#I was very inspired by stories about Miyazaki himself and his relationships with both his family and his employees

[theimpossiblescheme]

May We Know Them

(Or: How Clarisse de Cagliostro Lived Outside Her Tower)

There was a story Christopher told her once, on an evening lit with fireflies and heavy with the day’s fatigue, over matching cups of hot chocolate.  A story about a man whose wife had disappeared.

“He never saw much of her during the day, truth be told,” Christopher said quietly, gazing just past her out the open window.  “He was always busy tending the grounds, keeping the trees healthy, polishing the flagstones… and she stayed home with the children.  She wanted to work, too, but there was never time.  Besides, her--her health was never the best.”

He took a long drink before continuing, as if the chocolate were some fortifying liquor.  “He appreciated her for it, really.  She worked just as hard as he did, just differently.  It let him be away from home more, not worry so much.  So he could focus on making the place beautiful again.  But one day, he… he got home, and she wasn’t there.  The children weren’t there either.”  Shaking, gnarled hands replaced the cup on the endtable.  “Never knew what happened to the children… he never even saw her die.  One minute she was there, beautiful as anything, and then the next… gone.  Just gone.”

Clarisse’s hands tightened around her own cup as she puzzled over this.  “Even when she was sick, she was still beautiful?”

Christopher’s eyes flickered, as if startled to notice her there beside him, before dropping into his lap.  “She was always beautiful… he couldn’t imagine her any other way.”

“Would he have still loved her if she wasn’t?”

At first, no answer.  Then Christopher got to his feet, knees creaking, and picked his cup back up.  “Let me get us some more chocolate, Princess.”

That was all the answer Clarisse needed.

In her travels across her new kingdom, she had met many such women.  Women with tired eyes, bruised hands, and resigned smiles hiding a small army of children behind their skirts, who talked endlessly about the amazing and arduous work their husbands, brothers, and fathers did.  Who never failed to mention how proud they were, how much more beautiful Cagliostro would become thanks to their toil.  But who never talked about themselves except in passing, selflessly denigrating their own struggles in comparison and never wishing to be a burden on their loved ones.  Even if their babies cried all night no matter how much they tried to calm them, or their gardens withered after a hard winter, or their chests heaved with bitter coughs that never seemed to go away.  It was all worth it, they insisted, for their families and their country--it was a burden they would gladly shoulder.

Clarisse always figured that if their husbands, brothers, and fathers truly loved them, they would share that burden instead of leaving it miles behind.  And if less beauty in Cagliostro meant fewer of these tired-eyed, quietly suffering women, she would gladly accept that bargain.

She’d been in very real danger of becoming one of those women herself, she knew.  The Count toyed with the life of a young girl like a boy threatening to rip the arms off a doll, and in the best case scenario he would have let it shrivel to nothing in the darkness of her tower while he stayed below and continued his counterfeiting.  After her rescue, Clarisse tried to follow Lupin instead, leaning toward his kindness like a neglected sunflower and blinded by the prospect of becoming the student of a world-renowned thief.  He’d seen this foolish wish for what it was and turned her away, and in retrospect she found herself very glad he had.  

She was more than a doll or a sunflower, or the lovely gem locked in the topmost tower, or the child in the garden.  And lives, especially young lives, were not traded away so rashly.

Since taking her throne, Clarisse had spent many sleepless nights writing speeches, drafting new laws with one or two trusted counselors, burning so many candles she could have collected the wax and melted them together into one giant candle.  She ruined countless dresses wading in the tepid water of the catacombs, collected human remains for proper dignified burials, and traded her slippers for boots as she knelt to scrub graffiti from the walls.  Her hair smelled like burnt metal for days after the destruction of the printing presses, and her fingernails stayed short and blunt as the space was slowly transformed into a shelter for the poor and homeless.  These were all jobs for the men, but she refused to stay at home, delicate and neglected, as they were carried out.  Many boys her age--tradesmen’s apprentices, flush and swaggering with pride at working alongside their heroes--gave her glowing, grinning compliments after she helped them dismantle some machine or corrected the angle of a beam they were erecting.  Clarisse paid them little mind.  Her work was not for them.  It was for her country.  It was long and difficult and made her arms and calves ache for days, but it was necessary, and she picked up extra duties wherever she could.  So more of these men could go home to their wives, sisters, and mothers for a change.

And when the sun set, even if they were underground and couldn’t see it, she bade them all go home and rest anyway.  Nothing, no matter how beautiful or useful, came before their health.  Every so often, one of the workers would invite her over for dinner, and she always came with a basket of anything she could swipe from the kitchens.  But she seldom sat around boasting with the men and boys.  Instead, Clarisse would fill a few new bowls to hand around to all the women and girls sitting near the kitchen before pulling up a chair close to them.  To them, she was never “Your Highness”, “Princess”, or even “Little Miss”.  She was just “Clarisse.”  And she was loved.  Not admired, not envied--loved.  Even with dirt under her nails.

She wished no less for any of them in return.  She’d always been the kind of person who used the word “love” liberally, to the point where it stopped feeling like a word and more like another essential syllable, and she always meant it.  And she hoped she’d be the same with grey hair and arthritic fingers.

Between restorations and visits across Cagliostro, Clarisse had taken to writing her own stories, all about these women and girls.  So they might never be seen only as beautiful distant objects again, secondary to the men in their lives.

(She briefly considered writing about Lupin, but he must already have so many pages dedicated to him by now.  There were enough stories about thieves, even heroic ones, and not enough about the stolen hearts and lives.)

The first person she showed them to was her new friend, a woman called Fio--once starstruck by her own brave hero, now forging her own path as an engineer and mechanic.  Fio loved every sentence and urged her to keep writing.  “Save me an advance copy when you get published,” she’d said on another firefly-lit evening over another pair of hot chocolates.  “And let me know when you’re working on the next one!”

Clarisse knew exactly what to do for the next one.

After several weeks of asking for every tidbit and tale anyone could offer, turning everything Christopher had said that night over in her mind, she found herself in front of an old thatched cottage.  A once-proud shed slouched in the back, and over the door swung a sign that read Walter Masonry.  When she knocked at the door, the sound of a grindstone came to a stop, and one of the shop workers came out to greet her.  Her dark hair was trying to escape its practical bun and falling in limp strands around her (familiar, broad, bushy-browed) face, but when she realized who it was, she hurriedly tucked them behind her ears.  “Oh--Your Highne--er, Clarisse!”

Before she could curtsey or apologize for the mess, Clarisse just smiled.  “It’s all right, I’m not exactly dressed for a ball either,” she said, gesturing down at her grass-stained skirt and muddy boots.

Miss Walter managed a weak laugh as she pulled off her gloves and tucked them into her front apron pocket.  “I’m almost done, anyway.  You’re welcome to come in while I finish, and then I’ll put some tea on for us.”

“That sounds wonderful.  And actually, when you’re done… I wanted to ask you about your mother.”

Miss Walter’s eyes widened, and her first attempt at speaking stuck in her throat.  “What… What do you want to know about her?”  It wasn’t suspicion or even grief in her voice.  Just genuine surprise.

Clarisse’s smile widened in turn, and she reached out to take the other young woman’s hand.  “Everything you can tell me.”

[ideekhay]

What Ponyo Reveals About Belos

After rewatching Ponyo, I can’t help but see all the ways the Owl House's writers and character designers drew inspiration for Belos from the movie’s "antagonist", Fujimoto. The two are both scientists/engineers at heart: Belos with his blueprints and inventions, Fujimoto with his magical elixirs. Judging by their mutated faces, they also altered their own bodies in some way to renounce their humanity.

Although he once considered himself human long ago, Fujimoto used his research to infuse himself with magic traits, leaving his humanity behind "to serve the Earth". To replenish his magical powers, he consumes elixir by the jug. This parallels Belos, someone who was likely human centuries ago but gave himself magical powers and now considers himself a witch who serves the Titan. In classic Owl House fashion, he adapts Fujimoto's method of replenishment and makes it more morbid by consuming palismen.

Even when they differ on goals, their approaches are the same. Belos is shown to embrace industrialism; Fujimoto, the opposite, yet they both seem to have their eyes set on a single apocalyptic day to accomplish their goals. Fujimoto waits for the day that the his elixir well fills to the brim so that he can eradicate humanity and rebirth the Era of the Ocean. Meanwhile, Belos wishes to create a utopia free of wild magic on the Day of Unity, a place only the worthy will "inherit". Of course, to inherit means to take from those who die, implying mass death to the unworthy.

Fujimoto: [tastes elixir] "I can feel the power of the ocean in the furthest reaches of my DNA. When this well is full, then the age of the ocean will begin again. An explosion of life to match the Cambrian age. An end to the era of those abominable humans."

What cements the allusion is how both stories describe a broken parent-child relationship. Hayao Miyazaki wrote Ponyo as an apology to his son for being a terrible father. In movie, Fujimoto forbids his fish-child, Ponyo, from interacting with humans, telling them about how horribly they treat nature. Naturally, he becomes outraged upon seeing Ponyo transform into a human. Belos conditions Hunter, his "nephew" and effectively-adopted son, similarly by chastising him for even considering the use of wild magic.

But what becomes of these broken relationships? Ponyo finds Sosuke, a child raised by the more innocent, softer side of humanity, and is taken into his family. Luz fits perfectly as Hunter's (platonic) Sosuke, and if the two plots do mirror one another, Hunter would become another member of the Owl House's found family.

By the end of the movie, Ponyo gives up magic forever to permanently become a human. If Ponyo, the half-fish/half-human, changes in that manner, it only opens up a plethora of possibilities for Hunter, the powerless half-witch/half-human. Does he abandon the artificial staff, Belos, and his old life? Or will he give up his found family in exchange for Belos to transform him into a full-fledged witch?

tl;dr: belos is to fujimoto as hunter is to ponyo

extra tidbits/food for thought:

Ponyo is first described as a "goldfish", could this have inspired Hunter's title of the Golden Guard?

Ponyo was released in 2008 and is one of the top grossing anime films, certainly Dana and the crew have watched it.

Hunter's VA tweeted that the character could get a spinoff, hinting towards him getting a redemption arc.

Dana said in here AMA that Belos has "very specific inspirations" that will become clear in season 2, this might be one.

Fullmetal Alchemist is likely another heavy inspiration, see my other posts here (Day of Unity, Coven Heads)

[queen-of-my-goofball-army]

An Ode To Miyazaki:

Hi everyone! So for my final paper for film, we had to pick our own director of our choosing and talk about them extensively between the attributes that make them special. Our course focused on the narrative and technical styles of directors. For my final project, I have chosen my biggest hero in the world of animation and somebody that drastically changed my life as a young child, Hayao Miyazaki. Learning about him for this project gave me so much insight into not just his films but who he is as a person. I hope that my paper is as interesting for you to read as it was for me to do research for!

1. Hayao Miyazaki, often referred to as the Japanese Walt Disney is the front runner of his animation studio Studio Ghibli. I picked him because I already have sufficient knowledge and love of his films. One of the first memories that my parents love to remind me of is my first time watching Totoro and laughing at the introduction characters. Miyazaki himself stands out for a number of reasons. Over the years, Miyazaki has made a humongous name out of himself, one of his most famous movies Spirited Away became the most popular film to ever be released in Japan and also won the academy award for the best-animated film that year. His most “popular” films (I say popular in air quotes because it is nearly impossible for people to agree on a favorite) remain the aforementioned Spirited Away, My Neighbor Totoro, Howl’s Moving Castle, and Princess Mononoke. Beginning his career as a simple animator for Toei animation, he worked as an in-between artist. It was here that he met his future collaborator at Ghibli, Isao Takahata. His first big directorial debut in film before founding Ghibli was a team effort without Takahata was Lupin The Third, The Castle Of Cagliostro. His first successful movie was one that was based upon his own manga Nausicaa of the Valley Of The Wind. The first official Miyazaki movie that was made with Ghibli was one of my personal all-time favorites that had ever been created, Castle In The Sky. For many children, especially ones with parents who are lovers of a film like mine, Miyazaki was one of the first animators that I was introduced to. His films have become classics for every fan of animation, being referenced in culture, specifically back when Disney owned Studio in Toy Story 3, Bonnie has a Totoro.

2. So, this brings up the question, how does one recognize a film by Miyazaki? You can always expect for him to be critically acclaimed, for there to be some element of magic and whimsy in the way that he animates, for there to be something to do with flight (whether it be dealing with airplanes like in Porco Rosso, the idea of flight in Howl’s Moving Castle, or a floating castle up in the sky in Castle In The Sky.), his heroines are always strong-minded and live by their own rules never bowing down to anybody, his love stories are dynamic and fulfilled, a sweeping score by Joe Hizashi, and they have a meaning about nature somewhere, mostly about why it needs to be protected.

Let’s start by breaking him down narratively. The thing that is always in every Miyazaki film no matter which one you decide upon watching, is that his female characters are always strong-willed no matter what. In many ways, I think that he writes women better than Disney does. He has gone on record saying “Many of my movies have strong female leads—brave, self-sufficient girls that don't think twice about fighting for what they believe with all their heart. They'll need a friend, or a supporter, but never a savior. Any woman is just as capable of being a hero as any man.” Sometimes, this will cause them to come across as reckless, or stupid, but in my opinion, I have always looked up to his female characters and the way that they are portrayed. My personal favorite female character that he has ever brought to life through the screen is Sophie from Howl’s Moving Castle. She is strong-minded, not willing to put up with any of Howl’s dramatics, kind, an incredible adult figure for Markal, endlessly sympathetic to her friend’s plights (namely Howl and Calcifer), and somebody that I can always look up to. I spent most of my childhood looking up to characters like Kiki in Kiki’s Delivery Service, Chihiro in Spirited Away, or one of my personal favorite underrated girls, Fio in Porco Rosso. All of these female characters are independent and never let themselves be taken advantage of by anybody.

Another trait that can always be found narratively in his films is that Miyazaki is an airplane/ air travel fanatic. He absolutely loves airplanes, even to the point where his latest film, The Wind Rises was based upon the life of one of the first airplane manufacturers in WWII. Almost all of his films will involve something about flying in the air. Even with the ones that he didn’t direct and he just simply wrote. His obsession with flight is something that stemmed from his childhood and he never saw them as a thing to be used for war “airplanes are not tools for war. They are not for making money. Airplanes are beautiful dreams. Engineers turn dreams into reality.” My personal favorite of all of his flight animation is used in Howl’s Moving Castle when Howl and Sophie “fly” over the heads of all the people below them.

