OWARINAKI TABIBITO – No Make Girl’s Endless Journey

Vicki Zhao, So Close and other trips down memory lane

So here I am, sick at home due to acute food poisoning. Feels like shit, lemme tell ya, but at least 3 days of bed rest has given me motivation to update. What? So I was lazy the last coupla months, years, whatever…

Anyway, last night I saw Part 1 of Red Cliff. It was an excellent movie, but above that it starred Vicki Zhao in the role of the tomboy princess Sun. I was quite surprised. Vicki hadn’t crossed my mind for ages. I first saw her in So Close, that Hong Kong flick by Cory Yuen starring Shu Qi and Karen Mok. It wasn’t a very good movie, but Vicki captivated me then with her performance as a sort of tomboyish adolescent hacker-turned-assassin with crush on the cop hunting her down.

After that, I saw Shaolin Soccer, and while I didn’t recognize her as first I finally realized who it was by the end of the movie, and that was yet another big surprise. Since then, Vicki Zhao has sat on my fascination list, not just because I really like her unconventional cute looks, but also because she exudes a charisma that is subtle yet addictive.

There’s just something about how she can pull off depth in her characters. I just watched about half of So Close again, and I found myself impressed beyond my memories. Even in Cantonese, dubbed, Vicki’s portrayal stands out. In a genre where most film roles tend to be one-dimensional, Vicki alternates so realistically between playful and driven that she outshines even Karen Mok, definitely an excellent veteran actress. What a wonderful find, that Vicki has, probably of her own initiative, created a character far more interesting than what the original writers intended. (God knows, this movie was not an exercise in depth.)

In Red Cliff, she is once again a spunky tomboyish girl, and when I first saw her, I thought she was rather narrow in her roles. But after going back to So Close, I realize that it’s two very different characters and very different portrayals.

Well, when all is said and done, after my spontaneous Vicki revival, I dunno if I would actually go back and watch any of her other movies. I just like her character in So Close waaaay too much :P But then again, in respect of her skills, maybe I should.

This post had no point except to non-fangirlishly squeal about how freakin’ awesome Vicki Zhao was in So Close. So there.

EDIT: I just reached the car park fight scene with Shu Qi and Karen Mok. I had forgotten how ridiculously awesome this movie this.

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The Runaways

Just saw The Runaways. It didn’t get very good reviews, but I found it emotionally moving. Something about the story of these girls who rode the wild tornado of fame struck a chord inside. The highs and the lows, it was rock ‘n’ roll.

I was also really impressed with Kristen Stewart and Dakota Fanning. I didn’t know anything about Joan Jett or The Runaways. I only know Joan Jett’s classic songs, which I loved when I was a kid. So I can’t comment on how true they were, but they seemed pretty dang genuine to me. These actresses are so young, and yet they can portray all this, the strange freedom and suffocating, things that go right beyond your wildest dreams, and falling so far down, the 70s… Yeah, they did have that spirit.

It was a good movie. Not the best, but it gave me a complex churn of emotions, and that’s pretty good, yeah.

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Reflections on the passing of a good man…

Just now, I was informed that one of the people whom I had been working with, whom I hadn’t known for very long but counted as much as a friend as a colleague, had passed away a few days before Christmas last year.

I was supposed to meet him and some of his friends in LA, the Saturday before Christmas. When I got a message that the meeting was off, I was uneasy, but even that foreknowledge could not buffer in the slightest the shock I felt when I heard the news, directly from another mutual friend who had been completely devastated.

Alexander was brilliant and inspiring at what he did, and he was also warm, smart, fun, and had that sort of slightly twisted sense of humour that Belgians have. I liked him a lot, much more than would have been warranted for the short time we had known each other, much of which dealt with brainstorming the planning of shopping malls and drinking copious amounts of beer and wine while we were at it. I liked him so much, I was even going to introduce him to my girlfriend when we met up in LA…

I have never experienced the loss of a friend. I was never torn up when a relative passed away, and I had always wondered if I was simply emotionally stunted in that sense.

