Someone did a Tokyo/London Comparison probably as an exercise in scale, but the image they ended up with was certainly not something I was expecting. Is this what you thought the two would look like when plopped down on the same terrain?
There is only one real option this week: Skyfall is finally hitting the big screen! Like everyone else, I have been waiting for this one. I got bored with Bond after Sean Connery left the role, but Daniel Craig brought the character and the franchise back to life for me.
Topping the movie list this week is The Amazing Spider-Man, the world class reboot of the movie side of the franchise. A related documentary, With Great Power: The Stan Lee Story, is also being released this week. I find that a bit confusing, because I watched the documentary several weeks ago on Netflix, usually the DVD comes first. Eleven Samurai was the 1966 martial arts masterpiece the more recent 13 Samurai got a lot of its chops from, although some have said they felt Thirteen Assassins was one of the models for Eleven Samurai itself. Whatever the relationships, this one has some amazing fight scene choreography and is a classic of the genre.
In TV, Wolf Lake is being released about a small town of Werewolves just outside of Seattle. This was made for CBS, who canceled the series 5 episodes into the first season. So while the 9 episodes in the box are the complete series, you can’t even say it was the first season, since that was supposed to have 13 episodes all together. While it isn’t exactly TV, the original movie house serials from the 30s and 40s became instant episodic programming presented on TV in the 1950s, usually on Saturday mornings to keep the kids entertained. So this would be the place to mention Dick Tracy: The Complete Serial Collection is coming out this week, a total of 4 different serials made by Republic Pictures fro 1937 to 1941, along wit a collection of special features. Why mention a cop show on this web page? He was originally a comic book character, and most of the criminals he was out to get looked just like the criminals from Batman, which is close enough for me.
We have a couple of entries in western animation this week. Arthur Christmas is from Aardman, the animation team that do Wallace and Gromit, as well as Sean the Sheep. We are also getting Red vs. Blue: Season 10, the finest Machinima Combat Comedy series ever made. If you haven’t been following this from day one, you can pick up 10 Years of Red vs. Blue and get all 10 seasons in a single box set. Since season 10 completes the story, once I get my hands on it I am going on a serious marathon, starting at the beginning of season 1 and watching the entire thing to the end. You can also watch it online at that link since it was originally Webisodes.
Kung Fu Panda: Holiday kind of falls between western and eastern animation, since it is a joint effort between the US and Chinese branches
of Dreamworks and Disney. This new short feature is 25 minutes of amazing animation and wonderful story telling. I hope they keep this production quality when they crank out the Kung Fu Panda TV series for Nick, and not hand it off to second string animation teams like the Penguins of Madagascar franchise did.
Horizon in the Middle of Nowhere starts off the Anime section for this week, with the complete first season. Humans came to Earth from the skies, and in order to return they have to follow the path in The Testament. But now only Japan is inhabitable, the other countries surviving armies have each taken over a piece of it, and the Testament ends this year and with it possibly the world. Psychic Squad – Collection 4 brings episodes 40 through 52 of the series, and more insanity from the Pre-teen psychics that have every security agency in the world scared to death.
Maria Watches Over Us continues with season 2, but while the audio is Japanese, it has an interesting set of English subtitles. One is standard English usage, the other retains all of the original Japanese honorifics, especially useful for those trying to learn polite Nihongo. Although there are some sites that claim this one will come out next week, rather than this. I should also mention Ristorante Paradiso, because even though neither of these is really genre, they are both worth checking out.
Sengoku Basara: The Last Party brings the final conclusion to the battleground series that began as a game and expanded into an Anime series. This is a historical epic full of gun-toting mechanized samurai and mystical ninja that stepped sideways through time to get to us.
There is a re-release worth noting this week: Golden Boy, in a complete series package. This started life as an OVA about a law school dropout who went to study what school couldn’t teach, and ended up being a nice little series about the various disciplines necessary to create a Manga/Anime. If you haven’t seen this one before, I think you will find it worth your time.
