Fiasco RPG Review

So, after a number of months, I've finally started to "get" how to play Burning Wheel. Standing back and only challenging the players when they fail a roll is a bit challenging, but so incredibly worthwhile... except for one thing. Burning Wheel is a long term game, and I am not known as the most patient person on the face of the planet. Sometimes I just want something NOW!

Heh hehheHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! FIASCO!

I apologize for that outburst of evil laughter, but Fiasco is so damn evil that it makes me giggle. But then again, I like Oh Brother, Where art Thou?, Raising Arizona, and The Ladykillers.

That's right, this a game that's made to emulate Coen brother movies. Be afraid, people! Similar to another favorite game of mine, 3 Dragon Ante, this game seems to take the worst of all humanity and makes sure that you have to indulge in it as much as possible to get ahead. The game is GM-less and, while it doesn't look it at first, this can be a ridiculously competitive game. Why? Because in the first half of the game you can help determine how crappy of an ending your "friends" have. In the playtest game I completely screwed over a friend of mine, and we both enjoyed it immensely, if only because I managed to get the upper hand through good play. 

I'm not gonna lie, this game probably doesn't have to be so damn competitive. But, but... why would you play it any other way?

The REAL Burning Wheel Gold Review

OK, so I posted a review of Burning Wheel Gold at the beginning of the year, but it was based off of a few read-throughs and playtest reports from forums, so no personal experience to really relate to anybody. It's been 10 months and I've had quite a bit of time to run not just Burning Wheel but Mouse Guard and Burning Empires. So, here's my review, after 10 months of being soaked up in Luke Crane's work, and what do I think?

This is a truly remarkable game. There are some parts of the game that I'm not a particular fan of (character creation, you giant pain in the ass you), but the things that Burning Wheel sets out to do it does so well that I'm in awe of it. What does it set out to do? An RPG that will make stories similar to Lord of the Rings, the Earthsea Cycle, the Count of Monte Cristo. What does this mean? The RPG is designed to give you a story that will be long, character-driven, and fun, while keeping the sanctity of the character not being you, but someone who you watch develop and become attached to. This last point is probably the most important difference between this and other RPGs. We'll get back to that in a little bit. 

Burning Wheel is a D6 dice pool-based system. You roll a number of six-sided dice equal to your number in the skill, and try to roll a number of successes equal to the obstacle number, or Ob. If you succeed you get intent that you originally stated, carte blanch If you fail, however, the GM instead gets to muck with your original intent while making sure the plot still moves forward. Failed your Power check to knock that door down? Oh, you get the door down, but you attract the attention of your hated rival, who has been following you the whole damn time. Or the guards. Or your father, who owns the facility. Y'know, something awful and unforeseen but that doesn't get in the way of the narrative. These results stand for the entirety of the session, thanks to the Let It Ride rule, which states that all die rolls, unless changed, stand. So if you failed that Power check, all applicable Power checks fail until the situation changes or the end of the session. If the GM can't think of an interesting failure for your task, you automatically succeed.  Notice that interesting should mean something linked to your Beliefs, Instincts, and Traits, also known as BITs.

Oh, right, BITs. I should probably explain those. 

Beliefs, Instincts, and Traits are the things that make the wheel turn! These determine not only characterization, but where the plot will go, and what hooks the players and GM will be able to pull on to make the story move. Beliefs are an ethical statement with a specific plan of action attached to said Belief. This is where you get to state what your character is about and what he is going to do about it. Instincts are those little things your character has learned to do in the course of his life that aren't necessarily the best things to do, but he does them anyway (like "Never accept an insult"). Traits are personality traits that you are the embodiment of, for good and for ill. 

You then get rewarded for playing out your BITs with something called Artha. Artha are points that you get for role-playing in such a way that the story moves forward. There are three types of Artha: fate (for playing out your BITs, especially to the point of trouble!), persona (for fulfilling personal goals and breaking free of your BITs), and deeds (going beyond your own problems and helping everyone in a heroic fashion). Artha may then be spent to improve your dice rolls so you can get what you want. If you're playing the game correctly you find that you've got a good story-game, filled with drama and tension as you earn Artha for playing out your flaws and spend said Artha so you can get your goals accomplished. 

