"The only thing more terrifying than being blind is being the only one who can see," The doctors wife.
I was really excited about seeing this film because I had been waiting to see it for over a year! To my surprize, the reviews on the internet were spot on. This movie is a very painful watch; not the good kind.
The movie starts out with a japanese man who mysteriously goes blind while driving. He ends up stopping traffic. In order to get traffic moving again, a set of men rush over to help; one of the men volenteers to drive the Japanese dude home. Well, this man ends up being called The Theif because after dropping off the japanese man at home, he steals the car. Soon after this man goes blind, people around the world also start going blind. This blindness is not your ordinary kind. In fact, people can still somewhat see through a milky white haze. Due to this, this special type of contagious blindess ends up being called a disease. Once the blindess is seen as a disease, the people who have this desease are put into a sych ward in order to issolate them from the rest of the world. They end up having to fend for theirselfs because even doctors won't see them. Eventually, the guards who were making sure the blind people were staying in the building end up dying........
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Story wise, this movie is brilliant. I really wanted to buy the book, but could not find it. Before I could easily find it! Oh well. I'll still be on the hunt for that book because I keep hearing the book is brilliant and that's why people who have read the book hate the movies guts! Visually, the milky white haze was done really well. Other than that,this movie was VERY LACKING. I don't care how good the "story" was because that did not save the watchability of this movie.
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You're better off watching a different movie. Don't give this one the time of day unless your into women getting rapped in order to provide food... even that would not happen in real life.
.... I honestly don't know what to say about this movie. It's that bad!
Have you ever watched one episode of an anime and knew that said anime was going to be all sorts of epically awsome-amazing? Well, Ergo Proxy did just that (at least for me)! Not because of the studio Manglobe and not because of the art; because of the epic story. I'll explaine more in my review. Read on, readdddd onnnnnnnn.
ALSO, there is a new feature for these reviews- the AkiaDex! It's a dictionary that explaines various words and concepts found in any of my blogs (mostly for reviews). ___________________________________________________ -Summary- Romdo is a domed city built to protect it's citizens from an global ecological dissaster that made the outside world a place that life could not thrive on. Romdo houses all sorts of citizens- humans, androids known as AutoReives, companion type androids, and sepical types of citizens (who had to earn citizenship) called Fellow Citizens. One day the Cogito virus began affecting androids causing them to murder people and commit crimes they otherwise wouldn't even attempt to commit. Re-L Mayer is then assigned to investigate the Cogito virus. During her investigation she comes into contact with a Fellow Citizen who is connected to the creation of Romdo in a way that Re-L could not even imagine..... ___________________________________________________ -Credit(s)/Disclaimer(s)- All opinions expressed here are that of their individual owners and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Goggle Blogger nor that of their partners. The above image belongs to Manglobe Studios and FUNimation. I claim no ownership to any images used in my blogs unless stated otherwise, nor do I claim all these opinions as my own; just the ones that have Akia and/or Akia Tomiyo beside them (unless I'm the only one reviewing because then all the opinions are mine unless stated otherwise). ____________________________________________________ -Initial Impression(s)- I already knew I was going to love this anime because of the company that produced it. I had been wanting to watch this anime for about two years now; I would have watched it sooner, but I wasn't "old enough" when I saw the trailer on a FUNimation DVD. Initially, the anime really provoked my emotions =) I seriously love anime with robots who have minds of their own. I don't know where this fascination comes from, all I know is that it's there to stay for a long time.
_____________________________________________________ -The Music/ English Dub- The dub! It. Is. A-ma-zing. This is one of those rare anime where the dub surpasses the Japanese version! And the music! I'll just say I got my hands on both OSTs =) ___________________________________________________ -The Visuals- I don't have much to say about the visuals because if you know how Manglobe's anime looks, you know how this one looks. Excellent animation that hardley ever failed. Even side episodes were brilliantly animated =D
_________________________________________________ -The Story- The story incorperates (probably not on purpose) the Jesus Christ story, but in a twisted way. I adored this! I was watching every episodes wondering where they would turn (some dragged on a bit, but that's expected from an anime such as this). There were a few moments where I wanted to skip an episode, which is enterially ok to do with this anime because it's not an overly confusing one. I do not reccomend skipping because each episode has some nice tid bits of information that others did not have. You'll notice a tone change once you're half way through the series, but please don't let this turn you away from such an amazing anime!
1] Allen Walker was a homeless boy who made a choice that gave him the power to see the Akuma - skeletons in people. He also has an alchemists arm. Today, Allen Walker has decided to become part of a group that fights Akuma with the power of Innocence (Allen's arm is made with Innocence) and to find the person who trained him in the ways of fighting Akuma. [[this anime is based on the Jump manga of the same name]]
2] The International Solarsystem Development Agency (ISDA) in Japan has started creating "dragons" (mecha) in order to combat the threat of an asteroid only to find out that this asteroid is not their ownly trouble- dragon like creatured begin to cause chaos on Earth! [[this is an original anime produced by Gonzo]]
3] Albert had one goal in mind- to escape the reality that was his life. During his attempt to fufill this goal, Albert meats a count who seems to have a luxurious life. Intriged by this count, Albert ends up inviting him to paris to experience the Pari right life. [[loosley based on the book Le Comte de Monte-Cristo]]
I turned in Skin two days ago not only because it was due, but because I could not get into that book! It's just one of those books that gives you the end at the begining then goes to the past to lead up to the end. *sigh* First fail of the challenge!