Narratively also one of the biggest things that set apart his films from any others is his focus on nature. The idea of protecting the beauty of nature is something that he has always stood by. A lot of the time, America tries to prove that it can make films about nature as well to usually varying results. I think that nobody can sell an environmental message quite like my biggest hero for Japanese animation. One of the main movies that focus on his will to protect nature above all else is Princess Mononoke. He always manages to animate nature in such a beautiful and majestic way no matter where the film is set.

I also think that a narrative trait of his that often gets overlooked is how beautiful the romance in his films can be. He never has a romance between two characters that feels stale or boring. I love the fact that you can pick any number of his films and the chance of there being a romance that you’ll get sucked into is a very large one. Everybody has their personal favorites, I love Howl and Sophie from Howl’s Moving Castle but my best friend loves Sousuke and Ponyo from Ponyo. He has on record saying that “I’ve become skeptical of the unwritten rule that just because a boy and girl appear in the same feature, a romance must ensue. Rather, I want to portray a slightly different relationship, one where the two mutually inspire each other to live - if I’m able to, then perhaps I’ll be closer to portraying a true expression of love.” Writing romance between two characters can be a very tricky thing which is why it’s always amazing when he can continually pull it off despite everything and how many films that he has made over the years. The beauty of having both a strong and independent male and the female character is that they can both lean on one another for love and support. Probably the biggest supporter of this is Whisper Of The Heart, a film that he wrote instead of directing. The romance is what makes up the entire film. It’s a beautiful love story about how two young teenagers fall in love with each other. The romance is something that continually keeps me coming back for more every time.

Technical style Miyazaki can always be assured to deliver breathtakingly stunning animation. There is a reason why so many people leave his films starving because the food that he draws always looks so good. For me though, it’s the backgrounds that stand out above all else. It’s nearly impossible to have one favorite shot in one of his films but I as a matter of fact do have one. The most breathtaking animation in any Miyazaki film is the scene where Howl takes Sophie to see his secret garden. Everything about this scene never fails to make my breath catch. It’s such a profoundly beautiful moment and how it is animated is something that I haven’t forgotten since my first initial viewing of the film when I was seven.

Another iconic technical trait is that Disney did a fantastic job dubbing the films from their original Japanese language into English. Back when Ghibli films first started to become popular, they needed a way for an American audience to see them. So Pixar’s CFO at the time, John Lassater made a deal with Ghibli that they would dub all the films from their original language for a brand new audience. Growing up, this was how I watched all of Miyazaki’s films. I fell in love with the way that they sounded in English. To this very day, I have yet to see one of his films in any other language. I don’t think that anybody could have dubbed them better. Ever since Ghibli and Disney went their separate ways and they went to GKids the dubs haven’t been the same.

Finally, the last technical trait is that a Miyazaki film will always have a score done by his longtime collaborator Joe Hizashi. The score is such a big part of what makes Miyazaki’s films his own. They are what get you sucked in through their whimsical and magical tones; they always fit the vibes that he’s going through at that moment. There is also the element of sound. Every Miyazaki film has a distinct sound effect that will set it apart from the one before it.

3. The first film that I want to look at is my personal favorite of all his films that he has made so far if you were to force me to pick just one Howl’s Moving Castle. Released in 2004, it was the 9th film that the director came out with. It has an 8.2 out of 10 on IMDB and an 87% on Rotten Tomatoes. The storyline for the movie follows a young woman named Sophie. She gets a curse set upon her by the Witch of the Waste and when she leaves home she finds the infamous Howl’s Moving Castle. This is the second Ghibli movie voiced by a Batman live action actor. Christian Bale voiced Howl Pendragon after Michael Keaton played the titular Porco Rosso.

Narratively this is definitely a Miyazaki film. From how strong of a female character Sophie is I spent most of my childhood looking up to her as a character. Strong female characters are everywhere in his films and in my opinion, Sophie is one of the strongest. Another strong factor is that flight plays a major part in this film. One of Howl’s main powers is that he has the ability to fly around. This leads to my favorite scene of flight in any Miyazaki film when Howl takes Sophie’s hand and they “fly” over the tops of the city down below them. All of his early films up until the last few were set in someplace other than Japan. This one is set in Europe, and he takes a lot of time while in the cities to show off all the different types of buildings while Sophie tours around the city.

Technically speaking this is also a Miyazaki film and holds all the titular traits of being so. The animation is utterly for lack of a better word, magical and spellbinding. It takes my breath away every time that I rewatch it. The food looks incredible, one scene that most of Miyazaki’s fans always think of when this movie is brought up is Calcifer making the food for Howl, Sophie, and Markal to eat. The dub for this film is also one of Disney’s best dubs for Miyazaki films. It even brings actors to the table that I usually would not like to see in other films like Christian Bale. I haven’t loved him in any other films than this one. Billy Crystal is a stand-out as well as my favorite fire demon Calcifer. The score is done by Joe Hizashi as well. My favorite part of the score is the main theme which has Howl and Sophie floating above the people below. The sound effect that follows throughout this film is the steady creaking of the castle itself.

Princess Mononoke was the first time that Miyazaki ever “retired”. Most of the time, whenever he tries to retire, he always comes back. A lot of his colleague's joke that it’s because he physically can’t stop working. He animated most of this movie by himself. Before Spirited Away it was Japan’s most famous film to date. The story about a young man who is just trying to erase the curse that was set upon him by an angry boar and it leads him to a place called Iron Town is something that never fails to amaze me. While in Iron Town, Ashitaka meets a young woman named San who was taken in by wolves and he finds himself caught between a war involving humans and the gods of the forest.

Narratively this is definitely a Miyazaki film. It has a strong female lead, focusing most of its screen time on how important it is to protect and preserve nature as a whole. The idea of protecting nature is such a moving part of the film, as we see what it does when man takes over the forest. We see how distraught it makes the Gods of this world and how they wish that the humans would just go away. However, you also see it from the point of view of the villain of the film Lady Eboshi, who also regularly helps lepers and people who would often never get work outside of her offering them a home and a family. I have regularly gotten into a debate with my mom over which side is “right” and which side “wrong” over the course of the last few years of me being a massive fan of this movie. She takes the side of the forest while I see Ashitaka’s side that everybody should just get along and interact in peace and harmony. Miyazaki never shoves the idea of nature down your throat. That is not what this film is. It’s instead about the beauty of what we have and learning to appreciate it.

On a technical level, this film is fantastic as well. It blows my mind that Miyazaki-san animated most of it all by himself. The backgrounds are sweeping and utterly gorgeous showing off the time period of the film. The fight sequences which make up the bulk of the film’s running time are engaging, thrilling, and fabulously animated. Mononoke’s score was done by Joe Hizashi as well. Its score is beautiful and I always find myself getting sucked into it, especially for the more dynamic scenes with Ashitaka and San. The sound effect for this film uses nature as a backdrop for brutality. Ashitaka’s arrows don’t just come out of his bow, they screech through the air.

Finally, my last film that we will be focusing on, Kiki’s Delivery Service was made in 1989 a year after his cult phenomena My Neighbor Totoro and was his fifth animated feature. Kiki is a young girl that is hoping to become a young witch in training. However, to do so she has to train a year away from home. She and her cat Jiji find a town by the sea where she learns her true strength and what she can really do to help others. Hayao Miyazaki didn't want to bore the audience during the film's end credits by using just the names. He set it up to be like a mini-sequel so that the audience would leave the theatre feeling happy.

Narratively this has all the traits that one should be familiar with and associate with a Miyazaki film. It has a strong-minded female character at the source of it that young girls can look up to and admire. As a kid, Kiki was my favorite female character of his because I loved her strength and her dedication to what she was good at. She knew that she was still young and had a lot to learn but even though she gets depressed she doesn’t let that stop her in the long run and will still save her love interest Tombo. The romance in this film is by far one of the sweetest. I love the interactions between the characters and the way that they both inspire one another to be better than they are. The idea of flight is basically the focal point of everything. Kiki finds that her best trait is that she flies incredibly well and decides to create her own flying delivery service.

Technically this also has a lot of traits that Miyazaki made a name for himself in doing. The animation is spectacular, especially for Kiki’s flying. I could watch her fly around all day and that was the idea that he was going for while making the film. The sweeping score by Joe Hizashi, especially in my favorite song A Town With An Ocean View, is something that I’ll often listen to outside of the film itself. The sound effects for the film are meant to be calming. From the first sound that you hear of the wind rolling through the reeds while Kiki lies against the grass to the waves when she finally finds a home.

4. Miyazaki as a director has inspired me since I was way too young to even remember. When I was a kid I would pretend to run around my apartment building's front yard imagining that I lived in a big house in front of a camper tree like the one in Totoro. His movies are perfect for children that “suffer” from having an overactive imagination. His movies are everything that is bright and beautiful in the world. The animation never fails to take my breath away, the characters and stories are unforgettable, the soundtracks sweep me away and tell stories themselves. His movies are something that even my parents, who are not anime fans, can watch over and over again. I think that speaks for itself. Miyazaki makes films that are art, not just animated films.

[monkey-network]

Eizouken v. Ratatouille: Dawn of the Creative Drive

WARNING: This critique will contain spoilers for Eizouken episodes 1-4 and the film Ratatouille. Also this is long. And yes, I had to make this or else I would’ve exploded. Enjoy.

Youtube’s TheRealJims made a video review of pixar’s Ratatouille not long ago, check it out by the way, and one thing about it caught me deep. He described Ratatouille as “a progressive kind of film, not in the political sense, but a very forward looking movie.” This line stuck with me as I begun to watch Keep Your Hands Off the Eizouken, an anime about a high schooler, inspired as a child, working her way to create anime with her friends. It wasn’t until episode 4 where mind threads started to knot, where that line about the pixar flic started to click with this anime in a way I’ve never thought of before. As such, I found that these two have a great thematic link, a connected warp between the creative minds of adults and children. Eizouken and Ratatouille do the remarkable in giving us the bouts and beauties to having a creative, “progressive” drive, and I wanted to explore how they stack up differently and similarly. And with that,,,,

The Ignition

The beginning scene of Eizouken where Midori see her inspiring anime for the first time is personally my favorite moment of the anime so far, borderline perfect. Like Remy, we already see her have this extrinsic passion for drawing once she arrives at her jungle gym of a newfound home; crude as they look, we see her seedling talent in jotting the details of her world onto paper. It’s then when she watches Future Boy Conan where her passion becomes etched in stone intrinsically. Miyazaki was her Gusteau, the bonafide inspiration that, taking it all in, made a simple hobby into a driven pursuit. Ratatouille more or less streamlines this whole moment with narration (makes sense cuz it’s a film) but they nonetheless bring home how a talent can be solidified if given the right push. Even if you didn’t have a desire to have a fulfilling career from it, you can’t deny that there was a moment in your life where something (be it a show, game, book, etc.) was the foundation to your biggest hobby, which then allowed you to explore it more as you grew up.

One thing to note is how Ratatouille handles Remy’s character with his interest. In spite of his palette gift, he doesn’t become a snob or too good towards his rat family; there’s not a moment where he claims he knows better than his skeptic father, they just idealistically disagree and their connection remains intact throughout the film. He has taste and knowledge, but isn’t smug about it. Midori is rounded the same way, she doesn’t push Kanamori or anyone to accept that anime is the best thing ever, and there’s that layer of anxiety to her love of anime that humanizes her aspirations a little more than Remy. It was a lot easier for Remy to be a cook than it was for Midori to make anything beyond concept art, or be sociable about it for that matter. At the same time, both remain humble in their ignited desires and understandably had to deal with an initial drawback to pursuing their dreams which is where...

The Helping Hands

Now, I’m not saying Midori is puppeting Tsubame or that Tsubame is a subversion of the whole rags to riches trope. I say like Linguini, Tsubame is one of the bridges for Midori to live out her desire, with the added bonus of being just as on board in scaffolding Asakusa’s passion to its most palpable form with her own dream of being an animator. Midori and Remy, be it their figurative or literal limitations, needed the likes of Linguini and Mizusaki to make things come to fruition. Even when Linguini doesn’t desirably wanna be a top chef himself, he witnesses Remy’s skill and is willing to put himself out there to work together and make the best cooking at the restaurant. Likewise, Tsubame is more than willing to work with Midori if it means not being forced into doing what her parents want and sharing that pathos of anime with a similar mind. And unlike Ratatouille, it helps that Tsubame is already adept in animating; I’ll talk to more on this later, but I’m glad Ōwara didn’t force us a character that wants to be somebody but has done nothing for herself. That’s what I noticed with both of these features, there’s a great semblance of support when passion is there but can’t progress singularly. There can/will be people out here to help you and they will come when you least expect it. Linguini and Tsubame both work well as the muscle of the cast, the character that does the heavy lifting in bringing the meal or anime to life. As such, we essentially have our director and the more hands on conductor of the project, but this all can’t be done without the producer.

Colette and Kanamori serve well as the anchor for our respective characters; we can’t just have the four characters go nuts with whatever, there needs to be some stability, a reality to the ambitious madness that can come with creating. Kanamori isn’t teaching the two any ground rules of anime, but she understands the analytics and guidelines to keeping things on track. Colette helps Linguini, by extension Remy, on the known etiquette to being productive in the kitchen, the same can be said for Kanamori in helping Tsubame and Midori in getting the film done clean and timely. While making a meal isn’t the same as making a whole cartoon, the ins and outs of getting things done have a parallel organized track. There’s especially more to making animation, especially on a deadline, and I’m glad Eizouken doesn’t shy away from giving you the thought process in what might go on behind the scenes; it practically gives you the ropes on what could happen if you were in each of the trio’s shoes. 

