Review: Another [spoiler free]

My favourite anime genres are supernatural mystery and horror. I rarely want to watch or read anything that doesn't have something supernatural to it, while it doesn't necessarily have to be fantasy. For as long as I can remember I've had a fascination with horror, and I'm most passionate about my stories when they have supernatural elements to them. What I love most is a good haunting, and that is what made me pick up Another.

Another is a 12-episode anime based on a novel by Yukito Ayatsuji, and is one of the many adaptations of this story (also found in manga and feature film form). The genre is horror, and the premise goes as follows:

In 1972, Misaki, a popular student of Yomiyama North Middle School's class 3-3, suddenly died partway through the school year. Devastated by the unexpected loss, the students and teachers behaved like Misaki was still alive, leading to a strange presence on the graduation photo. In Spring 1998, 15-year-old Kōichi Sakakibara transfers into Yomiyama's class 3-3, where he meets the peculiar Mei Misaki, who is seemingly ignored by her classmates. The class is soon caught up in a strange epidemic, where its students and their relatives are caught up in mysterious deaths. Learning these deaths have something to do with the Misaki of 1972, it is up to Kōichi and Mei to discover the cause of these mysterious deaths and figure out how to stop it before it puts an end to them. (Source: Wikipedia)

As it's based on a novel, the anime also has a novel-like structure. The story gives the viewer the horror elements right from the first episode, providing you a promise of a continuation for the pressing atmosphere and presence of horrible secrets. It leads you on, turns around and smacks you and your expectations in the face, the plot twists and turns and never really is truly obvious. And don't we all love a plot that is full of terrible lies we don't really want to know the truth of - and yet, we do?

The story is also full of symbolism, no doubt all significant.

Novel cover

The small amount of episodes again promises that every episode is full of action and important things. It is so - there is only one episode that I was afraid would fall flat in its happiness, but the end took a terrifying turn that left me delighted. At one point after one big revelation I was afraid that the story would fall flat after leaving that lie behind - but it picked up again, making me nervous and excited for the main characters.

While the story builds upon classic tropes - creepy high school girls, broken corridor lights at hospitals, music that sounds like it was made for Stanley Kubrick's The Shining - like I said, it has an original haunting. I'm going to tell you straight ahead that this story is about an interesting haunting that makes you think, raises questions, and is a plentiful source of inspiration and even nightmares.

However, this story (at least in animated form) doesn't fully use all the elements it introduces. What exactly was the significance of the dolls? Mei's mother?

I almost added "why did Akazawa remember Sakakibara?", but some nights ago I realized why. It's an interesting plot point that makes sense when you think of it just a little bit deeper. The mysteries presented in the plot are solved believably, however the ending did feel somewhat anticlimactic to me.

The anime makes me want to grab the novel, and I hope I'll have a chance to read it in the future.

I APPLAUD:

• imaginative haunting
• ... and how it's presented
• ... and how the characters talk about it
• characters' young age serving the plot
• conventional horror elements being used well to serve the plot
• the "creepy anime girl" not falling flat
• ... and actually being interesting and not a cheap plot device
• pubescent youth being portrayed as pubescent youth
• beautiful artwork
• colour schemes serve the genre the story represents
• the quality of animation
• loose ends being tied at the end
• ... but not too tight
• haunting music

I FROWN AT:

• the somewhat anticlimactic ending
• presented ideas and intriguing sideplots not getting much attention
• lack of true variety in the wide cavalcade of characters
• exploration of a character's supernatural abilities not satisfactory

GRADE: 8/10, 4 stars.

LINKS:

• Read at Mangafox
• Watch at AnimeSeason
• Article on Wikipedia

We tried to hard, and got so far... (+ ABotD)

... In the end, it doesn't even matter...

I won Camp NaNoWriMo and wrote over 21,000 words' worth of my novel's fourth draft. As you may remember from an earlier entry of mine, I crafted a chapter structure on a cork board for me to follow.

Well, as I started rewriting, it turned out that this chapter structure was completely useless and I needed to continue according to a new one. So much for that, then. As I removed the chapter cards from the board, Linkin Park's good old cheesy classic In The End was playing in my head. Now the chapter board works as my general "pin-it-down-if-you-know-you-won't-remember-it" board on which I pin down things I know I need to remember later while writing. In fact, the board is now much more useful.

