tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12708492793111932932024-03-13T18:25:30.762-07:00Random musings of a Summer DreamerRandom thoughts, stories and general nerdy things by yours truly.Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.comBlogger68125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-11674748915876416172019-06-08T15:16:00.001-07:002019-06-10T12:58:04.205-07:00Small Update, New Article on Hubpages and The Future Of This Blog. Wow, it really has been awhile. I really don't have an excuse, I just suck at keeping up with this blog. But anyway, what have I been up too? Well, here are some highlights.<br />
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I quit making YouTube Videos. I couldn't find an audience, and the advice I was getting to grow my channel was stuff I couldn't financially afford, or I simply was uncomfortable doing. Beyond that, making videos...just stopped being fun.<br />
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Finally started working on a proper second draft of my Novel. I don't know when it will be ready. But the way I look at it, any progress is good, and it means I'm one step closer to getting it published.<br />
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More recently, I published a nine-part essay on HubPages about the history of the online harassment movement known as #comicsgate. I'd intended it to be much shorter, maybe two or three pages at most. But when I started to research the topic and saw the level of bat shit crazy I'd be dealing with, It dawned on me that short and sweet would not do. No, I would need to be as detailed, and as well-sourced as possible if I was going to come near what I wanted to do. And even then, it got away from me. If you'd like to read it, here are the links:<br />
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Part 1: <a href="https://hubpages.com/literature/thisiscomicsgate-or-Gate-Movements-are-Stupid-Heres-Some-Proof-Part-One">https://hubpages.com/literature/thisiscomicsgate-or-Gate-Movements-are-Stupid-Heres-Some-Proof-Part-One</a><br />
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Part 2: <a href="https://hubpages.com/literature/thisiscomicsgate-Or-Gate-Movements-Are-Stupid-Heres-Some-Proof-Part-Two">https://hubpages.com/literature/thisiscomicsgate-Or-Gate-Movements-Are-Stupid-Heres-Some-Proof-Part-Two</a><br />
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Part 3: <a href="https://hubpages.com/literature/thisiscomicsgate-Or-Gate-Movements-Are-Stupid-Heres-Some-Proof-Part-Three">https://hubpages.com/literature/thisiscomicsgate-Or-Gate-Movements-Are-Stupid-Heres-Some-Proof-Part-Three</a><br />
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Part 4: <a href="https://hubpages.com/literature/thisiscomicsgate-Or-Gate-Movements-Are-Stupid-Heres-Some-Proof-Part-Four">https://hubpages.com/literature/thisiscomicsgate-Or-Gate-Movements-Are-Stupid-Heres-Some-Proof-Part-Four</a><br />
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Part 5: <a href="https://hubpages.com/literature/thisiscomicsgate-Or-Gate-Movements-Are-Stupid-Heres-Some-Proof-Part-Five">https://hubpages.com/literature/thisiscomicsgate-Or-Gate-Movements-Are-Stupid-Heres-Some-Proof-Part-Five</a><br />
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Part 6: <a href="https://hubpages.com/literature/thisiscomicsgate-Or-Gate-Movements-Are-Stupid-Heres-Some-Proof-Part-Six">https://hubpages.com/literature/thisiscomicsgate-Or-Gate-Movements-Are-Stupid-Heres-Some-Proof-Part-Six</a><br />
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Part 7: <a href="https://hubpages.com/literature/thisiscomicsgate-Or-Gate-Movements-Are-Stupid-Heres-Some-Proof-Part-Seven">https://hubpages.com/literature/thisiscomicsgate-Or-Gate-Movements-Are-Stupid-Heres-Some-Proof-Part-Seven</a><br />
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Part 8: <a href="https://hubpages.com/literature/thisiscomicsgate-Or-Gate-Movements-Are-Stupid-Heres-Some-Proof-Part-Eight">https://hubpages.com/literature/thisiscomicsgate-Or-Gate-Movements-Are-Stupid-Heres-Some-Proof-Part-Eight</a><br />
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Part 9: <a href="https://hubpages.com/literature/thisiscomicsgate-Or-Gate-Movements-Are-Stupid-Heres-Some-Proof-Part-Nine">https://hubpages.com/literature/thisiscomicsgate-Or-Gate-Movements-Are-Stupid-Heres-Some-Proof-Part-Nine</a><br />
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If you all read it, I hope you enjoy it.<br />
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As for the future of this Blog?... I don't know. The truth is, I've been waffling back and forth lately about shutting this blog down and starting fresh over on Wordpress, or Tumbler or somewhere that has more traffic. But I'm afraid that, if I do that, I'll run into the same problems I've always had with any of my content, and I'm really reluctant to put myself through the wringer again. So, If I ever make a decision about this, I'll post it here.<br />
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In the meantime, if you actually want to keep up with me and my work, the best places to do so would be here:<br />
Twitter: <a href="https://twitter.com/WillEnglish2">https://twitter.com/WillEnglish2</a><br />
Instagram: <a href="https://www.instagram.com/wbenglish3/?hl=en">https://www.instagram.com/wbenglish3/?hl=en</a><br />
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Anyway, I have to go. Thank you for reading this. Later.<br />
Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-73423244549107115192017-09-26T13:52:00.000-07:002017-09-26T13:59:39.771-07:00New Story On HubPages. Hey guys, hows it going? I just wanted to let you all know that I uploaded an actual piece of fiction over on HubPages. It's called <i>Tales from the Universe Tree: Wolves Of Ice And Fire. </i>I had to divide it up into parts because otherwise, you'd be reading a 66 page wall of text. But anyway, here are the links to the various parts. I hope you all enjoy it. And All constructive criticism is welcome.<br />
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Part One: <a href="https://letterpile.com/creative-writing/Tales-from-the-Universe-Tree-Wolves-of-Ice-and-Fire-Part-One" target="_blank">https://letterpile.com/creative-writing/Tales-from-the-Universe-Tree-Wolves-of-Ice-and-Fire-Part-One </a><br />
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Part Two: <a href="https://letterpile.com/creative-writing/Tales-from-the-Universe-Tree-Wolves-of-Ice-and-Fire-Part-Two-The-Ambassador" target="_blank">https://letterpile.com/creative-writing/Tales-from-the-Universe-Tree-Wolves-of-Ice-and-Fire-Part-Two-The-Ambassador </a><br />
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Part Three: <a href="https://letterpile.com/creative-writing/Tales-From-the-Universe-Tree-Wolves-of-Ice-and-Fire-Part-Three-Lovers-Quarrel" target="_blank">https://letterpile.com/creative-writing/Tales-From-the-Universe-Tree-Wolves-of-Ice-and-Fire-Part-Three-Lovers-Quarrel </a><br />
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Part Four: <a href="https://letterpile.com/creative-writing/Tales-From-the-Universe-Tree-Wolves-of-Ice-and-Fire-Part-Four-A-Mothers-Love" target="_blank">https://letterpile.com/creative-writing/Tales-From-the-Universe-Tree-Wolves-of-Ice-and-Fire-Part-Four-A-Mothers-Love </a><br />
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Part Five: <a href="https://letterpile.com/creative-writing/Tales-From-the-Universe-Tree-Wolves-of-Ice-and-Fire-Part-Five-A-Wolfs-Fury" target="_blank">https://letterpile.com/creative-writing/Tales-From-the-Universe-Tree-Wolves-of-Ice-and-Fire-Part-Five-A-Wolfs-Fury </a><br />
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Part Six: <a href="https://letterpile.com/creative-writing/Tales-From-the-Universe-Tree-Wolves-of-Ice-and-Fire-Part-Six-Dinner-Conversation" target="_blank">https://hubpages.com/literature/Tales-From-the-Universe-Tree-Wolves-of-Ice-and-Fire-Part-Six-Dinner-Conversation </a><br />
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Part Seven: <a href="https://letterpile.com/creative-writing/Tales-From-the-Universe-Tree-Wolves-of-Ice-and-Fire-Part-Seven-A-Kings-Right" target="_blank">https://hubpages.com/literature/Tales-From-the-Universe-Tree-Wolves-of-Ice-and-Fire-Part-Seven-A-Kings-Right </a><br />
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Part Eight: <a href="https://hubpages.com/literature/Tales-From-the-Universe-Tree-Wolves-of-Ice-and-Fire-Part-Eight-Pain" target="_blank">https://hubpages.com/literature/Tales-From-the-Universe-Tree-Wolves-of-Ice-and-Fire-Part-Eight-Pain </a><br />
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Part Nine: <a href="https://hubpages.com/literature/Tales-From-the-Universe-Tree-Wolves-of-Ice-and-Fire-Part-Nine-Family" target="_blank">https://hubpages.com/literature/Tales-From-the-Universe-Tree-Wolves-of-Ice-and-Fire-Part-Nine-Family </a><br />
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Part Ten: <a href="https://hubpages.com/literature/Tales-From-the-Universe-Tree-Wolves-of-Ice-and-Fire-Part-Ten-Mourning-Period" target="_blank">https://hubpages.com/literature/Tales-From-the-Universe-Tree-Wolves-of-Ice-and-Fire-Part-Ten-Mourning-Period </a><br />
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Part Eleven: <a href="https://hubpages.com/literature/Tales-From-the-Universe-Tree-Wolves-of-Ice-and-Fire-Part-Eleven-The-Start-Of-A-Journey" target="_blank">https://hubpages.com/literature/Tales-From-the-Universe-Tree-Wolves-of-Ice-and-Fire-Part-Eleven-The-Start-Of-A-Journey</a>Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-28029296652516332662017-04-18T16:10:00.000-07:002017-04-18T16:22:15.130-07:00Music Talk: Aya. Hard Rock's Missing Princess. You know I just realized something. In all the years that I've been writing on this blog, not once have I talked about my love for music. So, let's remedy that right now. So yes, I love music. I like a bit of everything but my preferred genres are Rock music (all flavors of it), Metal, and video game music (shocking I know). In middle and high school, I considered myself something of a rock music aficionado. I mean, how could I not? I played the guitar some, I watched the music TV channels all the time (before they started to suck), and I listened to the radio all the time. Oh yeah, I was awesome. But then I went to Japan as an exchange student for a semester and discovered just how much of a dumb, dumb little boy I was. The trip was...well, mind blowing is a phrase that comes to mind. And I mean that in the best way possible. Seriously, Japan, I freaking love you.<br />
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Anyway, while I was there, I was exposed to a lot of Japanese Rock music. Of course, I wasn't completely ignorant of Japanese popular music. This was the early 2000's, back when Japanese Anime and Manga was really starting to become mainstream in the west, and a lot of anime that was released here maintained their original Japanese theme songs (which bizarrely was a novel idea at the time). So, as far as exposure goes, that was my first taste. But none of the artists and bands I discovered on the trip had any presence whatsoever in the states that I was aware of, not even in anime. Artist like <a class="" href="https://youtu.be/J89oBGGoqdc" target="_blank">hide</a>, <a href="https://youtu.be/mFoOHo_4jE4" target="_blank">Glay</a>, <a href="https://youtu.be/6dus8ha7KAU" target="_blank">X Japan</a>, <a href="https://youtu.be/4sZ9H1wAnyQ" target="_blank">Luna Sea</a>, <a href="https://youtu.be/e-osPCE7YsA" target="_blank">J</a>. <a href="https://youtu.be/m1PsKyTVDxQ" target="_blank">Malice Mizer</a>, Christ, it was like discovering a whole new universe. Why wasn't this awesomeness popular in America? But anyway, after I got home, I scoured the internet for any Japanese rock music I could. Eventually, I came across an artist that blew my mind even more. Why? Becuase, while a lot of popular Japanese rock music leans towards Glam, this chick was playing pure, unadulterated <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grunge" target="_blank">Grunge</a>. Ladies and Gentlemen, I present to you Hard Rock's missing princess, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aya_(Japanese_singer)" target="_blank">Aya </a>:<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Flowers In the Battlefield<br />
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Originally from Japan's northern island of Hokkaido, Aya was first inspired to pick up the guitar after attending a concert of the American band, The Ventures. Eventually, she made her way to Tokyo, where her first big break came after she was invited to audition for a band at a Pop Music vocal contest. Although she won, the songwriter they were gonna work with died and their debut never happened. Aya was close to giving on being a musician...and then she discovered that she was damn good at songwriting. So good in fact that, by the time she was discovered and signed to the record label BGM Japan...she already had 30 songs ready to go. Her first single, <i><a href="https://youtu.be/qgIgpW6-2rU" target="_blank">Hands</a>, </i>was released to the public in 2001. Her first album, <i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Senjou_no_Hana" target="_blank">A Flower In The Battlefield</a> </i>was released one year later. Later in 2003, Aya released a Seven track Mini-Album called <i><a href="https://youtu.be/QpZQGHV4wSk" target="_blank">The Forbidden Song</a>. </i>Although a huge critical success, The Forbidden Song's time in the spotlight was short-lived. When in 2004...something a bit more exciting happened. That year, Aya released her best album to date. <i>Baghdad Sky. </i>Why is it her best? Just listen...<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKZE_oRaG_1AfO4owwVonSF64FaRRKgu6oOcinRaGqPNoA2cQblGPkuEpknJ80WpcSAdaMfGcZiRFJAjVSD3lL7YZJxkG9wY5lkAQOBTuZZA8KgtS3kd6J4EeNe7903yRS-iGC5p_Wuron/s1600/Aya+cruel+she.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKZE_oRaG_1AfO4owwVonSF64FaRRKgu6oOcinRaGqPNoA2cQblGPkuEpknJ80WpcSAdaMfGcZiRFJAjVSD3lL7YZJxkG9wY5lkAQOBTuZZA8KgtS3kd6J4EeNe7903yRS-iGC5p_Wuron/s200/Aya+cruel+she.jpg" width="200" /></a>Yeah....don't tell me that's not awesome. So where did she go from here? Well, she kinda dropped off the face of the earth. No really. No one knows why, but Aya went radio silent in 2006 and didn't reemerge until 2015 when she announced her new band, Cruel She (or She Cruel, I dunno, I've seen it spelled both ways). Although no new album has been announced, the band has performed at Clubs in Japan and even has a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpH-iz5mozaJDPbmV2TV-7A" target="_blank">Youtube Channel</a> with some demos, and even one new song, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xzR-3SDkUE0" target="_blank">ANGELICA </a>. (among other things).<br />
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Aya is everything I LOVE about rock music. Her music is guitar driven, heavy and feels so real that you could reach out and touch it. That last one is hard to explain but think of the feeling you get when you're listening to, say, Led Zeppelin's <i>Kashmir</i>, or The Doors' <i>Break on Through To The Other Side</i>, and you'll see what I mean. As for her style, well, as I said, it's very reminiscent of Grunge, but I don't think that it fits perfectly within that label. Becuase while Aya has plenty of hard songs like <i>Prisoner</i> (see the first video), she has just as many slower, more melodic songs like <i>Shadows on The Road. </i> Regardless, Her style is one that you don't really see in the American mainstream anymore. Hell, come to think of it, you don't even see it in Japan all that much. But that's what I love about her music, she doesn't care about trends or what's popular, she does what she wants.<br />
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If you're wondering where you can get ahold of her music...well, unless you live in Japan, you can't. So far as I've been able to find, all of her CD's are currently out of print and only one of them, <i>Baghdad Sky, </i>is available on Itunes...the <u><b><i>British </i></b></u>version of Itunes. And its not even the full album. Keep in mind, however, I haven't been able to access the Japanese version of Itunes, so I don't know if her music is on there or not. Your only hope is Ebay or go on to Amazon and hope to god someone is selling her CDs. Also, "Aya" is a very common Japanese name, so unless you know the title of the CD you want, she's gonna be hard to find.<br />
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Regardless, if you have the chance to obtain any of her music, do it.<br />
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And that's gonna be all for now, Dear Readers. I'll see you next time.<br />
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Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-38002597852623912472017-03-14T16:07:00.000-07:002017-03-14T16:32:03.284-07:00Short Book Showcase: Rashōmon and Seventeen Other Stories by Ryūnosuke AkutagawaBefore we get started, I just want to let you all know that I do have another editorial up on Creators.co/ Now Loading. If anyone wants to read it, you can find it here:<br />
<a href="https://creators.co/posts/4212650">https://creators.co/posts/4212650</a><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ryūnosuke Akutagawa</td></tr>
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As you Dear Readers know, I love Speculative Fiction, especially Fantasy Literature. But that doesn't mean that I read it exclusively. I will occasionally reach into my bookshelf and pull out something by <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Faulkner" target="_blank">Falkner</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T._S._Eliot" target="_blank">T.S. Eliot</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edgar_Allan_Poe" target="_blank">Poe</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Conan_Doyle" target="_blank">Sir Arthur Conan Doyle</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ky%C5%8Dka_Izumi" target="_blank">Izumi Kyoka</a> or whatever. But for whatever reason, I keep going back to is my copy of Ryūnosuke Akutagawa short stories. For those who don't know, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ry%C5%ABnosuke_Akutagawa" target="_blank">Ryūnosuke Akutagawa </a>was a Japanese short story writer from early 20th century. He's one of Japan's most influential writers, pioneering the short story form in that country. During his lifetime he wrote about 150 short stories which range from the beautifully bleak<i> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rash%C5%8Dmon_(short_story)">Rashōmon</a></i> to the tragic yet hysterical <i>Horse Legs</i>. <br />
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I must admit, Akutagawa is one of those authors that's really hard to talk about. Not because I don't understand his work, I do. But he's hard to talk about because, well, because of his relative obscurity in the west. And the fact that his work is so soul-crushingly depressing sometimes that talking to people about it makes them look down at their feet uncomfortably and quickly change the subject. Or to put it another way, it's like explaining Hemingway's <i>The Battler</i> to someone who only reads disposable, factory produced garbage like <i>Fifty Shades of Grey</i>. They will listen to you for maybe a few sentences before shaking their heads and saying "Sounds boring. I don't want to read that." *sigh* exchanges like that make me fear for the human race.<br />
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Joking aside, I adore Akutagawa's work. Sure it's depressing and sometimes more disturbing than anything I've ever read from a western author. But it's dark in that meaningful thought provoking way that stays with you long after you've put the book down. Thankfully, if you want to get into his work, most of it is in the public domain here in the states, but I personally would start with Penguin Classics' <i>Rashōmon and Seventeen Other Stories </i>(pictured above) which was expertly translated by <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jay_Rubin" target="_blank">Jay Rubin</a>. It collects some his most well-known stories such as the aforementioned <i>Rashōmon, In a Bamboo Grove, Hell Screen, </i>And some lesser known stories like <i>The Story Of A Head That Fell Off, Green Onions, </i>and <i>The Life of A Stupid Man. </i><br />
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That's all from me today, Dear Readers. I'll see you next time.<br />
