Tag: human

The Night is Short, Walk on Girl: Monogatari But It’s Heavily Under the Influence

by macksamson, posted in Anime Movies, Miscellaneous

I read and wrote a review of the standalone Japanese novel, The Night is Short, Walk on Girl, a long time ago. It was a month before the lockdown that changed all of us. Now, what feels like a lifetime later, I found myself watching The Night is Short, Walk on Girl‘s 2017 movie adaptation, since it was on HBO Max. One of the reasons is that I reread my review of the novel, and realized that it was god-awful. My opinion on the work will probably remain unchanged, but I want to give a more professional dissertation all the same. Also, one thing I didn’t mention in the book review is that I had a bad feeling about it even before going into it. Back in the old days of MyAnimeList, the movie was often paired with Monogatari and the like as a profound and mind-blowing examination of the human condition; the kind of “elitist” stuff that you can’t criticize without risking an insult to your intelligence (even if that criticism is very intellectual in and of itself). So, without further ado, let’s get to reviewing The Night is Short, Walk on Girl!

In The Night is Short, Walk on Girl, a young college student is finally about to confess his love to the girl of his dreams! However, she manages to elude him without even trying. Will he be able to survive a long night in Kyoto, and meet up with her by chance?

Before getting into the movie, I need to confess my love for the movie’s setting. City nightlife is a real experience, even more-so in urban Japan. The night is a rare chance for Japanese people to be their true selves, especially when drunk (a major theme of this movie). In fact, one of my research books said “you don’t truly know a Japanese person until you see them drunk.”

The strangeness of the night is brought to life with the movie’s unique visuals. It’s minimalistic and abstract, with cartoony movements happening alongside Dali-like surrealness. Already, I found this to be my preferred version of Night is Short just from the visuals alone. It’s a real surprise that the same team would end up doing Ride Your Wave.

In case you couldn’t tell, the dude spends the entire ninety-minute movie just trying to talk to this girl. Visuals aside, the movie is a pretty simple rom-com. Both man and woman end up in ridiculously silly situations, all while in relatively close proximity to each other. Just like the book, the movie is split into four acts. 

Of course, it takes more than whacky visuals for the anime community as a whole to consider Night is Short profound. The movie is full of philosophical nonsense, and you can bet your ass that people take it way more seriously than how it’s framed in context. The main profoundity (new word) that’s explored is fate. It’s a major symbol for the whole movie. Elements of the many different stories all have some sort of connection, in order to provoke your thoughts into thinking that fate is a real thing. The amount of coordinating all of this is admittedly pretty impressive.

Sadly, like the book, I did not give a rotting carp about it. I personally call philosophy “overthinking mundane things, the job”, and it’s because none of it matters in the long run. Like, what is the takeaway supposed to be here? Is it open to interpretation? Am I supposed to look at the world differently? Is it all a vain attempt at pretending to be smart? 

To go at this from a more personal angle, well… let me begin by stating that I have autism (in case this is the first post of mine that you’re reading). As an outlier, I overanalyze mundane aspects of life all the time, and it’s only led to mental anguish. To be perfectly real, a lot of the stuff that comes up in philosophy is all in our heads. Morality, for instance, is an entirely human construct. Any other species would go extinct if they had to live by our rules, simply because they would all be guilty of murder. To paraphrase Temple Grandin, the best way to approach all the mysteries of the human condition is to not even bother trying to figure it out in the first place, and works like this movie are the exact antithesis of that mentality.

Surprisingly, I ended up liking the characters more this time around. The voice actors all do an exemplary job at giving everyone a ton of personality. When I reviewed the novel, I accused the girl of having no personality, when she’s actually got quite a bit going on. She’s got a childlike innocence, and is attracted to pretty much everything (read as: “booze”). She believes in fate, yet ironically dismisses her encounters with the dude as coincidence.

Speaking of the dude, he’s a classic underdog. All he wants is love, yet it seems like the world is against him. Surrounding them are a quirky cast of characters, from the tengu whose name I forgot, to the old cynicist Rihaku. 

