Fear the Walking Dead Thoughts

So, I rather HATE The Walking Dead. Honestly when I saw the first episode, I thought it was a joke. I thought it was a comedy; a zombie movie spoof. But...it wasn't. And the show...rather sucked. So I ended up reading the comic for it and I fell totally in love. It got me watching the show again but I hated it more and more. The video game really added to my experience...with the comic.

In general I just find the show to be poorly written mind numbing crap that recycles cliches from other tv shows and sitcoms to convince people with boring lives that they want to waste their time on it. And that's kinda how I feel about Fear the Walking Dead.

Now I went into this expecting to like it. Other people who were tired of the show were giving this one a thumbs up, and hell, I was interested in seeing the first days of the outbreak. Most things skip the outbreak events and get into the survival stuff, which gets repetitive. And the show kinda starts out how you'd think. There are like hints of the zombie stuff happening here and there and there's paranoid people who see the signs everywhere and get the hell out of dodge. But the show spends too much time on shit that doesn't matter. I don't care about your divorce dramas, I don't care that you're a teacher, I don't care that your neighbor used to babysit your stupid children. It's just warm fuzzy family time combined with your generic post-apocalypse gated community drama. People are carried away by the strict military. People venture out of bounds to be heroes and save people. People capture an innocent person who is a member of the oppressive party and torture him in a basement. RARELY DO WE SEE ZOMBIES. RARELY DO WE SEE THE EVOLUTION OF AN OUTBREAK.

I guess I am spoiled by World War Z (the novel) because it goes through the stages of it spreading and the slow break down of society. The show in 2 episodes goes from zero to Jericho. And I just can't make myself give two fucks about anything in it. I predict that in an upcoming episode, someone in the community dies and comes back as a zombie. Eventually zombies over run the camp (because there are none in TWD)  and the people will gather into small groups like in TWD and then we'll have TWD but with new people that the writers can do whatever the hell that want with.

My only praise is that it has such a diverse cast. It has a lot of great POC present in prominent roles in the show and also showcases many interracial relationships. It's nice to see representation of other races, and finally as take charge heroes and less canon fodder. I'm a big fan of saturating the media with ethnicities until white-washing is no longer even naturally thought of as the go-to. I want my friends to have the same experiences I have with the media as I see all these people like me in positive heroic roles.

Also something else that annoys me though. How do two public school teachers afford an upscale LA home? Just sayin...

Scream Queens: Thoughts So Far

So, upon first seeing a trailer for this show I immediately wrote it the fuck off. But as gifs started to come up on my dash of Ariana Grande texting the killer and tweeting for help, I had to see it.

And damn is it great so far.

The jokes and banter are spot on. The cameos are hilarious. It is Mean Girls meets Scream meets the wit of Cabin in the Woods. I was dying laughing. This shit is amazing.

I don't have too much to say because there's only been like 2 episodes so far and I don't really want to spoil anything, but I'm totally loving it and want to watch more. I feel like this is what AHS needed to be because so far, its much darker and deadlier than AHS has managed to be lately. I hope to write more about this as we get the plot rolling, but I highly recommend checking it out.

The Visit Mini

The movie was very unexpected. We see M. Night's name lately and just assume things about his movies. And I think for most people, this movie is proving those assumptions wrong.

Created using his own money, without knowing if this would even be shown anywhere, M. Night turned out a very well done film. I was actually chuckling through a lot of it and found the child actors charming, which I never do. All the acting was solid. It really got you feeling for every character in some way despite the horror film aspect. It hit its comedy beats and hit its creepy beats. For horror, it's incredibly tame, but creepy enough by utilizing the realism of (though over blown) the actuality that dementia and mental illness at old age can produce results that are found alarming and freaky to those who both don't understand what's happening and have to experience a loved one acting unlike themselves. Though it's amplified liek I said to increase the horror aspect of it, it still comes from a real enough place to hit home for many people.

This movie was a fun watch. It really was.

The Scorch Trials Mini

Let me make this short because I'm very sick.

 Nothing happens in this movie, and this movie makes no attempt to make you care about the nothing that happens.

 Despite the tense situations, there is no tension. It provides no answers, just additional "oh hey that's from the book" moments for the unfortunate people who finished reading that book (I made it only 2 chapters in before deciding life was too short for this). People do action but it's not action packed. They go from place to place where an undoubtedly more interesting story is happening and then leave 5 minutes later with no exploration or exposition from those places.

"Things happen, okay lets go, because we have to get to the finale and no one cares about the middle book" the Movie.

Turbo Kid Mini

An insanely fun film.
In a world where the robot wars have lead to a post-apocalyptic wasteland, one kid, inspired by the comic books from an age long past, becomes a hero to save the wasteland from a tyrannical psychopath. This film is a combination of sweet and gory in the most perfect sense.

It's a gritty comedy full of blood soaked action and a charming romantic subplot that for once does not manage to get in the way of the story. It actually really helps it out, and the twist makes it even more endearing. This is Kick-Ass meets Super meets Wall-E at it's Indie finest.

4.5/5

Paper Towns Mini

A film about as underwhelming as the book, and leaving out some of the best parts of the book.

While I'm slightly biased as I did not like the book, it had its own share of redeeming qualities, such as Q's panic and desperation upon thinking Margot may have committed suicide. Or when he finds Margot and she's writing little stories which have the two of them having adventures, because the memory of him and his friendship remained with her. But those were left out of the movie for more teen shenanigans type of things and witty dialogue. It was as though it was trying to contain the sass and wit of The Fault in Our Stars with something that is NOT The Fault in Our Stars. Instead of really having it's own atmosphere, it felt boring, slow, and predictable. Which in a way, the book was too, also including shenanigans and tomfoolery.

But the point, while I don't think was echoed loud enough in the movie, is that this girl is not just dreams. She is her own person. Q has to break from his Manic Pixie Dream Girl fantasies and accept that the reality is vastly different from fantasy. It does happen in the movie, but it's more profound in the book.

Gamer Biz: Yandere Simulator (1 of ??)

I love niche video games. I also love ridiculous anime culture. And above all of that, I love dedicated artists and creators. And that's why I want to talk about Yandere Sim today!

Note: In my title you'll see I say 1 of ???. Yandere Sim is not a finished game. The Dev (just called Dev or Yandere Dev) is still working on it and uploads the new build every few weeks for everyone to beta test and give feedback on. I've been a part of a few builds now and it has a ways to go, so I intend on talking more about this and in the end, I'll go in and add an actual number. Now on with the topic!!!

If you have not heard about Yandere Simulator, that's okay. It's a very small game right now that is not complete. It centers around the idea of the Yandere, which is a anime trope about a character, usually a school girl, who has affections for someone to the point of being violent and psychotic. You control "Yandere-chan", a school girl who has a crush on her Senpai, who is kind hearted and will go out with girls who confess their love to him. As Yandere-chan, you're still too shy to confess your feelings, but other girls aren't! To stop Yandere-chan from having a broken heart and thus, losing the game, you need to take out her opponents who plan to confess to Senpai. You can do this in many ways, currently limited to kidnapping and straight up murder.

