While genre movies seem to be missing this week, TV has Stephan King’s 11.22.63, an eight episode mini series about people traveling back in time to alter the Kennedy Assassination so it never happened. Also available is Supergirl: Season 1, now migrated to the CW network, which is a great call all around. They are the de facto DC Comics TV network now; they have added Super Girl to the channel already carrying Arrow, The Flash, and Legends Of The Future. I can’t wait to see what interesting crossover story lines they all build together.
In Anime, Absolute Duo: The Complete Series is about Koryo Academy, a training center for the art of war, where the students forge their souls into weapons. But Tor’s first combat experience is simple compared to his social situation at his new school. Together in Garo The Animation: Season One Part Two, León and Alfonso find each other an team up to begin winning their country back, even though they have radically different ideas about what their country is. Finally, in Barakamon: The Complete Series, uptight young calligrapher Handa punches out a critic, gets shipped out to a prison/rest camp, and has his life turned upside down.
Tales of Zestiria the X jumps straight into fantasy statecraft and combat, right from the beginning of episode 0 (yes, this series starts at the actual first integer of any numeric sequence). The artwork and animation are both quite good, although so far not spectacular except for a few fleeting scenes. The characters and dialog introduce what seems to be this series strong suit; its densely layered plot elements and action sequences, weaving together to form the basis of an excellent story, and story telling environment. Like all the other shows from this season, it is only 4 or 5 episodes along at this point, so there is no way to know if this is going to end up being one of the classics or an also ran. But I really like what it has shown us so far, and will keep watching it to the end of the season if only to find out if they can keep up the quality throughout, and deliver on the implied promise. I have high hopes, since this year marks the 20th anniversary of the Tales Of family of animations, with this being the latest.
I am watching this series on Daisuki, which has a number of shows you can’t see anywhere else, which makes sense; they are a consortium of Japanese Anime creation companies, and not a North American distributor of Anime, after all. They have just entered the Premium Subscription phase of a streaming services life cycle, and I am happy to report they are following the Crunchyroll Anime Business Model. In other words, your free registration with them allows you to watch everything the paid premium service gives you, with 3 differences:
1) Premium watches 1 hour after it airs in Tokyo, Free sees it 1 week after.
2) Premium has limited commercials (Free’s more numerous commercials are currently only promos drawing you into other anime shows they are running, but that won’t last once they can market it).
3) Premium can watch in true HD, as can Free. Guest (you didn’t sign up for a log in) tops out at SD.
That last point is different than Crunchyroll, which does not differentiate between unregistered and registered free, as far as I can tell. And the second point reminds me a bit more of Hulu rather than Crunchyroll, come to think of it, because there are NO commercials on Crunchyroll Premium. And all of these differences between providers explains why I watch it on Daisuki rather than Funimation, even though I have a Funimation Premium account which I really enjoy. For the most part, they only let you watch a few episodes of any given series until you sign up for the Funimation Premium account. I understand the business model, but would rather support the others, which are more appealing to me as a consumer.
Alderamin on the Sky is told as a history of a legendary tactician and general, who became great because he was lazy and had no interest in fighting. It is set in a very steampunk universe, with compressed air rifles and airships, and a technology base from around 1820 or so. It opens with our protagonist traveling with a childhood friend he is escorting on her journey to a military academy. They meet new friends on the ship they are sailing on, which runs into trouble leaving them stranded behind enemy lines. I was hooked by the end of the first episode, and every episode since has been better than the one before. We are up to the 4th episode, with a new episode popping up every Friday.
I have always been a Holmes fan, and Sherlock is the best there has ever been. So here are two offerings from this weekends Comic Con event, the new trailer, and the related gathering from Nerd HQ 2016 which benefited Operation Smile this year. The sessions of this project are referred to as A Conversation For A Cause, and it is exactly that. The format is a small intimate room at the San Diego New Children’s Museum, which seats a limited number of people, all of whom pay a noticeable (but not exorbitant) amount of money to attend. A small group of major players of some cult favorite show gather on stage, with another cult favorite actor from an unrelated property as the moderator. The folks on stage have a chat about the program they are involved in, then the moderator invites questions from the audience.
As near as I have been able to tell, 100% of the money raised by this series of events goes to the charity. The audience gets to have the kind of one-on-one experience with the show makers that used to be common several decades ago, when only us nerds and geeks even knew this kind of convention was happening, but which seems to have evaporated around the turn of the century. The participating actors, writers, and directors of these shows all get to contribute their time (and money; lots of them also make a contribution beyond their mere attendance), connect even more personally with their most loyal fans, and by doing so generate an impressive amount of revenue for the charity. As a person who was a member of the group who created the original Beg-A-Thon which was then used as the model all PBS radio and TV stations put into play to raise public awareness and money (crowdfunding decades before most people became aware that it was an option), I don’t see a downside to this project. The fact that they then make these sessions available to the general public (with or without editing, it could go either way but what I see makes me think without) is just yet another bonus as far as all us fans are concerned. Enjoy!
There is no actual genre I could find for western Movies and TV, but I will mention Hardcore Henry because it has such a unique visual style. Too bad they didn’t do it as VR. We did much better with Anime, where Arpeggio of Blue Steel brings the warships of the Fog into direct contact with the humans they isolate and attack. Log Horizon: Season 2, Collection 2 has the next dozen episodes about the trapped gamers, who are following up on some rumors about a potential way out while continuing their quest. When They Cry: Rei is the OVA collection with a few comedic episodes and a few more in keeping with the vibe of the main series, dark and chilling. One Piece: Season 8 Voyage 2 brings episodes 469 through 480 home (they are currently running episode 762, to put that in perspective). There are also a couple of shows being released in a S.A.V.E. edition, Date A Live: Season 1, and Code:Breaker; Complete Series.
We are only 3 episodes into the fall season, and already Taboo Tattoo has me looking forward to the new episode each Monday when I get home from work. The Tattoos are technology from an ancient civilization, each with a special power they give the wearer, a specific trigger that activates them, and a price they exact in return for the abilities they grant. The protagonist is a middle school kid who ended up being given his tattoo when he stepped in to defend a stranger from some street punks. He was promptly tracked down by a couple of American Army tattoo wielders. They had been tasked with locating a group of stolen tattoos and were hot on the heels of the man he had defended. There is also a psycho princess who just used her tattoo to murder her parents and take over the government of her island nation, as a stepping stone to world domination. She has agents with powers going to other countries to kill off the gifted and bring their tattoos back to equip her army. And that’s just in the first 2 episodes; it’s going to be a wild ride!
