Unpopular But Valid Opinions: I Am Pro-Manga Piracy

I keep hearing a lot about the manga industry and how piracy is "killing" it. And I think a lot about it. I have no choice but to think about it. It's a big part of the world I'm in. Hell, I'm only writing this blog post because the topic was brought up in my Business of Comics class last night.

I am on the unpopular (as far as the industry is concerned anyway) pro-side of manga being available for free on the internet along with available for purchase. I see it as a weird, skewed, scaled-up version of the free-content model of the webcomics industry.

Let me ramble my way through this and hopefully you will see my point...

Let me first present to you the webcomics business model as I understand/plan to use it. Webcomics GIVE AWAY the main body of their content for absolutely nothing. The actual comic is generally available for free, with no restrictions on viewing, to the entire internet. Essentially, creators are giving their product away to the whole world for free. They then make money off of sales of ad space, merchandise, and often PRINT VERSIONS OF THEIR COMIC.



Oh hey, doesn't that sound kind of familiar? Free content on the internet then being available for purchase in print form? Online scanlations --> Print manga.

Very rarely these days do I stand in a Borders (which, soon, I won't be able to do at all) or a Barnes & Noble, stare at the manga shelf, and buy five or six books. I do not pick up new series on a whim anymore! I cannot afford it! Manga is a bit expensive at $10-$12 a book, and I can't drop $50 to start five series, and end up only wanting to continue one of them. That is a waste of my money.

HOWEVER! I do stand in Borders or Barnes & Noble, stare at the manga shelf, and pick up the first volumes of series I read scanlations of online. Series that I have already invested myself in, know I enjoy, and want to be able to read ANY TIME, not just when I'm at a computer. Prime examples of this are "Bleach" and "Bakuman". Both of these are series I read free scanlations of first. As soon as I began reading scanlations of Bleach, I immediately went and bought hard copies. I wanted to be able to look closely at the artwork, and to be able to plow through pages without having to wait for them to load. But I knew it was already a story I enjoyed, and that buying it wouldn't be a waste of my money.

"Bakuman" is an even more perfect example. I, and by extension several friends, began reading scanlations before Viz decided to license the series and translate it for the US market. When we found out Viz had licensed it, we all marked the release date on our calendars. Within a week of release, several of us were at our local B&N, picking up volume 1, excited about when the next volume would be released for us to buy EVEN THOUGH WE COULD READ IT FREE ONLINE.



Scanlations are great to get into a series, and follow it beyond the current English releases. when you don't want to wait a month or two for the next full volume, you can read a few chapters online. Then, when a more reliable and accurate translation comes out on store shelves, often with extras that you won't get in scanlations (such as the rough draft pages between chapters in "Bakuman"), you can buy them.

Honestly, I'm so dependent on scanlations to "try out" manga at this point, that I worry without scanlations, I'll either miss out on series I would otherwise buy, or get BORED of series I like between releases. Again, I provide as an example "Afterschool Charisma".



"Afterschool Charisma" is a rare example of me picking up a title I know nothing about off a shelf at B&;N. I had seen it, joked about it, and the more I thought about the premise the more I thought maybe it would be interesting. But I didn't pick it up for MONTHS because I couldn't find scanlations online! Eventually, I was with my friend Philip, who works for B&N and offered his discount, so I picked it up.

This series is now my guilty pleasure. I adore it. But there are still no scanlations online. this would be less of a problem if it came out monthly, or even bi-monthly. But VIZ releases one volume of "Afterschool Charisma" once every six months. That is six months of me not reading Afterschool Charisma. Six months of me not psyching myself up for the next volume. In June, will I be as excited for Volume 3 as I was in January when I finished Volume 2? Yes, Viz makes the next volume available to read on their website, but their e-reader is abysmal and impossible to use. So I just don't read it on their site. So who knows if, in five months when Volume 3 is released, I'll remember to go pick it up.

There are also a lot of series that have large followings, but are never localized stateside. (See: "Hoshi no Samidare"/"The Lucifer & The Biscuit Hammer") These are series that I would buy in a heartbeat if they were brought to the US, but my only option is to read scanlations.



Manga publishers in the US are really just missing out on the opportunity to capitalize on this model. They need to make better, more accessible e-readers, make content available, and ENCOURAGE people to read their content online. Provide online versions of first volumes that they plan to publish in the future. Maybe even the first two volumes. Give people a chance to get into the story and to WANT to buy the print volumes. They need to pay attention to what's doing well on sites like MangaFox and MangaReader instead of trying to shut them down like they did with OneManga, and then go buy the licenses for those series and provide good translations that will be available at reliable times.

All of these things have been pushed on me as important in the webcomics business model because time has shown that they WORK. Having your content be good, accessible, reliably available is a key to success in the webcomics world. If you provide that, people will read, if they read they might enjoy it, if they enjoy it, they will be willing to support it.