The game play is in a very simple state right now. The latest update included an atmosphere integration, which is kind of like the students will notice when other students are missing and they will be more suspicious of goings on, making it more dangerous and harder to get away with murder. You can pick some weapons near the school entrance (for now, because they're not in their natural places around school yet) and use those to kill your victims. A tactic I like is to befriend everyone and have groups follow you to the incinerator for easy clean up after annihilation. Another tactic is the ability to push someone off a roof. This can either be a faked suicide, or just do it and shove the body into a garbage bin below. Drowning and electrocution are also available, but only in certain circumstances.

There are a lot of parts of the game that are currently not interactive. You'll notice all the NPCs are robotic and some don't move or react at all. Only one girl wants to confess to Senpai, so she's your only competition and once you've dealt with her, the NPC who makes you lose is someone you can't kill anyways. Everything is currently very robotic with little interactivity. But the limitations aren't so bad when you understand that this is constantly being worked on and embellished so you can try and push the limits of what you can do currently with each new update.

The Dev is building this all by himself. He is using gaming animators to help, as well as voice actors naturally, but he's coding this all on his own. His willingness to share and release it every few weeks for us to play with is awesome and shows a level of dedication for the player that you rarely see. He wants us to use it and help him fix it so that he can make the best game possible for people. He listens to the community and interacts with them, making him feel real and like someone I want to show support for.

You can check the game out HERE and download the latest update for free and play with it. If you like it, make sure you bookmark it and check back every few weeks for the new build or bug fixes. There's also a sub Reddit for it where you can get technical help from other players and talk about Easter Eggs, fan art, speculate on theories, and much more. The Dev himself even hangs out with everyone on there. I hope you enjoy this as much as I do. I love Yandere characters so much (which you know if you follow my art pages heheeeeh).

2 Everything 2 Terrible Tokyo Drift (Mini!)

Welcome to my new obsession. For anyone new to the game, I studied video editing and occasionally do a lot of video editing. So boy was I suprised when I was recommended 2 Everything 2 Terrible Tokyo Drift, by Everything is Terrible. Holy fuck. This is both a dream and a nightmare. The entire film is a stream of consciousness built upon the superb editing, intercutting clips from hundreds of movies, interviews, tv spots, and more into an hour long... expirieince. I've watched it so many times because not only is it stupidly clever, but the editing is beyond genius. I really don't know what else to say aside from, well, it's really an experience and you should go in with an open mind and despite the stupid humour (which may not be for everyone), I suggest you really examine the editing and how this was put together. I believe they've made another film in 2013 that is a continuous hip-hop song for over an hour with continual disjointed clips like this, but I haven't seen it. I've got to find it. But if you like internet stupidity and/or superb editing, or have an hour to kill, I HIGHLY suggest this film. I'll even help you by posting it below because it's fucking on YouTube.

Additionally... if you're an RLM fan, you may see a fair few things you recognize!

Book Talk: Patriotism

Patriotism is, by it's title, not a book you'd think that I would traditionally suggest. Additionally, the book in question is really only a few pages long. I'm not sure that it's more than 70, but it is less than 100 pages long. However, it is an incredibly enrapturing tale of love of one's country and love between two people. Again this is another sample of Japanese war era literature, which is one of my favourite genres along side Cold War novels.

The story is about a husband (Shinji) and wife (Reiko). The husband is a military general, and the two have only been married a short time. When Shinji is away for too long, Reiko begins to prepare for her fate. If a her husband were to die, she would follow him. Yet he does return home, but with grave news. A mutiny has occurred in his ranks (real world event the Ni-Ni Roku Jiken or 2-26 Incident). He will be required to lead an attack on the mutineers, many of whom are his friends. Trapped between comradery between close friends (the mutineers) and loyalty to his Emperor, he decides to take the honorable way out, and his wife agrees to follow. They write their suicide notes and make love one last time, savoring each others bodies and marveling at the inherent beauty of each other and their deep bonded love. Finally, Reiko sits as witness to Shinji's seppuku, which is embellished in horrific detail, cut by cut. Once it is done, Reiko cleans the blood off herself and follows him into the afterlife.

It's an incredibly beautiful and erotic story around a situation that is the antithesis of beauty and eroticism. Yet Mishima, the author (a model and body builder, as well as a 3 time Nobel Prize nominee who wrote literally every type of writing possible) captures the entire 3 day event in such colour and detail that it extends beyond the bonds of the word "remarkable". As an added note, Mishima went on to try ad start a coup, which ended in his own act of seppuku and ritual beheading (which was botched by an incompetent officer). It's a great read, just be wary of the gore and romanticizing of suicide. This is a work that displays the ideals and thoughts of another culture in war time, and is a product of its time, not an advocacy for suicide or self harm. (Or military coups).

Jon Snow is Not a Twin (SPOILERS ALL BOOKS)

So I hate the the TV A Game of Thrones about as much as anyone who has read the books and understands how money grubbing scumbags in the media industry don't give a shit about fans does. And I hate show watcher theories on how it will all end or happen SOSOSO much because they just google theories that are just book based and blow it up ad act fucking stupid, and then you have 80 people reporting it and blowing up my newsfeed with garbage.

Jon Snow is not Meera Reeds goddamned twin.

The basis for this theory is that the actors look similar and they are the same age.

AND THAT'S PRETTY MUCH THE ONLY SUBSTANTIAL EVIDENCE. The show watchers never even mention Howland Reed. I think part of the original, old as fuck theory which was long ago debunked that this was based on, at least tries to work in Ned and Howland's friendship and the comradery  between the Cragnome and the Starks.

Why it's not true:
Besides the fact that it's stupid and has really no bearing on the story so why make the theory...
The Starks and the Reeds are both Northern families. They are all most likey decendants of The First Men and all lived in the area on their own until the founding of Winterfell and the rise of the Stark family. Through alliance marriages and just fucking living in the same place and being from the same people, NO SHIT THEY BOTH HAVE BROWN HAIR. But Meera has the Cragno green eyes. Jon has gray eyes. Meera is incredibly short for her age, much like her father who was unnaturally short, as are many Cragnomen. They're both good fighters...because Jon was trained with a fucking sword and Meera's family is big on hunting and spearing.

There are no similarities between the two. There is no reason for them to be twins. There is no plot point that can be helped by this because the characters are on vastly different arcs and are unlikely to meet. Meera has shown no ability to warg, no dragon dreams, no green dreams, and no prophesies or visions concern her. There is NOTHING linking the two other than their fathers' friendship and living in the same region. And I guess Bran.

Hey! My buddy from Dragonball Z wrote and directed a short film! He's a pretty dope dude, and it's called "Opal White"! SO, if you're into like DBZ or Hetalia or something else Eric's done, you should check out his work!

MTG: The Quest for the Perfect Deck!

I've been playing Magic for several years now. I suck ass at it, but I love it. My best friend is super into it, and always wanted me to learn it someday so we could play. So once he moved away, I started learning how to play so that when we visited, I could surprise him!