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Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-21106301582598074302017-02-14T12:18:00.001-08:002017-02-14T12:18:24.535-08:00Life Update and a new article.Hey guys, happy Valentine's Day. I'm sorry about the lack of updates. My motivation for doing anything right now is on a roller coaster ride and I'm coming down after the 1 millionth loop da loop. That and I'm in the middle of looking for a job. But, as per-usual, I haven't had anything resembleing success; further proving my theory that corporate America hates my guts and wants nothing to do with me out of principle (kidding). To be fair it's not all bad news, I did manage to write another article for Now Loading (Movie Pilot's video game e-magazine), and this one actually got selected to be on the front page of the site and on their Twitter Feed. Which honestly I wasn't expecting and is the kind of little gold star I need, but rarely get these days. Even if didn't get paid for it, but I can figure that out on my own time. <div><br></div><div>If anyone wants to read it, you can find it here: <a href="https://nowloading.co/p/why-xenogears-needs-a-remake/4205207?utm_content=buffer7889c&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer">https://nowloading.co/p/why-xenogears-needs-a-remake/4205207?utm_content=buffer7889c&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer</a></div><div><br></div><div>That's all I have this week guys. Thank you for reading. I'll see you next time. </div>Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-62256181045090725752017-01-17T15:36:00.000-08:002017-01-17T16:14:04.539-08:00Youtube Channels you should check out: PushingUpRoses. Before we get started, I just wanted to let everyone know that I have another article up on Movie Pilot/Now Loading. You can read it here: <a href="https://creators.co/posts/4188587">https://creators.co/posts/4188587 </a> I hope you all enjoy it.<br />
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Anyway, When I did the <a href="http://thesummersleeper.blogspot.com/2015/12/youtube-channels-you-should-check-out.html">first post showcasing a Youtube Channel</a>, I said that gaming channels on Youtube were a dime a dozen, and that's still true. But what I didn't say was that not all of one of them are hyperactive weirdos shouting oddly hilarious obscenities into a Microphone for 20-30 minutes. No, there's actually a rather ginormous chunk of them dedicated to analyzing and reviewing games as well, and this one, in particular, is one of my absolute favorites. Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you Sarah Wilson, better known to the internet as <a href="https://www.youtube.com/user/pushinguproses" target="_blank">PushingUpRoses</a>:</div>
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Formerly of <a href="http://channelawesome.com/" target="_blank">Channel Awesome</a> (Aka That Guy With the Glasses), I first discovered Roses about a year or two ago after I stumbled upon a<a href="https://youtu.be/pNuvPg-MRms" target="_blank"> small Let's Play</a> of a game I like, an RPG called <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wasteland_(video_game)" target="_blank">Wasteland</a>, that she did with another Youtuber, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLx053rWZxCiYWsBETgdKrQ" target="_blank">Lazy Game Reviews</a>. When I first saw the video I didn't think much of it, and then some time after that, her <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alone_in_the_Dark_(1992_video_game)" target="_blank"><i>Alone in The Dark</i></a> video (see above) showed up on the sidebar of another video I was watching. I gotta admit, her tattoos, multi-colored hair, and ghostly goth look on the thumbnail drew me in (I always did find the goth look attractive). That and <i>Alone in the Dark</i> is one of those games I'd always been curious about, so I figured why not. I liked what I saw, so I checked out the rest of her Channel and, well, there ya go.<br />
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As far as content goes, Roses' videos range from Let's Plays, reviews (obviously), to videos spotlighting such things as <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6f4CMbMTEm0" target="_blank">where former game developers are now</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vZW-AleqprU" target="_blank"> forgotten female game protagonist,</a> and <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QhpWDMn89P8" target="_blank">Top Ten Sierra Adventure Game Deaths</a>. The last of which might give you an idea of the kind of humor her videos tend to lean on, which I think is pretty cool. For me, though, what makes Roses stand out from other gaming reviewers on Youtube is both her intelligence and the fact that the bulk of her content covers a genre that's not really given a whole lot of love on Youtube, the Adventure Game. She doesn't need to yell and excessively cuss to get her point across; just a well-written, articulate and sometimes funny review, like her review of <i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanitarium_(video_game)" target="_blank">Sanitarium</a>,</i> or her uproarious review of <i><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IhfaZxh357A" target="_blank">Curse of Monkey Island</a></i>.<br />
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If video games aren't really your thing, well recently Roses did begin to branch out and review old and somewhat obscure animated TV shows and films. The most recent video of which covered...<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_World_of_David_the_Gnome" target="_blank">David the Gnome</a>...hm. And here I thought I was the only one who remembered that.<br />
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Anyway, to sum it all up, Roses is a great content creator and I feel she deserves more attention. If you all feel the same after reading this, then go take a look at her channel here: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCTNXqhWPba9Xh8gx0EKOtQ" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCTNXqhWPba9Xh8gx0EKOtQ </a> <br />
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And that's it for me this week, Dear Readers.<br />
See you again soon. </div>
Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-82264547684413759932016-12-27T13:53:00.000-08:002016-12-27T13:53:30.776-08:00May the Force be with you. Always. (Eulogy for Carrie Fisher).<br />
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I'm really out of practice here guys, so I apologize if this comes off as sloppy. Anyway, I'm sure everyone knows this by now, but Carrie Fisher died this morning. I don't know what else I could possibly add to this. It feels like I just lost a friend, but I know it's because I'm attached to the character of Princess Leia, not the woman who played her. So who am I really mourning here? An actress I've never met and not all that familiar with outside of one major role? Or a friend that stayed with me all my life, and whose story helped shape the adult I am today? I believe that the answer is both of these. I never knew Carrie Fisher personally, but I know Princess Leia. I know that Leia taught me to fight for what I believe in, to never give up even when the world was at its darkest, that one person doesn't have to be an invincible Jedi to stand up to evil. But you know what else I know? It's that at the end of the day, Princess Leia is just a character dreamed up by George Lucas. But It wasn't Lucas who stood in front of the camera and taught these things to me and millions of others, it was a shy woman from California with Bipolar Disorder, who self-medicated for years with Cocaine and prescription drugs and fought with weight issues all of her life. And yet despite all of that, she still managed to become this character and inspire generations of people. Lucas may have invented Leia...But it was Mrs. Fisher that made Leia an icon. And for myself, my life was richer and happier because of it. <br />
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Carrie Fisher....Thank you.<br />
May the Force be with you.<br />
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Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-37118151923923611862016-11-29T15:52:00.003-08:002016-11-29T15:52:48.900-08:00Strange Dream I had. I dreamed that Rogue from the X-Men (or someone with the same powers as her anyway) and another character were sealing away Apocalypse (or some monster like Apocalypse) in a coffin covered in a force field and that it was somehow important that no one touch him....and then Rouge did just as the Coffin was closing.<br />
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And then Rouge joined the Justice League and began to mutate into a hideous monster when they responded to a domestic disturbance. Then it switched to me flagging down Hilary Clinton as she was leaving my house (...which apparently is inside a hallway to a plane) and asking for her to use her government connections to get Rouge help.<br />
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I follow her onto the plane and then it got freaky. And by freaky, I mean she started ranting and raving about the world rejecting her and hammering tiny and ginormous nails into my skin and muscles, literally pinning me to the chair. I pulled them out, feeling weak from blood loss and bleeding out. And then the stewardess quietly asked Mrs. Clinton to leave. Which she did...and left me there to bleed out.<br />
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After being attacked by insects, snakes and the elements. The scene changed and the plane had crashed, rather conveniently, into the shape of a theater in a forest somewhere. The other passengers, still alive (I think), remained strapped to their seats, but someone had moved me to a mattress they had found and put blankets over my bleeding, but still alive body to keep the rain off. And then we discovered that The Muppets had been on board and Doctor Teeth brought a human sized Rooster to play the flute to heal me.<br />
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The Rooster played the Christmas Carol "Comfort and Joy".<br />
And then it changed and I was watching the Rooster playing 'Comfort and Joy' over my shrouded body from backstage. And then I and two girls exited into a mall to look for t-shirts to give to the crowd. And then I woke up....<br />
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I have no idea what it means. But I thought it be fun to share this.<br />
I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving.<br />
See you next week.Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-62293840597993397102016-11-22T12:36:00.000-08:002016-11-22T12:36:08.322-08:00Old Hubpages article: Dragon Quest IX review (originally published on 05/25/13). <div style="text-align: center;">
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Ya know, as much as I love Japanese RPGs, I could never really get into the <i>Dragon Quest</i> (sometimes called "<i>Dragon Warrior" </i>in North America and elsewhere) series. Oh, I don't hate it, but me and it have a rocky relationship. I played the original game on the NES when I was a kid and found it lacking. I was still very young and it was incomprehensible to my slightly sheltered mind that video games could actually be about something more than rushing in with guns blazing. That and, unless you had a walkthrough (and remember this was before the internet), then you had no clue what the heck you were doing.</div>
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I wasn't as patient as I am today so that alone turned me off. So I missed the three original sequels, heck I didn't even know that they existed until I got the Internet. I didn't pick up another <i>Dragon Quest</i> game until 2001 when the seventh game came out in North America on the original Sony Playstation. I don't remember why I decided to pick it up, but I did....and I was really underwhelmed by it. I mean, I thought it was good, but that underwhelming feeling became the norm for me on this series. I picked up both the Game Boy Color remakes of the first two NES games and <i>Dragon Quest VIII </i>on the PS2 and got the same result. I originally wasn't even going to bother with <i>Dragon Quest IX</i>, but then a few weeks ago, I saw it at Gamestop for about $12. So I figured what the heck. And while I can't say that its 'wowed' me, I will say that not only is it the best <i>Dragon Quest</i> game that I've played, but it's also one of the best Nintendo DS games period. And coming from me, that's saying a lot.</div>
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Story: 4.5 out of 10.</h2>
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<a href="https://usercontent2.hubstatic.com/8023301_f260.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="The Celestrains' observatory." border="0" class="half lazy zoomable" data-original="https://usercontent2.hubstatic.com/8023301_f260.jpg" height="150" src="https://usercontent2.hubstatic.com/8023301_f260.jpg" style="border: 0px; display: inline; width: 260px;" title="The Celestrains' observatory." width="200" /></a><i>Dragon Quest IX</i> takes place in a nameless fantasy world. You play as a Celestrain, a race of angelic-like beings charged by the almighty with guarding the inhabitants of the human world below your floating observatory. This observatory is also home to Yggdrasil, the world tree, which the Celestrain's have been nurturing by taking the gratitude of the humans and giving it to the tree. They believe that if they do this long enough, Yggrasil will bear fruit and then they will be permitted to return to the side of the almighty. Well, the game begins when this happens...and something goes horribly wrong. The observatory is nearly destroyed by an unknown force, and you and the fruit are thrown down to the human world below. Now it's up to you find out what went wrong, recollect the fruit and save the world.</div>
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<a href="https://usercontent2.hubstatic.com/8023329_f260.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="player character holding one of the fruits of Yggdrisil." border="0" class="half lazy zoomable" data-original="https://usercontent2.hubstatic.com/8023329_f260.jpg" height="125" src="https://usercontent2.hubstatic.com/8023329_f260.jpg" style="border: 0px; display: inline; width: 260px;" title="player character holding one of the fruits of Yggdrisil." width="200" /></a>Let's face it, the Dragon Quest games have never been strong with their narratives, and that's still true here. The story feels unfocused and underdeveloped. With no character development and very little drama to speak of and the world as a whole is as generic as fantasy worlds get. Literally, all you're doing is skipping merrily along on the adventure's path. This is a common complaint among critics, but this is one instance where I think they're right. The story just isn't working for us. But with that said, the game has this quaint charm to it. I don't know what it is, but I can't help but be drawn into the world. This makes sense in a way because the protagonist is a blank slate for the player to mold. But I dunno, I think that its charm has more to do with Manga artist Akira Toriyama's (Creator of <em>Dragon Ball Z</em>) art style being front and center. He's worked on all of the Dragon Quest games since its creation as the monster and character designer, and his style has become the face of the series. The other factor, I think, is series composer Koichi Sugiyama's musical score. I have very conflicted opinions about this. I like the music, don't get me wrong, but I always felt like the music for this series was too<a href="https://youtu.be/lYO5k3ZrPxE" target="_blank"> happy and whimsical for a world-saving, swords and sorcery adventure. It feels like it belongs in a Mario game.</a> Which is odd because I know for a fact that Sugiyama's music is capable of stirring up a wider range of emotions. I mean, this is the same man that did <a href="https://youtu.be/_9wEosOu0yo" target="_blank">the music for Space Runaway Ideon.</a> </div>
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But one place this game doesn't skimp out on is gameplay.<br />
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Gameplay: 9 out of 10.</h2>
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<a href="https://usercontent1.hubstatic.com/8032504_f260.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="Character creation." border="0" class="half lazy" data-original="https://usercontent1.hubstatic.com/8032504_f260.jpg" height="390" src="https://usercontent1.hubstatic.com/8032504_f260.jpg" style="border: 0px; display: inline; width: 260px;" title="Character creation." width="260" /></a><i>Dragon Quest IX</i>'s core gameplay hasn't changed all that much since <i>Dragon Quest IV</i> on the NES. With turn-based battles, experience points, towns to explore, side quests to conquer, a world map to traverse, monsters to slay, the same old stuff. It embodies the saying "if it ain't broke, don't fix it." And thankfully they didn't. The job system from previous games makes a return. If you're familiar with games like <i>Final Fantasy V</i> or <i>Final Fantasy Tactics</i>, then you know how this works. You can select a specific job (like a Warrior, Priest, Mage and so on) for each character and use their abilities in battle. But here it works a little differently. Unlike <i>Final Fantasy V</i> and <i>Tactics</i>, you have to go a special place, the "Alltrades Abby" in order to change your job and each job has its own set of experience points. So instead of the player party members becoming stronger with each level up, your job does. There really isn't much to say on this end. It's a JRPG through and through, and there's nothing really wrong with that.</div>
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However, there is ONE major addition to <i>Dragon Quest IX's</i> gameplay here. Multi-player. Yes, multi-player. And I don't mean that thinly veiled horde mode from <i>Mass Effect 3</i>. No, this is true, <i>Secret of Mana </i>style co-op where you and up to four friends can play through the story mode together. Now it makes sense as to why the player character is customizable. You activate the Multiplayer by talking to a certain person in a tavern in the second town you visit. If you talk to the winged woman, she can set you all up. Incidentally, this Tavern is also where you can recruit party members for the single player game. But anyway, the Multi-player mode is a neat feature, and In my opinion, is the probably the best way to do multiplayer in a single player RPG....But there's just one catch. <i>Dragon Quest IX</i>'s multiplayer mode is offline only. And anyone you want to play with has to have their own copy of the game. I can understand everyone needing a copy of the game, but it makes no sense to me why an online mode is absent. The Nintendo DS was fully capable of online interaction, even more so after the DSi upgrade was released, but sadly very few developers actually took advantage of this feature.<br />
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<a href="https://usercontent1.hubstatic.com/8032490_f260.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="equipment management. " border="0" class="half lazy" data-original="https://usercontent1.hubstatic.com/8032490_f260.jpg" height="390" src="https://usercontent1.hubstatic.com/8032490_f260.jpg" style="border: 0px; display: inline; width: 260px;" title="equipment management. " width="260" /></a></div>
Anyway, the other thing that makes this game so awesome is the side quests. There's tons and tons of them that you can tackle both during and after the story, many of which are open ended. And the game has a cool feature where treasure maps are generated infinitely, so the player can constantly find loot and fight new monsters that aren't in the main game. In many ways, the game is like a pseudo MMO in this regard. There is also a crafting system that lets you use alchemy to make new equipment, provided that you have the materials and the recipe. So<i> Dragon Quest IX</i> doesn't lack for things to do, even after the story is finished. It's just too bad that's there is only one save slot. So if you want to start a new game, you gotta delete your old one. What the heck?<br />
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The last thing to mention is the length. The main story will probably take you on average up to 40-50+ hours to get to the end. But the amount of extra content can keep you busy for over 100+ hours. Heck, I know someone who has played this game for over 800 hours. So needless to say, it's a massive game and you'll get your money's worth.<br />
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<b>Conclusion.</b><br />
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What <i>Dragon Quest IX</i> lacks in plot and characters it more than makes up for with gameplay. And that's the best way to sum it all up. It's a fun to play, the music is pretty good, the art style is charming, the multi-player is intuitive, and there is so much stuff crammed in it that you'll never get bored playing it. With that said, this game is not for everyone. it's pretty much the textbook example of what some people down right about JRPG's. But then again I've read and seen reviews from critics who hate JRPGs give praise out the out the wazoo for the <i>Dragon Quest</i> games, so go figure.<br />
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But on the whole, yeah, DQ9 was worth my $12 and more. If you find a copy, get it. You'll thank me later.Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-20609174769984563712016-10-26T20:55:00.001-07:002016-11-15T10:40:09.224-08:00Dark Souls Part 11 epilogue: Dimitte me, Soror mea.<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="344" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/2aAJVz8Zb3M" width="459"></iframe><br />
