Category: Miscellaneous

BABYMETAL’s Fourth Album Almost Gave Me an Existential Crisis

by macksamson, posted in Miscellaneous, music

So… I know I have normally rescinded doing single review posts of an album, as opposed to my much better bi-annual highlight reel. However, when writing the first one for 2023, the blurb for BABYMETAL’s newest full-length—The Other One—ended up being more than a blurb. It was a diatribe that went on for at least double—if not triple—the length of all the other blurbs on that post. A lot of it was also… quite ranty. However, I still did want to touch on this album, since I don’t think the target on my back that I got for being one of the band’s critics was big and obnoxious enough. I’ve had a long history of trying to understand why and how they are the statistically most popular Japanese metal band in the entire world, to the point of being considered the face of Japanese metal as a whole. As a weeb, I want to love them, but struggle to do so.

Before getting into the proper review, I must contextualize the band for anyone who somehow hasn’t heard of them. Regardless of what I think about them, a lot of my all-time favorite Japanese metal bands owe their existence to BABYMETAL. The reason is because BABYMETAL invented the idea of fusing idol pop with metal in the first place. This was a novel idea at the time, and it paved the way for far better forms of the same idea to follow. The Other One is their first new album in four years, after a “hibernation” period or whatever.

Initial impressions were good when they released the first single, ‘Divine Attack – Shingeki’ (not related to the metalcore idol group Shingeki). It was as basic as expected, but it hit the right notes without having the chorus be overly infectious. Would I finally be able to unironically love a BABYMETAL album?

The answer to that is: it’s complicated. Positives: the songs are, for the most part, quite good. They are as heavy and catchy as ever. However, The Other One presents a stark change in the band’s sound, where they veer from their idol silliness toward a concept album that supposedly doesn’t play by the rules. As someone who has been open to changes in the styles of bands (and gave Oceans of Slumber’s Southern rock album a perfect score)… I’m not sure I welcome this change. I’ll admit that I had initially considered this a power-metal-influenced album going off of the pre-releases, which is very much not the case now that the full thing is out. However, they still feel as underwhelming as ever, perhaps moreso without the kawaii nonsense; a textbook example of jack-of-all-trades, master-of-none. Sure, it shows that “they’re grown women who aren’t idols any longer,” but at this juncture they kind of become Schrödinger’s Sellouts. What I mean by that is that their new shift is both selling out and not selling out at the same time; they sell out by making a more “normal” sound that’s more accessible across the board, but they also don’t sell out by showing that they are capable of different ideas outside of their established image. It’s an argument that could go on for an eternity. 

Maybe it’s just because I don’t listen to metal 24/7. Other reviews and people on Reddit could easily attribute each track not just to specific subgenres, but to the sounds of specific BANDS, and specific SONGS by said bands. Maybe I’m not music-y enough to tell that the one song “starts off with Architects-like drumming but with riffs from Gojira” or whatever. Honestly, I don’t even know if I want to be able to do that. Do people really enjoy looking at music that way?

Another disappointment is due to the press and myself. There’ve been rumors of them recruiting a third vocalist to replace the girl who left in 2018, and well, those are still rumors. I myself had figured that they were going to hire a dedicated unclean vocalist; something that could greatly help the band’s style. It would’ve been a brilliant move to have the pre-release singles with just the two, then—at launch—change them to rerecorded versions that unexpectedly rip our faces off with the new vocalist. However, that still remains a pipe dream (NOTE: This post was published mere hours before the actual third member was hired). For some reason, people think the two current vocalists are goddesses. Well, they are, but only as a given since they’re women in the metal industry. I know that it’s disrespectful to put women in metal on a tier list, but on the witness stand, I’d stand by my claim that BABYMETAL’s singers are kind of mid in the long run. I’m tone deaf, so I can only go off how they sound on a superficial level. Both of them always came off as lacking in pitch-range and versatility.

I must call myself out on one thing: I kind of have an inflated, unfair expectation of what Japanese music should be. A lot of the music down there is very eccentric and fuses subgenres as a given, to which I basically came up with this motto: “Japanese music is basically avant-garde by default.” As such, I get mad when a Japanese music artist sounds more bog standard. I admit that The Other One will force me to question how much I really like not just Japanese bands, but any band I love that has generally stuck to one style. The Other One almost spits in their faces; they can do all of these crazy, intricate things that defy logic, but are they really that talented if they can’t do something “normal” with equally good results? Would, say, Brand of Sacrifice still be great if they abandoned the Berserk themes, synthesizers, and just did classic blood n’ guts deathcore? Should that even be a metric to measure musicians on? THANKS GIRLS YOU’RE THE BEST.

Still reading? Yeah, this post became a mess, didn’t it? Part of that was from me making the mistake of looking up press releases related to the record. One thing I’ve noticed in a lot of articles is that the band was getting praise for abandoning the idol look; such as Metal Hammer saying they have “shaken off the ‘novelty’ tag” in a positive light. When I listened to this album in full, I was like “Yeah it’s still mid, end of story.” However, I really spiraled when trying to understand the reasons for The Other One‘s acclaim. This is BABYMETAL, the band that turned the very definition of metal on its head… yet they get praised more than ever for being normal? I was tempted to go into conspiracy theory territory, with crackpot theories that the press wants to belittle artists who go out of left field. Maybe what they’ve published don’t even reflect what the human beings behind-the-scenes really think. 

Fortunately, I shouldn’t have to be so jealous of their fame for much longer. For whatever reason, it looks like this decade will be the one where a number of those tragically underrated Japanese metal bands will break through into the global mainstream. BAND-MAID, the group that seemed the closest to achieving this, has toured with Guns N’ Roses, and even opened for The Last Rockstars, a supergroup composed of Japan’s most famous and important rock pioneers. That makes them mainstream now, right? In any case, Broken by the Scream has had their first overseas gigs, hanabie. has been booked for numerous festivals—including the coveted Aftershock—while Lovebites recently returned with their new lineup (and even got acknowledged by the almighty Metal Hammer), and Gyze—now Ryujin—have signed with THE Napalm Records. All of these bands will probably still be in BABYMETAL’s shadow for the time being, even with these achievements, but they’re slowly creeping in on that world conquest.

~~~~~

Final Verdict: 7.5/10

This band is one of the reasons why I sometimes hate having autism. Loving them has become a way of life as natural as breathing. No one questions BABYMETAL’s greatness, and anyone who does is clearly wrong, and gets choked out immediately by people such as Rob Zombie. The Other One isn’t bad by any stretch of the imagination—I’d argue it’s great even—but on the metric of how popular the band is, the score I’ve given certainly doesn’t seem positive. 

I think I just need to give up. Temple Grandin once said that she needed to accept things about neurotypical people that she didn’t understand, and people’s undying love for BABYMETAL is one of those things. Maybe I’ll give them another chance if they hire a death growler, but for the time being, I shouldn’t milk my vendetta with them any longer. The bottom line is this: nothing by this band sets my heart aflutter. End of story. I myself can’t adequately explain why, and that’s just the way the cookie crumbles. 

I of course recommend Lovebites, BAND-MAID, Broken by the Scream, hanabie., Shingeki, Utsu-P, Ryujin, and other powerful Japanese metal artists over BABYMETAL. May their Fox God have mercy on my soul I guess.

Neptune Frost: Bless the Hackers Down in Africa

by macksamson, posted in Miscellaneous

I have sworn off live action movies for a number of reasons, well really just one reason: the mainstream. In my experience as a consumer, you do not get aggressively bludgeoned nor pressured into any media more than live action movies. It feels like these movies—specifically ones of American origin—are given more clout than anything else, and if you don’t fill up that laundry list of films that come out faster than what you can possibly keep up with, you risk being alienated (for the record I only watch three theatrical releases a year at most just by following Disney alone). 

However, there is a whole other side to movies that goes beyond Hollywood. There are markets all over the world and in the underground. One such underground movie is an avant-garde little fella I happened upon on Kanopy… and you already know what it’s called since that’s in the title of the post. Neptune Frost is a relatively recent live action movie that actually looked good, and this is me we’re talking about. Eff it, I might as well!

Normally, I’d start the next passage with “In [insert title here]”. However, I did refer to Neptune Frost as an “avant-garde little fella” before. Ergo, this is not a movie where I can do that. Nothing in it makes sense, so it’s natural to write a review that makes no sense!

Anyway, the first thing to compliment is how it’s visually presented… for once. Like, these actors are wearing actual costumes. Use of CG is relatively light. Furthermore, the costumes are phenomenal. I’ve never been to Africa, but I’ve seen authentic African art at Disney, so I can tell how good of a job they did integrating that fashion statement with wires, circuit boards, and whatnot to adorn the main protagonists. I didn’t think “on location sets” (it was filmed in scenic Rwanda) and “costumes” existed anymore, so it was a welcome sight to see them in this century. 

Additionally, this is a musical. Traditional African chants mingle dissonantly with darkwave, EDM, industrial, and all sorts of electronic music to make some strange and gripping numbers. These songs are, naturally, where Neptune Frost is at its finest. The way they filmed and edited these sequences were really good; going all-in on weirdness without overwhelming you with excessive jump cuts and whatever you call that shaking thing they do in modern movies these days. 

However, that’s where the positives end… maybe? Well, the plot of the movie is a mixed bag. The basic idea is that a man named Matalusa(?) ends up joining a group of cyberpunked-out abolitionists who go against the status quo, and a lanky person named Neptune eventually follows suit. The structure, for the most part, is experiencing how crappy the world is, and then getting to see the far better pocket of space occupied by the cool kids on the block.

It seems straightforward, but it isn’t. Or is it? Neptune Frost is packed with strange edits and cutaways that scratch the avant-garde itch mentioned twice already. It’s engaging, but leaves you wondering what’s even going on. The content on screen often switches from rural Africa to a neon fever dream in an instant. 

Conversely, it gets more and more straightforward the further in you get. The takeaway of the movie will be blatantly told instead of shown, specifically in later musical numbers. It’s one of those plots that’s more confusing on the surface than when looked at with scrutiny. 

And… well… look. Okay, this technically counts as spoiler territory, but it’s basically telegraphed by the official product description telling you that this all-Black population is slaving away in a mine at the beginning of the movie. This is yet another one of the thousands of allegories to all the bad -isms in the world, that reviewers will be like “Hey, that’s an allegory to this and that!”, but then they just go back to their lives the next day and nothing changes. I admit I’m probably going to go back to my normal life as well. Look… As someone who worries about civil rights issues to the point of being prone to anxiety attacks daily, I must say that—as a reviewer—that Neptune Frost is a heap of often-used allegories with a novel paint job. The dialogue ranges from esoteric and abstract, to a guy saying “F*** Mr. Google”. It’s unremarkable yet remarkable at the same time. 

Originally, this paragraph was about me wanting to call Neptune Frost pretentious but then me denying that very claim. Well, just because it’s not made by Hollywood doesn’t give it an excuse. It is quite literally a textbook example of a pretentious movie: it blatantly telegraphs allegories that the masses generally already know, but through an abstract lens that feigns intellectualness. Take that lens away and it’s just The Hate U Give clone number forty thousand. It’s almost too on the nose, like how they reference White supremacy when—as far as we know—the Authority who torments them are as Black as they are. Its creator—Saul Williams—goes through all the trouble to fly to Africa and convince locals to stick wires up their noses… for something this lacking in originality?

For the sake of thoroughness, I suppose I should discuss the characters, despite them always feeling more like plot devices as a consequence of the feature film format. The actors, for the most part, are quite talented. However, the roles they play are underwhelming outside of the top-billed characters. It all revolves around Mata and Neptune, with the latter basically being the only one capable of doing anything in the movie. As pointed out in the official product description, she is intersexual, which—according to the Internet—means having an unconventional combination of reproductive organs. From various context clues, it seems that Neptune has both boobies and “the boys”. However, this doesn’t seem to be pertinent to the plot whatsoever. Neptune literally wanders in and—through a seemingly unexplained connection to Mata—is able to hijack the Internet. That’s… basically the gist of her character arc. She can also sometimes possess a bird? 

Before getting to the final score, I must stress that I am not really a movie expert. This is my first live action film since Mary Poppins Returns. I have no clue what any shot is supposed to invoke, or why they do this edit or that cut. All this has been speaking from the gut. If you want a more in-depth review, there’s probably one somewhere else on the Internet. 

