12/23/2006 - LOVELY COSTUME
Ignore  luijivillasana's
highly detailed and informative posts about the nature of 2007's incarnation of
Toei's sentai franchise. Whilst in Tokyo Hands last month I was struck, like
Saint Paul upon the road to Damascus, by the revelation of the true nature of
2007's sentai. Oh yes.
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12/5/2006 - Complete Lies
"A recently leaked document from Toei surfaced on
2chan yesterday confirming rumour of an agreement between Disney and Toei to
adapt Kamen Rider Hibiki for the 2008 instalment of its popular Power Rangers
franchise. The document apparently contains specific references to suits and
footage during the entire run of the Hibiki series and the licensing of props,
confirming that new footage for the series will begin filming in New Zealand in January of next year.
It is as yet unknown whether Disney will license the concurrent instalment of
Toei's sentai franchise and run the Hibiki-based show back to back with a more
conventional Power Rangers series.
More news as it becomes available."
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11/25/2006 - Dream Team
Following mariko_azrael's
example I thought I'd post *my* 'Dream Team' for the anniversary Super
Sentai 'special':
- 椎名鷹介 Shīna Yōsuke / 空忍ハリケンレッド Soranin Harikenreddo
- 野乃七海 Nono Nanami / 水忍ハリケンブルー Mizunin Harikenburū
- 尾藤吼太 Bitō Kōta / 陸忍ハリケンイエロー Okanin Harikenierō
- 霞一甲 Kasumi Ikkō / 角忍カブトライジャー Tsunonin Kabutoraijā
- 霞一鍬 Kasumi Isshū / 牙忍クワガライジャー Kibanin Kuwagaraijā
What do you mean I'm not playing properly? ^_^;
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11/20/2006 - Project Ultraman-最新版奥特曼的预告片
anita3858 recently posted the 'internal' trailer for Chaiyo's Project Ultraman on youtube
(thanks to baltaned of 'lah for the heads up). Not entirely sure what
to make of it, although somewhat dissapointed that the main spoken
language of the trailer was in Mandarin...not that I've got anything
against Mandarin media but I was hoping for Cantonese version.
Hopefully a dub will appear for audiences in Hong Kong.
The
actual dynamic of the trailer isn't that bad, just standard action film
fare. UltraMother fits in quite well, a couple of the newly designed seijin looked
interesting at least but where the trailer really falls down is the
brief footage of the Ultras. The suits still look badly designed and
the editing necessary to keep both them and human actors in the same
frame looked shoddy and badly spliced together, which doesn't bode well
for the main selling point of the series/film/whatever it is this week.
I'm
still not entirely convinced Ekin Cheng as Ultraman is a good choice,
even if it is a fun idea...I don't really expect to be proved wrong but
I'm really interested in seeing the actual result of this 'project' and
how audiences respond to it. I can't help but feel that half the battle
has already been lost by Chaiyo's lack of understanding in making the
Ultras look decent.
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11/20/2006 - Kabuto in Shinjuku
Quite why there are ZECT operatives delivering letters in the outer
areas of Shinjuku is beyond me. None the less, that's what they're
doing. In
fact, Kamen Rider Kabuto himself, dressed in a blue boiler suit, his
hair grey beneath a white helmet decorated with ZECT markings and a
logo identifying him as the aforementioned Kabuto, seems to be doing
the rounds. I wanted to take ask
Kabuto-san if I could take a photograph of his somewhat
identity-revealing helmet but by the time I'd decided to do so he'd
disappeared inside a building clutching a handful of white envelopes. So there you have it. Kamen Rider Kabuto, making Shinjuku-ku a safer place for people wishing to send letters. Wow.
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10/30/2006 - A New Challenger
Variety
and Ain't it Cool News seem
to reporting on the possible revival of the Street Fighter II film
franchise. Allegedly, according to reporter Kei from the awfully named theOtaku.com
the film will follow the story of Chun-Li something that would be fantastic,
from my point of view, if only it's handled in the right way.
A
good step in this direction, in my humble opinion, would be the casting of
Mainland actress, Fan
Bing-Bing.
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10/7/2006 - Infernal Affairs English Remix
Chapman To = Dexter Fletcher
Anthony Wong = Timothy Spall
Andy Lau = Gary Oldman
Tony Leung = David Thewlis
Demandage.
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8/26/2006 - The Sex Situation of Seventeen Year-Olds ~ EPISODE #4 SPOILERS
This might well be come across as the
feverish delusions of someone with slightly too much time to kill but, during
the process of watching the first half of Stand Up!!, I've
become stupidly fond of the idea of putting together some of the female
characters in order to tell a slightly different sort of story. It's not that I
don't like the central storyline of the series because it is, by and large, one
of the best dramas I've seen to date, but certain events during episode #4
really make the possibility of other relationships not exactly plausible
but at least an interesting distraction.