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sorry about the lack of a post on Tuesday. To make up for it here's a short story/Dark Souls Fan Fiction/Lore video I threw together. I hope you all enjoy it.Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-44532326090183778492016-10-18T16:12:00.001-07:002016-10-18T16:12:17.942-07:00Did you ever?Going to be a really short one today, guys. I just got out of a small writing seminar about marketing your book and stuff...you know that feeling you get in the pit of your stomach? Ya know, the one that fills you with an apocalyptic sense of dread and panic when you suddenly realize that you might be in over your head? That would be me right about now. <div><br></div><div>Just to illustrate: </div><div><br></div><div><img id="id_20a1_2f50_7a68_eb70" src="https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-mxxTICt5W5w/WAasUI-w4CI/AAAAAAAABBs/FkKkUxAgUng/%25255BUNSET%25255D.png" alt="" title="" tooltip="" style="width: 353px; height: auto;"> <br></div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div>But at least I have an idea of what the crap I'm doing now. So that's always good. I'm glad I went to it. </div><div><br></div><div>I'll see you next week guys. </div>Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-13447248808847853912016-10-04T16:20:00.001-07:002016-10-04T16:20:21.882-07:00Welcome to the October Country...<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="344" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/kGiYxCUAhks" width="459"></iframe>Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-31976493773034637342016-09-27T17:29:00.000-07:002016-09-27T17:29:59.850-07:00The Furthest Shore (Earthsea Cycle): Closing thoughts. <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8QAB_feKj90aWsFtt2Lz-kFG4mwBOb-I0JyD3xnPKTzrwdBi95bdz-fP4Db8I0EEYpQF102P8phWf3SnGESd7CV1nLA3_SDbCGXcE5U1fhxHmYBg382SEMpEp2XAAf5XE3BRSyN_j-ss1/s1600/blogger-image-810757460.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8QAB_feKj90aWsFtt2Lz-kFG4mwBOb-I0JyD3xnPKTzrwdBi95bdz-fP4Db8I0EEYpQF102P8phWf3SnGESd7CV1nLA3_SDbCGXcE5U1fhxHmYBg382SEMpEp2XAAf5XE3BRSyN_j-ss1/s320/blogger-image-810757460.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<b><i><u>Warning: I am writing this on the assumption that the reader has read and completed the first three Earthsea novels. If you have not and do not wish to have the story spoiled for you CLICK AWAY NOW! You have been warned.</u></i></b><br />
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgldM2FPRR4FvqDPzWCuOSOQ7C5MBc4ZarfB6o3-NfrLv5tU63NjbRA28Pry2P3O-nuKQCqYCXyjmbtRVkxVIKtOkJCmzAfKkv7nUDZPk43ybNrIUW5mGBUu0gsKnTfKKrW9oDQLszxz-Qw/s1600/Cob%252C+human+form.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgldM2FPRR4FvqDPzWCuOSOQ7C5MBc4ZarfB6o3-NfrLv5tU63NjbRA28Pry2P3O-nuKQCqYCXyjmbtRVkxVIKtOkJCmzAfKkv7nUDZPk43ybNrIUW5mGBUu0gsKnTfKKrW9oDQLszxz-Qw/s1600/Cob%252C+human+form.jpeg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Cob as he appears in the animated film<br /><i>Tales from Earthsea</i> (2004).</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimdHhFad7NrOQKyXYwd9arDj06JndkHwiHjiYdnTSTDchsTRTkLDguliGTypG4C8oXSfqlfUEBf53zavcdys35dKzxTqHxOVbR4yk40Wrjd6hQigg3CygvwMR6hXINThU5fHk3IxLq_v1N/s1600/tales-from-earthsea-2006-cob.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="183" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimdHhFad7NrOQKyXYwd9arDj06JndkHwiHjiYdnTSTDchsTRTkLDguliGTypG4C8oXSfqlfUEBf53zavcdys35dKzxTqHxOVbR4yk40Wrjd6hQigg3CygvwMR6hXINThU5fHk3IxLq_v1N/s320/tales-from-earthsea-2006-cob.jpg" width="320" /></a>Well, I finally finished the <i>Furthest Shore</i>. Now <a href="http://thesummersleeper.blogspot.com/2016/03/the-furthest-shore-earthsea-cycle-first.html" target="_blank">as promised</a> I'll talk about it a bit more. And honestly, I don't know where to start. I will say that the book didn't hold my interests as well as it probably could have, but that could just as easily be chucked up to my not reading a lot of Young Adult Fantasy. But anyway, where the book started to lose me was toward the end. Up to that point, Ged and Arren had been on several seemingly unrelated adventures, most of which involved gathering clues as to why Magic is disappearing from the world, but the other half, a large chunk of it anyway, involved Arren experiencing the world, i.e.: almost getting sold into slavery, experiencing other cultures than his own in the form of the Raft People ect, before finally introducing the villain when there is maybe four or five chapters left in the book. Oh, Ged did mention the villain (<a href="http://earthsea.wikia.com/wiki/Cob" target="_blank">a Wizard named Cob</a>) before then. But it wasn't until the end of the book that we got to actually see him and then his motivation is explained all in a rush. Essentially, Cob was looking for a way to escape death and become immortal, but in doing so he left the door between the realms of the living and dead open and this upset the natural order of the world. To me, that doesn't make a very compelling villain, And I understand that he can be seen as a counter- point to Ged and Arren, I.E.: Cob was so afraid of death that he missed out on life, unlike Ged and Arren who lived their life to the fullest. But when you distill him down to his core, is just a sad vain man who wants power. And although his character does help illustrate the themes of the book. I just found him kind of boring.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5E4spmm0BbetYYMuL3iwR58TFwsGeKnKuHbVh1GWZyZy6cecQidFGJwZ9nXM_tjluPSogFOLpEo8ghpYPoWUxbqiVOuJG6BudjHrBQShg3Ev63gpUt6gtjSd98OkiUsqspi4sXVTJS43A/s1600/Ged+and+Arren.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="172" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5E4spmm0BbetYYMuL3iwR58TFwsGeKnKuHbVh1GWZyZy6cecQidFGJwZ9nXM_tjluPSogFOLpEo8ghpYPoWUxbqiVOuJG6BudjHrBQShg3Ev63gpUt6gtjSd98OkiUsqspi4sXVTJS43A/s320/Ged+and+Arren.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ged and Arren<br />from the animated film<br /><i>Tales from Earthsea.</i></td></tr>
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As for Ged and Arren....honestly, Ged just started to get on my nerves after a while. Why? Well because he's way to damn cryptic half the time and he kinda turns into a half of a Mary Sue after a while, ya know the kind of character who nothing can happen too and is never wrong? Now, I understand that the context of the story that Ged is searching for the reason why Magic has disappeared from the world and therefore doesn't have all the answers yet. But I swear to god there are times when you can just tell he knows more than he's letting on and he isn't telling the rest of us for some reason. It's infuriating. And I say that he only turns into half of a Mary Sue because bad stuff actually does happen to him. He gets hurt, he gets sick, and by the end of the book....he loses all of his powers. Yeah, reversing what Cob did literally sucks the magic right out of him. I gotta admit, I didn't see this coming. But it does solve one major problem from of the book. Ged's character arch was complete after <i>The Tomb of Atuan, </i>he's full developed. But now that he's lost his powers, a new story can begin, and his character can develop in ways that he hasn't so far.<br />
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Now as for Arren. I just found him annoying. Maybe its Le Guin's writing style for these books not<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5ho6AfLloT1TyZYZ3q-23thuBsq2hOatRx3kUg8WOPjNsMYG7fCuTZuGnz6fU_sM4ljqEBQcuUQzKeDiO46dr3rtjvz90YDThtI9zKaVXIBJqavkq8wSfErk8RXfSbeZOn_Z1BzOBe6bo/s1600/Arren+and+his+sword.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="172" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5ho6AfLloT1TyZYZ3q-23thuBsq2hOatRx3kUg8WOPjNsMYG7fCuTZuGnz6fU_sM4ljqEBQcuUQzKeDiO46dr3rtjvz90YDThtI9zKaVXIBJqavkq8wSfErk8RXfSbeZOn_Z1BzOBe6bo/s320/Arren+and+his+sword.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Arren<br />put the thing away before<br />you hurt someone.</td></tr>
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doing much for me. But I was not convinced that Arren grew up at all by the books end. This a character in where the symbol of his adulthood is that he now has the courage to wield a sword that he's kept stored away till now. Like I said, I understand that this is supposed to be symbolic of him passing from boyhood to adulthood. But dude, didn't you say at the start of the book that you don't actually know how to use a sword? did I dream that? So why by Godzilla's radioactive green testicles are you putting it on now? You're no swordsmen, what are you going to do with it? Cut your foot off? Oh, and did I mention that the sword is the same sword that his legendary hero-king ancestor used. <br />
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Now I suppose that that last part isn't that big a deal. Legendary magic swords are all over fantasy literature after all. But Arren's lineage is actually one of the few things that stand him out from the other characters. And it's brought up through out the entire book. Hell, Ged even makes a big deal out of it when he's negotiating with one of the other characters, one of the Dragon's I think. Ged tells this character that Arren IS said legendary hero. When Arren rightly calls him out on this later, Ged says that Arren has the spirit of this hero inside him or something to that effect. <br />
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I guess you could make the argument that Ged was trying to inspire Arren to be like his legendary ancestor, but it still leads to some very uncomfortable questions and implications (given the target audience for these books). Ok, so what bearing does Arren's lineage have on him as a person now? Does it automatically mean that he's going to be a great hero AND a great King? Ged, don't you think that's an unrealistic expectation? That's like assuming that Michel Jordan's cousin thrice removed is automatically going to be legendary at basketball. Actually, come to think of it, doesn't that kind of contradict one of the major themes of <i>The Tomb of Atuan? </i>That who you are, and who you want to be isn't dictated by anyone or anything? That it doesn't matter what religious tradition you belong to or who your 15 times great grandpa was, You can choose who you are and who you want to be, not them? Soooo, why is Ged telling the exact opposite thing to Arren? Now granted that Ged could be trying to inspire Arren when it comes to the kind of ruler he'll be someday (he is a prince after all), but regardless these mixed messages are there, and they are worth thinking about.<br />
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But now let's wrap this up. I don't hate this book, but it's certainly not my favorite either, and it's probably not one of Le Guin's best in my opinion. But with that said, I am glad that I read it. And I still do want to find out what's going to happen to Ged, and I am kind of enjoying exploring this universe.<br />
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So yeah, if you haven't already, check it out.<br />
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And I'm out.<br />
Later guys. <i> </i> <br />
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Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-32862788999419593222016-09-13T17:06:00.000-07:002016-09-14T12:06:35.519-07:00Random Musings: Anime Talk: Hayao Miyazaki VS the fans. <div style="text-align: left;">
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnkWKleTSi8F8fr0LDH2QX4MCMm_GlF40GzXINkc1vd6-lRPeeLtXEcX4FlJIjwURBSrojHvL0y2e_gLB8f4q7nU2kYcE_BggjFCQF90yNFEL0mCSCU2CIbfsbab7wvAq_1PXTqEQQbVEU/s1600/The+image+Mason+pitched+a+fit+over.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnkWKleTSi8F8fr0LDH2QX4MCMm_GlF40GzXINkc1vd6-lRPeeLtXEcX4FlJIjwURBSrojHvL0y2e_gLB8f4q7nU2kYcE_BggjFCQF90yNFEL0mCSCU2CIbfsbab7wvAq_1PXTqEQQbVEU/s1600/The+image+Mason+pitched+a+fit+over.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The meme in question.</td></tr>
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Well, this day could be going better. One of my external hard drives became corrupted and is now yammering on about the benefits of the Dark Side for hours on end. So I installed some program to see if I can fix it, but its taking forever. So in the meantime, let's talk about something completely irrelevant for a while.<br />
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About a year or so back on Facebook I shared a meme that had four or so pictures of 3 girls from three separate anime series and under each picture was written the words "like", "comment", "share" written in big letters, and the fourth pic was written "Ignore if you hate anime." Honestly, the only reason I shared it is because I thought it was mildly funny, and a friend of mine had used a picture of one of the girls as her Facebook avatar for a while. I wasn't trying to start anything....But another friend of mine (let's call him "Edward") decided to start something anyway. For no reason other than he was irritated at something, he decided to leave a link to an article from Kotaku called <a href="http://kotaku.com/one-punch-man-shows-why-manga-will-always-matter-1739993533" target="_blank"><i>One-Punch Man Shows why Manga Still Matters.</i></a><br />
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The article was more or less an opinion piece, but I didn't understand why he was posting it when manga (Japanese Comics) was never even mentioned. So when I asked him, he said this (and for the sake of brevity, I'm paraphrasing):<br />
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
I'm not a fan of Otaku culture, or the mainstream agenda of anime as a product, neither the over-saturation of the Anime industry being filled with Loli/Shotacon garbage or tween romance with a twist in highschool etc[...]I share (Hayao) Miyazki's sentiment on anime[...]I try to be as moderate and understanding in all my views as possible, but I have very little respect for the anime industry at the moment, and other then a handful of good ones, most are just more of the same with a twist. </blockquote>
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Clearly, anyone who knows anything about anime can tell that Edward doesn't know what the hell he's talking about. Especially when you consider that both "<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lolicon" target="_blank">Loli</a>" and "<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shotacon" target="_blank">Shotacon</a>" are genres of pornography of questionable legality-Seriously, Edward, what the ***ck have you been watching?- And never mind the fact that there is a LOT more to anime than what he's suggesting. Yes, a lot of anime (particularly the anime that gets released in the west) does feature teenagers as their central characters -probably because a lot of anime and manga is actually targeted at teenagers *ahem*- but dude, how can you say what you said with a straight face when anime like<i> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akira_(1988_film)" target="_blank">Akira</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attack_on_Titan" target="_blank">Attack on Titan</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tokyo_Ghoul" target="_blank">Tokyo Ghoul</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berserk_(manga)" target="_blank">Berserk</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Future_Diary" target="_blank">Mirri Nikki</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghost_in_the_Shell_(1995_film)" target="_blank">Ghost in the Shell </a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fairy_Tail" target="_blank">Fairy Tale</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_Note" target="_blank">Death Note</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fullmetal_Alchemist" target="_blank">Full Metal Alchemist </a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gurren_Lagann" target="_blank">Gurren Laggan</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neon_Genesis_Evangelion" target="_blank">Neon Genesis Evangelion</a>,</i> and the way to many to count <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_Suit_Gundam" target="_blank"><i>Moble Suit Gundam</i></a> shows exist? How?!<br />
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But what does this have to do with Hayao Miyazaki? Well, he said that he shared Hayao Miyazaki's sentiment on Anime. But reading his reply, and knowing what I know of Edward, I don't think he understood what Miyazaki actually meant.<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/jtTBYMvLBbw" width="460"></iframe></div>
Alright, for those who don't know, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hayao_Miyazaki" target="_blank">Hayao Miyazaki</a> is a Japanese animator and film director who is often considered to be the anime industries answer to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akira_Kurosawa" target="_blank">Akira Kurosawa</a>. Anyway, sometime in 2014, Hayao Miyazaki said in an interview that he didn't like a lot of modern anime and supposedly ended his comments with "Anime was a mistake." Now, because this is the internet, this got blown out of proportion and many interpreted this as Miyazaki, well, calling the very medium he himself help legitimize as an art form garbage, and was disrespecting anime fans. This outrage might seem justified...until you realize that Hayao Miyazaki <i><b>never said that.</b></i> And this is where the confusion lies. What Miyazaki actually said was that modern anime was:<br />
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<font-family: arial="" clean="" helvetica="" quot="" sans-serif=""><span style="font-size: 15.08px; line-height: 24.128px;"><i>"[...] </i>produced by humans who can’t stand looking at other humans. And that’s why the industry is full of otakus!</span></font-family:></blockquote>
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The video I posted above sums this up better than I can, but basically what<a href="http://en.rocketnews24.com/2014/01/30/ghiblis-hayao-miyazaki-says-the-anime-industrys-problem-is-that-its-full-of-anime-fans/" target="_blank"> Miyazaki meant is that he feels that the quality of anime has gone down in recent years because many of his modern contemporaries are obsessive anime fans who don't know how real people act.</a> In other words, the people making anime nowadays don't have the real world experience or people skills to make compelling narratives or believable characters, and instead rely on cliches and archetypes that they grew up watching on TV (well that and the whims of their bosses). Now, whether or not he's correct is up to one's own interpretation of the medium. And, in my opinion, that's something that needs to be taken on a case by case basis. However, I do agree with him on the point that one must be as well rounded as possible to create something compelling. But it's also important to note that Miyazaki didn't grow up watching anime. His interests always laid elsewhere, not just in animation, hell I'm convinced that if he didn't make movies, he would have found another way to express himself and be just as famous and influential. And his style of making films isn't exactly copied by the industry at large. So this could just as easily be a case of an old man saying "Back in my day we didn't blah blah blah!" Whose to say? I don't know the guy, so all I can do is speculate.<br />
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And what I speculate is that I don't think that Miyazaki hates anime (Hell, one of his best friends in the industry is <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hideaki_Anno" target="_blank">Hideaki Anno</a>, the guy who created Evangelion, think about that for a second), or its fans (so long as they are sane) or anything like that. He loves animation, he loves filmmaking, he just wants to see more good anime than bad. And that's something I think everyone can get behind.<br />
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And I'm done for now guys. See you next week.<br />
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Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-27841589296259599602016-08-30T18:45:00.001-07:002016-08-30T18:45:56.283-07:00Xenogears analysis Part Two: The psychology of Fei Fong Wong. <iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/cIYB5stWUPU" width="560"></iframe><br />
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Let it be known right now that I am in NO way, shape or form a Psychologist, and that the Psychological theories of Freud, Jung, and what have you make very little sense to me outside of their broader strokes. However, I do acknowledge that these things exist and that they can provide great insight into human behavior. When applied to video games characters, these theories can provide much richer characters...or incredibly cool concepts. In the case of Xenogears, it does a bit of both.<br />
