Blogging about everything today.

Yeahhh.... I've been slacking off this week guys. Sorry. I've been out doing things pretty much every other day, so it's understandable right? But while I've been at ti I've watched more K-On, some clips from Hetalia, listening to the soundtrack from "The Road to El Dorado", and started reading "Yankee-kun to Megane-chan", which is absolutely hilarious. I'm still a long way from caught up, but it's fantastic, so far so I'd recommend taking a look at it if you've got some time to kill. I also went to a family reunion in there somewhere.

In pokemon news, we got another new pokemon revealed -- Yanappu.



A grass-type monkey is a weird combination to me, and I'm not totally sold on the broccoli growing out of his head, but I suppose he could be an interesting grass-type to work with if you're into that sort of thing. However, he's probably not going to be on my B/W team.

This pokemon isn't actually a reveal so much as a confirmation. We got a picture of a figure of this pokemon back in July, but up until now it wasn't confirmed as an actual pokemon in the games.

I've been playing SoulSilver again, finishing up some things that I've left hanging, such as chasing down roaming legendaries and doing the spiky-eared Pichu event. Suri's been helping me shuffle pokemon over from my copies of Platinum and Diamond to help me finish my pokedex. I also got a Japanese Wigglytuff over the GTS that has pokerus, so I've been infecting my pokemon with that slowly but surely. This is the first time I've ever had pokemon with it, so that's kind of exciting for me.

On a complete shift of subject, this week's "Bakuman" reminded me just who the team working on this was -- The pair who did "Death Note".

Mashiro and Takagi are currently planning a five-chapter story are in "Perfect Crime Party" that involves a rival trying to expose the club. Listening to them plan it out, it sounded a lot like the rivalry between Light and L, but with a lot less murder. Not that this is a bad thing. "Death Note" was written very well, even though I never finished it. I'm really excited to see how the next chapters play out and if "Perfect Crime Party" can beat Iwase and Eiji's crossover between "Crow" and "+Natural".

Image via Wikipedia

If you're not reading Bakuman yet, now is the perfect time to start. VIZ's translation has just hit stores, so the first volume is available. Go pick it up, and then catch up to the scans. then in November we can all go out an pick up volume 2. Especially if you're into the process of making comics, the physical volumes are worth picking up because VIZ has thrown in a little something extra for us -- Ohba and Obata's thumbnails for some of the pages! Getting that little something extra between chapters really sealed the deal for me. With how important the thumbnails are for Mashiro and Takagi within the story, getting to see Ohba and Obata's made it all the better.

Ahaha, I guess I managed to write a decent blog entry after all. I'm pretty impressed, since I didn't intend to. I'll try and do another update soon. It will probably be about Scott Pilgrim since I need to finish reading that and go see the movie.

"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!

In the hopes that one day I can play Atelier Marie.

Before I get started, I want to thank whoever linked my Saturday report for Otakon on facebook. It drew in a lot of traffic. I also want to welcome the new followers. It warms my heart to know people are actually reading this thing and it's not just me shouting into the dark.

Today I want to talk about something very near and dear to my heart. It is a game that I have fallen in love with, even though I haven't gotten to play it -- Atelier Marie.



For what it is, Atelier Marie doesn't get the credit it deserves in the western market. This is most likely because up until recently the Atelier franchise was struggling stateside. All we had was Atelier Iris, which iv'e heard is a bit different from the traditional games, and Mana Khemia, which is a spin-off of the Atelier series. More recently we've gotten Atelier Annie for the DS, which I have played multiple times and adore (and have covered here once), and are coming to Atelier Rorona for the PS3 (I'm not sure if this has hit the US market yet. I need to check my release dates.)

But a lot of modern RPGs owe their thanks to Atelier in one way or another, and Atelier all started with the one and only Atelier Marie. I've been completely in love with the artwork from this game for years now It's heavily influenced by Alphonse Mucha, who is one of my favorite artists. Some images are even reworkings of his illustrations.



