Reaction: Wonderful Hearts Land

Well there it is - I missed the initial pre-order on this ...er... tourbook? Photobook? I dunno. I'd compare it to a souvenir program you'd get at a fancy play - only much thicker and ridiculously expensive. It was backordered here and didn't even ship out until 3 weeks after I'd placed my order! And after all that waiting, I still wasn't 100% sure what it was I had just ordered.

The first treat I was pleasantly surprised with was a couple of neatly folded posters tucked into the front cover:

And here's a look at a typical set of pages. As you can see, beside a bunch of different shots of the Morning Musume members, each member also had a set of pages devoted to them. Starting with a studio shot of them in costume from the opening number (some kind of pseudo country-western theme), then pages with smaller shots of the actual performance (including the occasional candids from rehearsals), and finally another studio shot on their other major costume from the Morning Musume segment of the show.

That would be Gaki-san, if you recall her back in DOM5

There was one thing that surprised me about the book. Wonderful Hearts referred to a small subset of Hello!Project acts (the younger ones) during the 2006 touring season. In fact, although they did headline the concert, Morning Musume was only one of the acts appearing at the summer concert tour entitled Wonderful Hearts Land. This book however features only Morning Musume. And depending on your point of view, is both a good and a bad thing.
First of all, I really don't have much interest in seeing photos of the "munchkins" that make up the kid groups like Berry'z Koubo or C'ute. However, I'm still very much taken by Ishikawa Rika who, as a member of Vi-yu-den, also makes an appearance in the concert... and is sadly relagated to only a few behind-the-scenes shots in this book.

Still, it's one of those treats for my personal guilty pleasure. Take the concert at face value - we're talking tons of lip-synching going on. Lots of "we're Japanese so we suffer together and fans want to see us crying over Konkon's graduation speech." But hey, that's all part of the Musume experience, right? LOL! ^_^;;

DVD: Superman Returns

Just thought I'd post this since it does have something to do with anything:
The Futureshop site is just damn confusing (and wrong). For those of you still wondering, the item listed here is actually the two disc set.

The reason I'm sort of peeved at the confusion is that Futureshop Canada had also done an exclusive deal for X-Men The Last Stand with a similar metal case... designed for 2 discs... even though Fox never put out a 2-Disc set. Yeah, looks kinda dumb when you open up the case and find that empty slot for a non-existent second disc.

Oh, and by the way, yes, BestBuy Canada also has an exclusive release - they also have snazzy packaging but with a bonus 64-page booklet. But it also costs a few bucks more. I happened to like the metal case better at Futureshop.

Of course, for those of you interested in the super-duper boxed set with this movie and all the Christopher Reeve films also... well, all of the above is a moot point. Thanks for bearing with me. But anyway, I highly encourage you to grab the 2-disc version because there is indeed a single-disc release floating around out there that's a little cheaper but also very barebones with no features at all. Naturally, your mileage may vary so be sure to shop around. The steel-case 2-disc set was only $6 more than the single-disc regular version, for instance.

And as for the film? Well... my initial reaction here. Six months later... well, I've learned to go with the flow, so to speak. One thing that hasn't changed? Heh - that denouement sure seems to last forever... The epilogue reaches nearly "Return of the King" proportions.

The Happy 8 Audition finalists!!

I'm a day late but here you go...

http://ikimasshoi.jphip.net/index.php/?p=724

Ikimasshoi News has posted a round-up on the 6 finalists in the running for the 8th generation to join Morning Musume!

It's odd that the screen-caps posts are a little misleading - you really don't get a feel for the girls unless you go see their clips posted on Youtube. But a little training and they could all be great. The youngest one, Satou Sumire, however, could use a dose of valium... ^_^;

Reactions: comics round-up

Alright, have a bit of time on my hands today so I decided to get caught up on those new issues I picked up yesterday... Admittedly I'm sort of on a high right now because I just put down a really great issue of Wonder Woman (yes, it was worth waiting for)... so my mood is pretty good right now - the other titles ought to be thankful!

First up is the newest release of Ghost in the Shell in English. Old-hats like myself is remember fondly how confusing Shirow Masamune's masterpiece cyber-punk thriller was the first time they read it. Well, time has aged me and for the most part, I look at Shirow's narrative a little differently now. Either that or Frederick L Shodt's translations have become much smoother. The foot-notes are much quicker to digest than before (and funnier too). The artwork unfortunately seems to be frozen in time and has not evolved - I blame that on the actual time of production tho. These are "lost chapters" published many moons ago in its native Japan. I'm loving it though. It's an all-new story and well, we've been waiting ages for material about Section 9's exploits.