Today, we will be talking about the main character of the game, and how he is a representation of the Freud's theory of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_repression" target="_blank">repression</a>, the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Id,_ego_and_super-ego" target="_blank">Ego, Super Ego and the ID</a>. Oh, and just like last time we talked about this game guys I'm not going to be providing a step by step retelling of the game's plot. If you wish to know the low down on that, watch these two videos:<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/DadAepW4LD8" width="460"></iframe> <iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/gOaNr6jUuqQ" width="460"></iframe><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEge4b-73q2IKp8AJMGWEiNUmPKFirggpwQISMeMI65nEFGgZk1lwIk1znX8CkU4nbGyYIxc7V9QtlL_7Hpnm2ZqS_9vmutXp7wK-GlEHpc7MD4TuxXjK_Y-3hEuGZLqIyInIo9XgHRTq2Qh/s1600/Fei_fong_wong.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEge4b-73q2IKp8AJMGWEiNUmPKFirggpwQISMeMI65nEFGgZk1lwIk1znX8CkU4nbGyYIxc7V9QtlL_7Hpnm2ZqS_9vmutXp7wK-GlEHpc7MD4TuxXjK_Y-3hEuGZLqIyInIo9XgHRTq2Qh/s320/Fei_fong_wong.jpg" width="262" /></a><br />
All caught up? Good. Let's go.<br />
Fei is an interesting character, to say the least. I'm not real sure what to make of him half the time. But the one thing he is not is simple. What do I mean? Well, just like any form of entertainment, JRPG protagonist have their own little archetypes that they can fit nicely into. Fei is an anomaly in that regard. On the one hand, he does fit into the "Man with a mysterious past" archetype made popular by <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Final_Fantasy_VII" target="_blank">Final Fantasy VII's Cloud Strife</a>, but on the other hand he...doesn't fit that mold at all. Yes. he has a mysterious past that he can't remember, but unlike Cloud who blocked out his own past and took on the life of his friend/hero Zack, to make himself look cooler (And yes I know there is more to it than that, but I'm simplifying to make a point), the reason Fei has blocked out his own past is far more disturbing and a lot more realistic. The key word here for both of these characters is "Blocked." Normally, when someone blocks a past event from the conscious mind, they stuff it into the unconscious mind, where it never goes away but it's allowed to fester, like an infected wound. Usually, these<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Repressed_memory" target="_blank"> repressed memories</a> are caused by some form of mental, physical or emotional trauma, like the victim of child abuse repressing the memories. This is actually the case with Fei.<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhM2JlRtOnbsnKyVEuAkSEns2hpUHb-Dqg6vyYbxYjHO8IeJL6PKu9yrQrNlB2c0a_4It6enmd-f2z8ThqZfGX4nH_UJQBAZs6vxI3XprZ62Z-nTFqDQ-4Sb81bDs7pEh8rZaKHXDyXzKm4/s1600/FeiTorture.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="215" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhM2JlRtOnbsnKyVEuAkSEns2hpUHb-Dqg6vyYbxYjHO8IeJL6PKu9yrQrNlB2c0a_4It6enmd-f2z8ThqZfGX4nH_UJQBAZs6vxI3XprZ62Z-nTFqDQ-4Sb81bDs7pEh8rZaKHXDyXzKm4/s320/FeiTorture.png" width="320" /></a>Yes, Fei was abused as a child, but not in the way you would expect. This part of the story is long and complicated, but the short of it is that his mother was possessed by another character, <a href="http://xenosaga.wikia.com/wiki/Myyah_Hawwa" target="_blank">Miang </a> (whom we will talk about another time), and she subjected him to horrific scientific experiments. Eventually, as stated in the videos, the pain of these experiments became too much and he began to develop another persona to deal with the trauma. A darker, evil persona that began to want only to destroy. This Persona would later be given the name of "<a href="http://xenosaga.wikia.com/wiki/Id" target="_blank">Id</a>"<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjp4VdwrIzJQl8fgTH6ZnCYoDaotsiH7PIX5x9huAsb9bx58VOuToRXS6lynlyHf9pcpAbhy1Uc8g8Em8AdNmH7JjgZfyKM7HdsSUgv3iIvxaE_tbAMrqkcwYxM-RgY4QBr0n7nokRTe1G5/s1600/ID.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="173" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjp4VdwrIzJQl8fgTH6ZnCYoDaotsiH7PIX5x9huAsb9bx58VOuToRXS6lynlyHf9pcpAbhy1Uc8g8Em8AdNmH7JjgZfyKM7HdsSUgv3iIvxaE_tbAMrqkcwYxM-RgY4QBr0n7nokRTe1G5/s200/ID.png" width="200" /></a><br />
the Id personality would take over whenever anything bad would happen to Fei. This is one of the things that separates Fei from other RPG (and other video game characters in general I suppose) protagonists, in that he is one of the frew to actually have multiple personalities. Three of them in fact. And this is where Freud's theory of the Ego, Super ego and the Id comes into play. To understand this we have to look at Fei's three personalities. Which are referred to in game as:<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEpWNUjy7DYYSTJTprygtRHhV82s7vPnB2KmMi_wI5PKWhUUrOKOfwMOaJ3WxdJcHui24Nsg-4my4vyzSx6mccFpo2QY90KcWvBSSXx0kvx5mfNuaI5Phny585RdKbPNlRAhO8xACPxEV6/s1600/Fei%252C+Id+and+the+Coward+.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEpWNUjy7DYYSTJTprygtRHhV82s7vPnB2KmMi_wI5PKWhUUrOKOfwMOaJ3WxdJcHui24Nsg-4my4vyzSx6mccFpo2QY90KcWvBSSXx0kvx5mfNuaI5Phny585RdKbPNlRAhO8xACPxEV6/s320/Fei%252C+Id+and+the+Coward+.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Fei, Id and the Coward.</td></tr>
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1. Id.<br />
2. The Coward (Fei's original personality).<br />
3. and the artificial persona known as 'Fei' (the one we come to know throughout the majority of the game).<br />
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Id, like his Freudian counterpart, is unchecked aggression and rage, he represents the unconscious part of Fei's mind. That much is obvious, but what about the other two? Well, the Coward would be the Ego. He's the rational and peaceful side of Fei's mind, Id hates the Coward because he keeps all the happy memories of childhood to himself. So this leaves the artificial persona of Fei as the Super Ego, which acts as the mediator between the two. Although in the game this is done completely unconsciously, as Fei experience memory loss when the Id personality is in control, that is until toward the end of the game where his three personalities are fused back into one. <br />
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There is a lot more to Fei's character that I'm not going to cover here because then we'd be here all night (I.e.: the depression he feels throughout the game, the past lives ect), but what I have outlined alone is enough to show why he's such a great character. He's psychologically possible, and in that sense, he's completely relatable as a character. And a type of character that I wish would show up more in games.<br />
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And that's all out of me for now. See you all next week Dear Readers. <br />
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Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-72223919624915963732016-08-16T12:35:00.000-07:002016-08-16T12:35:30.986-07:00More research in progress and a new article I wrote. <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Hey guys, no post today. Still doing research for the next part of my Xenogears analysis. This game, I swear to god, makes my head spin sometimes. In the meantime, I did write an Op-Ed for the gaming e-magazine <a href="https://nowloading.co/" target="_blank">Now Loading Games</a>. Which you can read here: <a href="https://nowloading.co/posts/4033253">https://nowloading.co/posts/4033253</a> </div>
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So I hope you all check that out and enjoy it.</div>
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I'll see you all next time. Bye now. </div>
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Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-72891650677343695002016-08-02T15:26:00.002-07:002016-08-02T15:26:35.932-07:00Old Hupages Article: In the beginning, there was a Silmarillion.(Hey guys, I'm still researching the topic I wanted to write about last time. It's taking longer than I thought. I'll get it out as soon as I can but in the meantime, here's
an old Hubpages article I wrote awhile back. Enjoy). <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1l_uuAKfhwMKXQSIjget626sto36N1cts6rCfiillV8ZexFrsDbFAc_dm_AwtvVBVq-m-sj8iaiSAUAhfvoeI9mUIhwXZmq5eTwCUe9Rjrm9u6cx317RwYbabL8xKV0-YK0MV5H0Jue0n/s1600/The+Silmarilion+cover.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1l_uuAKfhwMKXQSIjget626sto36N1cts6rCfiillV8ZexFrsDbFAc_dm_AwtvVBVq-m-sj8iaiSAUAhfvoeI9mUIhwXZmq5eTwCUe9Rjrm9u6cx317RwYbabL8xKV0-YK0MV5H0Jue0n/s320/The+Silmarilion+cover.jpg" width="244" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgm9LLdayF1cy8Fvrel5sdX98nSazf4H2VhDI-603fODEr8ponRO__Y1n8yDZqCFack-85_9JvE9H1wXUNrtdbxat6k08AId-Rtt3AsXUe1VNeT9r0XL1CeaIjSSMJs5VYDiNWdxjOeHNQG/s1600/One+dose+not+simply+read+the+silmarillion.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgm9LLdayF1cy8Fvrel5sdX98nSazf4H2VhDI-603fODEr8ponRO__Y1n8yDZqCFack-85_9JvE9H1wXUNrtdbxat6k08AId-Rtt3AsXUe1VNeT9r0XL1CeaIjSSMJs5VYDiNWdxjOeHNQG/s1600/One+dose+not+simply+read+the+silmarillion.jpg" /></a></div>
Oh boy, this is not gonna be an easy review. I was first introduced to Tolkien's work as a kid through the old animated movie version of The Hobbit from 1977. But it wasn't until middle school that I first truly discovered his work by reading the original book. I didn't tackle Lord of The Rings until I was in high school, about a year or two before Peter Jackson's movies came out I think. I love those books. The influence they've had and continue to have on me as a writer can't be overstated. I first picked up The Silmarillion after finishing The Lord of the Rings, so naturally I was expecting another story like that....but when I first read it, I hated it. Back then, I just didn't understand it. It was as far removed from Lord of The Rings as the earth is to the moon, there were no Hobbits, the prose and narrative style was archaic, there didn't seem to be an overarching narrative and I personally didn't connect with the characters like I had with Bilbo, Frodo and the rest. So I put it away, didn't finish it, and moved on to something else. When I was in college, I started to get curious about it again. I had the audio book laying around so I listened to it...and now I love it.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYscLdfwb2yUVDrqWpdMvMirmzupdjmapZLJkbsKdN6NrgLwEL5JP2JOzG0771T0FO8liqrl-JGb1X-XM5ZyONfMMEjaOsJcaAaqcvRdC22rmTHC9X8Lg13o9fbIdVVIECGDNGodU9U_YO/s1600/Balriand.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYscLdfwb2yUVDrqWpdMvMirmzupdjmapZLJkbsKdN6NrgLwEL5JP2JOzG0771T0FO8liqrl-JGb1X-XM5ZyONfMMEjaOsJcaAaqcvRdC22rmTHC9X8Lg13o9fbIdVVIECGDNGodU9U_YO/s1600/Balriand.jpg" /></a></div>
Now before I can actually start talking about the plot, I first have to address the narrative structure and prose style, because like I said its archaic. On both fronts, The Silmarillion has less to do with a modern novel and more to do with the Bible....no really. The way The Silmarillion is structured is very reminiscent of the aforementioned holy text, and so is the language of the prose. Take the first four opening lines for example:<br />
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"There was Eru, the One, who in Arda is called Ilúvatar; and he made first the Ainur, the Holy Ones, that were the offspring of his thought, and they were with him before aught else was made. And he spoke to them, propounding to them themes of music; and they sang before him, and he was glad."<br />
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Wow, Book of Genesis much? To be fair, the prose style and plot structure makes a certain amount of sense, because Tolkien was a devout catholic all of his life and his original intent for The Silmarillion when he started writing it in 1914, was to make a unified mythology for the British Isles. So it stands to reason that he would want to write the book in this way. And while I personally think this choice makes it feel more epic and poetically beautiful, to the casual reader it might come off as dry, highfalutin and very, very hard to get into. And if that wasn't bad enough, the book is infinitely more complex and dark than either of Tolkien's more famous work. So you really have to pay attention or you're gonna get lost very quickly. But that's not to say that The Silmarillion isn't worth your time, because it definitely is.<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmNBB7fCORxpE_hTuC0DyBgsrEdquhgD8gcHp-0zwn1kq7gRb2zcIWTG-qK64iHPZzJaeSG5dHz24Sj_IPnKwB41gDG2YrxxDdjByiwFfb79TMVGO06E_KwSF0nECtOcxsdJUiazMBVBQw/s1600/Fingolfin+vs+Morgoth.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmNBB7fCORxpE_hTuC0DyBgsrEdquhgD8gcHp-0zwn1kq7gRb2zcIWTG-qK64iHPZzJaeSG5dHz24Sj_IPnKwB41gDG2YrxxDdjByiwFfb79TMVGO06E_KwSF0nECtOcxsdJUiazMBVBQw/s1600/Fingolfin+vs+Morgoth.jpg" /></a><br />
As far as plot goes, well that's kinda hard to explain. As I've said before, the book doesn't seem to have an overarching plot, it feels more like a collection of novellas that all focus on the same thing, namely telling the history of the first and second ages of Middle-Earth. Some of the stories presented here will sound familiar to Tolkien fans, as some of the characters in Lord of the Rings make references to the events depicted in The Silmarillion. So you'll read the stories of Beren and Lúthien, the story of the Silmarils (which Bilbo reference to in The Fellowship of the Ring), the rise and fall of Melkor (AKA Morgoth, the Dark Lord before Sauron) and The Fall of Gondolin. It also includes stories that, while no less important, fans had previously never heard like The Children of Hurin and The War of Wrath. The book also has the origin stories of many of the key players of Tolkien's other work like Elrond, Sauron etc. So in that sense, The Silmarillion lays down the foundation for the culture of Middle-Earth, as well as its early history. It's a fascinating read that can help better your understanding of the Middle-earth mythos, but as I said before, there are a lot of things to keep track of so its easy to get lost if you don't pay attention.<br />
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One of the things that seems to be accepted about this book is that its unfinished. Honestly, I don't know how much faith I can put in that claim. Because, according to Tolkien's son and literary executor, Christopher, The Silmarillion is in fact complete but Tolkien sadly died before he could go back and revise the bulk of it. And as a result, The Silmarillion has some small inconsistencies with Tolkien's later work. Christopher did his best to try to fix these (although he admitted later making it fully consistent with his father's famous work was impossible), by using other related material left by his father. But he was under considerable pressure from the publisher to get the book out. What's more, not all of his father's notes were in the family's possession at the time. So he should be applauded for getting the book published and for staying as true to his father's original vision as humanly possible. But there are still those that say that he made up entire sections of the book. But really, the only thing he added was a summary regarding the history of the One Ring, and that at the very end.<br />
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To sum things up; despite all of its flaws, The Silmarillion is still a must read for any Tolkien fan, or just a fan of the fantasy genre in general. It's a beautifully written swan song for the father of the fantasy genre. If you have the chance, then check it out ^_^. You'll be glad you did.<br />
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did.Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-71333992035688774162016-06-28T12:54:00.001-07:002016-06-28T12:54:09.965-07:00Old Hubpages book review: The End of Childhood (Childhood's End). <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsufBicSIWhU5YstmDaZBeaZVpX8eHVaUREP07bNXWLqflv3CNZCGDym7bt7R0e-mvfMdq8DJF0mCb07NJItJbqXVXiz_10SqICnxtJkiDFZdw4zFnKSfw3ff0DDtYuM8-01boT-HrU2cH/s1600/Childhood%2527s+End+cover.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsufBicSIWhU5YstmDaZBeaZVpX8eHVaUREP07bNXWLqflv3CNZCGDym7bt7R0e-mvfMdq8DJF0mCb07NJItJbqXVXiz_10SqICnxtJkiDFZdw4zFnKSfw3ff0DDtYuM8-01boT-HrU2cH/s320/Childhood%2527s+End+cover.jpg" width="198" /></a></div>
<em>Childhood's End</em> is one of those books that I always recommend to people, but I can never figure out how to describe it to them. Mostly because when I mention it to the average person that the plot has aliens coming to Earth, the first thing they say is something along the lines of "oh like Independence Day." And then I say who the author is and the fact that he wrote the movie and novel <em>2001: A Space Odyssey.</em>...and then they get this expression on their face like I just told them I eat ripe human flesh, nod noncommittally, and hurriedly change the subject....If I could back in time, I would go to Stanley Kubrick and tell him to not to make 2001 so dreadfully boring.<br />
All joking aside, this is one of my favorite books of all time. It was the first book by Arthur C.Clarke that I had ever read, and it was one of the books that, along with Frank Herbert's Dune books, changed my expectations as to what Science Fiction could be and what it could achieve. <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgnYv4p5hd0NCC1IaqF2aAo9ILXuNQNNij0i_mouKZN6rR5IAldK-Z490pGVypZPtypXSFXhV7inF6_XUn9CDmIXuc0FvBIuco_0D-mRwZQQa32q6kiEeXQKKjjEiWDi85wVZ3PiS6nDup/s1600/Arthur+C+Clarke+in+2005.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgnYv4p5hd0NCC1IaqF2aAo9ILXuNQNNij0i_mouKZN6rR5IAldK-Z490pGVypZPtypXSFXhV7inF6_XUn9CDmIXuc0FvBIuco_0D-mRwZQQa32q6kiEeXQKKjjEiWDi85wVZ3PiS6nDup/s1600/Arthur+C+Clarke+in+2005.jpg" /></a><br />
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The plot is divided up into three parts. The first part takes place late in the 20th century, where the US and the Soviet Union are deadlocked to win the space race for military purposes when suddenly gigantic alien spaceships come to earth. The ships belong to a race of beings called 'The Overlords,' Sounds like a cliche alien invasion story, but surprisingly, The Overlords are not on earth for that reason. They don't want to conquer us, heck they announce in the first week of their arrival they are they intend to save mankind from destroying itself. They just sit in their ships and supervise the human race and only interfere when necessary. But, despite their good intentions, many people don't trust them because they don't reveal themselves physically. That doesn't happen until the second half of the book when the plot jumps ahead 50 years and mankind have entered a golden age. And it turns out that the Overlords...looks like the image that everyone has of demons. So what do they want? Well, that's when things get interesting. In the third part and final part of the book, it's revealed that their goal was to guide the evolution of humans until a certain point, namely the point where they develop telekinetic abilities and basically, become a hive mind.<br />
<br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirMpfFMyRP0tJBGNDAjgvvI8o3GDjELx6J7cYKU9Y3sX39SRXgK-odNdQfd8T1rFcXVmpZahBzYbzDgNtQMAqtGEKWtNh3Rqp9QuXN3bifYoUpAOfs5MfEr2O4Vpizjjmo8dWA5htQTnUM/s1600/Overlord2.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="275" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirMpfFMyRP0tJBGNDAjgvvI8o3GDjELx6J7cYKU9Y3sX39SRXgK-odNdQfd8T1rFcXVmpZahBzYbzDgNtQMAqtGEKWtNh3Rqp9QuXN3bifYoUpAOfs5MfEr2O4Vpizjjmo8dWA5htQTnUM/s320/Overlord2.jpg" width="320" /></a>Why? Well, it turns out they serve an entity called "The Overmind," a god-like intelligence freed from physical form and made up of an uncountable amount consciousnesses from ancient civilizations. In other words, this thing goes around space adding the consciousness of entire species to itself once they reach a certain point in their evolution. The Overlords, unable to join with it for some reason, act as a kind of bridge for the next species. The book ends when this point is reached in the children of the "Last Generation" and the Overmind takes them into itself. The plot is fascinating, mixing real science with smart and imaginative speculation of our own future as a species, and on the existence and purpose of alien civilization and what their intentions to humanity are. The book also deals with themes of the evolution and decline of human culture and society as we evolve as a species. I don't have time to run down all the themes.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg769L4obTe3tKuN1BvO_9eAGA3-RQjnFMwbyhoTjJMjcHRaheS31bem8NLSqsfg7ZC7nO3uKM2uvXZQ1MMrtid2vLKxVEvVmB-UM6CZiHkkuSW0V0TtViUrYPPQtBgadEEnKk-9tCQpAXD/s1600/End+of+Eva+iconic+image.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="186" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg769L4obTe3tKuN1BvO_9eAGA3-RQjnFMwbyhoTjJMjcHRaheS31bem8NLSqsfg7ZC7nO3uKM2uvXZQ1MMrtid2vLKxVEvVmB-UM6CZiHkkuSW0V0TtViUrYPPQtBgadEEnKk-9tCQpAXD/s320/End+of+Eva+iconic+image.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
