#it runs in the same magazine as vinland saga

[nezuchuuko]

i’ll polish this up in a better worded post later but lately i’ve been thinking about several things. basically i love that fujimoto made part 2’s protag asa because she is a girl. like i constantly think about the things like red hood where the author was pressured into making the protag the young boy character and not grimm like he had wanted. then the series eventually got cancelled. even araki got questioned about why he made joylene the protag of her own part iirc. fujimoto’s editor seems chill and lets him do want he wants which is nice.

it makes me happy cause i’m so tired of the mentality that boys won’t read girls stories or stories where the main character is a girl. and fujimoto is forcing dudebros to read a story with a female protag. and hell even when they are forced not everyone is happy about and u see that with how ppl who shut up about denji returning as the mc (copium) or why they dislike asa. the cherry on the top is that asa isn’t even meant to be a likable character either.

and this is not to imply that fujimoto is some feminist icon cause that’s another thing. i find it very odd when people dispute whether or not chainsaw man is feminist or not. fujimoto loved to include female characters and write them a certain way which tends to skew towards unpleasant with traits that women will be judged or put on the stake for. he writes female characters that feel humanizing but like even fujimoto’s female characters aren’t the best written female characters.

it makes me uncomfortable when people praise him for having the best female characters in all of manga or in all of anime. and it also makes me remember how for a lot of people shounen is all of anime. they overgeneralize animemanga as being like a shounen so a lot of the complaints ppl have against anime are things that shounen suffers from that are almost non existent in other manga demographics. really goes to show the dire state of shounen when a guy does the a little above the bare minimum and ppl think it’s something tremendously special.

[poebradleyknox]

One Piece is without a doubt one of the most influential manga series and anime ever that takes place in a well-established and ever growing world of pirates and their conflicts with the World Government as they sail the seas to find the legendary treasure of the King of Pirates Gol D. Roger, The One Piece. Monkey D. Luffy is the protagonist and along with his crew: Zoro, Nami, Usopp, Sanji, Chopper, Robin, Franky, Brook and Jimbei they set sail to find the One Piece and stop anyone that gets in their way so Luffy can become King of the Pirates.

The manga series started in July of 1997, written and illustrated by Eiichiro Oda and was published weekly in the Shonen Jump magazine like a lot of other popular manga series like Naruto. In the early 00’s One Piece, along with Naruto and Bleach were deemed the most popular manga series and fans across the world called them ‘The Big Three’. And as of now 516 million copies of the manga have been sold.

Almost 30 years later One Piece has still yet to come to its conclusion and still holds a massive fan base. The series spans over 1,100 chapters and 109 volumes.

In 1999 the manga was adapted into an anime series which is also still airing. Though the anime series has fans debating on the quality as the pacing of the show is incredibly slow and only covers 1 or 2 chapters per episode meaning it takes a while for the plot to develop. Things like these happen when the manga and the anime run at the same time, sometimes the anime catches up to the manga so they need to let the manga get ahead so they draw out the episodes or produce ‘filler episodes’ which are original episodes separate from the real plot. The One Piece anime has 1,119 episodes and over 100 are filler meaning 10% of the show is unnecessary to the plot but a lot of other shows are lot worse, most famously Boruto a spin-off from Naruto were 206 of the 293 episodes are fillers.

In response to the slow pacing of One Piece a website was made by fans called ‘One Pace’ which cuts down on a lot of drawn out sequences and flashbacks to things that happened the episode prior.

Weirdly, an official solution is happening because a separate animation studio, Wit Studio ,who adapted seasons 1-3 of Attack on Titan and Season 1 of Vinland Saga, are animating a reboot of One Piece called ‘The One Piece’ whilst the original ,by Toei Animation responsible for Dragon Ball, is still airing. So two separate anime’s of the the same source material will be running at the same time. They claim this reboot will take only five years to get to the Egghead Island Arc ,the portion of the story that the original is on, unlike the original’s 27 years.