But even so, my decks always suck. I got the Gatecrash box and we put together an okay deck from that. But I don't have a theme. So, I've been tossing around some ideas.

• BEARS
• Vampires...unsure of red/black or mono black. But I feel as though it's cliched. I didn't like the zombie decks though and I like NORMAL non sparkly vampires. We'll see.
• Dragons! But then I found out there were 8 billion dragon decks and the cards get rather pricey... 
• Game of Thrones deck! Like if I can't do just dragons then maybe dragons and soldier type things. Still...still working that out..because it seems pretty stupid.
• Elf deck. For Legolas and his elf eyes.
• Leviathan deck. The problem is that a lot of sample decks I find are really lame and I don't like the cards. I'm really into Kaiju and Lovecraftian spooklies so...idk.
• Mermaid deck. Is this possible? IDK. I actually haven't checked. But I'm fond of blue or green decks so it's no something I wouldn't use.
• Angels and Demons deck. For all my cliched unholiness.

• GOAT DECK BECAUSE THATS A THING I CAN JUST HAVE GOATS. FUCK YOU. GOAT ATTACK.

So now that I'm employed. Again. For now. Hopefully for a while. Uh, hopefully in a bit I can have the money to really go for some cards and make a sweet deck. Meanwhile, my best friend is using his new teacher's salary to replace his decks with holographic cards only. He's so crazy and amazing. I hate playing with his decks because he knows exactly which card I'm playing based on how much mana I tap, and I feel so lame losing to him time after time. I can beat other people just fine! I'm not bad. But against someone who is like...God tier in the MTG world... I just pale in comparison Q___Q 

Two Movies Where The Sun Kills People (uh...Spoiler)

Hi and today on "I couldn't think of an inventive title but who cares", I've watched some shitty movies lately and I just want to talk about them.

Now first off is the movie Sunshine. Now...I love the premise! I love the acting! The whole first part is really awesome! You have my future husband Chris Evans as an asshole, Cillian Murphy as a smart guy, and other actors who have IMDB pages. Basically, the sun is dying and Earth is in a solar winter, and the crew of the Icarus II are out to detonate a bomb in the sun to restart it and save the world. The first time this was attempted, the ship Icarus I randomly lost contact with the Earth and everyone was presumed dead from an unknown accident. But Icarus II picks up on the distress beacon of the lost Icarus I and they go to take it's bomb as a back up, and to take their supplies to ensure they can make it back home alive.

And then it turns shit. It becomes a slasher film. People start dying left and right for accidental reasons, like the Captain getting burned alive outside the ship during a maintenance operation, and the ships greenhouse catching fire so that they won't have enough oxygen to make it to the sun. People die while trying to get supplies from Icarus I, a survivor on that ship escapes onto II, and from there he goes batshit insane even more. He's sure that humans are defying God by trying to restart the sun and wants to stop the mission. He kills everyone but Cillian Murphy, who manages to detonate the bomb payload and sees time or some shit.

Look, I love Danny Boyle, but this isn't that great of a film. It is really good at building tension...some of the times. Not all. And a lot of the emotional moments and drama are depending on relationships between characters that we don't feel invested in. It doesn't have any of those heart string moments. I hate to compare it to Interstellar, but Interstellar did a brilliant job emotionally connecting you to every character, even if we didn't know them for very long. Sunshine just tosses you in and says "okay, ACTION." The really only emotional scene is near the end when Murphy detonates the payload and its playing the tense music and you watch him sweat and cry as he struggles in the heat and knowing that he's humanities singular hope at this point. This movie always falls flat for me and every time I watch it, I think "Wow...that was still disappointing."

But do you know what movie was exactly the spectacular shitshow I was hoping for?

KNOWING.




So...there is no good way to start off talking about this movie except to take a deep breath and say "This is one of THOSE Nic Cage movies, and it involves psychics, possibly aliens, bunnies, and smooth pebbles." I don't even think I can discuss the story in a calm and intellectual manner so lets just roll with it.

The movie starts with some weird ass girl who starts hearing shit, so she writes down a stream of fucking numbers on a piece of paper to put in a time capsule before clawing her fingernails off in a closet and being Silent Hill Child levels of "creepy little girl". On to the present day (in 2009) where Nic Cage's son who I will call Son is at the opening of the time capsule and gets Silent Hill child's number sheet, and his friends make fun of him. Son steals the number sheet like a fucking degenerate and Nic Cage is angry with him. While gazing angrily at the numbers sheet, Nic has  moment that would make Jim Carrey from The Number 23 proud, and picks out the day and death total of fucking 9/11. Idk maybe it's because he was in that firefighter movie about 9/11. THEN HE DECIDES TO RESEARCH EVERY NUMBER COMBINATION IN ONE NIGHT...and figures out that most of the numbers are dates and exact death counts of major accidents that happened over the past 50 years.

He doesn't know what all the extra numbers mean, BUT I'M SURE THATS FINE SO HE GOES AND TELLS HIS FRIEND AT MIT ABOUT IT BECAUSE THAT'S WHAT YA DO WHEN YOU GET A PROPHESY PAPER FROM A TIME CAPSULE.
????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????
3 dates haven't happened yet. One of those days is herpaderp that very daaay! But no one has died yet so Nic Cage goes to investigate. While on a drive, a fucking plane crashes next to the road while he's stuck in traffic, while he has a GPS that shows him his position and realizes that the extra numbers are the Lat and Long of where the death toll will happen. He runs into the plane wreckage...to...help... because that's logical! And FUCKIGN SURVIVORS ARE RUNNING AROUNFso from there, at some point a creepy Slender Man type fellow gives Son a smooth rock. Okay. Later he visits Son and in his room, and Son, lacking the concept of stranger danger, obeys and looks out the window as Slender Man shows his the forest and CGI moose running around on fire. Son screams and Nic Cage chases Slender Man through the woods with a baseball bat. So the next accident is gonna happen in the New York subway, so Nic tries to tell the authorities and they're like "okay, aren't you the fellow who stole the Declaration of Independence?" and they set up a trap for him. Nic goes there anyways....because I guess he REALLY NEEDED TO MAKE SURE HIS PAPER WAS RIGHT IDK and he helps the police catch a man stealing DVDs and then the subway crashes and kills however many people the paper said. So Nic decides to be a creep and tracks down the daughter of Silent Hill Child. The movie becomes very distracting because she's the mom from Insidious. So I'm calling her Insidious Mom. He interrogates Ms. Insidious and she's like "yeah my mom was bonkers and heard voices and sometimes wrote letters backwards so maybe the things that are clearly NOT the number 33 are the letters EE. And maybe that means EVERYONE ELSE see my mom wrote all over her mobile home in the woods." Also Nic discovers that solar flares are causing the latest accidents and that a solar flare will kill the Earth. Okay. So Insidious Mom thinks they should go to the caves and Nic thinks they should go to the coordinates where the EE is going to happen, and the kids reveal that they're hearing voices too. It's a mess. Mom kidnaps the children, only to get carjacked and killed at a gas station, and eventually he just fucking goes to the mobile home. It's surrounded by smooth rocks. He follows the rocks and finds his son in the woods. His son has a bunny. He says its his friend. Slender Man is there too. He also has friends, but they are not bunnies. Insidious Mom's daughter also has a bunny. they tell Nic Cage that they're going away on a spaceship but Nic can't come because he stole the Declaration of Independence and so the Slender Men take the kids and their bunnies away to an Earth-like planet with a magical tree, and Nic Cage drives into the city as a solar flares burns everything.