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Final Verdict: 8/10

I enjoyed this version of The Night is Short, Walk on Girl more than the book. However, it’s still a pretty pretentious movie. I don’t know what it is, but a lot of Japanese writers have a real thing with trying to make the mundane feel otherworldly. Call me an uncultured swine, but I just don’t get it. In any case, I recommend this movie if you love Monogatari, or the novels of Haruki Murakami.

Grimgar of Fantasy and Ash Overview (Volumes 1-8)

by macksamson, posted in Light Novels, Other

This is a review of a light novel that I had abandoned around two years ago: Grimgar of Fantasy and Ash, one of J-Novel Club’s first publications. It looked great, then I read about two volumes and… just couldn’t get into it. I know that slow burns are a thing, but due to the sheer length of the series, plus me not yet having my IRL job at the time, I literally couldn’t afford to continue with it. But over the course of the last couple of months, I tried giving it a fair shot from where I left off.

In Grimgar of Fantasy and Ash, twelve people end up in this world- all Breath of the Wild style (including the amnesia). But unlike Link, they just go to the nearest town and GET A JOB. That’s basically about it; a perfect opening for a sandbox JRPG. That analogy is pretty apt, because this world is- of course- run on videogame physics.

Since it IS a JRPG world, Grimgar operates like one, specifically by having a slow and boring start. Most of the first volume is them just getting acquainted with the world. It is generic and boring, and shouldn’t have taken so much time to get acquainted with in the first place. Grimgar reminds me a LOT of Goblin Slayer, one of my least favorite LNs of all time (the group even gets called Goblin Slayers), and it could’ve even inspired that cesspool of D&D tropes. 

“Well, that’s only an issue for the first few volumes, right?” you ask. I thought that would be the case at first. But Grimgar is a “realistic” isekai. That means no lofty goals, no big bads to take out, no nothing. The whole point of the story is just… to survive. For some people (*cough* critics *cough*), this sounds like the greatest thing ever. And for some, the idea alone is enough, based on the positive reviews I’ve read. But the idea alone is never enough for me. The execution is more important, and Grimgar’s execution isn’t exactly on point.

At first glance, it seems the author really shows how ruthless the world of Grimgar is. Plot relevant characters do actually die, and it’s not always obvious who’s wearing the red shirt at any given time. Furthermore, it does a great job at showcasing the team’s struggles and shortcomings. Unfortunately, there are a ton of tone shifts. You know, have a story that takes itself SO DAMN SERIOUSLY and then suddenly throws in an ecchi scene. NO, you’re doing it wrong! Golden Kamuy and One Piece are rare gems that can mesh opposing attitudes all too organically, but Grimgar is no such gem.

The cast is ultimately what made me abandon Grimgar two years ago. Having twelve main characters immediately can be overwhelming in a book. In something like Danganronpa, sure, you’re introduced to sixteen main characters, but you didn’t have to worry about picturing them. I remember taking half an hour at the prologue just because I had to establish an image of all twelve people simultaneously. Fortunately, the author had the courtesy to split them up. The main MAIN group consists of Haruhiro (the leading protagonist), Ranta, Yume, Shihoru, Moguzo, and Manato, with the addition of Merry later on. 

Sadly, they aren’t that interesting. Haruhiro genuinely cares about his comrades, almost to a fault. But other than that, he’s a typical, bland self-insert. They try to justify this by having characters say something like, “He should be the leader because he’s the most ordinary” or something… but I still didn’t give a rat’s ass about him.

Ranta is the best and worst character in the whole series. He’s the best character because he has the most personality, memorable scenes, and feels the most fleshed out. Conversely, he’s the worst character because he’s a perv and is responsible for pretty much every tonal clash in the whole series (oh, and this person named Anna, who comes up later, is the female version of Ranta). Besides him, most of the others fulfill typical tropes like “deadpan loli” and “gentle giant”. There is some semblance of character development, which is enough for some (i.e. most) people, but for me, it falls flat in the face of their already boring personalities.

