Here Tezuka begins to experiment with full black page backgrounds and a cinematic zoom effect, with each successive panel getting smaller and smaller (or larger and larger) to simulate a film camera. After one such zoom out and another zoom in, we have moved in both time and space to Lyon, France. The year is 1939, and Lamp has sold his father-in-law's scientific research to the Nazis. As if Acetelyne Lamp's typecast villany isn't established enough, Tezuka has now convinced us that he is not a man to be trusted. His wife is heartbroken.

Zoom! Cut! It is now seven years earlier, and Zephyrus is introducing her boyfriend, Lamp, to her father amid a field of flowers. He would like to marry her, and her father happily acquieces. Zoom in on butterflies, cut to two arms in a bedroom, the lights dimmed. They are in Nice, in the winter of the same year. For two pages here Tezuka shows us the intimacy of these two lovers with nothing more than a series of horizontal panels, framing their arms as they talk. Lamp is having financial difficulty and wants to sell Zephyrus's father's research. Her arm shrinks away from his.

More black panels bring us to Lyon in 1940, where Lamp informs his father-in-law that, on the Nazi's orders, he is sending him to work for them. In a page exclusively composed of vertical panels, Lamp moves from the bottom of the panel to the top, and we see him speaking down not only to Zephyrus's handicapped father, but to her as well. He is an ambitious, ruthless man, completely in control of the situation.

Another cacophonous black page takes us from Zephyrus's father's suicide to the birth of a baby to Locarno again, in 1940. Canted shots of trains show Zephyrus's frantic flight.

Finally, we come to rest in 1943, on a small island near Guadalcanal. A caretaker rushes back to Zephyrus's bedside, watching as she relays her final words to her daughters. They must destroy money, law, and men in order to get revenge on the father who destroyed their lives. Zephyrus passes, and we zoom away from her crying children and finish the story on one final black panel.

In just 24 pages, we see the beginning, middle, and end of a marriage, with time and space jumbled up in the subjectivity of memory. In the hands of a clumsier manga artist, such temporal and aesthetic changes would surely be confusing, but it is a testament to his genius that Tezuka is able to tie it all up into a fast-paced, digestible, and entertaining package.

This post is a part of the Osamu Tezuka Manga Moveable Feast (MMF), a week-long celebration of the manga work of Osamu Tezuka, hosted by The Manga Critic. Check out the extensive archive for this week's MMF at The Manga Critic.

Half of the game is spent trying to reunite with Malik, and the other half is spent dealing with the surrounding evil. I don't know whether PoP: TFS felt easier due to my lengthy replay of its predecessors or if the new game is just inherently easier, but the lack of a hard difficulty (even after beating the game on a very easy-feeling Normal) may be a clue. Puzzles are sparse and, aside from the select few that subtly require the use of the Prince's Djinn-given powers, can be figured out in a couple of moments upon the first encounter. Similarly, the acrobatic paths required to navigate all the maps are so obvious that one could either compliment the camerawork for guiding the player or chide the level designers for offering up such an unambiguous environment. That said, the acrobatics (which I'll get to later) are what make this game ... especially when you take the fighting element into account.

The games comprising the Sands of Time trilogy have always walked a delicate balance between acrobatics and combat, leaning to one side or the other in any given iteration.  PoP: TFS is no different but rather attacks the issue in a different way. Here, the Prince faces off relatively frequently against hordes of up to around 20 enemies, most of whom don't require more than two sword blows to finish off, whereas the previous games had the player simultaneously facing, at most, five or so moderately challenging opponents. The difference is rather brilliant: make the battle element that of a button-masher to let the player feel accomplished in having dispatched so many minions while saving the real effort and time for the subsequent navigation. While the button mashing does get a bit tedious, there is a semi-decent variety of enemies, a few different combat moves, as well as ice, fire, and wind spells that can make each onslaught different enough to avoid becoming totally stale.

But acrobatics are the bread and butter of PoP: TFS. While the path the Prince must take may be all too easily discernible, that does not mean the path itself is easy. The Prince gains the power of the Djinn and with it can rewind time as well as freeze the flow of water to make it a navigable surface. A specific Djinn, Razia, also gives the Prince her familiarity with the now crumbled kingdom so that broken pieces may be made whole once more (but only one section at a time). Combine those aspects with already familiar movements, like wall running, pole swinging, ledge climbing, and bird hopping, and keeping track of what button does what can become your own worst enemy within maps intricately constructed to test dexterity (the Prince's as well as your fingers’).

Controls are spot-on, but some of the Prince’s moves feel unrealistic (compared to the earlier games).  These range from being able to run straight up a wall after jumping to it, running up walls after hanging statically from some exposed part of it (protruding stone or ledge), and bird hopping.  The action used to accomplish the latter is reminiscent of the 2008 PoP game: a power of flight aspect that just feels entirely out of sync with the rest of the physics in PoP: TFS.  Easily, programmers could have just added another bird onto which the Prince could jump or bring the ledges a little closer.  Believable or not, the gameplay is very fluid, even if it seemed to lag a bit, and the in-game camera, usually the bane of the series, is almost never an issue.

Steve Jablonsky's musical score is both appropriate to the theme of the game and complementary to each level's beautifully rendered aesthetics. My favorite touch regarding the latter is the random placement of sandstone statues, formerly living palace guards, that continually try to hold fast slightly open doors or otherwise stand and lie frozen in place. Their presence adds an eerie ambiance to a palace worn away with an omnipresent evil (sand) that wisps through those same crevasses. However lovingly crafted, cutscenes still smack of the earlier titles’ blocky renderings at times. Given the history of criticism behind the voice acting, it is also worth noting that Yuri Lowenthal reprises his role as the well-humored, sarcastic Prince from PoP: The Sands of Time and PoP: The Two Thrones.

I was so engrossed with the gameplay of PoP: TFS that it felt disappointingly short ... especially with the terse ending. The story is one big action movie cliché, but it's one that's fun to take part in and shares a good deal of elements with the original Sands of Time series. Sadly, PoP: TFS falls short on heart and introspective depth, making it akin to a deleted scene or bonus featurette rather than its own story. The insulting nature of this perceived brevity is compounded by the game’s only other mode of play: an Arena wherein the only wave of opponents consists of an eight-course serving of butter. I picked this title up on a whim one day at Best Buy for $20. If I had paid any more, I think I would have felt ripped off, but Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands is definitely worth your time to rent (or buy if the price is right).

While the TV series wasn't quite perfect, it was a great proof of concept for Kamiyama as an original storyteller, and I was excited to see how he would finish the epic story that the series started. Unfortunately, the first Eden of the East movie, subtitled The King of Eden, stands as proof that getting an original story right takes a lot more than some slick directorial work and clever scripting.

It's been six months since the events of Eden of the East. The "Noblesse Oblige" game, in which 12 unwitting victims (called Seleção) have been burdened with ten billion yen, a concierge that uses that money to carry out their every whim, and an obligation to "save Japan," is still in progress. The remaining Seleção, those who were not killed or otherwised removed from the game during the series, are still trying to track down the "Supporter," the one player among them who supposedly kills each Seleção when their funds run out. Takizawa, the quirky young man who served as our protagonist for the TV series, has gone missing, and his records show that he gave an order to his concierge to turn him into the "King of Japan," an order that apparently involved wiping his memory and giving him a new name (again).

