Category Archives: English Language Modern Visual Fandom

September 25, 2007

On This Rock, Kamina Builds His Church

By omo

Simon from Gurren Lagann shares similarities with Simon Peter of the Way. YA RLY.

You can read about Saint Peter here. Shimon indeed.

So it’s not a surprise that on this rock (does the term Cathedral Terra make sense to you now?) Simon builds Kamina’s church? But before people jump to conclusion about Jesus, let’s talk about Simon Peter some more.

For many scholars Peter is one of the most interesting disciples Jesus had out of the original 12. Some of them consider Peter being the spokesperson for the 12, and at least in the New Testament he was a leader of the early Church. We see him most notably when he gave the sermon at Pentecost with the baptism of the three thousand.

But he was not that sort of a man as we could possibly imagine with the brand of Christianity as you and I experience today. Much like Gureen Lagann’s Simon, Peter fished and lived humbly as a fisherman off the Sea of Galilee. He was a little rush-headed and oddly shy at times. Unlike Simon he wasn’t really a great fisher either (as Simon was a driller). But like Simon, Peter had a brother who told him of the good news.

In contrast, Gurren Lagann’s Simon isn’t likely one who would jump to cut the ear off someone; decidedly he was much matured after 7 years since he parted with Kamina. The transformation is also seen with Simon Peter from his moment of denial with the reconfirmation with Christ after the resurrection.

Am I stepping out a little too far with this bit of analogy? Maybe, but far from it be Gainax’s bag of tricks to pull punches from Christian lore. There are quite a few of the superficialities that make sense once you connect the dots. Much of the Gurren-dan can be paralleled with Jesus’ disciples. The transformation of Kamina City under Rossiu’s rule and his eventual redemption may be a little bit out there, but talking with the evangelicals today that might resound a little louder with them.

But is Kamina Jesus? I don’t think I’ll go that far, especially because there are just too many key dissimilarities. But his death was much less meaningful than his resurrection, even if only in spirit.

3 comments | posted in English Language Modern Visual Fandom, Modern Visual Culture, Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann

September 19, 2007

Well Done, Mikan; the Mystery Continues?

By omo

Mikan loses to Konoka by 6 votes in round 2 of Saimoe 2007. She joins her crew in the heaven of lost moeliciousness, having an ~~beer~~ice cream.

According to this post on 2ch, foreign votes affected the outcome since Konoka got an extra 59 votes, sealing the deal.

And I bet most of those 59 votes are cast by people who speak English. Or not? At first glance, that data just concludes how foreign votes (IP not originating from Japan) pan out to, as I’ll cut and paste below:
0543 0400 0143 41.17% 37.59% 56.08% 26.34% è¿‘è¡›æœ¨ä¹ƒé¦™ï¼ ãƒã‚®ã¾ï¼ï¼Ÿ
0537 0453 0084 40.71% 42.58% 32.94% 15.64% ç¨²æ£®å…‰é¦™ï¼ˆã¿ã‹ã‚“ï¼‰ï¼ ãŒããˆã‚“ã‚†ãƒ¼ã¨ã´ã‚ ã¾ãªã³ã‚¹ãƒˆãƒ¬ãƒ¼ãƒˆï¼
0239 0211 0028 18.12% 19.83% 10.98% 11.72% æ²™è‹±ï¼ ã²ã ã¾ã‚Šã‚¹ã‚±ãƒƒãƒ
In other words, out of the total 543 votes, 143 of Konoka’s votes originates outside of Japan. That could simply means people in Japan are voting from non-Japanese IPs, so it is inconclusive merely through that as to which demographic contributed to :3-chan’s loss.

A look at the by-the-hour chart of vote allocation, we get a better picture–Mikan held a comfortable lead at first, but it slowly went away until the end of polls, where she was upset. If we take the presumption of average internet usage–that Saimoe and its kin of tomfoolery take place during the night (8pm-2am) rather than during the day, we can see that Japan (and maybe Korea and Singapore and China and other locations with people interested in Saimoe) is still chiefly to blame for the downfall. It’s curious, as well, because Mikan had a demanding lead right off the bat, and it’s unlikely the same demographic had two different sways so drastically different.