~~~~~

Final Verdict: 8.5/10

Neptune Frost—regardless of how smart it is or isn’t—at least taught me one thing: that even in my least favorite entertainment medium, there are still hidden treasures that exist beyond the mainstream. Hollywood churns out its endless cycle of big productions, while elsewhere, independent films come out in droves, only achieving underground success at best. That’s where movies like Neptune Frost exist; in that unpredictable territory meant for the adventurous. It’s by no means a masterpiece, but I can at least respect it from an artistic standpoint… if I give it a MASSIVE benefit of the doubt. If you really want to see it… just keep in mind that subtitles are only in English (the actors speak in Kinyarwanda and other African tongues for the most part).

Top Seven Videogames I Like But Haven’t Finished for No Reason

by macksamson, posted in Gaming, Miscellaneous

You can’t finish every game, unless you’re a true MLG gamer who has videogames as a career. That’s part of the fallacy of the gaming market, because they’re all like PLAY THESE GAMES AND NONE OTHER, but then every time something popular comes out it only lasts about a week because—oops, almost went on a tangent. Anyway, as a non-gamer, I only own maybe seventy-five games (I traded a lot of my Gamecube and Wii games from back in the day because I didn’t have the foresight to know they’d become antiques), possibly less, and I don’t even think I’ve finished half of them. A lot of the time, I just don’t think they’re worth my precious time, but sometimes there really is no reason. My mind just says “No, you’re not playing it.” Here’s a top seven list of those games.

7) Blacktail

I’d preface this by saying how popular Blacktail was… but I honestly don’t know that information. It was supposedly trending on Steam at some point at launch, but like I said before, there are so many games and the market changes faster than humans can possibly follow yet they expect you to—ANYWAY, this is a title I looked forward to for some time. 

It looked beautiful and unique, drawing inspiration from Slavic mythology. From what I played, it has really good first-person combat with some open world survival elements. The dash is responsive and versatile, and has a morality system. I normally don’t like games like this, because that freedom of choice comes in quotation marks, for there is almost always a True Ending locked behind the devs’ pre-conceived vision. I ended up looking this up and I learned that Blacktail apparently has only one ending regardless of what you do, which a lot of Steam users were mad at. It’s presumably an allegory to how good and evil doesn’t exist and such acts are only defined as such by humans. Anyway, it is great and all, but it is a bit in the edgy Grimm-style gothic fairy tale category, and I generally don’t like that in my games. I prefer even a little humor. Also, I have it on PC, and it is one of the most demanding ones I have at that. My paranoia with my computer’s GPU definitely has an influence here.

6) Sable

I feel really bad with this one… barring the fishing content update, I am basically in position to finish Sable at any time. It’s not even difficult; it’s one of those “wholesome” games. With a unique aesthetic and transportive atmosphere, Sable was definitely one of the best open world indie games of 2021. It takes the barren and empty biome that is the desert and fills it with variety and interesting landmarks. I just… I dunno, man. I just haven’t been in the mood. There is also the fact that I essentially played an altogether better clone of it in SEASON: a letter to the future, which also has non-violent exploration with a vehicle companion, but additionally has a way stronger narrative that just feels more compelling. Sable is excellent in and of itself, though.

5) Mario + Rabbids: Sparks of Hope

I bought this and its DLC at launch, so I clearly was excited. As only one of two strategy RPGs I’ve played, it’s definitely a new experience. Mechanically, the game has a wide variety of strategies with numerous characters that have unique playstyles. There’s plenty to do in each world, and the incorporation of dashing and jumping from Super Mario rewards good reflexes to execute optimal strategies. The cutscenes are some of the best for Mario and Co., with tons of personality. 

However, it does have some iffy bits. There isn’t really any freedom in building your units, other than equipping up to two titular Sparks. Some enemy Units (such as those lightning tiger men introduced in that one world) are just tedious to fight. Also, you are locked to three characters (except in certain missions), but it’s more like two since Rabbid Peach is the only one with a dedicated healing move. It also has a lackluster soundtrack, which is a Super Mario sin. I might come back to it now that the DLC is rolling out—which will eventually include the return of Rayman to his own series—but for now, I haven’t been in the mood. 

4) Nobody Saves the World

From the devs of Guacamelee, Nobody Saves the World is a whacky beat ‘em up/dungeon crawler where you transform into various things—from a mouse, to an archer, to a horse, to an egg—and fight legions of monsters with them. Mechanically, it’s really good. It scratches the beat ‘em up itch, and most importantly, you can assign skills to other forms to create—say—a horse that fires missiles. It’s really good, but… I dunno, again, I just haven’t been in the mood. Most likely, it’s the caveat with beat ‘em ups in that they are substantially more fun in multiplayer, which Nobody Saves the World incidentally has.

3) Both Yakuza 0 and Yakuza: Like a Dragon

I seem to be cursed to where all the games for weebs are not in my wheelhouse. I gave the famously absurd Yakuza franchise a chance, though, with two of its most highly acclaimed titles, but ultimately have not been in the mood to finish either of them. 

Let’s start with what—from what I could tell—makes Yakuza by far SEGA’s most polished and perfected I.P. Even as someone who doesn’t care for story, these two games have engaging cutscenes that are more like live action dramas, but don’t feel as pretentious as Western ones. Yakuza: Like a Dragon (which is technically the name of the series twice, since Yakuza is the Western localization of Ryu ga Gotoku, which translates to “like a dragon”) has a particularly good narrative. The combat of both is excellent. Yakuza 0, as with most of the franchise, plays like a classic beat ‘em up in the vein of Shenmue, with intricate combos, and over-the-top special moves, as well as specific actions that involve the environment. Yakuza: Like a Dragon plays like a turn-based RPG, which is more accessible but is still ridiculous in its own way.

However, both games seem to have their own trappings. One of the most egregious issues is that they are immensely grindy for a number of reasons, such as the gacha-based item-finding mechanic in 0, where you need more and more money to get better loot and to decrease the time it takes to bring the loot in, or the obscene amount of yen you need to upgrade weapons and the crafting shop in Like a Dragon. This is from someone who completed every Rare Blade skill tree in Xenoblade Chronicles 2, so that means it’s REALLY bad. 0 seems to have a mechanic where you generate money automatically over time (that goes to show you how little I’ve done in that game), but man, you need that money all the same. Yakuza 0 is also very difficult at times, and Like a Dragon has some seriously spongey bosses—even when overleveled by a wide margin. 

The biggest turn-off for me, however, is that there are a lot of sidequests locked behind minigames. The sidequests are some of the best parts of Yakuza, and I can’t experience them all. Seriously, I played shogi on the easiest difficulty for over two hours and couldn’t win ONCE. It also doesn’t help that a lot of sidequests have right/wrong answers and can be annoying. Maybe Yakuza is just not for me. Womp womp.

2) Eastward

This is probably one of the best games of 2021. You can tell it was made with blood, sweat, and manly crocodile tears. It has gorgeous and unique pixel art, as well as Eastward wearing its Earthbound influence on its sleeve. The dialogue isn’t just well-written; the story is extremely well-told. 

