This is a Fan-made series about what happened when Robin left Batman and struck out on his own as the hero Nightwing. The first 4 episodes are posted online over at Ismahawk YouTube Channel, with a fresh episode each week. It is not authorized by DC or Warner, but hopefully they will let them continue to create the show.
When I first started posting about videos coming out in a package you could buy and take home in 1993, VHS was the format, eventually replaced by DVDs. But DVDs got replaced more-or-less by Blue Ray (augmented is a better word, since lots of folks are still perfectly happy at Standard Def), and Blue Ray by 4K, and owning a physical object was supplemented by owning something you could stream online any time you wanted to watch it. Streaming things you didn’t own a license to has also grown into a huge industry, of course, with legal payment plans ranging from advertising-supported free, through monthly subscription service payments, to Video On Demand pay per view options. And yet here we are almost half way through the 20 Teens, and a decades old habit has me still referring to the Discs as DVDs. So even though I still own a working 1964 black and white 1 inch reel to reel General Electric video recorder/play back device (my first personally owned video processing system, the size of a desk and the weight of a full-size refrigerator, with An Unearthly Child as one of those spools of tape), and I still have close to 40 VHS tapes of movies like Mutant On The Bounty and Witch Hunt which were never released in more modern formats, I think it is time I changed the title of this series of posts to reflect reality a little closer. If you are interested in the timeline about the VHS/DVD/HD evolution, check out the Wikipedia Article to find out what happened when.
We get an assortment of movies out on Disc this week in a range to appeal to most tastes. There is the family friendly upbeat story of Earth to Echo, not a remake of ET, but appealing to the same sensibilities and audience. Life After Beth is also somewhat light-hearted, but with a darker side to it in a zombie love story. Snowpiercer went to the edge of Mad Max land, with a tale of after the end of the world. This South Korean sci-fi action film is based on the French graphic novel Le Transperceneige and has a world-class cast; I can’t wait to see it, because it certainly never came by a theater near me! the historic epic Kundo is about the end of the Joseon Dynasty in Korea, and the group which fought to bring an end to it. It was an 800 year long part of their history most remember with both longing and horror as an age of brutal repression by a hereditary aristocracy.
The Scribbler is darker yet, with a woman wiping out her multiple personality disorder wondering if she is going to be one of the personalities that does not survive; the critics were less than kind to this one. Finally, The Purge: Anarchy is the latest tale in a franchise that they perhaps should not have started, let alone continued.
TV had nothing I could find this week, other than a confused animated Batman reference which was only the Blue Ray version of something released weeks ago on DVD.
In Anime, Ghost in the Shell Arise: Borders 1 & 2 is finally being released domestically, after months of being available only as a very pricy import. It is the first half of a 4 part OVA that is somewhere between a prequel and a re-imagining of Masamune Shirow’s classic cyberpunk story, with all new character designs, voice actor assignments, and music. In a related story, the word is that Scarlett Johansson may star in the live-action feature film version of Ghost In The Shell that is ramping up for production in Hollywood. Bayonetta: Bloody Fate is a feature length Anime that brings the video-game favorite to the small screen, in all her heavily armed glory.
Sunday Without God: Complete Collection is the story of how Humanity got along after being abandoned by god. With the dead staying on Earth and no more children being born the Gravediggers are our only hope. A Letter to Momo is about a young girl and her three Yokai friends, who are doing their best to get her into trouble. This feature length anime has won multiple awards and been compared with From Up On Poppy Hill and Children Who Chase Lost Voices.
They have now finished the GGO (Gun Gal Online) story arc in season 2 of Sword Art Online and are about to roll out the next one, Caliber. They did the same thing in season 1, where the first story arc was a Clear-the-Levels dungeon quest, and the second one was a Save the Princess game. While I think they could have actually broken them into 4 separate segments, they chose to do them in groups of two. I am really enjoying the Anime, almost as much as I enjoyed the books by Reki Kawahara they are based on. The other set of books he created, sharing that same universe and also turned into an anime series, is Accel World, which I am also enjoying watching. If you haven’t seen them yet, take some time to check them out; I think you will enjoy them.
In movies, X-Men: Days of Future Past was the best film of the franchise so far, and I highly recommend it if you haven’t seen it yet. The other feature length offering is the recent Mr. Peabody and Sherman, the heartwarming story of a dog and his boy, and a rather abused time machine that may spell the end of the world.
