Strider's Sci-Fi

This time we get the orbital thriller Life, and the award winning comedy fantasy This Beautiful Fantastic. The later film slid right past a lot of folks, if you haven’t seen it you might want to consider checking it out. In Anime Norn9: Complete Collection has a nameless girl join the spaceship Norn in it’s mission to protect the planet from unseen enemies. The Seven Deadly Sins came out with season 1, part 2, while One Piece unleashed season 9, voyage 1, which covers episodes 517 through 528. Sailor Moon S released season 3 part 2, just because they can. While I don’t often mention re-releases, there is a classic this week you should be aware of: The Big O complete collection. A Noir detective with a Giant Mecha, what better combination could there be!

It has been a while since I have featured Bump Of Chicken here, so I thought I would share a few tracks released since my last posting. The first track this time around is called Answer the theme song for the anime Sangatsu no Lion, AKA March Comes in like a Lion. The second is called Ribbon, both were posted this April, while the final track is Go from their Stadium Tour 2016, recently released on DVD.

If you have a nearby theater that shows Bollywood films, Super Singh is the story of a man who accidentally gets superpowers and runs around trying to figure out what to do with them. The other option is the American/Dutch film Kill Switch, where the promise of limitless energy leads us very close to the end of the world. Neither movie has a web site I could find, and I wasn’t impressed enough with either trailer to post it here, so I will be catching up on my binge streaming this weekend.

The western winner this week is The LEGO Batman Movie, absolutely my favorite Batman movie of all time. Although that may change, seeing as Joss Whedon is taking over DC Cinema, including the Justice League movie and the Batgirl movie. Except for some reshoots, the filming is largely completed on Justice League, but Whedon gets to be in charge of the editing; so for the first time in years there is hope of a well rounded movie with humor to go with the dark drama.

Anime brings Chivalry of a Failed Knight: Complete Collection, a story of magical knights, one of whom has no magical powers whatsoever. Did you know Shirow Masamune, the creator of Ghost in the Shell,also did Cyborg Comedies? This week we can also pick up Pandora in the Crimson Shell: Ghost Urn, Complete Series, where cyborgs and scientists fight terrorists.

The Gayageum is a multi-string instrument from 6th century Korea, and artist Luna Lee has been using the instrument to play rock songs to very good effect. So good that she plays festivals around the world, including SXSW in Austin this year. Here are a few tracks to give you a taste, I bet you can name every one of these songs with no help from me.

When aliens invaded Edo era Japan, built skyscrapers, introduced motorized vehicles and pizza delivery, and told the Samurai they could not use their swords, many were not happy. Chief among them was Gintama, a Ronin desperate to make a name for himself. The new trailer for the live action feature film from this manga/anime franchise looks just cheesy enough to be good campy fun on the big screen. The release is on July 7th in Japan, maybe by Christmas in North America if we get lucky.

This week the movie choice is The Mummy, with a tone closer to the original movies than the more recent trilogy. The one thing it has in common with the more recent work is it does still look to be Action driven, rather than the original Horror underpinnings.

Just posted yesterday, a brand new live track from The Wagakki Band I wanted to share here, even though it includes a commercial at the end for the new DVD the track will appear on, being released on June 21st. There was a 2 day celebration held in Tokyo in February, all the tunes on the new release were recorded there. If I am following this correctly, I believe it includes the Wagakki Band teaming up with a major Taiko Drum Troop for at least one performance. In English Wagakki Band means a band playing traditional Japanese instruments, which this band does with a unique style. The live track is Snow Dancing, the studio track after that is 2014s Senbon-Zakura.

SPIDER-MAN: HOMECOMING is a perfect title, since Marvel recently negotiated getting the character back into the shared universe which includes The Avengers, and that agreement will run through at least 3 more films. It will be in theaters July 7th, and I will be there to see it in the IMAX theater, no doubt about it!

You would think this weekend would be a no-brainer, and you would be right: Wonder Woman is definitely the movie to see, and it is decades overdue. The Alamo Drafthouse in Austin upset a few folks when it announced a Women-only showing, but it sold so well they added a second showing, and may have to add a third before we hit the weekend. This is the first movie in the DC universe that has excited me as much as the string of blockbusters Marvel has been cranking out, and I can not wait to see it in IMAX 3D.