Do you want to know what happened to me during the past year?

This blog’s inactivity clearly indicates that something did happen to me. Is it good? Is it bad? I don’t really know. The most accurate word to describe what happened to me is simply ‘change’. I have changed. As the dust has started to settle in my mind, I am now ready to recount the events of the past year to you.

To make things more interesting and to avoid giving away too specific details, I will tell you about a bird with red feathers, in a story heavily inspired by the book ‘A Peacock in the Land of Penguins by BJ Gallagher Hateley’.

I was born in this small, snowy island. It wasn’t much but it was home. My friends and family had always admired me for my burning red feathers, my unique voice and my ability to fly high. I was strong and smart. And even though I could have flown to other islands, I chose to stay closed to my nest.

Like any snowy islands, the biggest and most powerful group of birds here was the penguin tribe. They were the very first group to settle here. They basically ran the island and made it prosperous. Given my glowing talents and energy, they accepted me into their tribe. I was happy to be recognized and to be part of a great, stable organization.

From the very first day that I joined the group, I was given black and white suits and was instructed to wear them every time I came to work. I obliged believing that if I conformed to their rules, I would be accepted and successful in their ranks. After all, their system brought them great wealth so it must work.

For years, I learned the penguins’ way. They were hard-working and disciplined creatures. They were short-sighted and they usually moved around slowly and uniformly. They held to the chain of command extremely tightly. Whatever the big elder penguins do, the rest followed.

I remained silent, refrained from taking flight, moved around slowly on foot. I did my best to act like them. As a result, I moved up the rank fairly quickly. And despite my contempt, I chose to conform. Although I was suffering working among them, I got to remain on this island, in my familiar places, in my comfort zone.

At one point, I was really high in their chain of command. I was running for one of the ‘top penguin’ positions. For the past few years, I ended up working almost exclusively among them and that’s when things really went south.

These top penguins are intelligent and thorough but far from perfect. Calling them narrow-minded and short-sighted would have been an understatement. The top penguins were obsessive about their hierarchy of power and the conservation of the routines. Their identities and values were solely dependent on their being superior. To them, there was only one way to do anything and that was their way. They mostly lacked empathy and usually saw the worse in other lower ranked penguins. The worst thing was, despite everything, they firmly believed they were ‘noble’ and ‘righteous’.

Phrases commonly spoken by the top penguins included the following:
‘This is the way it has always been done’
‘This is not your job!’
‘I am TOP PENGUIN!’
‘Do exactly what I say or we cannot work together’
‘When will you learn to put those red feathers away?’
‘We only accept REAL penguins here’
‘Are you saying it’s my fault!?’
‘Say you are a failure, do it out loud!’

I was oppressed, abused and sometimes dehumanized. I came to realize the cold hard fact that I have been blindly over idolizing them. What’s more, when I tried to reach for help, there was none given either.

I also found that some of the ‘top penguins’ were actually other birds who managed to seamlessly disguised themselves as penguins. These were called the ‘faux penguins’. There was one pigeon which thrived through obedience and meekness. There was a chicken which always complained about problems but did nothing to solve them. There was also an ostrich which buried its head in the ground and avoid facing any kind of trouble.

I was not a pigeon, chicken or ostrich. And I was certainly not a penguin. I was as intelligent and resourceful as the top penguins were, if not more. The top penguins knew that and it was the only reason they let me into their circle in the first place.

But the longer I was force to disguise myself, the more I suffered. My red feathers seemed to keep seeping through my penguin suits. The more I tried to make monotonous penguin sounds, the more often my true uncompromising idealistic sound slipped out. The harder I tried to walk the short-stepped walk in their line, the worse my urge to spread out my wings and fly became.

At first I felt ashamed. And the top penguins kept reminding me so. It took me a while to know that letting my self-respect and self-esteem rested on their judgments was not the way to go. They would never perceive my red feathers as beautiful. I was condemned for not being meek and silent. I was persecuted for not being able to swim like them and if I tried, I would have drowned. I had nothing but admiration for their ability to swim but they had nothing but contempt for my ability to fly.

During the last phase of my time on the snowy island, I sometimes chose not to wear penguin suits. I even occasionally flew around and sang with my own voice, alone. Oblivious to the fact that they were the real problem, the top penguins summoned me to their ice cave and started asking if I had any ‘problem’, or if I had lost my aspiration. In the second and third ‘meeting’, they outright said that this island only accepts ‘real’ penguins. And that was it.

It was intimidating to leave the island where I had spent my entire life on. That was the first time I had to leave my comfort zone. It was intimidating but if I still wanted to pursue the same goal, I had to.

I flew away and soon arrived on a tropical island. It was a whole new world. This tropical island was not as big, prosperous or organized as the snowy island. But it was warm and lively. I was immediately welcomed into the island by the local birds. On the very first day I arrived, one local bird told me ‘We have too few reds around, your fiery red color will make our group even more beautiful!’ and I knew I came to the right place.