Visually, Grimgar has a true JRPG look. Watercolor paint style with desaturated but appealing colors give it an Octopath Traveler vibe. It also makes me wish that the quality of the art matched the actual story (oooooooh snap). 

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Verdict (Average of All Eight Volumes): 6.85/10

Although I can appreciate what Grimgar of Fantasy and Ash sets out to do, I’m not one of those people who gives A’s for effort. From its boring characters, to dialogue that’s so far out of left field that it circumnavigates the earth and ends up back in right field, it’s just too many negatives and not enough positives. Grimgar feels like something meant to be inherently appealing to critics above all else. Maybe I’ll revisit it, but for now, I just can’t. If all you care about is that it’s “realistic”, “human”, and “poignant”, then you’ll probably enjoy Grimgar more than me.

Log Horizon Volume 4 Review

by macksamson, posted in Light Novels, Log Horizon

Last time on Log Horizon, a whole slew of people enjoyed their own beach filler episode. Meanwhile, Shiroe actually does something important and heads to the Ancient Court of Eternal Ice, a castle where the important people of Eastal, the League of Free Cities, meet to discuss political bullcrap. But first, ballroom dancing, and assorted conspiring! During all that, the twins do some combat training in the dungeon known as Forest Ragranda. While they barely manage to survive against some skeletons, Shiroe and his buddies end up… having to attend various social gatherings (disgusting!)! One night, while Akatsuki is having an existential crisis over being a loli, some Li Gan dude shows up to discuss matters with her and Shiroe. This guy is some kind of powerful Sage who knows about the different classes of magic, including some seriously OP classes that can change the entire world in a single use. The Catastrophe that caused the players to be stuck in this world is world-class magic, a World Fraction, and this is the third time it’s been used. The first one involved these alv princesses from long ago who attacked mankind as revenge for their people getting wrecked, but they died too. This caused the demihumans to pop into existence, and take the world by storm. Even after creating the first Ancients, humans have been driven into a corner. Right at the end of their rope, the Second World Fraction occurred, but there wasn’t enough material left to actually know what happened. But after that, the third one occurred… and here we are. Based on the time scaling, Shiroe realizes that the second World Fraction was at the time of the open beta for Elder Tales (and also, that dying can apparently cause people to lose some of their memories). Back in the forest, the kids discuss the natures of their abilities, and- poof!- finally understand the basics of playing a JRPG! And it shows too; for they have a kick-ass expedition the next day. Oh, and the people at the beach get attacked by fishmen. That’s what you get for having a fanservice-y filler episode!

In this volume, the fishmen quickly end up becoming a less vexing threat than anticipated, mainly because they’re accompanied by a massive army of goblins. This is an in-game event called The Return of the Goblin King. Basically, this volume is about taking out this threat.

But it’s not so easy, thanks to politics. The League of Eastal has no choice but to hire the people from Akiba to fight back the goblins, but it gets complicated for some reason. It’s something about “them just exploiting the Adventurers” or something. Based on this, it seems that Log Horizon is no exception when it comes to fantasy politics that waste time more than build the world of the story.

There’s good news and bad news with this. The good news is that we get more character development regarding that Raynesia girl and Krusty (whom I didn’t mention in the recap because I figured that she’d be written out of the series after this arc). The bad news is that it’s boring. Raynesia is your typical “sheltered girl who can’t do anything, but then she meets ‘the one’ and he shows her ‘a whole new world in shining shimmering splendor’ and she comes out of her shell”. It’s cool if you like romance, but it’s not even as remotely interesting as the one player/tian relationship in Infinite Dendrogram, because those people are actual A.I., as opposed to the People of the Earth, who are humans.

At the very least, the twins and their group are now more than capable of defending themselves. The goblin battles end up going way to smoothly in this volume. I get that it’s still early, but even DanMachi had more serious situations going by the fourth volume. Normally, I don’t care if there is low tension, but here it felt very boring to read through for whatever reason. 