Even with how Atelier has slowly been crawling into the western market, we still have not, and most likely will not, see any of the games from the original Zarlberg (Salberg?) continuity that started with Atelier Marie. Even if the franchise does finally become popular here, I doubt NiS (who is localizing the games) will go back and bring us Marie, Elie, Lilie, Violet, and Judie.



The closest we've come was Tokyopop localizing 4 out of 5 volumes of the manga "Atelier Marie and Elie: Zarlburg Alchemists". However, they dropped volume 5 when the going got tough. I have Japanese scans of all 5 manga, and have gotten the basic idea of what goes on in volume 5 (the ending is very clear from the visuals, and is fantastic.) but I'd love to actually get to read it.

Finding merchandise for what is, essentially, a dead fandom in the west has been a challenge, but I've managed to get some doujinshi, a guide book, a poster from the re-release of Atelier Marie And Elie, and matching figures of Marie and Elie. They're basically the stars of my collection of things, and I'm glad I was able to find anything at all. But it doesn't bring me any closer to playing the game.

However, there is still some hope for that. There is an Atelier Marie translation project that some fans are working on to make a playable rom of the game for English language fans. I've been following the project for a while now, both on the blog and on an Ar Tonelico forum and just quietly offering support.

But now I guess I'm going to make a little bit of a rallying cry? If there's anyone who has the time and ability to help with translating or coding, please drop these guys a line. If not, spread the word and see if there's anyone who can. I'd love to see this project completed and get to play Atelier Marie one day.

Otakon 2010 - Saturday

Day two of Otakon 2010 was a good time. It consisted mostly with trips around the dealer's room and artist's alley, and one long trip outside. Suri and I went around watching cosplayers until we met up with my friend Amber. She gave me things to give to Downtown Otaku, and gave me a cat-earred hat that she made for me (complete with a hole in the back for my ponytail!) and a pink collar with a green bell that she got for me at another convention.

Once we separated from Amber, we planned to go to the AMV Contest. Of course, that was when fire alarms started going off and everyone was told to leave the building. 30,000 nerds were suddenly sent out onto the streets of Baltimore, not knowing what to do. The area around the convention center probably sent the regular residents into a panic. We were out there for maybe an hour before they let us back in.



While we were out there I found a Prof. Birch and asked if I could take a picture with him. He let me and then offered Suri and I pokemon cards of Mudkip, Torchik, and Treeko. I laughed and picked mudkip, and Suri picked torchik.

Once regularity had resumed, Suri and I went back in and took a spin around the artist's alley. I picked up a few things for Cass. I also got a cute poster of Kamina, Simon, and Nia, a Raichu postcard, and my friend Kyle bought me a bookmark with Italy from "Axis Powers Hetalia" on it. I also hung out with the dudes from Studio Painted Blade for a while. They are really cool dudes, so you should totally check them out. I think they have a webcomic going, and they just generally have fantastic work from what I have seen.



When we were done there we went back down to the dealer's room. There wasn't much for me there. I bought a few more of those Bleach cookies, a DBZ blind box for Downtown Otaku, and a little Hetalia figure since I'm apparently going to be watching that due to my love of ridiculous accents. We then went with Kyle to the Dr. Who photoshoot, and while they were busy with that I found a trio of unexpected Magic Knight Rayearth cosplayers...



I found Lantis, Alcyone, and Caldina. I spotted Caldina's cape and then noticed Alcyone next to her and needed a photo. Alcyone is, and has always been, one of my favorite Magic Knight Rayearth characters and I have never seen anyone cosplay her before. I expressed my excitement to the woman cosplaying and then we went back to the Dr. Who shoot.



After that, Cass came and picked us up. Dinner consisted of nachos and ice cream, and we watched some of our favorite episodes of "Avatar: The Last Airbender". I have no plans to go back Sunday. I'm out of money and there are no panels I want to go see.