Summer is coming. I haven't managed to get a job yet, and I regretfully believe that I will have to quit searching and search for another source of income, meaning student allowance. To get student allowance, I will have to study for the summer. My plan is to take up the basic courses of educational studies and finish them during the summer. They would serve a good purpose for later as my new aim is becoming a teacher of Finnish as a second language (henceforth S2-teacher).

So basically I came back to the plan I originally had in autumn about my aims for a future profession and how to make my degree useful. Being a teacher does not rule out possible future career as an author, but I must say that I have less and less faith for making money in the future with writing. I'm going to continue it, however.

As for The Punisher, I'm really glad about how it's going, and how I have managed to make sense out of its plot. My Scrivener file looks good, and I'll try to keep up with my 1,000 words per day pace for this summer. If I can't do it, then I'll make up for it on another day.

Concluding this blog post... It's been a while since I've introduced another art blog, so here goes. This time I'm presenting you with my domestic partner's work, as I have lots of faith in her, and the first thing I fell for about her was her art. (Still trying to propose her to illustrate my story once it's done, hmmm...)

~ ART BLOG OF THE DAY ~

Agata K., Ambi, or just Amb is a 20-year-old Polish artist currently residing in Finland. As with so many other artist acquaintances and friends of mine, I met her as well on the site deviantArt, a site Agata has already left. She has published her art online for a long time, and her deviantArt username was Ambusia. We met on that site, connected by art (she read my fanfiction, I looked at her fanart), and here we are.

An Atlantis being and a creature. Pastels on paper. See full size here.

Agata is a productive artist with lots of variety in her work. Her biggest influences seem to be Japanese comic art, Alphonse Mucha, and cartoon animations in general. She has been drawing since pre-puberty, both traditional and digital. Her drawings have been published in a Polish online magazine for young people, and while she doesn't take commissions (quite yet), she is more than happy to oblige if someone has a sketch request. She often tells me that her favourite thing to do is to please someone with her art.

Digital Rayman-fanart. Full here.

Her sketching comes out almost completely ready, and she isn't shy about showing her unfinished work. What I love most about her style is her way of colouring. As you can see from the piece above, her skills in bringing vibrant colours to a drawing is impeccable, and you can easily see that it's her favourite part of drawing overall. 

Another one of her strengths is the dynamic of her style. As she enjoys drawing humanoid characters more than sceneries or machinery for instance, it's obvious that during the years she has learned to draw compelling portraits and pieces filled with both motion and emotion.

Agata's future aspirations include illustrating and graphic design. She draws and thus trains daily, so it's easy to imagine her having this as a profession in her future. Perhaps one day she will take commissions.

LINKS TO AGATA

ART BLOG | MAIN BLOG (art trade & request inquiries) | TWITTER

Review: Canaan [spoiler free]

The "random anime"-button on AnimeSeason.com is truly a source of treasures and wonder. Some days ago I was clicking the button in hopes of finding an interesting-looking anime series that's short enough for me to consume and not feel like going through is a duty, and that has a synopsis that will spark my interest. So happened with Canaan.

Antagonist Alphard and main character/protagonist Canaan

Canaan is a 13-episode long animation series from the year 2009. It falls into the genre of supernatural action, and AnimeSeason classifies it also as a mystery, although it wasn't so much of a mystery to me as it was action and supernatural, even dystopian science fiction. I have not yet read the manga, but as it's only four chapters long I will get to it shortly. The artwork of it looks promising, as much as I have seen of it.

Canaan is based upon a visual novel called 428: Fūsa Sareta Shibuya de, and takes place two years after the events of the game. However, I had no difficulty in understanding the events without prior knowledge of the visual novel, and many things are explained efficiently throughout the anime. Quoting the synopsis written at AnimeSeason:

Two years ago, Shibuya was ravaged by a biological terrorist attack using the deadly Ua virus. Maria Osawa was saved when her father inoculated her against the virus, but is left with partial amnesia from the shock. She works as a cameraman when she reunites with a girl named Canaan in Shanghai, China. A gifted assassin with synesthesia, she is under orders from an unknown organization for a yet unspecified mission.

Even I was confused upon reading this. However confusing it sounds, it gripped my interest. Synesthesia, biological terrorism, China, a girl called Canaan? I was intrigued, and watched the first episode with anticipation.

And then another. And another. And watched nine episodes during one day.

As someone interested in international politics, this anime gripped me with its themes that surrounded the war on terror and the sensitivities of big nations. It had me gasping and cursing at the terrible decisions leaders of big nations are forced to make in order to preserve their faces, and then it played upon my heartstrings with its character cavalcade and its behaviour.