One issue I’ve been having is that Log Horizon doesn’t seem to be very good with giving its characters well-defined movepools. Sometimes, it feels like these characters have moves that they didn’t even have before. The writing is still wrought with exposition, and it’s getting to the point where it’s describing moves that have already been established, as if we were being shown it for the first time. 

Back to the low tension topic, the biggest issue with the volume is at the end. Something occurs that doesn’t just ruin the tension of the arc, but ruins any sense of tension for the entire remainder of Log Horizon. As established previously, crafting-based classes can use real-world experience to make something that isn’t originally programmed to exist in Elder Tales. This includes steam-powered boats, and food that actually has taste. Minor spoiler: Shiroe makes something that completely rewrites the established rules of the world, which makes him eleventy times more Kirito-ish than before, and he was already leaning far toward that extreme at this point. Sure, it’s still “technically” following an established rule, but that rule now seems to serve toward justifying any number of Deus ex Machinas that could occur moving forward. Plus, it undermines the worldbuilding that served as Log Horizon’s greatest source of appeal.

~~~~~

Verdict: 7/10

Holy crap, these scores have been degrading over time. It’s now almost as low as my final score for Overlord… which I recently dropped. Things are not looking good on the horizon (no pun intended). Let’s see, the next volume’s called… Sunday in Akiba? Oh… that sounds like filler. Eff me.

Tokyo Godfathers Movie Review

by macksamson, posted in Anime Movies, Miscellaneous

PREFACE: There might be a… slight difference in portrayals of certain things in the old Japanese audio and the new 2020 English dub of this movie. Being the weeb that I am, I watched it subbed. This is a review of the subbed version.

If there was any good part of my decision to watch Ride Your Wave, it was seeing the preview of Satoshi Kon’s 2003 film, Tokyo Godfathers. I traveled uncomfortably far from my home in the ungodly hours of night, because that’s where the nearest theater happened to be. Was it worth the hassle?

In Tokyo Godfathers, three homeless bumpkins go dumpster diving and *play Zelda jingle* find a baby. Since they’ve got nothing better to do, they set out to find the darn thing’s birth parents.

One thing that any viewer will notice, at least a viewer who’s used to current anime, is the movie’s rather unconventional portrayal of Tokyo. Instead of the bee-bopping, fun utopian metropolis, we are shown the less lawful underbelly of Tokyo that Japan’s tourism industry doesn’t want you to see. It’s much more “realistic”, which is something that you might enjoy over those battle shounens.

But Tokyo Godfathers is a satire, and that means it’s not all underbelly. In fact, no matter how dark or emotional the movie gets, it manages to never take itself too seriously. There’s tons of witty banter throughout this movie, but unlike most anime, the humor is much more- *Fmuh!*- nuanced (if you don’t know what that Fmuh means, check out the 1968 movie The Odd Couple). You’ll need to pay attention to the mannerisms of the characters, as well as crap happening off in the background in order to be able to understand how Tokyo Godfathers works its magic.

In terms of the narrative structure, Tokyo Godfathers follows these people throughout the crowded streets of Tokyo as they get involved in all kinds of antics with the baby. This includes getting invited to a party with the Yakuza, and narrowly avoiding a Terminator-style vehicular accident. But every so often, they break the ice with tidbits on their backstories, until they finally form a cohesive whole.

So who are these bumpkins anyway? Tokyo Godfathers stars Gin, Miyuki, and Hana. Gin is an old, cynical drunkard who became those things because he ran away from his life issues, Miyuki is a bratty and spunky teenage girl (and a loli, in case any of you modern fans cared), and Hana is a retired drag queen. These three have tons of Laurel and Hardy-esque banter with each other, but in terms of individual strength, Hana takes the cake. She is extremely eccentric, and behaves very flamboyantly, providing a bulk of the comic relief. But when something needs to be done, she’ll damn well do it. I can imagine that the animators had the most fun with her mannerisms.

