Posted by Michael Pinto on Sep 18, 2008 in Animation
It’s been a while since the last episode of Omakase Maidokuro but I never grow tired of finding a new episode in my iTunes directory. To me the show represents the next phase for anime which will be studios in Japan releasing their work to a worldwide audience simultaneously. It will start small (and the giant film studios aren’t going any where for a long time) but my bet is that the next generation of anime will see YouTube and iTunes in the same way that Viz deals with Cartoon Network today. And as computer help make animation cheaper and worldwide collaboration becomes the norm I think we’ll see a creative revolution that follows and “changes the rules”.
Posted by Michael Pinto on Sep 18, 2008 in Comic Books
I love the work of illustrator Skottie Young, shown above is a cover for The Wonderful Wizard Of Oz #1 which is an 8 part series that is starting in December. I’m impressed that Marvel is tackling such a classic story instead of the same old superhero stuff — and it’s nice to see that Skottie from both the imagery from the film and the original Edwardian book illustrations. Just look at this detail of Dorothy in action:
Posted by Michael Pinto on Sep 18, 2008 in Comic Books
Shown above is a wonderful detail from the cover art for Saga of The Swamp Thing Book One (the hard cover edition which is due out in December), the illustration is by artists Stephen Bissett and John Totleben. What makes this cover stand out is that it reminds me of a classical painting, not only that but the artists managed to make swamp thing look beautiful too! Here’s the full cover:
Posted by Michael Pinto on Sep 18, 2008 in Science
Now I’ll grant you that the main function of Moonbase Alpha was to look after the nuclear waste generated on Earth, but this new NASA concept of having a nuclear power station on the moon does remind one a great deal of Space:1999:
“Nuclear power could make a comeback beyond Earth if NASA goes forward with a proposed a fission reactor in its future moon base. A fission-powered system could generate up to 40 kilowatts and give any lunar outpost enough power to supply eight houses on Earth. More importantly, astronauts will require a reliable and steady energy source on the moon and Mars.”
“Each Japanese Popping Edamame Keychain has three beans. The end beans are small and immature. The middle bean, however, has one of 12 random faces printed on it. Why? We don’t know, but there is nothing like the smile it puts on your face. And the beans are connected to some sort of elastic band, so they pop back in to be popped again as many times as you want. It sounds silly, but trust us, these things are highly addictive. They are also a great way to keep your fingers busy during boring meetings and your mood positive – because no one can frown when their edamame smiles.”
Posted by Michael Pinto on Sep 17, 2008 in Pulp Fiction
Have they no shame? Of course not! Douglas Adams wrote five books in the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy series, but not being happy with the lame movie that was pumped out it seems that publishers have picked an author to slug out a sixth novel in the series. The PR around the book claims that Adams always wanted to write a sixth book, but I think it’s pretty lame stuffing words into his mouth at this point:
“Douglas Adams died in 2001, having written five of the enduringly popular Hitchhiker books – still inaccurately dubbed a trilogy. About 16 million copies of the books have been sold worldwide, but fans were left disappointed when it seemed as though Adams’ early death ended the series with all the main characters seemingly meeting a grizzly end. Children’s author Eoin Colfer has been chosen to write the sixth of the series by Adams’ widow Jane Belson. He writes of his joy at being able to continue the series with the new book And Another Thing.”