Why can't this free-content model be applied to the manga industry as well?

The numbers show that interest in manga hasn't decreased. Fandoms are still alive, thriving, and growing. Sales have dipped because we're in a recession. We can't buy $50 worth of manga on a whim anymore. We can't risk $10 on something we're not sure if we'll commit to.

I know this is not true for 100% of manga fans. There are always a few people ruining it for everyone. But I am the FIRST to yell at the people who say "I won't buy it, I can just read it online." and the first to tell them to go support series that they love.

The long and short of it, Manga Industry (and book/music publishing industry in general), is that if you let us find what we want, let us commit ourselves to it, we'll still buy it. We just need to know what we want first. Instead of discouraging this, embrace it and find a way to use it to your advantage.

New Sides To Old Stories

I know it's been a little while since you've heard from me. If you follow me on twitter or any of my other regular internet hangouts you probalby know that for me, the past two weeks have been full of sick cats, stressed moms, half-sinished comics, and pulling 3 water color paintings and a 5-minute presentation out of my ass at the last minute. I've been recovering from all of this since last Thrusday, but things seem to be calming down signifcantly now, so I'm going to try and get caught up on the things I've missed.

The great thing is that right as my schedule has calmed down two of my favorite series have entered new arcs. Chatper 424 of "Bleach" and chapter 57 of "Genshiken" both came out today and have manged to light a bit of a fire under me.



Once again, Kubo sets out to remind me why I love his goddamn manga so much. This week was full of Ichigo, his family, and his riends just hanging out, being weirdos, and implying things to come. In canon, it's been more than a year (17 months, if we're getting specific) since the end of the last arc. Ichigo's sisters are entering middle school and Ichigo is now a senior in high school. Uryu seems to have taken over fighting the hollows in Karakura, Orihime and Chad just kind of continue to exist, Keigo and Mizuiro are still dorks, Tatsuki has become hot, and Rukia hasn't shown her face once since she and Ichigo parted ways, which is to be expected I guess.



I'm wondering if Karin will end up as a shinigami or something given that it was pointed out how much stronger her abilites have become since Ichigo lost his. I'm also excited to find out what is going to go on with Ichigo's deputy shinigami badge. I was fairly certain I was the only one who even remembered he had the damned thing, and all of a sudden it's a plot point. I'm curious about this new villain, who seems to have inherited Aizen's evil mullet.

I'm hoping that next week that Urahara/Yoruichi or the Vizard start poking their heads back into the story. I doubt Ichigo is going to give much thought to his missing badge, but I anticipate one/all of them sticking their noses in and forcing him to go get it back for whatever reason. Still also anticipating Urahara injecting Ichigo with reishi and being "LOL YOU'RE A SHINIGAMI AGAIN!". Seem slike his kind of thing.



As I mentioned, this week also brought the long awaited return of "Genshiken". I think it was my sophomore or junior year of college when I sat down and read all nine volumes of "Genshiken" straight through. It is one of two (the other being "Gurren Lagann") that lived up to the hype I'd heard about it from friends before getting into it. Rumors circulated about it for a little while, and then a few months ago the first chapter leaked. This week brought us further in and I am looking forward to the things to come.

Old favorites Ohno and Ogiue are running the Genshiken now, Kuchiki still hanging around and being a creeper, the American transfer Sue still being totally insane and amazing, and a few new members coming in to give new life to the group we all know and love. Familair faces like Sasahara, Saki, and Madarame are also popping up as needed and I'm excited to see how they'll play as now-supporting members of the cast.

In a very out of character turn for me, I've already got a crush on the new member Hato. Hato is a cross-dresser. He goes to school as a boy, but whenever he goes to the Genshiken he changes clothes and makes himself up as a girl. He also seems to avoid the other members during regular school hours and wantes them to see him as boy as little as possible. A few other members are uncomfortable about it, but Ohno and Ogiue, from their past experiences, are already used to this sort of thing and make Madarame give them a key to his apartment so Hato can change clothes there after school instead of having to do it in a bathroom at the school.



There's somethign that I find very endearing about Hato, and I'm interested about all of the new interactions that the members of the Genshiken, new and old, will have. Sue seems to have taken over Madarame's place, even if Ogiue is the chairman, often proclaiming meetings to be the Nth meeting on whatever topic.

I'm still two or three weeks behind on the anime episodes for "Bakuman", but I promise I'll get caught up with those as soon as possible and blog about them. I have caught up with the manga though, and I'm really excited about the direction it's taking. I love Shiratori and I'm looking forward to seeing how Mashiro and Takagi will do working on seires spearate from each other while also still doing Perfect Crime Club. Kaya also continus to just be my favorite character in the damn series.



I'm headed to New England Webcomics Weekend, so I'll be sure to write a post about that as well when I get back!