Our story opens with Saki, a recent college graduate whose budding romance with Takizawa flung her into danger during the Eden TV series, trying to track him down in New York City. From the get-go, I was stunned by Kamiyama's attention to detail. New York looks spot-on, from the EZ-Pass toll booths to the NYC Taxi logos to the diffused lights in the windows of apartment buildings. Yusuke Takeda's (Giant Robo, Ghost in the Shell: Stand-Alone Complex, Gankutsuou) art direction strikes a delicate balance, creating scenes that are believable, but not so photorealistic that they're distracting.

It's that sort of delicacy that characterized Kamiyama's work on the TV series as well, and it follows through to the film. Takeda's backgrounds mesh perfectly with Kamiyama's screenplay and Satoru Nakamura's (Ghost in the Shell: Stand-Alone Complex) animation direction, which focus on a sort of slightly cartoonish realism. City streets look like real city streets, characters talk about taxes and politics like real people, and technology works the way real technology works (with some exceptions). There is comedy to be had among the drama, however, and this adds that splash of silliness that keeps the film from going too deep down the rabbit hole.

He may have the execution perfectly mastered, but a flawless genius Kenji Kamiyama is not. While each piece of the story is compelling in its own right, they never really mesh into a cohesive whole. Furthermore, the central conflict is never clear, since the most threatening villains are either off doing things unrelated to the main characters, are shown to be harmless fools, or are turned into good guys! In the end, there's not much to actually be worried about, since the protagonists are never in any real danger.

Look at this! I've gotten six paragraphs into this review without mentioning that amnesia is the most lazy way to start a follow-up to a popular TV series. Once they meet back up, Saki and Takizawa's relationship ends up being essentially the same as it was at the end of the show, so amnesia doesn't even seem to be a way out of some inescapable plot cul-de-sac. Building on the existing character relationships and simply moving ahead with new challenges would have made for a much more interesting film, and I don't really understand why Kamiyama didn't go down that route.

FUNimation's dub is a little overacted at times, as was the case for the original Eden of the East, but some of the more subdued roles, like Saki (Leah Clark), Takizawa (Jason Liebrecht), Hirasawa (J. Michael Tatum), and the sultry concierge Juiz (Stephanie Young) convey the tone of the story quite well. Unfortunately, the occasional odd deliveries mean it's going to be tough for non-anime fan types to take this seriously, despite the very Hollywood-style premise of the series.

The true finale comes in the second movie, so I will reserve my judgment on the entire series until I see it. However, The King of Eden is a weak follow-up to the already somewhat unsatisfying TV series ending. While it continues to prove that Kenji Kamiyama is a competent director who can construct beautiful ambiance and believable character relationships, the movie also seems to pull away the curtain on his seeming inability to tie up a complex, original narrative. Unless you're someone who really loved the TV series, this film's not for you.

[00:00] Evan introduces this super-old podcast.

[01:08] Intro: "Kill Me" by Lame Drivers

[01:23] Let's meet our guests!

[01:53] The review begins with a summary of the setting and characters of Spice & Wolf, and some of our general impressions.

[11:17] We start by talking about the sly wolf goddess Holo.

[16:27] Next up is our straight-man protagonist, the trader Kraft Craft Lawrence.

[29:35] Evan gets super-angry about Nora, the shy shepherd girl.

[30:22] Season one spoilers start here.

[31:27] Evan likes to see people die. Also, more spoilers.

[37:27] Incredibly mild spoilers about the final scene in season one.

[37:24] The spoilers are over now. You can uncover your ears, you babies.

[39:16] We talk about the animation, background art, and some of the music in Spice & Wolf.

[44:09] Final thoughts

[48:08] "The awkward ending." Twitter: @AniGamers, @VamptVo, @AnimatedInk (Ink has split his accounts between poetry and anime since this podcast was recorded), and @BradleyCMeek.

[51:10] Outro: "Kill Me" by Lame Drivers

[51:37] We read food nicknames from Parks & Recreation's Tom Haverford.

Fate/Extra is an RPG much in the vein of the later entries in the Persona series. You assume control of a blank-slate protagonist who finds himself involved in a single-elimination tournament for the Holy Grail for reasons he cannot remember. Gameplay breaks down between information-gathering in the school-themed central hub and commanding a Servant, a supernatural being, to fight for you in the tournament. F/E follows passage of time mechanics similar to Persona, assigning you time-sensitive tasks to do before progressing to the next elimination round. Now, I happen to love the Persona games, so I’m painfully aware of every moment F/E doesn’t meet the standards set by the game it emulates.

To start with, the environments (the school and the arena) aren’t all that interesting, and you’ll stare at them for hours as you run through the game. The arena is simply a collection of sparse corridors that don’t serve much purpose other than to hold an enemy encounter, treasure, or scripted event. The school is equally lifeless, especially once the number of NPC combatants is reduced by the end of the tournament. While the level design is lazy, it has nothing on the Extreme Rock-Paper-Scissors battle system. It’s a major letdown to learn that the Servant fights that awed me in the original visual novel have been reduced to a guessing game wherein you input six commands each turn (attack, break, guard, or a selection from a list of skills) and hope for the best. You can easily throw away an hours worth of playtime by not playing like a coward. After a while, Servants will familiarize themselves with enemies and telepathically figure out the enemy’s command order, at which point you can turn off all thinking processes and grind until the enemies stop dropping worthwhile XP.

So the gameplay isn’t all that great, but at least the story and writing should be good, right? Nasu’s name is prominently featured on the back of the box underneath a screen shot, which is more credit than what most writers involved in games can hope for. Unfortunately, Nasu takes it easy with this one. The only characters that are remotely interesting are the three playable Servants and characters with existing ties to the Nasuverse. The F/E originals are surprisingly clichéd and difficult to sympathize with in their dying moments after having remorselessly delivered a beating on them.The principle antagonist for most of the game is a snotty kid who happens to be the king of the world and spends most of his appearances giving condescending advice to your character, who takes it like a punk. Really, that’s the extent of the relationship with what you’re led to believe is your greatest foe for over 25 hours of gameplay. Everything is scripted so that you’re never at a loss of where to go, who to talk to, or what item you need to overcome any obstacle that comes up, and everyone is more than glad to help your amnesiac protagonist against his incompetent and stagey opponents. It’s so straightforward that it prevents interesting developments in the story. I never really felt like my choices had any impact on my character’s development, and forging a bond with your Servant essentially comes down to “Did you talk to your Servant today?” This is essentially the opposite of my experiences with the visual novel, so I wonder how much involvement Nasu actually had in writing the scenario for the game.

There are choice moments where the Fate spirit shines in the game, though. Saber Extra’s dialogue and vocal performance is excellent throughout, pretty much single-handedly justifying F/E’s inclusion in the Fate canon. Caster is worth a playthrough for seiyuu fanatics interested in having voice actress Chiwa Saito refer to them as “master,” even if she’s the weakest servant and requires hours of tender, loving grinding to compete in boss fights. I haven’t yet steeled myself for a third run of F/E, but I imagine Archer is just as wonderfully a jerk as he was in F/SN. Though I wish the game would make a proper name for itself, all of the call-backs to other Type-Moon properties are amusing. The Noble Phantasms are as flashy as the PSP can hope to muster, and the remixed F/SN music tracks let you know that its about to go down right now.