There were all kinds of birds here; the magnificent eagles, the elegant swans, the busy hummingbirds, the colorful parrots, the wise owls, the scary crows, the friendly doves, the noisy ducks and all the species I knew from the snowy island, including the penguins. But here, none of them wore similar suits. Each bird did what they did best the way that suited them most. There were all variation of sounds, endless ranges of colors and a constant commotion of activities. To my surprise, many of these birds had also migrated from other places.

At the time I was writing this, it had been six months since I joined the tropical island. It was not perfect but I was happy. The most shocking thing was the realization that I had never been this happy for a long time. If I hadn’t left the snowy island, I would never have known that I was suffering. I would never even have a chance to see any other possibilities. I would have been trapped there just because I was too afraid to leave my comfort zone. I could not imagine what I would have become, what those penguins would have turned me into.

On the other hand, spending the past year among the top penguins had many positive effects. In a matter of months, I had come to know myself far better than the 20 years I spent among regular penguins. And I was happy to say that the ‘Me’ I have discovered was really, really cool. I had never known how strong I could be. I could have been broken, bitter or muted. Instead, I rose from the ashes of my past ordeal and evolved into an even greater version of myself, completed with stronger and wider wings, sharper sight, brighter feathers and clearer and unique voice.

I knew that now my life was full of possibilities and hope. I was free. I knew I had all the strengths I need to fly higher and farther. I enjoyed all the little things happening in daily life. I enjoyed all the new, diverse species of birds I met. And most importantly, I was grateful for my family who had always had my back through the hard times among the penguins. I recently flew back to the snowy island to visit them and the island seemed different from what I remembered. Of course, the only thing that had actually changed was myself.

So now you know what I have been up to all these months. I was not sick or dead or have given up. I was busy evolving, learning and participating. After the chaos, it took some time to really understand what happened. For the first time in my life I truly respect myself. I have no idea what the future holds but I know that whatever comes next I will be fine.

Lastly, I want you to know that I intend to continue writing about anime on this blog, though the pacing could be a bit unpredictable. Let the beginning of the year herald a new and exciting chapter of this blog, my life and yours!

Ps. I haven’t told you what species of bird I am. Feel free to take a wild guess!

Don’t let the fact that I spent over 5 years to complete all four seasons of Natsume Yujinchou discourage you from this series. It was quite brilliant, actually.

Natsume Takashi was born with an ability to communicate with spirits. Natsume inherited the ‘Book of Friends’ from his grandmother Reiko. In the book were names of spirits whom Reiko had defeated and bound them to her service. The book made him a target of many spirits who either wanted their names back or wanted the book for themselves. Naturally, he was labeled as a freak since he was very young because he often acted weird, spoke to things that were not there and strange events usually happened around him. He spent most of his childhood alone and frightened.

After his father’s death, he had been moving from one relative to another. The anime began when he moved into the Fujiwara’s family. Natsume later befriended Madara (aka Nyanko-sensei) and resolved to return the names in the Book of Friends to their owner, thus releasing them from servitude.

Natsume Yujinchou told the stories almost exclusively in episodic manner. More precisely, the series employed ‘monster of the week’ pattern in all of its seasons, with few episodes directly connected with each other. The anime contained little action, but lots of dramatic moments. It was certainly not made for kids since the anime’s greatest strength was in the details of the characters and their interactions with each other. This might sound too good to be true but I believed Natsume Yujinchou series had no bad episodes. In fact, most of them were great on its own and as part of the big picture.

The most prominent themes in this series were family, friendship, and the complex, non black-and-white world view. These topics had been extensively discussed in my previous posts published throughout the years. I urged you to read them because those discussions were the testaments on why Natsume Yujinchou was one of the most important anime I have seen. It gave me lots of new perspectives and insights.

These posts were listed below:
Thoughts from the Book of Friends: concerning ghosts and monsters!
More thoughts from the Book of Friends: concerning power and friends in the shadow
Living among the spirits; do you believe in Nyanko-sensei?

Natsume Yujinchou boasted beautiful artworks and good animation both for the characters and the background. The original score was soothing but not particularly remarkable. Special mention should be made on the opening and ending songs since all of them were catchy and easy to listen to. The productions, in combination with the story and characters, made Natsume Yujinchou a very poignant and emotionally resonant show for me. The presence of Nyanko-sensei, my favorite character, also added plenty of humor to the show.

As you might have noticed, I hardly had anything bad to say about this anime. It hit all the right notes for me. But with that said, the anime might not be as appealing to every group of anime fans. Its slow pace and repetitive pattern of storytelling might be boring to some. And its relatively open-ended conclusion might leave you feeling incomplete. I thought the ending provide enough closure to Natsume’s character, as we finally saw him dealt with the memories of his late father, and find his place with the Fujiwaras. But the audience was not told how many names were still left in the Book of Friends. For me, the Book of Friends was not that important. It was the object that put Natsume on his journey and brought the characters together but it was not the story itself.