What? You didn't think I forgot, did you? Supergirl sure too its sweet time getting its feet wet and finding itself. Trouble is, it was caught launching last year in the midst of the Infinite Crisis event and then blown sky high thanks to the wake of that event (it participated in the "One Year Later" deal where everything skipped forward in narrative. Worked for some DCU titles... didn't work so well for others. In this title we spent a lot of time fumbling around with what should've been a tie-in with the "Legion" title but never really addressed that. And then a couple of stand-alone issues (which for the most part have been excellent. This pulls a Tarantino-esque non-linear plot but ends up with with a wacky cliff-hanger. And everything was going swell up until that last page... *sigh* At least we got to see hot bodies in bathing suits. If nothing else, the cheesecake was alright (and is it just me or do I smell shades of Danger Girl in the designs?

Ah yes, the grand finale to volume 2 of the Fathom series. Y'know, it actually did it well. Plenty of closure. Not sure if it was worth the wait tho. After 11 issues, I never really warmed up to Turnbull's art. Say what you will about Turner's incorrect anatomy, but he did faces well. Turnbull's faces... not so much. I mean, he's alright, but he hasn't really captured the sensual lines that make up the characters who populate the Fathom universe. The plot... well, the bad guys got what was coming to them. And Aspen and her boyfriend go off to live happily ever after. Which is in itself a good thing because despite being predictable, at least, didn't piss me off in the end.

And finally, I get to the issue that prompted this post. Y'know, I haven't warmed up at all to this idea of a bi-monthly release schedule - it makes the series feel very disconnected. In fact, when I saw this cover on the stands, I almost didn't get it because I'd forgotten how much I enjoyed the previous issues. But the saga continues as Diana debates over whether or not to retake the mantle of Wonder Woman from her protege, Donna Troy (currently moonlighting in the WW get-up). The story raises some very interesting soul-searching questions: what is the significance of the Wonder Woman, does mankind need a hero as such? And what about the person-on-the-street? Who is their champion in tough times? Do these people need a super-hero at all? The Dodsons provide a fantastic issue as always - Diana looks great even out of that crazy WW costume and in more conventional business attire. Plus we've got plenty of badguys and guest-stars. And then there's the villainous mastermind behind the attacks in the first few issues revealed. Oooh... the plot thickens. I'm loving it.

Sunday haul: procrastinating

Now that I'm in the 'burbs, heading into town for the old hauls isn't quite the same anymore. I used to be able to make a whole day of walking into downtown from my apartment. Now it's... different.

Here's a pic of one of the goodies I decided to grab tho. It's new school on the old school. Patlabor remains one of my all-time favourites and the design of the Ingram is something that will stick with me forever. So when I heard the latest "Revoltech" craze of tiny collectible figures with a revolutionary joint system for articulation was going to include some mecha from Patlabor, that was a $30 already spent. ^_^;
So far I'm loving it too considering how long ago it was that I built those MG class model kits (they had loads of moving parts like opening compartments and all, but hardly the same story). I hear the company behind these are also going to do a Type J9 Griffon mecha as well and perhaps a "unit 2" Ingram also. Sweet. Did I mention how affordable these are?

You might also notice the shiny new wireless router behind him in that photo. Grabbed that today too. Not to sound like a frickin' advert, but Staples is having a huge sale on netowrking hardware (don't know how much longer it'll last, today might've been the final day). At $55, the price was right for a 108Mbps wi-fi unit. Now I can sit in my "throne room" and surf the web using my PSP! Plus my brother doesn't have to hog my PC when he visits - he can just log into the router on his laptop.

And no haul list would be complete without a pile of comics to entertain myself with. Haven't read them all, but I'll be sure to mention these later on:
Ghost in the Shell 1.5 #1 - the "lost" chapters of the GitS saga - the story reads like an episode of the Stand Alone Complex series. I'm liking it so far. It's got me thinking I should dig out the GitS manga I collected a few years back and rereading those too.
Legion of SuperHeroes #24: I don't know where this series is going, and I'm actually considering dropping it if this Supergirl angle doesn't resolve itself soon. The questions have been dragging on too long, IMHO. Will blog this later.
Supergirl #11: yes, it's actually last week's issue but like I said, I haven't been to the shops in a while. Again, lots of unanswered questions and there's hardly any continuity between issues in this series... WTF is happening in the DCU?
Wonder Woman #3: ah - yes, where were we? Oh yeah, there was that appearance of the DCU's version of Hercules in the previous issue... 2 months ago. I'm not really liking this bi-monthly schedule. The series started out really promising but... geez, that was back in July!
Noble Causes #25: this series hasn't disappointed me in forever. Looking forward to reading this extra-large issue!
Fathom #11: suffered from Wonder Woman syndrome for a while... I don't even remember what was going on in issue #10. But I'm glad it's finally over. Also can't wait to read this one.