There is also a live action adaptation of One Piece that is produced by Netflix and currently has 1 season but the second is in production. The live action series has 8 hour long episodes that covers the first 45 episodes of the anime so it’s an easy alternative if you want to watch One Piece but not commit to 1000+ episode show.

The One Piece world is fantastical, it has sea monsters, dragons, abilities you gain from eating fruit but a lot of the characters take inspiration from real life pirates and history. Blackbeard is a common antagonist of the series and as the real Blackbeard was called Edward Teach, in One Piece he is called Marshall D. Teach. Another important character is Whitebeard or Edward Newgate, he instead has Blackbeards real last name and his surname is that of Newgate Prison which held many pirates in London.

Me myself am a fan of One Piece and started the series during the Covid-19 lockdown and though at the time it had 800 something episodes I was able to catch up and that’s when I realised the poor pacing people talked about. I was able to watch hundreds of 20 minute episodes back to back for hours but when I caught up and I had to watch one 20 minute episode once a week it was a struggle when not a lot happened and then I had to wait another week for another episode for the same thing to happen so I often stop watching for a while and just let the episodes bulk up so I can binge or watch a couple every day until I catch up again.

Overall, One Piece is a great piece of media that’s going strong even after almost 30 years, it’s fun and light hearted, the characters have goals that they all strive for, the fights are entertaining, has plenty of mystery and when it needs to delves more into mature topics like corrupt governments and gender identity.

[hermanwatts]

Sensor Sweep: Howard Days, Derleth Christmas Card, Tolkien Society Seminar

Robert E. Howard (Orthosphere): Considering that he died at thirty, Howard’s literary accomplishments can only impress.  Stylistically, he operates at a level many ranks above that of the typical pulp writer.  His vocabulary includes a rich lode of Latin and Greek derivations and likewise of English archaisms.  Brought up, from age thirteen, in the small and isolated Texas town of Cross Plains, in Callahan County, in the middle of the state, Howard almost miraculously overcame a lack of educational resources and acquired a reserve of knowledge in history, literature, myth, and folklore that would shame the modern holder of a college degree in any of those subjects.

Science Fiction (Wasteland & Sky): Ever since the Pulp Revolution started, the main kickback has always been from the older set who think it exists to erase their past when it exists for the exact opposite. The whole reason the movement sprung up was because of those who began looking into the past and were finally discovering what Fandom was actually doing was rewriting and destroying what came before. They were doing it for their own gain, chasing out anyone who wanted what they had mere years earlier.

Gaming (Monster Hunter Nation): I talked about this in the last blog post about the Yard Moose Mountain Mega Shooting Weekend, where I had shooters from all over the country coming to my place for three days of pistol training, about how one night I ran a one off RPG session for 17 of them, and by some miracle it actually turned out good. When this got posted about on Facebook right after, a whole bunch of gamers asked how the hell do you run a game that big and not have it suck, so here’s how we pulled it off.

Tolkien (Breitbart): “The Tolkien Society has announced that the theme of its 2021 Summer Seminar, held July 3 – 4, will be ‘Tolkien and Diversity,’” reports the Daily Wire. Here’s a sampling of what Woketard Tolkien Fanboys  can expect — you know, those whose lives are so empty, this is how they choose to spend a weekend: Gondor in Transition: A Brief Introduction to Transgender Realities in The Lord of the Rings. Pardoning Saruman?: The Queer in Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. The Lossoth: Indigeneity, Identity, and Antiracism.

Robert E. Howard (Adventures Fantastic): This past weekend was the 2021 Robert E. Howard Days. After last year’s cancellation, it was a much needed gathering. And while many of the regulars weren’t able to attend, the number of first time attendees made up the difference. The gift shop sold out of almost all the books they had in stock.