Aksys Games did see fit to give this game a proper showing here in America with its own limited edition release in a big cardboard box that seems to be the fashion with PSP RPGs lately. The extras are typical fare for a release like this: a small art book and an incomplete soundtrack CD. It’s a really nice art book, though; the hardcover binding and paper stock are above what’s usually done for bonuses like this. I’m only a little (very) upset that the Saber Extra figma from the Japanese release isn’t included, but I suppose licensing deals and price and all those other bothersome factors came up.

I’ll keep my berating of Aksys Games' F/E localization to a minimum if I ever hope to see them publish the sequel, which sounds infinitely more interesting. I’ll just say that the localization is kind of weird from time to time. There are a few embarrassing typos in the script, and even more embarrassing are the occasional fansub-isms that pop up in dialogue, a thing people complain about in, you know, actual fansubs and not a product released by professionals. I’m sure no one at mirror moon got paid to translate the F/SN visual novel, but I’m also sure they would have had the integrity to never have Caster say “OMG.”

So Fate/Extra didn’t manage to become my favorite game despite being a Persona clone with Servants in it. The game is a "fans only" experience that often feels like a chore. Even so, I will probably buy the sequel from Aksys or whoever publishes it in America, regardless of all the bad things I’ve said about the first game. I feel responsible to let publishers know there is a market for Fate in America, so I am compelled to vote with my dollars (though Aniplex won’t see a dime of that, let alone $700 to own the complete Fate/Zero collection). I optimistically await to have nothing but good things to say about the sequel.

While the plot is certainly centered around the struggle between Shizuku and Issei, the real struggle of the story is the exploration of self through which Shizuku has to go in order to be able to relate to his late father. Shizuku has had an in-depth education on the ways of wine but has never drank any, putting him at a severe disadvantage at a blind tasting. Issei has had a lifetime and celebrated career as a wine taster, but only one week as Yutaka’s son. As the plot progresses, Issei doesn’t try to be any more a son to the departed, but Shizuku (with help from apprentice sommelier Shinohara Miyabi) goes through various trials that bring him further and further down into the cellar of the subject that was his father’s passion.

The aforementioned trials are the bulk of this manga, and the wines they center around (all 100% authentic) are the respective heft of the chapters. This is made most obvious via the attention paid to the visual rendering of any panel featuring bottles or wine. Character designs and settings are distinguished but rather average in most instances, while any scene involving wine, wine bottles, or the various visual metaphors employed for the euphoric experience of tasting wine (a Queen concert, a maiden in a field, a merry-go-round, a scene from Strauss’s Salome) come across not as photorealistic but as lovingly crafted portraiture. Any serious wine drinker will love this manga for this aspect alone. To all readers, the alternation betwixt what I’ll call character and bottle style imbues this 424-page volume with a diversity of visuals that whets appetites for the next feast.

There is also a LOT of textual description within these pages: vinter lineages, wine taste, wine smell, how to drink wine, how to pour wine, when to pour wine, wine origin and similarity ... you get the gist.  Casual readers would probably find the material a bit too dry for their tastes were it not for the almost beguiling charm derived from the pacing of Shizuku and Miyabi's adventures as well as humor written a little too perfectly via extended metaphors exploiting similarities in terminology between manga and wine (such as the conversation pictured on the right). So that, combined with the almost laughably yet convincingly applied left-field taste analogies (did I mention the Queen concert?) and their culmination, actually makes the manga a proverbial page-turner. The same characteristics contribute to readability for those in the know. Being shoveled information on decanting, vintages, vineyards, etc. can be downright tedious, but it is the mix of storytelling techniques and art that will elicit interest and propel wine connoisseurs through the book. While outright descriptions attempt to fill readers in on the wines as well as the experience of drinking them, the authors and illustrator do a fantastic job defining Shizuku and Issei via glimpses into their preparations for the upcoming battles.

Shizuku, whose first musical wine metaphor involves Queen, describes the wine admiringly as “somehow like classical” but not quite, with “a melting sweetness and a sharp rush of sourness.” Altogether not the most poignant of descriptions, but it is a Romantic one. Later on, readers get a taste of Issei’s musical leanings: Richard Strauss’s opera, Salome, which Issei associates with a “blood scented sensuality born of decadence.” If one sets aside the obvious sweet vs. evil leanings of those descriptions, the context in which they are delivered is as subtle delivery mechanism as any for showing a major difference between the main characters.

The perpetual learner, Shizuku mostly listens to others. When he does speak, usually to elaborate upon the characteristics of a wine at hand or demonstrate a wine-related technique, his flowery meditations are written such that they are more Zen moments of sensory exploration that seem identifiable to those surrounding Shizuku. Even the way he gives advice to people shows him to be a genuine helping hand — a person who keeps in mind exactly who he is reaching out to as opposed to showing off transcendent talent of taste/technique. The latter is more applicable to Issei’s preachy tone. A lecturer at heart, Issei often talks as though no one else is in the room ... even when it’s part of a dialogue. I wager readers can take everyone else out of a scene involving Issei describing wine and that scene would have the same effect. By the end of the volume, the main characters’ choices of musical allusions reflect not only how personable they are but their sense of modernity as well. So far, Shizuku involves the recent present (as much as 70s Queen is recent) and Issei invokes a century-old opera. As wine is consistently referred to as a living thing (temperamental), how closely each critic can pull similarities from their own near history is an indication of who keeps wine closer and who put it upon a pedestal of distance.

Not everything in The Drops of God is great. The pacing can seem laborious depending on personal experience with and interest in wine, and there are a few minor instances where clichés border on offensive and overly convenient: why must the wine wisdom and saving grace in one arc come from a homeless person ... who then ends up knowing the main characters and acting as a judge?! But even if I found myself getting angry at situations like that, keep in mind that I was getting angry because it wasn't perfect. Why? Because this manga is just that good, and I wanted it to be perfect. This graphic novel has actually influenced countries' wine sales and purchases fer chris’ sake. If nothing else, to quote Evan Minto, “it’s almost frustrating how compelling it is!”

I feel like I’ve let the prose get ahead of me for a manga review about a quintet of schoolgirls, all members of their school’s Light Music Club, doing silly things and being cute. Even so, I can’t deny the unsettling parallels between drug usage and reveling in the moé lifestyle. It can’t be ignored that there are some deeper machinations at work to have propelled this humble 4-koma gag manga into a merchandising empire that will keep a few creators and publishers financially sound for a time. It’s easy to forget there ever was a manga while the anime has commanded such a blinding presence in the last couple of years (primarily in Japan, different story in the West), and I would argue the franchise wouldn’t be half as successful had Kyoto Animation (KyoAni) not been handed the reigns. K-ON! is one of those cases where the adaptation overshadows the source material.

