An amazing video I had to share: Hayao Miyazaki makes ramen at Studio Ghibli! Sadly, nobody in Japan seems to pay their animators a living wage, so this kind of communal cooking is one of the ways they survive. Including, apparently, the big man himself.
In Movies we have Hot Tub Time Machine 2, a movie I haven’t seen but which was panned by just about every critic I have read. My thoughts are to watch this one when it comes to one of the streaming services I am already paying for anyways. We also get the animated fantasy Strange Magic from Disney and George Lucas, which looks like it could be quite fun (yep, I haven’t seen this one either).
TV gives us Beauty & The Beast: Season 2, which sadly only seems to be available in Standard Def. But it is in time to be able to binge watch it before season 3 kicks off on June 11th.
There is a single new entry in the Anime category this week, in the form of .hack//Roots: The Complete Series. One of this seasons shows which I am really enjoying, Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon?, is up to episode 7 on the anime series, but its Manga only becomes available in the US this Tuesday; I mention it because it usually works the other way around.
Finally, it looks like DC is ready to challenge Marvel for the Group Superhero Team Championship. Yes, I know I had recently said that about the whole prime-time character set they had put together for the movie Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, the film where we get to see a major chunk of the Justice League for the first time. After all, they really were DC Comics most popular super-group, and the only possible opponents in theaters against the Marvel Avengers franchise. But they just up-leveled the entire process by putting together their own small-screen challengers to Agents of Shield, a series that features a lot of lesser known but just as important characters from both the Inhumans and S.H.I.E.L.D. story lines. How could DC Comics possibly go up against them? With Legends of Tomorrow, which feature Arrow, Flash, Atom, White Canary, Hawkgirl, and a few more, out to save not a city, but the world. I particularly like the fact that they brought in Doctor Who companion Rory as Rip Hunter, the Time Traveler who put the team together. Thanks to Topless Robot for the links to the videos!
In movies, The Cobbler is a story about a shoe repair man working in the same shop his family has run for generations who is granted the ability to live his customers lives by walking in their shoes… literally. The premise has a lot of potential, but the critics paned the movie brutally, and is is coming out on disc only a month after it was in the theaters for very little money, not a very promising sign. These Final Hours is a film about the last 12 hours before a meteor wipes out all life on Earth; but even though its theatrical run was limited to a handful of screens in Australia, it has received acclaim from the critics and a 78% rating from Rotten Tomatoes. While not genre, Blackhat does star Thor’s Chris Hemsworth, but that may be about all that can really be said for it. In western animation we get Batman Unlimited: Animal Instincts, a new Batman vs. Penguin story.
In Anime, Muv-Luv Alternative: Total Eclipse, Collection 2 the fight to save humanity from alien invaders continues, but mankind may be its own worst threat. The leaders of several nations are willing to sabotage each other in an attempt to gain power, allowing the invaders to conquer still more of the planet. The Familiar of Zero: “Rondo” of Princesses brings season 3 of Louise the Zero and her magical misadventures with her human familiar and newly undead husband Saito. Finally, Michiko & Hatchin is having the complete series released in a S.A.V.E. edition, meaning you can now pick it up for somewhere in the neighborhood of $20.
Yet another Netflix exclusive TV series, this one was put together by The Wachowskis (The Matrix and Cloud Atlas) and J. Michael Straczynski (Babylon 5 and World War Z), a couple of my favorite Sci-Fi creators. As usual with Netflix originals, on June 5th you don’t just get the first episode, you get the entire first season. I worked very hard to ration myself for the Daredevil series, to not just binge watch it in a single weekend. I can already tell I am going to have the same fight with this show.
This time around the Cosplay is from a number of places, in honor of Borderlands: The Handsome Collection going into wide release. You can go to the home page or just enjoy the video, your choice.