Anime Review! Kaitou Saint Tail

Finally, I'm writing about something other than books for once!

For the past few weeks, I've been watching this kinda-sorta obscure mid-90s maho no shoujo (magical girl) anime (distributed by the now-defunct Tokyopop). My main motivation for getting into it was because I read (and liked a lot) the manga, but I never got to read how it ended. So, one day I was bored and wanted to watch something new--and hey, why not find out what happened in the manga with the anime? I had even seen the first few episodes of the anime via VHS, and I liked what I saw: excellent animation, cute character design, and a fascinating setup.

***WARNING: SPOILERS***

Saint Tail is basically a romantic comedy, with a magical girl twist: the titular character is a thief who steals from thieves, using her magic to procure the stolen items and return them to their rightful owners. Her alter-ego Meimi's best friend, Seira, helps investigate new cases, and her crush, Asuka Jr., is intent on pursuing St. Tail.

As I soon found out, there was a reason it remained obscure, quite unlike Sailor Moon, Fruits Basket, and Hamtaro--all girl-oriented anime that made it to American TV. Well, it was...kind of...eh.

Though I was drawn in immediately, the excitement that had been slowly building with the introduction of rivals--and raised stakes--plot development petered out after barely ten episodes, and the next ten were basically filler one-shots. After a few of these filler episodes, I grew bored and impatient, anxious to get back to the real story--i.e. episodes that were actually based on the manga. The Sailor Moon also arguably used filler, but more often to an extent that revealed more about characters that we don't get to know so well in the manga. Some of my favorite episodes in the Sailor Moon anime are episodes that focus on the other Sailor Scouts. I did enjoy some of the filler in Saint Tail, but it was basically the same formula for each episode: there's the initial setup at school that's at least vaguely related to whatever's been stolen, someone comes to Seira with a theft sob-story, Meimi sends Asuka Jr. a calling card, turns into Saint Tail, and successfully steals the item in question. Sometimes Asuka Jr. almost catches her, and sometimes not. Oh, and the bad guy always gets caught. The just-world fallacy that's so pervasive in kids' TV is all over this anime.

But...it's not just the filler. Not just some, but ALL of the characters are woefully underdeveloped. Even Meimi! One could argue that she does developing, "growing out" of Saint Tail and realizing that Asuka Jr. is the most important thing to her (this is a fantasy romantic comedy after all), but we learn hardly anything else about her, other than her magical and athletic talents. Asuka Jr. is smart and wants to be a detective, Seira is a nun-in-training (because, I think, she starting having "sinful" thoughts about one of her female classmates...).

And when things start getting intense (like in the last few episodes), the tension drops too soon. Like in the end. A couple of real thieves who can use magic too show up...then in the end they just, like, leave! WTF??? The stakes get raised, but not high enough! I want my anime to be EXCITING!!! The will-they-won't they bullshit (even will-he-catch-her) gets OLD after a while! And everything was wrapped up too nicely, too quickly, along with a terribly short epilogue. A note to storytellers of all nationalities: epilogues are no good if everyone already knows the answers to the "questions" you "answer" about the main characters' futures. (ahem, JK Rowling...) You don't need to spell it out for us.

In summation, this anime had so much potential...almost Batman potential, with its own set of recurring villains, a mysterious past (we never find out when or why Meimi became Saint Tail), and a tense love story. But the anime either focused too much on the love story, or really nothing at all, and it left me wanting something better. Sadly, I am no longer as fond of Saint Tail as I was in my teens. All style, not much substance, unfortunately. I'll give it a generous 6.5 out of 10. Watch Cardcaptor Sakura instead.

ETA: I originally had an image to go with the post, but some mofo copyright police keeps taking down the ones I use! BUZZKILLS! So I've given up. Just google it if you want pix.

Parable of the Talents: An Analysis/Review

Parable of the Talents, by Octavia Butler, is probably a science fiction novel that you haven't heard of. I hadn't heard of Butler myself until about a year or so ago, and sadly have never read any of her work until now. Alas, many of my favorite writers are dead and gone. Butler, unlike a lot of mainstream sci-fi writers, features a more racially and sexually cast of characters in her stories, and brings up themes critical of the patriarchal establishment. Obviously I was excited to finally read one of her works...and it certainly didn't disappoint.

While I didn't get around to reading the first book (Parable of the Sower), I could follow the story rather well without much background information on the characters and plot. It stands great on its own.