I highly recommend that over Sunshine because it's so fucking weird and funny and I'm not sure why this had to happen. It's so bonkers. I can't deal with it. Go watch it while you turn up.

Personal Post

Yeah so I wanted this blog to be a bit more "formal". Like actually talking about things. My other blogs elsewhere are where I'm like completely bonkers but since I used to write for a few online publications in my college days and a small series on my shit-blog was gaining a fair deal of traction, I started this to present educated looks at things I'm interested in because I'm a dork. Probably why there's less of a structure but I want to write something more than "wow fuck guys I have some opinions so let me SCREAM AT YOU OMG". So generally, I think of something, I write a lot about it, and then I hope it gives you something nice to think about.

But here's were I break from that for a few moments for a like real life update. The girl behind the paragraphs of blahblahblah.

I recently quit my job. It was around the time I started this blog because I had adsense from running a small beauty and art YouTube channel and so any extra income was great and also for the aforementioned "I want to write things on a slightly more professional and in depth level for those interested in reading them". My job was crappy and I was there for over a year when a lot of drama happened and it got to the point where I couldn't sit by while someone made racist and misogynist commentary while sexually harassing all the female employees. I was this person's main sexual harassment target and when he started advocating that men abuse women, I became super uncomfortable and kept getting sick from just the terror of it. I can probably explain why it effected me how it did in another post but lets just say I have an unhappy past and this person was causing me to now relive certain events every day at work. I ended up getting a bad injury so fuck it. I quit. And I've been job hunting for a few weeks now.

I want to be an animator and I'm writing a comic right now actually. I have a lot of concept art and notes just everywhere. But my degree is in film and where I live doesn't have many opportunities for me. I don't have the money to move to anywhere extravagant, though I hope to go to Toronto after graduate school. But I'd really like to be a storyboard artist. I really like shows like Steven Universe and Adventure Time right now, and I'd love to draw for them. And I do a lot of character designs in my free time. Also I write a lot.

So I'm kinda sad that for now, I'm just looking for jobs doing like data entry where I can not get worn out and have energy to come home and draw and have the money to buy things and save for EVENTUAL SCHOOL. I'm pretty blue about the whole thing because it feels impossible. I'm really skiddish when it comes to promoting myself and my work. I'll post speedpaints on youtube and use a hundred tags on tumblr and instagram but it makes me uncomfortable and I wonder if its even worth the effort. But, unfortunately, even if its NOT worth the effort I'll still do it. I can't  be stopped.

So that's life right now. I have a lot of movies I'm trying to see for a few more minis and I wanna write more on Game of Thrones, and I have a lot of gaming things lined up but I'm not sure about how to approach those. And I have two more books I want to write in depth on because I think they're super worth reading and yeah. Idk. That's really all. Hey.

A Sci Fi Review: The Day the Earth Stood Still DOUBLE

Science fiction has been a staple of my life for as far back as I can remember. Star Wars was my childhood and since my parents thought the prequels were silly cash grabs, really only the original trilogy was part of my life until the premiere of the final of the prequels, so I got lucky there. But yeah, space and things coming from space really interested me because I came from a crazy religious family who didn't believe in aliens or the big bang or any of that. One of the most terrifying episodes of The Twilight Zone to me was "To Serve Man". My dad thought if I liked that episode so much (for though it scared me, I was also drawn to the horror of it, kinda like with dinosaurs) and since I was ENAMORED HARD CORE with Invasion of the Body Snatchers, well I would certainly like the film "The Day the Earth Stood Still". And that I did. I remember being unsure if the electricity ceased because the earth stopped spinning or what really as a kind so that kinda freaked me out, but it was held in a high place in my heart for all of these years.

It starts when Klaatu lands his space saucer in a park in Washington DC. While attempting to present peaceful terms, he is shot and wounded by the US military, a sign of what is to come. Klaatu's guard robot, Gort, arrives and gets rid of all the weapons with his energy beam to make the ordeal safer for everyone. Klaatu is taken to the hospital where the President's secretary interrogates him and informs Klaatu that due to the cold war, a meeting of world leaders cannot occur and peace is not a foreseeable option, despite the fact that Klaatu believes otherwise and insists that the message he brings is one to benefit and to be taken into consideration by the entire world, not just one nation. Not understanding this attitude of mistrust, he wishes to walk among the people and understand human life, but the government refuses. So Klaatu adopts the guise of "Mr. Carpenter" as he escapes government custody and moves into a boarding house.

Young Bobby really intrigues the charismatic and curious Mr. Carpenter. Carpenter offers to babysit Bobby while his mother, Helen, goes on a date. Bobby shows Carpenter around and they eat ice cream and Bobby shows him his father's grave and explains about the World Wars, and they have a splendid time. Bobby shows a lot of interest in the mysterious spaceman that has now disappeared in the city and Carpenter assures Bobby that the spaceman is only here for good reasons and maybe he just wanted to have a nice time. They visit a scientist and after Carpenter helps the absent scientist to solve an equation, government agents come for Mr. Carpenter in the night. They bring him to the scientist who believes that Carpenter is Klaatu the spaceman and that his message that Earth needs to seek peace or else be eliminated by higher powers is of the highest importance.

The dichotomy between the nature of man in war time versus the call for peace becomes more and more tense as the manhunt for Klaatu increases. Eventually we get to the pivotal scene where Klaatu stops all electricity on Earth, save for anywhere that would compromise safety like hospitals and airports, to show both his seriousness and his care for human life. Once the electricity is brought back, Klaatu is gunned down and Helen delivers a special message for Gort; "Klaatu barada nikto". Gort temporarily brings Klaatu back to life and with everyone, including the top scientists since political leaders wouldn't get over themselves to listen, present, the Earth stands still as Klaatu tells them that their warring, violent ways and their discovery of atomic power for weaponization is dangerous and that they need to beware and if they let their wars get out into space towards the other planets, then the otherwise peaceful planets will eliminate them.

This is a powerful story of someone who sees and is repeatedly confronted with the cruelty of humans, but is determined to not only understand but to give them a chance and a warning to change, and even goes about seeking the right people to do this. The fact that this was written in the time of Cold War was monumental as well, as it was a call for peace and rational thinking in a world gone absolutely mad.

So of course they decided to fuck it up in 2008.



The Day the Earth Stood Still, in 2008, was remade into a disaster drama staring the man who should have been cast as the robot Gort instead, Keanu Reeves. This convoluted  storm of CGI testing with a marketable name tacked onto it bombeb at the box office and was even Razzie nominated, though it lost to the 4th Indiana Jones film that TOTALLYNEVERHAPPENEDSHUTUP.

