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January 8, 2019

Tone Deaf Hero

By omo

[Rather than finishing my year in review, here goes a diversion.]

I too watched the first/preview episode of The Rising of the Shield Hero adaptation. It was a bit compelling but probably slightly more uncomfortable than compelling. The problem I have with it is its narrative voice. It reads(?) like someone is writing a light novel that target incels as the audience. That in itself is not terrible but seeing a show pandering to someone, no matter who, is not a great sign. It is not about the false accusation of rape, but the construction of the characters and motives surrounding it, that marks it poorly for the online lynch mob. (BTW linking Jeko because my post is basically a rebuttal of his and reading that motivated me to write this one.)

This post came to my mind primarily because, well, you can have a dramatic story about a hero who was falsely accused of rape, and not be misogynistic. He is right in that the innocent accused alone doesn’t make it per se misogynistic. So what makes Shield Hero so misogynistic thus far? Shield Hero is misogynistic because it reduces the women in the story to less than human specifically to further its emotional narrative. This is exactly what incels do as a fundamental concept to their cause. Of course, this is just based on one episode and I should overall disclaim that I don’t know what the story is like after this point besides from reading the Wiki entry. Given the quality of the story and the way the events are presented, though, I don’t expect it to be anything good. I certainly could be wrong (well, am I really wrong on SAO)?

So far in the series, things are not so offensive because, well, even the main character is hardly beyond a pile of tropes and I think even Nasu Kinoko wrote more compelling characters in the 90s than this. It is below par for the course for this genre. When you are eyeballing a pile of trash, that pile of trash is a bunch of trash, so even the bad ideas fail to be that terrible. I enjoyed Shield Hero e1’s general production quality (I guess it was technically the preview, so not the actual first episode). The baseline concept is not the worst among all the isekai light novel adaptations I’ve watched in the past couple years. I do like how the different heroes came from different versions of Japan. I even like (based on Wikipedia) how the main character grows to trust his female slaves over time, despite his trust issues with people, and despite that they had to actually utilize slavery as a key story element and not just some side dressing.

The unfortunate thing is, you can tell a story about a guy who suffers through all these common psychological issues without framing it using modern misogyny. Albeit almost as bad, but last year’s How NOT to Summon a Demon Lord similarly tacked this issue in a subplot without too much ick. (Although I was swimming in quite a bit of ick as is at the time.) I guess it is cool and hip and meme-worthy with some folks to tell a story Shield Hero tells. I am not particularly arsed by this because, ultimately, this is a work of fiction (and fantasy at that) and mature viewers (definitely not appropriate to show this kind of thing to children without parental guidance) should be able to realize what it is.

I think the story could be a lot better right off the bat by basing the main character not as a freeloader nerd laughing at bitches in his light novel. That is totally not the right way to start this story. If we want to go heavy with a fake rape accusal, Shield Hero will have to open with some heavier story elements, rather than just giving us the dumb lines he has been saying and the defensive (and borderline hypocritical) attitudes alone. I mean, maybe this indicates the author’s attitude about this particular plot element. It also doesn’t help, even before encountering the rape accusations, the main guy came across like a giant tool to begin with, and his cheerful “hey I’m in an Isekai Light Novel wink-wink-wink” attitude was the only thing that makes me want to root for him. This is also why that whole rape not-trial scene seemed really trite and a giant pander to incel thinking–as literally here’s a guy don’t own up to their tool-ness and blame others for their own failures, even if it may be a natural reaction and he might have a case for it. It’s a simple lesson in narrative storytelling–you are not suppose to be presenting facts of an internet argument to win your viewers’ sympathy. In terms of trustworthiness, our hero has very little one episode in because he has not done anything to earn any, so his plight also will ring hollow in the hearts of the viewers. Worse, it makes you think who would? Someone who was falsely accused of rape too? LOL.