Talents continues the story of Lauren Olamina, who by championing a new religion, Earthseed, is a preacher and a prophet. Unfortunately, as she gathers allies and followers, the fundamentalist Christian cult Christian America rises to power, perpetuating the fear and chaos that has spread throughout the nation. At some point she and her people who live in the humble, isolated community of Acorn are ambushed by these extremists, forcing Olamina into her toughest ordeal yet.

Talents contains a lot of the science fiction elements that I love: dystopia, a hope for extrasolar space travel, strong female characters, and of course, a great story. I read the book in a week. It's a different kind of page-turner from YA--being an adult book, the plot is more grim and the subject matter presented more thoughtfully--but I wanted to keep reading to get to know about the characters and the world they live in.

One of the biggest challenges for sci-fi writers is to present a plausible reality and continuous relevance--and Butler did that magnificently. Butler, like all good dystopian writers, constructed a future that in 1997 seemed all too likely, and that even today could still be our future. Unlike many others, however, Butler presents a "solution", as she called it, should this future become real.

But, there's a lot more to the story than plot. First, the novel's presented in fragments, most of which come from Olamina's journals. The other parts come from her brother, her husband, and her daughter. Though Olamina is a sympathetic character, her dedication to Earthseed is not seen in a very positive light by those closest to her...and her daughter. I sympathized with all of them, considering their various ordeals, but I wanted them to understand Olamina, who, while she was not perfect, was only doing what she thought would advance the human race, what would fulfill her own sense of duty, even if they felt she was wrong. Butler shows how a person working for the greater good may not be seen as so good by her philosophy, a three-dimensional perspective that reflects the complex themes of the novel.

Another aspect of Talents that I enjoyed is the introduction of the notion of a "successor" to Christianity, Islam, etc. As strong as these religions are now, a new, upstart religion could emerge and--with time--overtake them all and become the new most-practiced religion. Christianity and even Judaism were not around for all of humanity, after all. The fact that there is only a god of change makes this religion unique, and ties itself much more nicely with reality than Scientology, another sci-fi religion. Instead of being good in hopes of a rewarding afterlife, Earthseed advocates space travel as a common goal that humanity can strive for, uniting communities and fostering positive change. Butler presents a vision of the future that may be unattainable, but it's nice to think that no matter how tough it gets, the human race will come together, and they themselves will create Paradise on Earth.

Due to its exciting, engaging, and thoughtful approach to character and theme that extends beyond plot progression, Talents is one of the best books of its kind that I have read so far. I recommend it to anyone that wants to read some smart sci-fi that deviates from the norm.

Mockingjay, and the Disappointment of Hurried Good-byes

OK, I finished the Hunger Games trilogy about a month ago (I read Catching Fire and Mockingjay in quick succession). I won't say much about Catching Fire, but like many second-installments, it was better than the first. I loved all the new characters, the new revelations about Haymitch (one of my fave characters), it was just as fast-paced and exciting as the first, and the ending blew me away.

***WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD***

My main gripes came with Mockingjay. Unlike the first two installments, the pacing really slowed down. The entire first part was Katniss hanging out in the underground metropolis of District 13. When it was time to go to the Capitol, I got really into it. The blurring of the lines between the "good" guys and "bad" was also really interesting, and not something you see very often in sci-fi/fantasy stories. Though that perspective brought about some depressing rumination towards the end of the novel... which is where my problems begin.

While I wasn't expecting everyone to live (though I figured Katniss, Gale, and Peeta would live, cuz if one of them died, the love triangle would be too easy to resolve), some deaths I found particularly upsetting in their abruptness: namely, Prim, the whole reason Katniss entered the Hunger Games--and set the entire trilogy in motion--in the first place. The suddenness of it all was like when Fred was killed off in Deathly Hallows, only times 1000. Prim was reduced to a mere plot device in her death, to ultimately challenge Katniss to find the strength to keep on living. I know killing in war is senseless, everyone's a potential casualty, blah-blah-blah, but I felt that was needlessly cruel of Collins to do that, when there wasn't much of a reason for Prim to even be on the front lines in the first place. After all they've been through...you hurt them (physically and emotionally) even more?