Anyway, sorry, but I STILL haven't taking photos of that Morning Musume book I talked about before... Sheesh, I suck.

Star Wars: something else forgotten

Hey y'know what I discovered tonight? My television was calibrated to THX standard! And that probably means neither is my computer monitor.

See, I was one of those folks who've been complaining that my 2004 boxed set of Star Wars had the weird "rectangle frames" over the TIE-fighters during the escape from the Death Star (you remember - the scene where Luke and Han sit in the turrets of the Millenium Falcon and shoot at the passing Imperial fighters). Yeah, that scene. If you're tv is too bright, you start to pick out this awkward "bright square" that trails along each frame with a TIE-Fighter craft. It's kinda hard to explain...

Anyway, I was goofing off with the different settings on my TV tonight on a whim switched over to the "Movie" setting. Then it occured to me that I should watch that scene and see if making the switch made any difference (see, the "Movie" setting is a preset with darker contrast and slightly sharper colours). As it turns out, the hidious squares suddenly disappeared. Huh - go figure... I'll never say I had "too many settings" about my hardware again.

Backlog of items to blog about

Several goodies at the new house I haven't had time to photograph/scan or otherwise log in to blog about.

1) Morning Musume's "Wonderful Hearts Land" tourbook. Got this photobook in the mail last week. My folks were here - didn't think to blog it at the time. Over a hundred pages of Japanese cuteness - both in studio and on stage. A few behind the scenes too!

2) Guitar Hero II for PS2. Got this on the long weekend after I got my environmental certifications on my car. Figured, if I wasn't going to have to spend money on repairs, I may as well have a little fun with the cash. I rock hard. ^_^;

3) Voltron Collection One. Not sure what they have in mind with making the packaging theme of the first collection as "Blue Lion" (or the 4th lion, if you know from what). But this is a really slick DVD set. Dolby surround effects are in full force (almost overwhelming) as Voltron was one of the first tv shows ever mixed in stereo. Video has been completely remastered and looks cleaner that it's original broadcast. Comes in a beautiful embossed tin case with a fold-out card sleeve of 3 discs. Lots of behind the scenes material too. Really amazing.

More details later!!

50 questions

ok - I lied, I'm not particularly productive on a Friday afternoon so I've filled out the meme instead of leaving it for the weekend...

1. When you looked at yourself in the mirror today, what was the first thing you thought?
"I look remarkably well considering the head-cold I'm suffering."

2. How much cash do you have on you?
a couple hundred ...it's kind of a long story (I don't normally carry this much).

3. What’s a word that rhymes with “DOOR?”
Al Gore

4. Favorite planet?
Earth ...I haven't to any others.

5. Who is the 4th person on your missed call list on your cell phone?
My cousin.

6. What is your favorite ring tone on your phone?
The one I have right now (a Mandarin pop song).

7. What shirt are you wearing?
The free promo T-shirt that came with one of the Ghost in the Shell DVDs I bought last year.

8. Do you “label” yourself?
"geek"

9. Name the brand of the shoes you’re currently wearing?
Brooks (they're actually my running shoes; but I haven't had it in my to run lately).

10. Bright or Dark Room?
Bright, please.

11. What do you think about the person who took this survey before you?
I like to think we'd get along.

12. What does your watch look like?
One time, somebody asked if Batman wants his watch back. (It's an Oakley Detonator).

13. What were you doing at midnight last night?
Sleeping.

14. What did your last text message you received on your cell say?
My brother was telling me what time he got home that day...

15. Where is your nearest 7-11?
I dunno - it's not a common brand hereabouts - I think there's one on the main strip a 5km from here.

16. Whats a word that you say a lot?
"dunno"

17. Who told you he/she loved you last?
My mommy.

18. Last furry thing you touched?
A friend's dog when it came up to sniff me.

19. How many drugs have you done in the last three days?
3, I think (coffee, Nyquil and Dayquil).

20. How many rolls of film do you need developed?
none - been digital for years now.

21. Favorite age you have been so far?
I like to think 18 ...but right now's pretty good.

22. Your worst enemy?
Time.

23. What is your current desktop picture?
Ryu from Street Fighter II - I was on a "Udon Studios" kick for a little while after I met the artists in Toronto a couple of months ago.

