Posted by Michael Pinto on Feb 14, 2010 in Animation
There’s an old saying that behind every good joke there’s just a bit of truth: And the poster above seems to capture a certain contradiction about anime and anime fans which is interesting to say the least. I think part of the reason for this is that on a meta level most entertainment aimed ay kids is made to be so saccharine sweet that it seems that all of the life has been beaten out of it. For example if you look at the Disney channel so many of the shows look and sound like gentle sitcoms from a long past era — however my guess is that a certain number of kids want something more. In fact the best way to get a kid to read a book is to tell them that “you’re too young to read this book” and I think anime has that attraction to it. Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Feb 13, 2010 in Animation
This is an episode of Kaito Lenya which features the voice talents of Morning Musume member Reina Tanaka. What I love about this short is that they do a good job entertaining you even though the animation is low budget. By the way I realized looking at the animation that a few months ago on the DogaDoga7 Newtype YouTube channel that Noto Arisa mentioned this project (she’s pointing to the character that she does the voice over for): Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Feb 13, 2010 in Science
This cute video shows a chat between astronaut Mike Massimino on the ground feeding questions from Twitter to astronauts Nicholas Patrick and Robert Behnken who are hanging out at the International Space Station. As a sci fi fanboy what I love about this chat is how they go into detail on what outer space smells, sounds and looks like when you take a space walk.
The charm and the problem with the original Star Trek series was that there was never a mess that Captain james T. Kirk couldn’t get out of — and Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan turned this aspect of the series into a stellar plot device. But looking at this promo video of Star Trek Online: Borg Faction made me realize that what makes the Borg a brilliant plot device is that not only do they outclass Federation technology, but on top of that they’re pure evil. Read more…
Kevin Rose is famous for Digg, which has lost a bit of steam to Google when it comes to breaking news. However any illusions one might have had that Rose was on a siesta can’t be dispelled when you watch his take on why Google integrated Buzz into Gmail. To sum up Rose has the following interesting insights: Read more…
Sure everybody is making a fuss over Google Buzz, but the minute I watched this Emoticon Sushi Roll video by vlogger Taro I knew that I was looking at the next big thing in social media. When he’s not reinventing web 2.0 Taro has a YouTube channel which introduces folks to Japanese cooking. Being an artist my favorite dish is his Edvard Munch tribute: Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Feb 11, 2010 in Comic Books
I just love the character designs in those old school Peanuts comic strips, while they’re much more primitive than that later work of Charles Schulz there’s a powerful charm to them. On June 2nd Dark Horse will be releasing this 60th Anniversary Classic Peanuts: Charlie Brown in a limited edition (only 950!) which will feature a matching tin box, a button and a cute character booklet. Of course I noticed that the man behind this sculpture is none other than Craig Yoe who in addition to being a talented artist is an obsessive fanboy when it comes to the history of comic books.
Sometimes some of the best game concepts are the simple timeless ones, and Jenga is a great example of this: The games designed by Leslie Scott a Swahili speaking Brit living in Africa who designed the concept in the 70s and then brought it to the London Ty Fair in 1984. Since then 2.7 billion Jenga blocks have been sold owing to the joy of destroying your own leaning tower of Pisa. Doraemon Darake adds a Japanese twist to this old favorite by replacing those dull wooden blocks with (you guessed it) every anime fans favorite blue cat! And then instead of merely pulling out cats you have to do the opposite and construct a cat tower using chopsticks: Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Feb 10, 2010 in Animation
A good friend just gave this poster to me and I have to say that just seeing it made my inner child scream for sheer joy! Also fans of Star Blazers should take note: Amy Howard Wilson (the voice of Nova) has announced that at the ICON science fiction convention this year that Eddie Allen (the voice of Leader Desslok), Ken Meseroll (the voice of Derek Wildstar) and Tom Tweedy (the voice of Mark Venture) will be in attendance! The convention takes place March 26-28th in Stoney Brook, New York.