BUT I picked back up Med Center: Virus and Flood =D
[Akia] I recieved an email today from Tokyopop that went like this....[Tokyopop] Hey all you Fruits Basket fans! We have another new series by Natusuki Takaya right over the horizon. And though it doesn't come out until March, we're hooking you up with a juicy sneak peek now!
[Akia] Can I just say, about time Tokyopop!!! Tsubasa: Those With Wings (Tsubasa o Mostu Mono) was released after Phantom Dream and before Fruits Basket in Japan. Tsubasa has a total of 6th volumes =D I'm looking forward to buying this one because I don't plan on buying Phantom Dream any time soon (the art is pretty horrid. No offense).
Also, the email mentioned that Rave Master will join Sci-fi channel's Ani-monday line-up on March 21, 2009. YES! I know a lot of people are going to complain about this because apparently the Rave Master anime wasn't that good (I beg to differ! I remember being excited for each new episode when it used to air on Cartoon Network). Ohhh, now I'm excited for March!!
"A person is created by God./ Gifted with a natural body, a divine soul. A person thinks and feels, is born and dies. A person has free will. You, on the other hand, are a machine. Built by man. Programmed by man. You may look like a person and act like a person; you may even, in your own way, believe you're a person." Skinned; pg. 175
Look at that cover! I actually picked up this book because the printing I bought has a comment on it by Scott Westerfeld (of Uglies and Midnighters fame) who happens to be my current favorite YA author- "A spellbinding story about loss, rebirth, and finding out who we really are inside." *faints from her fangirl-ness* Ok, this blog entry is not suppose to be about S.Westerfeld (no matter how fantastic his YA novels are). Besides that, I picked up this book because of the type of series it is- young adult sci-fi. I happen to love YA sci-fi =D
The book opens with Lia Kahn (a rich girl who is, not a surprize, the most popular girl in school and on the interwebs) somehow trying explain that she is dead yet not. This is because her little sister, Zo, asked Lia to do a huge favor which resulted in Lia getting into a car accident (the cars autopilot ended up malfunctioning) that resulted in her mortal death but her Skinned birth. To be Skinned, in this book, is to be downloaded into a fully prostetic (robotic) body after having razor thin pieces of the brain scanned into a computer. Chapter one set up the story really well, and was nicely paced. I haven't read such an orderly book start since Uglies, which made me, the reader, extremly pleased. I went on to chapter 2 with enough knowledge behind what a Skinner (person who has recieved the download- Skinned- process) is and how one might think- at least, in Lia's case. I felt like a mech-head (I would use the term skinner, but in the book if you have recieved the download process, skinner is suppose to be an insult).
No matter how awsome the first chapter is, the chapters that followed seemed to drag. At least, untill page 187 where Lia meets some of her own kind- er... at least they were suppose to be like her (but what's a good story without a twist? this is where that twist occurs for Skinned). At this point, the book became one that I could not put down. The pages before seemed either like the author was trying to fit too much at once or too little, but by page 187 Wasserman got her act together resulting in a nice reader experience where the reader, in this case me, became Lia Kahn, the skinner. I mean, mech-head. A teenager struggling with the fact that what she now is has many advantages, but the sacrifice for these advantages is ones mortality.
Overall, Skinned had a nice start, rough middle, and crispy end. The first chapter was brilliant because of the pace and structure of the story, but by the next chapter and on, I became a little frustrated with the stories structure yet by the time Lia meet some of her own kind, I realized why this story is written the way it is- to have a non-organic flow. Lia's no longer and org (mech-headders term for organics- humans), thusly, the way she tells her story would have to have some geometrical sort of style. In the end, I'm left wanting to reccomend this story to all sorts of readers: sci-fi addicts, YA fannatics, people looking for something to read that is along the lines of the Uglies series, bored people and anyone in between (unless you don't like chessy romance, because there is some in here. Really well done chessy-ness if I may say so).
Oh, I'm so sure I did not tell you! By the time you finish this book, you'll long for the next one. That's right, folks! This is the first book in a series- a trilogy. The next book, Crashed, is set to be released in September of 2009. You can check out Wasserman's site to learn more.
"I was a ghost in the machine./ A mech-head./ A Frankenstein./ A skinner." Skinned; pg.32
Ok... if you've seen anything in the Ghost in the Shell franchise, you'll understand my surprise when I saw "a ghost in the machine" in Skinned. I actually would not be surprized if Wasserman got this little piece of her story from the GITS franchise, because it is an amazing one that spans 3 movies, an ova and 2 anime series. GITS also tells the story of a character that has a fully prostetic body and a cyber brain (but in GITS, almost everyone has a cyber brain which makes having a cyber brain the way to go while in Skinned, having a downloaded brain is seen as messing with what God created- at least for a radical group that tries to harm Lia in the book). Other than that, I did not find very many connections between the two because in GITS everyone knows they are still human where as in Skinned, Lia struggles to find proof between her still being 'alive.' I like this connection (because I'm an anime nerd).
I was born into this world a girl and I still remain as one! I later became an otaku (at the tender age of 13), meaning I can be a perv at times (but not nearly as much as over the top ota's who have too much time on their hands). I devote most of my time to reading manga, watching anime, reading YA novels and messing around on the computer (I'm not a hacker). I do play video games and eat, but the first list is what I use most of my time on other than sleeping ^__^
"The only thing more terrifying than being blind is being the only one who can see," The doctors wife.
[Tokyopop] Hey all you Fruits Basket fans! We have another new series by Natusuki Takaya right over the horizon. And though it doesn't come out until March, we're hooking you up with a juicy 