Additionally, these two are the most resolute of the three characters; they stick to the mission understanding where Remy and Midori are philosophically, and Tsubame and Linguini are fundamentally, coming from. She and Kanamori exhibit the practical outsider, the one to truly stick their neck out, don’t put up with bullshitting, to push the creative drive further. Both see the weight that comes to production and while Colette has her fallback in the 3rd act, they make sure everything goes as planned. They truly practice what they preach and are the glue that holds things together. The only disadvantage Colette has is that she lacks a relationship with Remy, it’s mostly indirect at the end while Asakusa and Kanamori are initially on better terms since they were already close friends. But with our characters on the move, there’s hardly such thing as a perfect run,,,,

The Fallback

This part is where Eizouken and Ratatouille truly divide because the problems that arises for our characters come in differently. Ratatouille has more outside factors coming in with the fact that Remy is a rat and is pulled between his connection with humans vs his own kind. Eizouken is more in-fighting between the three where Tsubame and Midori’s ambitions have to face off against Kanamori’s more realistic shut downs and options. Eizouken also presents the compromises that can come with being a creator where Ratatouille reasonably montages through the hardships that can come with human puppetry and becoming an instant hit in the kitchen. Success is portrayed more consistently in Ratatouille than in Eizouken, which focuses more on the progress. It’s obvious given that, again, making food is not as time and energy consuming as making a feature; we see that animation is a lot more than just drawing all your ideas onto the equivalent to a flip book.

To sidetrack a bit, I came to agree with Jim that Monsters University is the antithesis to Ratatouille where the hard work that one puts into their dreams doesn’t mean imminent or easily delivered success. It’s a bizarro film in that, while not breaking new ground plotwise, MU is grimly realistic in that your passionate drive won’t always lead to getting the spoils you exactly want. Eizouken cleverly sits the middle of the two, where success is achievable if you put the effort in, but that effort realistically won’t go exactly how you want. Mizusaki wants everything hand-drawn and Asakusa wants a story, but come to understand that shortcuts need to happen if they want to get it done by the  council meet. Kanamori isn’t crushing their aspirations for the hell of it, she makes it clear that time and the student body are not on their side. As opposed to Ratatouille, the final boss that are the critic(s) are notably secondary to getting the project done somehow. As mentioned before, I’m glad Ōwara made Tsubame already apt in animating because we can focus less on her being able to do it, more on the limitations that come with doing it. She has the skill, but has to bargain on her capabilities with what’s necessary as we see the tolls that come with the job.

Where I say these two collide somehow is the facet of the outsider putting the effort in for their goals. Remy and Midori are gifted and near encyclopedic in their trades, but are reasonably setback by both internal conflicting question of how far are they willing to go in exercising their drives. Remy more external than Midori since he could literally be killed if the truth was out too soon, but there is that self doubt in both of them where it can be hard to imagine that anyone can cook or that creating the great world is possible. It’s near the end of the arcs where they truly stand up for their beliefs and I appreciate that both handle the determined directing of our MCs in a respectable, pretty relatable way. They finally get to call the shots. They never sacrifice what could’ve been for what could be dauntingly realistic either; both offer an organic sense of optimism. But, with this optimism, comes the endgame that truly puts it all to the test in...

The Moment of Truth

Mr. Anton Ego, Skinner, and the Student Council are undoubtedly the final piece to these puzzles. It’s smart that they’re only present by the end of the arcs, only mentioned initially as the antagonistic force Remy and the Eizouken need to convince; they didn’t need to shoehorn their looming gavels any further. Naturally Skinner parallels the council president, a disingenuous hothead that antagonizes our MCs in a more unfair light while secretary Sakaki represents Ego, an intellectually honest person with actual standards and can see the forest for the trees. Eizouken’s episode 4 perfectly conceives why Kanamori is the boss, as she effortlessly confronts the allegations against them; not so much bluffing as she is spotlighting the council’s rash judgement. Unfortunately Kanamori can only debunk them so far, which leads to Midori overcoming her anxiety to demand that they’re given a chance. It’s great that Asakusa can suffer in silence for only so long before pushing herself to say something. This falls in line with Remy’s dad showing his son the grim realistic front of humans and rats before coming back to help him when he realizes Remy’s determinism. It’s like the rat says, the only way to go, “With luck, forward.”

Like the scene where Ego eats the titular dish, the moment we finally see the anime in full is almost disgustingly perfect. It’s fitting that a riot was going on before the presentation only for the action packed film to essentially come to life and throw chaos right back at everybody with powerful air waves, tank shells, and the tank itself jumping off the screen, literally blowing the audience away. Eizouken has literally more louder of a scene than Ratatouille’s, but both offer that climatic impart equally hard in their respective moments. They don’t shy away from grasping that immersive feeling of what you loved the most about food and/or animation, those invested in the film/series are basically with Ego and the student audience as those moments happen. It kinda hurts the brain how perfect these two moments are. Eizouken and Ratatouille, in a meta sense, weren’t successful only because they poke at our nostalgia or love, but of how they go the mile to convey it significantly. Ratatouille by the end, thanks to Ego, provides the apt idea of open-mindedness; that greatness can come from anywhere. Eizouken does this but adds the step that being open-minded can come with seeing what the efforts of that determined greatness can lead to. And with this, we see how it ends, or how it begins...

The Step Forward

I mentioned this before, but I loved that immediately after their demo reel finished, they weren’t worrying about any approval from the council or audience but discussing about what to improve on next. We see the soon boundless enthusiasm of the trio when, regardless of , they want to improve and do more as a team, all while the secretary approves the club in the hopes to see the fruitful potential. Compare this to Ratatouille for while Remy succeeds in convincing his family and Ego of his talent, they don’t sacrifice realism too much. Gusteau’s is naturally shut down, rats and humans aren’t suddenly living together by the end. At the same time, the movie wasn’t really about that, but about achieving small victories, optimistically grasping that palpable progress. Like Eizouken, Ratatouille leaves us with the progressive prospect that there’s the potential for more, for better.

To quote Jim once more, I say what makes both Eizouken and Ratatouille work fundamentally is that they keep the finger on the pulse of their respective message(s) while still creating enjoyable moments; they don’t sacrifice the fun of getting things right for pushing why it matters. They don’t sellout the bonds between our characters for irreverent romps in the kitchen or studio. Both offer a meaningfulness to their respective crafts, blending its many flavors into a well made dish that explores what it means to create and the steps that come with it. What it means to have passion and utilize that to its capable extent. What it means to enjoy a meal while watching an impressively finished production. They’re also very well animated; thanks Yuasa and Bird. 

[sonicfanj]

Sonic Ring Bond Intro

A sonic the Hedgehog AU by Sonic Fan J

Welcome everyone to my Sonic AU, Sonic Ring Bond. I would like to take the time now to introduce you to my little corner of the fandom and the ideas behind my AU. I had contemplated originally trying to present this introduction as a full-on textbook style document, but frankly I’m a lot better at talking than I am planning so I’ll be treating this more as a text seminar. Hopefully I’ll avoid rambling too much and will manage to entertain and enthrall you with my ideas. At the very least, I hope you’ll come away from this with a firm grasp at least of the world I see for my Amy Rosy redesign, Rosy, to run around in. There’s a lot to cover as well, from the ideas that led to this AU to the setting, the characters, and my take on what games have occurred within it and how the events within unfolded.

To begin, I should note that Sonic Mania did not initially enthrall me as it did so many other Sonic fans who have been with Sonic since 1991. In fact, I was already weary of the nostalgia pandering that so many others had grown tired of as well. I was also at a point in my Sonic fandom where I yearned for Naka and Oshima’s Sonic with only memories of Sonic Adventure 2 and Unleashed keeping me interested in Iizuka’s Sonic. Most importantly however I was having a complete reevaluation of my love of the franchise due to having finally watched the OVA and being overwhelmed with a sense of nostalgia for why I had fallen in love with Sonic to begin with. Then there was also me learning of a point in Sonic’s massive history where Amy had addressed him as Sonic-sama which led me on a massive reexamination of her character and what she was introduced as and the role she was meant to fulfill. I learned an awfully lot during this period both about Amy and my feelings and desires for what I wanted out of the franchise. Suffice to say I found myself disliking Amy’s signature Piko Piko Hammer and coming to odds with the franchise direction though Mania gave me a little hope. That hope was born of false expectations of my own creation due to a desire to see how Amy would have been handled before her hammer was ever given to her as her primary creator for the games, Kazuyuki Hoshino had said he was getting back into the mindset of that time as a content director for Mania. As is typically the case with such false expectations, nothing came of them, almost.

In addition to gameplay arguments going around at the time and my dislike of Amy’s hammer taking root in me, in the Sonic community I was a part of at the time, and quickly growing ostracized in due to my dislike of Amy’s hammer, there was concern about Amy’s outfit and the problems distinct to it in a three-dimensional space. This combined with my desire to see Amy with traditional Sonic gameplay led to me creating my Amy redesign Rosy. Garbed in a white leotard to avoid certain problems distinct to a dress while also intending to capture the image of someone who tumbles, I also went with her classic design to fully imply Sonic’s rolling gameplay. At the time that was enough for me and I was pleased enough to just see her serving as my avatar on various sights. I also enjoyed drawing her as it cheered me up with a lot of negativity floating around the fandom at the time. Naturally as I drew her more, more and more people started asking me about her and I had to start considering the why of her. It was no longer enough to just be happy with her as a drawing, she needed something more. An AU was the logical path to fleshing her out, and being a big Sonic fan who loves way too much of the franchise in all of it’s parts I wanted to try and mash as many disparate parts together as I could into a single world while rewriting Amy’s place in it. This resulted in my weird little Hedgehog Circus AU which has does possess several things I still like. But it is busy, over encumbered, and lacking in the simplicity necessary to serve the beginnings of an AU that I can enjoy. So, after a great deal of thinking, studying the franchise, and looking for ways that I could justify to myself Rosy having Sonic’s abilities I started again mashing together ideas I liked, but kept it as simple as I could. The result is Sonic Ring Bond.

The Setting

Aesthetics.

There is nothing that sells a setting to me more than aesthetics. I am a very visual individual who appreciates what good aesthetics brings to a story and world and nothing captures the sense of whimsey, adventure, and discovery that I yearn for in Sonic better than Hayao Miyazaki. The movies that I am most enthralled by aesthetically and thus become the primary basis for the setting for Sonic Ring Bond are Laputa: Castle in the Sky, Porco Rosso, Kiki’s Delivery Service, and Howl’s Moving Castle. Using the imagery of these movies as well as the ever-changing shape and nature of Sonic’s world from the games the world of Sonic Ring Bond is a fading world where technology has fallen to appoint barely hanging on to airships and early industrialization. Human’s, humans with animal traits drawing inspiration from settings like the fighting game “BlazBlue”, the Sonic OVA, and the anime “Shuumatsu Nani Shitemasu ka? Isogashii Desu ka? Sukutte Moratte Ii Desu ka?”, as well as animal people like Sonic himself all live together or in isolation across the world. But the world is ever changing. One day an entire landmass maybe just across the bay, the next it is not. To keep the world linked together the world’s governments uses an ancient technology they do not understand to build and deploy giant Rings known as Ring Gates to link together communities no matter where they may be one day. These gates are one part of where the Ring Bond title comes from for my AU, but are not used without due consideration. Making a Ring Gate requires a great deal of Rings which are collected by adventurers who are supported by the organization Checkpoint.

Checkpoint is an organization that possesses access to special Ring Gates that bond to an individual and allow them to recall them back to a Checkpoint facility at any time. They are not the only adventurer supporting organization, but access to these unique Ring Gates and even Sonic the Hedgehog being an adventurer who relies on them in the Ring Bond AU has made them very popular. Despite being an organization though, they are more of a hub for adventurers to sell the information found on their adventures as well as receive requests from governments, corporations, communities, and even individuals to explore new and frequently ancient landmasses. The most common of requests fielded by Checkpoint are scouting out resources and determining if a location is worth deploying a Ring Gate to for long term access with resources including material, historical, agricultural, or even culturally if new communities are discovered and deemed worth maintain relations with. Most adventurers have a dedicated agent who monitor them while fielding communications and requests in addition to handling the information they bring back from their adventures. Not every adventurer accepts requests preferring just to see new lands and locales like Sonic himself, reporting in for various personal reasons. Sonic himself in my AU was not even an adventurer who reported into Checkpoint until he rescued Zooey from Sonic BOOM! during one of his adventures and her home island simply disappeared before he could her back. With little other option Sonic left her with Checkpoint due to their reputation and she became his agent. Also, due to being inspired by a pic that @drawloverlala​ once drew with Tails and Zooey dressed Edward Elric and Winry Rockbell from Full Metal Alchemist, in Sonic Ring Bond idecided Zooey also serves as the mechanic for the Tornado. So, where does that leave Tails? Well, Tails is in the Ring Bond AU, but his role is a little different as well as his relationship with Sonic. This has to do with me being fond of the idea that him and Amy would make great friends who support each other in their pursuit of Sonic and his lifestyle. This of course leads me to

The Characters

For my AU I did not really want to change the characters too much, but I did want to answer a few questions I’ve always had while also indulging in some of my biases and preferences. In the example of biases and preferences after seeing artwork from @rontufox​ on deviantart.com that I interpreted as showing Sonic and Mighty as good friends who occasionally adventure together but mostly swap adventuring stories in my AU it is Mighty who is Sonic’s best friend and not Tails due to sharing similar lifestyles that give them grounds to bond on. Tails in Sonic Ring Bond actually becomes close friends with Rosy to indulge in my belief that Tails’ and Amy’s personalities and shared love for and interest in Sonic and his adventures as a starting point. But Rosy and Tails also share one more thing in common that they actually share with Mighty which leaves him concerned about Sonic’s spontaneity combined with his aloofness; the titular Ring Bond.

The Ring Bond

A question I used to ask myself all the time but stopped having to once SEGA and Sonic Team decided to be pretty definitive with how only a few Characters possessed Sonic’s speed instead of nearly everyone in the pre-Adventure days was what is the source of everyone’s speed. I used to have all sorts of headcanons for everyone but Sonic who I just accepted it as being natural for. Outside of speed though there were other things I wondered about as well such as how Tails managed to use Sonic’s Super Spin Attack without Sonic’s spines. As I began really developing my AU, I figured I could address that as well and the solution that I eventually settled with drew inspiration both from the Paramount movie and the Sonic OVA. That solution is that Sonic’s abilities can be shared by others. This solution of course needed to have a solution of its own to the question of how Sonic share could his abilities. Me being me with the need to over explain things as well but wanting to stay reasonably within the limitations of the games it was (Knuckles) Chaotix that would afford me my answer in Ring Energy. Going by the Japanese manual for Chaotix, Ring Energy is a force that can bind two Rings together allowing for the rubber band mechanics of the game. Considering all the other properties and abilities of Rings I came up with the Ring Bond, the ability to share one’s abilities with someone else through Rings.