The music also helps sell the screwballiness of the movie. The music pieces, when they’re not Christmas music, are intentionally dissonant and jarring, and sound like a song by King Gnu even though they didn’t exist at the time. 

It all comes together in the movie’s fantastic visual presentation. Normally, I’d write off great visuals as fluff, but here, it’s just as important to the plot as the plot itself. Most of us modern viewers have come to assume that anime are simply incapable of depicting themes like dreariness, suspense, and general negativity. But in Tokyo Godfathers, the desaturated colors and clever use of limited lighting effects conveys the mood wonderfully (it’s like they actually had funding to make it or something). Small details, like the various and creepily hyper-realistic adverts posted everywhere, make the underbelly of Japan feel otherworldly in its own way. Something so hideous has never looked so beautiful!

In addition, the animation is marvelous as well. Not a single frame is wasted to bring Tokyo Godfathers to life. It is most prevalent in the main characters, who tend to morph into completely different forms at times. This level of expressiveness is something that no live action actor can achieve.

There are TWO brief instances of… ahem… “nips” in the movie. You have been warned. 

Final Verdict: 9.4/10

If you wanna be one of those people who thinks that older anime are better than newer anime, then Tokyo Godfathers makes a great example. It’s a weird and wonderful movie that takes a bit of open mindedness to enjoy. At the time of this post, it’s the best anime feature film I’ve seen since Ghost in the Shell. I highly recommend it to anyone who likes satires such as The Odd Couple.

Ride Your Wave Movie Review

by macksamson, posted in Anime Movies, Miscellaneous

Recently, I’ve realized that anime feature films are where Japanese animation puts its best foot forward. By a long shot. So, I decided to go against my gut and see Ride Your Wave, a new romance film from the studio Science SARU. Were mistakes made that day?

Can’t answer that question without a brief rundown of the premise first. A cute surfer girl named Hinako Mukaimizu moves from Chiba to a new town. One night, her life almost- literally- goes up in flames when her apartment catches fire. She is saved by a young fireman named Minato Hinageshi. They fall in love immediately and live happily ever after. Nothing goes south whatsoever.

Spoiler alert, it goes south. No, this isn’t even a spoiler, because if you’ve seen ANY romance for teens, or Up, then you likely figured what was going to happen just based on that last paragraph. What happens is that Minato drowns.

But don’t worry, this is magical YA-land! In the aftermath of his death, Hinako starts seeing Minato in bodies of water. You know, like you do.

There are three reasons why I wasn’t even remotely invested emotionally in Ride Your Wave. First, I never fell in love with a real life human ever, so I can’t relate. Second, as someone who’s been a teenager, I KNOW that love at first sight is the most BS thing ever; merely just some hormones going off in response to primal urges and other stimuli. Third, and most importantly, it is incredibly cut and dry (despite being water-themed). I even spent more than half of the movie thinking about the movie previews that they showed, and I was still able to follow Ride Your Wave‘s plot without missing a beat.

Ride Your Wave is basically your typical YA novel, except with that touch of anime whimsy. I can’t really say anything else about the story, because there isn’t anything else to say. The characters are all typical teen templates, too. I’m probably going to forget all of their names after completing this post.

The music, though, is the absolute WORST aspect of the movie. While half of it is pretty harmless BGM, the other half is the freaking overused song: “Brand New Story” by GENERATIONS from Exile Tribe. I had seen the band’s name come up occasionally on Apple Music’s Similar Artists tab, but I never got around to trying their music. Because of how it’s used in Ride Your Wave, I was not given a good first impression. While it’s not the worst song by itself, it is a plot relevant song in the movie. This means that you will have to hear it ad naaaaaaaauseuuuuum! Blech.

But hey, the visuals are all worth it, right (*sarcasm*)? I’m sure a lot of people will go gaga over Ride Your Wave‘s bright, Wind Waker-esque art style and fluid animation. I’ll admit that I might’ve silently gawked at a couple of shots. Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem to serve any purpose to the story’s themes.

