{"id":457,"date":"2006-08-04T10:56:28","date_gmt":"2006-08-04T10:56:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/scienceblogs.com\/principles\/2006\/08\/04\/cartoons\/"},"modified":"2006-08-04T10:56:28","modified_gmt":"2006-08-04T10:56:28","slug":"cartoons","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/2006\/08\/04\/cartoons\/","title":{"rendered":"Cartoons!"},"content":{"rendered":"

Over the last few months, Kate and I have fallen into a Friday evening routine involving the watching of Japanese cartoons. We started out getting discs of Fullmetal Alchemist<\/cite><\/a> from Netflix, and then taping the later episodes off the Cartoon Network, and then Samurai Champloo<\/cite><\/a> from Netflix, and most recently finished Vision of Escaflowne<\/cite><\/a> (a combination of discs loaned to us by Yoon Ha Lee, and Netflix). Somewhere in there, we also watched Cowboy Bebop<\/cite><\/a> and Hellsing<\/cite>, which were loaned to me by a student, but those weren’t really Kate’s sort of thing.<\/p>\n

Last week, we watched the first disc of Martian Successor Nadesico<\/cite><\/a>, which was… interesting. It was a little more manic than I was expecting, and had its share of Scary Japanese Id<\/a> moments, but after a little recalibration, I think it could be fun. The winking meta-commentary on other anime is kind of cool, even if I haven’t seen much in the giant robot subgenre (other than the occasional weekend morning show, back when the Sci-Fi chanel did weekend morning cartoons.)<\/p>\n

Anyway, we already tapped the collective wisdom of LiveJournal for suggestions of future anime to watch (and we have the first disc of Trigun<\/cite> from Netflix), but I’d be interested to see if the ScienceBlogs audience has significantly different tastes in Japanese cartoons than Kate’s LiveJournal circle of friends.<\/p>\n

So, what should we watch? Preferably something that’s available in English from Netflix.<\/p>\n

(Capsule reviews of the series listed above are below the fold, for taste calibration purposes.)<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Fullmetal Alchemist<\/cite><\/strong>: Excellent series, with lots of twists and turns in the plot, and a reasonable attempt at handling complex moral issues. The transitions between serious moments and bits of slapstick were occasionally jarring, but this is good stuff. Probably the most coherent overall story of anything we’ve watched.<\/p>\n

Samurai Champloo<\/cite><\/strong>: A road movie set in an anachronistic Edo-period Japan (complete with rapping samurai), following three unlikely companions on a quest for a samurai who smells of sunflowers. There’s a loose overall plot, but it’s mostly just an episodic series of adventures. Probably the most consistent tone of the lot– there’s some slapstick material, but it’s better integrated, and it’s got a cool look.<\/p>\n

Vision of Escaflowne<\/cite><\/strong>: Less teen angst, more giant robots, please. Thanks. Probably the silliest overall of any of the things we’ve watched, and not necessarily intentionally.<\/p>\n

Cowboy Bebop<\/cite><\/strong>: There might sort of be a plot arc in there, but it’s pretty sparse. Mostly a story about a group of bounty hunters roaming around the solar system attempting to round up bad guys. I liked this a whole lot (it probably edges Champloo<\/cite> (made by some of the same people) as my favorite), but I’m a sucker for noir-ish stories, and it’s absolutely got the best combination of cool character design and great music.<\/p>\n

Hellsing<\/cite><\/strong>: The second-best soundtrack of the lot, but the best single song (“World Without Logos,” the track that plays over the credits). Very distinct (and pretty cool) look, but I’m not sure what the hell happened, plot-wise. A little too much cringing from the Police Girl, and a little too much Japanese Id in her outfit.<\/p>\n

Martian Successor Nadesico<\/cite><\/strong>: I really could’ve done without the teenage girl captain’s father commenting on her breasts. I’m just saying. There’s a nice little meta-fiction thing going, where the characters realize that they’re basically in a Gundam<\/cite> plot, and the show plays off it a bit. It’ll be interesting to see where this goes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Over the last few months, Kate and I have fallen into a Friday evening routine involving the watching of Japanese cartoons. We started out getting discs of Fullmetal Alchemist from Netflix, and then taping the later episodes off the Cartoon Network, and then Samurai Champloo from Netflix, and most recently finished Vision of Escaflowne (a… Continue reading Cartoons!<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"1","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-457","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-pop_culture","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/457","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=457"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/457\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=457"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=457"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=457"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}