Now I sit here at my desk at work, typing up this message while my eyes threaten to water, and my chest feels like a massive hand is pushing down on it. People say that when they hear of tragic news it feels as if it hits them; now I know what it means.

I suppose this is what grief is. Although we were just a small part of each others’ lives, there was so much we could have done. You cry for all the things that could have been.

I still can’t believe it. Alexander is gone.

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Final Fantasy character designs

Sick in bed, twingey headaches zapping all motivation to do real work.

In any case, been obsessing slightly with FF and Square Enix character designs. It’s been a dozen years or so since I’ve actively liked characters by their designers, or rather lately I don’t really bother to check who designed what since I haven’t really liked many characters.

That changed with the Final Fantasy XIII trailer showing Jihl Nabaat. Wowza. It’s been months and I still think she’s gorgeous. And now that it’s almost release time and the site’s been getting more and more updates, I can’t help but fall in love with the gorgeous beautiful art of all the characters. Well, half the characters.

Jihl’s definitely still my favourite, but Yun Fang is way up there too coz she’s got dark hair and dair eyes and is badass. Next would be Gadot, who just oozes charisma. Lightning, I’m not too hot on, but that picture of her riding Odin, that’s an amazing piece of art.

But I think the character I like the most of the FFXIII games, is Noctis. What a beautiful design. Or perhaps I just like the trailer, which is dark and gorgeous. Ah, I can’t help reusing that word over and over. Gorgeous… simply gorgeous. I remember why I love anime and games again.

After a bit of wiki-ing, found out about Square’s chara designers. Nomura Tetsuya did much of the FFXIII work, and FFX and FFX-2 too. I loved Yuna, and although Rikku and Paine don’t appeal as much, their costumes are wonderful. Lightning’s not bad, but I think she’s unfairly crippled because her sexiness got given away to Yun Fang, heh. Yun Fang looks amazing at times, a bit too dark at others. I think I may like Ikeda Nao’s work more. More dynamic for guys, more anime-ish I suppose. Jihl is an amazing creation. Too bad she suffers from inflated chest syndrome.

Been playing FFXII, and I realized that I like the faces for FFXII a lot. Ashe is really pretty. Not hot in the vixen sense, but just amazingly pretty. Don’t like the kids, but Vossler is simply incredible, and Basche as well. The costumes are interesting, but perhaps this is where Ikeda Nao is just better. FFXII was the Vagrant Story team, so it’s not surprising I like the designs and the game system. I loved the directing for Vagrant Story, and FFXII feels similar. I think FFXIII is overacted in a very typical Japanese way and it detracts from my enjoyment (it’s so beautiful and so painful to watch at the same time). Vagrant Story was true art. FFXII holds hints, but unfortunately was not completely free of bad acting direction.

The trailer for FFXIV looks amazing. I love the character design for the main guy in that. And surprise, it’s by the FFXII team! Minagawa Hiroshi gets kudos for this. Can’t wait! Did you see the detail on his armour?!

In other news (to me), Matsuno Yasumi who was the brains behind Vagrant Story and FFXII has left Square Enix. I wonder if he will create games of that breath and caliber again. Damn you Square for dumbing down FFXII with Vaan! The game woulda rocked with Basche as the hero. Time to play Vagrant Story again.

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Upgraded to WordPress 2.8

Phew, took forever. It was painful, but not through WordPress’s fault. It was my $&%$ router and my $%^# internet connection that made this a total nightmare. I should’ve realized sooner because power cycling the router seems to have solved my connection problems.

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Final Fantasy XIII – female charas FTW!

I’m back! I’m back! I’m back from the dead!!

Thanks to the new FFXIII trailer :D

Okay, I haven’t been watching anime since I found it a chore to wade through the last portion of Xam’d, so there’s been no motivation to post.

Then, two things happened.