However, it has some caveats that take getting used to. Despite the gameplay borrowing from 2D Zelda, it really isn’t a Zelda-like game at all. Exploration is limited, almost every collectable is missable, and to rub salt in the wound, there is almost no warning for when you pass one of those cutoff points; just casually going over to someone’s house to deliver lunch can trigger a sudden change in the story dynamic. Eastward is more like Final Fantasy X than Zelda, and this MUST be kept in mind. Unfortunately, I didn’t expect this, and have felt turned off from it for a while. It doesn’t help that the puzzles—from what I’ve played—are mind-numbingly simple, failing to execute upon the wide variety of gameplay mechanics you are given. 

While the story is really good, I don’t know if it can carry average gameplay. I do come to miss this game at times, but I still haven’t played it again in about two years now. Like the Magic Conch says: “maybe someday.”

1) Satisfactory maybe?

I’m not sure this one counts, because I by all means LOVE this game to death but I haven’t been in the mood to play it lately. I have almost a hundred hours in it, and have played a bit of Update Seven. Satisfactory is an exceptionally good crafting/open world/sandbox/base building/automation/logistics game with excellent UI, virtually no limit on how to build a factory, and a—no pun intended—satisfying progression system. It is a game where you feel like you are a god. Also, unlike some other automation games, resource deposits are infinite.

However, these kinds of games are full of caveats, but it actually takes a long time to feel the pinch. Learning how mechanics work is intuitive enough, but—similar to many other crafting games and their ilk—Satisfactory feels more balanced around multiplayer. There are numerous times in the campaign where I feel like I’ve pulled my teeth out to make a mind-bogglingly complex resource, and the best setup I have is about a mile long track of machines, and it takes them about twenty minutes to make one… just for that resource to be an ingredient in even more mind-bogglingly complex resource. In addition to that, you have to build machines that specialize in generating power for your factory, and since Satisfactory is super Capitalist in terms of theming, there is no taking advantage of low-maintenance sources such as solar or wind; EVERYTHING needs to burn at least one resource (also, why does the nuclear plant need water?). Also, Oil is an annoying resource, because it always needs to be refined into other things, and that refinement speed—even with maximum overclock settings—is slower than what a lot of those resulting resources are used for, such as burning fuel in Fuel Generators. The mechanics of the game will actively work against you as it becomes more of a struggle to increase and maintain power. 

It feels like there’s almost too much to do, as if it was intended to split up a team of players to do stuff like keeping up with maintenance in the base, while others expand and build the maze of devices needed to make those insane resources, or explore the vast overworld for loot. I like a lot to do in a game, but even in its current Early Access state, it can take at least two hundred hours to get through all available Tiers. That doesn’t include the hundreds of thousands of resources you need to convert into tickets to redeem various trophies in-game, which I presume will be tied to Achievements once those are added. I also have felt crushing loneliness playing Satisfactory solo, which is similar to a lot of other open world survival games I’ve played. Even if they are really good gameplay-wise, a lot of the fun comes from bringing at least one extra player. I’ve played many open world survival games and felt similar burnout every single time.

On the flipside, Satisfactory’s immensity makes it so that you really don’t need any other game of this kind. It really is one of the best, but I dunno… it might just be TOO good. Also, again, it’s a resource intensive PC game, and even with its internal fans and an external cooling device, my computer feels like an oven when running it. I’ve only had it for a year and it was a top-of-the-line computer too… What kind of beasts are Twitch streamers running by comparison?!

Conclusion

As someone who loves videogames, I often tell myself that I hate videogames. Boy, there are sure a lot of these fellas out there, right? Well, the real purpose of this post was to introduce you, the reader, to some games that I might never get to publish a proper review for. Hope you enjoyed this mess of a post, and maybe, you’ll have a better game clearing rate than me.

Random Thoughts on the Current State of the Pokémon Games

by macksamson, posted in Gaming, Miscellaneous, Rants

This is just a kind of stream-of-consciousness post. I just want to add my two cents into the endlessly toxic world of people complaining about Pokémon, and hopefully do it in a more civil manner. I say I love Pokémon and have given high scores to the very hated recent installments, yet I had times where I was straight-up bored with those games, despite how much I love them and how much I insist I love the series as a whole. My relationship with Pokémon is very complicated, so let’s go over this in segments. 

For context: I started with Pokémon Platinum and stuck with each main release since. My most nostalgic favorite installments are Black & White 2.

First, the Most Objective Flaw: They’re Ugly as Sin Now

No one—from Pokémon’s most devout fans to its most vocal critics—play these for graphics anymore. We all know that the Nintendo consoles have always been incapable of surpassing the 12k 480fps of modern systems, but most people who work with the thing—from Nintendo to Monolith—have managed to make beautiful games that run well nonetheless. GameFreak has not.

They really have no excuses here. At first, I thought that the data of 1000+ Pokémon alone made it so that they couldn’t invest in graphics without jacking up the file size to cataclysmic levels. However, my experiences with digital game copies taught me that the bulk of data IS the graphics. A ten-hour-long Devil May Cry game will take over seventy gigs, while a 80+ hour RPG made with pixel art (like CrossCode) will be barely over a single gigabyte. I really don’t understand why they just can’t get the games to look good. Granted, it is just the environs for the most part; characters at least look respectable. When Gen 10 comes around, they need to borrow some Zelda devs to make a Pokémon game that looks like Breath of the Wild.

Other than That, I Really Don’t Get Some of the Criticisms

Maybe I’m biased, but I honestly don’t understand what’s so bad about these games. I heard it gets divisive from Gen 4 onward, but starting from Gen 6, the hate feels unanimous. People refer to these games as if their badness is a scientific fact; as a level of gaming sacrilege on par with Fallout ‘76. Granted, my only window into the gaming world is what I hear from the YouTubers I watch…

In any case, I can at least understand why people wouldn’t like Gen 7 (i.e. cutscenes) and BDSP (i.e. the lack of Platinum quality-of-life improvements), but that’s about it. The rest of the games have flaws, DEFINITELY, but I wouldn’t call them travesties. People generally say the newer games are too easy (Souls fans, I presume?), but I have a counterpoint for that I’ll address later. 

I just don’t understand the hate for Gen 6, ORAS, Gen 8, and Gen 9. I will say that the Pokémon games have had unsubstantial postgames after Gen 5, which unlocked huge parts of the overworld, optional bosses, and… the stupid movie studio (well the argument is that it was a lot not that it was perfect). ORAS had the Rayquaza post-game story, but that’s the only one I think compares.

Other than that, the newer games are great mechanically. The eventual removal of HMs was huge, allowing more freedom in team builds. The battles are generally faster, and the actual visible encounters (once added) made it easy to avoid battles and find rare Pokémon. They also make TMs infinite use (or methods to infinitely produce them), which means you don’t need to play the entire game again for that Earthquake TM!

However, They Kinda Have Lost Their Magic

I don’t think the games are these cardinal gaming sins like the rest of the Internet does, but at the same time, I don’t know if I can call them masterpieces either. Each Generation, I always love finding the new Pokémon (since I don’t spoil myself on them) and reacting to them. That’s kind of… it for the most part. Like I said before, I love playing them but also get bored sometimes. 

Ultimately, I think the issue is that it’s for kids. I don’t wanna sound like that guy (especially since I love a lot of stuff geared to kids), but I think being adults and veterans of the series colors our impressions to an extent. Everyone these days says the games are too easy, and I kind of agree. You get a lot of XP in battle, to the point where only bosses are capable of requiring a little effort; they might make ONE Pokémon faint. The games aren’t balanced on understanding the competitive meta either. 

This is where my two cents come in: I think that the bulk of difficulty in Pokémon, moreso than any other RPG, is not knowing the mechanics. No matter what game we started with, our first playthrough was an uphill battle. I remember having to grind up to five-plus levels just to potentially beat a Gym, and now, I can do a lot of fights underleveled. To succeed in Pokémon, you need to know the relationship between eighteen different elements, as well as the stats, movepools, Types, and Abilities of over a thousand Pokémon. 

To further corroborate this, I should mention a YouTuber I watch who knows nothing about Pokémon: StephenPlays. He has a series of stream VODs archiving a playthrough he and his wife did of Pokémon Let’s Go. Let’s Go is Final Fantasy Mystic Quest-levels of aggressively easy; it gives XP out like candy, and doesn’t let you challenge any Gym without a Type advantage. However, they both struggled. Immensely. At the easiest games in the series. Why? Because they didn’t know the mechanics, especially with the Fairy Type being brought into Gen 1. 

By comparison, us veterans know the Type matchups, Abilities, and moves off of memory. In a casual campaign, we can eat everyone except maybe the final boss for breakfast (Gen 9 can be hard at points if you do it out of order, though). Randomizers and nuzlockes are the only ways for us to feel a challenge from them now, and sadly, the former is technically illegal (or, at the very least, will inject malware into your computer). 

Kids playing the “easy” newer games will definitely struggle. Also, since they’re the target audience, the stories of the games will—sadly—never go anywhere interesting. Let’s address it. People complain that the stories in the new games are simple, soulless, and boring, but honestly, I feel like it was ALWAYS that way. The difference is that they have a lot more escalation now. In Red & Blue, you went from fighting silly, incompetent criminals, to cultists who want to control literal gods. Despite this escalation, the stories remain cartoonishly simple.

Most importantly, they try and fail to have character development. People complain about characters being soulless now, but again, they were that way back then. The classic Gym Leaders and Pokémon League members in the beloved Gens 1-3 are no better than the newer ones; one-off people who sit in their buildings like hikikomoris. The newer games do put in a nonzero effort for SOMETHING; they actually have some moments. Sometimes, the brief impression of a Gym Leader that you do get from their Gym alone—such as with Larry—is actually sufficient to make a great character.