As I said yesterday, all of the pictures from this weekend are up in their own album on Photobucket, and there were some absolutely stellar ones, so you should definitely check it out. This was a fantastic convention, and I'm so glad I got the chance to go for another year.

Thanks so much to all of the attendees for being such great company, and an extra special thanks to the con staff for putting on such a great event and for handling a small emergency like total champions. It was a great year and I cannot wait for Otakon 2011!

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!

Short Post: State Of Affairs

So, apparently the Adiane figure in my last post, the one I am still so desperate to own, is a garage kit and is fairly hard to find. I'm certainly having a time of it via the internet. I'm going to try a few other means and see if I can't get my hands on it somehow.

In other news, Otakon 2010 is next weekend. Suri and I will both be wandering around. I'll be dressed as Professor Araragi from Pokemon B/W, and he'll be cosplaying Yuuhi from The Lucifer And the Biscuit Hammer. If you're going to be around, feel free to look for us and say hi!

I know I've got things to catch up on. It's just been way too hot lately, and things have been kind of hectic for me. I've barely been able to think straight. But I promise I will get back to proper blogging soon enough. I've got a whole lost of things to write about.

I will punch babies until I own this.

So this morning I wake up and check through the shit that happened on Twitter while I was asleep. I see that McLovin tweeted "This is for @SonoYourFace:"



Right now I know nothing about this figure. I don't know who makes it, the scale, the price, when it'll be released, or where I can get it. All I know is that I need this figure.

I've been whining for ages about how there needs to be figures of the antagonist cast and some of the characters less represented in the merchandise. And the top of my list has always been Adiane The Elegant. She has become my favorite female character in Gurren Lagann (just barely squeaking by Nia) and I've lamented the fact that there have been no figures of her to occupy my shelves.

In fact, just yesterday Armaina and I had been tweeting back and forth about Gurren Lagann figures and I had mentioned how much I wished there was an Adiane. Looks like someone decided to grant my wish.

McLovin is probably at work now, but as soon as I can I'll be grilling him for all the information on this figure. When I have it, I'll update here with all of the information.

Until then I will be squealing like a little girl.

It's like watching myself on Youtube.

A brief post, but I wanted to share this. It's my blog and I'll do whatever I want.

So a while ago, I posted about the Chozokei Damashii Gurren Lagann blind box figures and how completely amazing they are. I know I've also mentioned in the past that my friend McLovin is a writer for the awesome toy site, Tomopop.

Well today on twitter, he pointed me toward a video of his editor-in-chief opening up some of the boxes. It was basically exactly the same as my experience, and I thought I'd share because it was pretty fun for me to watch.



It's refreshing to see someone who reacts to Yoko the same way I do.

Chozokei Damashii Gurren Lagann Figures

So this week my Chozokei Damashii Gurren Lagann figures came. I essentially bought a 10 pc. case of blind boxes, so there was no real guarantee I'd get the full set. Fortunately, I got very very lucky:



For those curious about my 10th box, it was an extra "Yomako-sensei", which I may end up selling unless I can find someone to trade her with for an extra Simon, since I'd love to have him doing both poses.

I'm going to start this with manliness, and work my way through, so let's take a good look at these, because I am completely enamored with these figures. So let's kick it off with the Kaminas...



I'm not sure why Kamina wasn't just given alternate arms like Simon, or there wasn't two Simons like there are two Kaminas. They are essentially the same sculpt, just given a different left arm -- one to hold his sword, and one to point dramatically at Simon. The pointing-Kamina has no sword.

His face is a little strange to me, but I am glad for a couple more Kamina figures for my collection. I still need to go back and get the one from the first blind box set. I do love pointing-Kamina though, because they specifically advertised being able to do this:



And this is exactly how they will be posed on my shelf forever, because the reuniting of Bros in the Multiverse Labrynth was the most amazing thing ever, especially in Lagann-hen. But that's a story for another blog post. But since we're here, let's segue into looking at Simon.