That was the main thing. This also happens with less than like 50 pages in the book left to go...and we're at the lowest point. The rest seems kind of rushed, especially once Katniss kills the next president-to-be, Coin. There's a pervasive sense of hopelessness that drags itself throughout the rest of the book, even when we fast-forward through the recovery and reconstruction period and find Katniss settled down with Peeta. Someone pointed out that these last few chapters could have been a whole other book in itself, noting that these very important events were hastily rushed through. Guess that's why JK Rowling killed off Dumbledore in the sixth book... And hey, I wouldn't have minded a fourth one, getting to spend a couple hundred more pages with these characters.

But my main disappointment I guess is with the--er--bittersweet ending. In series where the stakes are so high it's almost impossible to see how one can overcome them, there's often sadness and tragedy. But this ending...was such...a downer. There was all this existentialist musing about how whether humankind should even really be allowed to continue existing, given all the destruction they give each other and the environment. Yet they keep on living...why again? Because the instinct to live is more powerful than the compulsion to kill yourself off?

Also--and this was something I wondered throughout the entire series--is everyone just ignorant, or is Panem really the only country left? Did all the other humans on the planet really get killed off some point in the past? Five-six billion of them? Really? I'm just going to go with ignorance--it's not like Katniss and co. really learned anything in school other than the basics of reading, 'riting, and 'rithmetic in addition to the Capitol's propaganda. I sense a brief foray into fanfiction coming on...

But all in all, I enjoyed the series, and like to analyze it almost as much. The series definitely warrants a second read-through...however, I should read some other stuff for a while.

The Allure of Astrophysics

I studied writing, literature, and publishing in college, so I didn't get a whole lot of exposure to math and the hard sciences. The closest I came was the biological and chemistry aspects of environmental science and measurements made in a print-media design class. And I didn't mind so much--math and science weren't boring, but their formulaic consistency (especially as they got more complex) depicts a false representation of a constantly changing world. Could the earth itself ever be as predictable as the sine of 9?

But there's something about astronomy--and physics in relation to astronomy--that always intrigued me. Maybe it was my childhood obsession with Sailor Moon (a pop-culture phenomenon that I am dying to talk about, just waiting for the right time), or the lyrics in some metal songs that refer to astrophysical phenomena, but the planets and outer space, and space-time, have held my interest. Not enough to deter me from my more--er, creative--passions, but present nonetheless. And it's just one of the reasons why this blog can often appear unfocused: my mind is a multi-faceted prism of thoughts, interests, and ideas, so it's difficult to single out any one passion without outright rejecting the others.

Today I got to look through an actual astrophysics textbook (it's my job for the summer), and I wanted to sit down and READ it. At least attempt to make sense of all the formulas and diagrams permeating the book. I am far from incapable of understanding the complexities of astrophysics--last year I read an article by Stephen Hawking, and could follow it quite closely. I want to read more, but it can be hard coming across a relevant article when I lurk around unrelated websites.

I think the primary allure is that of the more neglected portion of my brain, if that's really how mental tasks are divided up. I always think through my writing applying logic and considering certain scenarios--more of a pragmatist than your average fiction writer, perhaps. It's also easier for me to understand astrophysics than other sciences, which I'm less well-versed in: computer science, for example. I know how to work MS Office and Adobe, but I don't really care too much what makes them work (well, maybe a little).

It can be disconcerting (at the very least) to be thinking about the vastness of the universe, and mind-boggling to think about how light perception is not objective, but subjective, and how time and space are interrelated. At the same time I like thinking about it when the subject comes up. It's fascinating to explore these mysteries, and I am totally behind those who do it for a living. Perhaps it's just an intersection between logic and intellectual spirituality.

The thing is, while the universe is fucking awesome and all, I tend to want to focus on stuff that's happening here on earth--and incredible entity in and of itself. And though scientists may have found a planet truly capable of housing life, we got to take care of this one.

Photo credit: Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. Another cool thing about space: it makes amazing art.

Critical Response Archive: Brief Interviews with Hideous Men

And now finally, just in time for graduation, the final critical response from my postmodernism independent study, featuring one of my all-time fave writers, David Foster Wallace!