In conclusion, I have apparently spent too many posts over the years elaborating on how good and inspiring Natsume Yujinchou was. It was no longer a new show. So if you haven’t watched it. Well, you should.

Rating: A

Facts

Title: Natsume Yujinchou (aka Natsume’s Book of Friends), Zoku Natsume Yujinchou, Natsume Yujinchou San, Natsume Yujinchou Shi
Genre: drama, fantasy, supernatural
Released date: 2008, 2009, 2011, and 2012 (season 1-4)
Episodes: 13 for each season
Director: Takahiro Omori
Animated by: Brain’s Base

It was still the story of boy and a girl. But this time, we had the boy who wanted to be a girl and a girl who wanted to be a boy.

A boy who wants to be a girl

Traditionally, when writing a story, the author often tried to use the ‘everyday type of guy’ as the protagonist in order to be able to easily connect with the majority of audience. This was where the slice-of-life stories could be creative. Since slice-of-life stories tended to be character-driven, these characters were the story. With that said, having the lead character as a cross-dressing boy was quite a bold move which warrant some compliment.

Wandering son was structurally similar to most slice-of-life, coming of age anime, but with an additional subject of gender identity mixed in. It centered on Nitori Shuichi, a feminine-looking junior high school boy, who wanted to be a girl and often cross-dressed outside school. Each episode, the audience witness Nitori interacting with different people around him and dealing with the gradual physical change as he was entering puberty. One of Nitori’s closest friends was Takasuki Yoshino. She wanted to be a boy and often dressed like one. These characters were basically finding who they were and where they would fit into the world.

Gender bender play versus the real world

A large portion of Wandering Son revolved around Nitori’s gender bender play for school festival, in which boys played female characters and girls played male characters. All classmates also participated and provided plenty of opportunities for interesting drama. Since the show focused on gender identity, Nitori’s gender bender play served as a good allegory to the society. We were living in a society in which each gender was given a role to play, a dress to wear, and lines to speak. Those who could not or chose not to conform to the script would face difficulties. Nitori’s play also displayed that these assigned dressed and lines did not have to be fixated on one gender and could be switched as the writers saw fit. We were trapped in our own traps. Nitori wanted to break free from this assigned gender role. And in his play, he could do that in front of the whole school.

Gender roles and sexual orientation

I noticed that Wandering Son focused mostly on challenging gender roles rather than sexual orientation. These two terms were different. Gender role referred to behaviors considered normal for specific sex. But sexual orientation was more limited, referring to attraction to another person of specific sex. In the show, Nitori seemed to be attracted to several girls despite wanting to be a girl himself. This raised another interesting point. Gender role and sexual orientation did not have to align. Relationship between two people could take any form and did not have to follow any specific pattern. The same could also be said about love.

How realistic and applicable was Wandering Son?

It was obvious that the anime wanted to keep its tone on the lighter side. Wandering Son’s setting was consequently staged in a rather positive way. I would not say that it was not realistic but I would say that in reality, things could be much worse. Nitori and Takasuki were surrounded by good and open-minded friends. They also had Yuki, a transsexual, as a mentor. Even when Nitori’s gender preference was made known to the whole school, he faced little negative response from other students. Adult characters, especially Nitori’s parents and teachers, could have had much bigger roles in Nitori’s evolution. But the anime apparently tried to limit its scope within the students.

I also could not help wonder about few other things. In the show, Nitori was very good-looking compared to general population. Things might have been different if Nitori was just average looking, or wasn’t as charming a person. In addition, much of gender expression in the anime relied on school uniform. But school uniforms were not universal. Personally, I could easily relate to uniform as representation of gender roles because Thai students were also required to wear them. I didn’t know how Nitori and Takasuki’s troubles with uniforms would affect audience who had never worn them.

Artworks and overall impression

Wandering Son was one of the most beautiful anime series I have even seen. Light, water-color-style of art work made the anime looked like sweet, fading, distant memory. It almost felt unreal at times. Character animation was incredible as well. The show progressed in leisurely pace, which was fitting for its overall tone. I liked Wandering Son a lot for its beauty and its challenging idea on gender identity. In conclusion, Wandering Son was a competent anime. It was positive, brave and thought-provoking. Though its pace and style might not be appealing to everyone, I would still recommend this show to every anime fans.

Rating: B+

Facts

Title: Wandering Son
Genre: drama
Released date: January 13, 2011 – March 31, 2011
Episodes: 11
Director: Ei Aoki
Animated by: AIC classic

Of course, Silver Spoon was an anime about farming. The anime took us far deeper into the agricultural world than we could ever imagine possible. Even more impressively, the show also had several ideas hidden beneath the farming stories (also read this post). Here I gave my general impression of both seasons of the show.

