Michael McConnohie and 9
Went to Nan Desu Kan this weekend, had a blast looking at all the costumes and spending more money than I should have. ;) the highlight though was when I learned who one of the guests was.
I didn't even realize Michael McConnohie was going to be there until at the opening panels he got up and started doing the voice from Tracks from Transformers
So I went up to him after the panel before he left, because he was talking with some other fans as well, and told him how much I loved him as Tracks. That got me a chuckle and we started talking about the more recent repaints. Just before he was taken away by the staffers he left me with the poem from Tracks. ;)
"You can paint me blue,
and you can paint me yellow.
No matter what you do,
I'm still a handsome fellow."
At which point my friends dragged me to a program called "Anime Radio" where a group of voice actors were redoing some "Flash Gordon" episodes from the late 1930s-1940s. And guess who popped up as the narrator and other various roles? ;D
And of course during autographs he was amazing too. Both he and Melodee Spevack stayed nearly half an hour after the expected cut off time to get through the rest of us in last little bit of the line. I brought up the commission of Tracks and he laughed again, stating "there's that handsome fellow". He wrote "handsome is as handsome does...and I do" on the commission before signing it and I had to laugh. I asked him to do the voice, expecting him to just say a line or something along those lines. Nope, he stands up and gestures for all the people in the line to be silent, raises his hands, and then proceeds to state in that Trackish way that I was a pleasure to meet and he hopes that I attend further conventions again. I felt like I would die, and apparently my face was really red, as I got teased by my friends after.
And we didn't get any pictures of him in the autograph line because the camera died, but I did get a lot of pictures of him when he was at the radio drama, where I was like 9 feet away.
He is an amazing ham though! But I loved him for it <3
Saw 9 last night.
EEEEEEE!
I absolutely adored it!
I've heard a lot of people complain that the movie was too open ended, the same complaint that I heard about "District 9" which I also adored. I have to say I'm a huge fan of open endings though mostly because there are no definitive endings in life, and I'm one of those who likes having a bit of realism in films.
The film itself was very dark, definitely not a kid's film for people who think it is. Dead bodies everywhere and souls being sucked out might give the kiddies nightmares.
The story is essentially that humanity has been destroyed by machines that the "chancellor" *cough*dictator*cough* had commissioned so that they could wage war on their neighbors. Instead the machines turn on them and proceed to gas everything out of existence. Before this can entirely happen though the scientist who made The Machine splits his soul to bring to life 9 dolls who are supposed to save the world.
Thoughts:
I adored the allusions to war torn Berlin (the first thing that popped into my head when we zoomed out on the scene of the house) and Hitler, as well as the fact that the machines built by The Machine had the German helmets.
1 kicks out 2 for being a nosy jackass, but also for being old, which strikes me as peculiar since they can't be more than one or two years old . And wouldn't 1 be even older than 2?
I also think 1 got the short end of the shaft in the movie. Most people are going on about how horrible he was, but you have to think. It's a time of war where he has to keep everyone safe. He and his "siblings" are very small beings in a world filled with horrors and destruction. The weight of leadership is never an easy one to bear and he does what he thinks is necessary to keep everyone safe. He's callous, yes, but look at what he's been surrounded by since he was first created. Fear and agony have been his teachers, in his own way he's just trying to keep everyone out of trouble. If he has to sacrifice one for the good of the group, he'll do it because he knows he can't keep everyone safe while overseeing one member.
8 is of course the huge brutish lump, because when we have huge characters they have to be stupid, yes? Also, don't do drugs kids! You'll get stolen by the freaky baby doll/cobra/worm thing.
2 is freaking adorable and reminds me greatly of Wheeljack from the Transformers. I really enjoyed the play between him and 5 before 9 started the machine that sucked out his soul. He is my favorite, simply because of his light manner and the calm way which he says to 9 "oh no, no" when 9 asks him if they're alone. Plus 2's candle hat is amazing.
3,4 and 6 should have had more screen time. 3 and 4 because they were ridiculously adorable and 6 because he seemed to have more information on the subject than any of the others. Plus he has the Edward Scissorhands's vibe going on, which is always interesting.
I enjoyed 7 as a strong female character and thought she was done very well. She was, I suppose a love interest for 9, but thankfully they didn't dedicate a lot of the movie to that.
5 was cute, he seemed really badass in the commercial but seemed to be more of a Woobie (tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheWoobie for those of you who don't know what a woobie is ;) ). Really enjoyed his dedication to 2 as well.
I also appreciated The Machine, who didn't seem evil as much as inappropriately programmed. Who knows what they did to the poor thing after they dragged the Creator away?