1) FFXIII, which piqued my interest like over a year ago because it was the first FF to star a non-traditional female main character, released a new trailer with, oh my god, one of the hottest baddie female characters evar! ^^;;

2) I discovered (and promptly marathoned 9 eps of) Phantom Requiem of the Phantom, a most satisfying anime, which put me in a really good mood.

Anyway, about FFXIII…

This is Lightning. Non-cute, non-mage, female and utterly kickass gunblade-wielding ultra-cool main character. Coolness is good, hence, this is a good and desirable game.

Played the demo, and while the graphics were amazing, I thought the battle system was too anarchic and confusing. The stats were displayed in 3 corners and the damage takes place in the center, which means that I don’t know where to look to take in all the information I need. So I kinda left it at that.

Then, E3 rolled around, and I checked the official site for the new trailer. Which looked very cool.

And then, I saw this.

And this…

And this!!

ZOMG!! Okay I’ve always been a sucker for long hair, but usually it’s long black hair. The woman in this scene though, wow! She’s gorgeous even with the glasses! Man, must be the uniform and the badass attitude :D

But, seriously, after doing the screencaps, I’m looking at these pics and the detail is just absolutely utterly amazing. Look at the hair!! The detail! The individual strands! Look at the renders on the jacket fasteners! Look at the eyebrows! The eyeshadow effect! The graceful arch of the nose, the perfect angle of the jaw, even the minute textures on the lips… Square-Enix really outdid themselves. What an incredible model of the human figure. I can’t get over how real yet idealized it is. In other words, detailed enough to be real, but not realistic. At last, the right balance between CG and anime.

In awe dude, in awe. This is truly a labour of love, and only the obsessed could produce something like this. Suffice to say, I am really looking forward to FFXIII.

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Time is a river…

I just came back from a wedding in Singapore. In total I was there for 24 hours, some of which I spent having lunch with an old friend I hadn’t seen in 7 years (she has two kids with a third on the way, and the last time we met we were traveling carefree through Japanese hotsprings); attending the wedding itself (which was of my project boss at HSBC oh 6 years ago, to a girl who had come into our office to teach us how to use Thomson Financial); and scrounging in my old apartment in Singapore for some missing Hekiru CDs, cloth strips for boxing, and my two foot tall RX-178 MKII Gundam model, all of which I failed to find.

Standing in my old room where I had spent over two years, good times and bad, I looked at the stuff I had accumulated over 10 or so years of existence. Some from my days in Michigan, a hell of a lot from Japan after that, and the rest during my tenure at HSBC in Singapore. I had a ton of magazine cuttings and posters and assorted Hekiru stuff, but I also had hundreds of CDs, old photos, a long outdated desktop, nostalgic books, and clothes I will never wear again.

Failing to find the stuff I was looking for, and feeling quite down especially about the lack of Gundam, I picked up a few good books, stuffed them into my backpack, took one lingering look at the life I used to have, now sporting several holes in the shelves and drawers where I have been removing bits and piece every now and then, before stepping back out of the apartment and locking the door. I mentally noted that I should one day drive a truck down, stuff everything in, and haul it all back up to KL or Penang.

I had forgotten I owned the Utena LDs. I toyed with the idea of bringing a few more CD cases back. I missed my massive bookcase. I felt guilty about not really wanting to deal with my Hekiru posters anymore.

And somewhere I mourned that these 10 years of my life are now little more than old and faded things that only I know of. My friends from Michigan are long gone, my Hekiru friends are mostly estranged, my work colleagues from Singapore I’d probably not see again until Clare Koh gets married. I have my friends in Japan, but the ones from the DreamArts days are also far behind.

Time is a river, and happiness and sorrow are fleeting, and sometimes, you find yourself standing in a dusty room holding a battered old book and feeling a little sorry that you don’t know where the rest of the series is.

Music: M01 from Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 1 Soundtrack by Kajiura Yuki

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Proposition 8 is in mortal danger of passing…

It’s half a world away and pretty far removed from life here in KL, but it’s relevant, and depressing.

