Hey yalls! Guess you didn’t expect my absent for about two or so weeks did you? Well around the holiday seasons, working at a store, and being a cashier goes hand in hand with…time consumption overload. There’s also my mother, and little brother having visited me recently. They live in Kansas so of course I opted to spend as much time as I could with them over seeing movies, anime, and writing while they were visiting.
Besides my movie review of the live action Attack On Titan film I really didn’t plan anything ahead. There’s also a promised random list on haunted roads that turned out awful to be honest. I still plan on posting it as something I scrapped. I mean, I did some research, and might as well post it. I also got some other promises to fulfill since I did after all announce them.
I’m currently redoing a year old review of Persona 3 The Movie: No. 1, Spring of Birth because I want to review the films, and I got inspired from viewing the myanimelist page for the movie seeing the lack of criticism from fans towards the film. I knew not everything I wanted, or everything that made the games great would fit together seamlessly in film format. However, I didn’t the films to not only be bad as stand alone films, but also make one of my favorite video game storyline so boring to see onscreen. Can’t really say when I’ll come back, and post stuff. It should soon, if customers don’t come attacking me during black Friday that is. I’ll wait and see.
Here’s some quick impressions on things I saw to let you know what I could possibly write a review on in the future.
Strike Back: Season 1 – It’s an okay series. On a scale, it would get a 6 since the characters don’t develop beyond the first two episodes. Some of the writing is standard action film formula from go foreign place to save someone, a rescue mission gone wrong, or go to prison in foreign prison to rescue an assassin. It’s formulaic in its first season, but the action scenes are surprisingly good for a tv series. So for an action junkie it’s satisfactory.
Rurouni Kenshin (2012 Live Action Movie) – I’ve never the seen the anime series, or read the manga of the same name. I went into this live action film completely blind, and got to say for someone who has no knowledge of the series it was a great film. It had a good pace, the writing was solid, and while it had too many characters, and unequal screen time they all felt purposeful. Not to forget the excellent score for the film is worth noting. The action scenes while in short supply are expertly filmed, and well choreographed. I got my money’s worth as a fan of Samurai films, and would suggest anyone to see it regardless of experience with the series. It’s final rating I can confirm is a 9/10.
Rurouni Kenshin Kyoto Inferno (2013) – I still haven’t gotten around to seeing the film in the trilogy, but so far this was the weakest film in the series. One thing that wasn’t addressed were the many characters that disappeared for large portions of the film. While the balancing is better than expected when the film piles up more characters there are still instances of characters disappearing, and reappearing out of nowhere. There were a couple, but one in particular goes out to help the protagonist in the first act, and in the climax finally appears again in the film. Characterization is excellent, as well as the acting, music, and fight choreography carry over from the previous film. I still don’t know what the final rating will be, but rest assured it’ll get a positive 7 or 8 once I collected my entire thoughts on it.
Zero Hour – I only saw one episode of this docudrama series, and honestly don’t plan on reviewing it since my weakest point of writing is critically analyzing documentaries. However, I did see the episode that focus on Columbine, and I felt given the sensitive nature of the subject matter I felt the events portrayal of the event was done right. It gave me a good idea of what actually happened that day, and what I appreciated was there was no single reason for why the incident happen. Given the nature of news outlet I’m rather thankful the episode didn’t attempt to minimize a serious, and growing issue of school violence.
Owari of the End – It currently sitting at a 4, and nothing was special about this shounen series. It was repetitive in hammering the point the lead character lost his family. There’s also a large number of “just because” logic behind the writing, and lack of detail on a number of things regarding the world presented. We follow newbie recruits in the series, and yet, they are able to hold their own better than the experience Anti-Vamp Team (my name for them). Also, the intro of the series pretty much shows everything that happens in the first season. There is literally no progression of shown pass that in the series. The only way I kept making myself see this anime was pretending it wanted to be a Yaoi. With this mindset, it became more watchable since the writing unintentionally gives that impression, but doesn’t make the series any better. At least the music is good.
Knights of Sidonia Season 2 – Like the first season it would also a get a 2. The reason being it’s the most trite sci-fi series possibly ever written. It’s first season was entirely telegraphed, and predictable. That carried to season two, but made worse when lingering issues remained unsolved. There’s an episode showing a parasitic creature controlling a power person in Sidonia, and the series ends without addressing this issue. It goes unresolved. Then there’s a talking Bear who a nurse, and a cook that also never gets explained. One achievement this series will get from me is that it’s the first sci-fi, first anime, and first 3D animated series to ever make me fall asleep. That how bored I was seeing this series. I would rename it sci-fi since it has allot tropes associated with the genres without subversion.
Corpse Bride – It’s not as good as Tim Burton other animated films like The Nightmare Before Christmas, and Frankenweenie. It’s mostly because of its runtime being 78 minutes. So, things feel rushed, and there’s uneven length between musical numbers. I liked the animation, the story was okay, and the music was okay. The voice acting was adequate. I liked it, though on a rating scale it would probably fall into a 7 or 6.
Take care, and I’ll be back soon. As usuals, insert catchphrase here.
Personafication 