Awards (DMR Books): John Bullard is a good guy doing Crom’s work over at the Robert E. Howard Foundation (REHF). The other day, John sent me the list of REHF award recipients for 2020 and 2021, which were announced at Howard Days in Cross Plains a week ago. I should note that Corona-chan canceled last year’s Howard Days, so the 2020 awards were handed out this year. Check ’em out below. I’ll post my comments below that.

Fantasy (Goodman Games): Linwood Vrooman Carter was born on June 9th, 1930 in St. Petersburg, Florida. In the august company of his fellow Appendix N authors, Lin Carter is a figure both of high esteem and some controversy. As an editor and critic, he is indispensable, most notably for his role in editing the landmark Ballantine Adult Fantasy series (BAFS), which ran from 1969-1974 and re-introduced such luminaries as Lord Dunsany, William Hope Hodgson, and Clark Ashton Smith to the fantasy-reading public.

Pulp (Pulpfest): Today we celebrate the 125th birthday of TIME magazine’s “dean of science fiction writers,” William Fitzgerald Jenkins — a.k.a. Murray Leinster. An avid inventor who also happened to have a knack for writing wonderful speculative science fiction, his career spanned much of the 20th century.

Fiction (Realms of Night): In the early 1980s, Zebra Books published a four “issue” anthology series bearing the title Weird Tales and the stylized logo familiar to fans of the pulp greats who were published in The Unique Magazine. Weird Tales has been called the magazine that never dies, but most would agree it’s had a largely beleaguered existence since the late 1950s. It has appeared at various times in a newsstand digest format, a full-size traditional magazine format, and — perhaps the most successful post-Golden Era run of the magazine — a very nice perfect bound magazine during the 1980s and early 1990s.

Comic Books (National Review): How can you not know who Neal Adams is? He gave the world the modern Batman and Joker! Revived Green Arrow and the X-Men! Created the first Black superhero for DC, the John Stewart Green Lantern!

Robert E. Howard (Dark Worlds Quarterly): “The Fire of Asshurbanipal” (Weird Tales, December 1936) by Robert E. Howard is the point at which adventure fiction and horror meet. The story was found in a trunk with a note to be sent to Farnsworth Wright in case of the author’s death. This is according to Glenn Lord who published the first version of the story in The Howard Collector #16 (Spring 1972). Lord gives us a little preamble with:

RPG (Modiphius): We’re delighted to announce that Conan The Adventurer arrives in print! This latest sourcebook for the Conan Adventures in an Age Undreamed Of RPG is available now on Modiphius.net and coming soon to a retailer near you. Here are the details on this fascinating new sourcebook which is also available in PDF format on Modiphius.net and DriveThruRPG.com.

Comic Books (Arche-arc): Upon completing my viewing of the FALCON AND WINTER SOLDIER streaming series, I’m moved to comment on some of the parallels between Kevin Feige, founder of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and Stan Lee, the founder of Marvel Comics in its crucial sixties incarnation.

Comic Books (Irmonline): I have gone into the first series run of What If? by Marvel from 1977 to 1984, with 47 issues. The title series continues to find numerous use over the years with Marvel. There is a second series that starts in 1989 and ends in 1998, with 115 issues including a #0. After that, Marvel releases a few mini-series, or one-shot stories, that go under the title What If?.

Fiction (DMR Books): I like Vikings, specifically Viking fiction. I certainly have an interest in the history, and the sagas make for dense but fascinating reading, but my first love is pure, heart-pounding adventure. I remember first learning about Vikings back in grade school, when we briefly covered the Viking explorations of the New World, the discovery of Greenland, Vinland and Viking settlements on the Canadian east coast long before that Italian explorer came along and spoiled everything.

Gaming (Game Rant): Skyrim is packed full of references to the works of H.P. Lovecraft. Its last DLC, Dragonborn, saw the inhabitants of the isolated town of Raven Rock fall under a mysterious trance-like state that was leading them to build strange obelisks, with only the faintest memory of doing so. While some The Elder Scrolls quests are full of surface-level Lovecraft allusions like this, the series’ metaphysical lore makes the connection explicit. The same can be said for Obsidian’s upcoming first-person fantasy RPG, Avowed.