Posted by Michael Pinto on Feb 10, 2010 in Star Trek
Back in the day you’d only think about doing a sequel if a film was a cut above everything else — however these days if you’re a studio who is investing huge sums of money to get it right you plan to shoot several films at a time. Lucas did this with Star Wars in 1999, and the Matrix and Lord the Rings used the same formula. So you’d think if you were an executive at Paramount and you had J.J. Abrams signed up you wouldn’t be producing a one shot? Well that bet would be incorrect — and the next Trek film won’t be due out until 2012 at this rate. Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Feb 10, 2010 in Animation
You know when Dot Warner sings in Japanese she’s quite moe! I’m also surprised that they kept the English name for Pinky and the Brain. The other thing I noticed looking at these titles is that the only thing that seems dated is the Bill Clinton cameo — this makes sense given that the show ran from 1993 to 1998, but really dates the series to the 90s. And strangely enough when you look at the opening in Polish it seems to take on a slight Marx Brothers feeling to it: Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Feb 10, 2010 in Science
The shuttle looks like an aircraft and lands like one, yet we tend to forget that it’s a real spaceship — and flying a spaceship doesn’t look like an X-wing jetting into to the Death Star. And that’s what I love about this recent video footage from the current shuttle mission which shows the Endeavour performing a rendezvous pitch maneuver so that the crew members aboard the ISS can photograph the orbiter for any signs of damage it may have incurred during liftoff. By the way if you missed the launch of Expedition 23 here are some highlights of the dramatic night launch: Read more…
When I first came across this spot for the GunBuster Pachinko Machine I assumed that it dated from the 80s when the show first came out — but it seems that it’s part of a larger promotion that allows retro anime fans to watch the cult series online for free at this website! Aim for the Top! Gunbuster (トップをねらえ!) was quite a success for Gainax in the early days and the studio would go on to make other hits like Evangelion, FLCL and Mahoromatic to name a few. GunBuster was very typical of the shows from that era and featured giant robots, oversized insectoid space aliens and four lovely ladies who wear hot pink short shorts which match the new pachinko machine: Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Feb 9, 2010 in Star Wars
Shown above is a promotion for Stride Right Star wars sneakers from back in the day! And it seems that the great recession has hit The Force™ yet again as Payless ShoeSource and Stride Rite stores will be introducing a Star Wars show line in June or July. According to this article the line will feature Darth Vader and other characters (both cartoon and live action) from the George Lucas universe. If you buy the footwear at Stride Rite they’ll run from $35 to $55, but if you want to go to a lower budget Payless shoes will only be $15 to $20.
Posted by Michael Pinto on Feb 8, 2010 in Star Trek, Tech
I was tempted to write the headline for this story as Captain Picard giving his views on today’s tech scene but that wouldn’t be fair: What’s interesting is that Stewart finds Twitter limiting to express himself (well he is a Shakespearian actor after all!) yet he seems to almost be doing a commercial for Apple. It’s funny to hear that he avoids videogames for fear of not being able to quit. Stewart will be appearing on PBS in both Macbeth and Hamlet in April, and this interview was from Frontline.
Posted by Michael Pinto on Feb 8, 2010 in Star Trek
This is the prologue to the original opening of Star Trek as it was shown in Japan. The funny thing about this version is that the Japanese voice actor for Spock seems to be slightly more emotional in tone than Nimoy (although I could be reading into this). And in case you were wondering what McCoy sounds like here is another clip: Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Feb 8, 2010 in Comic Books
Jerry Robinson is best known as the comic book artist who helped to put Batman on the map along with Bob Kane — and credit for creating the Joker belongs to him. However sadly his other work is overlooked and that’s why I’m glad that Dark Horse is doing a proper reprint of Jet Scott. This wonderful science fiction themed newspaper strip debuted on September 28, 1953 in The New York Herald-Tribune. Read more…
I was pleasantly surprised to come across this Alfin Statue from Crusher Joe because I was convinced that I must be one of a handful of anime fanboys who still remember that amazing film. Yet sadly while most fans today know about Gundam or Yamato very few fans even know about Crusher Joe (クラッシャージョウ). So here’s why the film was important and worth getting your hands on: Read more…
When I came across the above photo I was blown away: I’ve seen Metropolis and looked at so many stills — yet I never came across a image that represented so well the amazing amount of work that went into this film. So I set on a quest to locate other behind-the-scenes glimpses of the work that Fritz Lang did before he fled Germany in 1933: Read more…
