oblivion

Daicon girl
Daicon girl

Episode 15 of The Melody of Oblivion contained a Daicon reference.

Flying Bunny
Daicon reference in The Melody of Oblivion

This is not the first time a Gainax show has paid homage to this Daicon icon. As you'll recall, FLCL had Haruko sky-surfing on her bass while wearing a similar outfit.

Haruko
Daicon reference in FLCL

For the record, Playboy bunnies sky-surfing on huge broadswords and fighting giant robots is like the best idea, ever.

Dated 8 March 2005: FLCL

Ninamori
Ninamori 1600x1200 wallpaper (822KB)

I scanned and stitched together a simple 1600x1200 wallpaper featuring a Sadamoto-drawn Ninamori from FLCL. I actually found the source image from a poster I've unknowningly had for over a year. It was in some anime magazine that I was just about to throw out.

Dated 2 July 2005: Diebuster

Nono
Nono

I am really enjoying Top wo Nerae 2 - Die Buster. It doesn't seem to be generating very much positive buzz, but the things it does well it does very well indeed. Plus it has Yoshiyuki Sadamoto as the character designer and animation director, and I am a sucker for his work.

Larc
Larc

The first Top wo Nerae - Gunbuster OAV set the bar very high (particularly in how it meshed giant robots and emotional resonance), gathering more and more steam with each episode. The second series is only halfway through, so it remains to be seen how it will measure up in comparison.

Larc and Nono
Larc and Nono

It is my understanding that Manga Entertainment has lost the Gunbuster license. Thank God. They did nothing with it for years. I suppose that was a bit of a blessing, seeing as how any Gunbuster DVDs Manga might have put out surely would have been fucked up something royal in some stupid, easily-avoidable way. Someone talk Geneon into acquiring both Top wo Nerae titles so they can get proper releases, please. But I digress.

Larc and Nono
Larc and Nono

The first episode of Top wo Nerae 2 (Aim For the Top II) is beautifully cinematic. I suspect most of the people who dismissed the new series outright after viewing the first episode never gave it a fair shake, watching a low-res 640x360 fansub—windowed, no doubt—on a computer monitor while devoting the bulk of their attention to IRC. They missed out. Even the establishing shots in the opening minutes alone look great. I want to watch this again in a movie theater, not on a television.

Larc
Larc comes to Nono's rescue

Matching the beautiful Sadamoto eye candy every step of the way is a great orchestral score—nothing fancy, but quite rich and grand all the same. It is appropriately epic at times and nicely compliments a show with so much heritage before it.

Dix-Neuf
Dix-Neuf

After the serious opening minutes, the first episode of Top wo Nerae 2 develops a comic sensibility, introducing the viewer to its lead character Nono, a young girl with an ambitious dream of becoming a space pilot. She is a long way off from her goal, though. In addition to lacking the approximately 15 years of education and training necessary, she does not seem to have the faculties for the job. Neither is she any good at her current job (which explains her maid outfit in the first episode...mostly). In fact, her primary talent appears to be an uncanny ability to break things.

Larc and Nono
Larc and Nono

Those of you familiar with the original Top wo Nerae (more commonly known among English-speaking fans as Gunbuster) may see some similarities with Noriko in her spiritual successor, Nono. Naturally, if there is going to be a Noriko, there has to be an Onee-sama. Enter Larc (or Raruku, if animenewsnetwork.com is correct). Larc is a Topless—an elite space pilot of a Buster Machine.

Dix-Neuf and Larc
Dix-Neuf and Larc

Larc sets Nono straight very quickly. To be an elite space pilot, it is not the years of education and training that matter. The important thing is to be Topless—and it doesn't appear Nono has what it takes. To Nono's credit, this revelation does not crush her dreams. Rather, she quickly aims even higher by switching her focus towards becoming a Topless. (I guess you could say she decides to Aim For the Top, eh.) Although, she does initially misconstrue Larc's meaning, Nono becomes steadfast at adopting Larc as her onee-sama.

Nono
Nono

Smoothly voiced by Maaya Sakamoto, Larc accepts her onee-sama role somewhat reluctantly. Larc in general is more laid back and unassuming than her Gunbuster counterpart. She keeps a lower profile, so all this onee-sama business is new for her. Personally, I feel making the towering Nono's onee-sama so petite and understated was a good move. It is a simple way to add something new to the dynamic, but it works well here.

Larc
Larc summons Dix-Neuf

Top wo Nerae 2 does a lot of things very well—many of them very simple in concept, but wildly entertaining in execution. For example, Larc thrusting her arm to the sky while summoning her buster machine with a shout is perfection. Likewise, Nono's somewhat embarrassed introduction to Fraternity at the end of episode two classically closes out the episode with a couplet that seques to the very catchy ED. (The OP, "Groovin' Magic" is quite good as well. Those of you familiar with H.264 and the Matroska container can view the OP here (512x288, 7.7MB), and the ED here (512x288, 7.8MB).

Chiko
Chiko

Episode three arrived in the middle of June 2005. It is a character development episode, and focuses primarily on Chiko (or possibly Tykho). Chiko is awesome, although I suspect most people will probably hate her. I dunno; I guess I just keep adding to my ever-growing roster of anime characters with deep-seated emotional problems—characters that everyone hates, but I tend to favor. (E.g., Poor Flay was merely misunderstood. She didn't deserve all the animosity.)

Chiko
Chiko

I attribute a lot of Chiko's appeal to the quality work of her voice actress, Miyuki Sawashiro, who is playing her spot-on. I am not really familiar with her work, and was surprised to discover she voices both Puchiko from Di Gi Charat and Mint from Galaxy Angel. Chiko does not sound like either of those characters, but rather is carving out her own niche with both sharp, curt interjections and somewhat droll statements. All in all, the voice plays out very well, and adds to my conviction in insisting that Chiko receive more screen time.

Nono and Chiko
Nono and Chiko

I can not really predict if Top wo Nerae 2 will manage to achieve the same impact as its superb predecessor, but even if the best I can hope for is further alternation between epic cinematic moments and giant robot fights somewhat reminiscent of the last few episodes of FLCL (seriously, most of the action is very much a combination of FLCL zaniness with staples from the original Gunbuster (complete with INAZUMA KICK), I shall still be anxiously awaiting the remaining episodes, and eager for a DVD box set.

Dated 3 July 2006: Gunbuster

Gainax Gunbuster splash page
Gainax Gunbuster splash page.

From the Best-News-I've-Heard-All-Day Department: Bandai has given full power to its inertial canceler and finally revealed that it holds the North American license to Gainax's fully awesome six-episode series, Top wo Nerae, better known by its English title: Gunbuster.

Gunbuster

I'm glad someone rescued this title from the Manga Entertainment tar pits, and nigh on ecstatic that it was Bandai. I can't think of any other company to which I'd rather entrust the Top wo Nerae license.