The characters were not mainly Japanese (or mainly one nationality only) this time as I am so used to seeing in anime and, well, any other media. The main character Canaan was from the Middle East, and so was the main antagonist Alphard. Their late mentor Siam was from the same area as they were, and the animators even took their time to actually make their skin colours darker -- if only by one shade or two. Points for trying, but only very few of them.

Protagonist Maria with main character Canaan

Stage of action was mainly in and around Shanghai, China. Thus many supporting characters were Chinese, and I believe I heard some Chinese during the anime as well, alongside English and German and obviously Japanese, as I watched the Japanese dub. As pathetic as it actually is, this "multiculturalism" delighted me.

What I also love is the fact that most main characters are women or girls, and men are mostly supporting or flashback characters. This is something I see surprisingly little in the anime scene. The main character Canaan did not fight for a man, but for a friend. (Or more-than-friend, but that's up for interpretation.) The one who is obsessively in love with someone is a female, yes, but she is obsessively in love with another woman. That, too, was a novelty.

I would recommend this anime to anyone interested in a) international politics, b) examples of great female characterization, and c) interesting supernatural abilities. Those who find sci-fi anime interesting, this'll be for you. Small amount of episodes guarantees action-filled episodes with no fillers, and yet there's enough time for some comic relief and even romance to spawn here and there, however lightly and vaguely.

Summary time!

I APPLAUD:

• main character/protagonist division
• easy to get on even if you aren't familiar with the visual novel
• versatile female characterization
• multicultural character variety
• international politics
• complex plot interwined with and complimented the supernatural abilities and past events of characters
• actual character development in protagonist
• developing relationships between characters
• exciting, mysterious plot devices
• implications of romantic love between two important female characters
• open ending
• lovely artwork, flowing animation
• the soundtrack

I FROWN AT:

• obsession with youth; protagonist "probably doesn't even have her periods yet" (quoting a supporting character)
• lots of telling and not showing
• some inaccurate details in combat
• only implications of romantic love between two important female characters.

GRADE: 7.5/10, 3.5 stars.

LINKS:

• Read at Mangafox
• Watch at AnimeSeason (with English subtitles)
• Canaan article on Wikipedia
• 428: Fūsa Sareta Shibuya de article on Wikipedia

Music of the Month: April

The month and thus Camp NaNoWriMo is almost over, but I ain't done with this month's tasks yet. My job searching still continues, I spent ten days alone at home while Agata visited Poland, and I have taken it easy when it comes to writing. Exams are over, and my main concern now indeed is finding a job for the summer.

My music this month again varies from one end of the genre scale to another, and the list consists of four songs.

Piano version of Rammstein's Mein Herz brennt. It came out last year already, and seeing how much I love the original version from their album Mutter it's insanity to me that I heard this rendition only this month. The video is beautiful in its ugliness, and Till Lindemann looks fantastic with his messy makeup, deep scars, and long black dress. When a song makes it difficult for me to breathe properly, I know it's a good song that I will consume a lot in the near future. This is one of those songs.

Warning: may make you cry.

PSY's Gentleman is a lovely song that totally lives up to its predecessor Gangnam Style in my mind. The video is quirky, humorous, and the song makes me want to dance and sing along in broken Korean. PSY's style overall appeals to me. I love music that satirizes itself.

I haven't listened to Lana Del Rey much and didn't even know that it was her when Agata has listened to her albums for a long time in my company as well. Lana Del Rey's Smarty is a cute song that makes me think of many headcanons Agata and I have of various characters, our own and of others'. Her voice is wonderfully sensual, and even addictive.

Katy Perry's E.T. is a beautiful song, and as little as I like Katy Perry as a person, her singing and expression of feelings in this song is very captivating and beautiful. I don't care much for Kanye West's part in this song with the bad puns and objectification of women and what not, but I hear love from Katy Perry's voice, and I can think of many stories fit this song.

On top of that, I'm a science fiction fan and a believer in extraterrestrial life, so that plays a big part in it too.

The Thing About Autobiographies

I love reading autobiographies. Even those of people whose lives' work I'm not all that familiar with. I've read the autobiographies of Charles Chaplin, Stephen Fry (Moab is my Washbot, am currently reading The Fry Chronicles), Iwasaki Mineko, and Gene Wilder, and am willing to read more once I get my hands on them. I've enjoyed all of the aforementioned books immensely, and would recommend all of them.