That's essentially the game in a nutshell, folks, but there's a bit more to it. Burning Wheel has a lot more to offer, and this is where a lot of people have issue with the game, because Burning Wheel refuses to do anything like any other RPG I've ever seen. This is good, because the mechanics are exactly suited for the game, but bad, because the mechanics are just enough out of the norm to get some rather significant balking from people, particularly RPG vets. If you've never played an RPG before this won't be as much trouble, but the next section is a bit more for the people who have issue with the following mechanics. 

Burning Wheel has a series of extended conflict resolution mechanics that are based off of the same basic idea. You construct a series of actions from 3-9 moves ahead of time, and play them out against your opponent, who has done the same. These moves are then resolved in a rock-paper-scissors format. This is done for two very good reasons: it puts a very strong tension into the conflict and it keeps the sanctity of player-character separation completely intact. I have never had so much tension as I've had in a single Fight! or Duel of Wits, because you genuinely have no idea what is going to happen next. I've seen conflicts turn around so quickly it makes my head spin. And again, this reinforces the fact that you are not your character, something that is critical to making this game run. Why is this critical?

Burning Wheel is designed to be resolved in 30+ sessions, and some games last years. You are watching a character evolve for a very long time, and, quite frankly, that can be a little dangerous without the proper distance.People get all wrapped up in their characters all the time and that's a bit unhealthy. Burning Wheel recognizes this and makes sure that you will always be a spectator of your character's actions, not a perpetrator.

Now, on to the thing I don't like about Burning Wheel: length of character creation. What you do is you put together a basic history of what your character has been doing all the way up to the beginning of the story in what's called Life Paths. It's a fine system, and is frankly quite awesome, I just don't like how long the ****ing thing takes, especially with beginners (myself included). It's taxing and exhausting, and sometimes is just infuriating how detailed it is. But, the thing is that all these parts are necessary to make the game work in this particular way. 

And that's the last thing you need to know about this game: it is NOT for everyone, and was never intended to be. Burning Wheel is heavy, crunchy, finicky, intense, and very particular. If you read this review and find that some of the things in this game really don't jive with you, that's fine! Burning Wheel is not the only story-based game out there, but it's a really awesome one. Do NOT buy this game looking for a catch-all RPG, because this isn't it and, let's be honest here, such an RPG doesn't really exist (no, not even DnD). But if you're looking for a game that will give you a story like the Lord of the Rings, the Earthsea Cycle, and the Count of Monte Cristo, this is that game. It's only 25 bucks for an awesome hardcover, and I cannot begin to tell you how excited this game makes me on a weekly basis.

Gankutsuo: The Count of Monte Cristo

OK, so in short: I liked it. A lot. A hell of a lot. Here's the break down:

The Good

• The story. Holy crap. 
• The characters. Again, holy crap.
• The art style. I know some people will really hate it, but I love it. It's AWESOME.
• I have not read the book, but I liked this thing so much I went out and bought it.

The Bad

• World exposition. Why do I care that the Empire and Earth are at war again? Oh wait, I don't? What a pity.
• ANYTHING WITH A MECH. These scenes suck, because they don't really fit with the art style of the rest of the anime. Oh, and they're just awful, period.
• THE OPENING. Good Lord that thing is awful.
• The last episode. Totally unnecessary.
• The fact that Albert ALMOST starts acting like Shinji Ikari. That made me a bit mad.

Oh,  go masturbate over Asuka's body some more, ya wuss!

The Ugly

• This a pretty inspirational story, really. The second to last episode really showed me something I wanted to do in a novel some day.

Despite the fact that my "Bad" list is longer than my "Good" list, I really really like this anime. What it does well it does really well, whereas the bad things aren't really that important. Ultimately, I'd definitely recommend it. Watch this anime if you can. Put up with the art style if you can, because the story is more than worth it. 

Eden of the East Review

Eden of the East was an anime released in 2009, and was created, written, and directed by Kenji Kamiyama, the writer of Ghost in the Shell. The show follows Akira Takizawa, who wakes up naked, holding a gun and a cellphone outside the White House. He quickly saves a Japanese student named Saki, who threw a rock into the White House yard for fun. What follows is an eleven episode show about the woes of society and the people in them. I'm not going to spoil too much of the plot, but here's my review:

Plot
While the basic amnesia plot is almost a direct rip of a Bourne Identity, the plot is a lot more than that. While it is slow (especially for an 11 episode series), the plot spends most of its time addressing the problems that the last few episodes endeavor to solve. Personally I've always been willing to put the plot on hold if the character work is good enough, but that's until the next part of the review. The point of the show is not the plot itself but the ideas that are explored by it, which the plot does adequately. While I'm not saying that the plot is bad it certainly doesn't take center stage, as it does in shows like Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood. No, what this show does is reminiscent of Clannad and Evangelion: if you thought those were about plot you were obviously going to be disappointed. That being said, the plot sets up the ideas and character situations quite well, and is the only show I've seen that makes people sit down and have an intelligent discussion. So the plot succeeds, in its own quiet way. 


