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Something to Watch: DVDs

There are actually a few good movies being released on DVD this week. In the just for fun category we have the Sorcerers Apprentice from Disney, starring Nicolas Cage. While I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting for this to win any awards, it has a blend of humor and adventure that makes it worth your time to watch. In a noticeably more serious vein, Valhalla Rising has won an assortment of awards at film festivals around the world. It is a story of slavery, escape, and loyalty in 1000 AD, although it seems to have something to say about religious violence as well.

Then we have a couple of silly movies related to each other. I am sure I don’t have to explain what The Twilight Saga: Eclipse is about, but the one I will be adding to my collection is its companion piece, Vampires Suck, the extended Bite Me Edition. Strangely enough, the Twilight flic doesn’t seem to be targeting Tuesday for its release.

I didn’t see much in the way of US TV releases this week, but China’s Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils appears to be worth a look. It is based on the Buddhist 8 non-human races for the make up of its cast, and the novel was serialized monthly for years before this rather complex story line was rendered for television.

There are two anime releases this week, each of which completes the season for its show. Hell Girl: Three Vessels – Collection 2 is the final 13 episodes of season 3, in which we learn Ai wasn’t as dead as she seemed to be at the end of season 2 (and just exactly where do ghosts and spirits go when they die, and how do they come back from there?). Her assistants had been having a peaceful afterlife until her return, and she has taken up possession of a schoolgirl (in the exorcist meaning of the word) to stage her Earthly operations from.

The other release is Birdy the Mighty: Decode 02, continuing the new adventures of Birdy the Mighty, a lethal interstellar federation agent who is more dangerous to innocent bystanders than the extraterrestrial terrorists who’s stolen weapon threatens to destroy all life on Earth. If you saw the OVA series from the previous century, you know what I am talking about. If you missed it, watching any episode of Dirty Pair will give you the general idea; some people just need to pay a little more attention to keep the collateral damage down to a reasonable body count.

Build Your Own: AMV, FMV

Dragoncon is one of the biggest media parties every year, based solidly in Fandom from its origins to its current incarnation, and encompassing one of the largest collections of creative folks from the US. One aspect of that creativity is expressed within the AMV or FMV competition, an event many cons have taken up. In its simplest form an Anime Music Video or Fan Music Video contest encourages you to take some video footage, either created by you or extracted from a favorite show or film and give it a song for a soundtrack. It rapidly gets more complicated than that, as you select the best scenes, try to match the lip movement to the song lyrics, and finally try to tell a unique story from these component parts. But even if you only achieve the first level, you have created something that has never before existed, which is always a good thing. I should also mention that the source laws for fair use have changed this past year, so you are allowed to rip your video segments directly from the DVDs if you want to now.

The DragonCon AMV 2010 is now over, and you can see the winners at that site (and maybe one or two at the end of this post). But the competition for 2011 just got serious this past October 1st, when the Fandom Music Video Awards went live. They are accepting contest entrants in three phases, or rounds: October 1st to December 31st, now underway, January 15th through April 15th for round two, and May 1st to July 31st for round three. Each round shall have its winners, and the finalists will be part of the con itself. The first video in the next segment includes some rules, hints, and trips. The others are a few of last years winners, starting with the Best In Show winner Building Steam, made from video from Steam Boy and the soundtrack being Steampunk band Abney Park’s Building Steam. Good Luck!

Something to Watch: DVDs

No actual winners on the movie front this week, although it could be argued that The Expendables counts since it was based on a comic book. Personally I prefer an actual sci-fi or fantasy story to count something as genre. There are a few that meet that requirement, like Deadland, a post-apocalyptic thriller about a man looking for his lost wife after WWIII. There are also a few Fangbanger films, Vampire Sisters and Lesbian Vampires. Please note that I did not recommend any of these movies, although Fire & Ice: The Dragon Chronicles could be interesting and has several actors I like.

TV shows didn’t fair much better, with the History Channel series Ancient Aliens: Season 1 being the only real selection from live action this week. Yes, I know the people doing the program think this is actual historical research, but until they bring in some actual physical evidence it is still science fiction. On the animation side Batman Beyond: The Complete Series becomes available finally.