I would like to stop talking about what KyoAni has done for K-ON! and focus on the manga in question, but it must be said that Kakifly provided an excellent framework rather than a fully realized work. If your first taste of K-ON! came from the television show, the manga may come across as a downgrade. Most of the essential elements are there, but there’s something missing. We might as well get it out of the way now and admit that the missing piece is that deft, loving KyoAni touch that elevates erog and light novels to heights unimaginable by their original creators. While Kakifly competently illustrates the experiences of a group of high school friends, KyoAni breaths life into the world and quite literally makes the characters come alive and sing.

As unremarkable as I make it sound, Kakifly’s K-ON! is still one of the better slice-of-life manga out there. Like any good slice-of-life 4-koma, it’s easy to pick up and effortlessly flip through a whole volume in an hour. There are no ponderous subjects to tackle, hardly any moments of distress, and most conflicts are resolved through spirited enthusiasm and encouragement. Kakifly plays up the sexuality plenty of times, either for a joke or a splash page, but don’t get the wrong idea that K-ON! is some sort of subversive perversion of schoolgirl idolatry (the author isn’t nearly brilliant enough to make that work). Between the anime and the manga, Kakifly takes the crown for having the sexiest content of the two, but even he manages to show some restraint. There are no two-page full color spreads of bathhouse scenes with the Light Music Club, although I’m sure you’d be able to find a poster like that by browsing through K-ON! merchandise.

I don’t want to make any excuses for K-ON! to explain why I like it so much, which is why I need to admit that several criticisms about it are on the mark. K-ON! is about nothing, aside from an account of a high school music club across three years, and occasionally there are too many bare thighs and maid outfits for the typical manga cynic to stomach. K-ON!’s greatest strength that prevents it from collapsing into a sugary goo are its characters. Granted, this won’t work for everyone, but endearment towards the characters goes a long way in one’s enjoyment of K-ON!. While several characters are pulled from stock anime personalities (Ritsu is the energetic girl! Mugi is the kind-hearted rich girl! Nodoka is class rep among class reps!), the execution is such that everyone mixes together well. The anime might do it better, but the manga does a fine enough job convincing me that these people can be friends for reasons other than "we're in the same club". Each character possesses distinct minor traits and are allowed equal time to shine, avoiding favoritism in what is supposed to be an ensemble cast. The clean and attractive character designs avoid the usual anime embellishment, opting instead for a subdued and unified design across all characters. They are “real” enough while allowing Kakifly space to capture the characters' expressiveness.

For a manga that is wholly character-centric, Kakifly makes it look good by keeping it simple. The situations and jokes are such fluff, readers are likely to either grin like a creepy idiot or frown with measured disappointment. Don’t expect too much in-depth musical territory to be covered in the manga, as the girls spend most of their time lounging around in the club room or hanging out in town and each other’s houses. The leisurely pace of Kakifly’s high school utopia covers the usual circuit of Japanese adolescence, from school festivals to club trips. It’s hard not to get even a little invested in the world and characters when it’s made to be so appealing.

The Yen Press release of K-ON! is put together quite nicely. The pages are larger than the typical manga volume, so you won’t need to keep the book so close to your face to absorb the details. Each volume has an abundance of color pages and a few extras tacked on at the end, which I appreciate. The covers and spine are done up in each featured character’s image color and look appealing when lined up. I have minor grumblings about the localization, a welcome change to how I normally feel about having things I like put in a language I can understand by people paid to do so. I commend Yen Press for not writing out Mugi’s yuri-vision scenes after KyoAni killed that noise early in the anime adaptation. However, they dropped the ball by swapping out the onomatopoeia in Azusa’s nickname for the American equivalent, despite how damn near everyone who would pick up K-ON! knows what “nyaa~” is. Yen Press even goes to the length of including a glossary in each volume to explain details that might be lost on American audiences, yet they couldn’t keep “Azu-nya”. Not to mention how poorly “Azu-meow” tumbles out of my dumb American mouth.

I suppose the purpose of a review is to sell someone on a product, but I can’t put it out of my mind the weight one must carry to enjoy something like K-ON!. To the uninitiated, approaching K-ON! requires a blind leap. You either come out of it feeling gross or you discover a new dimension to that Japanese stuff you enjoy so much. If you’re like me, you won’t find out about the dark side of seinen manga target demographics until after you’re in too deep. You’ll most definitely be judged for being into “That Little Girl Crap”, but they can never hope to understand you or your moé. Like with any drug, remember to never take it too hard and always mind your budget.

Lychee Light Club is a one-shot graphic novel from cult favorite Usamaru Furuya, based on the Tokyo Grand Guignol theatre troupe's tragic 1985 play of the same name. It follows the rapid degeneration of this tightly controlled boyhood hierarchy, perpetuated by the successful activation of their robot, "Lychee," and his successful capture of a beautiful girl named Kanon. Amidst growing paranoia in the club, Kanon forms a strange connection with her robot captor, who has been programmed to believe that he, too, is human.

Lychee's greatest strength is its brevity; the one-shot format allows Furuya to tell a complete story with a surprisingly satisfying arc, all while driving home some biting social commentary. My first impression was that Furuya is commenting on Japanese sexual seclusion, most clearly evidenced by the boys' idolatrous view of girls. One says "I kinda can't believe it: a girl, right in front of me," and the dictatorial leader of the group, Zera, declares that "you must never look at her as an object of lust!" Intentional or not, it calls to mind otaku culture's "sexualization of innocence," as evidenced by moé anime and teenage idol culture.

Grand Guignol-style theatre is known for its gruesome violence, and this manga adaptation pulls no punches. A female history teacher who chances upon the Light Club is stripped and then evicerated for her crime, and a fellow student who makes the same mistake has his eyes burned out after a morbidly funny scene in which the boys brainstorm ways to punish their unfortunate captive.

These moments of quirky, black comedy are rare, but they are deftly incorporated into the story, such as a sequence in which Lychee brings back a series of inanimate objects and ugly people in a failed attempt to pinpoint what "beautiful girl" means. There's a fascinating (and horrifying) cognitive dissonance in laughing during a scene involving human beings who have been needlessly kidnapped to fulfill the sexual urges of a cabal of disturbed teenagers.

The two rays of light in this story are Kanon and Lychee himself, who, in working as a tool for the Light Club members' dark desires, becomes more human than they could ever be. By the end of the story, the friendship (and perhaps romance?) between Kanon and Lychee becomes a strong driving force, and manages to leave the reader with a satisfying conclusion despite the horrific events throughout the book.

Furuya's art is a perfect match for the subject, mixing super-high contrast shadows and highlights with intentionally ugly, androgynous character designs. He seems to delight in drawing hair and cloth in particular, usually depicting them as all-black with white highlights.

There's a lot going on in Furuya's macabre epic, from subdued commentary on industrialization (told through background art but never explicitly mentioned) to homoerotic experimentation (the boys fulfill each others sexual desires in absence of a female presence). If you can accept that all of Furuya's absurd violence, including people being flattened from the head-down, burned alive, snapped in half, and raped, is there for the sake of commentary and (in some cases) catharsis, not titillation, you will find Lychee Light Club to be a wholly satisfying, even ... fruitful experience.