Characters
Now this is where the show shines. Akira and Saki are easily some of the best characters I've seen in a long time. They're complete, well-rounded people who are feel like ordinary people. Most of this is done by just watching conversations between the two. I for one liked the conversations so much I was a bit disappointed when the plot had to take over towards the end. I would have dearly like more, but the plot's good enough to enjoy. Honestly, the romance between these two characters is my favorite in all the anime I've watched, and that's pretty impressive considering that it's an 11 episode long show!


Conclusion
The series is charming, deep, and intelligent. The characters are well done, and the romance is deep and convincing. The plot is definitely thought-provoking. In short, it's one of my favorite series yet. Now I realize that there's two movies to finish up the series, but I've gotta say that I'm stoked to watch them. If they continue focusing on the characters I know I'll be happy with the results, no matter what they are.

Mortal Kombat Review

God, that looks painful.

Alright, let's get this out of the way, out of our system:

Now we can proceed.

Mortal Kombat is the reason we have a video game ratings system, since it was the first popular game to break the bounds of decency. For whatever reason parents decided to give up a little more responsibility and demanded the the government decide what was decent. While the rant on the stupidity of some parents is something that may come down the road I should probably stay on topic. We're here to talk about Mortal Kombat, not socialism. Anyway, Mortal Kombat is known for (and is thus rated by) three things: Violence, Gameplay, and Story.

Violence
Let's be honest with ourselves, this is the reason why Mortal Kombat is so well-loved: the ridiculous, over-the-top violence. If anyone says that they're playing the game strictly for the gameplay I'd reply that people look at porn for the articles and stories.

The violence in this game is extremely satisfying and not only fun to watch but hear. Honestly, this is some of the best sound production for a game I've heard in a long time. All the sounds are so well-designed that I could probably play the game on sound alone. Which is not to say that the visuals are bad. The figures are well-animated and the amount of blood is absurdly awesome. And the fatalities... well....

Gruesome enough for you?

Gameplay

While the Mortal Kombat franchise is known for it's blood, its gameplay is something commonly derided by the fighting community for being, well... not very good. And to a certain extent that's understandable. With the emphasis on presentation, not gameplay, you would think a game like this wouldn't have a good fighting mechanic. I can honestly say that most of Mortal Kombat's 3D excursions were too slow and bulky to really be fun. 

That's not the case here. The fighting engine is extremely good, with combos that can be cannibalized and put into your own ideas and imaginings. The game rewards creative thought in a way that reminds me very much of Smash Bros (the best fighting game ever made, in my humble opinion). However, if you're a beginner and don't want to spend a lot of time putting together your own custom combos the game has presets that work very well. That being said, Mortal Kombat is at its best when you're doing creative thinking about how the regular and special moves work together. When a game rewards ingenuity I think it's more than worth the time to play. 

That being said, the boss fights in this game are truly absurd, filled with bosses that truly break game physics and common sense, as well as many TV sets. Seriously, how are you supposed to fight these guys beyond medium difficulty? I still haven't found a way, and while I acknowledge I'm not the best player in the world I'm pretty decent in my own right, and I STILL play the game's story mode on beginner. The ending boss fight in the story mode is ridiculous even for the game, and after 30 tries I gave up in sheer frustration and downgraded the difficulty to beginner. It took an additional five tries before I got it. That's a total of 35 times, people, with cheating. That's wrong.  Most of this can be circumvented by playing as much multiplayer as possible, which is the point of the game anyway.

Story

This might come as a shock to most people, but almost all Mortal Kombat players I've met are in love with the plot of the games. The game's known for an intricate and dark storyline where the good guys barely win, and that's assuming nothing goes wrong. The story of this game is essentially a reboot back to the original Mortal Kombats 1-3. To be honest, I don't like the story all that much. It feels unnecessarily dark and dismal, to the point where I ask "why even bother?" Also, the matching up of the fights make little to no sense, particularly if you know the game's history. While it's true that people don't play fighting games for the plot the ruining of this element of Mortal Kombat is a travesty.