The series is really solid in
the way that it presents the characters and the various different significances
of the way in which they interact, which makes the show truly enjoyable to watch
(especially seeing as it also manages to hit the right balance of drama and
comedy which so many Japanese dramas fail to get right) and, whilst I wasn't
planning on going out of my way to look for girlslash couples, episode #4 has
kind of lodged in the back of my mind.
EPISODE #4 SPOILERS FOLLOW:
If there's a character to blame
for this then it's Sonoko.The nature of Sonoko's fall from grace and the part
Ellen plays in it makes the possibility of Sonoko/Ellen almost palpable. I'm not
saying it's a good idea...but it would make an interesting story. I've just got
to work out whether I can actually write it or not.
Of course whilst
we're talking of couples I shouldn't write, Sonoko/Chie would also be an
interesting story, as would Isuzu/Chie and Shiho/Chie. There's a couple of other
couples in there as well, mostly focused around characters with names that are
never mentioned in any of the English language cast lists due to the brevity of
their roles, suffice to say though, that Chie, Sonoko and/or any combination of
those two characters seem to feature quite strongly.
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8/25/2006 - Tsubasa is Gay
BOYS LOVE
automated_alice
turned up some info on this little gem of a drama. A potential 'housewife's
choice', this drama seems to focus around, well, boy love between former
tokusatsu actors.
Cast/Crew of note: Saito Takumi (GARO),
Kotani Yoshikazu (Kamen Rider Agito, Justirisers), Taniguchi
Masashi (KyuKyu Sentai GoGoV), Matsumoto Hiroya (Mahou Sentai
Magiranger).
In all honesty I am genuinely surprised to see
Matsumoto Hiroya is still in work as I'd widely assumed that Magi was
going to be analogous with Abaranger in that the actors were simply going
to drop off the face of the Earth (with one or two exceptions) due to the
slapstick/comedy nature of their respective sentai shows. Still, perhaps away
from the Toei directors, Matsumoto might find himself in a position where he
really has to turn in some quality work...but I'll believe that when I see it.
Either way I'm not expecting that since he seems to be fourth down in
significance on the HP's cast list.
I'm sure I'll end up being
press-ganged into watching this sooner or later so more details will, sadly,
arrive as and when the drama is released.
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8/15/2006 - Thin Edge of the Wedge
I should start this post by saying how
much I truly love Mebius. I think the team dynamic is amazing and utterly
outshines the poor effort Toei have made in their own premiere 'team' franchise.
I think the character of Mebius himself is one that helps the viewer understand
the various human supporting characters as well as the colossal mythos of the
Land of Light. The effects are good, the acting is often sound and the suit
design, whilst not astounding, is also of a higher quality than many of Toei's
efforts (bar, of course, Nirasawa's creature designs).
The trouble is
that, like all tokusatsu, Mebius is 90% filler, 10% progressive
story.
I wouldn't have had a problem with that until the Bandai induced
sub-plots began to occupy a larger and more significant chunk of each episode.
I'm being overly harsh, I know this and I'm expecting too high a
standard from what, at the end of the day, is just good monster-bashing fun but
in many ways I feel somewhat justified in this. If the show hadn't encouraged me
to have faith in these characters and the promise of an epic story then I
wouldn't be in this position (in fact I'd be watching a new gen Kamen
Rider show because God knows those new shows really do nothing but appeal to
the lowest common denominator).
I remember feeling uncomfortable
at the first mention of Hikari but, as it turned out, the show managed to
accommodate him more than adequately...and yet, that isn't to say there's any
reason for him to play such a significant role. None the less, I tried to avoid
complaining because it's simply one of those recent trends that each show obeys
and, in the case of Mebius, it was handled in a fairly neat and mildly
interesting way.
If that had been the end of it I would have been
fine...
But it's not is it? It could never be 'the end of it' because, as
we both know, Hikari is just the thin edge of the large Bandai branded wedge.
Since the conformation that Mebius will indeed be getting a 'power up' my faith
in the show has wavered. Episode #17 - 18 have been sitting on the hard-drive
for some time now and I just can't seem to work up the enthusiasm to watch them.
ilustrador
pointed out that in many ways this power up could be Mebius 'growing up' and I'd
really love to believe that...but it just doesn't ring true for me. Even if it's
handled with the same respect and skill as Hikari's debut it still strikes me as
being just another way in which the story of Mebius is reduced to playing
second fiddle to the money making machine.
I really feel that
Mebius could have led the way for tokusatsu but sadly, until the genre
can free itself of the tradition of advertising it does feel that any series, no
matter how promising it is during the opening arc, is ultimately going to sink
before the weight of its own obligation to shift units and that, for me, just
doesn't make for good viewing.
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