At its core, Silver Spoon was a coming of age stories of a group of high school students. But instead of a regular high school, the story took place in an agricultural high school, where major parts of its curricula and extracurricular activities involved farming. To help the viewers get into the world of agriculture, the story was told from an outsider’s perspective. Hachiken failed in his previous school in the city and had problems with his family. So he chose to attend the high school far away from his home and his previous life. He basically ran away. The rest of series followed him through his daily life in the new world completely unknown to him. We watched him struggled, grew up and eventually rose to the new challenges.

The anime was mostly episodic. Each episode focused on different challenge that Hachiken had to face, most of which were daily farming stuffs such as working with chicken, cows, riding horses, clearing trash, or baking home-made pizza. Typical events usually found in anime set in high school were all present; club activity, college planning, school festival, or visiting a friends’ house during summer break. As the series progressed, the audience learned more about Hachiken, his friends, and also a bit more about life. I had published a lengthy discussion about how watching Silver Spoon could affect the viewers’ lives here.

Despite its simple slice-of-life style and rather typical characters, Silver Spoon never ceased to amaze the audience with its in-depth exploration of the agricultural world. I didn’t know about other people. But for me, I never knew that making cheese and ham would be this complex and fascinating. Besides knowledge, teamwork and money, working with living things also required heart, respect, and even a bit of cruelty. The series did not shy away from mature or depressing side of things. It was made clear that in order to put food on the table, lives must be taken. And sometimes, the farmers had to weight those lives against other factors such as time and money.

The greatest strength of Silver Spoon was probably its comedic moments. Despite its often serious or technical subjects, the series managed to keep things on the light note for most of the time. It was one of the funniest shows I’d seen, thanks to Hachiken and Inada.

With all that said, Silver Spoon was not without flaws. The characters in this series mostly fell into familiar traits. Hachiken was actually an average good-natured high school protagonist we saw millions of time before. Komaba was the jock with heart of gold. Mikage was also a typical female lead, completed with kindness, intelligence, and looks. These characters were essentially flat and they were all very, very good people. Nevertheless, the show did not suffered much from this flaw. Silver Spoon did not give its character much complexity but, as I had discussed above, the situation around them were complex enough.

As expected in this type of series, a few episodes suffered from minor pacing issues and unnecessary fillers. The ending might not provide the conclusive wrap up that many would expect. But I thought the show ended on a very realistic note. There was no miracle or knight in shining armor coming to rescue everyone from his or her problems. Life could be cruel, but not without hope. Everyone coped and moved on. These characters’ lives did not end when the show ended. So I believed that Silver Spoon gave me the best ending it possibly could.

In conclusion, Silver Spoon was incredibly fun and interesting. The anime was also far more thought provoking than I had expected. Despite some minor flaws, I would still enthusiastically recommend it to fans of slice-of-life anime.

Rating: B+

Facts

Title: Silver Spoon
Genre: drama, comedy
Released date: July 11, 2013 – September 19, 2013 (season 1), and January 9, 2014 – March 27, 2014 (season 2)
Episodes: 22
Director: Tomohiko Ito, Kotomi Deai
Animated by: A-1 Pictures

According to Silver Spoon, farming could lend you some perspectives about life. So did watching anime about farming, apparently. Here I explored some of the topics that I thought was interesting from both seasons of the show.

Complete freedom does not exist

One of the earliest things Hachiken learned from school was that everything in the farm had its own specific purpose since its birth. For example, a pig was fed under predetermined food schedule, in order to specific weight. Every part of its body would become different kind of pork, with different prices. Female calves became dairy cattle until they were too old or injured, in which case they became meat. Hachiken was discouraged to get too emotionally attached to the animals. They had their jobs to fulfill and he had his.

Unfortunately, freedom was also the luxury none of the student could afford. Most of Hachiken’s friends were born into families with specific agricultural background. They were not free to choose their career because they were expected to carry on the family business, especially those from poorer family. Even in some students whose choices were not limited by financial factors, they still pursued careers in agriculture because they grew up in such environment. It was the world they knew best and they naturally drew inspiration from people around them.

So you see. Every decision we made was influenced by what we have been through. Complete freedom of choice does not really exist. We do not exist in a vacuum. We are the results of what happened before and probably the causes of whatever is coming in the future.

As one of his friend pointed out, Hachiken may have the most freedom to choose his own future since he came from middle class family of salary man. Ironically, Hachiken had always been worried about his future because he had no idea what he was going to do. Later, he started to see his condition as a reward and started to enjoy every new experience he had in the school. In the end, though he still hadn’t figured out about his future career, he was a much happier person compared to the beginning of the series.

Over-thinking and questioning the things around you

Hachiken was often lost in his own thoughts or could be overly obsessed about trivial things. His friends initially dismissed him as being overly thoughtful. But asking question was part of the learning process. Being an outsider, Hachiken often raised interesting questions out of seemingly mundane things that farm kids were already used to.

Life will never be boring if you keep asking question because it helps lend fresh perspectives to ordinary things. Hachiken’s questions lead to lots of further discussion in the group and actually made the whole experience in the school much more productive. Having diverse group of people, with different ideas and viewpoints, in a society was important for its growth and prosperity.