Within my AU Sonic with his experience with rings and the various things they do simply figured it out and shared his abilities with Mighty, Rosy, and Tails to get each of them out of a situation that he couldn’t just carry them through. In Mighty’s case that was escaping Eggman Island, Rosy it was getting through Metallic Madness on Little Planet (which addresses for me how she made it through and caught up with him by the end), and Tails as the fox needed to be able to protect himself being able to use his tails to keep up with Sonic through the Death Egg Saga. But while Sonic simply figured it out in his own way Eggman has been slowly figuring it out as he has been perfecting Metal Sonic, needing only the Ring Bond to fully add Sonic’s abilities to the robot doppelganger. Luring Mighty, Rosy, and Tails to island that (Knuckles) Chaotix takes place on as part of his attempts to further understand how rings work after realizing that they all have Sonic’s abilities. At this point though I should probably change course and detail what games have taken place in the Ring Bond AU and the order in which they do. I’ll also take this opportunity to further flesh out how the characters met each other so things might get even lengthier and meander even more as we move on into

The Games & History

So before getting too into, it should be noted that in my AU, like the Japanese manual for the original game states, Sonic and Eggman were already at it before any of the games take place. During this time period in Sonic Ring Bond is when Sonic met Zooey and joined Checkpoint. It was during his time with checkpoint before any of the games that he heard of Mighty as an adventurer who would seek out and find the most spectacular of natural locales. After checking out some of them himself Sonic would seek out Mighty to hear about his travels from the armadillo himself. The two being kindred adventurers with a love for discovery they hit it off and became fast friends exchanging stories and places for the other to check out. Their friendship would appear as an opportunity to Eggman who would attempt to capture Might to use as bait to lure Sonic to Eggman Island. By sheer luck however Egman managed to capture both Sonic and Mighty.

Unlike the original game, the Ring Bond version of SegaSonic the Hedgehog only had Sonic and Mighty go through game’s events. Now, as the Sonic Mania Adventure shorts showed that Mighty lacks Sonic’s speed and considering the traps of Eggman Island, Sonic knew there was no way to get Mighty out using his usual methods. Getting his hand on the first available Rings he could Sonic attempted to use Ring Energy to pull Mighty along behind him. With traps designed to overwhelm Sonic however littering the island in a continuous gauntlet doing so would have surely gotten the both of them killed. Wary to do so, but not accepting the alternative, Sonic created a Ring Bond between him and Mighty, granting his abilities to the armadillo. While it took Mighty a bit to get used to using them, his shell kept him safe and eventually he was able to not only follow Sonic to safety, but played his part in their escape from Eggman island.

Possessed of Sonic’s abilities, Mighty wanted to repay Sonic as he would now be able to see the world in ways he never had before. Sonic declined the offer as he believed the effects of the Ring Bond would be temporary but Mighty insisted and told Sonic how to reach Never Lake so he could see the appearance of the Miracle Planet. Figuring if he was in the area while it was around he’d check it and parted ways with Mighty until their next meeting. The Miracle Planet, Little Planet, was not just of interest to Sonic however as Eggman had ambitions of his own using it’s time traveling properties for his schemes and a certain pink hedgehog would receive an order from her cards to head to Never Lake for a fated encounter.

Now in Sonic Ring Bond, Amy’s background is a bit more detailed. The reason for this is like answering why she, Mighty and Tails have Sonic’s abilities, I felt a need to answer why I would use her original nickname over her actual name. To do so, I fell back on my Hedgehog Circus AU where before she met Sonic her fortune telling abilities allowing her to find treasure had resulted in her being sought out by Fang the Sniper. Being the treasure hunting ruffian that he is, Fang didn’t take to Amy’s personality and took to calling her Rosy as commentary on her outlook. Choosing to travel with Fang to indulge her desire for adventure and how playful she was would result in others calling her a rascal. But Rosy the Rascal would not spend all her time in the company of Fang as if the power of the cards gave her an order she followed without hesitation. Following the order to the letter was a different story as when she reached Never Lake she was enamored by the Miracle Planet and made her way up to check it out oblivious of the dangers posed by Eggman. As for how she got up there, for Sonic Ring Bond I’ve decided to play with a headcanon of mine that she owns the magic carpet that her stage in Sonic the Fighters takes place on. She probably found while adventuring with Fang and simply kept it for herself without ever letting him know she has it. I see her keeping it a secret from everyone as magical artifacts could very easily change the world in unexpected ways.

Rosy was not the only one thinking about the effects of mystical artifacts as Eggman was well on his was to tracking down the Time Stones so that he might unlock the flow of time and conquer the world. Ever the industrial genius, Eggman was expecting Sonic’s eventual appearance and to that end using the advanced technology he found in Little Planet’s future created his most advance machine, Metal Sonic. Despite how advanced Metal Sonic was and Eggman’s genius being able to easily comprehend and make deft use of technology long lost to the world, the robot was still pretty much just a mannequin built around a jet engine. Not wanting to waste his creation willy-nilly Eggman waited for an opportunity to use it where Sonic would have to take on it’s full capabilities without just trashing it. Rosy’s fangirling over meeting Sonic who as a hedgehog adventurer herself she idolizes would be the perfect opportunity and Metal Sonic would make his debut by abducting the hedgehog girl. Perhaps more bothered by not having the opportunity to talk Sonic into taking her on his adventure than being held hostage, Rosy would get her desire in a way she did not quite expect.

When Sonic finally caught up, spending more time leaving Rosy a hostage than she would have liked as he went about removing Eggman’s influence on Little Planet and making sure the Time Stones were safe, he found himself pitted in a race against his robotic doppelganger. Unfortunately for Metal Sonic, Sonic won the race and was able to rescue Rosy, to a point. The road to Eggman’s fortress was where the race had taken place and Eggman had completely annihilated it making doubly sure of Sonic’s end should he lose to Metal Sonic. With the road gone and the only way forward being through Eggman’s fortress, Sonic found himself having to figure out how to get Rosy to safety. It was unlikely that Eggman’s fortress on Little Planet would be any less dangerous than Eggman Island, and Rosy was obviously younger than him and lacking the ability to make it through such a place. Begrudgingly and hoping that the effects of the Ring Bond truly were temporary, Sonic shared his abilities with Rosy and led her into Eggman’s fortress. Unlike Mighty though, she was not as quick to pick up using Sonic’s abilities and would barely catch up to Sonic as he drove Eggman off of Little Planet.

Escaping the planet after Eggman just as it’s one-month appearance came to an end, Sonic headed off towards his next adventure leaving Rosy behind. The change in status quo for Rosy after her life changing adventure on Little Planet would come back to haunt Sonic in due time, but not before answering a call for help from the legendary South Island. Eggman had taken to the island after hearing of the major losses of the terrifying sky pirates, the Battle Kukku’s, who were searching for the legendary Chaos Emeralds. Conducting his own research into them Eggman discovered and tracked down South Island. Naturally he upended the island in his search and Sonic being so well known was reached out to by the inhabitants for help. Upon arriving at South Island, Sonic found Eggman waiting for him with a devious trap in play; to slow Sonic down he had captured all the animals on the island and shoved them into his robots.

Now, for the Ring Bond AU things are a little more complicated as Fang the Sniper and Metal Sonic also make their way to South Island. Eggman is surprised by Metal’s reappearance, both him and Sonic oblivious to Sonic using the Ring Bond having an effect on the robot allowing it to make its way back to Eggman. With Metal Sonic’s mysterious return and eavesdropping on Sonic and Fang discovering that the treasure hunter blames Sonic for his loss of his treasure tracker as Rosy suddenly had Sonic’s abilities leaves the doctor curious. Thus, while attempting to discover the Chaos Emeralds in a race against Sonic and Fang, Eggman repairs Metal Sonic and sends it out to cause interference. In the end Sonic beats them all, and through his Ring Bond ability harnesses the power of the Chaos Emeralds to undo the damage caused by Eggman. In his use of the Chaos Emeralds however Eggman was able to witness their power and desired more and more to harness them. To that end he would have to repair Metal again as the robot seemed affected by Sonic. He would need more data however as well as the chance to get his hands on the Chaos Emeralds again.

Whether by sheer coincidence or perhaps design, Sonic and Eggman both descended upon West Side Island, the Illusory Island providing the doctor the opportunity he had been waiting for. Sonic however was oblivious to his nemesis’ arrival and had simply set down on the island to take a break between adventures. While there he found himself starting to be followed by a two-tailed fox boy who could use his tails to keep up with him. Nicknaming him Tails and viewing him as little more than a minor distraction, Sonic ignored him for the most part during his time on the island and let him do as he pleased. This was enough for Tails, who despite having fended off the Battle Kukku Armada lacked the courage and confidence to approach a hero such as Sonic. He did however desire to become a hero like Sonic, especially after having defeated the Battle Kukkus. Having just a little more confidence in himself he had trained himself to use his tails to reach groundspeeds around the speed of sound in the hopes of one day impressing his hero as unlikely as it was that he would meet him. Impressing him was not quite what Tails would manage to do though.

Eggman’s plans eventually sprung into action and the destruction he caused in the process naturally drew Sonic’s attention. Racing off to save yet another legendary island from Eggman, Sonic found himself being followed by the young fox. Suddenly Tails’ ability to keep up with Sonic proved to be problematic as though Tails believed if he could keep up with Sonic everything would be fine and believed he could help, Eggman was far greater than the Battle Kukku Armada. Unable to chase Tails off and fearful that the stubborn fox would get himself hurt or worse, Sonic made the decision to grant him his abilities through the Ring Bond. Surpassing Sonic’s expectations, Tails took to his abilities like a natural and became a major asset in saving West Side Island. His ability to fly the Tornado elevated him even higher, but not nearly as much as his ability to slap a rocket on it and repair it in the time it Sonic to bring down Eggman’s airship. Impressive as Tails’ abilities were, however, he could not keep up with Sonic as Sonic chased Eggman into space and had a battle with a far clunkier robot double of himself. Clunky as it was, it was combat capable and the space fortress that Eggman built put him even further and further ahead of the technology of the world below. Unable to let Eggman keep his latest and greatest creation for the sake of the world below, Sonic again used the Ring Bond to harness the power of the Chaos Emeralds hoping to undo the space station’s creation. To Sonic’s surprise the Chaos Emeralds transformed him and granted him the power to do as he desired to protect the world.

With the Death Egg seeming destroyed, Sonic allowed himself a few days rest. Tails, amazed by Sonic’s extraordinary feats spent those days rummaging through the remains of Eggman’s bases on West Side Island to see what Eggman had dug up on the Chaos Emeralds. Tinkering around with Eggman’s tech Tails managed to put together a Chaos Emerald detector and to his surprise picked up reaction in the middle of the ocean. The direction was the same as the epicenter of a tidal wave that brought an ancient Ring to Sonic’s attention reminding him of the legends of an island that floated in the sky. Deciding his next adventure would be Angel Island, Sonic headed out allowing Tails to join him again as his Chaos Emerald detector would likely lead them to the legendary Angel Island.

Finding Angel island proved far easier for Eggman as he simply had to wait for the Death Egg to crash land to find it. Attracting the attention of the island’s guardian, Knuckles the Echidna, Eggman managed to trick him into believing Sonic was his enemy. Doubting that Knuckles would serve as much of an obstacle to Sonic, Eggman took his combat data from Mecha Sonic Mk. I to start work on a Mk. II unit in addition to digging himself in on the island. Eggman however vastly underestimated Knuckles, as the island’s guardian was more properly the Guardian of the Master Emerald, a legendary gem that controlled the Chaos Emeralds. Due to his duty and the stories engrained into the island and him he was blessed with abilities matching Sonic’s as well as knowledge of the Ring Bond. As a result, he introduced himself to Sonic by breaking his Ring Bond with the Chaos Emeralds. It was a shock to Sonic and Tails both and when they discovered that Eggman was already on Angel island things got desperate.

The battle for Angel Island was unlike any other as Sonic had to restore his Ring Bond with the Chaos Emeralds to prevent Eggman from gaining access to them, fend off the misinformed Knuckles, and stop the Death Egg from making it back into space. It was more than Tails could keep up with and as the Death Egg began to ascend Sonic’s journey would continue on alone. He would stop the first launch on his own and would soon after discover the truth about Knuckles. Deciding to help out the echidna he would use his Ring Bond to restore the bonds between the Chaos Emeralds and the Master Emerald. He would not succeed at stopping the Death Egg from finally making it into space however or keep Eggman from getting his hands on the Master Emerald. Realizing the error of his ways, Knuckles sent Sonic on ahead to try and catch up to Eggman exposing him to Mech Sonic Mk. II. Despite the improvements of his latest doppelganger Sonic managed to still catch up with the Death Egg. After an epic encounter in space, Sonic would truly destroy the space station this time and meet back up with Tails before reuniting Knuckles with the master Emerald. Despite saving Angel Island though, Sonic had a nagging feeling and after parting ways with Tails took the Tornado once again into the sky after the legendary floating island.

For Knuckles it was a good thing that Sonic did as Eggman’s robots had long overstayed their welcome, but most importantly, Mecha Sonic Mk. II had managed to get its hands on the Master Emerald. After a grueling battle with the emerald powered machine, Knuckles was saved by Sonic from plummeting to his doom. Relieved to hear that Knuckles had dealt with Eggman’s leftovers, Sonic left Knuckles and Angel Island for a second time. But neither he nor Knuckles realized that the Master Emerald’s Guardian had not fully dealt with Eggman’s leftovers. There was enough left of Mecha Sonic Mk. II for Eggman, who had survived his last clash with Sonic, to salvage and analyze the data it held. It was more than Eggman could have ever hoped for as it revealed through the bond with the Master Emerald the Ring Bond.