But needless to say, this is the only book I can think of that will make you think and make your head explode (but in a good way). I especially love the idea of the Overmind. It's neither good nor evil, it's just the end result of evolution. You never really see it, but you can always feel its presence throughout the book just waiting for the time to come to fulfill its purpose. Japanese anime fans, incidentally, will probably recognize the idea of the Overmind as the basis for both <a data-mce-href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neon_Genesis_Evangelion" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neon_Genesis_Evangelion" style="color: rgb(41, 124, 207) !important; font-weight: bold !important; text-decoration: none !important;">Neon Genesis Evangelion's</a> concept of "<a data-mce-href="http://wiki.evageeks.org/Human_Instrumentality_Project" href="http://wiki.evageeks.org/Human_Instrumentality_Project" style="color: rgb(41, 124, 207) !important; font-weight: bold !important; text-decoration: none !important;">Human I</a><a data-mce-href="http://wiki.evageeks.org/Human_Instrumentality_Project" href="http://wiki.evageeks.org/Human_Instrumentality_Project" style="color: rgb(41, 124, 207) !important; font-weight: bold !important; text-decoration: none !important;">nstrumentality</a>" as well as <a data-mce-href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Runaway_Ideon" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Runaway_Ideon" style="color: rgb(41, 124, 207) !important; font-weight: bold !important; text-decoration: none !important;">Space Runaway Ideon's</a> concept of the "Ide." And that was no accident.<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVjPaOg2VENO4kVIccXtN00OeKwh3fHM0GfJ_laVjJXv-vA8BPPtzayNhvaexb7Qm0-UO078GArFLo3oH99xfZ04UDkGABVcnSkvK5yJ5l5h0pz38KXgitumaRr-1XAKwYVYcLwvHo-xJN/s1600/Overlord+3.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="207" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVjPaOg2VENO4kVIccXtN00OeKwh3fHM0GfJ_laVjJXv-vA8BPPtzayNhvaexb7Qm0-UO078GArFLo3oH99xfZ04UDkGABVcnSkvK5yJ5l5h0pz38KXgitumaRr-1XAKwYVYcLwvHo-xJN/s320/Overlord+3.jpg" width="320" /></a>I only have two real complaints, the first is that there doesn't seem to be a main character. Although the characters aren't bad by any means, the only ones that come close to being the main focus are the Overlords, but I really couldn't connect with them that much. I dunno what it is, but something about them just makes me scratch my head in utter confusion. They want to be absorbed into the Overmind even though they can't (it's never really explained why). And even if they could, they know that it would mean the absolute end of their species. Does that make sense to anyone else? <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinx1tAlGzc3_GF8cTyJ9ZKAlQ1qpnZ9x92szp3B1vGCfuW4RQMg423-qDiREEJDyPmtwvqIN5T0evp-wRGIM5JB3hmVBC3EpHWneE99xl2xtSfyLQ7z9hm14vNeVZZyxYppaj1ch20Iwui/s1600/Overlord.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="257" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinx1tAlGzc3_GF8cTyJ9ZKAlQ1qpnZ9x92szp3B1vGCfuW4RQMg423-qDiREEJDyPmtwvqIN5T0evp-wRGIM5JB3hmVBC3EpHWneE99xl2xtSfyLQ7z9hm14vNeVZZyxYppaj1ch20Iwui/s320/Overlord.jpg" width="320" /></a>My second complaint is that I always found it weird how accepting the human characters are about the whole situation. I mean, early on in the book some countries do try and fight the Overlords but that doesn't work at all, and then they just kinda back off and never try again. The reason being is that the Overlords do what they say they are gonna do, they make very few (but big) demands and they don't interfere with humans unless they have too. They oversee the creation of single world government and basically force humanity to grow up and stop acting like idiots. They're like the ultimate nanny, now that I think about it, just with demon faces. Pretty much the same thing happens when humans learn of the Overmind, there's no mass panic or anything, everyone accepts our extinction as inevitable. Now, this makes sense in context, because (with one very short lived exception) by this point human society and culture has pretty much hit a dead end, and really can't advance any further. So it makes sense, but it certainly wasn't what I was expecting.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0BeMwdXjlG6J2UfrYsFPJ1biGbicMvUxoCTqBZmUohJAoGMlTqw_0DhHPOetOJ2uivJ0d8YgJi6cehBr3ojl5aiHFKPYCOQ4xjxZ6GuocDTYF9mDExt0sc_9IWNzoXr1xq8qbixUC8joA/s1600/Led+Zepplin+House+of+the+holy+cover.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0BeMwdXjlG6J2UfrYsFPJ1biGbicMvUxoCTqBZmUohJAoGMlTqw_0DhHPOetOJ2uivJ0d8YgJi6cehBr3ojl5aiHFKPYCOQ4xjxZ6GuocDTYF9mDExt0sc_9IWNzoXr1xq8qbixUC8joA/s320/Led+Zepplin+House+of+the+holy+cover.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The cover of Led Zepplin's Album 'House of the Holy' was <br />inspired by the end of the book. </td></tr>
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But ya know what, that's what I love about this book. It's not predictable, and it's devoid of cliche. It's not about killing aliens, or speculating about new technologies or whatever, it's about exploring ideas. In other words, Clarke took an alien invasion story and used it to talk about philosophical ideas. And as a result, he was able to write one of the masterworks of the genre and help shape what it is today. If you're a fan of science fiction (or just reading in general) and you haven't read this book, then I say you're long overdue. Check it out.<br />
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Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-62640287669712119042016-06-07T18:16:00.000-07:002016-06-21T11:33:14.160-07:00Batman VS Superman: What the hell happened?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I'm pretty sure that enough time has passed now to say that, when looked at objectively, Batman VS Superman ISN'T a terrible movie. Is it perfect? Good God no. But is it the death mound of T-Rex feces that every critic and their grandmother have made it out to be? No, I don't believe so. it's just uninspired 'meh.' But with that said, yeah, I can see why people don't like it. I'm not gonna review the movie, but I am gonna be as objective as I can be, and take a look at why the film got the reception that it did. And from what I can tell, it all stems from the director, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zack_Snyder" target="_blank">Zack Snyder</a>.<br />
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Let me just say right now that, yes, I DO enjoy Mr. Snyder's movies....some of them anyway. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/300_(film)" target="_blank">300</a>, for all its stupid historical inaccuracies and not so cleverly hidden "America F**ck yeah" bullshit. is STILL a great action movie. And Snyder's adaptation of<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watchmen" target="_blank"> Alan Moore's Watchmen</a>, is, in my opinion, one of the best comic book movies ever made. But it's <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man_of_Steel_(film)" target="_blank">Man of Steel</a> that Snyder really starts to lose me. I've been a Superman fan ever since I was a really little kid, hell he was one of the first fictional characters that I ever latched on too and probably did more to shape my young mind than, well, anything really. And while I thought that Man of Steel was a good reboot of Supes' film career; looking back on it, I'm starting to think that maybe that had more to do with Christopher Nolan's and David S. Goyer's screenplay, rather than Snyder's directing. Because, for all the flaws that Man of Steel had, it was still faithful to the spirit of the character. Batman VS Superman however....not so much. The point is that, while I do think that Snyder CAN do comic book/superhero movies. It has to be a VERY specific kind of superhero movie. Namely...not anything based off of mainstream comic books. Which leads us to Batman VS Superman. Oh, and from here on we are wandering into spoiler territory, so you've been warned.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNiB_dlRzbPd3lzZprKJwHE69ijf8kgCLTI0RxF6GJn2KxOWq6mehAYXwCWtGE-4-V6zESX0xIH-bo7N_5PSOb_oWvPKy83ZAWP5ppTJOp-YY2pvOVPg21zxISRW4OEOh3CAv8DYfIMdYZ/s1600/Jimmy-Olsen.png" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNiB_dlRzbPd3lzZprKJwHE69ijf8kgCLTI0RxF6GJn2KxOWq6mehAYXwCWtGE-4-V6zESX0xIH-bo7N_5PSOb_oWvPKy83ZAWP5ppTJOp-YY2pvOVPg21zxISRW4OEOh3CAv8DYfIMdYZ/s320/Jimmy-Olsen.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">RIP, Jimbo.</td></tr>
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I don't mean to focus solely on the Superman side of things here, but as far as I can tell, this is where a lot of the complaints come from. Snyder took everything that Superman was about, threw it into a pin of rabid hyenas, and is now charging people for the privilege. Just utter disrespect to the fans and what to Superman stood for. For example Superman mainstay, Jimmy Olsen, dies in the opening of the film, and after a while, Clark/Superman becomes reluctant to save anybody because reasons, and mopes around for half the film until Lex Luthor kidnaps both Lois Lane and his mother. One scene, in particular, seems to be the most egregious. There's a scene in where Superman appears before a hearing in the US senate about if they should try to restrict what Supes does....annnnd then a guy in a wheelchair who has a grudge against Superman detonates a bomb that kills everyone in the room (except for Supes, obviously). But get this, Superman heard the bomb with his super hearing, and he did NOTHING. Uhhhh....what? Snyder, have you never read a Superman comic book in your life? That's NOT what Supes would do in that situation. If anything he would have grabbed the Wheelchair (after pushing the occupant out of it), smash through the ceiling and let the thing blow up in mid air.<br />
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So why was Superman's personality changed so much? Well, the popular reason is that they were trying to make Superman more identifiable as a character, by giving him actual human emotions. And yeah, I can see why casual fans would think that he's not identifiable. In terms of what he can do, Superman is stupidly overpowered. I mean, this is a guy so physically strong that he can pull Planets out of their orbit with his bare hands, and outrun the gravity of a double black hole. And in the early days, Superman's personality was just a 1-dimensional boring nice guy, and the writers just gave him a new power literally every day. And while modern comic books and the various film incarnations over the years have done their best to correct and curtail both of these factors, it's a reputation he still has to this day. So yes, I can understand why they changed his personality for this movie. But here's the thing, Mr. Snyder, *ahem* YOU'RE DOING IT WRONG!!! Changing his personality serves absolutely no purpose and your not even doing in any way that's interesting or thought provoking. And on top of that, its is such a departure from the original character that, if not for the costume, he wouldn't be recognizable. Superman has never been about angst or being moody or brooding or things of that nature. That's Batman's thing. Superman is Pandora's little light of Hope given flesh and superpowers. That's always been the crux of his character, of his personality. Taking that away and replacing it with moodiness, doesn't make him more mature or identifiable, it just makes him look like a wuss and makes you look like a twelve-year-old who thinks that having a Whinny the Poo tattoo on your groin is the height of badassery. Oy.<br />
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Anyway, some people also point to Henry Cavill's portrayal of Superman/Clark Kent as an overall negative to the franchise. Honestly, I don't think that's fair. Why? Because anyone who takes this role is flying in the shadow of Christopher Reeves. That's not an opinion, that's a fact. For many people, myself included, Reeve's iconic portrayal of the character IS Superman, he set the standard to which all other actors who come after are gonna be compared to. Cavill knows this, and I don't think he's trying to fill Reeve's boots. He's doing his own thing with the role. And I think he's doing a great job with it, and I hope he stays in it for many more films. And let's be honest, guys....at least it's not Nicolas Cage. <br />
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As for the Batman side of things, honestly, I don't have much to say about that. Mostly because...well I LIKED Ben Affleck's portrayal of Batman/Bruce Wayne. And I'm actually excited that he will be returning to the role in a stand alone film. No, it's not Christian Bale, but Affleck is great in the role in his own right, let him stay. I also like Jeremy Irons as Alfred. So, uh,....I got nothing bad to say about this part.<br />
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But the one who steals the whole show was without a doubt Wonder Woman (played by Gal Gadot). Ho-ly shit, her showing up and fighting Doomsday was just amazing. This is something that DC fans have been waiting for a long time. Wonder Woman is considered the third of DC's big three (Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman), and yet for whatever reason, she has yet to receive any sort of modern film adaptation, outside of a few animated films......It just kinda sucks that Snyder didn't really give her really anything interesting to do. Seriously, Wonder Woman doesn't even show up in full costume till the final battle with the film's version of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doomsday_(comics)" target="_blank">Doomsday</a>. Before that, she interacts with Bruce Wayne a little, and that's it. Hell, she hardly has any dialogue until the end. For such an important character in the DC Universe, she sure feels like an afterthought.<br />
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This leads me into my final point and a major reason why I think that Batman VS Superman was received as poorly as it was, Poor world building and plot holes. I know I just said that I didn't have much to say about the Batman side of this movie, but that's because I was just focusing on the Affleck's performance more than anything else. Most of the problems with Batman's side of this film is actually tied to this point and I wanted to put them all together in their own section for the sake of my own sanity. Anyway, Leading up to the release of this film, we were lead to believe that Batman VS Superman would be a continuation of both Man of Steel, and Christopher Nolan's excellent Dark Knight Trilogy, and that both story threads would meet up in the middle and from there we would get DC's answer to The Avengers, The Justice League. To my knowledge, Warner Brothers never denied this. Fast Forward to the film's premiere and we find out that we had been hoodwinked. Nowhere in the film are the events of the Dark Knight Trilogy ever discussed, with the possible exception of Wayne Manor being burned down. There's no mention of Lucius Fox, no<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyzcXQrbpsv2IEWAFm5xj_6bdFb77E3Wpz0zmYF-PmpqFvWf743PJo9EN6XLXvLh_-gXhsXlsykIOZYvpeWHMc7LuQpYYJfqnjzwUQr5iecR3LcHUFHmpfLzjBzDQssHM-69oBeATwNGLl/s1600/Robin+suit+in+batman+v+superman.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="160" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyzcXQrbpsv2IEWAFm5xj_6bdFb77E3Wpz0zmYF-PmpqFvWf743PJo9EN6XLXvLh_-gXhsXlsykIOZYvpeWHMc7LuQpYYJfqnjzwUQr5iecR3LcHUFHmpfLzjBzDQssHM-69oBeATwNGLl/s320/Robin+suit+in+batman+v+superman.jpg" width="320" /></a>Batcomputer becoming the NSA's wet dream, The Joker, or even a shadow of Catwoman. There was, however, scenes showing Bruce Wayne's parents being shot and him becoming Batman and Bruce arriving in Metropolis during Man of Steel's final battle with General Zod and an easter egg of a Robin costume being sprayed in Yellow paint (see picture) and that's when it hit me...this film rebooted Batman, again. So, what we have here, is a NEW version of Batman, except that it's set in the Man of Steel universe, and this is the universe that DC is going to be setting all of its films in from now on. And they can't even get THIS right. This whole film feels like a half-assed crash course for DC to catch up with Marvel's film universe. But DC, Warner Brother, do you even know why Marvel's been so successful with this? It's because they took the time to develop each of their characters with their own separate film franchise, and their universe expanded and grew with each film. So by the time we got to The Avengers, we already had a good grasp on this universe and these characters that we had basically grown up with them. But here, you're jumping right into a cross over without giving us anytime to adjust to establish the universe or any of the characters What you should have done is a stand alone Man of Steel sequel or two, then a solo Affleck Batman movie or two, solo Wonder Woman movie and a sequel or two, and individual films for the other members of the Justice League, AND then you should have made Batman VS Superman and used it as a jumping off point for the JUSTICE LEAGUE movie, not for your entire universe.<br />
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Oh, and before I forget about him, here's something else that needs to happen to get your Universe straight, <i><u><b>FIRE Zack Snyder. </b></u></i>Seriously, I heard on Pat The NES Punk's Podcast (see the video on the left), that he doesn't even read Comic Books unless there is a lot of killing, blood, and sex in them. And that if he had made Batman Begins, he would have had Bruce Wayne raped during the prison scene. I'm...not even going to express how I feel about that. <br />
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Anyway, As I expressed at the top of this, Batman VS Superman isn't actually a terrible movie. But it's certainly not the best, and there's a lot wrong with it. But at the end of the day, I still think that it's a watchable movie. But this was just my two cents on the matter.<br />
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What do you, Dear Reader, think?<br />
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and I'm out. see you next week.<br />
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Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-12446445183546358702016-05-03T15:26:00.002-07:002016-05-03T16:04:00.877-07:00Pardon me, but please drop your pants before using the Restroom.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-rVBUgA1l3_vzOHTRe5lYk48nqznBT5cwhe5iG0Z6Mi9taFIChyb0YRPpZVFDDlexLlhhx7YL1bjCgSWYzJSOGJDTH8ta8NpgwJy_2zatnAlUApPvnVXYcnBkZtxlZJRA9B4pFIFMcsbt/s1600/I+am+ally.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-rVBUgA1l3_vzOHTRe5lYk48nqznBT5cwhe5iG0Z6Mi9taFIChyb0YRPpZVFDDlexLlhhx7YL1bjCgSWYzJSOGJDTH8ta8NpgwJy_2zatnAlUApPvnVXYcnBkZtxlZJRA9B4pFIFMcsbt/s320/I+am+ally.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
*exasperated sigh* I know I said that the post about me voting for<a href="http://thesummersleeper.blogspot.com/2016/03/random-musings-feel-berne.html" target="_blank"> Senator Sanders in the Georgia Primaries was my last overtly political post</a>. But I'm sorry, given recent events, this is something I have to throw my hat into. Now, anyone who knows me knows that I support LGBT (which, for those who don't know, is an acronym for 'Lesbien, Gay, Bisuxual and Transgender') Civil Rights. It's a topic I feel very strongly about--despite not being gay myself-- because to me it doesn't make any sense not to. This is a group of people who are constantly being marginalized and discriminated against in both modern times and in the past, all because the person they love happens to be of the same gender as them, or because they are the victim of one of God's cruelest jokes. And yet, some politicians (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African-American_Civil_Rights_Movement_(1954%E2%80%9368)" target="_blank">some of whom are old enough to know EXACTLY what discrimination looks like</a>) are trying to, or have already, passed laws that infringe on the rights of these people. And that, Dear Reader, is UNACCEPTABLE. And it also leads nicely into the topic today.<br />
