Tag: mainstream

Letting it Go for TEN YEARS: Frozen Retrospective

by macksamson, posted in Disney Stuff, Western Media

Walt Disney Pictures has had an incredibly long career with numerous ups and downs. You wouldn’t think that Disney almost went out of business as recently as the 1980s, but that was entirely the case. It took a less cynical adaptation of Hans Christen Andersen’s The Little Mermaid to dig them out of debt. And wouldn’t you know… decades later, an adaptation of Andersen’s The Snow Queen would practically upend the company’s time-honored formula. Released ten years ago, Frozen is one of the company’s most successful movies of all time. I saw it in theaters a week after my first ever trip to Walt Disney World. Like much of the rest of the world at the time, I loved it. However, as the years went by, it felt like more and more people hated it, and still do to this day. I’ve rewatched the film a few times, but I haven’t seen it in at least five years. Sounds like a good time to do a retrospective and see if it’s actually still good or not!

In Frozen, well, we know what happens. Two princesses, Anna and Elsa, live and play in their castle in scenic Arendelle. The latter has ice powers for reasons that won’t be explained until the sequel. Elsa almost kills her sister, and is told by the local trolls to not use her powers at all. After the parents—well—become typical Disney parents if you catch my drift, Elsa becomes a shut-in, and both sisters are depressed. When they finally get to meet for the first time in forever (haha reference) during Elsa’s coronation, things go awry, i.e. Elsa has an anxiety attack and everyone knows she has ice powers now. She runs away, causing a second Ice Age in the process. Time for Anna to fix her sister!

Well, let’s get the formalities out of the way: it still looks pretty. Beautiful particles, lighting, and expressive characters. The animation team literally filmed themselves playing in snow for research on the movie’s physics. Speaking of research, Arandelle showcases the company’s ability to painstakingly recreate architecture from around the world, with this case pulling from Norway. You can still tell that it’s a bit older, but this is probably the last Disney movie that shows any age. I feel like they start to peak with the visuals from Moana onward. 

Anyway, movie talk. Let’s just say this: Elsa did nothing wrong. First off, it was Anna’s fault that she was almost murdered by her own sister. She did all the jumpy-jumps too fast and that’s why Elsa froze her skull. She has complete control over her powers until this exact point (also, it’s Anna’s fault that Elsa has the panic attack in the present conflict, because she gets all lovey-dovey with some turdboy). The trolls don’t help either. Yes… I kind of got this point from MatPat’s theory regarding the trolls. I haven’t watched him in forever, but I always believed that theory in particular. 

For the most part, it’s your typical classic Disney movie. The conflict is established, and the protagonists go on an adventure to fix it. However, there’s one thing that upends the Disney formula. It’s a last minute change to the ENTIRE movie that was done when the lead composers—Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez—wrote a certain song: no villain. Well… there is a villain in this one, but he doesn’t count. From this point on, Disney protagonists would be their own villains; in this case, it’s Elsa’s fear of her powers, which causes her to lose control. If it wasn’t for that song, Elsa would’ve been more like Ursula. Some people might think that would’ve been better, but this is what we got, and it set the new precedent for Disney movies to this day.

Frozen’s second-biggest strength is its cast. Anna and Elsa are both subversions of the traditional Disney Princess. The former is a ditzy, tomboyish dingus, and the latter is emotionally insecure until she gets proper therapy. They are by far some of the best women in Disney movies.

The love interest is not a handsome prince; far from it. In fact, the male lead is an utter loser who can’t even lift a single block of ice: Kristoff. He has no manners, but he’s lovable and silly; a fresh take on the handsome Mr. Perfects who make a lot of 20th Century Disney movies age REALLY badly by today’s standards. His deer, Sven, is probably one of the best animal companions. Though Kristoff has his own voice to interpret Sven’s thoughts for the audience, Sven is so in sync with Kristoff, it sometimes feels like Sven is ACTUALLY talking. 

Of course, no protagonist in Frozen does better than Olaf. A simple, summer-loving snowman who loves warm hugs, this little guy has some of the legitimately funniest lines of any comic relief character. Josh Gad will be immortalized as Olaf, despite the numerous roles he’s been in before and since Frozen. 

However, the weakest link is the last Disney villain to ever be cast: Hans (not related to Christen Andersen). He’s just a pretty-boy who blatantly shows signs of not being the movie’s love interest, making his betrayal very predictable (although his delivery was actually really good). I feel like the Duke of Weaseltown would’ve been a better choice. He was already established as really funny but also conniving, and he already had intentions to burn Elsa at the stake anyway. Oh well.

Thing is, though, all we’ve discussed—consequently—means squat compared to Frozen’s biggest strength: the music. Disney has always had really good musical numbers (even though I didn’t appreciate Enchanted, The Princess and the Frog, nor Tangled’s soundtracks until years later; a Disney sin on my younger self that will haunt me until my dying days), and Frozen was the biggest breakthrough since The Little Mermaid. The whole soundtrack is excellent, but there is one song that took the cake. One paradigm-shifting song that made Frozen both famous and notorious at the same time, and the aforementioned one that changed the entire core of the movie mid-development. It’s why every Disney movie since is the way it is. I need to make a new paragraph just to discuss it.

