Haibane.info

Author: fledgling otaku

  • Robert’s Anime Corner Blog

    Welcome Robert, of Robert’s Corner Anime Store fame, to the otakusphere.

  • Galactica: Downloaded (via Jammer)

    I’ve been subscribing to Jammer’s reviews for years. He’s a scifi otaku extraordinaire whose episode synopses and reviews have been so high quality that it’s almost sinful that they haven’t been published in book form yet; you can get them all for free at his website. He started out reviewing Star Trek: The Next Generation (ST:TNG) and moved on to Deep Space Nine (ST:DS9), Voyager (ST:VOY), and Enterprise (ST:ENT). He also reviewed each of the Star Trek feature films. He’s got complete archives for every episode of every season of each of these shows, and is presently working on the original series (ST:TOS). I can’t recommend his reviews highly enough to anyone who is/was a fan of Star Trek.

    Near the end of Enterprise’s run he decided to begin reviewing the new Galactica series. This was partly a decision borne of frustration with the Rick Berman era, especially the massive wasted opportunities of ST:VOY and ST:ENT. Galactica offered a fresh start of sorts and he has approached the series with the same attitude he always had for Star Trek – high expectations. And no pulling punches when the series failed to meet them. The basic philosophy of science fiction as a genre – not spaceships and aliens for their own sake, but rather exploration of human society and the human condition by alien (biological, or circumstantial) perspectives – is one he keeps front and center as he reviews an episode and renders judgement on a season or a series as a whole.

    And thus far, Galactica seems to be dethroning ST:DSP in that regard. Jammer’s review of Downloaded just arrived in my inbox, and his insight into Baltar and Six’s relationship is both succinct and insightful:

    (more…)

  • 2000 visits!

    probably half were my own page-reloading. Still, it’s a nice round number and not too bad for only three months of blogging. I’ve got more geek service planned for the future, as well as my elusive review of Someday’s Dreamers and some more discussion of H2G2. The best part has been the comments, though – I truly appreciate all of you taking the time to leave your own thoughts here.

  • a disturbance in the Force

    I wrote a few days ago of my victory over the Lucas Empire, bending the Bearded One to my will in re-releasing the original Star Wars Trilogy on DVD without the plot “enhancements”.

    It seems that celebration may be premature. Quint of AICN delivers the bad news:

    The releases are going to be the 1995 Laserdisc masters and The Digital Bits confirmed today that they won’t even be anamorphic widescreen transfers, just the letterboxed transfers, which would mean we’re not getting the full theatrical experience. For sound junkies there is no option to listen to a digitally remastered THX soundtrack. We’ll get the two-channel stereo.
    …
    all the original STAR WARS films were released as 70mm experiences during their releases, which would mean they did have a 6-channel audio mix originally, so the 2-channel stereo only option on the DVD just became officially ridiculous.

    In other words, these DVDs will look and sound like crappy laserdisc versions, with sound akin to a pair of headphones. Not even minimal surround sound or digitally remastered film!

    As if to add insult to injury, the DVD covers will also suck, using stupid photoshop-level montages rather than the original stylized artwork of the 1970s-era posters. Quint has scans, so go take a look.

    It’s clear that these are “bastard” releases that are intended to scoop up extra change from the hardcore. As Quint notes, it’s a real dilemma for a true-blue fan. Will these sucky DVDs be the only way we can ever get the original Star Wars? (My letterbox VHS tapes aren’t going to last much longer). Or should we hold out for a future release with the real remastering and full six channel sound?

    Since I am budgetarily constrained, my answer is easy – wait, for what I really want rather than this half-assed effort which is really a step backwards IMHO from the VHS tapes I already own. Still, it’s going to be a bitter pill to swallow, that the very DVDs I’ve clamored for years to see are now not worth purchasing. I hope that Lucas follows through and does release “real” versions in the years to come. I’ll pay a lot more for those should they become available…

  • editorial policy: a revision

    When I poliblog, it’s always with the assumption that the user is as wonkish as I am, and is willing to do the due diligence toget up to speed on the topic so I don’t need to explain it from the basics. But anime-blogging is harder, since most new readers are coming to the blog to learn about anime rather than discuss anime they have seen (or so it seems). But discussions with other otaku (for both anime and scifi) are the main appeal for me, so I don’t want to alienate that audience with boring background that they already know. Thus far I still haven’t found a good balance.