Unfortunately, the story only peaked exactly twice: Black & White, and Legends Arceus. In Black & White, the Gym Leaders all have established roles (and actually help you at the end), while it goes into Pokémon training ethics for the first time in the series. Sadly, they oversimplify Team Plasma with a classic “puppetmaster pulling the strings” plot twist; probably another consequence of these games being made for kids. Pokémon Legends: Arceus is the only game to give the main protagonist character development. They are a kid who somehow ended up in Sinnoh of the past, and is immediately regarded as an anomaly by the locals and often discriminated against. The endgame pulls out all the stops and it actually feels emotional. I’m betting that we complained less about the older games’ stories because we’re just nostalgic for them; the ones we played AS KIDS. 

The Manga Actually Looks Awesome, Though

Among One Piece and Jojo is a manga that has run for about as long: Hidenori Kusaka’s manga adaptation of Pokémon. Each Generation has a self-contained story starring both variants of the player character, but with actual personalities.

I haven’t actually read it, though, since it’s huge, not part of Viz Media’s subscription, and my local library is sorely lacking copies. I have skimmed through it and what I saw is actually kind of lit. Unlike the anime, it’s faithful to the game mechanics, while taking creative liberties to extend on the story and the otherwise unremarkable characters from each game. Maybe give it a shot if you’re a devout critic of the games. It won’t fix the games themselves, but it’ll be something.

Despite Its Flaws, Other Franchises Have Yet to Surpass Pokémon (Hot Take, I Know)

Pokémon was a big, important series in the creature collector subgenre, to the point where it almost monopolized the subgenre itself. Naturally, a series like Pokémon has rivals. Although many vocal people have pieces—both trollish and scholarly—about how any of those franchises are better than Pokémon, I have yet to encounter such a phenomenon. I have played at least one game from two of Pokémon’s rivals, and honestly, I don’t get it.

Digimon

I played through a Digimon game once: the first DS one (whatever it was called). Despite it still having a devoted fandom that insists it’s better than Pokémon, Digimon seems to have died off. It still has new games, but they never looked too amazing (and the Steam reviews I read of the new, visual novel-esque one were pretty mixed, leaning toward negative). The DS ones seemed to actually be among the highest regarded.

Mechanically, there are some things about Digimon that are neat… actually, one thing. The way evolutions work is a lot more interesting than Pokémon. Each Digimon has its evolutions displayed like a skill tree, along with their conditions. You dictate when they evolve, and you can also unevolve them to experience other paths without having to catch a new one. You’ll need to do this, because Digimon have a level cap that blocks them from certain paths, and unevolving them increases their level caps.

However, the positives end there. For starters, the game was super unbalanced around this core mechanic that they expect you to use. You think Pokémon is easy? I two-shot the final boss of this game, just by using its systems like they wanted me to! Digimon retain some base stats on unevolution, making them much stronger than they were the first time. Some of these evolutions require you to do this several times, and by then, a Level 1 baby Digimon will have three-digit base stats. If there is any depth or nuance to combat, it’s useless. In fact, I don’t even think there is anything, at least not from what I recall (it was MANY years ago that I played it). 

In addition, it was a lot emptier than Pokémon; even Gen 8 and its lousy overworld. Structurally, it’s a dungeon crawler, which is fine in theory, but in practice there is nothing to explore, no treasures, NO REPELS TO STAVE OFF ENCOUNTERS, no nothing. Furthermore, the designs are too intricate. Digimon oozes that 1990s-early 2000s aggressive edginess where they had to make everything as edgy as that damn fourth Chaos Emerald. The evolutions also have no logic whatsoever. The grass starter evolves into… an angel? Meanwhile, there’s some other little puppy Digimon that I recall evolving into either a tsuchigumo… or Funky Kong. 

Yo-kai Watch (henceforth known as Yokai Watch because the hyphen is unnecessary)

I played the first game through the main story and most of Psychic Spirits. I actually thought that this was the one to beat Pokémon. The idea of using Shinto mythology in a creature collector setting is brilliant, since there are SO MANY yokai, and Shinto itself kind of encourages making up new ones as you go. The dialogue is some of the best I’ve seen in any media geared toward children, and the designs are REALLY good; arguably better than that of any Pokémon. It has a traditional RPG equipment system, and no HM mechanics, allowing for better freedom in builds. Its overworld (especially in the sequel) is full of life, and has an excellent map for navigation.

However, the positives end there. Where do I even begin with all the issues—that Pokémon doesn’t have—which led to me rage-quitting this series that had so much promise? The first thing that comes to mind is that Yokai Watch has had the worst Western localization in any game this century; I honestly believe former members of 4Kids worked on it, and you can’t convince me otherwise. Even though it was before I did my proper research on Japanese culture, I had still wanted Yokai Watch to be a learning experience. However, I would be quite disappointed to know that pretty much every yokai (except for Jibanyan, his cousins, and certain others) have Westernized names. They are really good names for what they are, but I hated them as localization. I suppose they thought that kids would have trouble with the Japanese names, but the games have full voice acting, including each yokai saying its own name. Thus, there is no reason kids wouldn’t know how to pronounce the names since they would be spoken anyway. 

More importantly, however, is the borderline censorship of Japanese culture (or at least attempts) that I find comparable to the infamous onigiri-into-donuts of early anime. Despite how much they try to pass it off as America, there are Shinto shrines, shinkansen, an equivalent of Tokyo Tower (or Skytree?), and—most notably—an early cutscene in the second game where the main character inserts a 100 yen coin into a gacha machine, despite the currency being localized as USD. I doubt that this kid got his hands on an old-timey dollar coin (and actually spent it). 

I wish the localization was the worst; the gameplay is worse. FAR WORSE. First off, team building—despite what I just said about it—actually sucks. Yes, there is equipment and stuff, but that’s it. The problem is in yokais’ movepools. In Yokai Watch, each yokai has a physical attack, a magical attack, a support move, and a status move (I.I.R.C. of course; I do know the first two are correct). The problem is that yokai fall into specific roles, just like in Pokémon; dedicated physical/magical attackers, tanks, etc. However, the four moves they have are what they get (I think there are TM-like items but they’re rare). This means that most yokai will be stuck with a move that is completely worthless, such as a physical yokai with a magic move and vice versa.

Oh but it gets worse! People hate Pokémon’s reliance on RNG, but Yokai Watch is significantly worse. Virtually EVERYTHING about Yokai Watch’s gameplay is RNG-based. First off, catching new Yokai is awful. It’s a random chance after they are defeated. You might think “Good, then I don’t have to worry about weakening them and using items—” WRONG! In Yokai Watch, you must feed them their favorite food (and touch them in a certain spot in the second game) to increase your chances of catching them. However, even when consistently fulfilling all these conditions, it almost never works. To make it more luck-based, there are hearts that occasionally fly onscreen—AT RANDOM—that increase the odds further (but even with them it rarely worked). There are even static, unique yokai that are really powerful and can join your team once you beat them; key word “can”. Yes, even THEY are luck-based, although not as much as regular mobs. It’s stupid, since they are stronger than most bosses. 

The problem with this compounds on what truly makes Yokai Watch the borderline-unfun slog that it is; fully autonomous party members. In battle, all you can do is use items, rotate through your three active party members (out of six), direct them at a target, hit random powerups (like those hearts), and use yokais’ Soultimate moves. Every move in a yokais’ movepool is decided BY A.I. For catching, this means that your party can (and often will) murder yokai that you’re trying to catch before you can maximize your odds. However, just fighting with them is no fun either. Theoretically, yokai have fighting styles that—for the most part—synergize with their builds; physical yokai will generally use physical moves, etc. There are also items to change this style if you wish. However, this rarely worked for me. I’ve had physical yokai use magic moves and vice versa quite often. 

All this meshes into a game that’s about as easy as Pokémon. In regular battles, you just need one multi-targeting Soultimate to win. Boss battles are more fun, but they’re also stupid. Yokai Watch is a series that highly encourages inflicting status ailments; generally the sign of a well-built, strategy-driven RPG. However, unlike recent RPGs, bosses are universally immune to status! This means that if you have a status-based team, then you lose. Also, most difficulty really comes from the party not doing what you want. As much as Souls fans insist that intentionally programming the player character poorly makes for good difficulty, there comes a point where it just stops being fun.

Yokai Watch further becomes less fun in the overworld. We all hate the long encounter animations in Pokémon; the fanfare plays, the Pokémon appears, then your Pokémon appears… blah blah blah. In Yokai Watch, you have to bumble around EVERYWHERE to get a reading on your radar, then go into a minigame where you have to do some focus thing on the yokai to get it to appear, THEN you can fight! It’s nice that the radar shows yokai ranks to give you an idea of what’s there, but I’ve had times where I couldn’t get anything to spawn at all. Dungeons are better since they are classic, visible encounters, but that’s only half the battle. You also have to grind for money (a lot), and if you’re a completionist, then you must additionally grind for fish and bugs. Although the journal in the second game shows habitats of undiscovered critters, they are still a PAIN to find. They have different rarities, and a very strict quick-time event that you must beat to get them (also the timing is—of course—random). 

RNG also extends into the overworld. For some egregious reason, every single sidequest has a random chance of giving an additional bonus reward… or nothing. For completionists, this means that you must SAVE SCUM to get all the awards; specifically for the rare super bonus rewards that’re better than the regular ones. I always thought that some of the later quests had really powerful, one-of-a-kind items ONLY available through the super bonus; I at least know it’s the only way to get the best revival items. Also, a lot of yokai are only available through an RNG-based gacha that appears at the end of a nerve-wracking stealth minigame that occurs RANDOMLY. Seriously… I dunno. Maybe the newer ones are good, but the notion of Yokai Watch in the West is a pipe dream now, so I’ll never know for sure.