Obviously, the song in question is titled ‘Let It Go.’ It starts as a somber piece before suddenly shifting into an epic, showstopping anthem of female empowerment. Adela Dezeem—I mean—Idina Menzel delivers powerful vocals here, cementing herself in the role of Elsa so well that everyone forgot that she was in Enchanted. The song might even have influenced the current Feminist movement. I still enjoy the song to this day, although that’s probably because I was never subject to the billions of memes it spawned.

It’s here where we arrive at a bit of an impasse. Up to this point, I’ve mainly discussed positives about Frozen. However, I’m going to be honest here: in my rewatch for this post, I wasn’t exactly in love with it. The conflict feels arbitrary in retrospect (hence this being a retrospective), the main antagonist is a shoe-in because of the Lopezes’ gambit, and the trolls’ musical number—while funny—feels like padding and tonal whiplash. Though it was a huge deal at the time for a Disney movie to take a direction like this—what with sisterhood constituting as true love—it’s not novel anymore. Moana, Encanto, Raya, and arguably Frozen’s own sequel are better than this in virtually every way (and that’s not including Pixar movies). Sometimes I’d argue that Princess and the Frog and Tangled are better, despite coming before and having the old formula. Another thing is that I watched this in 2013; I was a different person then. I hadn’t watched a single anime, let alone a foreign film other than Scrooge 1951. I had only JUST gotten into my first manga, and had only been to Walt Disney World once, and went into Frozen in theaters a week after that landmark first experience in the parks. As the person I am now, Frozen is just…

~~~~~

After All These Years: 8.65/10

I had a REALLY difficult time coming up with that score up there. While Frozen has a lot of the usual charm and personality of Disney movies, it also has a lot of the trappings. Are there a large number of better, more creative foreign animated features? Yes. Is Frozen still enjoyable? Yes… if you love Disney. If you decide to watch it, just don’t stay for the credits, because some mainstream popstar does a ‘Let It Go’ cover during them; THAT is perhaps the biggest flaw of Frozen.

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.

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!

Weathering With You: 2019’s Best Collection of Desktop Wallpapers

by macksamson, posted in Anime Movies, Miscellaneous

Anime movies are pretty hard to watch sometimes. While HBO Max has everything by Ghibli, they don’t have much of anything else. Streaming services are all missing a lot of movies by various people, especially Mamoru Hosoda. The Fathom Events screenings courtesy of GKids is the only option I have to see a movie when it’s new. Or… I could watch Weathering With You on HBO Max. Its famous creator, Makoto Shinkai, directed 2016’s Your Name, Japan’s highest grossing animated feature ever (unless the Kimetsu no Yaiba train movie beat it). I’m also pretty sure he’s the only anime movie director besides Miyazaki to get nominated for the Academy Awards’ Best Animated Feature (even if, like Miyazaki, he’ll never win because the Academy is the Academy). While not as popular as Your Name, Weathering With You was still immensely successful, both commercially and critically. With a new Shinkai movie in the works, I might as well watch one of his movies now to see what the hubbub’s all about.

In Weathering With You, a boy named Hodaka runs away to Tokyo. He lands a job with a single dad named Suga, who is sent to investigate an urban legend regarding the recent emergence of strange weather patterns. The source ends up being a McDonald’s employee named Hina, who has the power to make it sunny whenever she wants.

I already knew that Shinkai’s movies had impressive visuals, but seeing is believing. Weathering With You is gorgeous, sporting impressive feats such as individually animated raindrops. Even in crappy weather, Tokyo looks like an exotic paradise. No wonder why this man’s been nominated for the Academy Award.

The plot is a lot simpler than the actual animation work, though. When people start catching wind (or rather, catching sun) of Hina’s power, they pay her fat stacks to make it sunny all the time. In case it wasn’t obvious enough, her power will cost Hina her life. Oh, and the police get involved because Hodaka just so happened to have stumbled upon a loaded handgun.

The main philosophy of Weathering With You (besides “love trumps all”) is that the weather creates a placebo effect in humans’ moods. I don’t know if it’s because of the pandemic, but I found that belief to be a bit on the “dead wrong” side. There really is nothing else to the lore of the movie, except the apparent fact that cumulonimbus clouds all have golf courses atop the big flat bits that are home to magic water-fish.

Look, in case you couldn’t tell, I didn’t exactly enjoy the movie. That is also evident in the fact that I didn’t remember anyone’s surnames (their first names took everything I had). Naturally, I didn’t like a single person. Weathering With You has every appealing trope, presented in super-stock-looking characters. While Shinkai movies know how to have splendid backgrounds, these characters have the least style out of any anime movie I have ever seen. Sure, Ghibli and Hosoda’s tend to have same-face syndrome, but there’s at least a style. There is nothing in the cast that can even mildly perturb anyone.

That basically leads into my core gripe with the movie. I expected something that was at least so laughably bad, and manufactured, that I would enjoy roasting it. However, Weathering With You isn’t even that. Like Ride Your Wave, it is completely and utterly devoid of risk. Everything about the movie is precisely and perfectly set up. The commissioned musical numbers are also timed perfectly based on the mood to provide maximum emotion. Add the visuals to all this, and I completely understand how Shinkai works his magic. However, Weathering With You was still not an awful movie. I liked it more than Ride Your Wave and SIGNIFICANTLY more than Patema Inverted. The compliments end there, though. 

Be forewarned of the typical logistics issues that exist by nature in movies like this. I didn’t find them funny because… I guess I just expected them to exist, and they exist with no flare whatsoever. In essence, it’s a lot of the whole “kids constantly one-up the police” a la E.T. What makes this particularly stupid is that Japan has an uncompromisingly powerful police force when they’re actually needed, and it shouldn’t have been possible for anyone to oppose them. Also, at some point, Hodaka gets like a billion yen as “severance” pay. Yeah, sure, okay. Whatever, Shinkai.