It's about time we got a figure of adult Simon. I could be mistaken, but i'm fairly certain this is the first one, and I'm really not sure why. In fact I think Yoko might be the only one who had post-skip adult fugures until now. Oh wait, there was the Figumate sets. We did have some adult Simon and Nia in those. Though this is still the first Gar-Simon, if memory serves.

BUT I DIGRESS.

I totally forgot to photograph his alternate pose, but it's just him standing with both arms down. So, uh, not that exciting? But he is a good looking figure. He's got a lot of nice detail and there's some really good shine on his coat, which I like. Unfortunately, as you can see they all have little plastic things to help them stand instead of being given actual bases (except Anti-Spiral Nia, who really needed it, and Nia who didn't need it at all.) They work pretty well for msot of the figures, except Simon. His fits a little awkwardly and even with it, he has a bad habit of falling over backward. thankfully, my shelf space is a little cramped, so he can lean on Anti-Spiral Nia a bit so that he doesn't fall.

I guess I'll stick the Yokos in the middle. As you all probably know, I'm not really a fan of Yoko. I kind of wish they'd stop stickig her in every single set. There are characters much more deserving of figures than her. Like Viral, or Adiane, or Rossiu. You know, people who actually contriubuted to the plot. But fan-service is fan-service and there's not much I can do about it.



For some reason, I couldn't get a good picture of Yoko in her teacher get-up. The camera consistantly decided to focus on something other than Yoko. Not that I really blame it. This is, I think, the second Yomako we've gotten, which isn't a high number if you take a look at all of the Yoko figures available. She's pretty okay, looking. It's a nice sculpt and a nice paint, and I guess she's not looking like a total skank in comparison to some of her other figures. Funny story about this one though...

When I was setting these up, my mom was in the room helping since she finds my nerdings amusing. So I pick it up and whine a bit about how there are too many Yoko figures, and my mom leans over to take a look, pauses, and then loudly proclaims "WHORE!" I start laughing and direct her to Space-Yoko...



Mom and I had a good laugh about how Yoko's kind of a skank and about how guns should not work in space. Space-Yoko's cleavage kind of bothers me, since it seems to be pushed up kind of awkwardly, but over all, again it's a nice sculpt and a nice paint. The one problem Ir eally have with her is that her rifle doesn't like staying in palce and if you move her at all it kind of slides around everywhere. I feel like her plastic "Base" should have extended out a little to have a slot to put the end of the rifle in to in order to prevent this.



I really enjoy the Laganns in this set. I'd totally forgotten about him since when AmiAmi finally got the preordrs in stock, he wasn't on the product image. So when I found the regular Lagann in my set, I got excited. Then I came across metalic Lagann and had a fit of giggles because I had no idea this was in the set. They both look fantastic, but metalic Lagann just has this extra charm of the metalic shine that makes him seem a little more real.



Now it's time to move on to why I was really excited about this set. I've saved the best for last. It's time for Nia and Anti-Spiral Nia.



If you remember the post I made back in February, I was excited over this set because this is the first time we've gotten an Anti-Spiral Nia figure, even though we were promised a Revoltech one years ago that never happened, much to my disappointment. But now we at least have this, and my friends can stop listening to me complain about how Anti-Spiral Nia has been completely ignored.



She is absolutely gorgeous. She has all of her markings, and is positioned to "float" just as she always did in the series. (Because gravity is for suckers.) The way her hair floats around her is a little unsettling for me, since it never actually separated up like that, but I can deal with it since it's painted so well and we finally have this figure at all. I also wish the pole that held her up was clear plastic like the bases instead of blue so it was a little less conspicuous. It was also kind of hard to get around her waist. But that's okay since it means it will hold her stably now that I've gotten it on her.

Regular Nia, even though she's kind of naked, is also fantastic.