Hopefully all those things I mentioned are just setup for future character development. It should be clear that despite the misogynist elements in this particular light novel turned anime, the core of the story is very, uh, staple, to use a nicer word. There is too much poor execution, so much unoriginality, enough to blunt of any strong message it wants to actually send at this point. I think it’s a lot easier, if you want to talk about misogyny regarding Shield Hero, to run a Bechdel test after the season is over. Truth is anyone who still want to discuss after sticking around probably already have their minds made up.

PS. How NOT to Summon a Demon Lord is a fun, but really bad mary sue sort of a story. It makes SAO S1 look good (aside from the fact that SAO S1 does…look quite good, but that’s not what I mean). And now we have something even more problematic. Dare I predict in another 2 years we will have even worse garbage (and I will probably still watch it….). Or, I can’t believe Death March is the best generic Isekai anime in the past year. Well it does have Suki no Skill…

2 comments | posted in English Language Modern Visual Fandom, Modern Visual Culture, Tate no Yuusha no Nariagari

December 21, 2018

Travelogue: Wake Up Girls FINAL Iwate

By omo
Ishiwari-Zakura (the sign)

Since this spring, the seiyuu unit Wake Up, Girls! have been on a farewell tour. It reminds me of Major League players who announced their retirements during the off season of their final season, getting treats as their team travel around the league and getting presents from teams the player visit over the course of the regular season. It’s not that different for this seiyuu idol unit in a sense, given the extensive farewell they have received at Animelo Summer Live and Animax Musix Yokohama earlier this year. (AnimeJam is this coming weekend and it would be interesting to see what they do for WUGchans!)

While the shut-down date set as end of March, 2019, the IP will live on (most notably in a mobile game) as the voice actresses will be off contract for the main project. They will still work on the franchise, of course, but not as performers of live shows, and likely not so extensively tied to the various media opportunities such as their ongoing radio shows (though this remains to be seen), live action theater, as “solo artists” and most importantly doing new songs and concerts.

There is a actual farewell tour for WUG, which is broken into 3 parts. First two parts were announced right off the bat after the disbanding announcement. Part 1 covered Chiba, Kanagawa (Zama) and Saitama (Omiya). Part 2 covers Osaka, Iwate (Morioka), and Kanagawa again (Yokosuka). Part 3 will cover Kumamoto, Osaka (again), Nagano, Tokushima, Aichi (Nagoya), and finally Miyagi–or Sendai. It’s a lot of stops. Each stop promises at least 2 shows (early and late). The Aichi stop has 5 shows. Osaka totally gets 8 shows between parts 2 and 3. About half of these sold out, but it isn’t hard to get tickets for some of the more remote and remaining ones, even as I write.

The locations are important in that the farewell tour will take all the WUGs to their home prefectures. Yoppi is probably the most difficult, all the way out in Kumamoto, so it’s good it finally will happen. Iwate is where Kaya is from, and this tour marks the second WUG visit to Morioka. Minyami and Myu are from Kanagawa and Chiba respectively. MayuC is from Osaka, and Osaka is the city WUG toured the most outside of the Tokyo region proper. Nanamin is from Tokushima, which is also a rare stop for WUG tours but thanks to Machi Asobi, WUGchans have frequented Tokushima quite often. Of course, Aichan is the Sendai native who will invariably hold court for that final stop on that final tour, and it’s the second most common tour stop outside Kanto for them. You would think, right?

Sendai is obviously a super special place for Wake Up Girls. It gave birth to the group and the project, and promoting the (kinda still) struggling Tohoku region is a core mission for the team. The way the team was put together in 2012-2013 was just as much of a promotion of Japan’s rural areas as it is a way to represent them in this fandom niche–seiyuu idol and media mix. It’s really heartful to see the management stick to this aspect of the mission. I mean I would not have had reasons to go to Sendai until next year but for WUG, a good 3.5 years after my real first visit. It taught me a lot of places to visit, either ones I had in the past or will in the future, and sights to see and recommend to others. The TUNAGO solo tour earlier this year is a great example, when fans had to travel across Tohoku to see the WUG member solo events in tiny live halls in the countryside. It ended with a bus tour that took you even to rebuilding banks of the Eastern shore and survey the reconstruction after the 3/11 tsunami waves had left their marks.