Cinema (Talking Pulp): Beyond the Black Rainbow. I really dug Panos Cosmatos’ Mandy, a film that sort of came out of nowhere a few years ago that in some ways, boosted and reignited Nicolas Cage’s acting career. I don’t think that it was long-lasting but his role in Mandy proved that the dude can still bring it and excel when given the right part in a movie. Cosmatos only has one other film and, at this point, it’s already over a decade old. It’s been in my queue since I saw Mandy, however, so I felt like checking it out was long overdue.

Star Wars (Tor): The Star Wars movies are notable for spinning off into a wide variety of other media and related products, including TV shows, books, comic strips, comic books, radio dramas, toys, housewares, and other products. Since the series was largely modeled on the old Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers serials, this is no surprise, as both of those properties were also adapted into a variety of formats and merchandise, something George Lucas certainly noticed and emulated. Today, I’m going to look at two of the first Star Wars tie-in books, Splinter of the Mind’s Eye and Han Solo at Stars’ End.

Pulp (Fantasy Literature): The Universe Wreckers initially appeared as a three-part serial in the May, June and July 1930 issues of Hugo Gernsback’s Amazing Stories magazine, the first publication to dedicate itself solely to science fiction. This legendary magazine started publishing in 1926, the same year that Hamilton’s very first story, “The Monster-God of Mamurth,” appeared in Weird Tales, when its author was 22. The Universe Wreckers would then, sadly, go OOPs (out of prints) for over 80 years, until Haffner Press resurrected it for inclusion in one of its mammoth Hamilton anthologies.

Gaming (Arkhaven Comics): Last month, IGN decided that the hill to die on this week was Palestine.  They printed some article on giving aid to Palestinian Children* that I didn’t care about and didn’t read because I haven’t read anything from IGN for years and I wasn’t starting now.  However, IGN Israel did read it and screamed at the corporate owners. Ziff-Davis roused itself from its dreamy lassitude and made the accurate but surprising decision that this article had nothing whatsoever to do with gaming or popculture and spiked it.

Fiction (Allied Authors): Years ago on this Allied Authors website in “A Derleth Christmas Card,” I touted an unexpected find I made in a local antique store: a series of unique Christmas cards issued by Wisconsin’s famous author — and close friend of Allied Authors — August Derleth. Unexpected, because even in his home state, Derleth’s proverbial backyard, such finds are fewer and farther between, with his fame continuing to grow.

Comic Books (AE Index): An excellent representation of EC original art in an inexpensive format. Along with full-page scans of original art, this features an introduction by Annie Gaines Ashton, exhibit introduction, and twelve short essays or personal recollections from noted EC fans. There are also four double-page enlargements of art, three successful and one blurry. The scans are mostly clear with a few soft or blurry issues.

Review (Rough Edges): There’s no sophomore jinx for the second issue of MEN’S ADVENTURE QUARTERLY. It remains one of the most impressive, beautifully designed publications available today. The theme this time around for this oversized trade paperback is Espionage. It features a lot of vividly reproduced artwork, including both covers and interior illustrations, from a variety of the Men’s Adventure Magazines published in the Fifties, Sixties, and Seventies, along with seven stories (mostly fiction, even the supposedly true ones) from those magazines.

Cinema (Neotextcorp): When Rhodesian writer Daniel Carney’s unpublished novel The Thin White Line ended up in the hands of producer Euan Lloyd, it fit perfectly with his ambitious plans to make a grand-scale star-studded war adventure film in the vein of Where Eagles Dare. The novel toyed with the rumor about a mysterious 1968 plane landing in Rhodesia allegedly carrying a mercenary force, and when screenwriter Reginald Rose adapted it for film, director Andrew V. McLaglen was hired to bring it to life based on a decisive recommendation from the great John Ford. The cast was loaded with heavy-hitting names such as Richard Burton, Roger Moore, Richard Harris, Hardy Krüger, Stewart Granger, Jack Watson, Frank Finlay and many others.