Destiny works in a mysterious way

When Hachiken arrived at Yezo agricultural high school, he was like a lost soul. All he wanted was to flee from his family and his previous life. He nearly fell apart when he found that the life in this new school was far harder than he anticipated. Hachiken also felt guilty for running away. He initially believed that his running away was the evidence of his failure as a student and as a son.

But running away was not always a cowardly or wrong action. It might just come down to how we look at each problem and action. The school principal said it best. He told Hachiken that he should not get stuck in the past. Running away eventually brought Hachiken to this new school and to these new people who inspired him. His running way brought about the change that he needed and opened up new doors for him. It was okay to fail or retreat when necessary, as long as he did not give up. But who knew what would become of him if he decided to stay back home and endured? May be he should have stayed and face whatever the problem he had.

Ultimately, it might just be destiny that brought him here despite endless of other possibilities. All he could do was to make the best out of today and stopped regretting about yesterdays.

***

Silver Spoon certainly went beyond being just another comedic slice-of-life anime series. The most impressive thing about this show was how it could present so many thought-provoking subjects in such simple and entertaining way.

You might have noticed that I haven’t rated this anime. That is what I am covering in another post.

After the disappointment of watching bland high school kids playing magical war games in Fate/Stay Night back in 2006, I was delight to see this series finally reached its full potential in Fate/Zero. This time, we got to see real magi in real battle. This review contains spoilers.

The fourth Holy Grail War had arrived and seven magi were chosen to participate. Each mage would command one heroic spirits (called ‘Servants’) in battle. The fight would be moderated by agents from the Church and the stage was Fuyuki city. The victor would be able to claim the Holy Grail, believed to be the ultimate wish-granting object. As you could see, the story was simple enough. So the real challenge was how the interaction between the seven Masters and Servants played out.

No more good versus evil

The first thing to note about Fate/Zero was that it did not relied on traditional good vs. evil approach, which was highly prevalent among action fantasy stories. Despite the proclaimed ability to grant something good, the purpose of the Holy Grail War was not to achieve world peace or elimination of evil. This was similar to the real world. The battle between good and evil happened every day and everywhere, but not everyone was directly fighting for either good or evil. People simply fought so that their wishes would be granted. In addition, the variable definition of good and evil also proved to be extremely complicated. The war in Fate/Zero somewhat reflected the struggles in real world, leading to an intriguing clash between people from different backgrounds and goals.

Mature, professional, and morally ambiguous characters

Like I had implied above, the best thing about Fate/Zero was the lack of annoying high school kids. Almost all the main characters in this series were adult. They knew what they were doing and they were more or less professionals. It was fun to watch these people bringing their best cards to the table. Given to the relatively long series, Fate/Zero managed to fill each character with enough details to make the audience cared about them.

Thankfully, the anime knew that no matter how big the action sequences might be, they would not be interesting without good characters and context to back them up. Each character was portrayed with different mixture of strengths and weaknesses, good sides and bad sides, and unique set of skills. The Servants, despite being mere tools of war tied to the will of the Masters, were also acted as human being. They all carried some kind of sins, guilt, or unfulfilled dreams over from their past lives, which subsequently affected their relationship with the Masters. So instead of have seven well portrayed characters and seven kinds of weapons, the viewers were treated with fourteen characters. And the interaction between these characters literally kept Fate/Zero above most other action, fantasy anime.

Among the best illustrated characters were the two lead, Emiya Kiritsugu and Saber. I like Kiritsugu but not for his tear-jerking, sad flashback scenes. Kiritsugu dreamed of a world without conflict, but he chose rather questionable (but understandable) means to achieving his dream. He was willing to kill in order to stop the killing. But could the end justify the mean? Saber, on the other hand, believed in walking in the righteous path even though the path might not lead to her goal. In the end, no matter which path they chose, the ones with the biggest dreams always suffered the most.

Battles without consequences

I personally didn’t like the ‘battle without consequences’ usually found in long-running action anime series. This kind of battle was when combatants fought for a long time using many skills but then something came up and everyone just dispersed without any conclusive results. I personally preferred short, intense and decisive battle like those found in Kouga Nippo Chou, or Psycho-Pass.

Action sequences in Fate/Zero were big and flashy enough and the close range combats were all well animated. But the battle between Servants often fell into the ‘battle without consequences’ trap, which bored me quite a lot in the beginning. On the contrary, I found the battles between the Masters far more exciting than the often straight-forward battle between servants. I love the tactics, the concomitant use of magic and modern weapons, and especially the mind games used by the Masters. Some even went so far as to make sure that the judge was on their side. Assistance from outsiders was also extensively utilized. Ultimately, it would seem like the fights between Servants were just a distraction from the real battles that were taking place in the shadows. Similar to the real world, the victors were often decided outside the arena.