Bleach 423 - The End Of An Era

So, this week in "Bleach" the conflict with Aizen finally, after four or five years, came to a close. I promised myself that when this happened I'd blog about it since it's a pretty big turning point in the nerd world. Even if you're not into "Bleach", if you hang out even marginally in the anime/manga fandom circles you're bound to be at least aware of how long this has been going on.

And anyone who follows me on twitter, or talks to me on LiveJournal or on instant messengers or even knows me offline, knows how frustrated I've been for a while now because all of this constant random fighting just bores me to tears. Especially since they just go on forever, happen simultaneously, and make it damn near impossible to figure out how much time has passed.

But this week has reminded me why I love this series and why I keep reading it. Because there was no fighting this week. this week was the whole cast being dorks.



I love "Bleach" for it's characters. It's story is decent even if it's sometimes poorly handled, but it's characters are what make it shine and why I believe it's so popular. It's cast is larger than it has to be, but no one member of the cast is just like any other. "Bleach" presents a vast range of characters with an equally vast range of personalities and motivations. This, unfortunately, gets lost in the grunting shouting man fights that occupy about 75% of this series.

But that other 25% that is comprised of characters hanging out together being sarcastic and witty and weird and showcasing their crazy personalities. We really only get this between arcs, which means right now we're in for it for a little while and I can enjoy this series like I used to.



I think my favorite part about this chapter was how Aizen was handled. Last week Ichigo tried to sympathize with Aizen. He theorized that Aizen was doing all of this because he was "lonely" because no one could match him, or some shit along those lines. Me and several of my friends got very annoyed by this. There has never been anything "sympathetic" about Aizen. The dude is just batshit. I don't care how "lonely" he is, it isn't an excuse for multi-planal genocide.

But this week Aizen decided to remind us that he's not sympathetic. He takes his sentencing, and laughs in the face of those condeming him.

Does anyone remember my post on Bleach running on the DBZ principal? Because this week it was finally proven by Rukia.



His hair was getting longer because he had more power. Now that he's lost his power, it got short again.

This lead into Rukia and Ichigo parting ways again. I've read this chapter about three times since it went up, and I cry every time. These kind of goodbyes always get me. However, I know this isn't the end. I've heard that we're getting two more arcs (one 6-8 months long, one 2-3 years long). And even if I didn't know that for sure, Ichigo and Rukia have had to part ways twice before and look where that got us? She'll be back.

Given the state Ichigo's in, I'm curious as to how things will pick up again. Kubo Tite has once against it up so that I have to come back in two weeks when Bleach's hiatus is up to see where this story goes.

I'm still predicting that Captain Mayuri Kurotsuchi is going to be the next big bad, since he's still running around in Hueco Mundo when he gets bored, and he was making some threats at Ichigo before he left Hueco. I'm also wondering if, in this new arc, Grimmjow and Nel will make their way out of the plot-sink they were sucked into, since we're still involving Hueco and all.

So, in two weeks, Bleach will come back and we'll start whatever new story Kubo's going to string us along into. Once we're into that, I'll do my best to let you all know what I think. Because my opinion on this is clearly incredibly valuable to you all.

Just checking in at the moment.

So, the newest Pokemon games, "Black Version" and "White Version" come out in Japan in less than two weeks. The influx of leaked info has been minimal lately and mostly confined to info about the new anime arc, "Best Wishes". I am debating actually watching it because I have developed a huge crush on Dento and I want to see more of Araragi.

While new info is slow now, I'm expecting it to explode in two weeks when the games finally get released. I'll do my best to keep up, but since I'm heading back for my final two semesters at SVA on the 7th, and will therefore have classwork to keep up with, I don't know how much info I'll be able to give.

On the upside, my first Senior Series class is "Anime Workshop". This is a class on exploring different types of anime and it's influences. So we'll be watching a lot of classic anime films ("Akira", "Naussica", ect.), and I'll have those to write about while I'm in the class. The whole "Aizen is a total psycho" arc of Bleach also seems to be hitting it's final stretch, so once that ends I am sure I will have a long and meaningless post to write about that. I'm predicting I'll have some things to say about Bakuman again in the near future as well.

So stick around. We've got lots coming.

"Tuesday's Anime Sampler" or "Thanks For 1,000 Hits!"

Back home from my two week stay at Downtown Otaku's. It was a great trip and I was glad to hear that he had a nice time and got there and back okay. He bought me a figure of Rukia with Shirayuki, even though I already had it. so now I have one, and a special one from Chile. He also bought me GOALSBOT, which is probably the coolest robot I now own.


The one he got me is red and blue and has a 7 on it's uniform, but I couldn't find a picture of it, and I'm too tired to get up and actually take one. This is why I should not blog right after waking up.