Marriage is an artificial institution created to symbolize the bond of two people who find happiness in each other and wish to continue doing so for the rest of their lives. I think everyone has that right, to hope for a happily ever after. It’s not the same if you just say, well, yeah I think we should give living together forever a go.

Feel bleh the last few days, and I don’t know why. Things are going very well for me, and I wonder, is the other shoe going to drop? I can weather disappointments and upsets, but trust me it’s not fun.

And dammit, I want a happily ever after too. And I was hoping I could do it in California.

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Ghost in the Shell SAC Trilogy on Blu Ray

Bandai and Production IG have release GitS SAC, 2nd GIG, and Solid State Society in one Blu Ray pack that includes English subtitles, for ¥28,000. This is great news. EXCEPT, I bought SAC and 2nd GIG less than a year ago for like ¥65,000, under the (mistaken) impression it has English subs. Dude, I am feeling somewhat screwed.

Well, so I have 2 expensive paperweights on my bookshelf, and now I just placed an order for the Blu Ray pack. Happy, joy. Bah. Ugh, this media upgrading shit is killing now. Now that all my favourite anime are finally coming out on remastered DVD box sets, I have to worry about whether they will rerelease on Blu Ray in a couple years?!?! WTF?!!

*sigh* It’s a good thing, but not a happy thing, know what I mean?

EDIT: Oh, sorry, my bad, even more screw. It’s not the whole thing, it’s just the recompiled versions of Laughing Man and Individual Eleven. Okay, total piss off. At least I don’t feel bad for having fansubs of these. Duh. Bah, humbug.

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Xam’d Lost Memories ep 1

Wow.

All I can say is, wow. Words fail me in conveying the awe I feel upon watching this episode. My first taste of this new Bones series conjures up images of Miyazaki’s Nausicaa mixed with Simoun. An unfair comparison, perhaps, but just the combination to leave me giddily happy. This is the sort of anime I live for.

Bones has always been on my radar, for they do good series fantasy/sci-fi anime, and they do them with strong female characters. I confess I haven’t watched much, but I do love their original (just before leaving Sunrise) Escaflowne, and Kurau. Looks like they have another potential winner with Xam’d. I dunno what it’s about, but the first episode introduced an fine cast of intriguing characters and an imaginative world, which is good enough to hook me. On the technical side, I love the feel of the art and the character designs, which yes harken to Ghibli, but feel terribly refreshing in this action packed scenario.

My favourite so far is the motley crew of the ship in the opening, especially the captain who wins me over with her unorthodox character design and willful attitude. The strange girl who pilot their one-man craft is a close second, because hey, she’s just a reborn Nausicaa on a bigger Mehve :D Well, shades of Miyazaki aside, hints of weird technology and war tension have wet my appetite considerably.

On a another note, I find the BGM impressive and atmospheric. It’s mid-eastern and tribal in nature, especially in the “modern” setting part of the story, which only enhances the deliberate “like our world, but not quite” feel. The OP and ED are catchy, and surprisingly not out of place despite the fact that the OP is by BOOM BOOM SATELLITES, heh. Well, the OP definitely left an impression on me, since “slice of life” scenes shown contrasted so much with the “Nausicaa” portion before. Another plus to Bones for creating this sort of smart dichotomy.

At only one ep, it’s hard to say if Zam’d is bust or boom. Certainly it’s a very ambitious undertaking, judging by the complexity of the world and the large cast of characters; there’s plenty of rope with which Bones could hang themselves by. If they pull it off though, with a coherent story and sufficient attention to key characters, this could well be a strong contender for top anime of the year.

Its times like this when I am reminded to be incredibly grateful to be an anime fan. God, I love anime.