To take full advantage of the film release, they are also making available The Complete Mr. Peabody & Sherman Collection, 450 minutes comprising all 91 of the original episodes. One of the more interesting shows to come along recently is Penny Dreadful: The Complete First Season, a rather twisted new take on some old stories and characters, including Dorian Grey, Frankenstein, and Dracula, all in a single story. If you need still more Victorian Gothic Fantasy, Dracula: Season One also comes out this week; enjoy it while you can, it didn’t get a season 2. And the final TV release for this round is Star Wars Rebels: Spark of Rebellion, bringing us back to the realm of animation.
In Anime, A Certain Magical Index II: Part One will be hitting the shelves, as will Holy Knight, a twisted tale of a Vampire Slayer and the Vampire that wants to have his baby… just before she kills him. There is also Naruto Shippūden: DVD Box20, as well as Naruto Triple Feature, which compiles the movies Ninja Clash in the Land of Snow, Legend of the Stone of Gele, and Guardians of the Crescent Moon Kingdom.
In the Strangely Entertaining category we get Kill Me Baby, a story of what may have been the most dangerous childhood ever lived, and Meganebu, a tale of the man who founded the Glasses Club, and got all the guys to join it on the promise of developing working X-Ray spectacles. Finally, there is also a S.A.V.E. version of Princess Jellyfish, making the ultimate nerd-girl a bit more affordable.
Topping movies this time around we get Edge of Tomorrow, the movie based on the excellent book All You Need Is Kill by Hiroshi Sakurazaka. I find it interesting that they changed the title of the movie to the tagline for the disc cover: Live Die Repeat. The other live action film this week is Sharknado 2: The Second One, so even a new rebooting of Howard The Duck would have gotten top billing over that. However, there is one more that is worth your time to check out; the animated Jack and the Cuckoo-Clock Heart. It features a world class voice cast in both its English and French audio versions, and the animation quality is top notch. I don’t find that much of a surprise, since this is from the team that brought us A Monster In Paris, is produced by Luc Besson, and is based on the concept album by the French rock band Dionysos, and the graphic novel La Mécanique du cœur written by their lead singer.
There are several good choices in TV, beginning with Hemlock Grove: The Complete First Season, the made-for-Netflix supernatural series. I found it very interesting, and just spooky enough to make it a good selection for an October release. American Horror Story: Coven – The Complete Third Season is likewise an excellent choice for the month that includes Halloween. Bates Motel: Season Two, Houdini, and The Following: The Complete Second Season round out the selections this time.
In Anime, Rozen Maiden: Zuruckspulen is a twisted tale of time and fate unraveling, as the adult Jun speaks with his younger self. Their goal now is to try to revive Shinku to prevent Kirakisho, the seventh Rozen Maiden, from unleashing destruction on both of their worlds. Also this week Gargantia on the Verdurous Planet is a far future tale of what happens when several members of the space-faring branch of humanity accidentally finds their way back to Earth. This one was the best series in the Spring season of 2013 for me, I watched each episode as it became available before any other show. This release includes the entire 13 episode series, the two OVAs, and the 13 Petite Gargiantia Mini-Episodes as well as the Petite Gargiantia Special. In other words, everything they ever made for the series is in the box set, including a bunch of things not previously seen outside of Japan. I would have posted the Viz Streaming Anime link rather than the Crunchyroll for this one, except it didn’t seem to be working.
Mobile Suit Gundam UC – Part 4 is a slightly misleading title, since the original series consisted of 7 one hour episodes, and this 90 minute long release is the fourth and final part of it. If you are a Gundam fan, you will not want to miss this one. And a couple of non-Terrestrial Pirate shows are being re-released this time around, Bodacious Space Pirates and Space Pirate Mito.
Syfy has a pitiful track record at made for TV movies, but both their original TV series and their miniseries have been excellent, and Ascension looks like it could be a winner. The premise is simple; what if the space race Kennedy started in 1962 didn’t collapse once humanity made it to the moon, but kept going. If that progress had been steady, by now we would be launching our first expeditions to the nearer stars… and what a different universe that would have been! Of course, to keep up that constant development, you would have needed someone to race against, who also didn’t falter or pause.