Conclusion

Amazing presentation and overall great gameplay trump a crappy story and ridiculous boss fights. If you're into fighting games I definitely recommend picking this game up!

Vice Verses Review

I love Switchfoot. From the time I heard them when I was 15 til now I have bought all their albums and listened to them attentively. Their lyrics have always been smart and well thought-out, from their clever "Chem 6A" (which is where my on-again off-again band, Project 6A, with CarpeGuittarem drew its name from) to their sad and lonely "The Blues", Switchfoot has been with me through many a time, developing with me. As time went on, however, I found myself not connecting as I once had with my favorite band. Jon was at a very different part of his life than I was, and while I enjoyed Hello Hurricane, the band's previous album, I felt a little isolated from it. The album lacked the intensity of the band's previous outings, and wound up sounding like U2 (which is a bit of a mortal sin in my book, considering how bland U2 usually is). So I was a bit afraid of this new album, hoping the energy would come back with this album.

I'm happy to say that it did, and then some. 

Now if any of my audience is looking for The Beautiful Letdown, I'll be happy to say this: that's never coming back. Beautiful Letdown, while a good album, doesn't have the bite of this album, and I can honestly say that it's better than Beautiful Letdown. The entire album feels like Dirty Second Hands on steroids which, if you don't know what that is, here's the song so you can get an idea!

The whole album has this feel of  looseness and rapidity, firing off songs at a breakneck pace. It's Switchfoot's most energetic album to date. And it works. Each song leads to the next smoothly, and manages to be unique without sacrificing the feel of the album. The sound in this album, while like Hello Hurricane and the previous albums, is something completely and totally its own, and further evolves the band in a positive and unique direction. 

Come to think of it, that's something that this band does really well with this album: it's a cohesive unit, with all its parts contributing to make something more. I can't imagine listening to just one of these songs without wanting to listen to at least half the album, delving into all the sounds that these guys put together. It's one of the few albums I've heard that's an actual album, as opposed to a collection of songs that just happen to be together on the same disc.

Ultimately, I have to say that Switchfoot's album is worth the listen. It's going to be different than what most people think of as "classic" Switchfoot, but let's get real: they left that four albums ago. 

And good riddance I say.

Requiem for the Phantom Review

Requiem for the Phantom is based off of a Visual Novel by the same name, featuring three assassins who each struggle with their identities as dealers of death. The anime fleshes out the different philosophies these three have in dealing with their darkness, and shows the relative success of each person.

The Good

The plot of this show is nothing particularly special, it's fairly typical, and for the cynical they know exactly where this show is going from the very start. If you're not so cynical you get a chance to interact with the characters themselves. I found that, once I'd accept where I thought the anime was going, that the characters were appealing. Zwei (the "main" assassin) keeps his voice of conscience throughout the entire of the anime, a fact that intrigued and repulsed me. Here was someone who genuinely hated the fact that he was killing, and yet had no way of stopping, and so sunk into despair. He attempts to give up his conscience like the other assassins and totally fails to do so. Ein and Drei are very interesting in their own rights as well, as each of them represent a different archetype of why people do the evil that they do. Story

Truth be told, it's hard to pinpoint why I liked the story as much as I did. Nothing was very original, but it all worked in it's proper place when it needed to, and while the show did what was expected it did its job so well that I could only applaud.

The Music

While the openings and endings are nothing special, the actual music in the anime is very good. Themes are present and evolved throughout the storyline, making for an interesting and (at times) beautiful soundtrack. The later episodes have especially good music, and are almost worth watching just to see how the music is used. I say almost because the later part of the show is where it gets especially good.

The Bad

This Anime's a Bit Slow

I'll admit I wasn't very enthralled of the first 11 episodes, but it wasn't the type of "eh, this is OK" that leads to boredom and giving up on the show. I wanted to see what they were gonna do with the ground they were laying, so I stuck around. And while I was sorta rewarded for my patience (see below), the fact remains: the first 11 episodes are strictly build up for the latter half of the show.

Clip Shows

Why in God's green creation are there two clip shows in this anime? They're the bane of any anime watcher's existence, and I really do despise them. That being said, you can't skip these clip shows, because they slightly change things up and show you occasional bits of original footage, and then horribly twist the story at the very end with some original footage, so you have to watch what's essentially the entire show in twenty five minutes with some additions to get the major plot twist that you need to understand the rest of the show. While I like the idea of going over another character's perspective and doing it quickly re-using footage just automatically turns off my brain as I wait for them to do something new. GAH!