~~~~~

Final Verdict: 7/10

Weathering With You is very manufactured and accessible, and like many mainstream things, I do not understand why people think Shinkai is a genius. Yes, he knows how to pluck at your heartstrings, but I don’t consider that a compliment. This was extremely middle-of-the-road, and I can only be glad that I saw it included with a streaming subscription.

With that being said, I will probably pay to see his upcoming movie, Suzume’s Locking Up, in theaters when it comes around. I’m at least putting faith in Shinkai that his formula has some amount of variation. If not, then I disrespect him on an artistic and professional level. You, on the other hand, may enjoy Weathering With You to an extent, because it was tailor-made that way, but if you want a better anime feature with similar philosophies and actual balls, then watch the tragically underrated Children of the Sea instead.

Encanto: Smart House but Cranked up to Eleven

by macksamson, posted in Disney Stuff, Western Media

Does anyone remember the one good thing about COVID-19, i.e. when movie studios streamed new movies as an additional option on release? Nowadays, studios are like “Yeah, we can go back to making theaters the only option again”. And guess what, Disney’s Encanto is no exception! As the first animated movie since Moana to have potential future Disney Legend Lin-Manuel Miranda at the helm, risking my life would be more than worth it (albeit a bit inconvenient). 

Encanto begins when the Madrigal family narrowly escapes what I presume to be the Conquistadors. They get saved by a candle, of all things. A candle that creates the enclosed world of Encanto, with a magic house at the center. Over the course of fifty years, every Madrigal is blessed with a gift. And like any media ever with a “gift” system, our main protagonist, Mirabelle Madrigal, gets nothing. And like any media where that happens, it’s the person without a gift who has to save everyone.

Disney movies will always be very predictable, especially since this is their sixtieth animated feature. As soon as you hear Abuela utter the T-shirt-worthy phrase, “Make your family proud”, you know the theme, or rather, themes. Encanto is about family and trauma. Specifically, it’s about how families place burdens on one another because they want to keep things peachy keen.

One of the most interesting aspects of Encanto is its setting. Being enclosed from the rest of the world, the house—La Casita—is where the bulk of the movie takes place. This makes it feel much more compact than most Disney settings I’ve seen. Of course, that doesn’t mean there’s a shortage of Disney magic. La Casita has as many surprises as its personality!

Speaking of personality, the cast is full to bursting with it. Mirabelle is probably one of the best female leads Disney has cooked up. She’s not banging you over the head with feminism (although that was never a Disney issue as much as an issue with Western culture in general), but she shows that she’s a big-hearted girl who loves her family. 

But wait, there’s more! Mirabelle’s family is… big to say the least. Each person, from Best Girl Luise, to drop-dead gorgeous Isabel, have fully realized character designs and flaws. Bruno is likely my favorite character, what with his tragic backstory and quirky personality. Abuela is kind of a weak spot, being a traditional bad Disney parent like Miguel’s grandma in Coco. But you know what, at least Abuela had a more tangible reason to be dense! Hang on, did I say Bruno was the best character? No, that’d be La Casita; the house, like a loyal animal companion, is the only one to actually stand by Mirabelle from start to finish (okay, technically Antonio did too, but he’s not a magic house).

Of course, what always separates Disney from what I’d call the “superficial at best” mainstream is how much stock they actually put in to bring their stuff to life. As expected, every aspect of the movie is intricately well thought out, down to every particle. Also, they once again manage to perfectly border photorealism without ever entering an uncanny valley. 