Posted by Michael Pinto on Sep 17, 2008 in Animation
The above video is from a One Piece fanboy who edited several sword duels from the aired 4Kids version of the show followed by the DVDs issued by FUNimation. I’d have to say that i agree with the editor that the FUNimation version blows the 4Kids version out of the water. Now granted that the business goals of 4Kids is to recreate their success with Pokemon, but I have to say that FUNimation knows how to stay true to the series. It’s also interesting for me to see a movement within fandom urging fellow fanboys to support FUNimation by buying the DVDs instead of downloading. Here’s where you can find the series on Amazon:
Posted by Michael Pinto on Sep 16, 2008 in Dr. Who
Ah yes the Daleks are hell bent on exterminating the good Doctor and any soda or beer residue that may stain your beloved coffee table! Of course I know full well that if you’re a real Dr. Who fanboy you’ll never break these Dalek coasters out of their tin case to be shoved under your beverage (and be stained no less!), but instead they’ll proudly gather dust on your bookshelves:
I tend to be against Hollywood remakes but this seven minute clip of The Day The Earth Stood Still looks pretty well produced, and frankly having the likes Kathy Bates and John Cleese makes it even more promising. The film is due out on December 12th, here’s a recent trailer:
Posted by Michael Pinto on Sep 16, 2008 in Animation
The new Lucky Star OVA DVD isn’t due out until September 26th, but we’re slowly starting to see more and more hints of what it will look like. Shown above is a trailer, I love the faux videogame footage — and that doggie character looks too cute!
Posted by Michael Pinto on Sep 16, 2008 in Star Trek
It depresses me no end to see Williams Shatner being forced to shill copies of TekWar comic books, when he should be a cornerstone to the upcoming Star Trek film. As someone who grew up loving Star Trek as a kid it’s depressing for me to see the way that they’re treating William Shatner. It would be one thing if Nimoy wasn’t in the film, but he is and that’s just rubbing salt in the wound. And sadly at this point it seems more and more like this isn’t some sort of Andy Kaufman stunt to get PR for the film — but shoving Shat out into the cold.
At the end of the below excerpt of an interview Shatner argues that that Star Trek is science fiction and it’s easy to write him into a script. But I’ll take that a step further — not only is it easy to write him into a script, but if they did it in the right way they could have done it as a future flashback or something. I feel many of the old Trek movies were a mixed bag, so there’s no reason you have slavishly follow the plot if you feel like you’re reinventing the series.
No doubt I’ll be there on line when the film hits the street with my fellow fanboys, but after reading this I’m not sure that I’d love the show as much from this point on:
“Shatner will have his name emblazoned in the title of the new comics, and it would have been a nice tie-in if the early issues were coming out amid the hoopla of his appearance in the next “Star Trek” film, the J.J. Abrams reboot set for May, but that’s a party he is not invited to. Only Leonard Nimoy, sharing the role of Spock, will be returning to the cast, which will otherwise feature young actors portraying Kirk, Spock and the rest of the crew fresh from Starfleet Academy.
Posted by Michael Pinto on Sep 16, 2008 in Science
While NASA is working away at getting back to the moon, China is slowly building up an amazing manned space program with a strong focus. It was only back 2003 that they had their first manned launch, and now by the end of the month they’ll perform a spacewalk on live TV:
“China is gearing up for its third manned spaceflight, set to include its first ever spacewalk, later this month. The three-member crew is not yet named for the Shenzhou 7 mission, due to launch sometime between Sept. 25 and Sept. 30 from Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in Gansu Province, China, but a spokesman for the launch center told the Shanghai Daily newspaper that preparations were on track for liftoff.”
…It may not happen for a few years but my bet is at this rate China will beat the United States back to the moon. These programs take years to develop and by the time politicians are paying attention it will be too late. Of course it should be said that if the United States, Russia, Europe and China worked together my bet is that we could be talking about landing on Mars instead of going back to the moon (but sadly that is very much science fiction right now).
Posted by Michael Pinto on Sep 16, 2008 in Videogames
When I was a child we’d have to use physical LEGO bricks to build things, and even then only the most creative children might make up their own stories to accompany these self made inventions. But now videogame companies have solved this imagination problem once and for all!
Just kidding: Everyone knows that these games aren’t aimed at actual kids but overgrown fanboys like myself. Although while the wide range of vehicles does look cool in this title it would be nice to see a LEGO game that allowed the user to create and kitbash stuff as much as go through a linear story.
In the past two articles I’ve been writing about staying out late night in Tokyo when trains and busses make their last run at midnight.