For some reason, we start with Keanu Reeves climbing a mountain and touching a glowing sphere that takes his DNA and fucks right off. Okay. Sure. Then it just decides to shift to present day where a strange object is heading towards New York City and is going to kill everyone and there's no time to evaculate, however there is time to abduct a small army of scientist people and take them somewhere safe so that they can...talk about how they can't do anything. However, instead of the object crashing into the city and ending this movie, it slows down and gently lands in Central Park. Out steps......something freaky! And so the army shoots it. And then Gort the robot comes out and disables all the weapons before the alien tells him to be calm with "Klaatu barada nikto" (the phrase used to inform Gort that Klaatu was dead and needed to be found and revived so...okay).  The alien is taken to the hospital where they decided to try out their new special effects in terms of body horror, having the alien shed pounds of dripping flesh to reveal a slowly forming replica of Keanu Reeves from the mountain climbing scene.

It starts to follow the original. Klaatu informs the President's secretary that he needs to speak to the UN,  she says no because they said no in the original despite the fact that the UN building isn't that far from where he even landed, and since there's no Cold War in 2008 like really the reps can just fly in asap and meet with him tomorrow. But nah. And then they try to sedate Klaatu and he enacts violence to escape....wait what? Klaatu is a pacifist... but in this version he Man of Steel's his way through harming people. He's rescued by the doctor from earlier who refused to sedate him, Helen, and her son Jacob (in one of Jaden Smith's 2 good roles). Jacob thinks they should kill the alien because his dad was in the army and he would kill the alien because you have to kill those who are different from you! Yeah! Keanu Reeves, I would say tries to not make the situation more awkward but he just automatically makes it so by being Keanu Reeves. In fact, since he harms so many people and cares so little about humanity, I've decided he is not Klaatu. I'm going to just call him Keanu. Keanu goes to a product placement I mean McDonalds to talk with a random chinese gentleman who apparently is also an alien who has spent 70 years on Earth and has decided that humans will never change and are only capable of destruction. So Keanu decides that's good enough and decided that humanity should be erased for Earth's on protection. Spheres just start appearing around the world to start a small arc of animals before the nanobots from Agent Cody Banks are unleashed and start to eliminate humanity. Helen and Jacob try to change Keanu's mind and when they eventually do, Keanu tells them that to live, they must pay the price, and he sacrifices himself to end the nanobots and his sphere flies away, leaving Earth apparently unable to use electricity....because that's actually something you can do...(no).

This is a complete departure from the ideals of the original. While the concept of "humanity should peruse peace" is still kinda there, the entire fact that Klaatu comes from a place of peace who only desires peace and strives to maintain peace is wiped away. This movie is just about punishment and devastation. And I consider Klaatu's two biggest sins to be a large part of the downfall to this. He never desires to know and understand humanity. He does not approach this with the charismatic optimism of someone who cares and loves. And he eliminates electricity, which while Klaatu did to gain attention, he ensured that he left it on in places that might lead to harming a human. Keanu has effectively killed everyone in flight and in a hospital. Thanks, asshole. Even if it is just a "reimagining", you'd think you'd imagine the parts that were effective and meaningful to remain. Updating the story for a modern audience could have been extremely effective, but that is not what happened. We got a story of peace bastardized into a a story of threats and tragedy.

Becoming a Better Artist

This isn't the blog I wanted to write today. But someone distracted me while I was outlining my SciFi movie essay so I'm still not done, but hopefully that will be something that interests you guys. For the meantime, I've started following some really cool blogs and I noticed that some of you draw. I started as a fine artist and I majored in film making when I went to college, but what I could never do was draw the things in me head, or draw digitally like in photoshop and everything. Holy crap was I always bummed out that I just couldn't do it. I thought I was broken and stupid. But you know...it was something I wanted to do and I decided if I sucked, then I sucked but I was still going to do it. So I draw. Often. Always trying to figure out a style. And well... let me just post some things I guess.

The first 6 are self portraits. 1. Is from 2013 before I graduated. 2. is from mid 2014. (there were way more in between but i can't find the files because I'm messy when it comes to saving things in the right location) 3. is from maybe this Feb, and 5. was around March of this year, trying a new style (it wont fit right unless its in that spot hence the break in order). So 4 is from April and 6 is from May, roughly. I started trying new styles and techniques to draw something I was familiar with, my own face! I used new brushes for each image. A new style. And just general ass busting drawing other things. It took time and effort and dedication. And finally, we get the fine piece. The first image from a comic I'm writing.The first thing I've ever made that I feel represents my traditional art and is worthy of print. And getting HER done was no easy feat. I have tons and tons of sketches of her that I've been doing for months in different styles similar to my portraits and just always trying something new over and over again. 

Whether you like my style or not is completely up to you. I'm not happy with some of the results, but you can see the improvement. And that's the point. Keep going and you WILL improve. Pick something you're familiar with and apply new ideas as you draw it each time, and you will learn and get better, then apply that to other things. And just keep going. I'm by no means a digital art pro. I'm a swell painter and portrait artist, and this has always baffled me and I have miles and miles to go before I'm really truly worth a damn. But you have to practice, and I promise, just draw something today, and keep working to improve with the next and the next, and in a few months, or maybe a year if you want to see it be a drastic change, you will see a difference. 

For art tips that really helped me through the years, I recommend the youtube channels Drawing With Jazza and Sycra.

If you wanna see more of my nonsense art, I have an artist page here.

The Gallows Mini

The Gallows follows a group of uninteresting teens with video cameras as they wander a school at night for reasons you don't care about and proceed to be terrified by rope.

And that's being kind.
My first major beef with this farce is WHY. DID. A. HIGH. SCHOOL. PLAY. CONSTRUCT. ACTUAL. FUNCTIONING. GALLOWS. AND. THEN. PUT. A. ROPE. AROUND. A. CHILD'S. NECK. ?????????????
Why? Seriously, this is more improbable than the ghosts. This is how you know instantly that it's fiction, aside from the fact that you're watching a mass distributed film of kids dying. This doesn't happen.
After that, you have kids whose names you'll soon forget do things for reasons you're supposed to care about again, like Unfriended, we don't know these kids or have reason to care about them and their social connections. There's a tiny bit of chemistry between the two leads in the play but that's really all. The rest is just over and hour of kids screaming in the dark with shaky cam, and every now and then it gets quiet and you get a jump scare that's more of a gentle startle and nothing too intense. The boy who needlessly died because some over zealous set builder built actual fuckin' gallows and hung the kid just appears as a shadow moving blurrily, scaring the teens by ominously laying out rope and every now and then, hanging one of them.

This was an absolute waste of time. It exhibits so little effort, it's embarrassing. This is something an average teen could make with 2 cameras and permission to film at their school with their friends. And yet this has a wide release and struggling artists who put thought and care into their work are stuck bagging groceries while these hack frauds scare people with goddamn rope.

Deadpool Don'ts!