Last but not least is the one thing I was looking forward to the most in Encanto: the soundtrack. Between Hamilton, Moana, and Mary Poppins Returns, master maestro Lin-Manuel Miranda hasn’t only crafted top quality numbers, but a high quantity as well. Sadly, Encanto has a whopping not many songs. What’s there is top-notch stuff, but as of writing this review (mere minutes after seeing the movie), I already have withdrawal! Next Lin-Manuel Miranda movie when?

~~~~~

Final Verdict: 9.7/10

Honestly, I don’t remember having been so captivated by an iteration of the traditional Disney formula in quite some time, but that could also be because the last two years have felt like a lifetime. Encanto is a masterpiece of Latinx culture, introspection, and most of all… family! I highly recommend it to any Disney fan, and to anyone who wants a brief respite from the depressant that is being alive during a pandemic.

My Thoughts on the Hypest Metal Debut of the Year: Spiritbox — Eternal Blue Album Review

by macksamson, posted in Miscellaneous, music

As someone who is so disconnected from society, it makes sense that I would have been out of the loop for the new, borderline-mainstream Canadian outfit, Spiritbox. They have established a massive following with only two EPs and a couple of singles, and their first proper album, Eternal Blue, has been hyped up as the best metal debut of the year. I listened to their earlier stuff out of curiosity, but this is the real test. For the sake of keeping up with the metal market, I had to listen to this highly anticipated album.

Spiritbox was originally composed of vocalist Courtney LaPlante and guitarist Mike Stringer. They released the original Spiritbox debut EP by themselves, but since then have recruited bassist Bill Crook and drummer Zev Rose. Apparently, their 2020 single ‘Holy Roller’ was what put them on the map. Will Eternal Blue slap, or will they be a one-hit wonder?

I normally talk about album cover art first, but what is there to say? It’s blue, and… eternal. They’re new, so I’ll give them slack. Also, I gotta stop having OCD for good album covers, because some artists just don’t have those.

As far as Spiritbox’s musical style is concerned, I have—surprise, surprise—failed to see their novelty. The reason is, similar to VEXED, I went into their music knowing what subgenres they were labeled under. And to be blunt, I think only one of them actually applies. From what I’ve read, Spiritbox is considered “post-metal” and “djent” in addition to metalcore and prog-metal. It sounds like a lot, but that happens when you make up subgenres that aren’t real (Oooooooooh snap!).

To use Layman’s terms, Spiritbox is prog-metal, albeit very moody prog-metal. For how crunchy the guitars sound, most songs are very melancholic, and have a very echo-y vibe to them. That’s it. If this is supposed to be post-metal, then I don’t think post-metal is “post” enough. Also, how can a music genre be “post-something” if the original genre still exists?

Musically, Eternal Blue is very solid, and very heavy. There are a lot of unexpected tone shifts, often in the space of the same track, and there is an impressive amount of variety when it comes to different atmospheres. The lyrics, however, didn’t really resonate with me. It felt like a more progressive spin on early 2000s Evanescence stuff, a band whom I wasn’t entirely sold on. The only song I really felt something toward was the final track, ‘Constance’, a song dedicated to LaPlante’s late grandmother, and people who have dealt with dementia.

Need more hot takes? I’m not particularly impressed by LaPlante’s performance. I’m sure she’s a good person, but when reviewing music, I must evaluate how vocalists sound. And here’s my evaluation: LaPlante’s got solid clean vocals, but has pretty meh growls. To use another 2021 debut by way of comparison, I enjoyed Megan Targett from VEXED marginally better, at least in the growling department. 

~~~~~

Final Verdict: 8.75/10

Despite my complaints, Eternal Blue is a solid enough record for me to at least keep my eyes trained on Spiritbox in the years to come. You could chalk it up to me as “not being cerebral enough”, but the real struggle with Eternal Blue is understanding what makes it cerebral in the first place. Sure, there’s whacky, out-of-left-field hooks, but that’s just a metal thing, because metal musicians can do whatever the ding-dang-crap they want. Eternal Blue feels like nothing more than a great album, as opposed to “a game changer”, according to Metal Injection, who also say “the metal scene may never be the same after this”. I’d recommend it, but I wouldn’t consider it the debut of 2021. Even if you could exclude Wizardthrone—the band I had named debut of the year—because of the controversy, I have been listening to another contender who’s been under the radar, and you’ll see my review of that record fourteen days from today!

I Gave BABYMETAL Another Shot!

by macksamson, posted in Miscellaneous, music

In one of my older posts, I ripped into everyone’s favorite Japanese kawaii-desu metal crossover band: BABYMETAL. In their defense, I only listened to their first two albums, which doesn’t tell you crap about a band in the long run (unless it’s with god-tier bands like Alestorm). Also, that post was horrible, and I wasn’t as much of a metalhead then as I am now. With a much firmer grasp of the genre (and its ludicrous number of subgenres), I decided to try BABYMETAL again. 

Anyway, in the off chance you haven’t heard of BABYMETAL, here’s a basic run-down. They formed in 2010 under the guiding hand of producer Key “Kobametal” Kobayashi. Their style is, obviously, a fusion of googoogaga J-pop with metal. But unlike most traditional metal bands, the girls have zero know-how with the genre, the songs are all composed by people behind the scenes, and the instrumentation is done with hired help. Somehow, they have managed to catapult themselves into mainstream status, earning acknowledgement from figures like Rob Zombie, and the Metal God himself; yes, Rob Halford likes them. And they probably don’t even know who he is. I’m not jealous on behalf of other bands at all.

First off, one criticism that I will still stand by is their album cover art. Every single one is just the band’s name with different Photoshop effects on it. I’m sorry, but I’ve never loved a band with horrible album covers. Maybe some of the ones from the olden days are a bit dated, but with the power of current technology (and freelance artists online), anything should be possible. A real album would’ve had, like, ridiculously busy hand-drawn art of Japanese highschoolers shooting zombies with machine guns.

So, the music. Um. Where do I even start? Upon reexamination, a lot of it is quite good. Of course, for me “quite good” is not a particularly high score. The sound production is great, and they do genuinely sound like metal, strictly in terms of music. And given the branding, the melody and lyrics are really catchy. I can thank Ghost and Amaranthe for making me realize that pop and metal work well together; after all, metal has its roots in R&B. But for some reason, I still wasn’t entirely enthralled. 