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuhzuED9tkMsMEGGb1Mdt9-ZO6eC-ld3-HLrGBoE6RZ_1pJpZCt8NQd1nRBPeLoQ6CuESe07Q8Ozj0TA9iPoS0pmqx2uRlpWuSGrySLliLcwpTRmY-SgxwbdHuu8v87CqPCz5FnSUycnRV/s1600/perfect+reasoning+why+NC%2527s+bathroom+law+is+BS..jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuhzuED9tkMsMEGGb1Mdt9-ZO6eC-ld3-HLrGBoE6RZ_1pJpZCt8NQd1nRBPeLoQ6CuESe07Q8Ozj0TA9iPoS0pmqx2uRlpWuSGrySLliLcwpTRmY-SgxwbdHuu8v87CqPCz5FnSUycnRV/s320/perfect+reasoning+why+NC%2527s+bathroom+law+is+BS..jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Perfect illustration as to why Bathroom Laws are bullshit.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Now, unless you have been living under a rock, you've probably heard that North Carolina has recently passed a law that states that <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2016/03/29/health/north-carolina-bathroom-law-cards/" target="_blank">people in NC must use the bathroom of the gender that is on their birth certificate, and present some sort of card that explains that they are transgender </a> Well, not only is that a violation of a Transgender Person's right to privacy--and can lead to many an awkward situation besides-- it's also a violation of their Civil Rights, by trying to monitor and control what they do. And it would also<a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/lgbt-students-sexual-assault_us_55a332dfe4b0ecec71bc5e6a" target="_blank"> put their lives in danger, because who knows what a less tolerant man would do to a Trans Woman (or vise/versa) while she's trying to do her business or even after that.</a> <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/businesses-nc-anti-lgbt-law_us_56f42b8ee4b0c3ef52184903" target="_blank">Several big businesses, including Google and Apple</a>, have called this law what it is, a law born from bigotry, and are actively fighting against it. <a href="http://wgntv.com/2016/04/05/paypal-cancels-north-carolina-expansion-over-bathroom-bill/" target="_blank">Paypal for example, even canceled a planned expansion into the state, because of the bill.</a> The latest and most controversial corporation to join the fight is Target, who <a href="https://corporate.target.com/article/2016/04/target-stands-inclusivity" target="_blank">has publicly stated that it will not force Transgender customers to use the restroom of the gender they don't identify with.</a> This has lead many an angry religious and conservative nut grabbing their torches and pitch forks and boycott and protest against Target over this decision.<br />
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitfxgKZHMZV4rNfU2vmq_UHh91VkuLhkCvS4tbjvLKMvjUVZrI9sEHzyiEperuJi19ApvMu-J6E1gsng_QpyTZmtVm_ulpr-f3mTcb3fkV_r_zsHSunn43NeYxxfEx1QypWsDBNZvd_j65/s1600/Christopher+%25E2%2580%259CJessica%25E2%2580%259D+Hambrook.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitfxgKZHMZV4rNfU2vmq_UHh91VkuLhkCvS4tbjvLKMvjUVZrI9sEHzyiEperuJi19ApvMu-J6E1gsng_QpyTZmtVm_ulpr-f3mTcb3fkV_r_zsHSunn43NeYxxfEx1QypWsDBNZvd_j65/s320/Christopher+%25E2%2580%259CJessica%25E2%2580%259D+Hambrook.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Christopher Hambrook<br />
is a known Serial Rapist. and now the posterboy for bigots who don't get it.</td></tr>
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Why are these Bathroom laws even being passed? Some might ask. Well according to the people who are for them, <a href="http://www.aol.com/article/2016/05/01/ted-cruz-on-north-carolina-bathroom-law-this-isnt-about-the-c/21368541/" target="_blank">including GOP Presidential hopeful Ted Cruz, </a> The idea behind the NC bill, and others like it in other states, is to stop Sexual Predators from claiming to be Transgender so that they can gain access to the woman's bathroom unopposed, and do their vile business. And, to be perfectly fair, I would be hard pressed to dismiss this as an irrational fear. In doing the research for this post, I did stumble upon on <a href="https://gendertrender.wordpress.com/2014/02/16/christopher-jessica-hambrook-serial-rapist-sexually-assaulted-and-terrorized-women-after-being-placed-in-toronto-area-womens-shelters/" target="_blank">one blog post</a> that cited a <a href="http://www.torontosun.com/2014/02/15/a-sex-predators-sick-deception" target="_blank">news story from Canada that states that this actually happened</a>. It's important to note though, dear readers, that the articles cited in the blog post was done by the now defunct <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun_News_Network" target="_blank">Sun News Network </a>, a Canadian news network known for its <i><b><u>shoddy reporting and pro-conservative bias</u></b></i>. And while I have no way to check the article's accuracy; what is agreed upon is that the perpetrator of the incident in question (A man named Christopher Hambrook) is that he was NOT transgender, but a convicted serial rapist who had been in and out of prison numerous times before the incident in question. And after said incident, he was declared a danger to society and thrown into jail permanently.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7L6LbmKnf7s65RZ3o0PVDQoCllemcIcZNWs0s05qKwvcIw5Msw8aULuAaBjRAryBGVqTomDdxzS5dQj5pkL7HmLbHld5705wo_F08KEMIyTfPqbOrwX8tN85ZAGVZK1TbpYXlFtICPe4M/s1600/NC+bathroom+politcal+cartoon.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="242" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7L6LbmKnf7s65RZ3o0PVDQoCllemcIcZNWs0s05qKwvcIw5Msw8aULuAaBjRAryBGVqTomDdxzS5dQj5pkL7HmLbHld5705wo_F08KEMIyTfPqbOrwX8tN85ZAGVZK1TbpYXlFtICPe4M/s320/NC+bathroom+politcal+cartoon.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Also a good point, there's no real way for NC, <br />
or any state really, to enforce this BS.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Ok, these fears are not totally irrational. Here's the thing though. If the proposed laws are supposed to stop predators like Hambrook, why are they framed in such away that <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2016/04/28/transgender-bathroom-bills-discrimination/32594395/" target="_blank">specifically targets Transgender people?</a> <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/sexual-assault-bathroom-law_us_57190d25e4b0d912d5fdda6b" target="_blank">When there really ISN'T any evidence of a Transgender person sexually assaulting someone in the Bathroom (<u style="font-style: italic; font-weight: bold;">remember, Hambrook was NOT a Transgender)? </u></a> I'm not kidding, I scoured every reputable source I could think of, and, other than the aforementioned incident in Canada, there isn't a shred of credible evidence that suggests a correlation between Transgenders using the bathroom of the gender they identify with, and a rise in sexual assault. There just isn't, the evidence doesn't exist. Hell, as I hinted at before,<a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/brynn-tannehill/debunking-bathroom-myths_b_8670438.html" target="_blank"> there's way more evidence to suggest the opposite. </a>This is fear mongering. Pure slimy fear mongering that has been picked up by idiots who don't do their research, or just don't care. Or (even worse) they oppose it for "Religious reasons" (don't even get me started). Here's an idea, lawmakers, if you so worried about sexual predators, REAL sexual predators. Then why don't you make laws that make it virtually impossible for them to get out of prison in the first place? You hypocrites. <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj63-jhrLiLtdMJGlUx0uXW6PyZKxThuuJNL_TcMz1OewtGcGXiu5duXpHnQ2oknn0AInoC8f4RkDCx7n11nChhzAJs7ul8PQWFHTffmyb2oUjCCfWRr1w5-zPnSyFmyxrp2zyxAbgceYhB/s1600/gender-workshop-transgender-6-728.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj63-jhrLiLtdMJGlUx0uXW6PyZKxThuuJNL_TcMz1OewtGcGXiu5duXpHnQ2oknn0AInoC8f4RkDCx7n11nChhzAJs7ul8PQWFHTffmyb2oUjCCfWRr1w5-zPnSyFmyxrp2zyxAbgceYhB/s320/gender-workshop-transgender-6-728.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
Sadly, this ignorance and fear, has wormed into members of my own family. Without naming names, I'm going to tell you a story that happened to me recently related to this. A few weeks ago, a cousin of mine posted a video on Facebook of a Pastor standing outside a Target store and ranting and raving against Target's decision. This in of itself wasn't unusual, as he is always posting political stuff on Facebook, but this particular video really set my blood boiling. Now, me and this cousin, we don't see eye to eye on a lot of things. He is very conservative and a staunch republican, while I am more liberal and don't affiliate with either Party. And while I don't really care where he parks his butt on the bench of politics, He has this nasty habit of taking Republican propaganda and treating it like the golden word of God, and will largely not listen to views that run counter to his own. Throughout his young life (he's in his 20's), to my knowledge, no one has ever truly challenged him on his beliefs. Hell, as I recall, when I had tried to in the past, I was told quite sternly to leave him alone.<br />
This time, however, I had no intention of leaving it alone. I and another friend of his called him out on the video, and he asked us if we supported "gender neutral bathrooms?" I told him, no, I supported what Target was doing, because it's not the government's (or ignorant assholes) goddamned business when a Transgender person has to take a number 2. His counter argument was something along the lines of how awkward it would be for a "Man who thinks he is a woman" to use the woman's bathroom and vice/versa. Analysing what he said, however, it becomes pretty obvious to me what he truly meant; namely, that Transgenderism doesn't exist, and those who claim to be transgender are sexual predators.<br />
<br />
Well, I took some issue with that, as you might imagine. And I called his argument exactly what it was, "Ignorant and Bigoted" and explained to him that Transgenderism/Transexualism is a very real condition, and that it's backed up by strong scientific evidence. I even added two links to two science journals on that matter (<a href="http://www.fertstert.org/article/S0015-0282(07)01228-9/abstract" target="_blank">this one </a> and <a href="http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v378/n6552/abs/378068a0.html" target="_blank">this one </a> to be precise). and I ended my little spiel by asking him "When has this ever been a problem for anybody?" Well to make a long story short, he tried to paint me as a hypocrite rather than properly debate with me, and after trying to dox me a second time, I finally called him out and told him he wasn't providing any evidence to support his argument, which was making him look more and more in the wrong. He promptly deleted the post and removed me from his friends list. Classy.<br />
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Now why am I telling you this? because it shows just how much ignorance there is when it comes to this issue. Transgender people are not predators, their people. And they deserve to be treated as such. Regardless of what your personal beliefs are, that's the cold hard truth. And it quite frankly sickens the hell out of me that so many people don't see that.<br />
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Those are my two cents. Thank you all for reading. I'll see you next week. <br />
Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-67001765608749731632016-04-26T15:13:00.001-07:002016-09-27T14:52:56.003-07:00Berserk main characters analysis Part Four: Thoughts on Golden Age Arc.<div style="text-align: center"> <iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/A7m0saghsmU" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> </div>
I know I said <a href="http://thesummersleeper.blogspot.com/2016/04/berserk-main-characters-analysis-part_19.html" target="_blank">last time</a> that I'd give an overview of what came after Griffith's betrayal, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized that that might be a bad idea. Like I said before, there's a lot of ground to cover in Berserk, and even trying to summarize it would take me forever. So I decided instead to leave it alone and come back to it another time. And instead, I'm just going to give you my thoughts on the series that I've covered so far.<br />
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I should also probably explain the title of this post.You see, as of right now, the Berserk Manga has a total of five story arcs. The Black swordsman arc, The Golden Age arc, The Conviction Arc (i.e. my personal favorite), The Falcon of the Millennium Empire Arc, and the most recent (and ongoing) The Fantasia Arc. And although the Black Swordsman arc was the first published, the arc we covered, The Golden Age, is the first arc chronologically. And it's the one that casual fans would be the most familiar with simply because it's been animated twice. Once as a<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0318871/" target="_blank"> 25 episode TV</a> series in 1997, and, more recently, as <a href="http://berserk.wikia.com/wiki/Berserk_(Films)" target="_blank">a film trilogy</a>.<br />
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJf3-B6rx9npusc5qBGgJGKWht3AY0T8zIX8roe2iYzviOtwF7I_9Xr61ScePNprO6NUPcyRXJnoK7IxuIKMXImyyzMP2vnevB6Ph_YL-JGsPuLqOPTBTkVFJ6Gt-5Y8XFcpnVoJ5ZJKLq/s1600/Gut%2527s+birth..jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="238" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJf3-B6rx9npusc5qBGgJGKWht3AY0T8zIX8roe2iYzviOtwF7I_9Xr61ScePNprO6NUPcyRXJnoK7IxuIKMXImyyzMP2vnevB6Ph_YL-JGsPuLqOPTBTkVFJ6Gt-5Y8XFcpnVoJ5ZJKLq/s320/Gut%2527s+birth..jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Literally, we see Guts' birth.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Anyway, here's what I think of the Golden Age arc. It's no secret that I like it, why else would I be writing about it? But honestly, the character development is kinda, 'meh'. Oh, it's not bad by any means, Kentarō Miura did a great job in avoiding the stereotypes of his chosen medium. But the only character that he seemed to put any real effort into was Guts. We get to see Guts' from the time he's a newborn and all the way to Griffith's betrayal, a time span of several decades. At least we do in the Manga and the TV series. We get to see Casca as a child too, yes, But not to the same degree as we do Guts. The odd man out here is Griffith *stabs him in the face with a very big knife*. While I will still argue that he's a very interesting character, we still don't know much about his past. What about his formative years helped mold him into the ambitious, backstabbing scumbag that he is today? Why does he want to become a king so bad? To my knowledge, the Manga has never really addressed this, and neither has any of the animes.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEjM0N85G5gaoJyILSs15VnHlY2lmFpRepBYwHNk1ucbsc-PaKDj2yDBHB1lyboccf19L4-kZ2gvDpHvW-kSf8ICJZDSqKWzUlP9Ba6Er3kcK-xwwX4M6L_9VYFDECpaX2xA9ZGhGdTg6K/s1600/Griffith+makes+his+choice+2..jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEjM0N85G5gaoJyILSs15VnHlY2lmFpRepBYwHNk1ucbsc-PaKDj2yDBHB1lyboccf19L4-kZ2gvDpHvW-kSf8ICJZDSqKWzUlP9Ba6Er3kcK-xwwX4M6L_9VYFDECpaX2xA9ZGhGdTg6K/s320/Griffith+makes+his+choice+2..jpg" width="212" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Griffith,why can't you just DIE!!!?</td></tr>
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Despite that, as I've said, Griffith is still a very interesting character. I mean, yeah, I've wanted him dead, since the moment I laid eyes on him, but that doesn't change the fact. He's the kind of character that you "Love to hate," I think that that's one of the highest compliment you can give a villain character. "I despise you so much, that I love you." I still want him dead, though. As for the other Hawk members, we don't get to see them as kids either, but we do get a clear enough picture of who they are and how they development as the story progresses...but then again, all but <a href="http://berserk.wikia.com/wiki/Rickert" target="_blank">one of them</a> (not counting Casca and Guts for the moment) are dead, so they don't matter.<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpfOLiz-GExOfUS5ncQZ9djLVGuD9lTAXvhHGhXBniYao9gO6JpXVsk6orgQz5EzByEutj8IJ45DkZAdOAwJ1UA1qCESU35LFCjrgloKI733USbuAKzS2TyXnGfcdOv5CrE5Zf0plBk9X7/s1600/Schierke_Manga.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpfOLiz-GExOfUS5ncQZ9djLVGuD9lTAXvhHGhXBniYao9gO6JpXVsk6orgQz5EzByEutj8IJ45DkZAdOAwJ1UA1qCESU35LFCjrgloKI733USbuAKzS2TyXnGfcdOv5CrE5Zf0plBk9X7/s1600/Schierke_Manga.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Schierke...not in the Golden Age.</td></tr>
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As for the story, itself, I like it. It's careful to avoid all the supernatural stuff till it's important to the plot, which in the Manga is only three times in the arc we covered (and only twice in the TV show and movies), and that includes Griffith's betrayal. Like Game of Thrones, The Golden Age arc focus a lot of its attention on political intrigue and character development rather than "how cool Guts looks as he slays 1 million demons while his bulging muscles rip out of his shirt." Arcs after the Golden Age retain the same level of politics and character development, but we also get more traditional fantasy elements, like magic, fairies, witches (including my personal favorite character, <a href="http://berserk.wikia.com/wiki/Schierke" target="_blank">Schierke</a>), and of course, more demon slaying than I care to get into here. While I don't have a problem with fantasy elements; yeah, it's kinda hard to deny that, when compared to the others, the Golden Age is probably the best-written arc of the series. At least so far.<br />
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjv6XmfiL9gkOTXoGMYPpxSUR8gLJJUSfpbrFKHKbLIutBNu-InlZcdWTKFYDofKHL875wwbBdh3d0Ql2BjooWyLpzwdajjUFgdPxGpyNXxP8IrsLdtGrn1QWAqqx21vi7Ei2l-VydyKBpX/s1600/Casca_Post-Eclipse_Manga.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjv6XmfiL9gkOTXoGMYPpxSUR8gLJJUSfpbrFKHKbLIutBNu-InlZcdWTKFYDofKHL875wwbBdh3d0Ql2BjooWyLpzwdajjUFgdPxGpyNXxP8IrsLdtGrn1QWAqqx21vi7Ei2l-VydyKBpX/s1600/Casca_Post-Eclipse_Manga.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Casca, post-Griffith's betrayal. </td></tr>
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If I had one big complaint about Berserk as a whole, it's the lack of a proper ending. As I said in the <a href="http://thesummersleeper.blogspot.com/2016/04/berserk-main-characters-analysis-part.html" target="_blank">first post</a>, The Berserk Manga is, at the time of writing, 37 volumes long and there's still no end in sight. Game of Thrones feels like a paragraph by a first grader when compared to this series sometimes. Part of that, hell most of it, is on Kentarō Miura himself. I'm not gonna claim that he's artificially extending the length of Berserk, as there is no evidence to suggest it. And, as a fantasy writer myself, I can understand and appreciate that telling a big story like this takes time. But there are times when I feel like he deliberately ignores opportunities to get to the ending quicker. For example, much later in the story, Griffith returns to the mortal realm and reforms the Band of the Hawk, but this time with Demons disguised as humans at his beck and call. Being the genius that he is (sarcasm), Griffith visits Guts and tries to get him to join this new army. Guts obviously tells him to eat shit and die and attacks him. But Guts is repulsed by Griffith's demonic <a href="http://berserk.wikia.com/wiki/Nosferatu_Zodd" target="_blank">bodyguard</a> and escapes. Rather than do the sensible thing and, ya know, go after him and kill him once and for all, Guts decides to take Casca (who still has the cognitive functions of a child due to the traumatic events of the eclipse) and go on a journey to find a cure for her madness. Sure....why not?<br />
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There's also the fact that Miura puts Berserk on hiatus often, and for long stretches of time, particularly these days. And, as a result, the publication of a new Berserk chapter is erratic and not all regular. I've heard that he does this because of health-related reasons, but I haven't been able to find a reliable, English-language source (I can't read Japanese) that confirms or denies this. So for all I know, he could just be giving himself a break. Which is understandable given that, like many manga creators, he writes and draws all of his graphic novels himself. Writing is hard enough, but drawing it too, well you'd be burned out quicker.<br />
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Another thing that bugs me about Berserk as a whole doesn't have anything to do with the work itself, but it's fanboys and fangirls. I've already talked about the myth about Guts' sword, Dragonslayer, being the first oversized sword in manga and anime, we all know that's not true. But there are many other things that have been put forth by fanboys/girls that have become misconceptions about the series. Now, every fandom has its share of cringe-worthy fans, but the Berserk fanboys/girls scare me the most because of how many of them choose to paint Griffith, which I'll get to in a second. But for now I wanna address some of the misconceptions:<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgH6P7G70igsTvItzfxdWm1tg2xOWyHDGK5bjoORV85QgxeKHPlIMvixdDQ4e1aNEahOWAsUAhbrbnaN9cMHH4IPenV-DDIF6ZlppuxvYgZxc3aOUY00j76yr-aECnmlAUWst5fB5XqjkWC/s1600/akira+sence-2265097.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgH6P7G70igsTvItzfxdWm1tg2xOWyHDGK5bjoORV85QgxeKHPlIMvixdDQ4e1aNEahOWAsUAhbrbnaN9cMHH4IPenV-DDIF6ZlppuxvYgZxc3aOUY00j76yr-aECnmlAUWst5fB5XqjkWC/s320/akira+sence-2265097.jpg" width="219" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">scene from the Akira Manga.</td></tr>