    In addition, I found that for a given topic (for example, the Walls of Glie) I end up writing here and leaving comments at other blogs which leads to a very fragmented discussion. I end up with no single collection of my own analysis on the topic.

    So, to address these issues I am going to impose some rules upon myself:

    1. above the fold will be background material. Not a full episode synop but at least enough info so that someone who isn’t familiar with the topic can at least get a sense for why I think it is interesting. No spoilers.

    2. below the fold, the substantive geeky analysis and wonkery. Spoilers galore.

    3. I’ll leave comments on other blogs when I am responding to a topic they initiate. For topics that I start, I’ll update my original post below the fold with my responses.

    I think that this self-discipline will help me keep the blog interesting for other otaku and still accessible for newbies, and help me keep a more coherent record of my own thoughts.

    How do the rest of you do it? You all make it look so easy 🙂

  • anime for kids

    Don has suggestions for child-friendly anime. I can’t express enough gratitude to him for this.

    I think I’ll start saving up for Binchou-tan next for my daughter (now 4). She also (somewhat surprisingly) enjoyed Someday’s Dreamers, so I would like to add that to the recommended-for-kids list. Small girls really seem to relate to the whole “magical girl” genre, and my daughter in particular was quite taken with the idea of a magic bracelet/ring that she can use for her “magic power”. Plus she got hooked on the theme music almost as hard as with Sugar.

  • black is beautiful

    thinkpad

    I’d been using an IBM Thinkpad T40 for the past couple of years for my research. It was a fine machine, ordered and paid for by my advisor. After my graduation though, he needed his sizable investment back of course, so I began researching what I should replace the machine with.

    My needs were 1. thin and light, given that it would be used for travel to conferences and on the bus, 2. fairly powerful given that I will be running IDL and MATLAB, and 3. rock-solid and dependable. These requirements, along with a lot of help from the forum at NoteBookReview.com, led me right back to IBM/Lenovo’s T42. I chose the T42 instead of the T43 primarily because I could get a faster hard drive. I spent about a month and a half researching models from Fujitsu, Asus, Toshiba, and HP before finally deciding that the T42 was indeed the machine for me. I placed an order in November and the machine was received early December.

    Here are some specs:

    * Pentium M 1.86 GHz
    * 14.1″ SXGA screen
    * 1 GB RAM
    * 7200 RPM, 60 GB hard drive
    * Bluetooth and Wireless 802.11b/g
    * model part number 2373m3u

    I ran some basic benchamrks on the old machine before sending it back to my advisor and will run the same ones on my new one soon for a laster post.

    One of the major issues I faced was whether I should wait until the new Yonah (dual-core) Pentium-M chips were released in January. I decided to buy right away, however, because new T60 model with Yonah would be more expensive anyway, and I also needed a machine asap since my advisor needed the old one back and couldn’t wait until January (esp with ISMRM 2006 on the horizon)

    I got a very solid config at a very reasonable price, which I think will be more than sufficient for the next few years to handle whatever I need. I could have saved another $150 had I purchased from an ebay reseller, but I think that the peace of mind of buying direct from Lenovo was worth the markup.

    I notice via Brian that Apple has finally played catch-up to IBM and released a black laptop of their own. If I were a Dell user I might have some envy, but come on, a glossy screen and iPod lacquer finish? And what’s with the chiclet-style keyboard? It reminds me of the Apple IIc.