Admittedly, I have no idea how  the music industry as a whole works, but I feel like part of why I’m not enthralled is because the music production is manufactured. While some people can decide to not care that something is manufactured, I feel like there is a visible effect. None of the music is written by the girls, nor by the hired band. And that just feels… weird. There’s some kind of chaotic beauty when it comes to a band (with italics): even if it’s only two members, I want to believe that multiple band members bouncing ideas off of each other is important for the creative process. Of course, if it’s not, then feel free to reprimand me in the comments!

Because I’m insane, I didn’t only base this post on the music itself. I just had to consult the Internet as to why people like BABYMETAL, and then indirectly offer responses to each answer. Keep in mind that a lot of these were Reddit posts from well before other Japanese artists like BAND-MAID started to gain a foothold. But you know what, BABYMETAL is still one million times more popular than them, so they aren’t entirely outdated!

According to what I gleaned, they apparently have wild live shows. As someone who’s never been to a concert, I can neither agree nor refute that. Someone else, in addition to the Apple Music bio, says that they adapt all kinds of metal subgenres into their music. Honestly, metal has such a maze of subgenres that I don’t even know if the bands themselves know what their own stuff falls under. For example, Oceans of Slumber’s OFFICIAL Facebook bio says that they’re a prog-metal band from Texas. However, every review of any of their stuff I read was all like, “Oh boy, this is great doom metal!” So who do I trust? For me, BABYMETAL has only encompassed thrash, power metal, and straight-up vanilla metal. For the sake of simplicity, I’m just going to believe it to be a fact so that I don’t go insane from subgenre inflation.

A lot of the other reasons given by the less than 1% of humanity that can’t help but feel represent the entire human race are mostly refutable. Well, not refutable, per sé; they are technically correct as far as BABYMETAL itself is concerned, such as the notion that BABYMETAL is very clean and family-friendly by metal standards. However, their reasoning doesn’t appear to take many other bands into account, like a cappella metal band Van Canto for example (who predate BABYMETAL by a LONG TIME). That’s why I feel like most BABYMETAL fans aren’t really metalheads, because as a metalhead, I feel like they should at least know of a lot of these other bands by comparison. Some of the comments I’ve read implied that all the bands they had listened to were stale, and BABYMETAL taught them to love the genre as a whole again.

I must say: Who the eff have these people been listening to (or lack thereof) to think that?! In just the past ten years alone, metal has gotten more varied than ever, and without BABYMETAL’s help, thank you very much. If you name me a reason to love BABYMETAL, I can recommend at least two other bands that satisfy the same condition (and obviously, they do it better). If you have listened to these other bands and still like BABYMETAL more, at least you had a fair comparison to make. 

But you know what, I can’t blame people for having never heard of these other bands. Becoming mainstream puts you in a position of robbing the poor to feed the rich. What I mean by that is that you’ll get so much attention, the niche bands who have to work harder to get attention get exponentially less attention unless they become mainstream themselves. I, for instance, haven’t heard of most of my niche bands until I magically stumbled upon them by looking at random lists in Apple Music. But even before then, I knew I had something missing musically in my life. You just have to be explorative, which is easy if you have a streaming service for music. It’s not at all hard to follow the metal market. Have some of BABYMETAL’s older fans completely shut themselves out of the market due to nostalgia? And if so, why did BABYMETAL of all things drag them back into the fold? J-Rock News had an article with interviews of fans of various ages, but none of them explained exactly how they came across BABYMETAL. I know I did because of Mario Maker. But how could an old geezer who doesn’t follow the market come across them WITHOUT also coming across these other bands?

Seriously though, the gap between mainstream and niche is monumentous, especially in a country as powerful as the U.S. In my experience, BABYMETAL is the only 2010s band to become this big in American culture. Beyond them, the most popular American hard rock and metal bands have still been Linkin Park and Slipknot for the PAST TWENTY YEARS. What about Oceans of Slumber, Helion Prime, A Sound of Thunder, or In This Moment? All new, shiny American metal bands, and yet they’re still little babies in diapers. The latter even had a Grammy nomination and I still don’t know ANYONE who’s even heard of them. 

Another reason for my not liking them is something I didn’t write in the old post, but something I had discussed with another blogger in that post’s comments. It was actually my first ever interaction with RiseFromAshes (who has great Japanese pop culture blogs, by the way)! Plugging aside, the thing that bothered me about BABYMETAL has to do with how Japan is viewed on an international scale. By being an idol-metal outfit, they cement the stereotype that Japan is all about goofy silly kawaii-desu sensory overload nonsense. As someone who’s studied the nation at length, I know that this stuff is a big part of Japanese culture. However, an uninformed American might not necessarily understand kawaii-ness is a recent addition to something much deeper and infinitely more complicated. BABYMETAL gives off an impression that Japan can’t be manly, even with a genre as manly as metal, and makes things rough for old-fashioned-type J-metal bands such as Lovebites.

I also read a big fat post on Reddit about BABYMETAL being special because they’re accessible. I don’t know enough of the facts to vouch for the age variety of fans they claim to have, but I can say that I don’t like how accessible they are. What pisses me off about it is that it’s framed as if their accessibility is factually good. In my experience, the toxicity of fandoms has consistently been proportional to its size. Yet, the notion that “accessibility = good” is arbitrarily a fact makes me feel like a subhuman species. Of course, that could be how I’m reading into whoever wrote that. As much as I try to sound as subjective as possible on my reviews, someone could see my values and think that I’m assuming that those values are factually good. Being human is fun, isn’t it?!