I Have Hope for Cassette Beasts, Though

People still try to topple Pokémon to this day. The most popular attempt in recent years is an indie game called Coromon. It looked great, and had built-in randomizer and nuzlocke modes. However, I was ultimately turned off by what I read about it on Steam. All Coromon have monotypes, and I.I.R.C., can’t even learn multiple moves types for utility like in Pokémon. Also, Shinies have better stats. While it’s nice that you get a reward for finding such rare critters… it also means actually having to grind 1/4000 odds to get the best party, and since the game is apparently quite difficult, you might actually have to even on a casual playthrough.

For the record, I know about Palworld and I’m not playing that either. Mechanically, it looks interesting; like Legends Arceus on steroids. However, I don’t like the whole “cute but actually dark and messed up” image. It pretty much always ends up resulting in something pretentious and politically charged, and insults the idea of embracing your inner child. My therapist’s son is a marine, and the whole pop culture trope of “all soldiers are mindless, remorseless killing machines” is an insult to our soldiers, and oversimplifies the complexities that occur behind closed doors (at least I hope that’s the case).

Anyway, this part is about an upcoming indie game called Cassette Beasts. It looks cool, has expansive mobility options, and the monster designs are really creative and very different from most creature collectors. It has an in-battle fusion system, and a table-flipping Type relations system where using specific Types on another can trigger status effects that help or hinder. There’s also dual typing (at least in fusion)! There is—again—more incentive to find Shinies, which are called Bootlegs this time. However, they don’t seem to have better stats, but are instead different monsters entirely. Honestly, the game looks really hard, strategy-driven, and complex, but I’ll still give it a shot. I just hope that they show previews of the results of your moves so you don’t have to memorize the Type matchups!

Conclusion

I will probably keep playing Pokémon, but I’m not really so sure what should be done to improve it. Part of me thinks that it might be better to not have overworlds or stories at all. The combat in Pokémon is incredibly deep and strategic when taken competitively. People love Stadium and its ilk; the spinoffs that are literally all battles. Pokémon Showdown allows anyone with a computer to build any team they want, right down to Nature, IVs, EVs, Abilities, etc. without grinding hundreds of hours in the main games to get that perfect Pokémon. Unfortunately, I have no real use for it, since I have no friends (and there’s no way I’m fighting randos). 

The obvious good idea is to expand on Legends Arceus. The series has deep and fascinating lore, and that game set up potential to experience this lore for yourself. It could extend to a game set during the Great Pokémon War, and give huge character development to Surge. Arceus still wasn’t particularly difficult, and it was REALLY grindy, but it was a quantum leap in the right direction. Scarlet & Violet, at the very least, had a memorable and dynamic overworld, with huge variety in landmarks and geography. It’s possible to make an Legends game in a traditional open world setting and have it be good. However, GameFreak has had a long habit of coming up with brilliant ideas exactly once and never using them again.

Well, assuming that you’ve read all the way to the end of this long rant, I’d like to know your opinions. Do you love or hate Pokémon? Does the series have any chance to improve, or has it actually been saved with the most recent games?

Bonus Post: First Impressions of Sailor Moon Idol Group SG5

by macksamson, posted in Miscellaneous, music

PREFACE: I know I don’t normally post on this day, but since this is just a short blurb, I’m doing it now. Think of it as a bonus!

I feel like America, Japan, and South Korea are a classic rom-com love triangle. America is the boy, whom everyone loves even though he isn’t that interesting. Japan is America’s childhood friend. She gave America anime, the most historically important advancements in videogaming of all time, and popular artists like Yoshiki, Boris, Hikaru Utada, and more; what cherished memories. South Korea, however, is bustier and just appeals to America way more for some reason. Thus, Japan seems doomed to be forgotten… However, she has recently had her redemption arc, and is ready to show America her convictions. 

Analogies aside, while BABYMETAL, Ado, and numerous V-tubers have made their way into the mainstream, Japan needs to fight K-pop idols with idols of its own. This is where SG5 comes in. This group is inspired by the popular Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon franchise, and are endorsed by its mangaka, Naoko Takeuchi. Their first ever gig was held at Anime Expo, America’s biggest anime convention, meaning that they are pulling out all the stops to go right for the States’ jugular. Now, after much waiting, they have officially released their first single. Here comes the million dollar question: Is SG5 actually any good?

Positives, they actually caught me off guard. ‘Firetruck’ is not a pop song; it’s a RAP song. Additionally, it sounded extremely and uncomfortably sexual for an idol group. I’ll give them props for sounding almost as cursed as Mili’s ‘Ocean Bby’, a feat I didn’t think an idol group could achieve or want to risk shooting for.

However, positives end there. The idols themselves lack personality with their voices, and it has an aggressively basic beat. More basic than my least favorite BABYMETAL song, even. Going off of this impression alone, I would rank SG5 as my least favorite Japanese music artist ever, only behind Kyary Pamyu Pamyu. Scratch that, it might actually be worse. FOR THE RECORD, I am open to good rap music. Mori Calliope does a great job incorporating rap into her music, for example. There’s also the amazing Raoul Kerr from Bloodywood, my potential new favorite band of all time. I’m also getting into a rap-infused metalcore band called Fate DeStroyed, and their music is great so far. In any case, I might enjoy SG5 more down the line, if they can prove to be more versatile; juggling genres and moods around like nobody’s business, similar to Ado and Mori Calliope.  

In any case, the biggest issue is the fact that the idol industry as a whole is still this big, considering how its corruption is common knowledge. Perfect Blue has made the industry’s exploitative nature and the psychosis of its fandom very clear, yet we continue to support it and continue poisoning the minds of teenagers (and horny adults) all across the globe. I still listen to my favorite idol groups with trepidation, because despite them being fully grown adults a lot of the time, they could still be suffering underneath those smiles. I have additional concerns with SG5’s safety if they continue to commit to the highly sexual nature shown in this song.

In conclusion, SG5 seems like a shallow new face that’s going to be hard-carried by pretty faces and a familiar brand slapped onto said faces (I can at least rest easy knowing I’m not alone in my opinion, at least from what I found on Reddit). I wish them success, but only as a means to an end; that end being putting Japan and South Korea’s industries on equal footing, as opposed to the one-sided slaughter that’s been in favor of the latter for over a decade. They are better off pushing for existing artists who already have international renown, even if idols are easier money. If you have thoughts on this… collection of music notes, please tell me. I’d actually like to be convinced that what I heard was great.

Mack’s Music Highlights: 2022 Stragglers

by macksamson, posted in Miscellaneous, music, Music Highlights

If you’re reading this post, it’s because—surprise, surprise—too much music exists these days. The highlights for the second half of the year was LONG, and that was from cutting stuff out. So, since I’m not a reputable magazine consisting of many people who listen to various albums 24/7 in order to publish reviews on time… I’m probably going to have to make posts like this if a year’s music is just too darn good, especially if a lot of good stuff comes out so close to the end of the year that I can’t possibly finish it in time for the next. That, and the fact that I almost never listen to an album at launch.

Terra Atlantica: Beyond the Borders

Music is rarely more whimsical and escapist than power metal, and Terra Atlantica is ready to prove that fact once again with their third album, Beyond the Borders. While the first two albums were great, they showed the usual growing pains. However, I go by a music equivalent of anime’s three-episode rule in cases like this, and sure enough, Beyond the Borders is the breakthrough for them. With higher quality production, several guest vocalists, and—finally—a pirate-themed song set in their steampunk world, the album is a fun ride.

Verdict: 9/10

Asunojokei: Island

This album has a kawaii moe anime girl on the cover art, yet it’s black metal? I had to give this band a try, and boy… I’m not even remotely surprised that it’s weird stuff. The first album was quite experimental and all over the place, and by comparison, Island is… happier? Yeah, it’s weird. It’s not straight-up power metal, but the melodies still have an upbeat, contemporary rock feeling that’s integrated into unquestionably heavy black metal. Whatever you wanna call it, it’s a quantum leap forward for them. Island is definitely one of black metal’s most hidden gems of 2022.

Verdict: 9.45/10

Mori Calliope: SINDERELLA

“Didn’t you just talk about this chick?” you ask, recalling my previous highlight post. Yes, I did. Thing is, she just released her second full-length right at the end of last year, the same year as her previous full-length, and the Shinigami Note EP. V-tubers don’t get to sleep, do they? Also, this record is basically the entire reason for this post, since it came out in December.

Not to sound cliché, but SINDERELLA takes what Calliope has been doing and kicks it up a notch. For the most part, tracks hit harder, and still have the same wild variety as her previous efforts; there’s pop, rock, rap, and… well that’s pretty much it. I don’t imagine she has creative control over the compositions, at least in some cases, such as the song produced by The Oral Cigarettes (another popular J-rock band I never listened to); fortunately, her excellent singing voice is genuine. I hope. Regardless of who made the music, it’s still a step in the right direction for Mori Calliope.

Verdict: 9/10

Dream Unending: Song of Salvation

Wow, that was fast. Sure, their previous album (which I previously reviewed alongside Hand of Kalliach’s debut) wasn’t particularly intricate, but it’s still something that is hard to pull off well. In any case, here we are with a pleasant surprise: Dream Unending’s sophomore album, Song of Salvation! 

Expect quality over quantity again, because there are only five songs, two of which are pretty simplistic instrumentals. Anyway, it’s still good stuff. As usual, you have surreal atmospheric doom metal with eerie death growling and melancholic twang. Honestly, I don’t know what it is, but I love it.