In the same spirit, my visit to Morioka to attend WUG Final Iwate was just as much about WUG as much about Morioka. I am really going because timing worked best, not because Iwate or Morioka is special, plus honestly I can’t see myself ever going for another reason, so why not visit a part of Japan I don’t think I’ll ever go again?

The actual concert is on Sunday afternoon and evening. I had booked a flight back home leaving Haneda in the morning Monday after. In order to make the flight I had to travel by night bus (as the most reasonable transportation option), which was both reasonably priced and convenient, as the bus depot is right at the JR station Morioka, and a short walk from my hotel. The fact that it snowed overnight Saturday was a little disturbing, but it wasn’t a problem at all for me–the weather was still warmer in Morioka than at home. And unlike Kanto proper, this part of the country regularly deals with snow, so it isn’t as much of an issue for transportation.

Arriving Morioka by train Saturday morning, it was a fast ride up the Tohoku/Akita line, taking about 2.5 hours. At Morioka the Hayabusa and Komachi trains separates, which you can actually go see. The Komachi in front decouples, moves forward, and both it and the Hayabusa train retract the latches and the cover pops back to keep that aerodynamic nose shape. Literally, Shinkalion.

Right at the station, a famous local food, the fukuda pan, can be had. They literally are just rolls with different fillings, kind of like souped up buttered breads. I had chestnut and plain butter, and it was pretty good because the bread was of good quality and it was fresh.

Transit in Morioka is JR only, and there is no local mass transit on rail. You can take a pretty cheap bus to go around, but it’s hardly faster than walking. The JR local trains take you to the suburbs, so it’s not even helpful. There is a tourist bus, but I ended up walking around the area between JR Morioka and the main castle park area.

At the time there was a Salmon Festival in the park. Too bad most stuff there can’t really be had. You either had to eat it there, or bring home a fish or a sack of clams or something. The salmon looked good though.

The main park area is three things: a park, the remains of the Morioka castle, and a temple. It’s not what I’d say scenic in a dreary December weekend, but I imagine it looks good with some cherry blossom to go with. Very nearby is a historic house and museum, and some older buildings from before the War. Also a couple blocks away are the government buildings, and the famous Rock-Breaking Cherry Tree that grew through a boulder. As people (nee: Kayatan) say, the Ishiwari-zakura encapsulates the spirit of Iwate.

There weren’t a lot of sights in Morioka proper. I walked a bit to kind of take in the place. It is cold and I didn’t want to walk too much (but still probably did too much walking). It is kind of inaka-y but it felt more urban than it really was. The side where the older town was (where I was walking) did feel very much like “Morioka” in that it reminds me of Sendai and Hakodate, maybe because it’s kind of in between the two places. The other side of the JR Shinkansen tracks felt more like modern, newer developed suburb-y part of the city. There was a huge Bic Camera and Round 1 where my hotel was, where as the other side of the station had the densely zoned businesses and homes you expect in a Japanese city.

So instead of walking, we ate. Morioka has 3 famous noodles: the jya jya men, the reimen, and the wanko soba. Naturally we had all 3.

Reimen is a form of korean cold noodles. I’ve actually had varieties of this across the USA and even in Taipei. It’s more commonly the clear wheat version that you see, but the Morioka style is served up like a cold ramen, with sweet flavorings. It’s served with apple or pear in the broth, in the winter, and with watermelon in the summer. The ideal pairing for this is either hot weather, or because you have just had a lot of korean BBQ/yakiniku so you can cool down with it. We did not have BBQ with ours, but it was still tasty. You should get it spicy when you could, just know that Japanese eateries generally downtune their spicy levels.