***

The subject matter of David Foster Wallace’s short story collection Brief Interviews With Hideous Men is nothing new (relationships between straight men and straight women), nor is the dominating perspective (ostensibly white middle-class men). However, the experimental style of Wallace’s prose breathes new life into tired themes and perspectives, taking postmodernist literature to the next stage in its evolution. As a successor to the likes of Robert Coover, Vladimir Nabokov, and John Barth, David Foster Wallace is a natural heir, building upon such techniques as the non-linear linear tale (several stories are annotated tangentially a la Pale Fire), authorial presence and involvement, meta-fiction, and a dry and detached sense of humor. In some cases Wallace literally extends these postmodernist ideas, with long multi-clause sentences and footnotes, keeping the reader from getting too lost in the story and paying attention to his rather exhausting structure of lengthy-but-spare paragraphs and complete sentences. By synthesizing and building upon the style of the canonical postmodernist writers, Wallace continues their legacy and brings postmodernism to contemporary times.

The most striking thing about Brief Interviews is the non-linearity of the arrangement of the stories, and the interviews of the title story. None of the interviews printed in the book are arranged in a particularly numerical or chronological order, nor are the numbers consecutive. It’s clear that these interviews are the only ones “selected” for publication, since not all of these interviews are featured. These interviews are scattered throughout the text, divided into four parts, fragmenting them. This was definitely intentional, perhaps only for the superficial reason that the particular style of “Brief Interviews” may get tiresome for the reader or because they went on too long. A variant example of this fragmentation is “Octet,” which in fact has only five sections, and the fifth discusses how the eight sections became four among the other facets of the formulation of the story. “Octet” most obviously contains the classic characteristics of postmodernism, referring to itself, explaining itself, describing how its existence as a story came about, disregarding the conventional notions of character and plot altogether. “Adult World (II)” in fact disregards all formal pretense in its structure, reduced to a mere outline of the plot and character developments. Since it’s such a radical change from the preceding story, one might think that Wallace deliberately changed the tone to avoid and flout convention.

Wallace exhibits the detachment from his characters peculiar to postmodernist writers in a new way, writing of them as an unattached observer, with so much focus on detail that people and plot are all but forgotten. He utilizes this technique in “The Depressed Person” (who is referred to as that throughout the story), “Death Is Not the End,” and “Suicide as a Sort of Present.” The observational (though not usually objective) and often scientific language of these and many of the other stories cultivates the humor that pervades within them. In spite of the tragedies many of these characters endure, the reader can laugh due to the absurdly detailed and matter-of-fact voice of the narrator. Of course, the reader feels sorry for these characters, who often come off as victims of their own circumstances or pawns of plot, but in an abstract and distant way. Even the narrators who are an obvious part of the story (as in “Brief Interviews” and “On His Deathbed, Holding Your Hand”) reveal this sort of detachment from the characters they’re interacting with, due in part to their roles as listeners rather than speakers.

Wallace’s satirical and long-winded prose has evolved obviously from the postmodernist writers of the 60s, and his observational narrative style a more modern adaptation of their detachment from their subjects. He took postmodernist literature to new lengths, showing that even a movement that had become old hat could be revitalized and made anew in the face of a new century. After all, literature, like all art forms, always has room to evolve.

Critical Response Archive: Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit

As more experimental literature entered the literary world, the question of what could be classified as “postmodern” had to be asked when examining these texts. While a novel could be experimental, it did not necessarily make it postmodernist. Jeanette Winterson’s novel Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit is one of those novels that some would consider to not belong in the post-modern canon, for though she does some rule-breaking and experimenting that include stories-within-stories and unreal moments in the novel, it’s not so radically deviant from convention like the works of John Barth, William Burroughs, and Donald Barthelme. Yet one could argue that Oranges is postmodern, just in a different way from those canonical authors—after all, postmodernism is a flexible movement.

The most obvious element of experimentation, and the nature of its post-modernism, is the fact that much of the novel could very well be directly lifted from events that happened in her real life, and are nakedly so. Like Winterson, the narrator’s first name is Jeanette, she was adopted by Pentecostal evangelists, trained to become a minister, and she is a lesbian, among other autobiographical similarities. One begins to wonder how much truth lies behind the story—it could all be true, or it could be false; the reader doesn’t know enough about Winterson to draw any conclusions. Since it was published as a novel, one must accept it as fiction, with some facts and a grain of truth behind it. This is quite a contrast to the traditional memoir, which one reads expecting all the events that take place to have actually happened, when they might be exaggerated or even untrue.