Verdict: 9.5/10

C Z A R I N A: Arcana

C Z A R I N A is my first ever experience with electronic music, which apparently has more sub-genres than metal. Yeah, I didn’t think it was possible either. In any case, I started with their debut, Painted Holograms (btw, I know that everyone else calls C Z A R I N A a woman, but they said they were “gender fluid/non-binary” on their official Facebook page, so I’m using “they” for now). It was an interesting showcase of futuristic, atmospheric music, but I wasn’t exactly floored. Their sophomore release, Arcana, is a classic case of going from zero to a hundred.

It’s much simpler than metal, but has way more personality than mere pop. Arcana is a pulsing, fantastical record that takes the best of the 1980s and puts it all in a blender, with a touch of modern spices. C Z A R I N A has a deep and powerful voice, which only enhances the feel of the record. There are some points where the choruses overstay their welcome, but I presume that’s just a given with the genre. I don’t really have much of anything to compare it to, so I’m not really qualified to discuss anything else. Hooray for listening to metal 99% of the time!

Verdict: 9.25/10

Warforged: The Grove | Sundial

Aaaaaah… blackened death metal. My first ever extreme music experience, back when I put on good ol’ Behemoth, and found it—hot take incoming—kinda boring. Of course, because I’m me, I got acclimated much better to an obscure little band known as Warforged, who put a progressive spin on an already VERY specific subgenre. Their 2019 full-length debut, I: Voice, was truly terrifying, not because it was about blood, guts, and/or Satan, but because it was a surreal, supernatural horror concept album that was all kinds of whack. Fortunately, I’ve only been into them for a few months, so I didn’t have to wait much for their long-awaited follow-up: The Grove | Sundial.

The other noticeable change is that the tracks were shorter. However, they make the MOST of those fewer minutes! The Grove | Sundial is full of madness, with blackened death metal that goes all in, then tends to turn into an acoustic piece out of nowhere. It’s really quite scary. I honestly don’t know if I can follow this band, since—in case you didn’t know—I’m a squishy little boy.

Verdict: 9.45/10

Ado: Kyougen & Uta’s Songs One Piece: Film Red

As I said once before, I really want to like SG5 (whom you’ll be hearing my opinion on soon), and as such, I need to be able to tolerate more mainstream J-pop. While I got good enough impressions of Mori Calliope, she alone isn’t enough. I needed to try someone truly mainstream, such as Ado, Japan’s youngest insta-star, who basically conquered the globe overnight and only just turned twenty. They definitely gained tons of brownie points with their role in One Piece: Film Red, but their debut album, Kyougen, was already a chart topper even then.

One thing that stands out about Ado’s music is that it’s wildly varied. However, they deserve no credit for it; the reason is simply because the songs are all written by different people in Ado’s stead. For the most part, all of these out-sourced artists are Vocaloid musicians of great renown. The Vocaloid rabbit hole is deep, and that alone makes Ado easy to recommend, since newcomers can get a sneak preview of a myriad of these artists. On the flipside, there isn’t any telling what’s a cover and what’s originally written for Ado unless you’re well-versed in Vocaloid stuff. The other great aspect of Ado is their voice. What a beast (unless they use a voice changer). Husky and powerful, Ado is simply too charismatic for mere J-pop and I really hope they will be performing metal pieces in the future. 

Kyougen was already a phenomenon, but Ado REALLY became mainstream when they performed in One Piece: Film Red. The soundtrack album contains many VERY popular songs made just for the movie. I’d say it’s a huge step forward for them… well, only because I think the record is hard-carried by ‘New Genesis’ and ‘Tot Musica’. The other tracks have merit, but those two songs blow the rest out of the water. It turns out that those are generally among Ado’s most popular tracks.

Considering the numerous composers, it’s quite obvious that results will probably vary; I know it did for me. You’ll probably love some, and feel meh to others. As implied with the Film Red album, I’m willing to bet Ado is someone whose hits are so “hit-y” that every fan’s favorite will be the same handful of songs; that’s not exactly something I consider a good sign from a musician. Additionally, a couple of Ado’s best stuff has gotten a metal upgrade courtesy of V-tuber Futakuchi Mana, rendering the originals obsolete. Overall, Ado is off to a good start, but be wary of their mainstream appeal.

Verdict (Kyougen): 8.5/10

Verdict (Film Red Songs): 8.75/10

Hammer of Dawn: Uzil

I’m generally too scared of death metal and the like because they project gore and nihilism to the Nth degree. Symphonic blackened death metal supergroup Hammer of Dawn is no exception… at least on the surface. What makes their violent imagery tolerable is something that I’m sure some nerds might pick up on from their name: their brand is the famous videogame franchise Gears of War. Having stumbled upon them right after watching ProtonJon and Greg Chun’s stream playthrough of the second game, I listened to them on a whim and didn’t regret it.

Yeah, it’s lit. Even if you aren’t a Gears person, the band is at least a great way to be exposed to this type of music without—you know—having your brain smashed by a sledgehammer (as well as your flesh rended, your mind warped, your cerebrum shattered, and other things the press says about what extreme music physically does to your body). With a myriad of vocal styles, as well as symphonic and occasional electronic elements, Hammer of Dawn delivers some VERY intricate metal in a subgenre that’s complex enough as it is. They don’t do anything new, but with their branding, they prove themselves to be more cultured than the eight million “f*** the world” bands that saturate the market.

Verdict: 9.65/10

Stormruler: Sacred Rites & Black Magick

I previously reviewed Stormruler’s debut album, and wasn’t exactly in love with it. However, with them being my second black metal experience, I wasn’t really qualified to talk about it at all. I’ve become more familiar with the subgenre, and as such, I was willing to give their sophomore record a shot.

I don’t know if it’s the natural evolution between the first and second album, or my better experience with black metal, but I definitely made a good call keeping tabs on Stormruler. This is top-dollar black metal; dark yet whimsical. They don’t seem to do anything new with the subgenre (not that I really qualify to say), other than their usual thing of having an interlude track for every regular track. If you like fantasy black metal, then this record is an easy listen.

Verdict: 9.5/10

Vermilia: Ruska

Finland is the most metal-headed nation in the world, and they do NOT let quantity offset quality. Vermilia is a talented woman, and Ruska is the second of her two excellent full-lengths. Her style is your usual blackened folk metal (classic), but there are a few reasons why she stands out from the crowd.

Well, the gist of it is that her music is really good. The music is atmospheric, melodic, epic, AND pagan all at once. It’s a tough blend of subgenres to do, and she does it. However, the cherry on top is her vocal performance. Using multi-tracking, Vermilia is a one-woman choir, complete with black metal’s banshee-like shrieks. Better yet, she sings in Finnish, which is strangely rare for artists from Finland. Well, there’s another artist to add to the list of why Scandinavia is among the best!

Verdict: 9.75/10

Devenial Verdict: Ash Blind

I knew about this band for a while, but on their hypetrain late because… I was scared of them. The idea of the “dissonant death metal” subgenre they are categorized as sounded really intimidating. However, what makes them novel is that they are an unusual combination of that and atmospheric death metal. Ultimately, curiosity took hold.

Despite being tone deaf, I know what dissonance is in music theory: when people play the music wrong on purpose just to make you feel uncomfortable. However, when I put on Ash Blind, it didn’t sound dissonant at all. The guitars seemed to play at a higher pitch, but it didn’t sound “wrong” exactly. That’s what happens when you’re tone deaf I guess. In any case, the album is still very—no—REALLY good, and does a lot of stuff out of left field to keep you on your toes. Just be wary of it if you’re actually versed in music theory.

Verdict: 9.25/10

Te Ruki: Marako Te Ruki

I discussed this band on my metal diversity post, but. I have to talk about them again because this is definitely a highlight of last year! To sum up, Te Ruki is a French Polynesian black metal band that captures the traditional feeling of said ethnic group. Their songs are aggressive and primal, and they have Polynesian drums to boot. With this, Alien Weaponry, and a certain other band I will discuss in the future, we have a perfect trifecta of authentic Indigenous Polynesian metal. It’ll be enough to save their endangered languages and cultures, right? Please?

Verdict: 9.75/10

Conclusion

There. That should be ALL of the 2022 releases I wanted to discuss. Hopefully I’ll never have to make a post like this again, but you know I probably will. Well, see you in June for the first half of THIS year’s music that no one else talks about!

Inu-Oh: A Japanese History Musical

by macksamson, posted in Anime Movies, Miscellaneous

Man, I really hate seeing adaptations of stuff before reading the source material. The phrase “the book is better than the film” cannot be truer in the anime world, a medium notorious for cutting corners and taking creative liberties that ruin the heart of the thing. However, I had no choice with Inu-Oh, based on one of the stories in a book called Tales of the Heike; a book not licensed for legal Western use to my knowledge. Thing is, though, that it’s by Science Saru, and they have a vision for it that’s only possible in the Twenty-First Century. 

In Inu-Oh, a blind biwa player named Tomona meets the titular Inu-Oh, a person who was disfigured because of a curse. It turns out that the latter’s curse can be lifted if he performs the stories of the fallen Heike soldiers from important battles throughout Japanese history (or, in the context of the movie, relatively recent news). Nothing left to do but to form a traveling theater troupe and become famous!

Science Saru really is an excellent animation studio. This is the third movie of theirs I have seen, and all three of them are drastically different visually. Ride Your Wave looked aggressively generic, while The Night is Short, Walk on Girl looked all weird and liquidy. Inu-Oh is like Ghibli’s The Tale of Princess Kaguya on steroids. It combines traditional ink-brush-y art styles with modern anime visuals to make a stunning visual experience. The mouths of characters might look off-putting to some, but that’s just manga legend Taiyo Matsumoto for you. Yes, the creator of Tekkonkinkreet did the character designs.