    I love my ThinkPad. The keyboard is the best I have ever used on any computer, laptop or desktop (and I’m not alone in that assessment). The wireless antenna is built into the screen lid, so you get tremendously stable and sensitive WiFi reception. The components are top-drawer quality and the support software suite for rescue, recovery, administration, and security is astounding – easily several hundred dollars worth of software alone. Even the small touches, like the built-in keyboard light and the hard-drive shock protection are designed with the actual user experience in mind – not bells and whistles (like the integrated iSight on the macbook) that have no contribution to actual productivity.

    Yeah, I am a partisan. But unlike in politics, my partisanship doesn’t require that I hate Macs – in fact the day the Merom-based Mac Mini comes out, I am buying two! A laptop is an intensely personal choice and everyon’es mileage may vary, but this is the best computer I’ve ever owned, and where else to share my love for it than here?

  • Glie topology

    Don highlights a thread at the Old Home Bulletin Board that attempts to map the town of Glie. The basic data are estimated walking speeds and times of travel. It’s a pretty laborious task, but I think that the end result (while surely consistent with the data) is just not a good fit with the essence and basic symbolism of Haibane Renmei.

    The main issue is that the Wall clearly must be circular. I have been exploring the circle symbolism in my ongoing series of posts on the topic; that the Wall could be anything other than a circle would break the integral symmetry in a fundamental way.

    Any attempt to map Glie simply must begin with the basic assumption that the Wall is a circle, and that the town is near the center. I don’t doubt that reasonable estimates can be attained, but I also note that Glie is not a three-dimensional universe – Glie is fundamentally a two-dimensional plane. Steven has also noted that time itself doesn’t seem to be truly linear, in Glie it is always what time it needs to be. The spacetime topology of Glie may not be continous enough to map!

    UPDATE: Shamus has a nice screencap that shows the apparent curvature of the wall from the inside is much tighter than it would appear from the outside. More evidence that Glie is strange, topologically speaking.

  • a more wretched hive of scum and villainy you will not find

    I notice via Steven that we otaku aren’t respectable enough for the Mainstream Blogmedia – Taranto and the Powerline folks don’t even deign to link back to him anymore.

    I can just imagine what political bloggers think when they look over at Mos Eisley here and see us talking about Star Trek cribs. I think Steven’s obviously Chewie – I’m the hammerhead in the corner, Shamus is probably the furry thing.

    Well, political blogging sucks. I still do it but I’m starting to think of it like a bad habit – like smoking, I try not to draw attention to my polblog addiction. We all get the urge – even SDB is seen furtively lighting up a post at RedState now and then 🙂 Maybe by 2006 I’ll be fully weaned. In the meantime, I’m having fun blogging again – and we otaku can laugh from time to time at the robotic drivel that the polblogs generate.

    I hope no polblogger droid shows up here. We don’t serve their kind here…

  • orphans and accents

    I’m in Seattle for a conference but just had to finagle web access to see what the other otaku are up to.

    Steven, Pixy and Don discuss how often anime characters are orphaned. They speculate it may be to save costs for hiring seiyuu, though Pixy suggests it may also be a plot device. I haven’t seen most of the series they mention but the trend is certainly evident even in the small sample of anime that I have seen.

    In Sugar: A Little Snow Fairy, not just Saga but also Sugar appear to be fatherless. Also, Studio Ghibli films seem to be particularly taken with orphans – Kiki’s Delivery Service and the ultra-downer Grave of the Fireflies come to mind (and they came close in Totoro!). Of course, all the haibane in Haibane Renmei are orphaned in sense.

    I can’t comment on the anime I haven’t seen, but of the ones I have that do follow the trend, it seems that the orphan status is more oriented towards making the characters seem more vulnerable and thus sympathetic. Watching, I tend to give the orphaned characters more benefit of the doubt.

    Also, Shamus is watching Someday’s Dreamers (which I finished too, but have yet to post my review. slacker!) and notes that Yume’s rural accent is portrayed in the dub as a deep south dixie drawl. I remember being a bit bemused at this but it grew on me. Also, Runa’s urban accent is portrayed as a New York street accent, which I think is rather appropriate. My own observation of Tokyo certainly brought New York to mind – in terms of attitude and energy.