~~~~~

Final Verdict: 6.8/10

Ride Your Wave is nothing special; it’ll likely be forgotten when the next “pulse-pounding, break-your-heart-and-put-it-back-together” thing comes out (especially if it’s directed by Shinkai). I only saw it because the anime movies that I’ve seen have consistently maintained a higher standard than their TV counterparts, and despite all the salt, Ride Your Wave does the same. I can’t exactly recommend it, mainly because it was one-night only. So if the Blu-Ray comes out, borrow it from a friend, since there’s no such thing as a movie rental store in this world. 

Bottom-Tier Character Tomozaki Volume 1 Review

by macksamson, posted in Bottom-Tier Tomozaki, Light Novels

This isn’t the first time I’ll say that I don’t like factoring relatability into quality, and it won’t be the last. And despite how much I can relate to the titular character of Bottom-Tier Character Tomozaki (published in English by Yen Press), I will absolutely not factor it into the final score of this series. Well, assuming I even finish it, since there are a billion things out there right now..

Fumiya Tomozaki views life itself as the Dark Souls of… life itself (great analogy there)? Basically, he ranks humans in tiers, with higher tiers given an unfair advantage over bottom-tiers like himself. And as such, he just plays videogames, which make more sense to him. However, all of this changes when he meets a tough online opponent IRL, who turns out to be top-tier girl Aoi Hinami. After a serious argument, she convinces him to let her give him the “tutorial” for the game that is life, so that he can pick himself up and not be a piece of crap.

As someone who’s content as an introvert, this premise immediately made me uncomfortable on a personal level. While I don’t entirely agree with Tomozaki’s attitude, his viewpoints of life are undoubtedly true; after all, there are some individuals who have more net worth than entire nations in this world. But what bothers me the most is that whenever we have an introverted main character, they are forcibly put through the social wringer until they become an extrovert. I get that there wouldn’t be much of a narrative without the goal of making friends, that at least 99% of the human race actively seeks out relationships, and that Japan is really hypersocial, but the nature of the situation in Tomozaki really irks me.

But like I said, I’m not factoring all that personal-schmersonal crap into the score, no matter what.

The writing in Tomozaki is better than I expected. With the titular character as the narrator, you get a lot of videogame terminology lumped into aspects of everyday life. It’s not very descriptive, but it’s set in the real world, you can just picture where they are based on intuition.

Since this is technically a rom-com, the characters are gonna be the bread and butter. Unfortunately, they don’t give off a good first impression. Tomozaki is pretty passive; because of his situation, he just ends up getting strung along by Hinami every step of the way. He’s also treated like an idiot because he seriously knows NOTHING about social interactions, not even what one could glean from basic intuition (and I relate to him- Nice job giving yourself a good reputation, Mack). Hinami seems to be the Best Girl, because she is literally the best at almost everything. She has a funny quirk where she minces the word “exactly” and acts like nothing happened, but I see it becoming an old meme quick, especially when the anime airs. Although the interactions between Hinami and Tomozaki are where the series is at its best, the former sometimes comes off as a real b**** to me. The other characters aren’t even worth talking about yet; they are very one-dimensional, and some of them are kinda a**holes.

The art is pretty unremarkable. It’s a nice, tame style for a rom-com, but it’s not my cup of tea. It’s probably still more presentable than the anime will be.

~~~~~

Verdict: 7.5/10

Sorry, but this is the score I’m giving volume 1, even when I’m not factoring personal input. A lot of people on social media have hyped this thing to be an amazing masterpiece. But so far, Bottom-Tier Character Tomozaki is a generic “degenerate boy meets perfect girl, who helps him become an upstanding person whether he wants to or not” but with videogame jargon thrown in for what seems like further pandering. It’s a solid rom-com for someone who’s been in Tomozaki’s position (and of course, wants wish fulfillment).