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<li>"Guts is the most bad ass and hardcore anime character ever.": This is a matter of opinion, not one of fact. I personally think that <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motoko_Kusanagi" target="_blank">Motoko Kusanagi </a> from the excellent anime/manga series <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghost_in_the_Shell" target="_blank">Ghost in The Shell </a> (seriously, why haven't you all read or seen Ghost in the Shell) is more bad ass than Guts because she can literally rip both people and giant mechs apart with her bare hands. And besides, when I ask Berserk fanboys/girls to explain what do they mean by "Hardcore." none of them can answer me. </li>
<li>"Berserk is known for its illustrations being far superior to any other manga out there!": ....um.... Have you all never read <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akira_(manga)" target="_blank">Akira</a>, Ghost in the Shell, or any other manga whose target audience wasn't kids and teenagers (hell, I'd even argue that kids and teens manga can be just as detailed as Berserk)? When you read Manga that's meant for adults, you're gonna see more detailed drawings as a general rule. It depends on the artist's style and what kind of deadlines they're under, but the point is that Berserk isn't unique here. </li>
<li>"Berserk is better written than any manga or western comic book.": Generally said by the fans who don't know a goddamn thing about writing, anime, Manga, or western comic books. Moving on.</li>
<li>"Griffith isn't the villain, he's the antagonist/ Griffith did nothing wrong": I mentioned this briefly in the post about Griffith, but this is where the fan misconceptions really start to disturb me. Yes, you CAN make the argument that the antagonist of a story isn't necessarily the villain. Problem is that that argument doesn't hold water when it's applied to Griffith. He's manipulative, controlling, sees his friends and comrades as stones that should only exist to pave the way to his dream. And he murders people just to get what he wants, and he murders those who reject him and he ultimately doesn't care. Need I remind you of what he did to the Band of the Hawk after they saved him? Or what he did to Casca? All of which leads to one conclusion, HE'S THE VILLAIN. Who are you KIDDING?! Griffith is evil, he has ALWAYS been evil. Cut, print, end of bloody story. And if your STILL one of those people who think that Griffith did nothing wrong...***ck. right. off. </li>
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I could go on, but I think I made my point.<br />
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Anyway, that concludes my analysis on Guts, Casca and Griffith, and my Thoughts on Berserk as a whole I guess. I hope you all found it informative and enjoyed it. Have any of you read Berserk? Do you agree with my analysis? Do you want me to talk about the other Arcs? Let me know down in the comments. </div>
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Oh, and if you are reading this from Goodreads.com or my Amazon authors page (becuase I know that this blog is linked to those sites too). DON'T POST YOUR COMMENTS ON THOSE SITES. I WILL NOT see them if you do. Leave your comments on the proper post here: <a href="http://thesummersleeper.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">http://thesummersleeper.blogspot.com/ </a> </div>
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And that's all out of me for now dear readers. I'll see you next week.</div>
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Oh yeah, yeah, you wanna know why they haven't made an anime out of Berserk's other story arcs, right? Well, I don't know why they didn't with the TV shows or the movies, buttttt......</div>
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<div style="text-align: center"> <iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/iLMimcmxIdk" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> </div>
Hell Yeah. Beyond summer of this year, I don't know when exactly this new series will air. But I do know that it will pick up where the recent film trilogy left off and eventually cover the Manga storyline in its entirety. And I know that anime streaming website, <a href="http://www.crunchyroll.com/" target="_blank">Crunchyroll</a>, have <a href="http://www.crunchyroll.com/anime-news/2016/03/25/crunchyroll-to-stream-berserk-anime-this-summer" target="_blank">acquired the rights to stream the series in the west as it airs on Japanese TV. </a> I'm not ever sure how that works, but whatever.<br />
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If you wanna read the manga for yourself, it has been released in the west by Comic book company Dark Horse Comics, and you can buy the volumes at any book retailer (Amazon is your friend), and <a href="http://kissmanga.com/Manga/Berserk" target="_blank">it can easily be found online at the time of writing.</a><br />
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And in case you all missed them, here are the links to the other Berserk posts: Part 1: <a href="http://thesummersleeper.blogspot.com/2016/04/berserk-main-characters-analysis-part.html">http://thesummersleeper.blogspot.com/2016/04/berserk-main-characters-analysis-part.html</a><br />
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Part 2: <a href="http://thesummersleeper.blogspot.com/2016/04/berserk-main-characters-analysis-part_12.html" target="_blank">http://thesummersleeper.blogspot.com/2016/04/berserk-main-characters-analysis-part_12.html </a><br />
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And Part 3:<a href="http://thesummersleeper.blogspot.com/2016/04/berserk-main-characters-analysis-part_19.html" target="_blank">http://thesummersleeper.blogspot.com/2016/04/berserk-main-characters-analysis-part_19.html </a> <br />
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Now I'm out for real, later. <br />
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Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-71199429878241847542016-04-19T15:03:00.001-07:002016-09-27T14:37:33.431-07:00Berserk main characters analysis Part Three: Griffith ( Golden Age Arc) *Spoiler and Mature Content Warning*.<div style="text-align: center;">
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/zpGUpVGjcn8" width="560"></iframe> </div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7l7sN4AmwCCednIVS8BZDC4lUraZ-Pza-lrqN5-vYdGiwhhjXYxk0pNkH_Xlm6rEWOI0scTgHemoBIfUFSKqCKpDtM3i-0QCnRShE-Rww998Sn-BUxhG0DKGC4IpWAkaGDJFHDUpi4zFw/s1600/Griffith.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="136" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7l7sN4AmwCCednIVS8BZDC4lUraZ-Pza-lrqN5-vYdGiwhhjXYxk0pNkH_Xlm6rEWOI0scTgHemoBIfUFSKqCKpDtM3i-0QCnRShE-Rww998Sn-BUxhG0DKGC4IpWAkaGDJFHDUpi4zFw/s320/Griffith.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Griffith.</td></tr>
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And so we come to the third part of our analysis, this time covering the third link that ties the story of Berserk together. The charismatic, and ambitious Griffith.<br />
*sigh*. I gotta be honest with you guys, I HATE this f***er, I mean honest to god, jump up and down HATE him. Not because he's an uninteresting character, but because he's the kind of person you NEVER want to get involved with. He's a self-serving, manipulative, <a href="http://www.healthyplace.com/personality-disorders/sociopath/high-functioning-sociopaths-and-the-damage-they-cause/" target="_blank">high functioning psychopath</a> who will do anything, ANYthing, to get what he wants. In other words, he's the WORST kind of evil. And yet, for whatever reason, <a href="http://aminoapps.com/page/anime/5316212/griffith-did-nothing-wrong" target="_blank">half of the Berserk fanbase just goes ga-ga over this guy. Seriously, there are people who will defend every single one of Griffith's actions, no matter how reprehensible</a>. Hell, some won't even call him the series villain. Here, I will show why they are wrong. Oh, and guys, for the sake of time, I am going to skip some of the things that Griffith does. I will, however, say enough to give you a basic idea as to what kind of person he is. and as alway,<b><i> Spoiler and Mature Content Warning!!!!</i></b><br />
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Anyway, when <a href="http://thesummersleeper.blogspot.com/2016/04/berserk-main-characters-analysis-part_12.html" target="_blank">we last left Guts</a>, he had just left the Band of the Hawk. I told you that the reason for this was because of Griffith, but not because they had a disagreement or anything like that. No, Guts left because he wanted to become worthy of being Griffith's friend. No really. Rather than explain it, I'm just going to show you the moment Guts discovered what Griffith's definition of a "friend" is. Keep in mind, this scene happens<a href="https://youtu.be/qG98CqVbR9w" target="_blank"> immediately after Guts assassinates the heir of Midland's throne (and said heir's son, though that kinda happened by accident) on Griffith's orders</a>:<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/enY3sXZUwBI" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> </div>
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKfFxKad1JZ18tdGDQmayPmYO5QdLN6-CLgFe1uitwgJJMMuuOxqJBFbgJubjhdSZcfF51xWvyQu3pKzCQaawEDZwEqHwIth5roG7dvDgeMQn3yEXC1A18kgRmcoY83hPQ50c3mgG4ELqH/s1600/Griffith+fucks+not+given+face+%25281%2529.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="231" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKfFxKad1JZ18tdGDQmayPmYO5QdLN6-CLgFe1uitwgJJMMuuOxqJBFbgJubjhdSZcfF51xWvyQu3pKzCQaawEDZwEqHwIth5roG7dvDgeMQn3yEXC1A18kgRmcoY83hPQ50c3mgG4ELqH/s320/Griffith+fucks+not+given+face+%25281%2529.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">This is the face that told me just how evil this bastard is.</td></tr>
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....Yeeeah, can you see why I don't like this guy? Guts at that point in the story has devoted his life to helping Griffith achieve his dream, and Griffith has the BALLS to say that he doesn't consider anyone his friend who doesn't have any dreams of his own? Yeah, no. F***ck you, Griffith. Though to be fair, at this point in the story, Guts still has no ambition of his own. He dosesn't care about dreams, he's just enjoying killing people and the fact that he now has friends that actually care about him. He's pretty much the definition of what Griffith doesn't consider a friend. But regardless, this is what prompts Guts to eventually leave the Band of the Hawk, to find his own dream. Griffith, however, kinda has a cow about this.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-35FpUMGCbAdSXsOPhbVmkPjVvlU1lJp_mXK52C8ln7o9wRYJtdpkOzNW9gIdMPLiepQj_d1sWr9JAlfaNl79svQi1fzKzn7bYMGieQSTcJqFuq7UCaHYNZE62omjNtzwM4kRs1E5iStF/s1600/the+start+of+Griffiths+dream+1.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-35FpUMGCbAdSXsOPhbVmkPjVvlU1lJp_mXK52C8ln7o9wRYJtdpkOzNW9gIdMPLiepQj_d1sWr9JAlfaNl79svQi1fzKzn7bYMGieQSTcJqFuq7UCaHYNZE62omjNtzwM4kRs1E5iStF/s320/the+start+of+Griffiths+dream+1.jpg" width="214" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The start of Griffith's dream.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzooYsxi4t_DQM6NYJ6FxHLZqI3JxuA-SE2FhQGKnUkgaaUHdBeahlfmEIWjnYN55oaLDkDeub9F_BQqXPFshsK64O-dNAX9Zr3y9AlBrW1hStxlpEoPYZK0CUCsPUrho2pTykcwEVLvZf/s1600/Crimson_Behelit.png" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzooYsxi4t_DQM6NYJ6FxHLZqI3JxuA-SE2FhQGKnUkgaaUHdBeahlfmEIWjnYN55oaLDkDeub9F_BQqXPFshsK64O-dNAX9Zr3y9AlBrW1hStxlpEoPYZK0CUCsPUrho2pTykcwEVLvZf/s1600/Crimson_Behelit.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Griffith's Behlit.</td></tr>
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But before I get to that, I should probably back up and talk about Griffith himself. Normally this is where I would talk about the character's backstory, but in the case of Griffith, there really isn't that much to go on. Other than he was born a peasant and that he always dreamed of becoming a King, neither the Manga nor the anime has really offered up much on Griffith's past, or what could have made him into the scumbag we see when the story begins. What we do know, however, is that as a child, Griffith was given a strange crimson colored egg shaped pendant called a "<a href="http://berserk.wikia.com/wiki/Behelit" target="_blank">Behelit</a>" And that he was told that it would guide him to his destiny. And we know that when he came of age he formed the Band of the Hawk with Casca and some other secondary characters that I don't want to get into. What is important here is the Behlit, Griffith carried it with him as a good luck talisman pretty much all of his life. The importance of the Behlit is best summed up by this bit of foreshadowing:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTHh972DI5kj1Cmz9bekXWAKBWk4YRBy0cy-5u4w4RNnDalUA19SfXNKvZdxjwNgvW7REGYRdDv5FQLk4r2k-81DV5LxHSNKss2mL1uSwHK6cWm4a6OrVOYTmMgEPs4TWm1wLao0IR2PEI/s1600/Foreshadowing+the+Eclipse2..jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTHh972DI5kj1Cmz9bekXWAKBWk4YRBy0cy-5u4w4RNnDalUA19SfXNKvZdxjwNgvW7REGYRdDv5FQLk4r2k-81DV5LxHSNKss2mL1uSwHK6cWm4a6OrVOYTmMgEPs4TWm1wLao0IR2PEI/s320/Foreshadowing+the+Eclipse2..jpg" width="218" /></a></div>
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Anyway, back to the present. Before Guts leaves the Band of the Hawk. Griffith tries to stop him in a scene that also reveals what kind of man he is. Basically, when Guts first joined the Hawks, Griffith said flat out that he was his to control and do with as he wishes. And that only death could free him from that control. Now that Guts wants to leave, well, as I said, Griffith's not happy about it. In fact, it pisses him off. So, just like when he was recruited, Griffith challenges Guts to a duel. If Guts wins, he's free to go. This is a very revealing moment to me. Not only is Griffith manipulative, he's also controlling. To him, his comrades aren't people, they're toys. Toys that he controls and he's free to do whatever he wants to. He dosesn't care about them, why would he, they exist to solely to support him. Guts' may or not be the exception, and I say that because after Guts win the duel, Griffith becomes incredibly depressed. So depressed, that to console himself, or (and I suspect more likely) to reassert his manhood or something, he seduces (and has sex with) his bride to be, Midland's young Princess Charlotte. Some have viewed this scene as Griffith trying to speed up his plans for the throne. I completely disagree. Y'all, as much as I hate him, Griffith isn't an idiot. He knows that if he's caught with the Princess before they are married, he'll get skinned alive and everything he worked for will be for nothing. No, this is someone who is depressed and trying to drown out his depression. Some have also viewed Griffith's depression and his actions here as him having romantic feelings for Guts. While there are scenes in the story that suggest that Griffith is at least bisexual, I doubt that he had any feelings of the sort for him. In my opinion, Griffith sees Guts' leaving as a betrayal. That despite his words, he did see Guts as a friend of sorts. But him leaving to live his own life and not support him and his dream? Nope, he's turning his back on me. We can't have that.<br />
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Anyway, Griffith is caught. And naturally, the King of Midland is very upset by his actions. He throws Griffith into the hands of the castle interrogator and brands the rest of the Band of the Hawk as traitors. Under Casca's leadership, they manage to flee Midland and hide out in the surrounding countryside. A year passes, and Guts eventually hears of Griffiths and the Band of the Hawks fate. And he rejoins them. Casca confronts him and blames him for what happened to Griffith. But by then, she's tired, burdened by the mantle of leadership. It's also here that they officially become a couple:
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Well, to make a long story short, Guts finally realizes, that what he's been seeking his whole life wasn't a dream worthy of Griffith. But a family, a sense of belonging. And that he had had it all this time with the Hawks. They had given him everything he had ever wanted in life. Casca, similarly, has found in Guts the acceptance and love that she would have never gotten from Griffith, and through that she has rediscovered her femininity. Griffith had been the capstone that had held them all together, but now they've outgrown him. They have each other. Problem is that they don't realize the latter, and Guts agrees to help them rescue Griffith. And when they find him....you know what, I'm just gonna show you (sorry for the lack of subtitles guys, but this was the best clip I could find, watch):
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Griffith makes his choice.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Griffith is reborn as Demon Lord Femto. </td></tr>
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These are the God Hands, God-like Demon Lords that explain themselves to be the right hand of the divine, and they have appeared now at Griffith's call because he's been chosen by fate to join their number. This is where <a href="http://thesummersleeper.blogspot.com/2016/04/berserk-main-characters-analysis-part.html" target="_blank">Griffith's betrayal that I mentioned in the first post happens</a>. You see, In order to become a demon, he needs to sacrifice someone close to him, like a family member or friend. Griffith, being the grateful bastard that he is (sarcasm) accepts the God Hand's offer and willingly sacrifices The Band of the Hawk. What happens next is a slaughter fest, demons kill and devour all of Hawks members one by one, save for Casca, Guts and one other character who was absent when these events took place. Griffith is then reborn as the Demon Lord Femto.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Guts survives.</td></tr>
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What happens next is so disturbing, I'm not even going to show it. Griffith/Femto then rapes Casca in a pool of their former comrades' blood. Yeah, he has demons hold her down and everything. And in the Manga, you see it in explicit detail. This was one part of the story I really didn't understand for a while. Why did he do it? My friend who is a Berserk fanboy tried to pass it off as part of the ritual that turned him into a demon, but that's a fat load of BS. Why? Because his transformation was complete when he did it, that's why! And where was Guts while this was going on, you might ask? Well, he did try to stop it. Hell, he had to sever his own arm to do so. But he was then pinned down and forced to watch with one of his eyes gouged out. Now, from a narrative standpoint, this whole horrific chapter can be seen as a rebirth of Guts, Casca and Griffith. Well, ok, Griffith's rebirth isn't so much of a rebirth as it is his true self-being manifest. He was always this evil, but now that evil has come out, and he is ready to unleash it upon the world. Guts rebirth is more symbolic, he was born amidst blood and death, and him surviving this can be seen as him being born again as an embodiment of rage that he will become. It's a rebirth of Casca because, well, after this her mind is destroyed, reduced to the cognitive functions of a child to block out the events. And it can be seen as her character coming full circle. She was saved from being raped by a nobleman by Griffith. Hell, she idolized him, and this is how he repays her loyalty, by ruining her just like that nobleman tried to do all those years ago. There are some fans out there who say that Casca actually LIKED what Griffith does to her. If you're one of those people, get away from my blog, <i style="font-weight: bold;">YOU'RE A FUCKING PIG! </i><br />
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But this brings us back to my original question, Why did Griffith rape her? Well, the answer is that he did it out of spite. He saw what Casca and Guts meant to each other, and how they didn't need him anymore. And he couldn't stand it. This one act of sexual violence is him reasserting his authority over both of them in the most painful and brutal way possible. Guts and Casca do escape, and shortly thereafter, Guts begins his quest for revenge.<br />
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This is as far as I'm going to go when it comes to analyzing these characters. Guys, this Manga is 37 volumes long and is as complex as any of Game of Thrones books. If I tried to look at everything, I would be here for the next two or three years. But I will give you a synopsis of what happens after this events, as well as my final thoughts on the series.<br />
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Tune in next week for that.<br />
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And I'm out. later guys. <br />
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Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-70739452970407008222016-04-12T16:59:00.001-07:002016-07-19T16:22:02.233-07:00Berserk main characters analysis Part Two: Casca (Golden Age Arc). *Spoiler and Mature Content Warning*.