"Rook Takes Queen" has also hit the milestone of 1,000 page views. For a blog that's only been consistently updating for two and a half months (which is the period of time I've been tracking visitors) I think that's a pretty impressive number, and I want to thank you all for coming by here 1,000 times. I hope in the next two and a half months, you'll all come by 1,000 more times.

To celebrate, let's take another look at my ridiculous visitor map.



Spent yesterday with McLovin and Kristin, once again in Kristin's basement watching anime. This is usually the only time I get a chance to watch new things, because on my own I am generally just too busy and impatient to sit and watch series. And I miss out on a lot because of this. But it's been fun sitting around with friends and watching things together and I'd rather see things with friends than alone anyway. While usually we pick one thing to watch and marathon, this time we watched a little bit of several things...

Gurren Lagann: Parallel Works 2


In all honesty ParaWorks 2 deserves it's own post, so I think i'm going to hold off saying too much and write about it in full later. Like most people, "Kittan Zero" is my favorite but I also adored "Kiyal's Magical Time". It was humorous and sweet, and I think I described it as "If Gurren Lagann and Di Gi Charat were the same thing." Over all, I liked Parallel Works 1 better, but 2 had some really great stuff.

Hetalia: Axis Powers


I've always been pretty against Hetalia because portions of the fandom drive me insane. (Sorry guys, but it's true.) But at Otakon, I went to the Voice Actor Q&As for the voices of Vino and Firo from "Baccano!", who happen to be doing Russia and Italy. They did a bit of the voices, and there was so much crazy accents that I thought I'd give the dub a shot just for that.

We watched the four episodes that are up on Funimation's website, and while I'm not suddenly going to throw aside everything else I'm doing to dive into this fandom, I did think it was pretty funny and cute. I have also developed a huge crush on Italy. Italy and Germany are amusing to me, but so far i'm not that into anyone else. We'll have to see where things go as I watch more.

K-On

McLovin once described K-On to me as "If the cast of Lucky Star was in a band." and I have to admit that's pretty spot on. The story isn't quite as scattered and moment-to-moment as Lucky Star, but it's got a lot of the same feel. The characters are very cute, and the show is a little mindless (at least as far as I've watched into it), but I think after watching things that are a little heavier, like "Baccano!" and "Durarara!!" (which are both still hilarious at points, but are not straight comedies), there's nothing wrong with something that's just silly and cute.

I'm loving all of the character interactions in K-On a lot, and their reactions to the world around them. it's a very sweet little series and if you just want to laugh and enjoy something fluffy and silly, I'd recommend it.

I'm still waiting on the last chapter of "The Lucifer & The Biscuit Hammer" before I can blog about that, and Kristin just sent me a link to "Yankee-kun to Megane-chan" for me to start reading, so I'll have those to blog about in the near future. I'm also planning my next cosplay; Marlone from "Atelier Marie". I've got lists of everything I need, and my best friend, Cass, has offered to help me make it. Suri's possibly going to do Kreis so we'll be a matching pair. So I'll have updates on that as things happen too.

Thanks again for coming by guys! It's been great blogging for you all and I hope to bring you more great things to read about in the future!

My Recent Nerdy Purchases

So I felt the need to finally update again. It's been a few days, and I haven't really been doing anything nerdy since I've been apartment-sitting. But I did buy a few things last Sunday when McLovin, Suri, and a few others came up to visit so we could run around for McLovin's birthday. So I can talk about all that I guess.

But first, man guys... Look at my visitor map...



I hope all of my international visitors, who probably came looking for something else, at least found something they could enjoy for a few minutes while they were here. From what I can tell form looking at my stats, a lot of people have ended up here recently searching for pictures of Alcyone cosplays and finding our picture we took of Super Cosplay Kazoku's Alcyone and Lantis. (Which, again, were just stunning.) While I'm on the subject, drop by and give them a look if you're into cosplay. They're really fantastic, and I hope to see them again at future conventions.

Okay so onto the stuff I bought on Sunday. At one point we ended up at Forbidden Planet, a great NYC comic store (one of several) and went upstairs to their manga section. I was surprised to see that VIZ had released a translation of the Bleach "Official Bootleg" book. A while ago, Downtown Otaku had bought me a japanese copy, and I've always been curious as to what all of the little bonus comics were about.



It's probably just been released in the past few weeks (it was on FP's new releases shelf) but if you've got a decent manga section at your local Borders, B&N, or other bookstore you shouldn't have a hard time getting it. And if you can't find it there, it's already up on Amazon.com. If you're a bleach fan, and you're like me and can't be bothered keeping up with all of the communities that translate supplementary material like this (and therefore haven't read it yet) it's definitely a worthwhile addition to your collection. The color comics are pretty hilarious and there's some other good general info included in the book.

The other book I bought was Let's find Pokemon! Crystal, which is basically "Where's Waldo" but with pokemon. It's all Gen II art, and is apparently the third in a line of "Let's Find Pokemon!" books.



