Happy New Year’s and all that good junk.

So I just finished watching the Fate/Zero anime… the first half anyways. Two things come to mind:

1. Wow, the mages in Fate/Stay Night must have been pure crap, because there is a huge gap in power levels between the servants in Fate/Zero and Fate/Stay Night.
2. Wow, changing animation studios really powered up those servants.

I think Rider is my favorite character. I especially like how he put that stupid bitch Saber in her fucking place. Go back to the hole you crawled out of you false king! Speaking of Rider, I think the Banquet of the Three Kings was one of the coolest ideas this show has surprised me with since Irisviel laid Ilya.

As always, my opinions are available uncensored on the net, because children don’t know how to use the Interweb. I do believe that is a proper noun, so I’ve capitalized it.

During the bright sunny days of winter, I like to stroll through the meadows of my childhood, and pluck flowers from the desert wasteland dirt I once called home. I then press it between the sheets of the latest John Grisham novel and adorn them on my oak bookshelf so the aroma can waft throughout the house as the flower rots. Like most Americans, I live the American dream. I wake up early to a day of gratifying hard work and meager pay, then come home to my red-brick white-picket fenced house, and sit on my tire swing until I grow wary of the smell of smog. I have running water and a toilet that flushes, what more could I ask for? Manga.

There are only two things more important to me than manga: family and food; and I’m not completely certain of the latter. I like to involve myself in politics for shits and giggles, but when an issue severely affects my way of life; or more importantly, my manga… then I get mad. If SOPA really will hinder me from downloading manga, then people must die. I like to start from the top.

Very large book publishers Random House and Hachette Book Group have decided to support and lobby for The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) in the US. If SOPA or its backup bill Protect IP Act (PIPA) pass it will greatly change the Internet in many harmful ways for websites all over the web and their users. Random House handles distribution for both Vertical and the American division of Kodansha while Del Rey is a branch of Random House and Yen Press is apart of Hachette Book Group.

The Senate version is PIPA and SOPA is House of Representatives and if either passes it’ll include ways for the government to order American Internet service providers to block domain names of websites, payment services like PayPal to close accounts, search engines to modify their search results to not include sites, and ad services like AdSense from paying out to domains. Under SOPA Internet service providers gain immunity from blocking domains independently without request including if they’re blocking competitors if they themselves deem them as copyright infringing. Both bills would remove the provision of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act that protects web hosts if they make an effort to remove copyright materials upon request. Variations of fee, lawsuit, and prison penalties for unauthorized steaming and downloading of copyrighted materials are there too. All without being under the public eye and without any method to counter or dispute it before actions are taken.

Protecting copyrighted materials for artists is one thing, but this is an extreme and dangerous addition to already existing laws and abilities that can already be used against piracy. Many law professors already have declared the changes unconstitutional as entire sites would mean even protected speech is suppressed, burden of proof is on the accuser, and people are innocent until proven guilty. A blog or user of a site would have to be careful who they’re linking to that the site has original content or permission from copyright holders even if the site just has photos of a vacation, fan art, and screenshots. SOPA also means toying with DNS of domains which could mean a less stable Internet or even less secure, but neither SOPA or its sponsors address this.

Discussion of SOPA and PIPA isn’t enough and along with registering to vote there’s more. Contacting corporations who support these laws, canceling orders with SOPA and PIPA as cancelation reasons, not buying products and services from supporter and their companies, and contacting your politicians are more examples of taking action.

If you see any information as incorrect or have more ways to take action, you may comment here or on the forums and this entry will be edited. Merry Christmas.

Contact Politicians
Phone & email at AmericanCensorship.Org including email for US State Department if not in US
OpenCongress.org pages for SOPA and PIPA
Contact Publishers & Distributors
Contact page for Random House
Vertical info@vertical-inc.com and specific employees
Contact page for Hachette Book Group

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QZg30Dur5lM[/youtube]

So everyone that matters, that is to say, you the fans… has been tearing up for that sappy story in episode 20. Well, I have to agree the direction was remarkable, with the right buildup for Chihaya’s return to singing. But the script was lazy and boring.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0pNQfaEkM8?hd=1[/youtube]

If anything this scene from episode 21, where President Kuroi sabotages 765’s bgm was in my honest opinion the best scene to date; and let’s face it, nearly every scene in iDOLM@STER is amazing.