The jya jya men in Morikoa is similar to the Chinese and Korean versions, except it is made with miso instead of black soy bean paste or fermented flour paste. This means it’s a meat miso that you mix with your noodles, and it pairs with similar toppings. Because miso is actually more mild than soybean paste or fermented flour paste, there are more options for topping such as umeboshi and grated ginger, or even rice vinegar. The noodle used is much thicker too, they are basically udon level. It makes for a cheap and hearty meal. 600 JPY fills me up, with chi tan tan, which is a complementary soup they serve you in the same bowl by mixing an egg with hot noodle water.

Somehow I had it three times, because you can get Pairon (which is like the one famous name for the dish) jya jya men at the station, and JJM was the easiest eat that you can have all day long. Other than these noodle bars, most places don’t open late in Morioka so jya jya men is a good substitute if you would have ramen instead.

Pairon at the station (they have a few branches)

Wanko soba is more of an experience than a dish. Basically the idea is a server will serve you bite size portions of soba at a time until you are full. There’s some ceremony to this, so you ought to go with Instagram ready with a small group. Our server served the three of us over 300 servings, and it is a pretty (ugly?) sight (unsightly?). It is at a rapid fire pace, when you eat it, the next serving comes. You get a break when the server runs out of noodles on her plate, but these rounds can be brutal. Wanko soba is lightly flavored in soy sauce, so you can also add other condiments like grounded chicken or grated daikon or whatever, which they provide to you. Not that it matters, you are literally eating as fast as you can most of the time, and if you are not drawing the meal out, the whole experience can be over in less than an hour. But yeah, having Moriokan(?) waitress throw noodles at you non-stop turned out to be surprisingly fun. To stop eating there’s a procedure you do with putting the lid on top of your bowl. The server’s trick is to throw noodles in it while you show it to her empty. It continues if you let it happen as you have to finish what’s in your bowl.

I wonder if this is why Kayatan is kind of S.

As a proper dining experience, wanko soba should really be had as a proper meal, but most places close quite early (like, 8:30pm). And according to what I hear, wanko soba in Tokyo is just not as good as wanko soba in Morioka, but who knows. We went to Azumaya by the JR station, which I guess is well-detailed in this CNN article.

Anyways, the live.

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Leave a comment | posted in Conventions and Concerts, Wake Up Girls!

December 17, 2018

Illumination Festa

By omo

I dump thoughts on this blog, usually in a hard-to-understand way. This is not that hard to understand, I hope.

Question: How many hours of continuous illumination can all my IDOLM@STER penlights provide?

Background: THE IDOLM@STER has a line of merch for their events in which button-cell (LR44) penlights are available for purchase. Each character gets her own penlight (fixed color). There are also penlights for groups (SideM, Shiny, Cute/Cool/Passion, Princess/Fairy/Angel). Here’s a link for example. In short: there are a lot of them.

Assumptions: Assuming 3 hours per light, and all my lights are running for 3 hours. It’s probably a fair assumption given most of my lights are hardly used, and the 3-cell ones probably run closer to 4 hours. Newer IDOLM@STER character lights are 2-cell but most of mine are the older, 3-cell types. I’m also generally assuming I can use one for light, and use another once that one runs out, so the total hours here is just the total number of lights times 3.

It would be obtuse (but rigorous) for me to dig out all my lights and count them. Instead I will do it from memory. No big deal if I miss a few I guess.

Series 1 CG Cu/Co/Pa: 3
Series 2 CG Cu/Co/Pa: 3
ML Pri/Fa/An: 3
765Pro series 2: 14
765Pro series 3: 14
765Pro 10th: 14
CG 10th: 13
ML 10th: 13
ML 1st day 2 box: 5
ML 2nd (all 3 boxes): 21 
CG 4th SSA – one for every idol (not sets, minus 10th ones): 34
ML 3rd – One for each one that I didn’t have before (estimate): 19
Miscellaneous CGs: 7
Duplicates: 6 Matsuri ML 4th, 6 Matsuri Hotchpotch, 1 Makoto Hotchpotch, 1 Makoto Hatsuboshi Enbu

Total: 177
Times 3 hours for each light: 531 hours, or 22 days and 3 hours.