I've already sat down and found all of the pokemon I was supposed to find, but it's also fun sitting down and seeing what other pokemon are in the scenes, and I love the Gen II artwork. When McLovin showed it to me I just took it from him and was pretty much set on buying it. It wasn't much of a question. Because I love me some Gen II pokemon stuff.

So I've still got a few more days before I go back to New Jersey. Hopefully I'll manage one more post before I head home and get back to my usual nerdings. Take care, ya'll!

Otakon 2010 - Thursday/Friday

So we didn't do anything Otakon related on Thursday, but it was a good day, so I'm going to shove it in with Friday's activities.

So Cass picked me up around 1, we grabbed Suri, and headed down to Baltimore. We stopped at a rest stop for lunch, and then headed down to UMBC, where we're staying in Cass's apartment on campus. We got ourselves settled in, and then headed over to the local Safeway to pick up some food/snacks for the weekend.

I made steak sautéed in olive oil (I am the most Italian), a box of white cheddar & broccoli Pasta-Roni, and a bag of frozen broccoli for dinner. Cass made a box of cupcakes for dessert. It was the most delicious. For those of you who didn't know, I absolutely love to cook. So getting to cook dinner for my friends (while wearing an awesome blue apron!) was great.

Suri played some Twilight Princess, I played some Cate West: The Velvet Keys, and we made a lot of jokes about mangos being 100 cents, Death Note's "Take this potato chip... AND EAT IT!!!", and various other things we all found funny over the course of the day. Just being out of the house is nice, and I enjoyed hanging around and just being kind of nerdy and awesome with two of the most important people in my life.

Friday rolled around and Cass dropped Suri and I off at the convention center. We picked up our badges and began heading around the convention. We met up with friends and took pictures of cosplayers until it was around time for a Q&A panel with Jerry Jewel, who voices Vino/Claire from "Baccano!".



The previous Q&A for Todd Haberkorn was still going on, so we sat in in the end of it and figured out that he voiced Firo from "Baccano!", which was pretty cool also. They are hilarious men, and will also be voicing Italy and Russia (respectively) in the dub of "Axis Powers Hetalia" with crazy accents. I've never been too into Hetalia, but I do love crazy accents so I may watch it just for that.

After that, Suri and I made a few round in the dealer's room and artist's alley to scout out things we might want to buy and what booths had the best prices. While doing that, we also found some of my favorite cosplayers of the day.



Once we'd made a few rounds, we went back and started buying things. I didn't figure there would be much I wanted, but I managed to find a good handful of Nia figures to buy, plus a few other little Bleach things that I couldn't resist.



The "cookies" are actually zipper-pulls/keychains. They are really really cute. The "decorated" cookies are of Abarai Renji and Hitsugaya Toshiro, the two square cookies are of Kuchiki Byakuya and Hirako Shinji, and the chocolate cookies is just squares. I don't really know what it is. If I can find the booth again, I may buy a few more tomorrow and see what else I can get.



I also found this poster in the artist's alley. While making my rounds, there wasn't really a whole lot that I wanted. There were things at the tables of friends that I'd planned to pick up (and will go back for tomorrow since I didn't get to today), but there wasn't much I wanted to buy. Then I saw this Bakuman poster by Rikyo (of Studio Painted Blade), and just stopped dead in my tracks. He asked if I saw anything I liked, I pointed at it, and said "That." I paid the $10 for the poster and we had a brief conversation about how great Bakuman is.

After that we caught up with Cass and headed back to the apartment. I made chicken, corn, and chicken-flavored rice-a-roni for dinner, and now we're all hanging around unwinding after a full, very eventful day. Tomorrow we plan to take another spin around the dealer's room and the artist's alley and then see what happens.

All of our pictures from this weekend can be found in this album on Photobucket. It is full of fantastic cosplayers, so do go take a look!

The DBZ Principal Is In Effect

Okay guys. I haven't really rambled about this here at Rook takes Queen yet, so I'd better get the score settled on something.I am fully, 100% convinced that the real villain in Bleach is Aizen's mullet, and that this manga is actually all about hair. Kind of like "Bobobobobobobobobobobobobobobo" or whatever the hell you want to call that, except with less of a chance of stabbing yourself while reading it. I mean just look at Aizen, for each stage of his villany, he's gotten a progressivly smarmier mullet.



This week I just about had a heart attack because it seems to have gotten longer, which only means the evil destructive force of his mullet is becoming more powerful. But then my freind Gonsai pointed something out that I'm just going to laugh about forever...



Evil demon overlord by day, fabulous male supermodel by night. It all makes sense now. He is using his undercover work as Fabio to win public appeal so no one will care when he takes over the world and kills them all. Aizen, you clever bastard. Even Gin seems concerned lately. Fortunately we have a means to combat Aizen's diabolical mullet in the form of Shinji's bowl cut and Ichigo's rocker mullet.