The illusive wish-granting machine

Hadn’t anyone thought that maybe the Holy Grail wasn’t the answer? There had been three Holy Grail wars already, and no one had been able to obtain (not to mention use) the Grail yet. It should be obvious that there was no single wish-granting object that could solve any problem, even when you wished for something noble like world peace. As expected, no one got what they wished for in the end of Fate/Zero. Of course, this did not mean that peace was not worth fighting for.

Speaking of the Holy Grail and the ending, I thought the anime should provide more information regarding the events in the third Holy Grail war. The infestation of the Grail by another dark entity and the black substance flowing from it were related to the previous war. I was initially confused by the ending until I did some additional reading about previous Grail wars.

Conclusion, Fate/Zero might have been weighed down by some redundant sequences and confusing endings. But it was still a very competent action anime series, equipped with intriguing characters, thought-provoking premises, and excellent production.

Rating: B+

Facts

Title: Fate/Zero
Genre: action, fantasy
Released date: October 1, 2011 – December 24, 2011 (season 1), and April 7, 2012 – June 23, 2012 (season 2)
Episodes : 25 (2 seasons)
Director: Ei Aoki
Animated by: ufotable

Ps. the annoying high school kids return in the latest Unlimited Blade Work series. I guess we’ll see how that one turnout.

This afternoon, I laid down on the grassy ground near the beach and look upward. The sight of tree leaves moving slowing and the endless blue sky seemed so foreign to me. How long has it been since I last do this? When was the last time I really take a break both in the body and the mind?

I am writing this post while staying at a beach resort in Lanta Island in the Southern Thailand, where I am staying until after New Year’s holidays. I have been spending the past month in the South as a visiting fellow.  Staying away from regular environment and having more time on my hands really lent me some perspectives. I feel like the dust in my mind has somewhat settled down and I now see things more clearly. Somehow, all the things that had been troubling me for the past year seems rather trivial now. And even though I can see the storm gathering in the far horizon ahead of me in 2015, I know that I will be okay.

Well, I just want to wish you all, my readers and blogger friends, a very happy New Year.

I’ll certainly continue to write about anime, though the pacing may be slow due to tight academic commitment, which will thankfully come to an end this June.

p.s. My blog turn 7 years old on the past November 4. Let’s drink to that as well!

Piano no Mori was certainly interesting and inspiring. But why did it have to be in the forest? Couldn’t it be piano in the attic, instead? (This review contains minor spoilers.)

Born in the family of professional pianists, Amamiya Shuhei was raised to be one himself. Piano was not his hobby but it was his life mission. And he was very good at it. The story began when Shuhei moved to Moriwaki elementary school and met Ichinose Kai. Kai had never taken music lesson but he had been sneaking into the forest near his house to play the abandoned piano. After hearing Kai played, Shuhei realized that Kai might be far better pianist than he could ever be.

Practice does not make perfect

The story was simple enough. Shuhei represented a person who worked extremely hard to the point where he stopped thinking about his own happiness. He was accomplished and well respected but not really passionate. On the other hand, Kai seemingly had the gift since he was born. He never had official training and he played purely because he loved doing so.

As you might have heard, we currently believed that multiple factors contributed to a person’s performance of certain skill. Chief among those factors were genetics and practice. But of course, when you talked about human being, nothing could be clearly defined. For Shuhei, he had loads of practice hours and he probably inherited good genes from his pianist father. His house was predictably full of piano competition trophies. But he lacked passion. Kai, on the contrary, had no musician family members and had some unsupervised practice. But he had love and passion.

Although I thought that Kai’s talent in playing piano was somewhat too good to be true. Suspension of belief might be needed to accept that Kai was destined to be pianist and was only the second person in the world to be able to play this forest piano. But the message was clear. Love was another key ingredient in any skills. It could not be measured but it could be felt. That was one thing I could not argue.

Why did the piano have to be in the forest?

Couldn’t the piano be in the attic, the basement or somewhere else? It was told that the piano was especially made for Mr.Ajino but when he retired, the piano was sold to a circus and was eventually left in the forest. But seriously, the circus could have left the piano anywhere. Having the piano in the forest might make it looked mystical and beautiful in cinematic context. But it was far from realistic. Piano was mostly made of wood and strings, which would naturally degrade if left unattended. In this anime, the piano had to withstand sunlight, cold, humidity, rain and animal in the forest. Unless it was some kind of magical piano, it was hard to believe that it remained functional.

A shift in point of view

Here I would elaborate why Piano no Mori fell short in terms of storytelling. It was obvious that both Shuhei and Kai were the protagonists of the anime. I didn’t know how things were in the manga version but in the anime, the two characters’ arcs were not well balanced. The point of view through which the story was told was also inconsistent. In the beginning, the anime followed Shuhei until his meeting with Kai and the piano. But after that point, Kai took the center stage. We instead followed Kai through his journey to his self discovery as a pianist and his interaction with the people around him. In the climax, we saw Kai overcoming his fears and realized his own potential. Shuhei’s character arc, unfortunately, was underdeveloped. In the end, Piano no Mori was no longer the story of Shuhei like it had apparently set out to be. I would love to see more about Shuhei. How did Kai affect him as a pianist? Would he eventually found his own passion?