24. What was the last thing you said to someone?
"No trouble." (in French)

25. If you had to choose between a million bucks or to be able to fly what would it be?
Flying is really tempting, but hardly practical in Canadian climate... so I'd go with the million.

26. Do you like someone?
Of course.

27. The last song you listened to?
A Japanese pop song from the 90's (but I don't remember which).

28. What time of day were you born?
Close to midnight, I think.

29. Whats your favorite number?
8 (and not because I'm Chinese).

30. Where did you live in 1987?
Sherbrooke Quebec.

31. Are you jealous of anyone?
From time to time.

32. Is anyone jealous of you?
If there is, I don't know about (and I wouldn't understand why, either).

33. Where were you when 9/11 happened?
In my cubicle - most of us didn't even know what was going on until we got home and saw the non-stop television coverage.

34. What do you do when vending machines steal your money?
I curse myself for trusting my money to a mindless automaton.

35. Do you consider yourself kind?
I do.

36. If you had to get a tattoo, where would it be?
If I HAD to? Probably my shoulder - high enough that it could be hidden by a T-shirt sleeve.

37. If you could be fluent in any other language, what would it be?
Japanese - so I could enjoy all those downloads I have without reading sub-titles, etc...

38. Would you move for the person you loved?
I'd like to think so... but it's kinda hard to say without actually being in such a position.

39. Are you touchy feely?
Not really - I had a bad experience with it in my youth.

40. What’s your life motto?
"Freedom is the right of all sentient beings."

41. Name three things that you have on you at all times?
my glasses, my watch, underwear.

42. What’s your favourite town/city?
Right now it's Montreal - it's always exciting.

43. What was the last thing you paid for with cash?
Last night's supper (I was lazy so I ate out).

44. When was the last time you wrote a letter to someone on paper and mailed it?
I don't remember - years ago I wrote a letter to an old friend ...but I don't think I sent it by mail.

45. Can you change the oil on a car?
I like to think I can. I've topped out my motor oil and know how to check my dipstick and where the filter goes, I've just never had to do it myself before.

46. Your first love: what is the last thing you heard about him/her?
Out of sight, out of mind. I don't remember what I last heard of this person.

47. How far back do you know about your ancestry?
My grandfather was adopted ...but I do know my great-grandfather is buried at Mount Royal Cemetary in Montreal.

48. The last time you dressed fancy, what did you wear and why did you dress fancy?
Starfish's wedding... I wore my favourite navy blue suit.

49. Does anything hurt on your body right now?
A constant itch in my nasal passage (I think it's an effect of that Dayquil I took).

50. Have you been burned by love?
I think so... but then... who hasn't?

Reaction: Captain Atom "Armageddon"

I have mixed feelings about Captain Atom: Armageddon, but not in the love-it-hate-it way I have with most collected editions. Rather than being disappointed that it read too episodic or feeling like I walked in on the middle of a grander adventure I could not understand (it's HAS been years since I was into Wildstorm comics), I spent more time curiously drawn forward in the story flipping through the pages to discover more and more of the WSU's vast cast of characters. And in most cases, that's a good thing. Publishers who engage in these cross-universe events have one ultimate agenda besides telling a cool story: they want to sell you more titles, and cross-over events allow readers of one product sample the other product making up a potential for future sales of that other product.

So what's the deal with Captain Atom?

Nathaniel Adam is a lesser-know second-string character inhabiting the DC Universe along-side top-tier powerhouses like Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman. He's a former soldier blasted forward through time from the 1950's (I could be wrong on this one) and encased in a invulnerable metal skin that contains his nuclear powers. Admittedly, he's actually a remake of another comic character from DC's purchase of Charlton Comics lock-stock-n-barrel in the 1970's.

What's the setup?

Having a personal crisis of faith, Captain Atom attempts to sacrifice his life in a Bruce Willis-esque mission to blow up a kryptonite meteor within the pages of the "Superman/Batman" comic... The meteor is destroyed sending fragments showering Earth with debris (but that's another story we're not concerned with). The point is that his quantum powers kicked in at the moment of his apparent death and sent him off again – but this time instead of jumping through time and space, through to an alternate universe. Thus begins Captain Atom's encounter with the ruthless and brutal cast of the Wildstorm Universe.