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Kara no Kyoukai ep 2, 3

After the disappointment of Mnemosyne, it’s been a rather slow month as I rummage through the new season for something that will satisfy my craving for cool, strong female characters in a dark violent setting. Yeah, I know that sounds so wrong, but that’s what floats my boat. I love well-made anime such as Mushishi and Seirei no Moribito and Patlabor and Escaflowne etc etc, but I will always crave straightforward kickass female noir action.

With Kara no Kyoukai ep 3, it seems that I have found my new pick. I saw ep 1 about a month ago, and it was okay. I was more impressed with ep 2, which features Shiki’s back story (part of it anyway) and sets out the series as a mix of “monster of the week” coupled with non-linear plot advancement. Well, not so much plot, as the telling of the story of Shiki and Kokutou.

The only problem with ep 2 was that I still wasn’t terribly interested in Shiki nor her relationship with Kokotou. It appears that Shiki is a split personality and one of them is a killer who harbours a sort of affection, as far as a sociopath can, for Kokutou. We don’t know why Shiki kills, or who Shiki is, really, but the ep ends with Shiki about to stab Kokutou.

Ep 3, the one which I found the best of the lot, is set between ep 2 and ep 1. Now we see the connections lining up, and Shiki and Kokutou both start feeling more real, less 2-dimensional. The focus of this episode is a girl named Fujino who has been killing members of a gang. Shiki immediately identifies her as “of the same cloth” as herself, ie a killer with an unstable mind, and is quite vehement in her hatred of the girl as Fujino appears to be an indiscriminate murderer; as Touko says, Shiki herself still holds on to certain codes of morality.

This fleshing out of Shiki’s personality makes her more intriguing to me, and the revelation of how she got the puppet arm in ep 1 is also a nice tidbit that I eagerly devoured, as was the nature of her psychic abilities. However, perhaps the best part of this story is Fujino herself, who is a very interesting victim. Her actions are murder, and Kokutou, ever the idealist, still considers it wrong, but he adds that he feels nothing for the men she murdered. Fujino could have been a flat character acting out her brand of insanity, but we are made to feel both sympathy, in that her pain is caused by something out of her control, as well as condemnation, for she is a murderer who denies her own guilt. My favourite part was the very end, when she cries that she wants to live, a sequence which suddenly restores to her a modicum of humanity. Although there seems little chance, for me the ultimate fanservice would be Fujino appearing in later eps to seriously massively kick some bad guy ass, heh.

I liked this part also because I liked the character design for Fujino, and I was very very drawn to her voice. At the end, I noted with pleasant surprise that her VA was Noto Mamiko. That’s just ridiculously good casting :) And again, I had forgotten that Shiki was played by Sakamoto Maaya. Yes, she’s that good.

All in all, I’m very happy with this series, and hope the remaining parts will be as good or better. As long as there’s no romance between Shiki and Kokutou, I think I’ll be well satisfied.

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Updates and new season

Macross Frontier on hold because I can’t be bothered to watch it. It just doesn’t feel very exciting. Until someone comes out and says the story progresses really well to its conclusion, it will stay in limbo.

Watched one ep of Koihime Musou, because it was supposed to be yuri. I think it will be the only ep I see. *shudders at chara designs*

Blade of the Immortal looked pretty good from the first ep. Production quality is high, probably because Bee Train had help from Production IG. I think Bee Train still lacks finesse in the more upfront sort of action scenes, and the ep felt awkward at moments. I wish they would make another surreal girls-with-guns anime featuring Kajiura Yuki, it’s what they are good for :P

Might try Ultraviolet. Started watching Utena again, this show is absolute genius.

Ugh, finger hurts from too much Monster Hunter.

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Mnemosyne ep 5, 6

It’s rather sad, but Mnemosyne, an anime that started out with quite a bit of potential to be a nostalgic throwback to the 80′s girls and guns era, has wound up a muddled mess.

Although the series, up till ep 4, was rife with plot holes, extraneous service, and middling art quality, it was still watchable if you took it at face value. After seeing ep 5, and especially the finale of ep 6, I cannot be so kind. It was a train wreck, plain and simple.