Kelts specifically noted Astro Boy, which emerged after World War II, and pointed out how the story uses radiation as an aspect of creation rather than destruction. This "boy born of radiation" shows a faith in the same technology (or along the lines thereof) that delivered such a crushing blow to life not even a decade earlier. Along the same lines, Kelts offered up a similar method of thinking regarding the resurrection of the Japanese battleship Yamato, which was the pride of the countrys naval fleet as one of its most technologically advanced WWII warships. After its defeat, the Yamato came back to life via fiction as a technologically superior spaceship ("Take THAT, America!"). In addition to Kelts also mentioned the birth of mecha as means to fight the disillusionment with current technology. In all instances, destructive new technology didnt bring about fear in art but rather promise as well as hope that what has been survived can be learned from and built upon to become stronger.

Next Kelts focused on two anime film directors, Hayao Miyazaki and Isao Takahata, and their specific works. Perhaps to take advantage of Ponyos immediacy, Kelts pointed to this Miyazaki film as a shining example of the portrayal of natural disasters and Japanese natives reactions to them. Kelts focused specifically on the scene where personified waves of a storm are reaching up and over the road with cars, which are trying to escape. Kelts said that this portrayal is not a malicious one but rather a dangerous fact of life. He said that the eyes in the waves had a sort of aimless, "staring into space" aspect that relayed the same sense of natural innocence as another one of Miyazakis creations, Totoro.

Kelts pointed out one scene in particular from My Neighbor Totoro built on a couple of images meant to evoke memories of the Japanese people who went through WWII. In this particular scene, characters in mismatched clothes watch as a man drives off into the countryside in a jalopy. According to Kelts, this scene was one that took place in many homes during WWII as those types of cars were simply what were available and clothing supplies were scarce. In all, Kelts concluded that since Miyazakis family was one of relative privilege and could afford to escape the paths of destruction, that personal history is what colors his work.

This contrasts Isao Takahatas Grave of the Fireflies, which is tied to the notion of not being able to escape and having to deal with the event as well as its aftereffects. Most of the movie, after all, centers around trying to define and etch out an existence after an American firebombing raid consumes life as the children had known it. Kelts said the differing vantages between directors makes sense given the fact that Takahatas family was of lesser means and could not afford to escape.

After a few more specific examples of the panel, an audience member asked if there was a difference in how man-made and natural disasters are depicted. Kelts postulated that manmade disasters serve as an analogy to the evil that resides within all of us. He noted that even historical apocalyptic depictions spare specific countries any finger pointing. Instead the focus of most anime that deals with man-made apocalyptic scenarios open with disasters instead of trying to prevent them (as with the majority of Western media). This further demonstrates the themes of coping with and overcoming ourselves. Natural disasters, said Kelts, are portrayed as indirect, non-intentional ... just a part of life thats meant to be dealt with and overcome. A rather pertinent question from the audience as to if there has ever been any backlash to the depiction of such tragedies reaped a rather funny, rather thoughtful response from Kelts, who said that there have been none to his knowledge but that the popularity of mo might just be that ... another means of escape from economic or climate-based disasters or both.

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12-year-old Asuna is living alone with her workaholic mother following her father's untimely death, but despite a healthy school life she spends most of her time up on the nearby mountain, listening to whatever radio signals she can pick out on her crude ham radio. However, a dangerous run-in with a giant monster in the woods results in a friendship with a mysterious boy named Shun. Thus begins Asuna's adventure into the ruined underground world of Agartha.

You might already be sensing a bit of an influence here, and no, you're not mistaken. Makoto Shinkai has openly expressed his admiration for the works of Studio Ghilbi, particularly Laputa (Castle in the Sky), which made a big impression on him when he saw it as a boy. And while imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, Shinkai — almost certainly accidentally — leaves the realm of homage and heads straight into the no-man's land of full-on copying. Oh look, there's the Forest King from Princess Mononoke, the cave shelter from Grave of the Fireflies, the fox-squirrel from Nausicaa, the architectural style of Castle in the Sky!

Shinkai's touch is definitely there, and one need only pay attention to the director's masterful use of watercolor-esque lighting and color to understand that this is not straight-up imitation, but I still feel like there's a little bit too much Miyazaki and not enough Shinkai in the film. His trademark brooding, silent moments are still there, but they are interspersed with action scenes and fast-paced plot developments.

And boy oh boy, those action scenes! I was sure surprised to find that a director whose last outing was characterized by long stretches of waiting silently on a train can create such lightning-fast, exciting action sequences. The film's moments of gunfire and hand-to-hand combat have a sort of whipping speed and kineticism that I've seen only in some of the best action anime directors (and of course, Mr. Miyazaki). Shinkai claims his team studied both Ghilbi movies and the Rurouni Kenshin anime in order to figure out how to animate the scenes.

Children hits all the emotional points that you might expect from the director of Voices of a Distant Star, The Place Promised in Our Early Days, and 5 Centimeters Per Second, but one too many deus ex machinas and a few too many different set pieces bog down the pacing to what feels like a crawl. Shinkai has got to learn to edit if he's going to attempt another movie in this vein.

But let's make this clear: I would love for Shinkai to try another movie like this. It's a distinct break from his previous work, and while it's more of a so-so Ghilbi film than a great Shinkai film, it is enough of a proof of concept to hook me for the rest of his work. As long as he learns from his mistakes and doesn't get stuck in the rut of re-making this exact movie over and over, this director could really go places. He's got emotional expression down better than basically anybody else in the business, and now has proven his mettle in the realm of action scenes. A little bit more editorial oversight will probably do wonders for honing his style.

Is he still the Green Day of anime? Yeah, probably. Is he "the next Miyazaki?" That still remains to be seen, but Children is certainly a fine down payment towards the title.

[Recommended]

This review is based on the Otakon 2011 premiere screening. The reviewer was given a complimentary press pass for the convention.

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The storyline itself is very interesting, and the symbolism involved is rather profound. Taking its enemies into the darker corners of Alexs past, the creators at Konami have once again hinted towards the truth through bosses, enemies, and sceneries, mixing symbolism with the background to the game. Enemies, which range from nurses to underwater lurkers to creatures which walk on needles, are all scary but rather easy to kill given the right weapon. It takes very little practice to master the games combat system, yet fighting on the whole is somewhat clunky. Alex receives a variety of weapons throughout the game, and it is explained that he can handle most without training due to his background in the military. Therefore, Alex easily wields weapons such as knives, pipes, and even guns, but the game does a somewhat poor job of making combat as seamless as possible. Guns tend to lag when fired, and enemies will freeze for split seconds when shot. It is much more efficient and satisfying to play the game without guns at all, but when the time calls for some heavy firepower, players will be met with a bit of lag.