Desperate to study the secret of the Rings and learn about Sonic’s Ring Bond ability, Eggman was thrilled when a whole island began to rise up out of the ocean in response to the Master Emerald’s time on the surface. Hoping that the island would lead him to unravel the mysteries of the Rings Eggman was more amazed than he anticipated he could be. He discovered the Rings could be used to directly access the Master Emerald and more secrets due to the island having once been part of the same civilization that Angel Island had been part of. Gleefully building a new base on the island to support his research, Eggman invented the Dark Ring and began enhancing Metal Sonic. He still needed more data though to complete his original Sonic doppelganger and recalled three individuals who he knew about who possessed Sonic’s abilities. Hatching his next scheme Eggman proceeded to lure Mighty, Rosy, and Tails to the nameless island. Unfortunately for Eggman, someone he did not account for got involved.

Since having rid Angel Island of the last of Eggman’s influence, Knuckles had been watching the world below for signs of the Master Emerald having affected it. The rising of an island from the ocean in a world constantly shifting about seemed little to worry himself about, but Eggman’s interest in the island kept him keeping an eye on things. When the Master Emerald began reacting to the Chaos Rings, powerful Rings born from long lost Ring Bonds with the Chaos Emeralds and Master Emerald, Knuckles knew he would have to investigate what was going on. He didn’t know about the Chaos Rings themselves, but was not surprised when a trio of adventures with Ring Bonds with Sonic showed up and fell under attack from Eggman. What horrible fate awaited them had Knuckles not come down from Angel Island is one Mighty was glad he would not find out.

For Mighty, his time on the nameless island was a lot like his time on Eggman Island constantly avoiding traps and Eggman’s attempts to stop him. Matters were more complicated this time though as the presence of Rosy and Tails also sharing a Ring Bond with Sonic and believing they could help Knuckles with his reason for being there meant he couldn’t just flee. Someone had to take responsibility for Sonic so recklessly making Ring Bonds and Mighty felt with what he saw of Knuckles’ personality he was unlikely to keep Tails and Rosy out of trouble. When they had to face off against Metal Sonic and a giant monstrous version of the machine, he was glad though that Knuckles was present as his combat expertise proved integral in stopping Eggman’s plans and the creation of the Dark Ring. Knuckles took it a step further however and used the power of the Master Emerald held in the Chaos Rings to destroy the island and make sure that they could never be used by Eggman again or endanger the master Emerald. Saddened by the loss of history, Mighty would have liked to spend some time speaking with the echidna about his past and everything he knew about the world but had to deal with Rosy and Tails.

During the adventure Rosy had hit it of with Tails in their shared idolization of Sonic, even if Tails couldn’t grasp Rosy’s crush. Completely hyped up by the adventure Rosy wanted nothing more than to team up with Tails to go adventuring and try to find Sonic but Mighty wasn’t having it. That Sonic had shared his abilities with the two and did not bring them to Checkpoint to make sure they could develop their skills safely left Mighty far to concerned. Though rosy put up a fight, he managed to get the two of them to Checkpoint. It was not the best start either as Rosy wanted to meet everyone and hear their stories while Tails found himself meeting Zooey who had more than few words for him for making her maintenance work the Tornado harder by attacking a rocket engine to it. Eventually things smoothed over and Zooey became Rosy and Tails’ agent in Checkpoint, though policy kept her from telling them where Sonic was at any given time no matter how much Rosy pestered her. Staying with Checkpoint at Mighty’s insistence Rosy and Tails would become exemplary Ring Hunters, a respectable if not exciting role as though Rings were finicky and no one knew how they worked or why, Ring Gates needed them to be built and function so the two slowly built a reputation for themselves. Mighty already having quite the reputation was free to go as he pleased and once he was confident that Rosy and Tails had settled in headed out in search of Sonic, something he could use to get Sonic to come to him, and to make sure that if Eggman was up to anything someone might know.

The funny thing about Sonic and Eggman though was that they were always bound to bump into each other at one point or another, even when Eggman would prefer they did not. After his defeat on the nameless island to Knuckles, Eggman went about compiling all of the data he managed to gather, and though he lamented losing almost all of his Ring data had more than enough to finally complete Metal Sonic. The only thing left he needed was what a dubbed a Chaos Factor to forge a Ring Bond between Metal Sonic and Sonic. Of course, he also had to repair Metal Sonic again, upgrade it to receive the Chaos Factor, and then test it to make sure that it was indeed Sonic’s equal, or even better. To that end, he sought out Mirage Island, a place where Little Planet was said to appear, even if it was not a tangible appearance like over Never Lake. It seemed the perfect place to work and Eggman sure enough found ancient ruins with hints to the Chaos Factor he needed. Thus he set up base and began his search while preparing to test the eventually completed Metal Sonic by putting out old Badniks that Sonic had already proved were failures, though adding a few new twists to test Metal Sonic’s adaptability.

Sonic had no clue what Eggman was up to when he arrived on Mirage Island by chance, but seeing Eggman’s old machines littering the island, and with the local fauna stuffed inside, he was quick to act. His testing grounds suddenly under attack by the wrong Sonic, Eggman had to scramble to meet his long-time foe. Unfortunately his little twists to his old designs were not enough to deter Sonic, and only by launching his incomplete low-orbital base was he able to pull Sonic away from Mad Gear Zone so that Metal Sonic might be completed in peace. Unfortunately Sonic still inflicted tremendous losses and Eggman lost his new, though much smaller, space station as well as great deal of the tests he had set up for Metal Sonic. It was not all a loss however as Sonic was unaware of why Eggman had chosen Mirage Island for his latest scheme. That meant that the Chaos Factor he was after was still untouched, though he had lost the machines to excavate it. That was fine though as the completed Metal Sonic was more than up to the task, a task that made him truly complete for as he absorbed the Chaos Factor his Ring Bond with Sonic was completed and the machine was non longer just a constructed copy of Sonic, but for all extents and purposed a robot Sonic. Eggman was overjoyed by his success and needed now only the opportunity to spoil Sonic’s fun and let him meet his perfect machine counterpart.

And that wraps up how the games that have occurred in the Ring Bond AU and the order. My apologies for the format and meandering approach, but I hope it helps paint a picture of the AU’s history. For a quick recap though before I wrap this up, the game effectively took place in the following order

SegaSonic the Hedgehog>>Sonic CD>>Tails Adventure>>Sonic the Hedgehog (1991)>>Sonic 2>>Sonic 3>>Sonic and Knuckles>>(Knuckles) Chaotix>>Sonic 4 Ep. I>>Sonic 4 Ep. Metal.

From here the Sonic Ring Bond AU will be going in its own direction. How the characters develop and grow is for the future, though I hope I’ll make something of it. If not, for now this AU is the one that my Rosy occupies. She has Sonic’s abilities and the desire to master them so that she can go on adventures with him and maybe even win his heart. Her shared idolization of Sonic has resulted in her and Tails becoming best friends, while Sonic is best friends with Mighty. Eggman has completed a version of Metal Sonic that is for all extents and purposes Sonic and is just waiting for the perfect opportunity to ruin his fun and gloat in victory. Meanwhile, the Battle Kukku Armada is still out there and desiring revenge against Tails, and Rosy leaving Fang in pursuit of Sonic and his lifestyle has left her and Sonic yet another crafter enemy who himself wants “compensation” for losing his treasure tracker. And all of this takes place in a world where Eggman’s robotics and engineering skills puts him decades ahead of the rest of constantly shifting world full of ancient ruins and legends barely hanging on to airship technology fueled by early industry. But with the help of Checkpoint, it is a world that is a home to many adventurers who live out their dreams of a lifetime of discovery.

Thank you to everyone who read to the end, and I welcome any question or suggestions you may have. For the sake of organization though, please send questions or suggestions through my ask and I’ll be glad to answer. Thank you again everyone for your time.

[brooke-the-poet]

The Fantasy Adventure Trope and Autistics.

Currently I am fascinated with narrative framing. The structure of a story and how that gives us the meanings that we draw from it.  

What I have noticed is that neurodivergent consciousness isn't taken into consideration very often. In fact many narratives, especially in children's literature and films have a gaslighting affect when it comes to the experiences of neurodivergent children.

Children who are different are portrayed as having an overactive imagination, big emotions or too reserved, shy, afraid, a little adult, low impulse control, not very social, bullied at school and are ignored by adults.

This jumble of traits pretty much fits most neurodivergents. But just enough so that they are endearing and don't seem "too weird".

Unfortunately many children are thought of in the same vein as the biblical prodigal son. Disabilities and difficulties are seen as trials to be fixed, or to fix "us" as if we need some form of chastising.

That our ways are wrong and we choose to bring difficulty on ourselves by not ignoring the things everyone else ignores and doing what everyone else does.

 People expect neurodivergent children to be doormats and when they are shoved into that role they naturally become distressed and hide or rebel.

Such children then go on a magic adventure, where they learn about who they are as a person and then return home better off than when they left, able to cope and function better in their world.

That's a very general idea of the plots of most magic adventures. And there's nothing wrong with that, if indeed that is what is occurring.

But too often it is not.  Most of these narratives portray the child as in need of a rude awakening, again with the prodigal image, spoiled, lack of discipline, bad attitude, needing to burn off energy, needing confidence, needing change over all.

And how this occurs is through what is known as exposure therapy.  A theorized technique where non-biological anxiety is reduced through exposure to the source of the anxiety.

This does not work on neurodivergents nor many with trauma related conditions. It only serves to burn out energy and destroy our nervous systems and peace of mind if we had any to begin with.

The adventure supposedly  leads the child to become used to physical stress, work and decision making. It assumes that the child has had no trauma or stress before this. That their difficulties came from being uncooperative with adults.  What it comes down to is that it is the child that needs to change, not their world.

And what that means for the neurodivergent child whose experience of the world can not change through a change in attitude, is that they are made to feel flawed, that unlike the "good" children in those stories, they are bad.

Which leads them to hiding their difficulties and masking. And if they are autistic, the feeling of being nonhuman increases significantly.  

*On a side note: Fantasy gives neurodivergent traits to majority non-human characters. I really do enjoy fantasy but the characters I related to most were the non-humans or the villain, and both.

There are a lot of non-human characters that should just have been human. When only "make believe" species have your sensitivity and traits, it makes it very hard for people to take you seriously. That's a whole other article though.*

Back to narrative:

Two examples come to mind. The German novel "The Neverending Story"  by Michael Ende and and the Japanese film "Spirited Away" by Hayao Miyazaki.

These were big impact stories, I'm only going to cover 3 items from each.

Someone with more energy can dig in deeper.  Also if the plots sound really similar to you, children going off into fantasy worlds and receiving help from dragons, it is because Michael Ende loved Japan and was inspired by Japanese folklore.

His second wife is Japanese and his stories became huge in Japan where he toured and gave lectures and was honoured with his own museum shortly before he passed away.

First, The Never Ending Story.

Yes, the story with Bastian, Atreyu, the child-like empress and my personal favourite, Falcor the luck dragon. Who doesn't love the ending of the film version where he scares the shit out of those bullies as he chases them  into the dumpster?

There are a lot of very good things in this story,  Bastian fits completely the profile of the neurodivergent child,but for those who have read the book there are some glaring details, and Yes, I know all the other interpretations and cultural symbolism going on.

But I'm looking at these from an autistic perspective, being as personal and  literal as possible. Because that is how I viewed them and many others will, as a kid and teenager.

1. Despite Bastian's trauma from school and his mom's death it is up to him to fix his emotionally shut down father.

There's a new term for this, emotional incest. Google that.  Emotionally Bastian has a lot going on,he and his father should really be seeing a therapist.

This topic can be controversial as it crosses into many cultural expectations of what a family is and the required roles within a family.  There are various levels of toxicity that can occur in parent child relationships that result in anger later on in the child. But a parent relying on a child for emotional support is seen as the most benign.

One could say that is traditionally what children are for.  From the outside pushing back at this role looks like "modern selfishness" but the inside reality is that the stress placed on a child who needs support and understanding themselves is damaging. When suppressing growth for a parent, the child does not learn to become an emotionally healthy adult.

For many neurodivergents this can look like carer abuse, infantalisation, a parent guilt tripping for all the work they do for the child. Expecting full loyalty to a parent with punishments imposed for perceived infractions.

Demanding all of a child's time. Not allowing friends, becoming jealous of online friends, hobbies, and anything that takes their attention away from the parent.

Given that as adults many disabled neurodivergents rely on their parents for support, these relationships remain complex and complicated.

2. Spending too much time in your inner world makes you less human.

For those not familiar with the second half of this book, for every wish and fantasy  Bastian lives out he loses his memory and humanity. WTH?

As someone who has memory and dissociation issues this really freaked me out and made me question whether or not my dissociation, frequent need to retreat and loss of self at times was due to me being a bad, selfish person like the townspeople in the book.

Autistics and other neurodivergents have rich inner worlds that are just as real as what is going on outside them.

They are a part of this world as nature, and it is there that we often find and preserve our sense of self instead of getting lost in a sea of others.

Without them we would lose ourselves. Our humanity should never be equated with how much we outwardly participate.

3.  Bastian wasn't capable of being loved before his journey.

When Bastian loses his humanity he nearly kills Atreyu but is stopped. He repents by working hard in a mountain, as a miner where he loses the last of himself, including his name in order to learn selfless love.

Hard stare. Really? Neurodivergents tend to be born selfless it seems, and we have really hard times creating boundaries for ourselves in how much we will give others and are much too open to manipulation because of it.

In my mind Bastian is already doing far too much emotional labour for a child to sustain and shouldn't be required to have to work on top of that  for love to be given him.

More messages towards us about being selfless only harms us and makes us feel guilty for not draining ourselves dry for others.

Reiterating again, that Esoterica and symbolism, metaphors etc...are my special interest, I know what the esoteric symbolism of all this is but most children will not and Will take this aspect literally.

Overall none of his physical issues such as Body positivity, the school and bully situation nor any other issues were addressed. His real fear was part of his "overactive imagination" that he had to overcome.

This gaslights many neurological disabilities and experiences with the world, where synesthesia, sensory processing differences and executive Dysfunction are labelled imaginary and trauma around them is exasperated.

Spirited Away

This is the film that inspired this. Because I loved this. Miyazaki truly knows how to capture the soul of nature.

Some back story about anime you truly need to know before we move on.