But you know what, no matter how much I can explain with facts, this all remains an opinion. In the end, I cannot explain why I’m not in love with BABYMETAL. I don’t think Su-metal is a particularly talented singer, for starters. I welcome the earworm that is Ghost’s ‘From the Pinnacle to the Pit’, but songs like ‘Gimme Chocolate!’ feel like an ear-parasite. And as far as memey-ness is concerned, any band with Christopher Bowes has more memes in one song than BABYMETAL has in an entire album.

Overall, I like BABYMETAL more, but I also dislike them more. The music is better than I thought, sure. But now, my envy toward them is worse than ever. Not only have they taken more attention from a lot of Japanese bands, I now realize that they’ve taken attention from a massive slew of Western bands as well. It’s good, but I don’t know what makes people (including the Metal God) think that BABYMETAL is one of the greatest things since sliced bread. Well, it’s not exactly new for me to have animosity towards something mainstream, is it?

A Bittersweet Return: Evanescence — The Bitter Truth Album Review

by macksamson, posted in Miscellaneous, music

Evanescence is a strange band all right. They went mainstream overnight with their massively popular first two albums, Fallen and The Open Door. Unfortunately, things got complicated within the band and they have since gone on numerous, long hiatuses. Their 2011 self-titled album wasn’t just different, but it was also the first after a long hiatus very early in the band’s career. Needless to say, they’re still strong numbers-wise, but nowhere near as much as they were. 

As mentioned in one of my older music posts, I decided to check them out. I enjoyed Fallen and The Open Door, but I never fell in love with them. And it’s probably because I wasn’t in love with those albums, that I was able to enjoy the 2011 album with an open mind. Saying that anything beyond those first two albums is Evanescence’s best work seems to be the minority opinion these days. So, of course, I want to piss off their fandom by saying that 2021’s The Bitter Truth is their best album yet. Let’s see whether or not I agree with such a claim myself.

Of course, I gotta look over the album cover first. I always thought Evanescence had weak album cover art, and The Bitter Truth is no exception. It’s just a mouth with a pill on the tongue. If I wasn’t already listening to this band before the album’s release, I probably would’ve ignored it when stacked up against others. Good thing that what matters is the music!

I might as well start by discussing the pre-release tracks, since those technically came out first. Most of them are good, but they’re kind of… ordinary. Of course, I’m probably just saying that because I—again—am not a diehard Evanescence fan. My least favorite track of the pre-releases ended up being ‘Yeah Right’, but not because of the song itself. Musically, it’s good, but when the band stated that it took them a decade to write it, my impression of ‘Yeah Right’ was colored in a negative way. By way of comparison, Queen’s ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ was written and recorded a couple years faster. My favorite track (of the pre-releases) ended up being ‘Use My Voice’, which felt like it had the same pompous, tween spunk of their classic stuff, while still feeling different stylistically. 

In fact, the whole album feels like that. The Bitter Truth retains more of their original, early 2000s emo style than the previous studio outing (which was a decade ago. Holy shit). There’s your usual gothic synth, as well as the sad piano (although they’re still missing the world’s smallest violin). Even the lyrics are their old brand of dreary, esoteric nonsense. For example…

“I’m not fine” / “I don’t know if I will be alright” / “But I have to try” / “I know you’re with me, so what if we do fall apart?” / “Give into all that we are” / “And let all the broken pieces shine.”

Um… I guess that’s relatable? Those lyrics sure take me back to when I was a miserable, friendless child in high school that no one understood. But to be honest, Evanescence is the kind of band where the lyrics don’t matter. Vocalist Amy Lee can sing the menu of Papa John’s Pizza and we would still love her. Even though she’s all old and stuff, she’s still as talented as ever. 