I can’t believe I just said that about an anime based off a milk-money fanservice franchise. Considering its roots, I guess we should be glad the characters are in color, but this series has already exceeded my expectations to a point where I can no longer remain silent.

Damn it Japan, you win again. Fuck you, idolmaster.

I’ve been thinking lately that anime doesn’t depict relatable human emotion as often as I’d like it to and began wondering why that is. There’s no shortage of drama in many anime story lines, after all. It shouldn’t be all that hard for a studio to punch you in the gut or make you cry out in joy since animation is a visual medium and we as human beings are quite used to seeing emotion playing out before our eyes in our daily lives. Why, then, do I feel like the depiction of emotion in anime is largely unsuccessful? In a word, I think the answer is melodrama.

Japanese entertainment on the whole seem rife with melodrama, to the point where I feel hard-pressed to name something that doesn’t include it. Part of this is certainly due to my limited exposure to Japanese media, to be sure, but I’m left to wonder why most of what I see from that nation suffers from excessive amounts of this literary technique.

This kid knows what I'm talking about.

I guess it’s worth talking about melodrama itself before continuing. For those not in the know, melodrama is essentially when a character begins acting almost irrationally emotional in order to appeal to your, the viewer’s, emotions as well. The plot can also be melodramatic, throwing characters into emotionally-charged situations without adequate explanation for the same purpose, to make you feel something. The inherent problem lies in the “make you” part, because the entire point is to force you to feel something that you might not feel naturally in a given situation. It can work, I’m told, but I’m not well-read or well-watched enough to summon up any recent examples.

This leads to a lot of scenes in anime where characters are thrust into a situation that doesn’t really match the tone or context of the rest of the show in order to drag an emotional response out of you. This can be as simple as an ordinarily upbeat and chipper show, perhaps even a comedy, suddenly being thrust into an emotionally charged situation at the very end. Thus, instead of laughing at some slapstick humor like you have been for a dozen episodes or more you’re suddenly exposed to a dark, sometimes downright disturbing situation and these fun-loving characters are changed into walking sacks of depression or anger. More insidiously, melodrama might be infused into the show from the get-go but not completely explored until the creators wanted you to suddenly be happy, sad, angry, or any other emotion. There’s a lot of ways that studios use melodrama, and in my experience it’s almost always bad for the show as a whole.

Another good example of melo- WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOUR FAAAACE?

So, there’s the foundation of my point laid bare. In my next entry I’ll give some examples of shows that make excessive use of melodrama (which shouldn’t be difficult, as my pictures have no-doubt shown) as well as shows that either use it well or don’t need to use it at all with better results. I’ll end with a question for you: Do you also find the depiction of emotion in anime somewhat lacking? Do you also attribute it to melodrama or do you believe that something else is at work here?

I look forward to your thoughts.

Couple days ago my pre-order of Lon’s best of CD came. Lon is a singer on Japanese video site Nico Nico Douga who does Vocaloid songs and many collaborations with other Nico Nico artists. Many of her songs are Kagamine Len and Rin with her ability to smoothly switch between them. She’s known for her little boy voice and many of her hits get millions of views. Her works include Remote Control, Hanging Garden, and GHOST which are also on the disc. A preview can be found on Nico Nico Douga along with Lon’s video list that has some of the included songs.

Bonus features include a strap for sticking on a keychain or apparel and a small mousepad both with designs of Lon’s character. Insert has lyrics and credit pages as expected. Releases such as these that have some of the songs with Vocaloid origins show human vocals can be as good if not better than the original.

EhNani here helped introduce me to this music quite a while back…all your fault. Thanks.

It can be bought on Amazon or many sites that sell similar music.