Reviews~!!
RIGHT. Reviews.
Manga:
Zombie Powder - Tite Kubo
Zombie Powder is a manga by the same artist who created Bleach. In fact, it was apparently his project before starting Bleach. I've been told it was apparently a flop, but I've picked up the first two volumes and I'm quite enjoying it.
Zombie Powder is about a man with a huge bounty on his head (a la Trigun) named Gamma Akutabi, searching for twelve rings of the dead which, when brought together, create something called the Zombie Powder. The Zombie Powder can bring the dead back to life or grant eternal life to the living. Of course, such a thing is highly treasured and he's not the only one who wants it, so a lot of things stand in his way. The second main character is a young man named Elwood gets caught up in Gamma's affairs and they team up, each to find the Zombie Powder for their own reasons.
It's the same kind of setting as Trigun, a sort of futuristic-but-not Western, with strange looking characters and wild weapons. I enjoyed this more than Trigun, though. The fact that Gamma fights with a six foot long chainsaw sword just grabbed me, I think.
The characters aren't particularly deep, but I've come to expect that from this mangaka. The humour is quite good, however, often butting into a serious scene to cut down the intensity a bit. I mean, when Gamma's introduced the first thing that happens is his long flowing coat is caught in the door of a bus and he has to run after it. Its action scenes are pretty good too, and its villains intriguing.
It's good for a laugh and it has the simplistic lineart style that I enjoyed so much in One Piece, though where One Piece has lots of rounded lines, Zombie Powder has sharp angles. It's a good read, and I'll continue buying it.
La Esperanca - Chigusa Kawai
I hold very, very little love for this series. I own six of the books, the expensive DMP style ones, and apparently the seventh is the last one. Why do I keep buying them if I hold little love for it?
Because I keep hoping something will actually happen.
The cover art attracted me to the first two volumes, and at first I kinda liked it. It's a boys love story set in a strict Catholic school, about the school angel, Georges, and the school delinquent, Robert, how the two affect each other's lives. The series is frustrating in the sense that every time something could happen, it doesn't. And I'm not talking about boys love scenes. I don't need them to keep me interested in a series. I'm talking about anything. I've never before found a mangaka who could span so many pages with what is essentially nothing at all. There's pictures and words, but somehow when I finish a volume, I still find myself backpedaling and trying to figure out exactly what significance, if any, the events I read about had.
Certain things about the artwork irk me, too. It's kind of hard to explain, but there's something in the faces I don't like.
The only thing that makes all this forgivable in my opinion is the side character Joshua, who becomes a little more important after volume two. He's SO MUCH like my own Joshua in appearance and behaviour (and the only openly gay character in the series) that I can't help like him and want to keep reading about him. But he's not the main character... and I don't see him nearly enough.
The series ends at the next volume apparently. I better get some wicked conclusion, or I'm going to throw a major temper tantrum. Srsly.
Anime:
Gintama
This series... oh my I hold so much love for this series. I've now seen 18 episodes, and a slowly developing plot is emerging from all the random. See a few posts back for the first 9mins of episode 1, if you don't know what random I mean. I'm not going to dwell too much on this series, since it's too hard to explain, the best thing to do is go back and watch it. I have to say, as a parody show, a lot of the Japanese cultural references probably go right over my head, but I still understand enough to laugh out loud at a lot of it. It's getting more and more serious now with the introduction of a dark character from Gintoki's past, and nothing involving him has been funny yet, which is weird for this show.
It's a real feel-good show, and no matter how crappy my day's been, watching Gintoki step on a land mine or having him yell at the other main characters because it took them 12minutes into the show to actually get to him and then scolding them because they haven't played the opening theme yet, really cheers me up.
I'm so buying the manga.
Manga:
Zombie Powder - Tite Kubo
Zombie Powder is a manga by the same artist who created Bleach. In fact, it was apparently his project before starting Bleach. I've been told it was apparently a flop, but I've picked up the first two volumes and I'm quite enjoying it.
Zombie Powder is about a man with a huge bounty on his head (a la Trigun) named Gamma Akutabi, searching for twelve rings of the dead which, when brought together, create something called the Zombie Powder. The Zombie Powder can bring the dead back to life or grant eternal life to the living. Of course, such a thing is highly treasured and he's not the only one who wants it, so a lot of things stand in his way. The second main character is a young man named Elwood gets caught up in Gamma's affairs and they team up, each to find the Zombie Powder for their own reasons.
It's the same kind of setting as Trigun, a sort of futuristic-but-not Western, with strange looking characters and wild weapons. I enjoyed this more than Trigun, though. The fact that Gamma fights with a six foot long chainsaw sword just grabbed me, I think.
The characters aren't particularly deep, but I've come to expect that from this mangaka. The humour is quite good, however, often butting into a serious scene to cut down the intensity a bit. I mean, when Gamma's introduced the first thing that happens is his long flowing coat is caught in the door of a bus and he has to run after it. Its action scenes are pretty good too, and its villains intriguing.
It's good for a laugh and it has the simplistic lineart style that I enjoyed so much in One Piece, though where One Piece has lots of rounded lines, Zombie Powder has sharp angles. It's a good read, and I'll continue buying it.
La Esperanca - Chigusa Kawai
I hold very, very little love for this series. I own six of the books, the expensive DMP style ones, and apparently the seventh is the last one. Why do I keep buying them if I hold little love for it?
Because I keep hoping something will actually happen.
The cover art attracted me to the first two volumes, and at first I kinda liked it. It's a boys love story set in a strict Catholic school, about the school angel, Georges, and the school delinquent, Robert, how the two affect each other's lives. The series is frustrating in the sense that every time something could happen, it doesn't. And I'm not talking about boys love scenes. I don't need them to keep me interested in a series. I'm talking about anything. I've never before found a mangaka who could span so many pages with what is essentially nothing at all. There's pictures and words, but somehow when I finish a volume, I still find myself backpedaling and trying to figure out exactly what significance, if any, the events I read about had.
Certain things about the artwork irk me, too. It's kind of hard to explain, but there's something in the faces I don't like.
The only thing that makes all this forgivable in my opinion is the side character Joshua, who becomes a little more important after volume two. He's SO MUCH like my own Joshua in appearance and behaviour (and the only openly gay character in the series) that I can't help like him and want to keep reading about him. But he's not the main character... and I don't see him nearly enough.
The series ends at the next volume apparently. I better get some wicked conclusion, or I'm going to throw a major temper tantrum. Srsly.
Anime:
Gintama
This series... oh my I hold so much love for this series. I've now seen 18 episodes, and a slowly developing plot is emerging from all the random. See a few posts back for the first 9mins of episode 1, if you don't know what random I mean. I'm not going to dwell too much on this series, since it's too hard to explain, the best thing to do is go back and watch it. I have to say, as a parody show, a lot of the Japanese cultural references probably go right over my head, but I still understand enough to laugh out loud at a lot of it. It's getting more and more serious now with the introduction of a dark character from Gintoki's past, and nothing involving him has been funny yet, which is weird for this show.
It's a real feel-good show, and no matter how crappy my day's been, watching Gintoki step on a land mine or having him yell at the other main characters because it took them 12minutes into the show to actually get to him and then scolding them because they haven't played the opening theme yet, really cheers me up.
I'm so buying the manga.