Speaking of characters, they are no doubt the weakest parts of the movie. The only real characters are the two protagonists, and they’re pretty simple for the most part. Honestly, there really isn’t much to say about them. However, that’s okay this time around, since the whole point of the movie is the music. 

By the way, Inu-Oh is a rock opera. It doesn’t take long for Tomona—hence known as Tomoari—to don garish makeup and glamorous clothes like someone who didn’t know whether or not they wanted to cosplay as Gene Simmons or a Buddhist priest. Inu-Oh’s dancing rivals that of Michael Jackson, while the troupe somehow manages to create show-stopping stage effects that match that of this century despite it being a thousand years before. Although there are only three musical numbers, they are long, intricate, and utterly moving. 

However, all of that is shallow compared to Inu-Oh’s voice actor… at least his Japanese voice actor. Inu-Oh is voiced by none other than Avu-chan, vocalist of Japan’s famous glam rock band, Queen Bee. I have spoken of them once or twice, and sadly, I ended up falling out of their music despite how much I wanted to enjoy it. Despite how little I care for Queen Bee to this day, I’ve dearly missed Avu-chan’s utterly amazing vocalwork. It was bittersweet and nostalgic to hear them again for the first time in years, and boy, they REAAAAALLY go ham in this movie. Inu-Oh is one of the reasons to never watch dubs. There is no way in hell anyone can replace Avu-chan in their role, and I feel sorry for whoever did in the dub.