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Before we get started, I have a bit of an announcement. I have started a Patreon page to help keep both this blog and my YouTube Channel alive. Don't worry, I'm not going to charge anything for anyone to see this blog or my videos, but I need a little help. I'm serious guys,<i><b> I NEED</b></i> your help to keep doing this. I don't like asking and I HATE begging for money, but I really have no choice now. I'm flat broke, and I can't find a job outside of this blog and Youtube. Guys, there's just no way for me to say this with any pride: Please, I know I don't deserve it but, please....<b><i>HELP ME</i></b>.<br />
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Here are the links to my Patreon, I hope you all will consider it:<br />
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My Patreon: <a href="https://www.patreon.com/WillEnglish?ty=h">https://www.patreon.com/WillEnglish?ty=h</a><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Casca holding her own against Guts when they first met. </td></tr>
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Now That I've proven that I have no shame. Let's continue on with where we left off last week. And just like last time: <b><i>SPOILER ALERT!</i></b><br />
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<a href="http://thesummersleeper.blogspot.com/2016/04/berserk-main-characters-analysis-part.html" target="_blank">When we last left Guts</a>, he had just been recruited by Griffith into his company of mercenary, The Band of the Hawk, It's also here that we meet <a href="http://berserk.wikia.com/wiki/Casca" target="_blank">Casca</a>, the only woman in the company. But unlike Gut's adoptive mother, she's not the camp whore. No, she's second in command and is as good with a sword as any of the men. Hell, when they first meet, she's able to hold her own against Guts, blow for blow. But anyway, that other thing that characterizes Casca, and this is a very important detail, is her undying loyalty to Griffith.<br />
Why is she so loyal to him? Well to understand that we need to go to her past.<br />
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Casca was born a peasant, and she accepted</div>
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that all of the hardships that peasants had to endure. Midland was (and still was by the time Guts joined the Band of the Hawk) in the middle of a Hundred Year War. And she had lived through crops getting trampled, people getting kidnapped, the pillaging, the slaughter, all of that. She was young and accepted being helpless. Then one day, a local Nobleman came and took her with him, promising her parents a better life for her....but in actuality all he wanted to do was rape her. He would have succeeded too, if Griffith hadn't been passing by and intervened. The strangest part about this whole scene is that he didn't actually save her, not the traditional sense. He threw his sword down and told her to make a choice. To simplify: she could be weak and accept her fate, or she could be strong and fight back.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Casca makes her choice. </td></tr>
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Casca chose the latter. Ever since that day, she has been at his side. Griffith had saved her life, and in return, she gave him everything, effectively throwing away her both her childhood and her femininity completely in exchange for the strength to stand on her own....except that's not what she's doing at all. Sure she becomes strong, but all of that strength she's gained was so that she could be of use to Griffith. She basically worships the man, and wants his attention, his love. Even though she kinda sorta knows that Griffith doesn't see her that way. Still, she tries to be of use to him....and then Guts enters the picture.<br />
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Not to jump ahead, because I wanna talk about this more when we talk about Griffith, but the short of it is: Griffith starts to play favorites and favors Guts over the other members of the Band of the Hawk and Casca dosen't like this one little bit. And starts acting hostile towards him. But as the story progresses, she starts to open up to Guts, and probably for the first time in her life, starts to love someone who isn't Griffith, and in that process, she rediscovers her femininity. There's even this hilarious scene from both the anime and the Manga in where Casca wears a dress and everyone is shocked to see her in it.<br />
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Because it's so out of character. But anyway, things seem<br />
to be going good, at this point. Guts and Casca are a couple (unofficially anyway), The Band of the Hawk has single handedly ended Midland's 100 year war and Griffith is set to marry Midland's Princess Charlotte and achieve his ambition of becoming King...and then Guts decides to leave the Band of the Hawk. Why did he do this? Because of Griffith.<br />
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Find out how next week, when we are finally gonna talk about him.<br />
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And I'm out guys, see you later. <br />
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Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-59186611446861626042016-04-05T14:39:00.000-07:002016-09-27T13:47:04.803-07:00Berserk main characters analysis Part One:Introduction and Guts (Golden Age Arc) *Spoiler Warning* . <div style="text-align: center;">
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This is one topic I've wanted to cover ever since I woke this blog back up. Yes, because I'm an anime and manga fan, but more so because of how fascinating Berserk as a series actually is. Even so, I held off on doing it since I know that many who actually read this blog aren't THAT interested in all the nerdy stuff I talk about (or if they are, they don't tell me. Seriously who do I gotta bribe to fill up my comments section? *laughs* kidding), and I wanted to let what I had to say cook in my noggin until it came out as a piping hot thought. Whether that time is now, I don't know. But I'm gonna talk about it anyway. Also, guys,<b> I can't analysis any aspect of this series without spoiling it, so if you don't want spoilers, turn away now. </b>Oh, and some of the pictures I'm using for this are actually pretty violent and disturbing. You've been warned. <b> </b><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOuuwtSlpsyCio1vV08HGd4jSl3LLoPK5LnUKRB-09FQ33VQk831_k70QsFOzawV-E0wr8KicL-gVG4gdniSbAyTA25V1XUj5LPUhk0psmTFhHSpjQVOJtpMeYCpDLAqWaVu0CQZMurE2n/s1600/Berserk_vol01.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOuuwtSlpsyCio1vV08HGd4jSl3LLoPK5LnUKRB-09FQ33VQk831_k70QsFOzawV-E0wr8KicL-gVG4gdniSbAyTA25V1XUj5LPUhk0psmTFhHSpjQVOJtpMeYCpDLAqWaVu0CQZMurE2n/s320/Berserk_vol01.jpg" width="230" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Berserk's first volume cover. featuring Guts.</td></tr>
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Anyway, for those who don't know, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berserk_(manga)" target="_blank">Berserk </a> is a Dark Fantasy manga (Japanese Comic Books) series created by artist <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kentaro_Miura" target="_blank">Kentaro Miura</a>, Set in a familiar medieval Europe-inspired Fantasy setting called 'Midland' the plot revolves around a demon slayer named Guts and his quest for revenge against His former Commander/best friend, Griffith, who betrayed and sacrificed his former comrades, The Band of the Hawk, to demons in exchange for power (more on that later). I first heard about it from a friend of mine who fanboyed over this series to the point of obnoxiousness and kinda turned me off it for a while. That is until I spoke some other friends who were more moderate fans, and based on their recommendations, I decided to check out the manga....all <i><b>37 </b></i>volumes of it. Yeah, Berserk began serialization in 1989 and despite its length, there's still no end in sight. But that's neither here nor there.<br />
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What is there, however, is a rich, complex, mature Dark Fantasy that I've often compared to The Song of Ice and Fire series (AKA Game of Thrones), at least in terms of scope. And also in terms of its characters. Now, Just like Game of Thrones, Berserk has a lot of major and minor characters with their own stories. But it's generally agreed that the three characters that drive the story are <a href="http://berserk.wikia.com/wiki/Guts" target="_blank">Guts</a>, his comrade in arms and lover <a href="http://berserk.wikia.com/wiki/Casca" target="_blank">Casca</a> and their former commander <a href="http://berserk.wikia.com/wiki/Griffith" target="_blank">Griffith </a>. And it's these three characters that we are going to be focusing on. I don't want to go into too much depth, but there is a lot to talk about and with these three characters alone. So for the sake of my own sanity, here's what I'm going to do, I'm going to break this up into multiple parts. Each part will introduce a character, and each part after will expand upon the previous one, and then I'll wrap it up with my own opinion on each once the other parts are done. Let's start with our star, Guts.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbWtdLRT63GLUy5VoEr9OncKlRVonoAa-Ueh2m_kwlxDw4yY6KJsR_zZ2219DxHSw2y8Z81GAbgpZKVD7WNU6kIk1GuoVV4p0pfeqFKLhGXRwn2OLEd8KsL17Y0ddKrpDUN1UYinZk9-aU/s1600/Gut%2527s+birth..jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="148" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbWtdLRT63GLUy5VoEr9OncKlRVonoAa-Ueh2m_kwlxDw4yY6KJsR_zZ2219DxHSw2y8Z81GAbgpZKVD7WNU6kIk1GuoVV4p0pfeqFKLhGXRwn2OLEd8KsL17Y0ddKrpDUN1UYinZk9-aU/s200/Gut%2527s+birth..jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Gut's birth.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhaE5OmE5RzNyN1GzOxVRfF4u8UOB9Alq9arHuH7isV_ETxZDed4Kn5c5PyrTAzfxWiqbdXw8-htVI5C9V90U58P_PdDwTmT8hoUYJWGgpd9h1qh3rmci_rlfkSjhMkl9WvbWIrmkl_t4SF/s1600/Casca%252C+Guts+and+Griffif.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhaE5OmE5RzNyN1GzOxVRfF4u8UOB9Alq9arHuH7isV_ETxZDed4Kn5c5PyrTAzfxWiqbdXw8-htVI5C9V90U58P_PdDwTmT8hoUYJWGgpd9h1qh3rmci_rlfkSjhMkl9WvbWIrmkl_t4SF/s200/Casca%252C+Guts+and+Griffif.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">From left to right: Casca, Guts, and Griffith. </td></tr>
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Gut's past is darker than any you might find in a George R. R. Martin story. His village was massacred and he was born from the corpse of his mother...who was hung from a tree. No really. Somehow not dying from hitting the ground or the elements, Guts was discovered by a band of roaming mercenaries and adopted by the camp whore...who then died of disease some short years later. having nowhere else to turn, Guts was taken under the wing of the mercenary leader Gambino. Who taught him how to use a sword from the age of 6, and abused Guts in ways that I don't wanna talk about. Anyway, to skip ahead a bit, After Guts killed a crazed Gambino in self-defense, he became a lone mercenary. Until he was discovered by Griffith and recruited into The Band of the Hawk. I don't want this analysis to sound like a Wiki page, but this information is important to understanding Guts as a character. When he is recruited by Griffith, Guts is the very definition of a lone wolf, All he does is go around from battle to battle, fighting and killing as much as he wants. He has no ambition, no direction, and he doesn't seem to want any. His best friend is his sword and he doesn't want any others...until he meets Casca, Griffith and the rest of the Band of the Hawk. They would be his first taste of camaraderie, friendship, and even love. This leads us nicely into part two, where we will talk about Casca and her relationship with Guts and how it changes the both of them....next week.<br />
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Before we go, I want to quickly bust a myth that has built up around Guts over the years. It's something that my Berserk fanboy friend told me and, I've heard it from other fans around the internet as well. First, take a look at this:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxM4gB2Ghc_eL9qwXGUQHwmBYeNbBJWIyGgIqTa5FyUUQfz6R-FkUDi93hevfeVG5m7JevoLpAWzwec49_hJvnrtGCDPjYaOOP5qxNvyAZPEtIw8XnQAT5Cd8I-tzhCM3QGlQEGGRh0lmK/s1600/Dragonslayer_Coloured.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxM4gB2Ghc_eL9qwXGUQHwmBYeNbBJWIyGgIqTa5FyUUQfz6R-FkUDi93hevfeVG5m7JevoLpAWzwec49_hJvnrtGCDPjYaOOP5qxNvyAZPEtIw8XnQAT5Cd8I-tzhCM3QGlQEGGRh0lmK/s320/Dragonslayer_Coloured.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiimdlq9OXfEjbGq_7AtqoomvSzUoFt2CFlRYLfogAySNPhdy5YvFLeRw3HHHm14ouz04VMC7V6o5pB4qrWTMAKH9Ae9J2t5ZbuaudrAKjQeHvFPtMqQgnNTt4Yh0TdxhfMRYdF0fdUSN5u/s1600/pre+berserk+giant+sword.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiimdlq9OXfEjbGq_7AtqoomvSzUoFt2CFlRYLfogAySNPhdy5YvFLeRw3HHHm14ouz04VMC7V6o5pB4qrWTMAKH9Ae9J2t5ZbuaudrAKjQeHvFPtMqQgnNTt4Yh0TdxhfMRYdF0fdUSN5u/s320/pre+berserk+giant+sword.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small; text-align: start;">Could this be the sword that birthed Dragonslayer? </span></td></tr>
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That, dear reader, is Gut's iconic sword, <a href="http://berserk.wikia.com/wiki/Dragonslayer" target="_blank">Dragonslayer</a>. A massive 400-pound slab of iron and steel that Guts wields after Griffith's betrayal. Since their debut, Guts and Dragonslayer have influenced countless other characters with similar weapons, most famously <a href="http://vsbattles.wikia.com/wiki/Cloud_Strife" target="_blank">Cloud Strife and his Buster Sword </a>from the game Final Fantasy VII. The fans and several reputable sources say that Guts was the first anime and/or manga (some would even argue the first in the whole of fiction) character to use such a ridiculously oversized weapon. Well, I am here to tell you that that is completely wrong. While it's impossible to pinpoint exactly when or what series first used giant swords, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kentaro_Miura" target="_blank">Kentaro Miura</a> himself has often cited a manga series from 1978 called <a href="http://mangafox.me/manga/pygmalio/" target="_blank">Pygmalion</a> for having an oversized sword. Could this series be where he got the idea? I don't know. But considering that the 1970's are often remembered as the "Golden Age of Manga," it's not outside the realm of possibility. And of course, there are historical two-handed swords, like the Scottish Claymore. And there is the possibility of an oversized weapon in other fantasy literature, but I don't want to get into that. The point is, Berserk wasn't the first manga to have an oversized weapon. It merely popularized the idea.<br />
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That's all from me for now, see you in part 2. <br />
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Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1270849279311193293.post-25398741480939774392016-03-29T17:06:00.000-07:002016-03-29T17:50:26.137-07:00The Furthest Shore (Earthsea Cycle): First impressions. <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMMXjlRnK3tBvp7UINTqAOKfn7z6Tq7Gu6uM21AEhztYa-6wKhfnh8ZrXg59AMdLZImlxbey1fNuFwfnfc0fM_TgJJboae0CfFH7lQpOTWtZ1R_qHfViHB3a3pAbEwD0sE1zAiQKt7vInd/s1600/blogger-image-810757460.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMMXjlRnK3tBvp7UINTqAOKfn7z6Tq7Gu6uM21AEhztYa-6wKhfnh8ZrXg59AMdLZImlxbey1fNuFwfnfc0fM_TgJJboae0CfFH7lQpOTWtZ1R_qHfViHB3a3pAbEwD0sE1zAiQKt7vInd/s320/blogger-image-810757460.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0689845340/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=0689845340&linkCode=as2&tag=awesostufffor-20&linkId=4ZICSNUNS63IYA2Z" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://ws-na.amazon-adsystem.com/widgets/q?_encoding=UTF8&ASIN=0689845340&Format=_SL250_&ID=AsinImage&MarketPlace=US&ServiceVersion=20070822&WS=1&tag=awesostufffor-20" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">click this picture to buy the book<br />
for yourself.</td></tr>
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<img alt="" border="0" src="http://ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?t=awesostufffor-20&l=as2&o=1&a=0689845340" height="1" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" />I have very conflicting opinions when it comes to giving first impressions on things. On the one hand I like doing it because I can still give my opinions on something as I'm experiencing them. On the other hand, the opinion I give might turn out to be an incompletely thought and is much harder to pin down objectively. In the case of <i>The Furthest Shore, </i>I've yet to read the entire book, and so I have to urge you to take what I say about it with A LOT of salt and consider it as an incomplete thought. <br />
Anyway, <i>The Furthest Shore </i>is the third book in Ursula K. Le Guin's Earthsea series. And thankfully, unlike <a href="http://thesummersleeper.blogspot.com/2016/03/wizard-of-earthsea-and-tomb-of-atuan.html" target="_blank">The Tomb of Atuan</a> Ged is once again a central character...but he's still not the main character. No, this time the main character is a Prince named Arren from the kingdom of Enland. Who has come to visit Ged, now Archmage of Roke's magic university, to discuss with him a very dire matter. Magic seems to be dying from the world and nobody knows why. Ged takes it upon himself to go forth with Arren and solve the mystery. I'm not real sure what to make of Arren, personally. He's basically a male version of Tenar from the last book, at least in the sense that he's almost completely ignorant of the world outside of his homeland. but the other side of this, and his entire reason for staying in the story so far, is that he's irrationally smitten with Ged and wants to learn from him. Granted, that's what I would want to do, but still. Hell, he begs early on to stay at Roke and become his page/servent. Now, I know that that's a common theme in this series, they're all coming of age stories. But it feels like Le Guin is <br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ged AKA Sparrowhawk.</td></tr>
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repeating herself just a bit. at least so far. I will have to get back to you on how Arren develops; but for now let's take a quick look at Ged. He hasn't changed all that much from the second book, save that he's physically older now, and has become Archmage of Roke's school of magic. That's where he was always going to end up. There was no question about that. But the question I have is...where can his development as a character go from here? Realistically, there's really no more reason for him to be in the story at this point. He's fulfilled his dream, he's the Archmage, a leader that's looked up too and respected around the world. And so far, there's no all powerful Dark Lord Sauron-type character for him to defeat. and he's already overcame his greatest character flaw, his arrogance, in the first book. So where exactly can he go from here, besides just being a mentor? I dunno, I honestly couldn't tell you at this point. And that's one reason I want to keep going. To see where he's gonna end up...at least until I can get my hands on <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Other_Wind" target="_blank">The Other Wind</a>.<br />
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Anyway, Overall, I am enjoying this story. I can't wait to see what happens next. And when I do, then I'll give my complete thoughts on the series as a whole.<br />
And I'm out. Later.<br />
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Tet64http://www.blogger.com/profile/13841031113473936247noreply@blogger.com0