Quite honestly, I loved this book and read it almost in one sitting (I would've too except for the part where I had to go to bed and get up for work the next day). Characters were at once familiar and yet still new to me – all major players in the then-current WSU were lined up. In that I mean I was vaguely aware of the turmoil brewing in the WSU when it morphed from a series of X-Men styled super-heroes into the gritty style of relentless morally-questionable anti-heroes of the late 1990's... but I hadn't really been reading those comics (not since before "Stormwatch" became "The Authority." But I knew just enough to enjoy what was going on with those maniacs that Captain Atom was dealing with.

So where is the serious problem?

I suppose I won't be spoiling anything now, but up until now WSU continuity was pretty solid. It's not like Stormwatch changed into The Authority for absolutely no reason. WildCATs go from an underground team to a multinational corporation overnight... the comics had a logical evolution through the years of stories that were published. But now the plans were in the works for a new reboot. And this mini-series featuring Captain Atom finding himself trapped in said continuity (combined with Mister Majestic's recent adventure in the DCU and meeting Superman) was meant to be a springboard towards that reboot. So what's an event comic to do? Well, you can guess what that means to the status quo of the WSU by the end of the mini-series...

It's odd to know that I finally got around to reading a WSU title only to find that at the end of it all, none of what I was reading amounted to much because it would all be different by the time I got around to reading any new material coming out today. Now there's two ways of looking at that:

First, WSU got the raw deal... I will not likely ever get motivated now to ever go back and find collected editions of all the material that lead to final status of the WSU (heck it's been something like 10 years!).

Secondly, the complete opposite – by rebooting with such fanfare, new readers have a better chance of jumping on now than ever before. I admit that one of the factors that kept me from jumping back into WSU when I started reading comics regularly again in the early 2000's was the fact that the WSU looked nothing like I remembered it. It was around the time I dropped comics altogether in the late 1990's that a lot of the changes were occurring. I had tried to pick up WildCATs 3.0 but was lost withing the span of only a couple of issues... and the same happened with Stormwatch Team Achilles. Who were these folks? What had happened to my old favourites? The WSU was hardly recognizable anymore.

The final verdict?

The collected edition of Captain Atom Armageddon does its job rather well – you get to say goodbye to a continuity that took years to create and it does it with the most tragedy that could only come from knowing that the maniacs running around in the WSU (at the time) had all deserved their fates considering the way they handled themselves even right to the end when confronted by someone as traditionally pure as a DCU hero character.

memory fragment: heap

S'funny that the other month I was at Walmart (don't ask, my presence there is a shameful episode in my life), but I stopped in the video section to browse what had come out lately. Apparently "Droids" is now out on DVD... seems to be a complete set of the episodes too but I'm not sure.

I have a horrible memory sense for logical stories from things I watched as a kid. Sure I watched the A-Team but I barely remember anything when a co-worker buddy will say something like, "yeah, and remember they had to break Murdock out of the mental hospital before every mission?" And I'd say, "they did? Hmm..."

Well, I barely recall anything from Droids except that as a kid, I loved seeing Threepio and Artoo bumbling around the galaxy on their misadventures. Back then it was hi-class entertainment. I wonder how I'd react if I were to watch it now. I did not buy the DVD as my curiosity was just not that powerful.

All I do remember VERY vividly was a made-for-tv movie version of the series entitled "The Great Heap." I was so excited to learn of the hour-long extravaganza that I even taped it. Today all I can remember is the herald for the sentient trash-compactor creature announcing in a shaky squealy voice, "The Great Heap!"
I really don't remember anything else from this...

pocari sweat

I just wanted to quickly mention (in spite of my personal crisis of faith - as usual, check the other blog for my long-winded dissertation on the matter) that I finally downed the rest of my bottle of Pocari Sweat.

"Japanophiles" will recognize this funny-named sports drink. It's a white sodium-filled solution that came out in Japan around the same time as Gatorade became popular (let's say 1980s) - and was quite possibly the first ever entry on Engrish.com - a more serious article on it is found at Wikipedia.org as usual.

What did I think? Like all Japanese foods, it rapidly turned my stomache at first. I remember my first time having a plate of chicken terriyaki on rice and the sauce was so light it felt as though it slid down into my belly and wanted to float its way back up. It was a weird feeling. Of course, I grew to like it. And I think I'll grow to like Pocari Sweat too... but come on, with Gatorade readily available when I go for a run outside, as if I'm going to go out of my way to purchase a bottle of Pocari Sweat (probably a Taiwanese distribution at that; like I'll actually ever find an authentic Japanese edition bottle).

And on top of that, a large glass of orange Gatorade doesn't make my insides feel like they want to do somersaults either. That's really too bad because I really wanted to like this drink right off the bat.