If there is any real flaw with the movie, it’s that there isn’t much closure. To be as vague as possible, the main protagonists do find closure in a way, but for the most part, that’s it. I really can’t elaborate further than this. It has a bittersweet and anti-climactic end, but it’s thankfully not on the level of abrupt nonsense of Ghibli movies. 

~~~~~

Final Verdict: 9.75/10

Inu-Oh is a truly spectacular movie. It is an example of the creativity of animation and why animation is better than anything in Hollywood. It also shows the power and passion of a nation that actually cares about animation in the first place. I could pretty much recommend it to anyone… except for those who are triggered by gore. There are only a couple of scenes, but they’re still there.

STILL Heavy and Colorful: More Diversity in Metal

by macksamson, posted in Miscellaneous, music

I know that the National Day of Racial Healing was four days ago, but… well, I have no excuse. That’s just what happens when you only do one post a week, and that day of the week isn’t on the holiday. In any case, this may or may not be the last time I do something for the National Day of Racial Healing, since a lot of bands like this are—sadly—still quite under the radar. We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it, though!

Bloodywood

A literal month after I published the post from last year, something truly miraculous happened. A 100% independent band from New Delhi, India, unleashed its first album—Rakshak—and actually took the world by storm! For once, I’m not alone in loving a weird niche band from East Jabip (even though most people still liked Lamb of God, Slipknot, Lorna Shore, etc.’s albums a lot more by comparison).

What makes Bloodywood special? Well, kind of everything about them. As a folk metal band, they incorporate heavy modern instruments alongside traditional Indian ones. The music is exceptionally well-composed; and they’re not afraid to throw in some electronic sounds to spice things up. The lyrics are also exceptional, going into themes like personal struggles and politics. In fact, I think Bloodywood is perhaps the only band able to discuss the latter without trying to divide the community like an overtly Left or Rightist band would. These lyrics are conveyed—you guessed it—exceptionally well by Jayant Bhadula, who growls in Hindi, alongside Raoul Kerr’s rapping prowess.

Cemican

The only Mexican musicians I listen to other than Mariachi Cobre in EPCOT’s Mexico pavilion, Cemican is a unique folk metal band that uses Mesoamerican instruments in their heavy sound. They have elaborate costumes that represent their native roots, and look fun to see in concert, based on the clips they’ve shared on Facebook. They really get the ball rolling on their third album: In Ohtli Teoyohtica In Miquiztli. They haven’t released anything new since COVID, but have been pretty busy with gigs, so they seem to be doing alright for such a niche band. Hopefully, you’ll be a fan of theirs as well.

Blackbraid

Of course, Mexico isn’t the only country with marginalized Indigenous people (well, technically, EVERY nation has some but I’m just trying to make a segue here). Sgah’gahsowáh, the sole band member of Blackbraid, is another excellent example of native people going heavy. Hailing from the Adirondacks, this man delivers top-dollar black metal (with the occasional woodwind accompaniment) and has left a lot of people wanting more. Fortunately, as someone who sold VERY well on Bandcamp, we’re pretty likely to get more in the future. Time to be good noodles and wait!

Bloody Tyrant

Taiwan has had a passionate metal scene since its important pioneer band, Cthonic. However, the country in general is still pretty slept on, even in the metal community. Sounds like a perfect place for underground enthusiasts to search, with Bloody Tyrant being one potential result of said search.

It took a while for them to get the ball rolling though. Their first album, while still enjoyable, is pretty garden variety black metal, but over time, they started to incorporate the Eastern folk instrumentation that makes them stand out. Each album has gotten better, with their most recent record from 2020 being a legitimate knockout. I can’t wait to hear what’s next!

hanabie.

LEWD WARNING for this this one!

Of course, I HAVE to gush over at least one Japanese band; at least this isn’t one I’ve discussed before, like with last year’s entry. As much as I hate the excessive amount of metal genres, I feel like hanabie. (yes, the period is part of their name) should be referred to as “otakucore”. They attack with aggressive metalcore energy, dual vocalists, and an uncharacteristically silly vibe. A lot of their song titles have to do with being nerds and hikikomori (and presumably the lyrics as well?)—hence the “otaku” descriptor from before—with the occasional cultural commentary. They’re pretty new to the scene, but they’re off to a strong start, and the prestigious Dutch metal festival they’ve been booked for later this year will probably earn them international attention.

Te Ruki

Thank goodness for Black Metal Promotion; they know how to help the little guys.

Despite the wild success of Disney’s Moana, Polynesian culture is still dying in this world. A new hope emerged in 2018 when the wildly successful New Zealand Maori metal band, Alien Weaponry, began their career in reclaiming their people’s culture. While that band is all well and good, it turns out that “Polynesian” is an umbrella term for numerous Pacific islanders. The people of French Polynesia are in even BIGGER danger; according to Te Ruki’s page on Encyclopaedia Metallum, only a few thousand people can speak their unique Tumutoan language. As far as I know, they are this ethnicity’s only voice in pop culture whatsoever.

Fortunately, it’s a damn powerful voice. In fact, they are everything I’ve wanted out of Alien Weaponry and more. However, unlike their Maori cousins, they employ primal-sounding black metal. Performed with tribal rhythms and singing in their native language, Te Ruki’s rituals knock it out of the park. The cherry on top is the use of TWO sets of percussion instruments: the usual drum kit, along with a set of traditional Polynesian drums.

Heilung?

Does this neofolk group even count? Sure, they represent pre-Christian Europe, which is kinda-sorta a marginalized culture, but… they’re still European. Well, for three White people, their popular music is almost scientifically proven to break barriers. I mean, just look at their policy: “Remember, we are all brothers. All people, beasts, tree and stone and wind, we all descend from the one great being that was always there, before people lived and named it, before the first seed sprouted.” I HAD to include them here, despite them technically not being a metal band (although they are still popular among metalheads, and are signed to a metal-devoted label).

In any case, Heilung is an uncharacteristically bizarre band, considering their immense fame. With pretty much no rules to their music, they can have an epic, melodic masterpiece like the embedded video… or six-plus minutes of Nordic ASMR. They mold the ancient instruments of the past into something new and otherworldly; something beyond comprehension that we can all be baffled by together, regardless of our color and creed. Heilung is one of those groups who can’t NOT be described without hyperbole, because they are just that kind of experience. 

Closing Thoughts

People complain about there being a lack (still) of diversity in popular culture these days, music included. Yet, as you can see from this post and its prequel from last year, that lack isn’t exactly—you know—real. Not to sound rude, but it’s honestly people’s fault for listening to the same small group of household names over and over again and never going out to discover anything new. That’s just how the mainstream works, I guess. This might be the last time I can do a post like this, but if I can find MORE good groups, then we’ll meet each other again next year.

My Final, Definite Top Ten Favorite Japanese Music Artists List

by macksamson, posted in Miscellaneous, music

I’ve done at least eighty iterations of this post, because I keep finding new artists and my tastes keep getting more insane. Back in the day, I only liked music from Japan, but that’s changed… somewhat. Now it’s 20% Japan, 75% Europe, and 5% other, but that’s besides the point. Anyway, my older lists were outdated. Just for closure, here’s my real list. NOTE: Contains artists I have talked about before.

10) MYTH & ROID

My first ever exposure to modern music. If it wasn’t for this band, I would still be a classic rock boy. This progressive hard rock duo is everything you could ask for: heavy beats, heavy synth, and emotive female vocal work (with the latter courtesy of the talented Kihow). They’ve been pretty quiet though, with only sparse releases of singles and EPs. I don’t listen to them too often anymore, but I definitely keep my eyes trained on them.

9) nano

My other first exposure to modern music. nano is an anything-goes bilingual hard rock soloist who has pumped bangers for over a decade. I remember when they hardly showed their face, and now… we just know what they look like. What a trooper. Anyway, nano’s music is simple with relatable lyrics, but it’s great stuff. Their talents have been wasted on openings for anime that the community never seems to care about, but whatcha gonna do. The fans still love nano nonetheless.

8) RAISE A SUILEN

I haven’t talked about this band in years, and that’s because I hadn’t listened to them in years! Of all the Bang Dream! outfits, they were the one I was obsessed with. However, I eventually fell out of love with them, mainly because right after their debut came out I had discovered Amaranthe, a band that’s been doing the same type of music for longer and better. However, as superior as a lot of bands are to RAS, it turns out I still love RAS all the same.

RAISE A SUILEN is Bang Dream!‘s heaviest band, standing right on the line that separates rock from metal. Just like Amaranthe and many others, they frequently use electronic elements to give their music extra zing. I honestly don’t know what my beef with them was… and honestly, I’ll cringe at myself if I go back to the old review of their full-length and find out. Feel free to bash my past self if you so choose!

7) Mili

I don’t talk about this experimental J-pop group too often, considering how much I love them; always have. This trio knows how to make any idea into a good one (even a cursed song like ‘Ocean Bby’). With moving piano playing accompanied by all forms of symphonic and electronic effects, and lyrical themes ranging from food to existential horror, Mili almost always delivers. They are a group that feels metal in terms of creativity, despite not sounding metal whatsoever. Of course, vocalist Cassie Wei brings the band’s weird lyrics to life; easily one of J-pop’s best and most underrated voices.

6) BAND-MAID

I’ve gushed about them many times and I’ll do it again, except with even more fervor than ever because they’ve gotten REALLY GOOD lately. BAND-MAID is considered hard rock, but they have a heaviness and aggression that sounds more like metal. They hit hard with an old-school feel, and it hurts so good. Also, vocalist Saiki Kasumi has an amazing singing voice.

5) Lovebites

Being a Lovebites fan was hard once upon a time, but fear not: they have a new bassist. Since their inception, Lovebites has put forth some amazing classic-style metal and power metal. Vocalist Asami has a powerful voice, but her English isn’t the best. Hopefully she’ll improve with time. Anyway, expect me to fan-gush over their first album with the current line-up when it drops later this year.

4) Crossfaith

Apparently, this was my second ever metalcore band. While I felt like they had a rough start (although I might think differently now if I go back to the older stuff), they’ve gotten to the point where they hit hard with metal and meaty synthesizers to create futuristic heaviness. Vocalist Kenta Koie takes some getting used to, especially in the older stuff when his English wasn’t as good, but he definitely shows his capabilities soon enough. In case you’re still intimidated by those extreme vocals, Crossfaith does tend to incorporate more melodic stuff, giving them even more tools to work with. Unfortunately, they’ve seem to be on hiatus, question mark? They generally put out at least SOMETHING every year, even if it’s just a single, but they’ve been quiet lately.

Naturally, with Crossfaith being my second metalcore band, you might surmise that my FIRST metalcore band would ALSO be Japanese. That assumption is resoundingly correct! Only a certain popular Japanese metalcore band would give me my first exposure to extreme music…

3) Crystal Lake

Psyche!

3) PassCode

You really thought I would actually like a POPULAR band? Well, believe it or not, I had a phase where I didn’t like PassCode at all (and now they’re THIS HIGH on the list). The irony is that—of all things—this niche alt-idol outfit truly is my first ever experience with metalcore! Additionally, the first unclean vocals I ever heard came from them. This band is basically why I had a history of underwhelm-ment with BABYMETAL; I found PassCode first. 

My reason for not liking them was because their songs were so intricate at the time I first listened to them. Metal-virgin-me had figured that I didn’t like a song if I couldn’t commit it to memory in the first several listens. Now that I know that’s not the case, I eventually missed and returned to PassCode, more in love with them than ever. I wish I had never left, because the band has only grown, especially after 2020’s Strive (holy crap). Imagine Perfume but with metalcore (or you could just watch the video so you don’t have to imagine it at all).

2) Utsu-P

Utsu-P is special for multiple reasons. One is that he churns out music like a factory, juggling his own solo career with a band AND producing for an idol group. Another reason he is special is because he’s hired an unusual assortment of vocalists… or should I say, Vocaloids. Oh, and did I mention that his music is heavy and chaotic djent metal?! That’s right, Hatsune Miku and her friends sing and even perform death growls in Utsu-P’s staggeringly large catalog of insanity. Right, and the final reason why Utsu-P is special is because his music is simply some of the best that Japan has got. He’d be in the number one spot, if it weren’t for…

1) Broken by the Scream

I’m sure you know of BABYMETAL: one of the—like—three globally, truly mainstream Japanese music artists, earning collabs with death metal icons like Alissa White-Gluz (actually she might be the only death metal icon to collab with them… for now), and having endorsements from veterans like Rob Zombie and the Metal God himself. If you know me, then you know that I find them to be… okay. Broken by the Scream is the same idea—Japanese idol pop with metal—but on steroids. BBTS takes it a step further, focusing exclusively on extreme metal elements. Connoisseurs of the current extreme music scene can easily recognize death metal, metalcore, and even deathcore in BBTS’ practically perfect cacophony of J-pop. It is the kind of chaos like when you boot up Katamari Damacy for the first time… every time I put them on, I am always boggled with how they managed to pull it off.

Conclusion

This went from having Dempagumi.inc and MYTH & ROID having top spots to only the latter being on the list at all. Hooray for metal. Anyway, Japan has amazing music; I don’t know why South Korea gets all the love now. In any case, this is the FINAL LIST. I will not update it even if I actually end up believing the positions need to change (which you won’t know regardless). If you like the embedded MVs—which I actually put in this post unlike the other lists—then check out the artists yourself!

Pompo the Cinephile: A 2D Movie About a 3D Movie

by macksamson, posted in Anime Movies, Miscellaneous

I always have to specify when I’m reviewing an adaptation of something without consulting the source material… mainly so I don’t look like some normie who just watches movies without knowing where they come from. According to MyAnimeList, Pompo the Cinephile is an adaptation of a two-volume webmanga from several years ago. It sure-as-hell doesn’t seem available over in the West, and honestly, something that short could probably be adapted with most of its soul intact. Hopefully. 

In Pompo the Cinephile, movie magic is made in Nyallywood. A classic underdog named Gene Fini works with the titular loli producer herself, Pompo, who specializes in skimpy B-movies. She’s young, but really talented, being the granddaughter of one of the most famous producers in the world. Anyway, despite the movie being named after her, it’s really about Gene’s spiritual journey through the world of film when given the opportunity to shoot a contemporary drama as its director.

Like in actual filmmaking, there’s a LOT to go over, i.e. the actual process of making a film. However…

We can’t talk about that yet! This is an ANIME feature film, so we need to discuss the visuals. As expected with the better budget and less time to fill, Pompo the Cinephile is gorgeous. The movie does all kinds of clever edits that fit with the filmmaking motif it conveys. Every minute of it is full of life and color. 

Anyway, as I said before I was so rudely interrupted by myself, this movie REALLY shows how hard it is to make a movie. You have to book all kinds of things, arrange for flights to the filming location, make sets (or use CG if you’re Hollywood), get sponsors to fund the movie, and… a LOT of editing. Gene’s movie, Meister, ends up clocking in at ninety minutes, but there was SEVENTY-TWO HOURS of raw footage to go through! Is that… realistic?! For the sake of whatever Earth’s resources are used in filming, I hope that’s a gross exaggeration.

With Pompo the Cinephile itself also being ninety minutes, you can expect the story to be simple, approachable, and concise; none of that mundane stuff that boomers get dopamine over. It goes through the whole Murphy’s Law laundry list of hiccups, and they really end up getting down to the wire with this one. Furthermore, it has layers in that Meister has parallels to Gene’s life.

Oops, I talked about Gene’s character arc, which means it’s time to discuss the cast! Pompo is great, in case it wasn’t obvious enough. She’s short, spunky, and eccentric, and is basically the Roy Disney to Gene’s Walt… or something (you know what I mean). We’ve already talked about Gene, but there are more characters than just him and Pompo Natalie is a young girl who seems wholly inadequate to act, yet her existence inspires Pompo to write the screenplay for Meister. She learns the ups and downs of acting, and gets a little spiritual journey of her own. We also have a sad banker named Alan, who ends up compelled to invest in Meister, and learn what it means to run a bank. Wait… then wouldn’t that make HIM the Roy Disney to Gene’s Walt? Crap… my analogies suck.

There are plenty of supporting characters with a lot of charm, like the sleazy other director who works in the B-movies. We also have the famous actors, Mystia and Martin Braddock, the latter of which is the lead role in Meister. The cherry on top with all these characters is that there is NO ROMANCE on set whatsoever. That’s my kind of movie.

We all know how hard it is to make a film, but Pompo the Cinephile never fails to be light-hearted at its core. There’s plenty of good humor while still hitting us in the feels. It also gets pretty psychological and philosophical when the characters dissect what a “movie” really is. I, of course, humbly disagree—at least where live action is concerned—but they do a good job with the dialogue when viewed in a vacuum. What’s important is that it gives a shout-out to introverts by claiming that they are inherently more creative than people who fit in.

Speaking of humbly disagreeing, I feel like the movie would start some interesting debates. Walking out of it, I interpreted that—due to the nature of some later scenes—it was trying to endorse that notion that there is no cost too great for living your dreams. Not even cutting away all of your loved ones, and having disregard for your own life. It’s ironic coming from a place like Japan, where that self-sacrificial lifestyle is leading it to its demise. Maybe there was something I didn’t get; I’m not exactly good at this subtext thing.

~~~~~

Final Verdict: 9.5/10

Pompo the Cinephile was an excellent movie, even if it didn’t make me appreciate live action cinema any better than I already do (or lack thereof). It does just about everything right, and I’d daresay it was one of the best anime of 2021 (which sure holds water considering how little anime I watch anymore). Do you like anime? Do you like movies? Do you like anime movies? If yes, then watch this one.