The trailer for this short film, directed by Neon Genesis Evangelion‘s Shinji Higuchi, from Studio Ghibli aired last summer, but now we can actually watch the whole thing. It was announced not only as the company’s first foray into live action, but also as an attempt to capture an old style of Japanese kaiju filmmaking. Including: no CGI. The God Warriors are the ultimate danger in the world of Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind, and they’re no less ominous for being placed in Tokyo. [via The Mary Sue]
A really stunning debut, I just wish I spoke Japanese.
Amongst other things (~cough~ Puzzle and Dragons ~cough~), I’ve been spending quite a lot of time playing the very fabulous Ni No Kuni. Like most JRPGs it is fairly travel heavy and in my experience, there is only one thing that makes running across the wide expanse of world (aka nothing) fun, and that is jumping. Thankfully Ni No Kuni delivered, and right on time as I was starting to wonder if I had lost the jump button.
I had two more Rare Egg pulls after Venus yesterday for God Fest in Puzzles and Dragons. One resulted in Neptune, which I already had (my only previous god). The last pull I saved for my husband since he enjoys the entire process far more. I like making him happy, plus he seems to have crazy good luck on my account.
This is what his pull resulted in:
Though I had hoped for Hades, because God of the Underworld is too awesome to not want, the Japanese God Kagutsuchi is even better!
I think these pleasant surprises are part of what I enjoy most about the game, the chance to discover new faces and be impressed by new possibilities. Although right now I do feel a little overwhelmed by the amount of leveling and evolving my monster box has filled up with.
I have been waylaid by the post Halloween plague. Okay so it is a mere cold, but it has caused much listlessness and lethargy. Sleeping is about the extent of what I have wanted to do the past two days. But tonight, in an effort to right my sleep schedule (didnt want to wake up at 5am again due to sleeping the 24 hours before), I attempted to stay up past 6pm.
Gaming seemed like way too much effort, as did anything requiring thinking at all, so I tuned into Netflix. Thankfully they give out handy suggestions and I took them up on one of them.
“Jiro Dreams of Sushi” was my first pick. I thought it was a comedy, because the title is goofy and frankly with Japanese movies you never can tell. Turns out its a documentary about one of the most celebrated sushi chefs in Japan. And it is incredible. Not only is this movie a wonderful cornucopia of delicious looking sushi, but it creates a surprisingly insightful picture of Japanese culture through the love of sushi. This was a true find and makes me want to visit Japan again.
Sadly, Jiro was quite short, so I hunted around for something else to watch and found that Netflix has season six of Psych! As a huge fan of the show, I couldn’t help but watch four episodes in a row.
This might have been the best night of TV I have watched in recent memory, dare I say a miracle cure for the Halloween Plague?! I laughed, I cried, I yearned for Japan, what more could a girl want.
Looking at it from a broader perspective I could just pick Nintendo EAD. But I have found the gaming industry is rather volatile. Though Miyamoto-san didn’t create games in a vacuum, it is unlikely that the entire Super Mario team is still working at Nintendo. Though, honestly, it is far more likely in Japan than it is here.
Whatever the case, since Nintendo has chosen to give Miyamoto-san his due, I can only assume that the projects he worked on were heavily influenced by his vision for the games.
Shigeru Miyamoto is also one of the few developers to enjoy almost constant success through out a very long career.
I will add that my other pick was the creator of Diablo…<3
It feels like I have been trying forever to get my husband to watch anime. Having very little success, I wrote the whole thing off as a lost cause. Then just the other day the husband came home with a Gundam model kit from the hobby store. A rather surprising purchase to say the least.
When asked what prompted this purchase, he told me that he really enjoyed building Lego mechs and this seemed like an interesting new challenge. I was totally floored, because I LOVE Gundam. Whats not to love about Giant robots, come ON!
Of course I found an excuse to get back to that store as soon as humanly possible, so I could get myself a kit. The unicorn one. Oh yeah!
Which is what we did today. Side by side Gundam building. Hubby is working on the Freedom Gundam model and mine is the Master Gundam & Fuunsaiki model.
But the real win here is that he said he will watch Mobile Suit Gundam with me. Thus proving that Lego is a gateway drug for anime. Pure logic there. =)
Lots of photos of my first ever Gundam model building to follow, but first, here is how far I have gotten.
The very first randomly* selected item off of the ‘to watch list’. Space Battleship Yamato turned out to be a fortunate first choice, as I hadn’t seen it yet, plus it was a rather recent purchase of mine, so I was doubly excited to watch it. =)
The movie was actually based on a very popular Japanese anime series that started its run in the early 70s. I am not familiar with this series, was a bit before my time, so I can’t speak to the movie remaining true to the original.
Though there were a few animated movies released in Japan associated with the series, this is the first Live Action version.
I didn’t actually know any of this before watching it. All I really knew was that it looked like a fun Space Sci Fi Action movie. That’s certainly how the trailer sold it.
But like most Japanese movies, it managed to thwart my expectations. There were lots of really decent space battles and good CG, but ultimately I think this movie is really more of a character study. It reminded me of one of those movies that Hollywood actors would do to try for an Oscar.
Now that my dirty little secret is out, I can share my next hair brianed idea – to finally watch all the anime/movies/tvshow I have always wanted to watch (or rewatch). I even managed to rope in a buddy and between the two of us we created a list.
Currently the list has 155 items. I admit that it is a little ambitious. Even if every item were only a two hour movie, this would be a solid 13 days (24/7) of viewing time. That of course is only true if we manage to not keep adding more stuff to the list. (I haven’t even added any k-dramas to the mix.)
So much to watch. Its going to take a while, especially since we haven’t actually started yet. Now to decide how to pick what to watch. Rolling two d10s would give us random numbers up to 100.
Anyway here is a little selection from our list. Any suggestions?
I’m on a serious K-drama bender right now. And before you ask, I am not Asian, not even a little bit. So how did I develop a love of the Asian persuasion? I blame Transformers.
It would probably be more accurate to say that Transformers had me primed for the anime bug to sink its teeth deep into my soul. Win for Saturday morning cartoons.
Fast forward to my teen years, I watch Akira for the very first time. Am completely clueless about plot or storyline, but generally floored by the whole experience. Of course I immediately watch it again (finally figure out what the hell is going on) and am totally hooked.
Ninja Scrolls follows as well as a bunch of fabulous Chow Yun Fat movies. At this point selection is limited (I lived in a totally boondocks town, I’m shocked they even had Ninja Scrolls) so I make due with what I can find.
Forward a bit more, I finally make it to a city that has options. Am introduced to Escaflowne, Macross Plus, Gundum, Manga and much more.
Eventually I add in live action Japanese movies and various movies/shows based on manga I liked. This also introduces me to a bunch of K-dramas (Korean dramas) based on Japanese manga. And so the story unfolds.
Found this at a local Japanese store. I’m shocked they didn’t call this the Official Face Roller, but then the folks who named this probably had no idea. Yaay for engrish.
Next time someone in raid claims to be facerolling, I will know what (wtf?!) they are doing.