The End

Contrary to how it sounds, I really liked this show. It set out everything it was set up to do, did a damn fine job of having good characters and music, and had a rather meaningful story.

Until the last minute and a half of the anime. Dead serious, last minute and a half they manage to take everything and (from a Western viewers' standpoint) completely destroy everything they did. Now, before people who have watched the ending and liked it tell me that I'm being too close-minded because I obviously don't appreciate other cultures, I say... well.. what is there to say? You're right in this instance. I don't. I'm not saying that American and Catholicism and mom's apple pie are the only things to consider, but the ending just put a sour taste in my mouth that I really can't deny, and actually goes against the Visual Novel that it's based upon (if reports are right, that is).

No, I"m not giving it away. It's just that dumb of an ending, all cultural difference counted in!

I'd say watch the anime, but just ignore the last minute and a half.

Akane-Iro Ni Somaru Saka Review

SPOILER ALERT!

'Without a summer job boredom comes quite easily, and when one is bored one watches anime. Apparently the folks over at Anime Season were thinking of poor saps like me when they designed a random "picker" of anime on their site. So I decided to test it out. After a few anime that just looked too damn gross for me to seriously consider viewing I stumbled upon Akane-Ino Ni Somaru Saka, and learned my first lesson of random anime viewing: RESEARCH YOUR ANIME BEFORE VIEWING IT!

Gaaaah.... where do I start? Akane's an anime that's based on an adult visual novel where the main character, Junichi, rescues a girl only to find out that they've been arranged to marry. From here starts the weirdest attempt by a shallow anime to be a lot more. Don't worry, I won't keep you in suspense.

It fails. Epically.

This isn't to say that the anime has all bad points, it's just that the good points are so shallow and unoriginal that it really doesn't matter how funny it is that Junichi's nickname is Geno Killer because of a spot of bad behavior in his youth. The whole idea of a nice guy that's got the identity as a delinquent is done to death, so why do it again? The girls all fall prey to the same tropes used in romance anime (the harsh but actually insecure girl, the incredibly beautiful sister the main character lusts after, you know the drill).

Use of tropes isn't a bad thing when they're used well and moved beyond. My favorite show, Clannad, is stereotypical from start to finish, so being stereotypical really isn't the trouble. It's the fact that not one single stereotype is moved beyond in a way that's satisfying. The guy is attracted to his sister, and he decides that he's going to date and screw her, instead of the main love interest they've been setting up the entire time? But it's not really his sister, as we find out. So what? He doesn't know, and so in his mind he's committing incest.

Overall, the show left me with a feeling that it could have been so much... more. Instead of actually looking at the effects and consequences of growing up and leaving your family to start a new one the show degrades into senseless and repetitive tropes and fan service.

It's essentially Clannad gone wrong. Which is painful.

The Trolling of Evangelion: The Bad

Before we start this extremely late post, take a look at what I wanted in the previous review: Asuka being awesome!

Say you're welcome to Taylor, who made the cuts for us.

That being said, as good of execution that Evangelion has, it has some serious problems. They're myriad and quite irritating.

All these problems really have one root trouble: Hideaki Anno, the writer/creator of Evangelion.

Hideaki Anno, it's said, wrote a lot of his four years of depression into Evangelion, which(let's get real) is a courageous and noble thing to do. In an age where people

write crap for a check this man obviously had something to communicate and did his level best to do so. However, there's a level of detachment that's required for a writer. The more personal a project, the less personal you have to be about it. With the little experience I have of writing I've found that if you get too personal in your writing it suffers, which Anno definitely has. He's made the statement that Evangelion is the only truly original thing in anime, and that his remake is one of the most necessary things of our time.

Come again? Really? No wonder you picked the name Evangelion, which (assuming that they picked the name correctly, more on that below), means good news (which is what Gospel means, BTW's). He really appears to think that this is the honest to goodness truth. He focused on telling the truth, as opposed to a story. And I can guarantee that when people do that the story suffers, because they're no longer telling a story but preaching from their self-made pulpit. When G.K. Chesterton did it back in the day it wasn't cool then, and I can assure you that it's not cool now.