Assuming I only need light 8 hours a day, it’ll keep me lit during a power outage situation for 66 days and 3 hours. Not long enough for some Puerto Ricans. But definitely enough for 12 days of Christmas.

This light merch is all a racket and I’ve already had my fill years ago. Now I only buy lights to replace old ones as they start to have problems, or because I broke them at the live. I guess I still do for new idols that I don’t have lights for. I guess this is also why it won’t end anytime soon, if ever.

In a few months, Million 6th tour will begin. I will have to rely on penlights that I got like 4 years ago (if I get to go). Hope they still work, LOL.

Leave a comment | posted in Idolmaster

December 12, 2018

Eventing 2018

By omo

[Updated Oct 18: The hole of my bank account, etc…]

This is a blog post that will keep track of the nerd events I’m attending in 2018. It will be updated over time to add/delete and update the status of the events I plan to attend or have attended. If you’re going to one of these, feel free to let me know ahead of time. You can find last year’s log post here.

In 2018 I think I’m just going to be kind of vague, since YOLO’ing the past 2 years has kind of caught up. There are some stuff I’d like to go and see/participate but a lot of maybes are really in play. Just going to throw them down as guidelines.

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Leave a comment | posted in Conventions and Concerts

December 12, 2018

Japan Trip Dec 2018

By omo

I’m not sure what to write about in regards to my recent trip to Japan. I did it mostly because of CG 6th in Nagoya Dome and Wake Up, Girls! Final Tour in Iwate, but I tried to use that JR Pass power for tourism purposes in the days between the two lives. It also occurred to me that I went to Japan way too many times this year, in a way that I have to date my trip by the month that it happened in, not not just by the Year or Quarter even.

I traveled quite a bit compared to my usual weekend jaunts, so I had some thinking time as I sat on the Shinkansen. They are marvelous aren’t they? I saw the Hayabusa and Komachi detach at Morioka and the nose cones of the two trains transform and cover up the latches. This kid behind me even went “Shinkalion da!” I was able to take an overnight train from Okayama to Tokyo. I finally got to see the Seto Inland Sea as I rode on a bus around Mihara. I had okonomiyaki in Hiroshima. And primarily, I was able to finally visit a Japanese car museum.

Of all the things Japan is known for in the world, I want to believe Japanese cars are the most renowned things. Before weirdness, sushi, ninjas or anime, there are these heavy machineries that made everyday life possible for 100s of millions of people across the world. It’s like when I was watching Jack Ryan I see how the rich terrorists drove Land Cruisers and the poor ones are in Tacomas. Joke aside, Toyota is the number one car company in the world, and that is saying something. Something that probably summarises the totality of the post-atom-bomb Japan, its economic recovery, and the role it plays in the world today.

So it was nice to go back in time and see the humble beginnings of these modern marvels. It’s almost like flaunting when the Toyota automotive technology museum in Nagoya proper featured all these textile manufacturing stuff for maybe a third of the place. After all, that’s how Toyota got started, making textile manufacturing hardware? I guess you can always visit their main campus for the full blown tour but I did not have the time. I spent a couple hours before the live in Nagoya looking at a giant metal press, or how relatively small a Prius’s battery is compared to the skate-style batteries in newer BEVs. There were a lot of neat little things if you are into cars, and even more if you aren’t, as the whole facility tends to target a more general and youthful audience.

I was more emotionally connected to the Mazda factory tour. You get an English language guided tour of the much smaller museum space in Hiroshima but also their primary assembly line. It totally reminded me my last car, which was also built in Hiroshima–the only place MX-5s are built, if not the only assembly line. The Mazda company takes up like a quarter of the city out there in Hiroshima, sprawling complexes of ports, warehouses, factories, schools, dorms, hospitals, gyms, you name it. It’s still the boonies, but it was something the locals prided themselves on. There are buses of school children at the tour as well.

It was pretty cool watching a MX-5 put together and I shed a single tear. Which was one more tear than I shed at CG 6th. I mean, it’s not that small, agile, fun-to-drive fandom it used to be, as this joke goes.