Since we were talking about imbalanced character arc, there was also another troubling character that emerged out of the blue during the last part of the anime. Takako was just another competitor that Kai met before the performance. But for some reason, a large chunk of screen time was spent on her during this part of anime where it should be focusing on its two lead characters. And in the end, this character did not have any long-term influence on either Shuhei or Kai. I suspected that she was a major character in the manga. But for a 100-minute anime, Takako’s character was redundant.

Other remarks

Piano no Mori boasted fluid animation. It did not shy away from animating the character’s hands when he played piano, which was really impressive to watch. The anime color template consisted of mostly dull earthy color. As expected, the background music was mostly piano. I used to play piano during my school days and it was nice to hear those familiar melodies again.

In conclusion, imbalanced, underdeveloped and redundant character arcs prevented Piano no Mori from reaching its full potential. But it was still a good anime overall, completed with inspiring theme and interesting premise.

Rating: B

Facts
Title: Piano no Mori
Genre: drama
Released date: July 21, 2007
Running time: 101 minutes
Director: Masayuki Kojima
Animated by: Madhouse

It was really hard to make Colorful sounded attractive. The anime overall was incredibly somber. Grey and blue made up for most of the film’s color template. Despite that, Colorful talked about how complex people could be and seriously explored several issues in our society. This review contains minor spoilers.

Colorful followed one rejected soul, who was given a second chance to redeem himself by living in the body of a junior high school student, Makoto Kobayashi. Makoto had recently committed suicide by overdosing himself with his mother’s medicine. This soul in Makoto’s body had to live through Makoto’s life and learned about the context behind his eventual suicide.

People are full of colors. Clearly, this was the main point of the film. The anime tried to display the wide range of colors in life and its characters; from the darkest of colors to the brightest. Despite its young protagonist and juvenile-looking style of animation, Colorful did not shy away from disturbing subjects, or sugarcoat them in any way. One of Makoto’s classmates, Hiroka, bought expensive clothes using money earned from selling herself to rich men. Shoko, another classmate, was eccentric and ugly. His brother, Mitsuru, hardly spoke to him and probably hated him. His quiet father was paid less than he deserved at work but did not complain. Meanwhile, his mother had an affair and was ridden by guilt. These people in Makoto’s life at first seemed to provide nothing but bad influence to him. And we could easily understand why he was so miserable. But Makoto himself was also far from perfect. He was bullied and had low self esteem. He hated his family for what they did and punished them with apathy and resentful words.

But these bad things were actually not the real problem for Makoto. The problem was that he only saw the bad colors in people around him. May be he was too young to see that these people also displayed other colors as well. The second half of the film showed that Makoto’s friends, despite their faults, were far from being bad people. His parents and brother, despite their flaws, loved him very much and would support him in whatever he chose to do. Hiroka was later revealed to be insecure and surprisingly caring. And Shoko was actually the one who had the best understanding of Makoto’s feeling.

Every person was multifaceted, full of colors. And they should not be defined by their worst colors, but rather by all the colors they had. Realizing this truth was all it took for Makoto to turn his life upside-down. He did not undo anything that had happened. He did not change anyone around him. He only changed the way he looked at them and his own life. Suicide was his own failure. It was neither his escape nor solution.

I loved the minimalistic style of character design used in this anime. Despite the fluid animation, I occasionally felt stark contrast between highly detailed background and the simple character design. The landscape shots depicting different places in the city were used to emphasize on how lonely Makoto was. As we frequently see him walking alone through lively places. The original score consisted mostly of quiet piano pieces, which suited the overall atmosphere of the film well.

Colorful was a masterfully crafted anime. It won a number of best animated film prizes in Japan, and rightly so. Its key message about life and nature of human was nothing new. But the way this film handled these universal issues were interesting and easy to understand. The ending also managed to deliver a surprisingly effective revelation. Colorful is highly recommended for anime fans, especially those into rather serious, contemplative titles.

The curious case of Makoto’s revival: additional nitpicking
In the beginning, Makoto died of drug overdose. The drug belonged to his mother, probably some antidepressants since she was clearly depressed. These drugs suppressed the nervous system and Makoto should be in a coma. For someone who had been in coma, he should have been placed on ventilator to support breathing. Instead, Makoto was seen on a regular bed, in a regular room without any life support. It’s as if they just let him sleep and die. Plus, after he woke up, Makoto appeared to be in perfect health. But in reality, patients suffering from drug overdose usually had some degree of damages on other organs, especially the liver and kidneys. These issues were trivial but they distracted me somewhat while watching the film. Of course, I did not took them into consideration while rating the film.