Before all you Evangelion fans say that I'm being unfair, read the rest of what I've written. Honestly, you guys bicker and troll as badly as Twilight fans.

The Symbols Don't Mean Anything

You remember this funny little sign?

If you don't you obviously weren't paying attention to any of this show. The constant use of crosses, the references to Original Sin, the Lance of Longinus, and (possibly) Adam, Lilith, and Eve?

Admitted to be thrown in for the hell of it by the creators to make shock and make Evangelion seem "edgy". Now this might work on a Japanese person, whose culture isn't pervaded by these symbols, but it's a damn shame that one of the strongest visual symbols in any anime wasn't actually supposed to mean anything! This entire time I was watching the anime and trying to piece together what in the hell was going on with the crosses. What a let down, what wasted potential. Instead of saying something, they said something worse than nothing: pretending to say something. The same applies to the Lance of Longinus. No reason it was there, it was just a name to shock people. Why one earth do something like that? At least they were consistent, right?

I guess they deserve a point for that.

And then there's this issue about Lilith. Now, this world appears to be operating out of our world, so forgive me if I'm wrong, but isn't Lilith an eater of children and an overall nasty bitch? The biblical equivalent of a succubus? Someone who screws devils? And she's the mother of all life?

Thanks?

Jeez, you can't think about this show too hard, otherwise you get a blood clot to the brain, the symbols don't line up. But that's what happens when the writers are sloppy and rely upon hype instead of substance to support a show. If you want to communicate that in order to get past depression you need to stop running back to the impression of the mother that we all have in our brains and to rely upon where we are in the present instead then do so, but DON'T USE LILITH! That says some rather nasty things about humanity that I don't think the writers of the show would have wanted to say, if they were thinking.

On the other hand, having Lilith, the evil mother figure, being the "you can't go back home" person is pretty apropos. I just think they could have picked someone who wasn't a demon, or became a demon, whatever version of the myth you're using. All involve her being evil to the core, regardless.

The Main Characters

I can't begin to tell you how much I hate Shinji Ikari. This character is so beyond pitiful, so... Baka-Raptor is more eloquent than I. Far more. Obviously Shinji represents Anno in the strictest way possible. A 14 year old boy is a pretty awkward age, and I can tell you that being depressed is a pretty damn awkward thing to experience. How're you supposed to tell everyone that when you say fine you actually mean that you'd rather the entire world go burn in a hole, yourself burning the worst?

See? Awkward.

The problem is that Shinji is so unlikeable and pitiful that he doesn't come off as a real person in the slightest degree, because he's not complex enough. Every person has good and bad points, and when it's obvious that your main character has no good points to speak of you have a flat character, not a deep and complex one, which is what Shinji could have been. If they'd shown that Shinji had redeemable qualities his shortcomings would have become relate-able. I mean, I like Simon from Gurren Lagann, I like Peter Parker, and those guys can whine like none other. I mean, really, you ever read a Spider-Man comic by Paul Jenkins? Spidey can whine. But that's balanced by Spider-Man being an awesome hero who really is trying to do the right thing. Same with Simon.

But Shinji? He's just a sack of crap. No one likes a sack of crap.

And then there's Gendo, the father. It's the exact same problem. There's literally nothing to sympathize with inside of him, not even his love for his wife. Because if someone is willing to burn the world so his beloved can come back it's obviously not love but selfishness to such a degree that I find it disgusting. Again, if we saw that Gendo actually had a good bone in his body somewhere I wouldn't have minded his flaws. But instead the character becomes a stand-in for Anno's foibles. And that's disrespectful to the story, which would have been better if they'd actually thought about giving the main characters qualities worth looking at.

I'd start talking about Rei, but I think I'm screwing a dead horse that I beat to death ages ago.

So the three main characters of the show are as unlikable as the supporting characters are likable. Wonderful.

The End of Evangelion

Y'know how a lot of people wanted to see what actually happened at the end of the show? I didn't. I liked the ending of the anime as it was, and understood that the show was never about the plot. It was about Shinji turning from caricature to character, and so I was happy that they openly addressed what the show as actually about. Those last two episodes were my favorite of the entire series.

So when the movie turned out to be an overblown, convoluted, and spat on everything that I enjoyed about the final two episodes I was appalled. Watching the movie I had this feeling that the creators were telling me "Ho ho! We're Evangelion and we're awesome! You're going to accept whatever we do because we are the best thing ever!" Oh wait, that's what Anno believes. Oops. Maybe that is what they're saying. I wouldn't doubt it.