Perhaps that means there are two divisive faction on 2ch when it comes to Saimoe–the people who keeps up with anime and people who do not? The latter is likely who votes early in the day (but near the end of the contest) and the former can stay up and watch those late-night shows, and vote on Saimoe as it begins the next day. But we don’t have to go that far…

The western fanbase failed–the shrinking lead during the eek hours would suggest as much. In the 12-hour gap between 5am Japan time and 5pm Japan time we see Mikan’s lead erode from 70 to 42, and that would’ve been peak hours for Europeans, all the Americans, and more.

It still smells suspicious, however. Ah well. It just means today the sun shines a little dimmer compared to tomorrow.

Leave a comment | posted in English Language Modern Visual Fandom, Manabi Straight, Modern Visual Culture

September 9, 2007

Team Simoun Needs Your Help!

By omo

Until 10~11pm Japan time, you can still vote for Rimone in the 2007 Saimoe contest. Tomorrow The-Very -Good-Girl Mamiina will be up in the running, so please support her as well! If you like Simoun and is curious about Saimoe, you can read about what Saimoe is here, as well how to vote in the world-wide contest about Japanese anime 2-D chara popularity.

Or if you’re really lazy, just:

1. click here at least 1 hour (ideally 2) before 8:58AM US Eastern time, keep the new window open.
2. Wait two hours (or right after 8:58am if you are getting this in really last-minute), then refresh that window you kept open. Keep it opened.
3. click here and then click on the top most thread that has a number less than 1001.
4. Scroll down to the bottom with the text box, input the code [[balhblabhab]] from step #2 (including the [[]]) into the text box.
5. If you are voting today (up to Monday, Sept. 10 US Eastern time), next line in the text box put in <<ãƒªãƒ¢ãƒï¼ ã‚·ãƒ ãƒ¼ãƒ³>> — the text string starting with << and ends with >>. If you are voting tomorrow for Mamiina, put in << ãƒžãƒŸãƒ¼ãƒŠï¼ ã‚·ãƒ ãƒ¼ãƒ³>> instead.
6. Click the button next to the text box. Should be the only one on the page.
7. Click again on the button on the next page (scroll down a bit maybe).
8. ???
9. Profit!

That is, if nothing went wrong. A lot of European ISPs seem to work fine. No proxies will likely to work with this. It sucks for me, but hey, it’s worth a shot for VERY GOODNESS.

2 comments | posted in English Language Modern Visual Fandom, Modern Visual Culture, Simoun

September 6, 2007

Tasha Yar == Karukinus

By omo

No, not really. Seriously. I’m just kidding…

More I watch Heroic Age, the more I think of Star Trek. Why? It has that geek-utopia smell to it.

There is a lot of literature written about the Star Trek … franchise. Thing. Culture. Geekdom. What have you. Ever imagine if The Next Generation was not about Captain Picard going out there and discover new stuff, but Deanna Troi’s younger, innocent sister leading the Federation to reconciliation with a strange version of the Borg… Oh, and replace all that technobabbling with “hoshiboshi no michibiki” and “staarrrrway” and “the power of the Golden Tribe” and you’ve got it.

What if Q raised Age?

I think that air of utopia seasoned with reason being the common pillar for all those sentient being existing in the universe…is the heart of the Star Trek universe, the common thread behind its themes. And in this Heroic Age, such is the order of the world.

Onto the present and ever present whine:

Within the series we need to realize, that like many other space sci-fi stories, traveling between each star is a big hassle and a major plot point. Such is as true in The Heroic Age as with others in the same genre of anime. The nature of space travel in each sci-fi setting is something of some concern and attention for the story teller. That’s a big “Kero-chan Check” point for settings (as with character designs). But so far within the series we have not had a very clear explanation of how FTL travel works. I think it’s a major disservice to the audience to not be able to understand how this major plot point works. Especially how it ties into DNAra’s singular, unique power that we realize later on.

Along the same line, real space maneuvering in The Heroic Age seems to be akin to that of Starship Operator–it takes real time to move stuff around (each battle takes days and weeks and months to resolve), although it seems rather Star Wars-ish when it comes to combat otherwise. The Nodos here is both a help and a harm–it strips the show of any kind of realism, yet it makes things a lot less boring. But somehow, the combat parts of this show is still pretty boring and I don’t know what can be done to help it.

4 comments | posted in English Language Modern Visual Fandom, Modern Visual Culture, Popular Culture, The Heoric Age

September 4, 2007