If you're autistic, and fan of Anno Hideki creator of Evangelion, also a fellow autistic, who also worked with studio Ghibli, then you probably know what he means when he stated that anime and manga are an inherently autistic medium.  

Paraphrasing Anno: 

Your goal is to reach out and connect with others deeply and emotionally.  

The main way this is achieved is having the emotional interior of people reversed, showing every emotion externally.

In anime all the huge feelings, trauma and anxiety that usually go on inside someone are shown on the outside. This makes it really relatable and easy to connect emotionally to the characters.

Big secret though, non-neurodivergents assume a lot of the emotions are exaggerated and the trials and stages the characters go through are metaphors.

If you are neurodivergent, you know they are not. Many things are literally what is happening to us on the inside, how certain things feel.

I'll give examples when I talk about Spirited Away, but if you are further curious, Google Newtypes from the Mobile Suit Gundam saga and Evangelion.

This unique feature and style, of emotions began in the Tokugawa Era as a form of non-violent rebellion against the imposed socially rigid caste system and militarism of the era that saw creativity as superfluous.

Anything different, mysterious, unknown, imaginative and emotional did not meet the new "social norms" of the shogunate era and were rejected.  

Artists and writers, the creative castes, started making woodblock prints of fantasy scenes and stories in a style now known as manga.

They kept Non-linear, neurodivergent thought and ways of being alive during that violent time period when many creators were imprisoned.  

     Ok, with that on to Spirited Away.  I'm going to focus on Autistic masking. Masking plays a huge role in this story.

Briefly, the plot is: 10 year old Chihiro, on the way to her new home is spirited away with her parents. Going against her instincts she follows them into what turns out to be the holiday and pleasure district of the gods.

Her parents eat the god's food, turn into pigs and Chihiro must then sell herself to the onsen ( bath house) in order to work off the debts of her parents and save them.  

The main characters that I personally relate with in this piece are Haku, the dragon boy/river god,  the Faceless Spirit/Noh Face and the witch Zeneba.

So again, 3 things.

1. Masking, Chihiro is The Mask.

Chihiro, the cool, collected,lovely mixture of innocence and maturity is the mask that many autistic women grew up wearing in order to handle trauma. Be strong, brave and stoic for the sake of others. This is one set of strong messages that the film puts out.     

In the bridge scene where Haku and Chihiro, under an invisibility spell, cross the bridge to the bathhouse; in order to cross without being seen Chihiro must hold her breath.

That is what Autistic masking literally feels like, the fear of being seen, caught and punished for who we are and the sharp pain of inhaled breath held, for too long, and slow suffocation.

             Chihiro's journey  will feel familiar to many young autistics who are learning about themselves and the people around them and how they fit into the social structures here. Chihiro is a foreigner and awkwardly trying to stay out of trouble.

There isn't a structure that fits her.  She's scolded and hindered for simply existing in that space not meant for her. But she has a task to complete, so she has to figure out a way to make things work.

Being survival, task and mission oriented is a strong point of being Autistic. It's part of our ability to be perseverant.

It can be so strong that your mind creates different ways of being to hide and protect the most sensitive parts of itself, to protect the parts that are different.

Chihiro's final line in the film is:

"Don't worry, I think I can handle it."

She's resolute in her maintaining a stoic mask, which is implied as part of growing up.  This message is toxic to Autistics

For a lot of us Autistics this line recalls childhood trauma and masking. The exact phrase we would say to "make things work" for ourselves. Suppressing our needs in order to appear mature and keep our parents and those around us comfortable.

If the bathhouse is supposed to represent life and the social- economic reality, then it's the same reality so many face, forced to change and pretend they fit into society.  This message about masking feels at odds with the "re-discovering your true self" message that we get with Haku.

   The river dragon spirit, Haku literally represents what masking your true self can look like. Under Yubaba he loses sense of his true nature, physically grows pale and steely eyed. He isn't conscious of the spell Yubaba has placed in him. Masking isn't conscious to a lot of Autistics either.

     As an apprentice Haku carries out orders no matter what the danger is to himself. Putting ourselves in harm's way and being abused without us knowing is an outcome of masking. When masking we are in the position of copying others feeling very much like "apprentice non-autistics".

We want to please in order to survive and feel adequate with others. In the scene when Haku is bleeding to death and Yubaba kicks him into the incinerator to be disposed of, that unfortunately is a real emotional outcome to many abusive relationships built through masking. Relationships fail once we burn out.

In order to show his true nature, Haku actively fights inside himself when helping Chihiro. He plays double agent throughout the film. And then has to be saved from himself by Chihiro.

Do I need to be saved from myself?

Do I seem as cold and distant as Haku?

Am I and my masking setting a bad example, a burden to seemingly purer people like Chihiro who haven't quite learned to mask yet?

These questions flitter and linger for a long time. There's a pang of sadness in them.

    It's an extremely complicated issue which is further complicated when navigating personal  boundaries and what is felt to be personally owed to others, it changes with each situation.  

During the train scene when Chihiro is given time to process her predicament you can literally see her mentally forming her mask, the mask that's prepared to take responsibility for others mistakes.

It's the same mask we create to carry the burden of being social and appropriate when no one else is, the mask that self blames and takes up energy.  Chihiro takes responsibility for everything.

There is again that message of sacrificing your well being for others that is pushed. She is the only one actively trying to save both her parents and Haku.

    Being a heroine doesn't have to be about saving others, or being responsible for them, especially when they are capable of finding their own solutions. There are so many different ways to show love and support.  

It isn't about being selfish and just taking care of yourself, for many Autistics and those with multiple disabilities, caring for others in this manner isn't an option but feeling guilty for not doing this is a constant to many.    

   Who this message is being directed to, needs to change. It should not be directed at vulnerable girls or any children who will worry and have anxiety about themselves.

The reality of many situations where change is needed from someone in authority, parent or any other institution is that it fails to occur. Children or other exploited parties are made responsible for that failure.  

If an Autistic fails to fit in, it's never societies fault, the burden of change and guilt is always put on the autistic. And in order to shoulder it, masking occurs.  How long is she going to be able to keep up that tough girl facade?

      2. Home   

     In the opening of the film Chihiro is  upset at what would honestly be devastating for someone who relies on "their world" to make sense of who they are.  Moving, no home to return to. This concept literally is played out with Haku and Noh Face.

Haku's river is destroyed, because of this he loses his identity and falls prey to those who would enslave him.  An identity that changes with physical environment is common. Some autistics, like myself, unconsciously build an identity or mask that fits specifically to our environment.

     Environment becomes routine along with all of the sensory stimulus and sensitivity, our bodies physically bond to what is comfortable to us.  And when that changes, so does a whole persona or personality mask.

When it is an unexpected and forced change, it is traumatizing. In my own experience, I've moved 10 times in a single year at the age of 14. Only 4 years older than Chihiro.

That caused a shutdown that I'm still experiencing the effects of 20 years later. Losing those connections is never a matter of letting go and moving on. They are grieved and must be processed at length.  

    On the way out of the forest Chihiro's father notices how quiet she is, both parents finally are paying attention to the emotional reality of their child. If they had listened and paid attention to her intuition, warnings and signs of trauma, in the beginning, their predicament would not have occurred. They might not have even moved in the first place.

"A new home and school, it is a bit scary," her father says. To which Chihiro replies that she can now handle it.

Chihiro, suppressing her original concern and the trauma of her experience, now gaslights herself, after she's gone through the process of learning how to perform emotional and mental labour for others through masking as an act of love.

An act of love, that's how mainstream society positions suppressing the needs of the disabled. You're told if you love your parents, your family, don't cause problems, don't cause trouble.

Oh, your having trouble at school, at work, at home? Disabilities are framed as trouble in this manner, the same way one speaks of a misdemeanor or crime. It subtlety shifts feelings of fault and blame onto the disabled.  When it comes to Autistics the way we understand our self and our experience of the environment is often blamed as the cause of troubles.

For us the Non-autistic world is assaulting both physically and emotionally. It's a mess of social and psychological mind games and head traps that make us chronically ill.  We have to create our own environments to dwell and recover in each night.

For a large proportion of us, we experience time and space Non-linearly. Which means events are not chronological, they don't neatly line up in our minds.

Our experience of the world is like the concepts of Ukiyo and Yugen. Transience, ethereal and profound depth of feeling. Events, people, places float in and out with moments of deep joy and sadness to help us make sense of time.

Miyazaki makes full use of this narrative tradition in his storytelling with vast spaces and characters who on the surface are only loosely associated with each other yet deeply connected.

In our world connection is not linear, nor emotions. Associative thinking leads us to make broad connections in ways that branch out and lead us to discoveries that seem impossible or were unknown to many because the right associations couldn't be made in their linear minds.

Non-linear emotions mean that we don't process events as they happen. It's too much to take in, emotions float in us, incubating until they are ready to be understood. The moment this happens is usually triggered by seemingly unconnected events but to which our minds have made connections to, enough to bring us to full circle. Different mental processing times mean reactions and effects come later, long after expected.

3. Noh face.  Portraying other as grotesque.

The best for last.

Noh face as in the Noh theatre, because the mask they wear, delights and troubles in it's accurate yet disturbing qualities. The spirit does not speak except to make pleading utterances. The faceless spirit  is sad, mysterious, interesting,terrifying and revolting all at once.

When it is invited into the bathhouse it begins to eat several of the workers and gains the ability to speak and their personality traits.

It is one of the most grotesque and extreme moments in the film. It can make you squirm. But it's also the most literal example of what it can be like to mask.

There is a certain type of masking that occurs for autistics who also experience dissociation, derealisation and depersonalisation.

It's the least understood and most vital to  understand; this is how the brain involuntarily forces command or auto-pilot, for survival in situations it deems life threatening.

 When around other people these autistics physically feel themselves absorb the energy, the personalities, emotions and desires of other people, so much so that it overwhelms their mind/ soul, their identity and sense of who they are.

They can lose track of where they are and what they say and do ; literally becoming "drunk" on other people, acting erratically or hyper with a loss of inhibition.  

They may do and say things they wouldn't have before and never would alone, when caught in the energy of the crowd or moment. And often they can't quite remember what occurred until afterwards. It's an uncomfortable and frightening experience to not be in control, to feel like a slave to others wills .

 With this type of masking the autistic may be aware of it or might not be, but they are not in control of when it happens or with who. It occurs on a daily basis this absorption of personas and others traits. It's chaotic inside, an ever changing kaleidoscope of thoughts and feelings that are almost never your own.

Physically, after socialising, especially if it's from a party, when this type of  autistic is alone, people hangover sets in.

People hangovers, even though I don't drink that's the best definition I have of it, you feel ill enough that you vomit; as you would expect with all of this swirling chaos.

The only way to end it is to sleep it off as you psychologically purge all the fragments of others out. This is another  physical sensation as you feel yourself emptying and regaining control. This process can feel like being scrubbed raw, internally.

This masking isn't done out of "loneliness" as is the reason given by the Noh Face. But having no one to understand and going through this alone, does build up and can increase the feelings of desperation to have a stable self.

In the scene when Chihiro gives the Noh face the expectorant, and they vomit just as Haku did, as all the people they consumed left, they returned to their original small form, no longer able to speak.

Chihiro, in that scene is the only one with boundaries, she masks her fear and listens, using her knowledge to give the Noh Face what they really need. She presents a kind, calm and stable force that counters chaos.

It's no wonder the Noh Face wants to absorb her. She's the ultimate mask that it can then have to feel whole and interact with others finally.

But it still would not be their own.

On a side note, it is for this very reason that Noh Face is finally paired with the witch Zaneba, whose line "hmmm, what else can we mess with?" is my favourite. Zaneba sees the structure of the bathhouse and wants to disrupt it.

Due to the chaos occurring inside these type of autistics, instead of trying to order life in a structured or "tidy" way, they impose chaos externally. As long as it is their chaos, this ordered chaos approach is effective in coping with life.

Roles, duties and tasks bring about more structure than superficial order as in the bathhouse. If there's a specific function and purpose that is clear, it makes it easier to not mask, which is why the noh face is able to remain calm.

At the end of the day Zaneba and Noh Face retreat to their quiet home, where function and roles are simple. Personally that's where I'd like to stay, if I were Chihiro I wouldn't have returned.

That's a final point, the "fantasy" world is always made out to be lesser than our shared reality. But is it really? Our inner worlds are what make it possible to survive in the outer world. It's where we process and draw strength to combat the hostility we encounter daily.

They aren't something you abandon in childhood, but a necessary life skill that develops further with age. The fantasy retreat is vital for rest and reclamation of self from society. Not something to be left behind.

So there you have it. My rough autistic sense on what messages an autistic/neurodivergent might take away from popular story narratives and elements in children's fiction and film.  

[kdcomm450]

Messages from Miyazaki

What Studio Ghibli has done to spread positive messages about human relationships to the natural world around us. 

Hiroshi Yamanaka attributes Spirited Away’s massive international success to several factors, including high animation quality, family-friendly content, great promotion, and material that is for children but also conveys deeper, more serious issues. Spirited Away was so immensely successful that 1 out of 5 Japanese citizens have seen the film! While Yamanaka focus more on the idea of the “power to live” and how Studio Ghibli movies empower young girls with their frequent female protagonists, this is just one of the several messages that is present in almost every film by Miyazaki. These movies delve into themes of environmentalism, pacifism, feminism, love and family, personal transformation, and traditional values (Schellhase).

In this post, I’d like to elaborate more on the “shiny leaf culture” that Yamanaka touched upon in The Utopian Power to Live and talk more about the environmentalist messages, often in line with Shinto beliefs, contained within many of these films.

Yamanaka talks about the disconnect Miyazaki felt with Japan and its nationalism, which led him into something of an identity crisis. In fact, Miyazaki considers himself more along the lines of a Europhile, according to the recent documentary The Kingdom of Dream and Madness. However, dissonance was alleviated when he read a book called The Cultivation of Plants and the Origin of Agriculture, because this brought on an epiphany that Japanese is not as isolated when one looks to nature and forests common with other cultures. This common culture, not limited to borders, was coined by the author of the book as “the shiny-leaf culture”, and Miyazaki felt relieved of his depression and guilt when he imagined himself as part of this culture instead (Yamanaka). He was awakened to the beauty of the environment, which knows no borders or nations. 