Ep 4 jumps 20 or so years into the future. Rin is gone; in her place is a woman who looks like her but has no memories. Rin-who-is-not-Rin lives a normal corporate life, has a lover who wants her to marry him. Mimi is a now a Buddhist nun. Teru cleaned up his act as is now boss of a very high profile conglomerate. The latest generation of Maeno is a pretty young thing who’s gutsy, great at manipulation, and forever pining to her boyfriend that there are no good men in her life. I like her :)

I thought the setup of this episode was quite good. It was cool to see Rin be given a normal life, and then to see her reaction on regaining her memory. She says, “It’s been centuries since I’ve had a lover. It was like living in a fairytale”. That’s pretty deep, to me anyway. Rin, who has no innocence left, was given a chance to taste it again. The plot also unfolded decently, although Apos’ use of Laura is getting old. Apos himself is shown to be the worst kind of villain, the one who personifies the trope “Rape the Dog“.

So far so good… The part I have beef with is just the gratuitous scene in the middle of nowhere. You know the one I’m talking about. The one with Mimi and the other immortals, in the monastery, which served zero plot value, and negative service value, because it was so bizarrely placed anyway. I’d have given this ep 3 1/2 stars without the scene, and 1/2 a star with. Bleh, I say.

And as for ep 6. Well, all’s well that ends well, Rin saves the universe and becomes God, literally, Apos is banished to eternal suffering (I think, I couldn’t tell), Mimi lives on, alone, and Mishio becomes yet another follower of the cult of Rin… and I don’t care one whit. Ah, you see, obviously they tried to tie it up into a whole with now loose ends. You know, leave no mysteries, explain it all, etc. Well, it sucked. Badly. This sounds like something a 4th grader would come up with. It’s horrible. It’s so bad, Mnemosyne will have the dubious honour of being the only anime series in which I, out of protest, refuse to buy the final DVD.

Now that I think about it, perhaps they also intended to follow in the old 80s tradition, showcasing an anime that sucks just as well as some of our other terrible classics did. Begone.

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Baccano! ep 1-13

Wow! What a pleasant surprise! Just finished this series, over the course of a few months, and while Baccano! isn’t one of my favourite anime by a long shot, it’s something I’m really really impressed with.

This is a show with a huge cast of characters, but each and every one of them are individual and important. In fact, this show is built upon these characters, and gives as much time to their idiosyncrasies as to the plot. The show doesn’t take itself seriously at all and everyone’s just kinda whacked, but that’s the beauty of this sort of show on anime – it works. Over-the-top psychos, more than a couple screws loose clowns, nasty mafia guys, superhuman deadly assassins, heroes with a heart of gold, and pure evil baddies, all done to glorious fun.

Baccano! is three stories all cut up and mashed together in a non-linear jumble. It takes more than half of this 13 episode series before you even get a vague clue of what is going on, and then finally it all wraps up in the last episode in a grand finale that is both what we have come to expect in natural conclusion, yet with still a surprise or two thrown in! Brilliant writing and setup! You could have told these stories separately and straightforwardly and they would still been quite good, but thanks to this mishmash gimmick, suddenly the series becomes in itself a fun show that also makes you think.

Of course, there are many ways in which this storytelling style could have failed. Luckily it’s based on a series of light novels and each story was firmly established. Of course, how the writers chose to cut it up was also crucial, because you have to give just enough to keep the audience watching and curious, yet be careful not to give it away before the end. The care with which this was done shows that the writers have not compromised for the lowest common denominator, ie they assume the viewer is pretty darn sophisticated, intelligent and patient. That’s good.