Cinderella Girls 6th Live was a visual spectacle. Having seen a couple lives inside the home of the Seibu Lions, Metlife Dome frankly, well, sucks, in comparison. Metlife Dome is a bad venue, despite the innovative (and ecologically neat) semi-open design, as if a UFO phased into the Japanese hillside. Nagoya Dome was much better. I really liked the acoustics, despite having to deal with outfield bucket seats. The full dome roof also made the visuals less weird, I guess.

There are a lot of things I could say about CG 6th, but I was glad to be able to see TriPri being powerful and how “AAAAAARu” Field chains into Nagareboshi Kiseki. I really enjoyed Treasure, and it’s fun seeing Kirarin Robo in the metaphorical flesh. And villain Acchan with a frying pan. There are also a lot of bellies there for some reason. I’m glad I was able to participate in a pretty good event and fulfill my dumb promise I made at AX.

I really should talk about WUG Iwate and Morioka separately, as the totality of that visit is kind of one thing all together. So I will do just that.

There were other minor objectives I had in mind on this trip. One of them is to stay at the “famous” Economy Backpacker Hotel New Koyo. Located in Minami-Senju, this place is not what I’d recommend you stay at unless you are okay with living in a run-down dorm, as it is what it is for 2900 JPY a night. I think the only real reason to stay there is that it is cheap and the staff speak English. There are similarly priced single-room hostels that don’t look completely like a dump, and maybe even closer to the station, for a bit more in rent. Cheap business hotels are maybe starting at 5000 JPY. OK, the real reason is I know all too many people who stayed there, so I wanted to see how things are like.

I also tried remotely working while in Japan. It only works somewhat–I really need to have a desk and a chair, as it is tough staying awake when you’re sitting on the bed the whole time. I do a lot of meetings so it necessitates me being awake during Japan’s sleeping hours. New Koyo isn’t really meant for that, and maybe I’ll try again at a proper hotel next time.

Another thing I had done on this trip is take an overnight bus. Japanese buses are kind of interesting, as now I have taken all the basic varieties from the mass transit version, the shuttle version, the tourist bus version, and now the overnight sleeper which comes with a bathroom. I splurged a bit and took a 3-in-a-row type bus which meant you had basically a premium econ plane seat to yourself. It’s sort of unusual to see this in the US, if ever. I took the bus mainly because it was the only way to get to Tokyo in time for my morning flight out, coming from Morioka.

Destination-wise, besides the automobile museums in Nagoya and Hiroshima, I dropped by Takehara as the one anime pilgrimage spot. The trip is complicated because flooding and typhoon earlier in the year took out the Kure line, meaning the only other way via JR Pass to Takehara is a bus from Mihara station. Alternatively I could have taken the direct bus from Hiroshima but that costs about a thousand yen one way. Mihara station itself is interesting, as a local Shinkansen stop, as it’s also built on top of a castle ruin. The bus drove along the coast to Mihara, so it had a scenic side effect despite making that side trip much longer.

In terms of events, I also attended Machico’s solo live on 12/1 in Yokohama, as well as a mini-album release event at HMV Shibuya for Komagata Yuri, in addition to the aforementioned live events. In retrospect I definitely could have packed on more, but it was already quite a lot.

A lot of the time this trip I was doing solo traveling, which was refreshing given my prior trip in September. On my last tourist trip to Japan, I was basically in a tour bus the whole time, living on a schedule dictated by the tour company. It was fun and eye-opening, but restrictive. This was more just whatever-I-want but the quality of the trip is as good as the homework that I did ahead of time. I guess if you could, why not do both?

PS. On my way out of Japan, I took a Monday 10am flight from Haneda to JFK. While waiting to board I spotted the famous video game developer Kojima Hideo, in line for first class. I can never be sure of these things but it did turn out to be him, confirmed by his tweets later in the week.

1 comment | posted in Conventions and Concerts, Modern Visual Culture