If there’s any real problem with this album, it’s kind of… Evanescence itself. Like I said before, I enjoy them, but I never once thought that anything they made—even Fallen—was worth all the hem and haw. I don’t even think Lee is the goddess that most fans consider her. They’ve been working in the music industry for twenty years, and there are debuts that I would consider better than this album. 

~~~~~

Final Verdict: 8/10

Evanescence’s The Bitter Truth is—indeed—their best album (according to moi). However, it’s just not god-tier. I don’t know why this band is so big, when Fallen is outclassed even by stuff that was out at the time. I can’t recommend this to someone who’s not acquainted with Evanescence; there’s just so much better out there. I feel like only fans of the group can love it.

Attack on Titan: A Mainstream Series That I… Love?

by macksamson, posted in Full Reviews, Manga

Preface: If you’re wondering how I already have a review of Attack on Titan the day after it finished, don’t worry; I didn’t pirate it! There are official channels through which to finish this manga right now, at least in the U.S. One is to read the last leg of it on Crunchyroll’s manga tab that they actually updated after the death of Flash even though most people never use it. Alternatively, you can buy the remaining chapters on BookWalker for about 2 USD each. Of course, you’ll have to have read all thirty-two currently published U.S. releases for it to work. But you know what, at least you’d be supporting the actual creator!

There are types of stories that have existed since the dawn of man. Romance, for example, as full of BS as it is, is one of the most enduring story types of all time. Stories like Hajime Isayama’s Attack on Titan are insanely common; plucky teens thrust into a world of strife against some “mysterious enemy” that the main character “happens” to be “special” enough to save the world from. However, Attack on Titan is probably one of the best variations of this story ever created. And here’s why.

The plot is nothing new. We have the Titans—the “mysterious enemy”—ravaging mankind and driving them into hiding behind some walls (“But what about the possibility of an AERIAL ATTACK?!” Squidward Tentacles exclaims). After the designated first-chapter-death, the “plucky teens” join the designated “cool fighter people” and, well, fight the Titans.

I’m gonna tell you straight. You likely already know what’s going to happen, thankfully minus the dumb romance sideplot. As much as this series excels at foreshadowing and build-up, you don’t need it. If you’ve read stuff like this before, then you can probably make several ballpark guesses on what the low-down of this manga’s world is and at least one guess would probably be correct.

But you know what, strong execution beats lack of originality. The rules of how the different units of the military work are all thought out (even if the Survey Corps are the only ones who matter), the “parkour gear” or whatever it’s called is one of the coolest things I have ever seen, and there’s always something engaging going on in terms of plot progress. Even during a later arc that is notorious for its utter lack of Titan combat, the manga consistently keeps the momentum going.

Most of the time, I’m not a fan of “human” characters. But unlike cardboard boxes such as Rimuru Tempest from TenSura, Isayama actually seems to understand the definition OF a human being in the first place, especially what it’s like to be a teenager who has to live in a world of despair, and to have their perception of their established facts of life turned upside down numerous times. Wow, that was all one sentence…

First off, the three main characters—Eren, Armin, and Mikasa—somehow manage to maintain a relatively platonic relationship throughout the whole series. Two male characters and one female character, all of which are childhood friends, is a perfect love triangle, and any [bad] YA author would’ve done it in a heartbeat and ruined the story forever. Mikasa clearly has some level of “thing”-ness for Eren, but it’s seldom ham-fisted into your face but instead shown visually merely by the scarf that she wears; a gift from him when they first met. The fourth main character is Best Boy Levi, who is raw badassery and intellect rolled into one handsome boy. What’s there to dislike? The supporting cast is also phenomenal. From gambit-happy Erwin Smith, to potato-eating Sasha Blouse, to Actual Best Girl Krista, these kids are surprisingly easy to love.

This manga warrants a reread, because re-experiencing the story by watching the anime from the beginning, after having read past chapter ninety, really shows how organically they have developed over time. I cringed at the first episode, at Eren’s incessant whining, thinking, “Is this really the SAME GUY who I grew emotionally attached to?” THIS is character development at its finest.

“Rough around the edges” is an understatement for the art in this manga. Based on the “rules of art” that have been established over the years, Attack on Titan has “objectively” bad art. It’s not smooth nor crisp, but for me, it somehow “works” (It’s as if art was never meant to be assigned rules to begin with…).

If there is one “rule of art” that it follows, it’s gesture drawing. The many (MANY) tiny strokes in Isayama’s technique helps to convey motion in a spectacular fashion. I didn’t need the anime’s sakuga to feel the force of the parkour gear as our intrepid heroes flew through cities and forests, striking Titans as they went. All this in addition to his great sense of good panelwork makes Attack on Titan a tightly paced read. Not even the dialogue-driven chapters feel like a waste of time.

For the last paragraph, I’ll touch on the one thing that always ends up being divisive for long-running battle shounen series: the final act. Don’t worry; I’ll word it in the least spoilery way possible. Late-ish in Attack on Titan, an epic battle—one of the best in the series—unfolds in spectacular glory. But the aftermath opens up a can of worms that drastically changes the entire tone of the manga. Although it is still a great arc, the biggest problem is that it introduces a metric ton of new characters that I honestly didn’t care about, let alone remember their names in the first place. It also didn’t help that this was the arc where I had caught up on the most recent chapters, and ended up playing the waiting game most often. Since I’m always pressed for time, I can’t reread volumes to make sure I still remember stuff. 

And honestly, like a lot of long battle shounen, the plot gets pretty complicated. There’s even the possibility that it was retconned at some point. But you know what, I still love this manga to death. You gotta give mangakas some benefit of the doubt, since a lot of them are forced to make this stuff up as they go along. No matter how confusing it got, I still loved Attack on Titan all the way through. Isayama knows how to make a story feel engaging regardless of what’s happening. That takes talent.

~~~~~

Final Verdict: 9.8/10

Attack on Titan is one of my favorite manga of all time. Isayama draws (no pun intended) influence from the very best of Western culture, without using any of the BS, to make a fantastic battle shounen series that miraculously maintains a consistent state of cohesion for a decade-long runtime. I’d recommend it if you want a shounen series that’s light on the fanservice, but I also just recommend it in general. The biggest issue will likely be the art if it doesn’t suit your tastes, but other than that this manga is a masterpiece through and through.

Why It’s Okay for Disney to be Mainstream: A Rant

by macksamson, posted in Disney Stuff, Miscellaneous, Rants, Western Media

I’m not one to enjoy massively popular media, so you’d naturally think I’d despise the Walt Disney Company, at least in their current, mainstream-savvy form. Despite that, I ended up giving Frozen 2 and Onward overall positive scores, in complete disregard to how much I criticized them. Why is that? Get ready for a rant!