So with the final release of the trailers for one of the coolest, uh, can we say superhero? ...Marvel Masked Entity with Questionable Morales, I thought I'd go through two of my least favourite Deadpool related comic series as I'm now finding this as an acceptable excuse to put aside what I'm currently reading and reread some old comics.

The first series does not exactly feature Deadpool, but it is still considered part of the series because the character in question was actually a replacement for Deadpool for a little while. Yes, "Agent X", the classic series that started in 2002. Now, 2002 saw a large trend in America. Adult Swim was becoming a late night hit, kicking off its run with more niche anime like the first broadcast of Cowboy Bebop, and eventually the premiere of InuYasha's English dub. The building popularity of gritty anime left an unfortunate impact on Agent X. While dips into other art styles and including non-American cultures was not a foreign (heh) concept to comics, Agent X just looks...stupid. The company behind this was UDON Entertainment, who not surprisingly work wit manga and manhwa.

What are the negative effects of this? Well...the art for one. Sandi, Deadpools secratary, has hair oddly similar to Aeris and breasts like Tifa, both of Final Fantasy VII fame. Other characters are equally goofy, sporty way too large shiny eyes, and spiky dramatic hair styles that would make Maester Seymore proud. The faux-anime art style clashes with the incredibly dull colours that make up the comic. It favours browns, grays, and navys, while the actual Deadpool series is bright and vivid, making use of bold primary colours. Another bad area the comic slips into is white-washing. Agent X goes by the name "Alex Hayden" but apparently is also named "Nijo Minamiyori". It feels incredibly Marty-Stu and reminds me of all those MySpace kids who had profiles saying "Hi my name is Zach Kuwabara Neko Gintama but my friends call me Vash or Kuro Lestat". Stop. But this isn't the only case of "this random white dude is secretly Japanese". Nope, most of the villains are white guys with Japanese names. The main offender is "Saguri", a woman with magenta hair and green eyes, wearing a traditional Chinese dress, wielding a samurai sword and using phrasing like "respectfully" and "___-sama". Basically a weeaboo Sansa Stark. Her boss, Higashi, is a Japanese crime lord who for some reason has facial tattoos. See, the thing about the Japanese gangster mentality and tattoos... Yakuza get full body tattoos that can be hidden under office attire. I've never seen one with extensive facial tattoos. Especially since they get them done in the traditional method of Japanese tattooing, I don't even think you can get a head tattoo! This comic screams of a sudden addition of perceived Japanese culture for edginess. While it's not to an offensive level, it's really annoying and makes the creators look amazingly stupid.

The story is weak in itself, having the Deadpool knock-off having a ridiculously endless arsenal of resistance level superpowers that would instantly get him thrown out of an RPG for "god-moding"and being essentially a crime syndicate story mixed with "you absorbed his powers and memories" level stunts. Eventually, the series was canceled and ended with Deadpool just returning to save the day and run the Agent X industry that was created to replace him and the drama with his licence. It's a boring run in the series that is briefly joked about elsewhere in Deadpool's various comics, and is really not worth your time or effort at all.




The next one I'm going to trash is actually a little bit on the popular side. It's Cable and Deadpool, another unfortunate cum dumpster for Rob Liedfeld. You know you've done something wrong when your most notable work is Youngbloods. His artistic ineptitude has ruined countless comics, and this one is no exception, except that this one also has the unfortunate addition of being not amusing at all.

I'm serious, the story is just completely uninteresting! It starts off with a cult that wants to turn everyone blue. And while its ripe with stupidity like that, Deadpool is also missing a lot of his wit. I remember that this was the first Deadpool series that I read and I hated it. People told me Deadpool was such a classic and he was witty and hilarious. But none of that translates into this series. It is a slog to get through and while it's only 50 issues, it feels like I'm reading Dune.

I suppose I have less to say on the story than I did Agent X because I read Cable and Deadpool a while back and I have no desire to do so again. I'm unsure of if I even finished the series or if I just skipped through to the end so I could go back to X-Men. Even articles going through the history of Deadpool don't linger long on this series. It's an unfunny disappointment.

I really recommend the Deadpool titles by Joel Kelly. I'm going back through those now, and they are everything you expect Deadpool to be. It's witty, funny, and startlingly brutal, with plenty of meta jokes to go around. And don't for Deadpool Kills the Marvel Universe and Killustrated!

Despite my capture services botching the process, I have managed to do my first semi-successful speedpaint from recording my Cintiq screen! I've fixed the recording problem for future pieces but for now, this isn't half bad! I'm working really hard on learning the best ways to paint with this, with hopes of doing fanarts and stuff for conventions :]

This of course, is Ayanami Rei from one of my favourite animes, Neon Genesis Evangelion. I'm super happy about it so far! I'm going to be making more to document not only my growth but to show my talents and hope that I can help and inspire other artists.

My 2 weekly longer articles are on their way. I've had a hectic week so far.

Unfriended Mini

So I finally got around to seeing Unfriended and I am pretty much as unimpressed as I figured I would be. It may have been really pointless to sit through it, because it turned out to be exactly what I figured that I would be, but I generally have a problem with flinging hate at something that I haven't given a chance.

All in all, I wouldn't recommend this film in the slightest. But I do have a teeny bit of praise to throw at it. I do think it is interesting to limit the storytelling to a computer screen. It makes it a bit claustrophobic because you just have this overall static screen that you can't get away from. What you can show and do with your characters is considerably restrained, so while some people can say that this was just lazy to have people sit there in front of a screen, it's clear that a lot of thought had to go into trying to figure out how to present traditional horror tropes within those confines. While some parts got rather contrived and stupid, for the most part I thought it pulled things off rather well.  

The rest of the movie, well, sucks. We aren't given the chance to know or care about the character as it wants to just get on with the killing. But the teenaged drama in just insufferable and it's unclear what emotions we are supposed to be feeling. Do I feel sad that they die? Do I feel scandalized by their betrayals of each other? Do I feel happy that the ghost killed everyone? I just don't know! 

Team Sansa: My "The Winds of Winter" and Beyond Speculations

So, as the title states, this is going to be about my favourite She-Wolf of Winterfell, Sansa Stark. Now, to preface this, I am going to be mentioning things that will most likely fall into the category of "spoilers". I have no idea what the HBO show is doing with her character, and I've ceased watching the show in general because the quality has really gone down hill (and also for the extreme disrespect they showed Selmy). So this is going to be talking about the books, and I mean all of the books, including Alayne Stone's sample chapter of The Winds of Winter. If you don't want to know about any of that, then I suggest going elsewhere. Don't blame me.

Anyways, Sansa Stark for some reason is/was disliked at first by a majority of the fandom. I am aware of their reasonings, I'm just not sure that I understand why they feel that way. Sansa starts as, and feminism forgive me, the typical little girl trope. She lives for the stories of knights and heroes and princes and kings. She likes nice dresses and wearing hairstyles and being a lady. There is nothing wrong with this. There are many individuals who adore the same types of things growing up in our own world, and we do not condemn them. Sansa really just starts from a point of disillusioned innocence. Her father's friend, King of the Realm, visits and suddenly, one of her dreams comes true. She is betrothed to the heir to the kingdom and one day might be a Queen. She has no idea of Joffery's insanity, and having grown up dreaming of perfection and fantasies, I think it's completely acceptable when everything starts to go horrible wrong and she latches onto those fantasies for dear life. She never expected Joffery to be an insane murderer. Her entire outlook towards her situation changes the moment Lady is killed, and you can't convince me otherwise. It's subtle, in fact her entire evolution is incredibly subtle, but from that moment on she is acting. Be it acting through her imagined fantasy, or acting to save her own life, she starts playing the Game far earlier than anyone else in the series.