However, when I go to GoodReads to read reviews of autobiographies, there's this endless string of the same comment. Many people don't like people's autobiographies, and for many reasons - but how relevant is it to say that you don't like an autobiography because the author talks about themselves? One review stated that Iwasaki put herself too much in the center of her book, many people didn't like Gene Wilder's life story because he justified his actions too much.

All's well, when opinions are in question. But riddle me this: why do you read someone's own story written from their own point of view if you think it's a vice that they put themselves in the centre? For goodess' sake - we all are the centre character of our own lives. We are the watchtower of our own life. We look at everything through our own perception and our own perception only.

So much talking about self!

I don't know what you were expecting from an autobiography if not a fully subjective point of view to someone's life choices, opinions, and ideals. Sure, it tells a lot about a person if they don't weigh other people's point of view and emotions in as well. But the thing about autobiographies is that they are self-written stories of one's life, from a perspective exclusively limited to one person's point of view.

Same thing applies, to some extent, to blogging. Sometimes I wonder if I use the word "I" too much in my blog posts, and get really self-conscious about talking about myself. I remember the times people have called me out for talking about myself, so I have moved this critique over to my blogging and, in a way, to my writing.

Why shouldn't I be allowed to talk about myself on my blog? Why shouldn't Gene Wilder put his opinions in the centre of his autobiography, why shouldn't Iwasaki Mineko think of herself as an important person? All autobiographies and blogs that present opinions need to be taken with a grain of salt. It's up to the reader to do it, not the author.

The point I'm trying to make across here is that while criticism is a healthy and welcome aspect of all arts, it's not fair to criticize an autobiography for being too author-centric. Just like it's not fair to criticize an apple for being a fruit, or a science fiction story for having science in it.

What do you think about autobiographies? Do you read them often, or do you not find them interesting at all?

Hair Crisis and Clothing Lately (+ ABotD)

(If you haven't, please check out my new blog header. My talented girlfriend made it, and I'm very very pleased with how it looks on my blog. Tell me what you think of it as well!)

As of late, I have completely ignored one important part of my life and interests in this blog - and that is clothing. You see, once I came here to study in Tampere, I've noticed a few changes in my looks.

First of all, since I don't have my mother's excellent hairdresser skills at hand, and on top of that my financial sources are limited, I cannot go get a new haircut. All I can do on my own (or all I dare to do) is to ask my girlfriend to dye my hair sometimes. During my stay here I've had dark violet, blonde, orange (which was an attempt to pink, but the hair dye failed be completely), fire red, and now I have long roots after what was supposed to be dark brown, but dyed on top of the fire red it became more like the colour of a chestnut. It was a fine colour, though.

Now I just don't know what to do with my overgrown haircut and faded hair dye. While I decide, I do nothing. I'm tempted to return to the look I had back in 2010, with a kind-of-long mohawk my friend shaved me, and that my mother later modified. I'd also like to dye my hair pitch black. We'll see!

39.90€, Cubus

What I have been doing for my looks has been shopping! I bought two new pairs of skinny pants lately, after lots of persuasion from Agata who convinced me that our domestic finances can handle two pairs of trousers. She was right.

The first pair is a deliciously pink pair of trousers. I've never worn really skinny jeans (I suppose the fabric is jean fabric in these, but I wouldn't know), so this was a new thing to me - most of all buying such trousers voluntarily.

In my wardrobe I mostly have dark trousers and dark skirts - and this splash of colour was a great, sorely needed addition. Finally I have a piece of clothing that fits with my pastel pink necktie, for instance - no need to hide it in the closet anymore because of lack of fitting garments, at least.

The trousers and a closeup

As for the second pair of trousers, I got a hefty discount (-70%) when I bought them - of course, the biggest incentive for buying them in the first place. They were in the discount rack of Lindex, and I spotted the wonderful pattern in the pants. I tried them on, and got them without much thinking. I wore them later to a party, and they lasted long, despite my suspicion of the fabric's quality. The garment is pretty light in weight, and its pattern is fabulous. It fits with so many clothes of mine that it proved out to be a more necessary addition than I at first thought it would be.

My only problem with these trousers is that I don't have a pair of shoes that really fits them. They'd look glorious with high heels, but it's not the season yet. Oh, woe is me!

That's it for today's fashion show. Have you done any wardrobe improvements lately? How about hair? Leave it in the comments!