Rating: A

Facts
Title: Colorful
Genre: drama, supernatural
Released date: August 21, 2010
Running time: 127 minutes
Director: Keiichi Hara
Animated by: Ascension, Sunrise studio

Allegedly Miyazaki’s last directorial feature, The Wind Rises was similar to his previous films in many ways. But at the same time, it was also the one that greatly deviated from his other works. This review contains spoilers.

Loosely based on the novel ‘The Wind Has Risen’ and Miyazaki’s own manga, The Wind Rises was a fictionalized biography of Jiro Horikoshi. The film focused both on his career as an airplane engineer whose work included the Zero fighters used during World War II and his ill-fated relationship with Nahoko Satomi. During the time span of the film, the viewers also experienced events occurring to common Japanese people aside from those in the battle fields.

“Airplanes are not tools for war. Airplanes are beautiful dreams. Engineers turn dreams into reality”

A good film often gave the viewers different perspectives and some great films may even change the way we look at the world. Like other Ghibli films, The Wind Rises showed us that everything was multifaceted.

The Zero fighters, used by the Empire of Japan, were naturally regarded as machines of war and probably one of the Empire’s most recognizable icons. Telling the story of the fighters’ engineer could draw controversy to the film (which it did, to a certain degree). This is where I like this movie. It infused the heartless symbol of cruelty with humanity and emotions. The film only made subtle reference to the politics. Most of the story was told from Jiro’s perspective not as a creator of war machines but as an ordinary man who spent his whole life chasing his dream. The Zero fighters were the product of his love, not his malice.

Jiro’s relationship with Nahoko was, similarly, far from being straight forward. There was no doubt that he loved Nahoko. But his actions might lead some to think that he loved his airplanes more. After their engagement, Jiro spent all of his time working on airplane design. The two were completely separated. Even when Nahoko’s illness (tuberculosis) deteriorated, Jiro could only pay her brief visit. During Nahoko’s final days, she decided to move into Jiro’s house which meant that she would not receive the treatment like when she was in the hospital. Even then, the only time Jiro could spend with her was late at night. There was no easy answer. Jiro might be selfish for being so obsessed with work and leaving Nahoko behind or keeping her away from the hospital. On the other hand, airplane design was literally his life at that time. It was the one thing that defined him, not his wife. Jiro and Nahoko made a choice. I doubt that it was the best one. I even suspected that Jiro regretted his choice when Nahoko died. But I believed that they would have made the same choice, given a second chance.

“In the end, everything falls apart”

For a film that looked so bright and beautiful, the ending of the Wind Rises was as dark as it could get. Compared to other films by Miyazaki, this movie was like waking up from a long sweet dream to face a harsh reality. Jiro’s planes were successfully built but they were used as war machines and the sky eventually swallowed them all. Nahoko left for the hospital and later died while Jiro was at work. Her final words were nothing but the sound of the blowing wind. Jiro’s dream was realized but ended in ruins, as did his marriage. All he could do was to live on.

The fantasy element, which was often found in Miyazaki’s works, was limited to the occasional dream sequences. In other words, the Wind Rises was unusually grounded in reality. And it concluded in a painfully realistic note. Not every story has a happy ending. Nevertheless, the ending might not be that important. In fact, the ending was only an illusion. Jiro’s life moved on, even after the movie credit rolled. What really mattered was the good times he had while creating airplanes and with the ones he loved.

“Which would you choose: a world with pyramids or a world without?”

Watching The Wind Rises, for me, was like watching all past Miyazaki films all over again. I saw bits and pieces of his other films everywhere. Naturally, the looks and feels of the film were familiar to me. It was also a common knowledge that aviation was one of Miyazaki’s passions and this film was no exception. As a Ghibli fan, I saw The Wind Rises as both stand alone feature and a sequel (or final?) to Miyazaki’s long journey through the world of animation. The passion in anime-making was still palpable in every scene. I especially love the scenes that depicted mundane activities, such as Jiro absent-mindedly lighting his cigarettes, or when he examine the fishbone on his plate. These trivial events might seem irrelevant and unnecessary but they actually made the animated characters and this animated world more real than any live-action film.

“Who has seen the wind? Neither I nor you: But when the leaves hang trembling, the wind is passing through.”

In the end, there is really no need for me to elaborate further about the Wind Rises’ directorial or technical achievement. Besides the distinguished qualities I spent most of this article discussing about, the Wind Rises was another great entry from Studio Ghibli. The film showed me that there were many aspects to everything. There were beautiful sides to the seemingly horrible things and there were also ugly side to the apparently perfect things. The Wind Rises might be less appealing to children and offered no magic in its literal form. But the film itself was the magic displayed on screen because it was about life and life was full of magical moments.

Rating: A

Facts
Title: The Wind Rises (aka Kaze Tachinu)
Genre: drama
Released date: July 23, 2013
Running time: 126 minutes
Director: Hayao Miyazaki
Animated by: Studio Ghibli