The irony of this Back to the Future Lights and Sound Mark I Delorean is that while it doesn’t have the ability to travel into the future just looking at the photo takes me back to 1985. And the strange thing about the 80s was that there was a very self aware consciousness that the decade had its own unique style and look — which I think that may be the real reason why they picked the DeLorean DMC-12 (1981–1982) as their time machine of choice. Of course to quote Dr. Emmett Brown in the film his reason was “The way I see it, if you’re gonna build a time machine into a car, why not do it with some style? ” Read more…
For all of the advances with computer animation there’s something still charming about good old fashioned stop motion animation. This Honda advert from the year 2000 does a nice job of using candy to animate the typography for the ULTRA Step WGN. Although it should be noted that the candy in this spot isn’t mere decoration — it’s being used to emphasize both the range of colors the auto comes in and the fact that it’s a kid friendly mode of transportation. Read more…
My first reaction when looking at this Ralph McQuarrie Darth Vader Concept Helmet collectable was “this makes him look even more evil than the original”. In terms of the design I think the reason is that this early take on Darth Vader is much more angular and lean-and-mean — also the infamous mask has a slightly anime feel to it, and I think that’s because you can see the dark samurai side of McQuarrie’s influence: Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Feb 6, 2010 in Japanese TV
It’s someone surreal to hear the Snuggle bear (renamed ファーファ Fāfa) speak Japanese from this 1988 advert. Introduced in 1983 there was always something very creepy about this fabric softener mascot: I think it indirectly reminded many of us of the many horror films that featured puppets gone back like Talking Tina from the Twilight Zone and later Chucky from the 1988 film Child’s Play. Although anime fans should note that the original voice of the Snuggle bear was none other than Corinne Orr who provided the voice Trixie in Speed Racer and Nova in the third seson of Star Blazers. Read more…
Recently while a good friend was telling me about the advantages of seeing Avatar in 3D IMAX over just plain 3D I couldn’t help but mention how much I hated “the plot” of the film. My friend then challenged me that while the twists-and-turns of the Na’vi may have been overly predictable that in fact the first Star Wars film was just as telegraphed. Read more…
There’s an old saying that behind every good joke there’s just a bit of truth: And the poster above seems to capture a certain contradiction about anime and anime fans which is interesting to say the least. I think part of the reason for this is that on a meta level most entertainment aimed ay kids is made to be so saccharine sweet that it seems that all of the life has been beaten out of it. For example if you look at the Disney channel so many of the shows look and sound like gentle sitcoms from a long past era — however my guess is that a certain number of kids want something more. In fact the best way to get a kid to read a book is to tell them that “you’re too young to read this book” and I think anime has that attraction to it. Read more… 
This is an episode of 
The charm and the problem with the original Star Trek series was that there was never a mess that Captain james T. Kirk couldn’t get out of — and Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan turned this aspect of the series into a stellar plot device. But looking at this promo video of Star Trek Online: Borg Faction made me realize that what makes the Borg a brilliant plot device is that not only do they outclass Federation technology, but on top of that they’re pure evil. 
Kevin Rose is famous for Digg, which has lost a bit of steam to Google when it comes to breaking news. However any illusions one might have had that Rose was on a siesta can’t be dispelled when you watch his take on why Google integrated Buzz into Gmail. To sum up Rose has the following interesting insights: 
Sure everybody is making a fuss over Google Buzz, but the minute I watched this 
I just love the character designs in those old school Peanuts comic strips, while they’re much more primitive than that later work of Charles Schulz there’s a powerful charm to them. On June 2nd Dark Horse will be releasing this 60th Anniversary Classic Peanuts: Charlie Brown in a limited edition (only 950!) which will feature a matching tin box, a button and a cute character booklet. Of course I noticed that the man behind this sculpture is none other than Craig Yoe who in addition to being a talented artist is an obsessive fanboy when it comes to the history of comic books.
Sometimes some of the best game concepts are the simple timeless ones, and 
When I came across the above photo I was blown away: I’ve seen Metropolis and looked at so many stills — yet I never came across a image that represented so well the amazing amount of work that went into this film. So I set on a quest to locate other behind-the-scenes glimpses of the work that Fritz Lang did before he fled Germany in 1933: 
