we are only made of air and dust

While flipping through TV, stopped on the CW and saw a promo for Kamen Rider Dragon Knight...or something, I was laughing too hard to realize what the title was.

KAMEN RIDER. IN AMERICA.

None of them are cute as Hiro/Yusuke/Seto/etc. are.

I love Google reader, I really do - because it tends to suggest blogs that I would like, and 85% of the time, it is absolutely correct. So I've been rediscovering YA authors again (old and new - Sarah Dessen was pregnant! And now she has a cute little girl named Sasha! I love the exclamation point!) through their blogs, and anyway - a random link by and I found Alisa Valdes Rodriguez's take on the Twilight phenomenon and just how much Stephenie Meyers' religious views shape her writing and how there is something disturbing about the Twilight world. I'm not referring to the purple prose, the questionable romance between Edward and Stephenie, Bella, the massive herding of lolcats that is Breaking Dawn. Ms. Rodriguez goes further than the usual fun peel-back-the-glitterlame-scorn-fest that usually accompanies a Twilight review now (or perhaps I am deliberately not reading the ones that praise it and Stephenie to the upper strata of awesometown) and throws in her two cents about how it shouldn't just be excused as a light entertainment.

It was definitely an interesting read, and I can see why it can be construed as controversial. I'm waiting for the full span of a literary critique/argument, and I think that after some of you read that post, you will be too.

Also, Maureen Johnson weighs in on a part of the presidential campaign that shouldn't have been put into the spotlight anyway, but hey, GOP - you brought it up, and now she's A Topic: Free Bristol Palin.

Great post about why comprehensive (dare we say, 'explicit') sex ed should be taught in schools, and why birth control is not the tool of the devil. Purity rings aren't going to save your immortal soul, America.

Also, I believe I should now start every story I tell with, "So, this random gay guy texted me out of the blue on my birthday," now, because not only did I feel like I was actually living a less whimsical episode of This American Life, it actually made me feel younger for a brief moment - flashing back to when I was still twee in high school and had the miniature posse of gay boyfriends to discuss Important Matters and to apply eyeliner with in the school quad.

Sweet Rain Shinigami no Seido (AKA: Accuracy of Death) is up, with subs. Thank you, birthday gods (and generous fans)

Fan-created English soft subs are finally out for Maki and Tatsuya Fujiwara's war & romance SP, "Tokyo Daikushu"

Fuji put up a skeleton of the official site for Maki's Innocent Love

Proper scans for Shinkansen & Love, featuring Maki & Meisa should up be this weekend (but here are some pictures of Maki's shoot)

I also have some older scans of other j-drama actors up (helllllooo, Yuuta)

I'm caught up with all the hardsubbed episodes of Yasuko to Kenji, and have two episodes of Seigi no Mikata to watch. Then, finally, a Shibatora marathon (one of the better jdramas that no one is watching this season).

Tomorrow I go out for Indian food and beauty things and karaoke with the posse.

I went on Sunday, the last day of the con - and attended two panels: Harold and Kumar's DVD pre-release, and the 25th Anniversary of Fraggle Rock, which was attended by the voice/puppeteer of Red Fraggle ("The first live appearance of a Fraggle in the ...flesh!"). It was pretty low-key for comic-con, but there were still tons of people.

I took a few pictures.

Bollywood goes on a world tour.

I saw Death Cab for Cutie/Rogue Wave last night with my friend Shar, and didn't get to bed until 1 a.m. I am now appropriately zombified - which just reminds me how old I've gotten - back in the day, I used to be able to stay up until 3 a.m., fall asleep for two hours, then get up again and attend a college lecture without any ill effects.

Which of course has come back to haunt me now.

Anyway: a mess of links/reports/fannish squee:

According to Amazon, there is going to be a lot of Mick Takeuchi glee coming out this year:

Bound Beauty, vol. 1 release date September 15 2008

A Wiseman Sleeps, vol. 2 release date June 15, 2008 (I'm getting this next week.)

Her Majesty's Dog, vol. 10 release date August 15, 2008

Her Majesty's Dog, vol. 11 release date November 15, 2008 *sniff* The last volume!

and Matsuri Hino (of Vampire Knight fame)

Captive Hearts, vol. 1 release date November 4, 2008

Captive Hearts, vol. 2 release date January 6, 2009

Vampire Knight, vol. 5 release date September 2, 2008

Wanted, vol. 1 release date September 2, 2008 I read a scanlation of this a while ago, and I'm thrilled to see it's licensed. Matsuri Hino does PIRATES!

Also, I went to Kinokuniya yesterday (just before coming home and realizing that OMG, Death Cab for Cutie was TONIGHT, or last night) and I bought volume 19 of Kurosagi: the Manga. This weekend I'm going to Yosemite, so scans will be late in coming, but yes - Kurosaki's birthday is February 14, which I thought was a bit rich. And I'm going to miss the release of Wanted and Wall-E. >__< Oh well. It'll do me good to get back to nature.