My faith in Sansa stems from the simple fact that she has survived. Most people casually refer to her as a pawn in other player's hands without fully looking back and considering that the pawn might be playing as well. If one pawn can be a player, can other players not be pawns? We see other people manipulating each other around and around in circles. Sansa keeps herself alive in an almost literal lion's den. Theon and the Boltons prove that you don't actually need the person in question to claim that they are alive. Jeyne Poole, who barely resembles Arya, is married off to Ramsey and no one disputes it. Joffery has no issue with flat out murdering others. He started the damn war by killing Ned Stark. He could have killed Sansa with no problem, and all Cersei would need was a baseborn red head to throw at the North along with Jeyne. But Sansa somehow worms her way through everything and manages to be kept around. This girl should have been killed ten times over, but not only has she lost her father, her betrothal to the King, her brothers and mother, her homeland, and is forced into marriage with Tyrion, but she manages to win the hearts of Sandor Clegane, the Tyrell's, unfortunately Littlefinger, and aids to the direct murder of Joffery in front of hundreds of witnesses and escapes. No one in this series could be this lucky, unless you count the "masterminds" of the series, Varys and Littlefinger, who consistently fuck everyone around them over still get the people they wrong to be the ones who apologize. Now I'll have another thing later probably about Littlefinger and his fuckery, but for now this is all about Sansa.

And yes, Sansa is still a scared little girl, but she's been through a ridiculous amount of trauma. I don't think the average person would be able to hold themselves together for so long. But Sansa remains often times composed, and again ALIVE. And I think Sansa's "scared little girl" aspect is what really prevents people from looking so closely at her, which is what I think GRRM expects. Sansa is even arguably going through a type of rebirth. She has escaped the place of her traumas and been given a new identity, which once cast aside, reveals Sansa anew.

Here's where things start to change and Sansa's evolution really starts to become noticeable. She is now living with Littlefinger as "Alayne Stone" (which I think is a funny parallel to her mom who is currently Lady Stoneheart), his bastard daughter, and Littlefinger intends on killing off Sweet Robin and marrying Alayne to Harry the Heir and then revealing her as Sansa and through possession of The Eyrie and the North, further cut off power to Kings Landing. But what are Sansa's plans. Well, in her last published chapters, we see her figuring out her situation. She is playing adoptive mother to little Robert and what I think is most important, working to plot with Littlefinger. She is going along with his plans, but she doesn't have to. Petyr has already made his attraction to her known. In the past, Petyr's love of Cat was his downfall and Sansa undoubtedly knows this story because it seems like everyone knows the story of little Petyr Balish the loser. And what has Sansa done in the past with someone's weakness? She almost succeeded in getting Joffery to kill himself at the battle of Blackwater. If others had not intervened to STOP Joffery from being a fucking moron, then Sansa's coercion would most likely have been successful. Additionally, she engaged in self deprecation to appease Joffery and get him to desire having her around, alive, to torment. She knew what would work on him, and I think now she knows what will work with Littlefinger.




This is where the spoilers and speculation territory are really going to begin. I think one of the best places to start with my speculations is to point out something about Littlefinger. In case you haven't been paying attention, Littlefinger sees Sansa as Cat Take 2. She's the reincarnation of Cat's youth and beauty when he loved her and now his creepy ass is 24/7 Sansa. A lot of it's in the background but it's pretty easy to deduce what's going on. Knowing this, do you really think that he's going to be content with having Sansa marry someone who isn't himself and just stay that way? He's already murdered Lysa and is plotting to kill little Robert, so that when Sansa marries Harry the Heir, there will be no questions about who is in charge of The Eyrie. If something was to happen to Harry, then it would belong to Sansa and any child had by her and Harry which I'm pretty sure Littlefinger would have no issue in snuffing out. He could probably then marry Sansa for himself. Lets not forget that Littlefinger has Harrenhal as well. While there's not really anyone there at the moment, it is in a pretty prime spot between The Eyrie and The Riverlands. The Riverlands are in a bit of turmoil at the moment, but there are Tully's there who may see an opportunity for revenge if they see Lady Catelynn's daughter just across the way. The Riverlands, Harrenhal's region, and The Eyrie would create a blockade between the North and the South of Westeros. There is also the savage wolf pack near the Riverlands as well as Jaime and Brienne who may be out for vengeance towards the Frey's, so the Twins could potentially be added to that lot, almost completely taking The Neck. And then there's the question of The North. While I personally think that Stannis will return to The Wall and not remain at Winterfell, there's the question of who is going to be loyal to Stannis if he wins the Battle of Ice (which I speculate that he shall win). The Manderly's have already made moves to obtain Rickon Stark from Skagos via Davos, but will those Stark loyalists support Sansa? I think they might, especially if she arrives on the scene with all of this power backing her.

An issue with this is the fact that Sansa is a woman and women are not generally seen as the "rulers" of an area, but rather a place holder until they do marry. This doesn't mean that she wouldn't be able to lead any banners in the Stark name, because I'm sure many of her father's bannermen would see their sons as prospective husbands to Sansa and making themselves the ruling family of the North and maybe whatever other areas Sansa has claim too (which maybe she could get Harrenhal if she married Petyr). But useless men aside, there's another battle getting ready to brew in The Winds of Winter. Dorne is on its way to King's Landing, and for the Dornish, the oldest child is the one who gets the throne, which leaves the North to Sansa depending on what happens. Additionally, I doubt Dany and her dragon squad are going to require a king once she finally lands in Westeros, so that line of thinking may be completely thrown out of the window very soon. But I'm talking like Sansa won't have a husband, even though I already said that Littlefinger is clearly not going to let her go. And that's where we revisit the point I made earlier about Sansa using the way Joffery thought to manipulate him to his death (even though she was thwarted). Depending on how utterly stupidly in love she can make Petyr (which we see her practicing on Harry in terms of sexuality) she can probably get him to do something incredibly reckless that will lead to his ultimate demise at the hand of his perfect auburn haired dream girl.

From there on, I do think Sansa will make it through to A Dream of Spring. I think, as she's been shown to mirroring the Mother of the Seven, that she'll be the opposite of Cersei's attempted Queen regent as she takes care of Sweet Robin (if he survives) and Rickon (if he is able to get off Skagos). Whether she meets someone and marries them or if she remains alone and caring for what's left of her family in what's left of her home, I think at least she's going to survive and at least have plans to make for the North where her home is. Maybe they'll end on a cliffhanger of her heading up despite it being winter, or if she opts to hold somewhere else, dreaming of spring, so that she can return and rebuild, that's ultimately where I see her. Of course, the books are not done and all of this could be entirely wrong, but I am a Sansa fan. In fact there are few characters that I hate. I'm sorry if you're blind and just hate Sansa but that's your own deal, and I doubt I'm offending you by speculating that she'll really just unify and further devastate the South before retiring to a quiet life.