His view of nature also aligns and is influenced by Shinto: one of the main beliefs being that everything in the universe, include non-living objects like rivers or stones, have their own spirit. Perhaps this view feels so refreshing to a Western audience because we are so used to “a Judeo-Christian tradition, in which nature is an impersonal object created by a transcendent God and given to humanity to be conquered and controlled” (Yamanaka).

I have grown up watching many of Miyazaki’s films, and almost every movie includes themes about the coexistence of humans with nature, and our mistreatment and destruction of the natural world and how humanity owes nature our respect. Often set in gorgeous natural backdrops, characters make friends with spirits of nature like the tree spirit Totoro, the river spirit Haku, wolves and boar from Princess Mononoke, or tales are even told from the perspective of these animals like shape-shifting raccoon dog “tanuki” in Pom Poko.

In My Neighbor Totoro, the father of two young girls tells them that the great tree near their house has“been around since long ago, back in the time when trees and people used to be friends.” This contains a nostalgic notion that humans and the environment are not on the same good terms they once were in the past, as humanity continues to carve out so much of nature for their own gain.

Pom Poko is one of the movies that sends the strongest message of environmentalism. In this movie, raccoon dogs with shape shifting powers try their best to frighten humans away from encroaching on their land, then expend their last ditch effort to create a gigantic visual mirage that shows what an older, less urban Japan looked like, trying to convince the humans to bring this type of world back. They fail each time to stop the development, and at the end of the movie, those who cannot shape shift perish, and the raccoons who have the ability take on human appearances to live in the city that sprang up all around them.

In the last scene, the raccoons shed their human disguises and meet again at night in their true forms to dance on the last remaining patch of green land: a manicured golf course. The protagonist and all of the main characters in this movie are non-human forest creatures, and watching the destruction of these animal’s homes from their perspective over many years is both heartbreaking and eye-opening.

Miyazaki often weaves personal experiences into his films, and it’s clear that seeing the pollution, exploitation, and disrespect of nature has affected him deeply. In Spirited Away, Chihiro helps to escort a ‘stink god’ to be cleaned up at the bathhouse, and this creature actually turns out to be the spirit of a highly polluted river. Miyazaki was inspired for this scene from a personal experience, when a river near his house was excessively polluted. They finally made an effort to clean it, where junk and objects like a bicycle were discovered and removed (GreenShinto).

Even if the whole movie doesn’t center around ideas of environmentalism, it is a recurring trope that we can see hinted at anywhere. Sophie from Howl’s Moving Castle lives above a hat shop right next to train tracks, which spews out smoke and exhaust frequently over her window.

Nausicaä navigates a “toxic jungle” of fungi and mutated plants after a nuclear fallout. What you see in this GIF aren’t snowflakes: they’re actually toxic spores, and she wears a gas mask to protect herself against them, a foreboding warning against how nature could turn against us as a result of humanity’s own bad decisions. Nausicaä has been collecting samples and experimenting on the poisonous plants, and she found that plants grown with clean soil and water are not toxic, but it was the humans who destroyed the soil to make the plants grow that way. The humans in the story fear and even hate the toxic jungle, not realizing it was actually them who led to its creation in the first place.

One of the main characteristics of the majority of the villains or antagonists in his films are that they are “exploiters”: “people who attempt to dominate nature in pursuit of political domination, and are destructive to both humanity and nature.” (Schellhase)

However, one device that is also present in many of these films is the idea of the grey area that exists between good and evil, and that maintaining a balance is often for the best. This balance is demonstrated within Princess Mononoke several times. One example would be the highly complex character and antagonist Lady Eboshi. On one hand, she rescues prostitutes and takes in lepers to run the factory-village Iron Town, but the iron production is bad for the surrounding environment and she does not care about the damage it brings to nature and the animals. She is very complex in her morals, as we can see with this tumblr thread here, titled “Lady Eboshi is Awesome”.

Nature is not shown as the perfect option either, as the wild animals are not without their own faults. Both movies do not urge for domination on either end, but rather coexistence. The environmentalist message calls for coexistence of all living things, and perhaps for humans to stop seeing themselves as the dominators and instead as equals to all things we share this world with.

Works Cited

http://www.greenshinto.com/wp/2014/12/11/miyazakis-shinto-themes/

http://www.theimaginativeconservative.org/2014/11/conservative-vision-hayao-miyazaki.html

Hiroshi Yamanaka (2008). “The Utopian “Power to Live”: The Significance of the Miyazaki Phenomenon” in Japanese Visual Culture: Explorations in the World of Manga and Anime (pp. 237-255).

[mrmichaelchadler]

A Look Back at Those We Lost in 2018

Below is a full index of our tributes from 2018, celebrating the unforgettable talent we lost like Penny Marshall, Stan Lee, Aretha Franklin, Burt Reynolds, and more. Each tribute includes a passage from the obituary, a credit to the respective author, and a link to the full piece. 

John Mahoney (1940-2018) 

“Whether it was in film, on TV, or on stage, John Mahoney found a way to always feel like he was present in a scene, listening to the actor opposite him and not just waiting to say his rehearsed lines. I was lucky enough to see him at the Steppenwolf, and he was so completely captivating that he stole nearly every scene he was in. What he did was so subtle—whether it was in “Frasier,” “Barton Fink,” or on stage—that it probably didn’t get the attention it deserved, but he’s one of those rare actors about which one can honestly say that he made everything he was in just a little bit better. And sometimes a lot.” (Brian Tallerico) [link] 

Jóhann Jóhannsson (1969-2018) 

“He leaves behind an incredible discography, made from his sensibility to tell stories with minimalist melodies, grandiose arrangements and meditative pacing that challenged the conventions of music composition. Aside from his own accomplishments as a nearly unclassifiable composer, his film work was pivotal to helping numerous movies deeply resonate with audiences.” (Nick Allen) [link] 

Steven Bochco (1943-2018) 

“On the Mt. Rushmore of TV creators next to faces like Norman Lear and David Chase, there should be a spot reserved for Steven Bochco, the man who changed the medium of television drama in the way he emphasized ensemble over star vehicles and multi-episode arcs over standalone stories. Shows like “Hill Street Blues,” “L.A. Law,” and “NYPD Blue” earned Bochco a stunning 10 Emmy awards, along with prizes from the Directors and Writers Guilds of America and four Peabody Awards. In 1996, he was inducted into the Television Hall of Fame. He should probably have his own wing.” (Brian Tallerico) [link] 

Isao Takahata (1935-2018) 

“As a producer, he co-founded the legendary Studio Ghibli with the legendary Hayao Miyazaki and would go on to collaborate with him on a number of his internationally celebrated films as a producer. […] Without his efforts and influence over the years, it is safe to say that the animated film industry would be a markedly different beast than it is now, and definitely a less interesting one to boot.” (Peter Sobczynski) [link]

Milos Forman (1932-2018)

Milos Forman, the Czech-born filmmaker who helped revolutionize cinema in his home country before moving to America and becoming one of its most celebrated directors as well, has died. The man behind such celebrated films as “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” (1975) and “Amadeus” (1984), both of which won Oscars for Best Picture and earned him prizes for Best Director, passed away from what was described as a short illness at the age of 86 at his home in Connecticut. Mixing together surreal humor, documentary techniques and an interesting blend of cynicism and affection, Forman helped put Czech cinema on the map. When he applied those same techniques to the projects produced in his adopted country, the result was some of the most incisive, knowing and most profoundly American films of his era. (Peter Sobczysnki) [link]

R. Lee Ermey (1944-2018) 

“Ermey was fun to watch. He became an actor by playing himself, a rare breed of man who was familiar as himself—an American, a Marine and later, an actor. While many scream over Hollywood's liberal slant or other preconceived notions, Ermey's presence on screen was an example talent always wins out. We're all winners for having the Sarge in our viewing life.” (BJ Bethel) [link] 

Anne V. Coates (1925-2018): 

“Throughout a career spanning over 60 years, she worked on over 60 films, receiving numerous accolades that included two Oscars and four additional nominations, and is credited with creating perhaps the most famous single cut in movie history. [...] In 2003, she was named an Officer of the British Empire by the Queen in celebration of her career. In 2007, the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, who had in the past nominated her work on “Murder on the Orient Express,” “The Elephant Man,” “In the Line of Fire” and “Erin Brockovich," presented her with a Lifetime Achievement Award. She received her second Oscar, a Lifetime Achievement Award, in 2017.” (Peter Sobczynski) [link] 

Margot Kidder (1948-2018) 

“She was a spiky brunette with a sexy low voice, but she had her goofy side. Her “Superman” director Richard Donner once said that Kidder was so physically maladroit that if she walked into an empty room with a small trashcan in it she would somehow find a way to get her foot caught in that trashcan.” (Dan Callahan) [link] 

Tom Wolfe (1931-2018) 

“As a journalist, he would take subjects that I would ordinarily have little interest in—Southern California car culture, LSD, the early days of the space program—and attack them with both a zingy writing style that was practically novelistic in nature. He had an enormous depth of detail that made the subjects come to life in the most memorable and unexpected of ways. Later on, Wolfe applied those same techniques in the service of narrative fiction and came up with a series of best-sellers that included one of the most popular and influential novels of the second half of the 20th century.” (Peter Sobczynski) [link] 

Philip Roth (1933-2018) 

���Early novels like Goodbye, Columbus and later novels like The Humbling might show differences in relative aggressiveness but they grow from the same work aesthetic and the same desired relationship with the reader. Much like the greatest films, they pick you up, they draw you in, they show you a world—and the world, usually, is not the world you would have dreamed up. It is a world in which you are morally and intellectually uncomfortable.” (Max Winter) [link] 

Harlan Ellison (1934-2018) 

“That said: if you want to send Ellison off in style, do as he encouraged, and not just as he wrote: read more; talk back to any authority figure within earshot; raise a stink if you feel like you're being taken advantage of, even if it's by a friend; value your time, and don't be afraid to walk away from somebody you love if they don't; respect artists by paying for their work; denounce superstition whenever you can, especially when it seems harmless; reject platitudes, and don't let anybody tell you that your informed opinion doesn't matter. Life may be a series of confrontations, as Ellison said at least once, but you can't let the bastards get you down.” (Simon Abrams) [link] 

Claude Lanzmann (1925-2018) 

“The 1985 documentary “Shoah” was a movie whose critical reception, at least in its United States incarnation, was defined by a slight paradox. The nine-and-a-half hour movie about the Holocaust, specifically the Nazi death camps operated in Poland, was a work utterly defined by the personality, the aesthetic, and the moral determination, and determinations, of its director, Claude Lanzmann. [...] Lanzmann’s flame was an uncommon one. Filmmakers and people of conscience and compassion the world over would do well to keep its memory close by.” (Glenn Kenny) [link]

Tab Hunter (1931-2018) 

"And yet, it was the very things about him that the system sought to repress—such as a sly, self-effacing sense of humor and his homosexuality—that helped breathe new life into his career a couple of decades down the line. Now that he has left us, three days before his 87th birthday, Hunter will be remembered not just as a pretty face with an admittedly memorable name. He'll also be celebrated as a trailblazer whose accounts of his experiences as a gay matinee idol in Hollywood at a time when such things were unheard of helped pave the way for acceptance." (Peter Sobczynski) [link]

Aretha Franklin (1942-2018)

“Her lyrics told you to think, but her voice taught you to feel. She was a fountain of useful knowledge, too: She could tell you who was zoomin’ who, where Dr. Feelgood’s office was and the exact speed limit on the Freeway of Love. She also knew that the only path to immortality was through her art, so she infused every one of her performances with an otherworldly staying power.” (Odie Henderson) [link]

Neil Simon (1927-2018) 

“Neil Simon’s work was often about human connection. It was a message often hidden in humor, but he was clearly a playwright and screenwriter who believed in empathy and compassion, bringing together disparate personalities to ask a simple but crucial question: If Felix and Oscar can get along, can’t we all?” (Brian Tallerico) [link] 

Burt Reynolds (1938-2018) 

“His screen persona often fused the strong-silent jock-adventurer with the anti-establishment wiseass, a combination that had never been attempted in movies before, at least not to such staggering effect. In the '70s and early '80s, Burt (that's how you referred to him, as Burt) was the biggest movie star in existence.” (Matt Zoller Seitz) [link] 

Scott Wilson (1942-2018) 

“Every time I got to talk to him, he was unfailingly kind and open and, best of all, filled with great stories. I mention all of this here upfront because as you read this, I want to stress the fact that he was not just a great actor but a great guy as well. [...] Because of his association with “The Walking Dead,” it was ensured that his passing would not go unnoticed and I can only hope that the renewed interest in the man will inspire some to go looking at some of his past work to see what a truly gifted and memorable actors he was. He may not have been the most famous of actors but when it comes to the things more important than fame—little things like talent and decency—what he left behind will more than stand the test of time." (Peter Sobczynski) [link] 

Stan Lee (1922-2018) 

“It is impossible to fully grasp the influence Stan Lee had over the world of popular culture since he first achieved fame in the Sixties. As a writer, editor and publisher of comic books, he, along with an extraordinary group of collaborators, revolutionized and expanded what could be said and done in that particular art form in ways that reverberate to this day.” (Peter Sobczynski) [link] 

William Goldman (1931-2018) 

“William Goldman changed the perception of the screenwriter in Hollywood, often refusing to give in to studio or directorial demands—his list of “unproduced screenplays” is as long as the ones that got made. He was an icon in his industry that helped pave the road for well-known screenwriters that would follow him like Aaron Sorkin and Cameron Crowe. Movies wouldn’t be the same without him.” (Brian Tallerico) [link] 

Nicolas Roeg (1928-2018)  

“Roeg was one of the least celebrated influential filmmakers of the last half-century. In terms of the techniques that he helped refine, he's as important as Orson Welles or Stanley Kubrick. And if you judged contemporary cinema purely in terms of the grammar that it has borrowed and retained from past masters, you might have to give Roeg the edge, because of how he told stories.” (Matt Zoller Seitz) [link] 

Ricky Jay (1946-2018) 

“He was a sleight-of-hand magician whose illusions startled and amazed audiences throughout the world; a student of the history of magic who used his extensive knowledge to pen several books, and put together a number of museum exhibitions and lectured extensively on the subject; an actor whose cagey screen presence made him a favorite with such filmmakers as David Mamet and Paul Thomas Anderson; a crucial man behind the scenes who helped create a number of the screen’s most celebrated illusions.” (Peter Sobczynski) [link] 

Bernardo Bertolucci (1941-2018) 

“Bertolucci was the opposite of austere, providing the element of danger in these movies—this was dependent on plumbing a sub-conscious that could be seen as out-of-date in some areas, but that was part of taking such risks. Sometimes it felt like Bertolucci was providing the idea of a certain type of Italian film director of his time, and that idea was meant to be more than the sum of his filmography.” (Dan Callahan) [link]

Penny Marshall (1943-2018) 

“To some, she was the co-star of one of the most popular sitcoms of its era and a familiar face/voice on any number of shows over the years. To others, she was a trailblazing filmmaker who became the first American woman to direct a movie that made over $100 million at the box office, a feat she would repeat for a second time just a few years later. Whichever side of the camera she was working on, Penny Marshall was a consummate entertainer who could handle everything from the broadest slapstick comedy to serious drama.” (Peter Sobczynski) [link] 

from All Content http://bit.ly/2TogguT

[talakhouri]

Bibliography

Articles:

·      Sumida, S. and Jefcoat, B. (2018). Anatomy, Animation, and Visual Effects: The Reciprocal Tools of Biology and Film-Making. Integrative and Comparative Biology.