See how this all interrelates? It all goes back to the writers doing the one thing they shouldn't: believing their own hype. If they just told a story without trying to make statements then this wouldn't have happened. But they believed their own legend, the poor bastards.

And that's why I don't like Evangelion. It's arrogant, over-convoluted, and not written well enough. If they'd taken the time to tell us that Shinji and Gendo were worth watching as opposed to hoping that they'd wow us with their "deep" imagery (which it isn't) and their awesome pyschology (which is even less so) then I would have liked it. But they got sloppy, because they thought the message that you can't go back to mommy is more important than the story itself.

The story always comes first. Always. No exceptions.

All images have been found via Google Image Search. The Youtube video was provided by my friend Taylor, who's emergency was taken care of, thank goodness. I'd also like to thank the Evangelion fans who have patiently put up with me thus far, on Facebook and off. Obviously the messsage reached you, thank goodness.

Come back next week to see the last part of this review, The Ugly! That's where, after trolling what's considered one of the best anime of all time, I troll myself. It's only fair, and I hope it's entertaining to all of you.

At the Bottom of the Hill

A special thanks to Taylor and Clannad Central who uploaded all the videos I'm going to use for this series of reflections. I haven't heard anything about Taylor's situation, but when I do I'll make sure to let you guys know. Keep up the prayers!

I'd just had a really bad break up with a girlfriend, so I was dazed, confused, depressed, and in desperate need of company. My friend Marty made it a point to make sure I was never alone, so he started showing me the most positive anime he could find, played an obscene amount of video games with me, and made sure that I didn't feel alone. It was a pretty easy task, come to think of it, because we hung out so often to begin with.

I'd only seen Fullmetal Alchemist, and was more than willing to find out if FMA was a fluke or a sign of Japan's quality. So Marty showed me Eureka 7, which I watched in about a week (pretty good for a 50 episode show and a full load at school)! Eureka 7 is an anime I might review sometime, but for now all you need to know is that I really liked the show, and that I found myself liking this whole "anime" thing.

So far I'd seen shows about the number one thing I needed, which was hope, and I desperately needed to be shown more. Upon questioning Marty said he had this anime that he knew I was going to love, that it was the saddest thing I'd ever see, but so beautiful that if I didn't cry I simply wasn't human. I was in a pretty depressed mood so I told him that was fine with me. I felt sad, so it made sense to watch something sad and beautiful. And crying didn't feel like such a bad thing to do, either. We sat down, pizza in tow, and this is what I saw.

I never looked back.

The Trolling of Evangelion: The Good

Disclaimer: If you like the show, please read the title. And then read it again. Realize this is coming from someone who doesn't like the show. I'm not going to attempt to play fair, since it's intentional trolling. Please realize that I geniunely like the parts of the show that I'm trolling, and that I'm having fun, usually at that fans' expense or at mine. Those of you who aren't having fun need to check themselves off this blog. Oh, and SPOILER ALERT! For those of you that care.

The Characters

I like all the characters in Evangelion.

Everybody but this guy:

...and this guy. What a coincidence, they're father and son!

I'm really not kidding. Everyone else in the show was understandable, easily related to, and hell, enjoyable.

Misato

How can you not like her? Seriously? Put aside the fact that we get to see her boobs, butt, or skin in every episode for a second, and actually think (something Evangelion fans claim to do all the time, but probably not with their brains)! Misato's pretty amazing. Having gone through some extremely rough situations with her parents and being unable to talk she's actually up and talking, trying to follow in her father's footsteps (even though she think she hates him). She takes Shinji in and tries to mother him, only realizing that her own flaws prevent her from doing that well. Watching her with Kaji is absolutely hilarious and awesome every time, and who can't love Pen-Pen? I dare you to not love him. How could you say no to that bloody penguin? Misato can't, and that should be more than good enough for you, you heartless bastard. Seriously, she's one the few characters that's actually human in this show. Flawed, broken, but absolutely determined to do good. She's also the only one of the three main female leads whose falling in love with Shinji did not seem pushed by the plot, which I don't hold against her. The show had shown that the two of them, despite being in the opposite camps of awesome and fail, had a lot in common and Misato geniunely cared for Shinji and wanted to help him leave Camp Fail (where Twilight: The Extended Cut is shown every night) and go to Camp Awesome with her for sex. Wonderful statutory rape sex.