Courtesy of Unleash the Geek - witness the glory of the Hanadan premiere appearance here and here. Shun looks like all that time hanging out with Johnnies has finally taken it's inevitable toll: he looks like the missing member of a boyband, whereas Matsujun and Shota look like members of an 80s new wave outfit. Abe just looks like he's going to hit the bar running.

Mao looks pretty and summery, and also occasion appropriate. That's why she's the clever mastermind.

For calixa, what Shota Matsuda is up to, besides not being the other half of Erika Toda's OTP in the lukewarm Code Blue (or as D calls it, Dr. Heli and his perm of Doom)

( getting married to Maki for Atsuhime! FINALLY. )

If you loved the tech boys in Get Smart, cynicalism, I'm looking at you - they have a spin off DVD of their very own, coming out July 1st.

And now I'm going to go re-read Howl's Moving Castle and stagger off to bed early.

:/

I will reply to comments/stories/bribes/feats of valour next week!

to be brief:

finished Eternal Sabbath. Need to write about it - it's very dark and twisted and on the whole I quite loved it. It's a morality tale. Had similar themes to Mars, but Eternal Sabbath has a bit more of an apocalyptic feel to it. Title possibly a tip off to that mood.

Must illustrate my WTF meter, especially the "movies that are so bad, they're awesome, or stuff that I've managed to talk myself into liking despite knowing beyond a doubt that my braincells are being flayed alive. I've acquired a nice little backlog of the wacky, the insane, and the terrible. Of course Koizora features in it. Yesterday at a Thai restaurant (this is actually immaterial, but I like setting things up) I actually blurted out, "THIS IS THE POWER OF MY LOVE," and then I could not stop laughing.

Footnote to lurkers and new people: I am admittedly, a very terrible person and I do not like what you like. But I like cupcakes!

Loved, loved the Venture Brothers season 3 premiere. Can't wait for the t-shirt.

also - apparently there's a rumor going around that Taiwan is going to be filming a live action adaptation of Skip!Beat with Ariel Lin and Jerry Yan. I am apprehensive, as I really adore the manga.

eta: SHE WAS ALMOST EATEN BY A COW.

Hmm. I've been out of the loop re Joss Whedon, but here's the trailer to his new show, starring Eliza Dushku and Tahmoh Penikitt: Dollhouse. I have a semi-complicated relationship with Joss as media creator: I fell for Buffy hard, never really warmed up to Angel, liked Firefly well enough and I've skimmed through Buffy Season 8 - but I don't think the man is the second coming of anything, and there have been better writers with the pulse of what really makes strong female characters - but I grew up with BtVS, and for better or worse, I do wish him success in this venture, even though I don't know why he keeps on going back to FOX.

Even though it is only Thursday tomorrow, I already feel like it's Friday. Or that it needs to be. :/

A post it post of "Remind me to talk about...."

1. the most recent episode of Vampire Knight anime : specifically how I'm not sure they adapted the manga artwork style into a cohesive/consistent style for the anime and that it suffers for it. There's a flatness/generic shoujo quality that I don't associate with the manga.


2. how even though I'm not a Yuu Watase fan at all, and really, live action adaptations of manga are always a hit or miss situation - I somehow ended up watching the first episode of Zettai Kareshi and found myself strangely charmed by it. At the very least, I certainly wouldn't mind having Hayami Mokomichi as my fake robot boyfriend. I might need to do a mini screencap review for it.


3. Last Friends - and the concept of family, victimhood and contradictions - the easy generalizations and what I think the screenwriter is trying to say about modern social issues and how much I was reminded of The Fun Home and an episode of This American life about double lives and what it means to lie to people you supposedly love


4. Maiko haaan! - an odd, very broad Japanese comedy about an ramen salaryman who's obsessed with geisha and the long suffering girlfriend who loves him despite him being a total and utter troll to her, and yet there's redemption, musical numbers, and people get stabbed with exacto knives. Good times, clearly.



5. How I'm stuck half way through A Natural History of Love, yet I went and picked up Joe Hill's Heart Shaped Box purely on the basis that it is about a man who buys a ghost on an online auction site and his life goes to the proverbial handbasket. Also, I'll be playing on paperbackswap.com this weekend - unload some manga possibly, fill out my Terry Pratchett collection


6. I need to spend quality time with my new Shin Han Touch markers. Because art supplies are ruinously expensive sometimes, and it's ridiculous that I haven't drawn in ..I don't know how many months.


7. My list of favorite Asian actors - mostly jdrama oriented, as they're the majority of what I watched this past year. No JE actors are on this list, despite my adoration of one evil-sama, because I'm trying to think in terms of overall body of work. Maybe as a footnote or something.