S. Samida who has done several books on morphology and paleontology before joining Disney Studios as an animal anatomy consultant talks about how the anatomy, paleontology, and evolution in different kinds of animals are directly related to how the characters in animated movies are designed. What traits to consider and develop in order to create believable characters based on their needs and instincts to survive. This article helps me directly in my field and covers a very important part in the pre-production phase, which is character design and profile.

·      Hernández-Pérez, M. (2016). Animation, Branding and Authorship in the Construction of the ‘Anti-Disney’ Ethos: Hayao Miyazaki’s Works and Persona through Disney Film Criticism. Animation, 11(3).

The author of this article is the program leader of the Game and Entertainment Design course in Hull University. This article aims to examine the current state of author theories in the field of animation, making use of the Walt Disney figure through a review of different forms of criticism. Disney’s legacy has been reviewed and examined through different theoretical lenses derived from cultural studies and film criticism. This article helped me see how competitors can influence movie creators, and how one’s life experience can help them be unique in his narrative ideas.

·      Maslej, M., Oatley, K. and Mar, R. (2017). Creating fictional characters: The role of experience, personality, and social processes. Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts, 11(4).

This article talks about the audience’s perception of the characters. Engaging characters must be conflicting and unpredictable enough to be complex, but not so much so that they stretch naivety and appear unrealistic. It appears that some level of complexity is necessary to help characters appear lifelike. The authors also mention all the ways that help people create characters and how to make character design a habit. This passage basically helps demonstrate that there are ways, supported by studies, to create engaging characters; people can have a relationship with, which helps me personally in creating strong character profiles.

·      Kätsyri, J., Mäkäräinen, M., Takala, T., 2017. Testing the ‘uncanny valley’ hypothesis in semirealistic computer-animated film characters: An empirical evaluation of natural film stimuli. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies 97, 149–161.

An old article titled Animated Documentaries as Masking by Nea Ehrlich talked about how Animated documentaries demonstrate that “reality” can be constructed and fictional whereas the virtual and/or fictional can become accepted as “real”. Led me to this article which studies whether semi-realistic animated film characters show evidence of the uncanny valley hypothesis. The uncanny valley hypothesis would predict that some animated film characters that are intended to appear realistic, cause negative reactions from the viewers. I realize that this might not be a problem when creating 2D films, but I always consider 3D art as a passion of mine that I might one day develop. It also opened my eyes on all the possibilities that animators can work in, such as motion capture and motion capture.

·      Cheetham, M., Hänggi, J. and Jancke, L. (2014). Identifying with fictive characters: structural brain correlates of the personality trait ‘fantasy’. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 9(11), pp.1836-1844.

After reading an article about how personal experiences affect the way the person perceives things. This article talks about how the audience portrays itself in the character himself and try to live his experience as if it was its own. I started searching for why villains and heroes look the way they do in animated movies. What help the character to be the hero or the villain are the geometrical shapes that form his appearance. What makes us associate those geometrical shapes to character trait, is our experience and the kinds of morphology people we encounter have. This in addition to the previous article about character credibility has changed the way I design my characters.

Books:

·      Chan, J., Dow, S.P., Schunn, C.D., 2018. Do the Best Design Ideas (Really) Come from Conceptually Distant Sources of Inspiration?, in: Subrahmanian, E., Odumosu, T., Tsao, J.Y. (Eds.), Engineering a Better Future: Interplay between Engineering, Social Sciences, and Innovation. Springer International Publishing, Cham, pp. 111–139.

I always wondered where ideas come from; I once saw an animated short done by students In ESMA University called “La Fenetre” and loved it to the point that I started wondering why I did not come up with the idea myself. Then I found this book that covers a big range of topics and picked the one that answered my question. This chapter talks about how cognitive scientists have discovered that people inevitably build new ideas from their prior knowledge and experiences, which makes it nearly impossible for me to imagine what the creator of this movie has gone through for him to create such a story. This chapter then goes over how we can create new things from experiences each one of us has gone through. Which helps a lot with creating concepts and stories for my own work.

·      Deroy, O. (2017). Sensory blending. Oxford, University Press.

When I read the given of Optical sounds, one of the 5 projects we had to do in our practice course, I stumbled across this book that covered a phenomenon I have never heard about before which is Synesthesia, its when senses get mixed up in the brain and make a person hear colors or see sounds. And it was basically the idea of my project. This article did studies on several people to see how their brain works under various conditions. It showed me how far animation could go. It helped me create something that couldn't be heard without stimulating the visual sense. Which eased me serve the purpose of the project in an original way.

·      Winder, C., Dowlatabadi, Z. and Miller-Zarneke, T. (2011). Producing animation. Waltham, MA: Focal Press.

In this book, the author has attempted to define and clarify the process and procedures of producing animated projects using 2D or traditional animation and 3D Computer Generated Imagery (3D CGI). It explains the animation process and the implications of decisions made to the overall project. This book covers the role of every member in a group work in big production movies. Since I work alone on all the projects I would love to be able to cover all the positions at once, this book helped me organize my work without missing any detail, details I never knew existed.

·      David, I. and rea, p. (2015). Producing and Directing the Short Film and Video. 5th ed. Focal Press.

Most short works are created to give filmmakers an opportunity to express themselves, display their talent, and develop filmmaking skills; to experiment with the medium, or to provide a stepping stone to a career in film and television. This book talks about the production of a short movie whether animated or real-life footage, it covers everything from A to Z from script writing, cast choosing and post-production. It serves my practice because I always come up with ideas too complicated to fit in a short movie, and this helped me simplify my story structure in a complete and logical way.

·      Bendazzi, G. (2015). Animation: A World History. Focal Press.

In this writer’s opinion, a good historian seeks to narrate/explain the facts, not list them. It’s mandatory to identify coherent periods of mapped facts, basically through the ‘discovery’ of clear turning points. A turning point is an event that’s so important as to characterize what happened before and after it as two separate. What would have happened to the art, craft, and industry if no theatre had decided to screen Walt Disney’s Steamboat Willie in 1928? Those unbeaten tracks, based on already known (or easy to get) information, would have been exciting intellectual exercises, both for the writer and for the readers. This book not only informed me of animation milestones I previously did not know about, but it also gave me a lot of ideas for new stories and concepts based on the history and the facts that happened in where I come from.

Audio Books:

·      Audible Original (20018). Strong ending. Narrated by Mary Louise Parker, available at:https://www.audible.co.uk/search?keywords=strong+ending&ref=a_hp_t1_header_search  (Downloaded: 21 October 2018).

I listened to this book not long ago, and it got me thinking of how to turn miseries into comedy, where people who suffer can laugh and look at their miseries in a way that helps them get over these struggles. It talks about veterans who underwent traumatic experiences and got over them by becoming stand up comedians. This book led me to think of how to look at the things that annoy me the most in myself and turn them into art people can learn from in a fun matter. Which helped me create a story of my Misophonia problem in a comedic way and give people a glimpse of what it might feel like without making it boring and dramatic.

[eng200fandoms-blog]

Sijia Yu

Ms. Goode

ENG 200

8. Feb. 2018

                                    Fandom of Miyazaki Hayao

           I am a super fan of Miyazaki Hayao, who is one of the best and most famous film directors, animators, producers, authors, manga artists and screenwriters in Japan, even all over the world. Each of his films is well-known among various age levels and inspired a great number of people as well. I admire Miyazaki Hayao for three reasons, his films, his attitude to life and his politics. I believe if you learn enough about him, you will be one of the fans of his.

           Miyazaki Hayao was born in Tokyo, Japan. He loves reading and has been very talented in drawing since he was really young. He found himself interested in comics deeply, so he committed himself to drawing what he liked and he has maintained this passion his whole life. He started to learn how to draw professionally when he was in high school. Interestingly, even though drawing was an irreplaceable part of his life, which he knew clearly, he did not study in a relative major in college. Surprisingly, he chose to learn about politics. Most people indicate that Miyazaki Hayao’s political life was affected by his mother and the whole environment when he was living then. He did not quit drawing, it just was not a major focus at that time. He joined a club which had the closest relationship with animation and created several works in his spare time. He has changed his work location several times since he graduated, and during this period, he met one of the most significant figures in his life, both in his personal life and career, whose name is Takahata Isao.In the middle of 1985, Miyazaki Hayao and Takahata Isao established their own studio, Ghibli, in order to cooperate more conveniently and perfectly. Under the run of this studio, they produced Castle In the Sky, Princess Mononke, Totoro, Spirited Away, Howl’s Moving Castle, Ponyo On the Cliff, The Wind Rises and so on. Each product has its own story and plots, with different kind of attractive roles. Among these, The Wind Rises, Spirited Away and Howl’s Moving Castle won the Oscar Awards respectively. In my perspective, Totoro, Spirited Away and Howl’s Moving Castle are my favorites, and I have watched Spirited Away four times. Every time I can obtain some new thoughts from the movie, which is one of the most amazing and inspiriting parts I learn from Miyazaki Hayao.

           First of all, I found that his films are able to satisfy all age levels of audience. A lot of people state that animations are only for the children however, Miyazaki Hayao takes advantage in his own way telling the world that the animations are not limited to children only, it is facing all the crowd no matter which age you are. If you are a child, you can enjoy the beautiful scenes and cute roles in the film. If you are the young, you will acquire enlightenment from the films. If you are kind of experienced about life, you will find some common ground in the films. So different generation can watch the same film but feel differently meanwhile. Another astonishing aspect of Miyazaki Hayao’s films is that he and his group insist upon drawing by hand over the years, and a lot of scenes in the films are exactly existing in the reality, which is totally the same with the real life. In other words, you can track back the scene from the screen right to the real occasions. There are a lot of people starting games about finding the real buildings and streets in Japan or Taiwan based on the scenes in the films. It is like remote connections of his fans all over the world, gathering fans to do the same interesting things in the different time period or same time in various plots. Under the situation of high-tech movies separation, their insistence looks pure and valuable.

           Secondly, Miyazaki Mayao has a very positive attitude toward his life, reflecting by his products partly as well.  He is good at observing the details of life and characters, showing his found to the audience, and letting them know what they have missed in their lives. Every time when there are some disasters, or something happened in Japan, he will donate his fortune to help the people who are in need at the first time. He and his co-workers attend to the damaged site or shelters themselves to comfort the victims.

           Last but not least, as a Japanese, Miyazaki Mayao stands as absolutely objective politic opinion publicly, compared to the leaders of Japan. Miyazaki Mayao is unique, as a Japanese citizen, because unlike many high-profile Japanese people he takes a clear stance arguing that Japan needs to apologize for some of its crimes during the past, which most Japanese leaders choose to deny or are silent about. It seems that Japan is always under some controversial arguments due to their political standing, such as they deny their cruel and inhuman actions to the comfort women or they try to hide and cover the history what they have done to Chinese, especially in Nan Jing to their new generations. As a public figure with high reputation, he pointed that the leaders of Japan ought to apologize and be shamed for what they did to the women in the past wars, which truth are admitted by Chinese, Korean, American and part of Japanese but the leaders of Japan, for now, deny facing it and are trying to erase the history. Miyazaki Mayao did not avoid the sensitive topic when he was interviewed by the press, on the contrary, he indicated his standpoint clearly form the truth and justice. His actions earned him more respect than before. He taught us that no matter who you are, where you are from, what other people say, there are some principles and baselines which are unbridgeable. He is going further than an artist.

           Every fan of Miyazaki Hayao is long for visiting his Ghibli studio, which is located in a comfortable and peaceful community in Tokyo. These fans love not only Miyazaki’s writing and artwork in his movies, they also love the music in the films created by his co-worker Joe Hisaishi. For many of his movies, they are not as powerful without the music that accompanies them. So when fans visit the studio, they are not only looking at Miyazaki’s work but also that of Joe Hisaishi. It is like the temple of God in fans’ mind because we will have the opportunity to visit his workroom and appreciating his manuscripts by ourselves. There are also some exhibitions in the studio showing the audience the process of making an animation. It is like a grand party for all the Miyazaki Mayao’s fans. Miyazaki Mayao has a very helpful and famous partner during his film life, Joe Hisaishi, Japanese composer and musician as the national treasure. He wrote plenty of beautiful songs for the films, and his songs are popular among the fans as well. Every once in a while, Joe Hisaishi holds a concert about playing the songs which are made for the movies all over the world. At that time, it is another way that the fans gathered together and pilgrimage their adoring person together.

           Even though Miyazaki Mayao said he wanted to retire for too many times to convince people, his creation and passion are staying the same as the past. He is fortunate as he is capable to combine his hobby and his work together, making a living for them and inspiriting his audience all over the world. Apparently, his fortunate cannot exist alone without his effort. He said he retired again recently. Then the people who love him started to ask when he would come back with his new work. Several decades past, and no matter when, he, his work, his co-workers, as well the lesson we learned from him, will last for good. The classic will not be shaded by the time, it will shine more brightly.