Part 3: Last month I went to a restaurant in Shibuya real late with a special friend. I think my friend thought I was staying in Shinjuku, which isn’t too far, but actually I couldn’t find a hotel there and settled for Edogawa, which is quite a ways East of the center of town, almost as far as Tokyo Disneyland. It was 2 subway transfers and about 40 minutes from Shibuya. Taxis run all night. A Shibuya to Shinjuku taxi might be $30 or so, but a Shibuya to Edogawa would surely cost a lot more than a night at a normal hotel room.
But I figured that I really wanted to see my friend and would maybe either crash at their place or hang out in Shibuya until around 5 AM for the morning trains. Anyway what I wasn’t going to do was leave in a rush and risk getting stuck somewhere unfamiliar because of all the transfers to get back.
So after the dinner I said my mock teary farewells a decided to find a Manga Kissa (sometimes spelled Mangakisa) to hang out at. These are somewhat buzzworthy and controversial establishments typically on upper floors of buildings where you basically pay a fairly reasonable hourly fee to read their manga library.
Posted by Michael Pinto on Sep 15, 2008 in Animation
This Evangelion Rei USB Memory Stick is just too cute for words! Buffalo Japan will be doing a limited run of this Anime collectable which will store up to 4 gigs of files and is available at GeekStuff4U.com on pre-order.
Posted by Michael Pinto on Sep 15, 2008 in Japanese TV
The above video is from a Japanese game show called TV Champion. It’s very strange yet surrealistic watching all of these oversized mascots playing a game of soccer. My favorite part is when one character can’t lift his oversized head off the ground in front of the goal post! Apparently in other episodes the oversized mascots engage in other sporting activities (although there are other episodes that feature boring normal people who aren’t in mascot costumes).
What’s sad to me about this trailer is that director Terry Gilliam has to do such a hard sell for himself to sell the film The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus. Even if Brazil was the only film that Gilliam had made, we should all be waiting on line eager to see his next epic. Gilliam doesn’t always give you what you expect, but he’s always taking chances with his work and I wish there was more support in terms of marketing dollars to sell this.
The other thing that I love about Gilliam is that he’s always doing something original and interesting — it’s sad but perhaps in an age of movies that are remakes, based on old TV shows or comic book titles that’s why Hollywood doesn’t honor him. However I dare say that’s why he’s earned my respect and admiration. It’s sad but I predict long after Spider-Man 3 is a footnote that future generation will look back on Gilliam films with the love that they deserve. I beg all to support Terry today and not wait to rediscover him far in the future after his obituary is printed.
I know I’m old fashioned, but if you’re going to take 007 and force him to act as a peddler the least you can do is to associate him with luxury brands — but sadly the product placement being pushed for the next James Bond flick (Quantum of Solace which comes out in November) is Coke Zero. Would Mr. Bond like some fries with that?
If you’re in NYC you may get a chance to spot these tall bronze sculptures of Miffy and Hello Kitty at 53rd Street and Park Avenue which are designed by artist Tom Sachs.
Posted by Michael Pinto on Sep 12, 2008 in Animation
It’s an anime series about a cat. So you’re asking “and what else?” Nope that’s it — it’s about nothing else but seeing the world through the eyes of a little lost kitty! Chi’s Sweet Home (チーズスイートホーム) is based on a manga by Konami Kanata, the episodes are very short and have been airing since March of this year. By the way the word “Chi” in Japanese translates to “pee” which becomes the cat’s nickname after being adopted by family (Chi got her nickname while being housebroken). The series is a must watch if your cat fancying fanboy or fangurl.
This is an amazing interview with Ridley Scott, the man behind two of my fanboys favorites: Blade Runner and Alien. It’s amazing to think not just of the scope but the sheer scale of projects that Scott has tackled during the last thirty years. You can tell from this interview just how much he loves his craft, and I’m very impressed with background with fine arts and photography as a starting point. Extra points to Scott for mentioning my old teacher Henry Wolf (who was a brilliant graphic designer and photographer). It’s amazing to think that Scott almost became a fashion photographer.