Of course, it’s not some kind of intellectual exercise. What was great about Baccano!, other than the well-handled execution of the story, was how each character was treated exactly how we, the audience, wanted it. Have you seen a show and gone, man I can’t believe the writers did that to a character, what a waste. Sometimes likable side characters are sacrificed as plot points, or kick-ass dudes get taken down in some utterly pitiful manner, or the punk kid is suddenly all powerful… Those shows can be frustrating no matter how good a story otherwise. Well, luckily, or perhaps miraculously, in Baccano!, each got what he or she deserved and more, either good or bad. That shows remarkable consistency in writing and interpreting the characters. You don’t jerk the viewer around.

Anyway, very good show and a stellar example of what creative talent can come up with even in this age of formulaic plotlines. The only problem is you have to go back and watch at least the first episode to get the whole story! In fact, I imagine a full rewatch would be very enjoyable indeed.

BTW, my favourite characters were Firo and Chane. What were yours?

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Kara no Kyoukai 1

Okay, it was a tossup between MacF 11 and Kara no Kyoukai. Didn’t know anything about Kara no Kyoukai except it was Type-Moon and hence very hype and probably undeliverable (I got burned by Fate/Stay Night anime), but it was Kajiura Yuki’s latest work and so I bit.

I’ll say off the bat that, still knowing nothing about the series other than what little backstory is miserly scattered to us in this first of seven episodes, I think I like it. It reminds me of Miyu; the obvious reasons are the supernatural horror flavour and the setup that we, the audience, are given little introduction to the situation and background, thus creating a mystery that is to be revealed in the following parts.

I like these types of mysteries because I like fantasy, dream-like worlds that are not our reality. The first key to making this succeed is to insert plenty of atmosphere and little details that keep you grounded even when you don’t know what the “real reasons” are. The other key is having at least one well-developed, sympathetic character so you, the viewer, can concentrate on their reactions and personality as the focal point, thus allowing you to view a world that may not make sense to you, via a character who is part of that world.

I think the Miyu OVAs are an excellent example of this. (Forgive the Miyu focus, I just watched ep 1 again the other day, and I was pleasantly surprised to find it has stood the test of years and years and more than a bit of my own idolatry.) Anyway, Kara no Kyoukai isn’t quite as mysterious and otherworldly, lacks properly developed characters for us to sympathize with, and in the end wasn’t a terribly imaginative story, but it had enough to hook me.

First of all the animation and art is gorgeous. It is sophisticated spending and beautifully detailed in cases; for instance, my favourite parts are how Shiki’s shadow is blurred on the edges when she entered the building, and how when she walks inside they show her as a shadow and then as a brightly lit figure as she passes from window to window. Granted well-animated and directed action is always a joy, but nowadays I find myself being delighted by all these tiny little bits of care that the director lavishes on the show. In something which relies on atmosphere, all the more so.

Next, I am always partial to kick-ass female main characters. Shiki is kick-ass. She’s also pretty damn cold and empty and unfortunately seems to have a weakness for the nominal male romantic interest, but if she continues to kick ass I will continue to watch. Okay, so the puppeteer thing was like super piquing my interest as well. Human body augmentation, in all its various cybernetic and spiritual forms, is a fascination of mine.

Last, Kajiura is there. It may not be as overwhelming as say Yoko Kanno’s GitS soundtrack, but I like her stuff and it makes everything better. Hell, I ordered the limited box of this ep without even seeing the show, just to get the soundtrack. So there.

The bad part of Kara no Kyoukai was that too little was explained. Not enough background folks. Actually, rich background isn’t really needed. As I said before, what you do need is one character to ground you. We had something, with Shiki eating the ice cream, but we didn’t get inside her head at all so that may as well have been nothing.

Hopefully the next episode will give something, but actually I don’t want it to be Shiki. I like Shiki, and I like Shiki as the mystery, so I want Shiki to be revealed to me via someone else. This is what made Miyu good, and I think it would be a great way to handle this situation as well. Somehow I doubt it’s gonna be though, but hey one can hope.

Oh, and I was really surprised that it was Sakamoto Maaya who played Shiki. Wow… loks like she’s reviving her seiyuu career. This is another woman I highly respect for her abilities. Go Maaya!

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