The point is, it seems like every time a major character has a dramatic shift in power, their ridiculous haircut changes to an entirely different ridiculous haircut. I wouldn't be surprised if Rukia came home from Hueco Mundo with bankai and longer hair.

Another post about video games.

So. I've played a little more Wind Waker, and I have one question.

When will this game start being fun? 

I'm on the Rito's island now, trying to get up to the crazy dragon so it will stop rampaging. Except I am charged with the impossible task of throwing a bomb halfway across a pool of lava into a jar. I spent about three hours on this task last night and continued to fail.

This frustration aside, I've realized that the Rito aren't really all that bright. Several of the Rito people spoke of how their spring dried up. So, I blew up the rock that was clogging it. And then... All of them still talked about it being dried up. Including one standing on a balcony overlooking the spring. I've taken a coding class. I know it's not hard to have dialog changed after an event. I'd be satisfied with even a "HO'SHIT THERE'S WATER AGAIN!"

Then again, if this spring, which is being filled with ash, thanks to being inside of a volcano, is their primary source of water, I suppose I can understand why they are not really that bright. And also jerks.

The better part of today has belonged to Pokemon Trozei. Suri passed it off to me a while ago because he didn't want it. When I took it, I didn't know what I was getting into. You see, I have a problem. When I play a puzzle game, I get pretty hooked on it. I will play it for hours straight, weeks at a time. I don't LIKE playing puzzle games. They frustrate me because they are pretty high maintenance. If you lose focus for just a second you're totally screwed.

I made it through the first round of the adventure mode and am currently on some kind of secret hard mode. I am impressed that there's some kind of logical reason for rescuing a bunch of pokemon to be in the form of a puzzle game. That was pretty clever, even though I can't remember what it is.

The Bleach filler seems to be winding down. We've gotten to the big boss and the evil plan and all that nonsense. I've got a lot to say about it, so when it's done I guess I'll marathon it and write a post about it.

I'm getting a new laptop in the near future, so with wireless internet in my grasp again, I'll be slightly more mobile in my otakudom. I'm gonna go back and look over some things I've checked out recently and hopefully get posts for them up soon.

So as it turns out, I'm madly in love with a sword.

I'm here today, continuing my coverage of the Zanpakuto filler arc of the Bleach anime. I'm gonna kick this off with yet another comparison shot because I forgot to cover this last week.

We already learned in Magic Knight Rayearth that Debonair is a GREAT mommy.

Am I the only one who thinks Muramasa is the bastard son of Debonair from "Magic Knight Rayearth"? The white skin, the color scheme, the obscenely long fingernails? How the hell does this guy even hold a sword?! and so far he's done next to nothing except for blathering on and on about how Shinigami suck. He is either the worst, or the greatest villain ever. I think it's too early to tell.

This week was mostly a "Let's recap what we know and remind you all that this shit is bad news." episode. Also there were a lot of things in this episode that really didn't make sense to me.

But the first five minutes of this episode were just a dream~ to watch. As it turns out, I am apparently madly in love with Sode no Shirayuki. Rukia pretty much falls out of the sky in Karakura and Ichigo finds her, trying to figure out why she's hurt. and then Sode no Shirayuki turns up.

Don't be fooled by the pretty face. She will wreck your shit.

Ichigo quickly decides she's not a hollow, but still has no idea who she is. This was the first thing that made no sense to me. Sode no Shirayuki should, in theory, have the exact same reiatsu as Rukia. I know Ichigo isn't exactly the brightest crayon in the box, but he should be able to at least be able to figure out she has the same Reiatsu as Rukia. And once she starts using Rukia's abilities, maybe you'd think something would click?

Sode no Shirayuki using her second ability, Hakuren.

Another thing that bothered me was the opposite. Sode no Shirayuki not recognizing Ichigo. After all, Rukia's power was transfered too Ichigo via Shirayuki. But when they fought, she was curious to who he was, and then figured out as they fought that he was "the substitute shinigami". She did some adorable blowing snow in his face thing, and then just sort of got bored and left.

Again, because of her connection to Ichigo, you'd think Sode no Shirayuki (who I assume is far more intelligent than Ichigo), would recognize him immediately and, due to context, probably react like "OH. YOU'RER THAT GUY WHO TOOK ALL MY POWER THAT ONE TIME. 8D HAVE SOME STABBINGS!". I also feel this might have made a little bit more sense, than her just randomly fighting. But the fact that Shirayuki is even acting against Rukia at all has me a bit perplexed.

There's a reason she's got the title of the "Most Beautiful Zanpakuto In Soul Society".

Ichigo then took her back to Urahara's and got everyone together to fix up Rukia and figure out the situation. Rukia wakes up and explains what's going on and we flash back to some more of the fighting between the zanpkauto and their masters. This whole segment just made me want to slap the shinigami.