The sights and sounds in Homecoming are highly impressive. The graphics appear to be taken out of an old photoshoot, as there is always a bit of fading in the details of scenery and characters, particularly in the hellish versions of Silent Hill and Shepherds Glen. Rather than taking away from the experience, this touch makes the events that are happening truly seem otherworldly. Overall, graphics are very bleak and gray while nightmarish and dark in the hell counterparts, making for a beautifully disturbing game. Lighting is once again a crucial factor, as enemies are attracted to Alexs flashlight as well as light from objects such as televisions. However, on default mode, the game is almost too dark, to the point that players will have to turn the brightness level up just to see what they are doing. It is nice when things are dark and scary, but there is a point when players just have to be aware of their surroundings. The sounds of the game are just as good as the graphics, and voice acting is also well done. The only flaw is that dialogue is spoken very softly, making it difficult for players to hear at times. Subtitles help immensely, but surprisingly subtitles oftentimes do not align with what characters are saying. A word or two is off or the timing is wrong, making it difficult to follow along if players are relying solely on subtitles (which they should not have to do). However, the soundtrack to the game is phenomenal, and Akira Yamaoka has once again made magic with gruesome sounds and terrifying noises.

The game features a lot of exploration, and maps are, as they are in all Silent Hill games, extremely helpful. Traveling in the game can get pretty tedious, though, as players will backtrack through multiple areas numerous times in order to gain new items, talk to different people, or simply retrace their steps. Save points are scattered haphazardly around the worlds of Silent Hill and Shepherds Glen as well, making it hard to gauge when the next save point will be. Some save points come within five minutes of each other; others may take up to an hour to find. Furthermore, Homecomings puzzles can be a bit tiresome, including several tablet puzzles where players need to move pieces on a board in just the right way to proceed. These are frustrating, in that when a player gets stuck, they must exit and return in order to reset the puzzle, if it resets at all. With the lack of save points in certain areas, this can make for some disgruntled players. There are plenty of hidden items to find during Alexs travels, including photos taken of the various Shepherds Glen citizens, drawings left behind by Josh to be used as clues, and powerful weapons. Obtaining these items can be tricky at times, but the rewards are relatively good. Not only are there achievements to be unlocked, but they add a layer to the overarching story that makes it worthwhile to explore. With so many items to find, the inventory system is laid out somewhat nicely, yet it stops overall gameplay and can be tricky to maneuver when in the middle of combat, as players must choose from a wheel what items they wish to use.

Silent Hill: Homecoming has its flaws, but compared to the entire game, theyre actually relatively minor. The game itself is a great, in-depth story that is both horrific and inspiring. With five available endings for players, along with many unlockable items including outfits and weapons, there are plenty of reasons to replay this game. Achievements are relatively easy to get, as it only takes two or three playthroughs to unlock them all, but with such a good storyline, players will want to play it to relive the experience instead of just obtaining points.

This review is based on a retail copy of the Xbox 360 version, purchased by the reviewer.

Tempest started off by setting BJDs apart from their plastic counterparts by noting how the latter is comprised of mass-manufactured, static, non-polished, semi-posable figurines: pre-made molds around which owners minds must build a plausible reality or personality. On the other hand, BJDs are hand-crafted and fully customizable and allow owners to make the dolls in their own image. This doll as avatar idea even comes across in one of the manufacturers (Volks) mantras of building another yourself. This is no understatement. BJDs can be customized to the buyers desire with regards to skin tone, eyes, appendages, body type, and hair in addition to the myriad outfits and accessories available to adorn the laboriously conceived mini-me. Ms. Strife also pointed out that the amount of time and number of decisions that went into the conception of each BJD added to the sense of anticipation and attachment experienced between the completion of an order and its arrival. If this wait is likened to the months parents nervously spend waiting for their own baby to be born, it is possible to see the kind of attachment BJD owners form with their other themselves.

Concerning the levels of attachment betwixt owners of regular dolls vs. BJDs, depth of feeling is further differentiated by semantics of acquisition. Whereas regular dolls are bought, BJDs are brought home. This may seem an inconsequential difference, but what follows is definitely not. It is common for BJD owners to record, via video and photographs, box openings and celebrate such arrivals as births. These photo welcomings arent the only media-based evidence used to accuse BJD owners of obsession. Pride taken by owners in their BJD customization efforts, the giving of form to secret dreams in an aesthetic representative of the owners own style, can only be fully realized when appreciated by others. So those involved with the hobby often attend public meets and publish their collections on the Internet in presentations that range from photo shoots to photo stories. This form of presentation is not original. Hans Bellmer, a German artist, used life-sized pubescent dolls as the subjects for his photographs, which were published in surrealist journals and arguably started the tradition of doll-based photo stories. However, one quick look at BellmersWikipedia page will explain the ringing of modern societys prude alarm.

While most of us in the USA are uncomfortable with public (and even private) nakedness, there exists a major difference when it is seen in what is perceived as a childs hobby vs. art and an anatomically correct vs. neutered state. This nervousness is what sparks the playground-style teasing seen in Western media coverage of BJDs. Not a single news story fails to mention the presence of genitalia on BJDs, which stands in stark contrast to neutered dolls such as Barbie and G.I. Joe. Other common elements in newscasts used to persecute BJDs include removing the dolls wig to make it seem sickly or less recognizably human; focusing on the cost per doll, which can range from hundreds to thousands of dollars; and even automating the dolls movements, such as spinning its head or raising/lowering an appendage, to make it look possessed or unnatural. Over-exaggerated examples of BJDs are not the only focus of finger-pointing newscasters. Tempest pointed out that Western broadcasts specifically target the nervous, the fidgety, the socially awkward for on-camera shock value and the ratings that come with it (or at least to keep the news anchors entertained). This is complemented further by the portrayal of BJD owners as obsessive, which is reinforced when the fact that it is rare to find a BJD owner who only has one doll is combined with the aforementioned statements about cost and emotional attachment. BJD owners are not only interviewed in the USA (of course), however, but their treatment and the story focus tends to vary greatly.

In Japanese media, for example, news stories shows both sexes treating dolls as children. What the West perceives as an obsession translates to almost parental pride. There is a certain air of honor concerning the degree of caretaking required for BJDs, and the bestowing of names, personalities, and back stories is seen as a creative act rather than psychotic. One additional difference is in the focus on obsession, which is seen as a great joy derived from the size of the collection as opposed to a fixation on customization.

According to Tempest, dolls are seen by many as creepy to begin with, because the figures can seem so uncannily human and yet are static ... almost corpse-like. It could be said then that the juxtaposition of these concepts elicits a knee-jerk emotional reaction to the innate fear of death. Ms. Strife did an excellent job of exploring and explaining aspects of the dolls and their owners that Western society generally finds creepy. She also was quite adept at pointing out the cultural bias at work in the Western media and mindset that ostracizes BJDs and those that dare to love them. I say and wholly mean the latter because the panelist, whether knowingly or subconsciously, kept stroking her BJDs hair or caressing its arm whenever she walked near it, and that sort of affection for an inanimate object (at least to me) is just plain creepy.

* Individual doll pictures are of Tempest Strife's BJD, which she was kind enough to share with the panel audience. Group photos were taken at AnimeNEXT 2011.

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At the very least, Ink, Elliot, and I will be playing Otaku Bingo amongst ourselves during the con (with a punishment for the loser to be determined by the other two players), but we'd love to get our readers, listeners, and fellow bloggers involved. So feel free to print out a card or find us during the con to get one from us. Of course, if you have ideas for more squares for us to use next time, definitely let us know. Have fun, and see you at Otakon!