The main reason for my claim is that most of their movies- at least the good ones- have a lot more substance than most mainstream content. There are a lot of popular things I’ve consumed that basically go down a checklist of what people inherently love and don’t do anything remotely inventive. One manga example is Kimetsu no Yaiba, which barely gets the benefit of the doubt because the author ended it when it was at its peak (relatively speaking) instead of milking it.

Although their main demographic is children, Disney at least saw ahead and made sure that those same viewers would enjoy their movies in adulthood. This is something I learned five years ago, when I watched The Incredibles during a Movie Under the Stars event at Walt Disney World. As a kid, I had seen it so many times, I basically had the movie memorized. However, when I saw it at age nineteen that night, I saw it for the first time ever. As an adult, I was actually able to understand what makes it one of the best Pixar movies of all time, in ways that I couldn’t have comprehended as a kid. It was an amazing experience, and it stays across most core Disney movies (MOST of them; Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, you haven’t really aged well, narratively speaking…). 

One of the things that makes Disney movies enduring is that they have strong supporting characters besides the cliched main ones. I don’t really like Snow White or Ariel as much as some of my actual waifus, but the Seven Dwarves and Sebastian are timeless. There’s also characters like Olaf, the ultimate Disney husbando. And of course, there’s nothing like a good Disney villain. They have iconic personalities and exude intimidating auras thanks to their brilliant animators. The Evil Queen, Maleficent, Lady Trumain, Ursula… and also Hades and Yzma, who have gotten a billion times more popular in recent years; they are among the most memorable antagonists of all time (except Hans in Frozen). These days, most people are probably looking forward to them more than the good guys (who actually watched The Little Mermaid Live for any reason other than fangushing at Queen Latifa?).

And of course, there’s the MUSIC. Disney has had master songwriters that don’t get talked about too often, but they’re real geniuses, writing songs that people still sing to this day. I don’t think the ENTIRE Disney discography is perfect, but a lot of it—especially the newer stuff—is really, really good. The other important factor is that ever since they had the brilliant Howard Ashman work for them, the songs also contribute to plot progression in a very Broadway-esque manner. I still listen to songs from Frozen casually (PS: ‘Let It Go’ deserves all the praise it got, fight me), and that’s just the tip of the iceberg (no pun intended). And just when you think they’ve run out of ideas, something like ‘Lost in the Woods’ from Frozen 2 comes up. I remember thinking, “Oh boy, a bad, melodramatic Krifstoff song shoehorned into an already shoehorned subplot”, at first. But when you hear that eighties guitar riff out of nowhere, it’s like, “What the crap?!” It’s safe to say that Disney would have not made it this far if they didn’t turbo-charge their films with amazing music! 

I also love the Walt Disney Company itself, more so than the movies. For starters, they are pretty much one of the few bastions of goodwill left in the world. I’m sorry, but that’s how it is. Most other companies are too selfish and/or corrupt to even try to do better for the world, and others have pretty much given up on even trying. They don’t just make movies, they help animals and the earth through the Disney Conservation Fund, the use of environmentally friendly buses, and massive solar panel farms. To accomplish so much, they need a LOT of funding. These people don’t just need movie budgets, but they need to be able to manufacture merch of literally ALL kinds, as well as paying the millions who are working at several theme parks AND cruise ships. So, yeah, some of their movies might be riskless cash grabs, but they kinda need it once or twice in a while. If it weren’t for their vision, I would probably accuse them of pandering just as easily as any crappy hack writer.

And as much as I hate to say it, I must acknowledge the value of being able to relate to the main protagonists. They’re generic to a fault, but they definitely had an impact on cultures around the world. Their arcs (and the narratives of the movies in general) are not marred by any sort of cultural barrier, making them lovable to anyone. I also can’t deny that they have saved a lot of young’uns from torment, especially in the case of Frozen. They also handle wish fulfilment themes in ways that are genuinely good, at least recently. Most of the time, the tropes say, “You’re special for no reason now go be a wizard Harry.” Disney merely says “You’re you,” which is a lot better. In fact, as much as I said I loved good Disney villains, they seem to be moving towards complete abandonment of main antagonists in the favor of developing their protagonists, which I’m interested to see moving forward. But you know what, if you only love Disney movies because of the relatability aspect, then I feel genuinely sorry for you; you’re missing out on some really well thought-out, detail-oriented media.

And seriously, they are detail-oriented, in a way that transcends OCD. It’s made readily apparent if you go to Epcot and look at the architecture. Everything is authentic and accurate right down to the last brick. That same attention applies to their movies. If you watch the behind-the-scenes of some of this stuff, you’ll see them have board meetings over a three-second shot. It sounds excessive, but they need to do it because they know that those details make or break the whole picture, even if it’s stuff that no casual viewer would even think to look at.

So, in conclusion, I’m willing to bet that most people really do just enjoy Disney movies because of their eye-catching visuals, and the audience’s innate desire to see “themselves” in the narrative. But from a professional standpoint, they’re decent movies, with great soundtracks, from a team that’s constantly moving forward. While I still don’t entirely enjoy the wish fulfillment themes that they perpetuate, they at least have substance, and that’s something that makes them stand out from the rabble.