This is probably the only really "adult" figure I have, due to Nia being naked. But even so, she's covering herself pretty well. I don't think my mom (who is the one who attached Nia's hair for me since I couldn't get it) even noticed she was naked. Or if she did, she at least didn't comment on it at all. Though given her reaction to Yoko, she probably would have. None the less, she's painted wonderfully, and it's nice to have something a little Simon/Nia related, even if it is pretty blatant fan service.

So I am really pleased with how these figures turned out and I'm glad to finally have them on my shelf to enjoy up close, instead of staring at pictures on the internet and waiting for them to arrive. If you're a TTGL fan and like collecting figures, I'd definitely recommend this set. AmiAmi has plenty in stock right now. Though if you get registered SAL shipping, your total is going to come out to around $75. Just thought I'd give you fair warning.

But guys, it's totally worth it.

Ichiban KUJI Premium - Genome Figure

So about a week ago, while talking about upcoming Gurren Lagann figures, I mentioned that I had ordered Banpresto's Genome figure. This morning, eight days later, he arrived in all of his glory. What I hadn't realized about this figure is that he is HUGE.



This is him next to my iBook G4, for comparison. The screen comes up to his shoulders. If you'd like another comparison, here he is with Uplark's Nia figure.



Dude is ENORMOUS. But he is also totally amazing to look at. Genome is an enormous, bulky, hairy guy and that is reflected so beautifully in this figure.



Everything about him is so wonderfully defined that I can see a lot of his details from the other side of my crappily lit room. Banpresto went above and beyond here. His chest hair/foot hair is amazing.



They have gone into such detail on him. He's an Ichiban Kuji premium, so I'm not that surprised. But Just got damn. Look at him. Even his BACK is ridiculously defined. (Though I guess if you're going to do it, do it all the way, right?)





Yet another purchase I don't regret in the slightest.

More Things That Will One Day Line My Shelves

As I mentioned last time, my friend AnthonyMclovin is a pretty big toy nerd. He has a bad habit of dropping things in my path that I either don't care about or would rather not see. But he also knows what I like, and if he sees something that I'd be interested in, he's always quick to bring it to my attention. Because of this, I tolerate everything else.

This morning he passed the following along to me...


Click here for a slightly larger version of this image.

...and I just about died. He has been listening to me complain for AGES that I wanted someone to make an Anti-Spiral Nia figure. (Not to mention just some older Nia figures in general.) And here she is. I want both of those Nias, since they both look gorgeous.

I'm not that interested in the Yokos (since my interest in Yoko herself is nil) but I'd probably buy them all as a set and just leave her standing around the back of the collection. but Id would display Simon and Kamina reenacting the end of Simon's anti-spiral dream for all time. Because the fact that they've enabled that is FANTASTIC.

He's also told me there's supposed to be a second wave of figures featuring villains and minor characters. My mind instantly jumped to one person -- Adiane the Elegant. If this came to pass, I'd probably die of joy. Adiane is probably my favorite female character in the series (only barely surpassing Nia) and the idea of any merchandise at all of her sets my heart a flutter.

These aren't coming out until May, but preorders are open. As soon as I drop some money in the bank i'm taking a swing at them.

I also just now purchased this handsome fellow for my collection:



I saw this ages ago and never thought I'd have the chance to buy him, but I spotted him on eBay and knew I'd regret it if I didn't jump at the chance. So expect a post featuring his exploits in the future.

There are actually, finally, quite a few Nia figures out these days, and I eventually plan to start gathering them up for my shelves. Though the rest of the cast is still dwarfed by the sheer volume of Yoko available. I shouldn't be surprised since Yoko exists entirely for fan service, but I wish we had more figures of everyone else instead of a couple dozen of her showing off her boobs.

But oh well. No one's making me buy them, so I'll just glare angrily at them in the stores I go to and then come home and enjoy the figures I've bought.