For anime, the classic Ghost Sweeper Mikami – Collection 1 isn’t your Saturday morning ghostbusters type program. Reiko Mikami is very beautiful and very greedy; her sidekick, Tadao Yokoshima is a serious pervert hot for Reiko, which makes it easy for her to manipulate him to do all the dangerous jobs while she collects the money. Also out this week, the much more modern Sekirei – The Complete Series from Funimation. This series is a fun romp about a highly intelligent guy who doesn’t do well under pressure, and the bevy of combat babes who need him to unleash their special powers for the competition rounds. Once you are on the shows homepage, there is a link to let you watch streaming episodes online if you are not sure if this is for you.

AMV assortment 13

AMV – Anime Music Video – Is one of my favorite art forms. It includes the obvious, animation and music, but also the detail that makes it art; the ability to combine any two of those sources into something wholly new. These are a few recent AMV builds that I particularly liked.

Something to Watch: DVD’s

One of the most unique movies of the year hits the DVD stands this Tuesday: Scott Pilgrim vs. the World. I haven’t seen a movie that brought in its comic book origins that blatantly and still made me love every minute in a long, long time. On top of that it mixed the Gamer aspects of the graphic novel in ways I hadn’t seen before, and that many of the games turned into movies could have benefited from. If, that is, they had someone with the skill set of Edgar Wright running the productions. The cast brought their A-game to the party, the music was world class, the camera work was spot on. The film may not have done major box office business, earning $45 Million worldwide when it cost $60 million to make, but I intend to do my bit to help them break even by picking up the DVD, because we need more films like this.

There are a few independent films worth noting this week: The Last Vampire on Earth and Zombie Girl the documentary are not major films, but you might just find them each a refreshing change of pace in its own way. And a classic live action film from Tokyo this week, Shinsengumi Chronicles – I Want To Die A Samurai!, is also being released.

Taking the top spot for my personal Must Have list of TV program box sets this week is Doctor Who: The Complete 5th Season. Matt Smith and Karen Gillan have definitely made the Doctor and Companion rolls their own, which seriously surprised me. MY Doctor was Tom Baker. But then David Tennant blew me away, with his perfect Doctor incarnation; I figure that was going to be the last and best Doctor ever, and indeed he might still be. But Matt and Karen have not been the anti-climax I was expecting after David, and I have to attribute some noticeable portion of that to having Steven Moffat at the helm.

Interestingly enough, the other TV DVD box set coming out this week is also from both the BBC and Steven Moffat: Sherlock: Season One. Steve brings a whole new twist to the classic series of tales, just as he did with Jekyll.

A documentary holds the border between live action and anime this week: Secret Origin: The Story of DC Comics. It touches on 75 years of comic book history with a large number of the current big names in the business contributing to the project. Or perhaps it should be Detroit Metal City, a live action film about a skizo rocker (j-pop by inclination, death metal by occupation) who fights himself every step of the way that is SOOOO close to being an anime.

In Anime, Xam’d: Lost Memories – Collection 2 definitely gets my vote as the video to beat this week. It has great animation, a quality storyline, first class voice work (with either cast), and a soundtrack that includes the Boom Boom Satellites; what’s not to like? The other major release this week is also a good one; Tsubasa: Season 2 takes us back on the search for the missing feathers, or in alternate realities the missing memories, of Sakura. Yuuko is the one who shows them the path through the multiverse they might want to explore, but leaves the decisions to them, much as she did/is doing for XXXholic. When your story skips around through time, space, and parallel dimensions, your tenses and syntax can become a bit strained.

Finally, one classic gets re-released in a more affordable package: Comic Party Revolution – The Complete Series [S.A.V.E. Edition] comes in at under $20 for the whole season, for your dojin and cosplay entertainment. What gives this one a bit of added spice is the fact it is one of the about us otaku kind of shows, being all about a group of people that get together to put out their own manga.

King of Thorn screening

Next Wednesday, November 10th, the JICC, or Japanese Information and Culture Center, will be presenting King of Thorn on the big screen. The Medusa virus is sweeping the earth, turning everyone to stone. 160 carefully selected people are put in cold sleep to be awoken in a hundred years, so the human race will survive. But when they wake up, a lot more than a hundred years have passed, if evolution is any judge. The presentation is free although it does require a reservation, which is only fair for what will certainly be the first (and may just be the only) time this Anime feature film will play in a movie theater in North America (even if the screen is technically on Japanese soil, being in the Embassy).