~ ART BLOG OF THE DAY ~

RP art of E. Aster Bunnymund

This post's featured artist is Miki, or Mikodemus, as she is known online. She was also known as MikiEwans on deviantArt when she still was there, the page where I first found her back in 2009

Miki is a Finnish 20-year-old artist who has been publishing her art online for years. She's very active in many ways - she publishes her art frequently on Tumblr in her various blogs as well as her sketch/art blog, roleplays a lot and often, she writes and illustrates her and her girlfriend's stories (WITH her girlfriend; about her in a later post!) and has aspirations of becoming a film director and an author of children's books. She is also a good photographer, and makes vlogs every now and then.

One of my favourite things about her artist persona is that sometimes she posts a video showcasing her recently filled sketch book, or the month's sketches. I love sketchy style the most, and her style is wonderfully relaxed and, at the same time, very comic-like. She has a very distinctive grip of digital art, and there is something very unique about the stroke of her brush (stylus? pen?) that makes me go "yep. that's Miki alright." During the years I've had the pleasure to see her develop this style further, and am delighted every time I get to see her stuff.

Part of a three-piece, one of my recent favourites.

Mikodemus is a passionate artist who makes art from her heart. Perhaps that is the thing that I can tell from her drawings?

Who knows. Nonetheless, I expect a lot to come for her and her artistic endeavours in the future, and believe that she has all the potential for anything she desires to do.

LINKS TO MIKI

ART TUMBLR | E. ASTER BUNNYMUND RP BLOG | HAMSTER PHOTO BLOG | YOUTUBE

Writers, I Have Sinned (+ ABotD)

As I have edited my novel, and as I am rewriting some of it now during Camp NaNoWriMo (with a word count goal of 20k), I have noticed during this passing year of 2013 that my novel commits way too many of the "deadly sins" of novelling for it to be satisfactory to me. Then again, I might need to keep them just to have the story told and blame it on this being my first novel - but on the other hand, I wouldn't be too proud about half-assing a story that is so dear to me.

Which cardinal sins am I talking about?

1. Prologues. I have a goddamn prologue in my story. I never had problems with prologues, but then I read a lot of writing advice - and lo and behold, I cringe at the thought of having a prologue in my story. It's either that I have internalized an ill-spirited advice, or maybe I have realized how cheap a trick a prologue can be - either way, I don't like them. I have removed a prologue from my story, but I notice day by day that it might actually benefit the story a whole lot.
   
   
2. Flashbacks. The novel draft that I wrote in 2011 was a myriad of dream scenes, flashbacks, and flash-forwards. They worked as they were, but like in the case above, I started to cringe at them after reading lots of writing articles and stories with lots of flashbacks. Now I'm trying to make my story more linear, but I believe that I will have to include a flashback and a dream scene, one of each at least. Or many of them.
   My story has a non-linear nature, but unfortunately its genre (horror/supernatural mystery) doesn't really advocate such tricks.
   
   

Otherwise, my Camp is progressing nicely. I reached my weekend goal of 8k and might type up enough words to break the 9k line. I have rewritten the first chapter to fit the current storyline and mood I have in mind, and am keeping some syntactic and linguistic tricks in mind while writing.

Doing sprints together with my girlfriend has also proven itself to be a worthy way of conjuring up words. She's writing a collection of science fiction stories, and I love to encourage her writing hobby - although primarily she is a visual artist.

Any others who cringe at the thought of prologues or epilogues like I do? What do you think of flashback scenes? Can they ever work? Can you think of any good or bad examples?

~ART BLOG OF THE DAY~

Today as the artist of the day, I shall introduce my friend Henu, also known as Jerico Pretzel, or Jerico Rinkeli, or Ziisa on Tumblr. 

She studies the art of comics and soon graduates from the year-long course. I've had the pleasure to know her for the past at least six years, and I have been acquainted with her since middle school. When we became friends, I got to know about her artistic talent, and have always been very happy if she has drawn me anything. And she has drawn me quite a lot of things!

Commissioned drawing.

Her style is comic-like (as she studies the branch of comics), but she is phenomenal at drawing realistic portraits with pencil. She has done a few commissions, each one of them excellent quality. On her art blogs she mostly publishes her comic art, but from her deviantArt-gallery you can find her realistic pieces.

What I like most about her style is the relaxedness, her sparkly sense of humour and the self-irony in her comics. She will publish and sell her debut comic, Hunter Saga: Fall of the Oracle at Tracon 2013 here in Tampere.

LINKS TO ZIISA

ENGLISH BLOG | FINNISH BLOG | DEVIANTART | TUMBLR