More J.R.R. Tolkien classic storytelling is coming to the big screen! Yes, we have all known this for years, and yes, this trailer has been online for days (or at least 1.5 of those day thingies) but DAMN it is good to finally get a glimpse of it! I am so ready for the next set of feature films from this franchise!
Not that I am into either Doctor Who or Animations, but I thought these instances were a bit of fun…
There are two animated full length feature films worth checking out this week, with The Pirates! Band of Misfits being another excellent comedy from the folks who brought you Chicken Run, Wallace and Gromit, and Shaun The Sheep. The trailer alone had me in stitches, the movie itself is a hoot. On the more action/adventure side of life Starship Troopers: Invasion is the fourth story in the film sequence, with Casper Van Diem as the executive producer. Which may be a bit confusing since it is an animated presentation rather than live action; but it is part of the feature film series, and not the Roughnecks TV show animations. And with Shinji Aramaki as the director (his work on the Appleseed movies, Halo, and Gasaraki among others prove his skill set in producing adult oriented mecha power suit combat films) this will definitely end up being a production Robert A. Heinlein would have been proud to see.
The live action movie this time is Battleship, which still makes me scratch my head; I consider this the strangest choice for a computer game you would want to turn into a movie, perhaps exceeded only by Solitaire. Unlike the two animated feature films this week, I will catch this one on streaming when it hits that market rather than add it to the permanent collection.
In TV, Once Upon A Time was one of my two favorite shows on broadcast TV (Grimm being the other) last fall, and with the new season kicking off at the end of September the timing is perfect for this DVD release. A big chunk of why I think that is I normally DVR broadcast TV shows and watch them from the hard drive, but with this series and Grimm I decided to try out a strictly streaming approach. Unfortunately between my workload from the office and some capacity issues with the streaming servers during peak usage times I missed some episodes of each series before they were replaced by the following weeks offering. So now I have a chance to catch up with everything that happened before the new season starts, and yes, I did grab the $10 off coupon the ABC Once site has posted, good for this week only.
The other TV show this go round is The Walking Dead: The Complete Second Season. I am not a horror fan generally, but my friends who are seem to love this show. I may get around to checking it out soon if they keep up the positive comments.
For western animation I am a bit torn on whether to give a recommendation or not. I absolutely love Dreamworks and all their masterpieces of whatever length, but this week is just confusing. The DVD is Dreamwork’s Spooky Stories, which is made from Shrek’s Thrilling Tales, as well as Scared Shrekless and Mutant Pumpkins From Outer Space. I already own the latter two discs which were released months ago, and I own another Shrek short DVD which may or may not be the third story under a different title. But if you don’t own any Mutant Vs. Alien or Shrek short presentations than I can definitely recommend it, as the stories are hysterical. I just wish they would have been a little less ambiguous about the included titles, so I would know if I already owned them all, or at least had a search function of the Dreamworks home page so I could find more information.
In Anime, Freezing is a tale of genetically enhanced schoolgirls called Pandora’s out to kill alien invaders with the aid of their male partners, known as Limiters. And yes, you may assume the males job does not involve any actual combat, this series being more fan service oriented than anything else. One particular newly forged battle couple (Satellizer el Brigette as the Pandora, Kazuya as the Limiter) seems to be under attack by their classmates as well as the aliens, and must work twice as hard to annihilate their opponents. This one is a bit pricey, running around $42 for 12 episodes.
Pretty much the opposite of that series is Koihime MusÅ – Ultimate Collection, about a woman warrior from historical times who becomes a role model for other oppressed women, who all take up arms and flock to her banner. This boxed set is comprised of 3 full series each of which is 12 to 13 episodes, plus a few OVAs, so even though the asking price starts at $52 for the set (lowest price, it ranges up to $80), you get 975 minutes of program for your money, which works out to $1.30 per episode for this series.
Finally, K-ON! Season 2 – Collection 2 becomes available. I know it isn’t genre, but it is about rock music, and that is good enough for me.