Book Talk: Naomi

I have recently found myself on a binge of old Japanese novels and came across one of the stories that inspired my work a great a deal. The novel is called "Naomi" by Tanizaki. To briefly summarize it before going into more detail, Naomi is story about a man named Joji who sees the titular Naomi working as a hostess. He is overwhelmed by her "Eurasian" features and befriends her before moving her in with him and eventually marrying her. Along the way he is forced to come to terms with the fact that Naomi is more than a face, and his inability to raise a child has created a destructive human being who uses him to live an extravagant lifestyle.

One of the key points of the novel centers around the Pre WWII obsession Japanese society had with Western customs. While the book mocks the Japanese' obsession, it oddly parallels the modern fetishism of Asian ethnicity. Joji finds general uninterest with Japanese society, idolizing the Western movie stars and their extravagance in contrast to his very traditional surroundings. His obsessions cause him to target in on a young girl working as a hostest in a cafe simply due to her looks. Specifically, he believes her to look like Mary Pickford (Madame Butterfly, Ben Hur) and finds extreme fascination with how her name is spelled the same as the Western name Naomi (Note: The Japanese name is said "Nah-oh-mii" as opposed to the English "Nay-oh-mii", with most Japanese spellings utilizing the character for "beauty"  while in English and Hebrew it means "pleasantness". Both of which have meaning in terms of Naomi herself).

Joji slowly befriends the girl and upon learning of her life of poverty, he asks her family if he may foster Naomi and send her to English and music lessons and rear her to be a socialite. The parents, happy to have one less mouth around, agree to the fostering. Joji tries to create a dream world where he can lavish Naomi with gifts while monitoring her growth and behaviour in a manner that is outstandingly creepy. After taking Naomi to the beach, he becomes more and more obsessed with the 15 year old girl's body and takes to washing it every night in the tub and recording diaries about her physical developments. He encourages her do whatever she wishes and to create her own fashions to set her apart from the"drab Japanese" and catch the eyes of the Westernized socialites, and repeatedly has his delusions crumble before him when he does get to compare Naomi in person with these individuals and finds that she does not measure up to them at all. His biggest disappointment comes when he tries to teach her English. It is unknown whether Naomi has a learning problem or simply knows that she'll get anything she wants regardless so she doesn't even bother, but she does not seem to grasp anything Joji teaches her (despite the fact that her English tutor insists that she performs well in lessons). Joji decides that Naomi is stupid and will never mix with the Western intellectuals. He then turns his focus on cultivating her body rather than her mind, which he has given up as a lost cause. Though Joji's narrations present Naomi as being dismissive of his attitude towards her intellect, her actions make it clear that she is not only highly intelligent, but that she intends to use this against Joji as time passes. Eventually, once Naomi turns 16, the two profess their love for each other and secretly go through the customs to become married. Not wanting their marriage public, they carry on "living like friends". Naomi begins to trash the house and refuses to do any chores, forcing Joji to hire several maids. She also refuses to cook and orders out all of her meals. Joji tolerates all of this, until he catches her talking with a boy her own age in their garden. Enter Hamada and Ma-chan. Hamada is a pimply boy with a crush on Naomi who attends the same music school she does. The meeting with Hamada leads to the meeting with the second boy, Ma-chan, when Naomi claims Hamada was only visiting to invite them to join the dance club at her school. Joji complies and becomes instantly enamored by the Russian dancing instructor so much so that he breaks his budget to continue on with lessons for months. In the meantime, Naomi gets close to a instrument player named Ma-chan. Naomi insists to Joji that they're all just good friends, which Joji goes along with, even allowing the boys to stay over one night. It all goes to hell, however, when Joji finds out that Naomi has been sleeping with both Hamada and Ma-chan behind Joji's back. Joji initially throws Naomi out for this, but as she slowly returns every day for her possessions, his obsession with her consumes him and he eventually caves in and agrees to spend all of his money on her and never to meddle with who she spends time with ever again in exchange for her staying with him.




As I said before, there is an interesting dichotomy between the two versions of Naomi's name. The Japanese "Beauty" is obvious, as the girl is pretty and attracts loads of admirers both in front of Joji and behind his back. The other one, however, pleasantness, is ironically the Western term and is the complete antithesis of Naomi. She is a complete pig, saturating the apartment with filth and wearing her filthy kimonos until they tear or become far too soiled. Her unrestrained rearing leads to her expelling extremely brash and tactless dialogue in inappropriate situations, which embarrasses Joji and prompts men to think of her as a lower class harlot. And her manipulation of Joji is downright horrible. Now, calling out her flaws does not mean I am an advocate for Joji's behaviour. He is downright disgusting. But his bad behavious does not condone hers. She can leave and go and be with anyone else, but she repeatedly returns to this pathetic creature to manipulate him further so that she can have whatever she wants without consequence. We see very little affection from her towards Joji, while she never hesitates to stand up for Hamada or Ma-chan. There's no sign she actually loves him at all. And again, it's a sign of her intelligence that Joji dismisses that she's able to pull of elaborate ruses to hide multiple affairs right under Joji's nose, and have him physically take her to where she needs to be to cheat on him. She is a mastermind, and she knows that Joji thinks she is too stupid to ever orchestrate the betrayals she racks up.

Joji is Tanizaki's way of showing the disillusionment of Western culture, and portraying his own people as stupid Joji being taken over the vicious harpy of Western civilization. It is as though he sees the men around him as comically stupid in their choices, and predicted a state of decline and depression for those willing to follow it.

While the core of the novel is a very sensitive topic (pedophelia, though not considered quite as such in it's day), it is still a wonderfully engrossing tale of two utterly horrible human beings using and abusing each other to obtain some sort of deep desire; Joji to "own" a beautiful Western trophy wife, and Naomi to experience riches and have relations with whomever she pleases. It is to be looked at through similar lenses as Lolita and not to be considered a proclamation of truth and acceptable actions. It also gives the reader a look at Japan in a pivotal period between maintaining tradition and idolizing the cultures they will be at war with in a decade's time, after which Western culture will almost entirely dictate the evolution of it's society from there on out.

The Obligatory Intro

Well, I am no stranger to blogging. I feel as though I have accounts scattered all across the web but none of them are cohesive or connected or, ehem, well maintained. And I say that BEGRUDGINGLY. However, I seek to remedy that. Right now. So welcome to Nerd-trovert. Whether I'm feeling rather introvert or extrovert is irrelevant, I'm still someone who spends way too much time debating A Song of Ice and Fire theories on the forums or screaming at horrible book adaptations, aaaand all the way down to nitpicking movies in a hellish, rage fill manner. This is a place for me to discuss things such as anime, comics, books, films, and video games. I hope it proves interesting to you.