• Bingo Card (PDF)
• Bingo Card (JPG)

The plot is very original and highly in-depth. The main protagonists stray away from general archetypes, and the voice acting adds a layer of realism and depth to their characters. Special dialogue options triggered with the Select button reveal small discussions between certain characters which brings to life their daily thoughts and feelings. While this may seem a bit useless at first, it does add a new dimension to the plot, revealing the character’s thoughts and feelings in a way without overloading players with cut scenes. These dialogues are shown through boxes revealing the characters involved, and the presentation may appear a little out-dated to some players. Many of their actions reflect the hard decisions between right and wrong, values over necessity, and the storyline forces players to reflect on their own morals, asking themselves what they would have done in such a scenario. There are just as many scenes of laughter as there are of remorse and sadness, and Namco Bandai does a god job of keeping it from becoming childish and cliché while still driving a point home. In the end, unlike most RPGs where the group simply goes their own way to save an unsuspecting population, the protagonists work together with world leaders in order to accomplish a common goal. For such an unrealistic plot, the game’s realistic problems faced, both with individuals and in society, grab players in an astounding way.

Like any JRPG, the game is not just about the main plot; side quests are a must, and in a game that spans 60+ hours, there are certainly some side quests to be accomplished. There are a good number of things to do, such as puzzles, extra exploration, and special monsters to defeat, but the game does very little to present such events. The side quests offer a good amount of extra items, money, and, surprisingly enough, plot, meaning that parts of the main storyline are solved by looking for a side quest players would never have known about. With so many extra cut scenes and information available, it would have been nice if such events were given a bit more advertisement. Instead, they are hidden away and must be followed in a specific order, creating confusion and a bit of frustration for players.

The sights and sounds of the game are very well done. The graphics are very bright, and while Namco Bandai strays away from making the game look realistic, the looks of the game are very sharp and clean. Environments are nicely done, and the music played in each area evokes a certain ethos that contributes to the environment. With four large continents and many smaller areas to explore, the variety of music and atmosphere is refreshing.

Tales of Vesperia utilizes a very efficient system of combat. You initiate battles by running into stationary enemies and are transported to a circular area of combat, where you can use 3-D movement to jump, run, and attack enemies. You can choose to set the battle system to manual, where you control everything, semi-automatic, in which the computer sometimes determines attacks or motions, or automatic, where the computer fights the battles for you. Added to this are a large number of attacks, spells, and items available during combat, which includes moves called ‘Artes’ that utilize Technical Points, or TP. The camera is a bit annoying sometimes during battle, particularly when using 3-D movement, but overall it follows the characters well. At the end of each battle the game lists several properties of the fight, including experience, money, and Grade earned. Some of these properties do not make sense until much later in the game, particularly Grade, which is used at the end of each run to purchase abilities to be used in the next playthrough.

A very large part of the game is synthesizing materials, and Namco Bandai made the system both fun and innovative for players. Each character can be equipped with specific weapons and armor, and by visiting stores around the world, players can enhance older weapons or create entirely new ones, allowing characters to learn new abilities. Accessories to outfits can also be synthesized, which adds a bit of humor to cut scenes. One in particular gives Yuri Lowell a large moustache and old-school pipe, which is hilarious to see when he is arguing with the Commander of the Imperial Knights. Added to this are Titles characters can earn, which sometimes changes a character’s attire, and players can make some pretty interesting outfits. Synthesizing occurs throughout the game, and while it may seem overwhelming at first, the fundamentals are easy to understand, and players quickly learn how to master the system.

All in all, the game is a classic JRPG that features unique content to keep players interested. Despite its length, the game stays fresh the entire way through, and the plot offers enough twists and turns to satisfy even the most die-hard RPG fan. Multiple run-throughs for such a long game may seem tedious, but the rewards are great, and it takes more than one run to truly appreciate the plot of Tales of Vesperia.

This review is based on a retail copy of the Xbox 360 version, purchased by the reviewer.

Kenji Koiso, a high school student and mathematics enthusiast, is recruited by a girl at his school to help her out with some job. Despite his current part-time work with the infrastructure of virtual-reality super-network OZ, he decides to help her out without asking details. He helps carry her things as they travel to the traditional Japanese family mansion to celebrate her grandmother's 90th birthday. The girl, Natsuki Shinohara, asks Kenji to play along as she announces him as her fiance to her grandma. He now finds himself in the awkward position of being a pseudo-newcomer to this tight-nit and very large family descended from a warrior clan. During his first night there, he receives an email with a large string of characters that he is asked to decrypt by an unknown entity. Being almost Japan's representative for the Math Olympics, he wastes no time in pulling out some paper to work out the problem, which takes him all night. What he did not realize is that he was being asked to break the security that would breach the main OZ server, and in the morning he finds that his account is being used by the hacker to cause chaos in OZ. With most major government and official institutions being dependent on OZ, the hacker is able to cause damage not only online, but in physical space by taking over the person's privileges. For example, by obtaining the account of the president it would be possible to launch a nuclear missile.

Kenji discovers that one of the family members, Kazuma Ikezawa, is the infamous OZ gaming champion King Kazma. The pair find themselves in a battle against a dangerous artificial intelligence being tested by the US Army within OZ. Meanwhile family drama arises as the problems online are connected to the family in ways they did not expect.

Beyond the themes of online action, what lies at the heart of Summer Wars is a thoughtful portrayal of family life. The members of Natsuki's massive family all believe Kenji to be her fiancé, and welcome him to the family in different ways. Hosoda relates his own experiences from when he suddenly became a member of a family due to marriage through Kenji's awkwardness at being accepted into their close group. Indeed, the closest thing to a human villain in the story is the one family member who drifted away from the rest and went to America. The two major aspects to the story — family life and Internet action — seamlessly intertwine, and neither is pushed into the background or feel tacked on to the other. Summer Wars is ambitious in the broadness of its scope, but this natural connection is what really makes the story stand out. If anything, it is much more realistic. In Summer Wars, world-changing events are caused from computers sitting in the middle of a traditional Japanese mansion, not an underground hacker cave with fifty monitors and a nonsensical cooling unit. The heroes are awkward mathematicians, well-connected grandmas, and working class dads with years of video game experience, as opposed to trenchcoat-wearing dudes with BitTorent and bad attitudes. (See: every movie about hackers ever to compare)

One of the most common complaints made toward Summer Wars is criticism of its technical inaccuracy. The story revolves around an incredibly advanced Internet structure, called OZ, that can be connected to through all types of devices and thus has became an extremely integral part of business, culture, and communication. Users create avatars and are able to interact over OZ in various ways: chatting, shopping, business, learning, etc. Additionally, languages are instantly translated to allow communication with anyone. Even the least technically minded viewer can see that it is an unrealistic view of the Internet. This leads to many lumping it together with WarGames and Hackers with their over the top, glamorized distortion of real technological advancements. However, this is completely missing the point of the story. Summer Wars may not be realistic in its details, but that is not the point. It is an exaggerated stylization of computer communications and should be treated as such. Like much good science fiction, it is able to make very relevant points that concern real world technology in a highly fictionalized setting.