You have all just lost your main source of power. But go right ahead and attack said source of power with your useless swords and no plan at all. That truly is the most brilliant of ideas.

No wonder you are getting your asses kicked. Geez. And these are supposed to be Captains and Lieutenants. You would think after everything that they have dealt with they would not make such stupid mistakes. Though Iw as really hoping to see Hianeko attack Rangiku so there could be some more sassy banter.

I think she was hoping it would be more of a challenge.

The worst off, supposedly, is Byakuya, who disappeared while fighting off Senbonzakura so that Rukia and Renji could escape. By all logic, he should be dead, but we all know that's not true because this is Bleach and the only one who ever really dies is Ulquiorra.

When Rukia finds out that Byakuya is the only one who wasn't found and taken care of, she apparently runs off when no one is looking to go back to Soul Society and find him. Everyone gets concerned and Ichigo and Yoruichi decide to head to Soul Society to find her.

All I'm really sure of is that I am heavily anticipating next week so I can find out the context behind Sode no Shirayuki making this face that she made in the preview:

Oh shit. We are all going to die.

So when 232 is fansubbed and available, I suppose I'll be continuing my coverage. Until then!

Its like one of those "Breaking News" stories, except no one but me really cares.

THIS HAD BETTER NOT SUCK. IF THIS SUCKS, I'M GONNA GRAB MY SHIRAYUKI AND STAB A BITCH. IT WILL BE IRONIC.

- Me to Suri about 5 minutes before watching episode 230 of Bleach.

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This is something that I never thought I would be talking about here -- the Bleach anime.

As much as I love the manga, I declared the anime dead to me months ago after the "replacement captain/lieutenant" filler arc in which Sora form Kindgom Hearts was the new Captain of the 3rd division (It was a fucking keyblade, goddamnit.) and his lieutenant was the bastard offspring of Sosuke Aizen and Szayel Apollo Grantz. no matter how untrue that statement may or may not be, that's how I feel about it and I lost all desire to ever go anywhere near the anime ever again.

Aizen is the daddy and Szayel is the mommy, and together they spawned this horrible abomination against God.

I'm not a big fan of Bleach's filler arcs. The Bount arc didn't do much for me, but it did bring about the line "Everything it touches turns to snakes!", which has lead to some great moments hanging out with my friends in which we've randomly shouted that out in public. But the latest filler (Which, according to what I've heard, will only be four or five episodes?) is focusing on one of my favorite aspects of Bleach -- Zanpakuto.

For those not familiar with Bleach's cosmology, Zanpakuto are sentient swords belonging to the shinigami. They are spirits born from their master's soul and are the force of power behind all of the sword's abilities. There are a few other things that were brought up in the second movie that I think are bullshit because Hitsufag likes to make up his own rules, so we won't go into that.

But I've loved this concept from the beginning. I've been absolutely fascinated by the idea of learning what the appearances of everyone's swords were. And as soon as we came out of the Soul Society arc and were shown Sode No Shirayuki, Rukia's Zanpakuto, in action for the first time, I fell head over heels in love.

So when it was announced that the Zanpakuto would be the focus of the new filler, I became intrigued. I still had no real plan to watch, but I was curious, and a little excited to see what might become of it. The idea that the zanpakuto were rebelling against their masters interested me. And the nest part was that we would get to see them, even if they were all forced into humanoid forms. But there was one thing I was worried about...

I've always had a very clear mental image of what I believed her to look like. Anyone who's read the short CLAMP manga "Shirahime-Syo" may remember the story "Hiyoku no Tori" and the Heron woman in them. That woman has always been my image for Sode No Shirayuki. Would this arc, shatter my perception of her?

Left: Heron ("Shirahime-Syo") // Right: Sode no Shirayuki ("Bleach")

Surprisingly, no! Sode no Shorayuki is presented here actually very similar to how I pictured her to be. This helped a lot in getting me to want to keep watching. I was very worried about this, because I am resistant to change and didn't want to have to rethink my entire perception of her as a character.

So I torrented the episode, sat down, and watched...

My opinion so far is pretty neutral to the story as a whole, but as for the characters, my head is racing around trying to keep all of my perceptions of them in line.

Haineko was the most hilarious little bitch in the world. I loved when she shoved Rangiku aside and told her to get out of the way. I'd love to see her also have a more kindhearted side to match Rangiku's but I think she is perfect. and oh my god those pants. Wut.

I like Suzumebachi's appearance (especially that she's so fucking tiny), but I can't say I'm too thrilled with her personality. She is way too bubbly, happy, and excitable. Even before Soi Fon was an angst bucket, she did not act like that. Zanpakuto are meant to share many of their master's personality aspects and Suzumebachi doesn't act like Soi Fon at all. 