Of course that might just be me reading far too much into it.
And one last thing:
9, Get Out.
I didn't even realize Michael McConnohie was going to be there until at the opening panels he got up and started doing the voice from Tracks from Transformers
So I went up to him after the panel before he left, because he was talking with some other fans as well, and told him how much I loved him as Tracks. That got me a chuckle and we started talking about the more recent repaints. Just before he was taken away by the staffers he left me with the poem from Tracks. ;)
"You can paint me blue,
and you can paint me yellow.
No matter what you do,
I'm still a handsome fellow."
At which point my friends dragged me to a program called "Anime Radio" where a group of voice actors were redoing some "Flash Gordon" episodes from the late 1930s-1940s. And guess who popped up as the narrator and other various roles? ;D
And of course during autographs he was amazing too. Both he and Melodee Spevack stayed nearly half an hour after the expected cut off time to get through the rest of us in last little bit of the line. I brought up the commission of Tracks and he laughed again, stating "there's that handsome fellow". He wrote "handsome is as handsome does...and I do" on the commission before signing it and I had to laugh. I asked him to do the voice, expecting him to just say a line or something along those lines. Nope, he stands up and gestures for all the people in the line to be silent, raises his hands, and then proceeds to state in that Trackish way that I was a pleasure to meet and he hopes that I attend further conventions again. I felt like I would die, and apparently my face was really red, as I got teased by my friends after.
And we didn't get any pictures of him in the autograph line because the camera died, but I did get a lot of pictures of him when he was at the radio drama, where I was like 9 feet away.
He is an amazing ham though! But I loved him for it <3
Saw 9 last night.
EEEEEEE!
I absolutely adored it!
I've heard a lot of people complain that the movie was too open ended, the same complaint that I heard about "District 9" which I also adored. I have to say I'm a huge fan of open endings though mostly because there are no definitive endings in life, and I'm one of those who likes having a bit of realism in films.
The film itself was very dark, definitely not a kid's film for people who think it is. Dead bodies everywhere and souls being sucked out might give the kiddies nightmares.
The story is essentially that humanity has been destroyed by machines that the "chancellor" *cough*dictator*cough* had commissioned so that they could wage war on their neighbors. Instead the machines turn on them and proceed to gas everything out of existence. Before this can entirely happen though the scientist who made The Machine splits his soul to bring to life 9 dolls who are supposed to save the world.
Thoughts:
I adored the allusions to war torn Berlin (the first thing that popped into my head when we zoomed out on the scene of the house) and Hitler, as well as the fact that the machines built by The Machine had the German helmets.
1 kicks out 2 for being a nosy jackass, but also for being old, which strikes me as peculiar since they can't be more than one or two years old . And wouldn't 1 be even older than 2?
I also think 1 got the short end of the shaft in the movie. Most people are going on about how horrible he was, but you have to think. It's a time of war where he has to keep everyone safe. He and his "siblings" are very small beings in a world filled with horrors and destruction. The weight of leadership is never an easy one to bear and he does what he thinks is necessary to keep everyone safe. He's callous, yes, but look at what he's been surrounded by since he was first created. Fear and agony have been his teachers, in his own way he's just trying to keep everyone out of trouble. If he has to sacrifice one for the good of the group, he'll do it because he knows he can't keep everyone safe while overseeing one member.
8 is of course the huge brutish lump, because when we have huge characters they have to be stupid, yes? Also, don't do drugs kids! You'll get stolen by the freaky baby doll/cobra/worm thing.
2 is freaking adorable and reminds me greatly of Wheeljack from the Transformers. I really enjoyed the play between him and 5 before 9 started the machine that sucked out his soul. He is my favorite, simply because of his light manner and the calm way which he says to 9 "oh no, no" when 9 asks him if they're alone. Plus 2's candle hat is amazing.
3,4 and 6 should have had more screen time. 3 and 4 because they were ridiculously adorable and 6 because he seemed to have more information on the subject than any of the others. Plus he has the Edward Scissorhands's vibe going on, which is always interesting.
I enjoyed 7 as a strong female character and thought she was done very well. She was, I suppose a love interest for 9, but thankfully they didn't dedicate a lot of the movie to that.
5 was cute, he seemed really badass in the commercial but seemed to be more of a Woobie (tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheWoobie for those of you who don't know what a woobie is ;) ). Really enjoyed his dedication to 2 as well.
I also appreciated The Machine, who didn't seem evil as much as inappropriately programmed. Who knows what they did to the poor thing after they dragged the Creator away?
Of course that might just be me reading far too much into it.
And one last thing:
9, Get Out.