A major theme of Summer Wars is communication. OZ's primary function, like the internet, it to connect people and services from all over. The film demonstrated both the dangers of over-reliance on digital networking, as well as celebrating the positive aspects of everyone being able to work together towards a goal. The theme goes beyond modern technology; the grandma was able to use contacts from a lifetime to make phone calls and encourage family members and important decision makers to take action during the crisis. Throughout the movie, communication is key in solving problems — online and off.

One aspect that many viewers should be able to relate to is the contrast between the characters taking initiative and using their computers to fight the AI, and the other relatives who can't understand why they are wasting their time with “video games” during this time. For Kazuma, Kenji, and the dads who pooled their resources together, nothing is as important as stopping that threat inside OZ. They realize, especially after what just took place in their own lives, that what goes on in the wires does affect what goes on the “real world”. It isn't until tragedy is -literally- looming over their heads that the non-techie relatives finally realize the gravity of the situation.

Hosoda touches on plenty of scenarios throughout the movie that could have been pulled straight from Slashdot. Compromised users were being assured that the security was impenetrable even after the hacking took place. Online accounts held enough power that stealing their account granted the hacker the user's government privileges. A dangerous artificial intelligence program was developed which questioned the responsibility of the developer who didn't actually implement it himself. A hacker was causing problems through an account that had been taken over, leading to the arrest of the innocent true owner of the avatar. While the movie itself may be an implausible action movie with pseudo-technological workings, the points it makes are often grounded in reality. The actual computer use is done in a way that can be approachable to the average person, but the technically inclined viewer should be able to appreciate its themes with a deeper understanding. Instead of seeing it as dumbed down or inaccurate, I adored the stylization of the Internet and artistic interpretation of technical concepts through Superflat imagery. The last thing I would have wanted is if it became an Nmap documentary.

Summer Wars has very impressive production values with smooth, detailed animation and a high degree of artistic merit. Two distinct art styles are used to easily distinguish the real world and OZ: The real life characters are designed by Yoshiyuki Sadamoto, whose work contains the same appeal and quality that he is known for, and I've noticed since The Girl Who Leapt Through Time that his style has become even more distinct and refined. The background artwork is composed of beautiful countryside scenery and convincing realistic settings. The visuals are extremely detailed, which provides a noticeable contrast to the Superflat style used in OZ. This style, mostly associated with the work of Haruki Murakami, is frequently used in Hosoda's work and has been become a trademark of his style. Even his work with Digimon incorporated a very similar (if less ambitious) Superflat world for the Digimon to fight in. Summer Wars takes it to a new level, with a fantastic stylized world with bright, flat colours against a largely pure white canvas. I've always been a big fan of the Superflat style, and Summer Wars delivered a truly spectacular example of the craft.

Hosoda has obviously been holding onto this premise for a while — after all, his work with Digimon uses almost the same plot. In Digimon: Our War Game, a virus-type Digimon is infecting all of technology through the Internet and causing chaos by manipulating everything it can. Some of the first season's cast meet up to stop the threat by sitting at their computers and working with their Digimon partners who are battling inside a Superflat-style online world. The conclusion practically mirrors that of Summer Wars with the virus launching a nuclear missile (the possibility of this was even alluded to in Summer Wars, I'm assuming as a reference). In the end, people around the world send emails in support of the Digimon. There are so many emails that Izzy/Izumi forwards them to the virus who is then slowed down (DDoS?) enough for them to finish it off. It is good to see that Hosoda was eventually able to fully flesh out the concept with the experience he has gained since then.

I absolutely love this film. It follows a fairly typical action blockbuster formula, but with a level of craftsmanship, intelligence, and social satire that elevates it above the expectations of the genre. I have no doubt that there will be criticism of its typical action film influences, but it really does Summer Wars a disservice to lump it with the mindless action film crowd. If anything, it takes the elements that makes such films so entertaining, but loses the pedestrian brainlessness associated with them. Instead, it presents a thoughtful, realistic, and charming portrayal of family life in addition to the cyber-warfare action plot. Summer Wars is a film that embraces a video gaming, highly connected culture and equally the importance of everyday family life. It is a near-perfect representation of the joys of living in the information age, presented in a wildly unique and enjoyable package.

[Highly Recommended]

This review is based on a retail Blu-ray disc purchased by the reviewer.

This new story has a welcome improvement from the previous volumes in that all of the strange events of the story directly affect the first-person narrator Kyon. You get to watch his sarcastic outlook get put through the wringer instead of having him relate events that are happening to others, leading to much more engaging prose overall. It provides a welcome change from having the main character be a disaffected observer of bizarre events yet again and allows for some interesting development of his character and motivations throughout the book. The rest of the characters also receive their fair amount of the spotlight, and you learn a little more of the interrelations between them.

The plotline, which I am trying to skirt around in case of spoilers, moves along at a reasonable pace and answers all reader questions, but notably stumbles at the climax of the books events. Shortly after the climax, which for me made perfect sense and opened up some exciting possibilities, the author calls the book to the halt so he can clearly spell out the events that occurred just in case you weren't paying attention. This cheapens the ending a great deal, as instead of merely hinting as to the outcome a great big red arrow was instead used to point it out. Kyon further dwells on the climax in the final pages, adding big flashing lights to the sign saying "This is what the ending means, doofus!"

I feel I should mention here that the majority of the plot itself is highly engaging and enjoyable, and it is only because the way the climax is handled is such a noticeable drop in quality compared to the rest of the book that I feel the need to bring it up. The characters are still enjoyable to spend time with, the events presented are interesting, and the whole story is an page-turner even when you take into account its errors. There is one further sin the book commits, but that will need a bit of explanation.

If you watch anime you may be familiar with characters saying "That Person" instead of using someone’s name as a way of increasing tension in a plotline, or just to draw events out. It is usually used poorly, and sadly Disappearance falls into this trap as well. The first time it happens in the book it is actually used sparingly and to some decent dramatic effect, however it is used again later on across four whole pages when it would have been best to not bother with the gimmick. Given that the reader should have already figured out who the person in question is in this second instance, having so many mentions of "that person" in bold text at such a key point in the story ruins the tension that has been building and left me rolling my eyes.

For readers of the previous Haruhi books, Disappearance will feel like a comfortable continuation of the series with nothing truly earth-shattering but a lot to love nonetheless. Those who have not read the previous books may find themselves adrift somewhat as while the prologue does a great job of catching you up on the principle characters and setting, the story proper draws on a lot of elements expanded on in previous volumes. The book will still be a nice, enjoyable read, but will not be as engaging for fulfilling overall due to the lack of prior knowledge. If you have already watched the TV series, then this may well be a good place to start if you were put off of reading the first three volumes as you had already seen the events in animated form.

I have not seen the theatrical version of the story, and I am now even more excited to see it after reading the book, but I have to wonder how the movie can have a run time (2 hours, 45 minutes) longer than the amount of time it took me to read the source material.

One last thing I want to bring up is that I really like the colorful presentation of the paperback edition of the book, which along with the earlier volumes now has a vibrant little corner on my bookshelf next to some drably presented sci-fi.

Barring a few preventable mishaps, Disappearance is a great read and I utterly devoured it during my commute to and from work. I would recommend it to anyone, even if they had never heard of the series or anime as a whole.

[Highly Recommended]

This review is based on a retail version purchased by the reviewer.