Kazeshini... I have never liked Kazeshini. Ever since his shikai was revealed and it was shown that he was a dual wield, I've hated him. It was established in the Soul Society arc that the only dual-bladed shikai were Katen Kyokotsu (Kyoraku Shunsui) and Sogyo no Kotowari (Ukitake Juushiro). I refuse to believe his shikai was a secret, since he's a lieutenant. It's possible Kubo hadn't thought it up yet, but for the love of god, Kubo, stick to your rules.

Anyway, the zanpakuto arc has proved that Kazeshini is a dick. this was hilarious to me because I just dislike him so much and how his personality just fell into me continuing not to like him. I'm not a fan of Hiyorinmaru either (gay Chrsitmas trees, wut?) for various reasons, but all he's done so far is stand around and stare at people so I can't really judge him yet.

But oh man the opening and ending? Hot shit, yo. I actually watched the opening twice before I started the episode because Iw as just so fascinated by Orihime and Rukia dancing. I want to dance with them so bad. XD Also everyone was just hanging out and being really hot. What the hell? SDid everyone suddenly realize how sexy they are?

The ending was fantastic. I'm completely addicted to "Mad Surfer" now. that's the kind of song I will hang out alone in my house and dance to in my underwear. I liked the kind of retro feel to the visuals and how it really depicted the personality aspects of all of the zanpakuto.

My big worry about this arc? That it's going to end up focusing on Hitsugaya and Hiyorinmaru. With the way they were introduced in the first episode of the arc, they seem to be getting special attention, and I'm really worried this is going to be another one of those instances of undeserved attention for them.

So I guess there will be followups to this as the arc progresses, because I anticipate having very strong feelings on this. We'll see where it goes.

Otakon 2009

Last weekend Suri and I, along with several other friends, made the long trip down from central New Jersey to Balimore, Maryland for Otakon 2009. It's our one big convention of the year and we're usually pretty psyched to rock it out. It was great this year, as always.

General reports for Friday, Saturday, and Sunday can be found via their respective entries in my LiveJournal.

But overall, it was a great con. This was my second year cosplaying Simon form Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann, and this year I got to be accompanied by Suri and my best friend Cass as my Kamina and Nia. We all hit up the Saturday photoshoot which was a lot of fun. Cosplay is about 50% of the reason I do Otakon, and it was really great to get to see other cosplayers and join in on photos and things.

We are the bitch-sassiest pair of Simons ever.

In an amusing twist, a friend of mine form high school who writes for Japanator ended up writing a short entry about when the Gurren Lagann shoot and the Super Smash Bros. shoot decided to wage war against each other. I ended up in a few of the photos he posted and we had a laugh a little later about what a small internet it is.

The better part of the weekend was spent in the Artist's Alley and the Dealer's Room, which is the other 50% I do Otakon. I got to see a lot of good friends in the Alley. These are people that I only really get to see once or twice a year at Otakon and NYAF, so it was really great to see them and catch up for a while. I also bought a few posters and prints, and a comic from the amazingly talented Hilary Florido, who is maybe one of the coolest people I know.

The Dealer's Room was fantastic this year. I bought two figures (Urahara Kisuke and Kuchikir Rukia) and an old Magic Knight Rayearth doll (Hikaru. I already have Fuu. Now I'm on the hunt for Umi.), and a really fantastic Sailor Moon pencil case.

I also got myself a few doujinshi, though I was only really satisfied with one of them -- an Ukitake/Unohana bleach doujinshi that looks like it's really cute. I may have to eventually try to translate it. I somehow ended up with another Ukitake/Kyoraku doujinshi, but while sitting outside of one of the panels we were waiting to go to, I decided to narrate it with hilarious dialog for my friend Jess and it turned out to be the best purchase ever.

"Blah blah blah I have cancer."

"No you don't. You have lupus."

"Well shit..."

I really don't have the slightest idea what was going on through the whole thing other than that Ukitake and Kyoraku kept fighting and bitch-slapping each other, but it made for an amusing little tale. I also got another Bleach doujin about Kon and some members of the female cast, and a FullMetal Alchemist Roy/Havoc doujin that also includes Riza somehow. Again, I need to learn to read Japanese so I can know what the hell is going on.

But the real prize for the weekend was buying a replica of Sode no Shirayuki, Kuchiki Rukia's sword, for $25. Anyone who knows me as a member of the Bleach fandom knows the crush I have on Shirayuki. So when I found it, I was sure it was really expensive and made Suri lead me away. But then he kept suggesting going back to ask how much it was, so we went and found out it was cheap enough for me to buy!

The unfortunate part is that she'll probably remain in her box until the spring when I either move back down to central NJ for good, or move in with my good friend Boomer over at Downtown Otaku. Then she will be proudly displayed on my wall where I can admire her.

So over all, it was a great con. I may switch up my cosplay next year, or I may not, but either way I'm looking forward to it.