Expect a post about Lagann-hen soon, guys! I need to rewatch it and take notes and screencaps so I can write a decent post! But I have watched it through once and can say that it was SPECTACULAR.

Figures - Viral & Nia by Uplark

One of my favorite things is collecting figures. I'm not even really sure how I got into it, but it became a complete addiction of mine. I've sunken ridiculous amounts of money on my collection. I swear, being a nerd is a lot like being a drug addict, except it's not illegal. But that aside, I'm here today to show off the two newest additions to my collection -- Uplark's Viral and Nia figures.

Suri and I went half and half on Uplark's Kamina figure last Christmas. Since I'm the one who doesn't have a hyper-destructive younger sibling, the expensive figure lives with me. So having basked in Kamina's glory for a year, I know Uplark puts out quality products.



A good friend of mine who writes for Tomopop keeps a pretty close eye on the toy scene, and alerted me that Hobby Link Japan had these two figures on sale shortly after Christmas. A brilliant move on their part since I was no longer broke and yearning for something new for my shelves. It still cost me a pretty penny -- $130-ish for the two of them and shipping. But honestly, since on their own they're normally about $100 each, it was a bargain.

I picked Viral and Nia up from the post office this morning and when I took them out, I was not disappointed.



I pulled Nia out first since her box was smaller, and I instantly fell in love with her. She's got a certain rather lovely elegance about her that I noted right away when I got her on her base and set her on the table to get a good look. And her face is just so charmingly "Nia".





She comes with an alternate head that you can change out of her later pre-skip look after her hair had been cut. But for some reason I can't look at her with short hair if she's not wearing her adorable pink Gurren-dan hoodie, so that head has been left in the box.

I think my favorite thing about this pose is her feet.



I love how one foot is just about off the ground. It's a nice little detail. I also love the bend in the strap on the back of her shoes. Being female, and having a mother with a million-and-five shoes, I don't think that the one on her weight-bearing foot should be bent out so much, but still it's nice that they at least acknowledged the way womens' shoes actually work instead of just painting a red stripe down the back of her foot and calling it a day.

I also love the lace detail on the back of her skirt.



I have to admit, this was pretty much the last thing I noticed about Nia's outfit when I watched Gurren Lagann, bit I always thought it was rather charming and I love the way it's handled here.

Now let's cross the spectrum from cute to completely badass and take a look at Viral, shall we?



Viral is absolutely glorious. I've seen this figure in person before (though it was in it's box) so I knew it would be, but being able to get up close to him was fantastic.



He has a great, classically "crazy Viral" face going on, though unless you're looking at him from a certain angle, it's really hard to see it. He's a figure that definitely needs to be displayed on a shelf above eye level. Otherwise you just totally lose some of his charm. But even so, it's impossible to miss the great details on this figure.



The best is his weapon. Uplark, you get a gold star for this. It's all knicked and worn and scratched, as if he's been slicing up bitches left and right! And you know he has been. It's Viral for christ's sake. You don't have to get up close to really notice it but it is something you'd have to be really looking at him to notice.

But the one thing about this figure that can't go beyond notice? Viral's hands are enormous.



Now my hands are really tiny, but I've NEVER had a figure with a hand much larger than the end of my thumb. I can only say that because of Kamina. The rest of them are roughly the size of my thumbnail. But I can fit an entire finger in Viral's huge cat-hand. I'm pretty sure it's for dynamic effect, but I'm certain Viral's hands aren't normally that ridiculously huge. None the less, huge hands mean I can make him hold smaller things...



The best I had on hand was Ririn from the "Bleach: The Styling" set, who will probably be a snack for Viral until he figures out that she's a stuffed animals and not a bird.

All in all, there is no way I regret spending the money on these two. They are absolutely gorgeous. Judging by a slip of paper that came in Nia's box, Uplark also has a Darry figure out (or on the way) so I hope to get her, and pray they eventually do a Simon to round out the collection.