Kaji

What can I say about Kaji that would do him justice? No, really, I mean that. Kaji is one of the best characters in any anime I've watched, probably reaching up into the realm of my Top 5 Favorites (I should probably write that post someday...). Throughout the show, like all the characters, Kaji shows some pretty impressive flaws. His sense of humor pisses off Misato (which yes, I count as a flaw), and... that's about it. He's the best character you can ask for in any show, and he makes quite the impact in a show where there really are no other heroes besides Misato. I mean, what can't this guy do?

Oh wait, that's right.

Live.

Kaji's death is the turning point in the series, forcing it into a downward spiral of despair and futility. I think that with the death of Kaji any hope for, well, anything, in this show dies as well. He was the one guy consistently doing the right things for the right reasons, and with his death there's a very uncomfortable hole left. I mean, who's gonna save the world, Shinji? That's about as likely as Shinji voluntarily kissing a girl.

Asuka

While she's not the most heroic character of the bunch (it's a pretty steep drop off after Misato), Asuka has several things going for her. First, she has a temper. I like temper in an anime girl, it's just in my nature. Second, her last fight scene in The End of Evangelion was one of the most badass things I've seen. 9 Evas? Girl, you rock. Hard. I haven't cheered that hard for someone in a long time, and then..... again...

What is the deal with the writer's need to make sure that no awesome characters live? OK, that's technically not true. Asuka does live. But she's stuck with Shinji, a fate worse than death. I mean, someone that indecisive stuck with an awesome girl like her? Yeah, don't make sense to me either.

Yeah, Asuka has flaws. Tons of them. She's ill-tempered. She's immature. She puts all her self-worth in her ability to pilot an Eva. Her abandonment issues are expressed by her constant bullying and inability to be nice to anyone but Kaji (but being cruel to Kaji puts you out of the grasp of humanity anyway). She falls in love with Shinji. But hey, so do the rest of the female leads, so we'll just chalk that up to the plot.

The rest of the characters, while not nearly as cool as those three, are enjoyable and easy to sympathize with, which is a key aspect of this series. If you can't sympathize with the characters then you're stuck(which is why most harem anime is doomed to fail). While Rei has the personality of vanilla ice cream when it's revealed why this is case it makes a good deal of sense. So even while I don't like her she's at least understandable.

Design

Tokyo-3 is a marvel of imagination. When I first saw it in the Rebuilds I was truly impressed with how it was fantastical yet felt so real. I mean, a city that can come up out of the ground after a fight? Why hasn't anyone in the real world done that?

Not feasible? I don't believe you. Try again. Harder.

The show's designs mostly make sense (disregarding the mechincal trigger on a gun the size of a skyscrape) and are as utilitarian as the tools who made them. The plug suits also work out, despite being an obvious attempt at fan service. All the human stuff looks like it belongs.

Intent

Most importantly, however, this show knew that it had something to say and made me want to find out what it was. It's very difficult to get me to actually care about what happens, and Evagelion through the characters and the desperate feeling of trying to say something got me hooked. I knew that whatever the show was trying to say it meant legitimately, which excited me after I got the bad taste of Shinji and Gendou out of my mouth. What did they want to say? What was so important that they would take someone who's an anti-hero in the literal sense and make a show about him? What were they going to say? As the show got darker I wanted to know more. Hell, I wanted whatever they had to say mean something, even if it was about one of the two Ikaris. Hell, maybe they would try to redeem those two! T'was a long shot, but I hoped.

And that's a rare thing that only the best of shows inspires, even if its only for a second. Hope. It's the ability to carry on even if nothing seems to work. It defies reason, emotion, religion, politics, you name it and hope will trudge through it. A lot of people take hope from stories and use it to carry forward, and this show has the capability of doing that. That's high praise for any show, and I give it to Evangelion. I like the fact that something so depressing as Evangelion can inspire. From someone who overall doesn't like the show that's pretty high praise, and I would like you all to congratulate me for being so high-minded. Thank you, thank you, I'm here on this blog for awhile.

So, Evangelion has good points. Hell, it's got excellent points. But does that make it a classic in my book? Come back next week and find out what I didn't like in The Bad.

Please offer prayers for my friend and Youtube uploader, Taylor. His family is in an emergency, and because of this he couldn't help out with today's post. I offer my condolences.