And though the novel is basically a straightforward bildungsroman about her coming out and her relationship with her mother (framed within her coming out), there are some peculiarities about the prose—not just her unique writing style—that set it apart from typical autobiographical novels. For one, there are abrupt transitions from one scene to the next, big moments are interrupted tangentially, and in between we have lengthy metaphorical or direct real-world commentaries—an entire chapter, “Deuteronomy”, follows this vein. Images of such things as oranges and demons that would only appear in a carefully constructed reality constantly pop up, instead of being camouflaged in realism, glaringly symbolic of Jeanette’s conflicted identity. One character that pops up only in times of distress is her orange demon, and though this pebble that he gives her exists in the real world, the reader wonders if the demon is real or a hallucination—after all, nobody else could see him. It calls into question the realism of visions: as Jeanette was raised to believe in such visions, she believed the demon was real, even if it was never there at all. Winterson makes no argument that these visions are inconsequential: after all, the fictional Jeanette is compelled by her demon to leave home and stay true to herself.

Winterson also plays with perspective: though the story is obviously told from an adult Jeanette, descriptions of observations and beliefs she held in childhood reflect the point of view of a precocious child, or else a childlike adult—otherwise a person who does not understand the conventions and traditions of the world she grew up in. The reader witnesses her perception of the world develop and change, just as she does from childhood to adulthood. Her particular point of view as a lesbian could be a part of its uniqueness, as that perspective is hardly given a spotlight in serious literature.

In Oranges, Winterson blurs the line between fiction and memoir, fantasy and reality. One could classify her novel as a “fictitious memoir,” since Jeanette’s personal history parallels her namesake’s, though the various details may be exaggerated or fabricated. While Winterson does not deviate from convention to critique fiction, she does critique the memoir, showing that every person’s life story is just that—a story, shaped by his or her perception of the world—though this does not take away from the significance or uniqueness of that story. So in a way, her first novel could be classified as postmodern.

The Hunger Games, and the Art of the Hook

*WARNING: SPOILERS*

So last weekend I read The Hunger Games, uncertain as to whether I would love it or just like it. I got into it after a lot of hype: the folks at my internship raved about it, and I’ve come across a lot of Harry Potter and Twilight comparisons. So when I began reading I wondered: will it be more like Harry Potter (yay) or Twilight (boo)?

Believe the hype.

It has the same edge-of-your-seat story structure that engaged me in Harry Potter and other book series in my youth. For the first time since the Princess Diaries (whenever the last book came out), I read a book in four days of my own volition, and not because I had to read it for a class. The pace picked up really quickly, and before I knew it I was engrossed in the adventure.

Like Harry Potter, The Hunger Games was almost a completely positive reading experience. I got engrossed in the story almost immediately, and there was no shortage of violence, intrigue, and of course romance. It's almost indescribably good. The characters that we got to know were rich and complex, the protagonist Katniss a strong but flawed woman. I teared up when Rue was killed, and was nearly bawling when District 11 gave Katniss the bread as a token of appreciation. (something similar happened in Book 2, which I'm already almost done reading) I can't really remember the last time a new book got me so emotional and excited. Maybe Lolita, which I read back in January... and that was a different kind of reading experience.

However, unlike Harry Potter, I am glad that this world is not possible in reality--and hopefully never will be. In spite of all the violence and gore (which, as a formerly avid video game player of Grand Theft Auto, Super Smash Bros. and the like, I enjoyed in an abstractly sadistic way I guess), this was not glorified or celebrated by the sympathetic characters. In fact, because they are forced to kill to survive, one finds the violence abhorrent. It's the characters that matter most in this YA series.

I was actually surprised at how much romance was actually IN the book, and how quickly we learn of Peeta's love for Katniss. One could almost classify it as a YA romance...with a dystopian twist. It didn't put me off too much...I used to read fantasy/sci-fi stories with a pivotal romantic subplot all the time--though they were shojo manga, not YA prose. How did I get swept into it?

Authors like Suzanne Collins and JK Rowling have some sort of magic touch--a mixture of writing talent, cleverness, and ability to craft a story that has the audience asking for more--that captivates readers so much. I think it's an impossible talent to learn, as it's almost impossible to articulate why these books are so good. It's not the same way that David Foster Wallace or Vladimir Nabokov or Joyce Carol Oates are good writers. Or maybe it is...they're just working with different genres.

All in all, I've found a new obsession. I can't wait to read through the end of Book 2! (I'm already on Chapter 21...) I might even see the movie. The pacing of the book is so brisk it was practically made with a movie deal in mind.I give it a 4.5...and will probably like it even more on a second go-around. But I have plenty more to say about this book: expect more gushing in the coming weeks.