Sensor Sweep: Howard Days, Derleth Christmas Card, Tolkien Society Seminar published first on https://sixchexus.weebly.com/

[recentanimenews]

Prepare for Tower of God with a Closer Look at the Staff Behind It

  It's hard to believe, but we're officially less than a month away from the April 1 premiere of the Tower of God anime, a Crunchyroll Original that adapts the popular WEBTOON series by SIU. We previously covered some of the key players behind the production, and now that it's right around the corner, there's no better time to take a closer look at a few of the staff members who are working hard to bring it all to life. 

    Director - Takashi Sano

  Takashi Sano may just have a few full-on director credits—including Sengoku Basara: End of Judgment and a bunch of episodes of Transformers: Energon—but this is a career that spans decades. In addition to working on a lot of Lupin, from key animation on special episodes to working as animation director on The Woman Called Fujiko Mine and storyboards for Part 4 and Part 5, Sano has had a hand in some of the biggest anime series of all time.

  Chief among them is a little series called Neon Genesis Evangelion, on which Sano is credited as a key animator. Sano also directed episodes of Gantz and Gad Guard, and recently storyboarded on MEGALOBOX, Princess Principal, and Vinland Saga, which took home Best Drama at this year's Anime Awards. 

  When quality storyboards make an award-worthy show! 

  Assistant Director - Hirokazu Hanai 

  Assisting Takashi Sano is another long-time industry animator, with key animation credits ranging from InuYasha to Fullmetal Alchemist, a couple episodes of Naruto, an episode of the 2011 Hunter x Hunter anime, and many more. This is far from a first-time directing gig, though; Hanai previously helmed Dances with the Dragons at anime production house Seven Arcs Pictures. As far as assistant director credits are concerned, you can catch Hanai's stamp on Chain Chronicle: The Light of Haecceitas and Tantei Kageki Milky Holmes TD. 

  One of Hanai's credits is director of Dances with the Dragons.

  Series Composition - Erika Yoshida

  When it comes to taking SUI's WEBTOON series from strip to script, Erika Yoshida is in charge of Tower of God's series composition. Yoshida's résumé is a little more compact than some of the other staff members, but there's impressive range on display already. It all begins with scripts for Sunrise's 2011 superhero outing, Tiger & Bunny, which led to the same line of work for spinoff DOUBLE DECKER! DOUG & KIRILL, as well as LUPIN THE 3rd PART4, and Touken Ranbu - Hanamaru. 

  Yoshida flexed these skills even further as series composition writer for Trickster in 2016, followed by NAMUAMIDABUTSU! -UTENA- in 2019, and now… Tower of God! 

  Capturing the spirit of Lupin takes a special type of writer.

  Character Design - Masashi Kudo & Miho Tanino

  Character designer Miho Tanino may not have a lengthy list of credits, but Tower of God pairs this relatively fresh talent with a major veteran of the anime industry. Masashi Kudo has an absolutely stacked lineup to his name, and in the character design department you're likely most familiar with his take on Tite Kubo's creations for Pierrot's Bleach anime. 

  Going beyond an extensive list of character design, key animation, and animation direction credits, Kudo actually has a few director credits to add to the pile. If you want to see what the Tower of God character designer has to work with in that capacity, you can pop on anime like Kyō no Asuka Show, Re-Kan!, SANRIO BOYS, the Ikki Tousen: Extravaganza Epoch OVA, Hayate the Combat Butler! Can't Take My Eyes Off You, and the aforementioned Chain Chronicle. 

  Character designs are one of Bleach's long-running strong suits.

  Music - Kevin Penkin

  If Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken! has taught us anything, even the most electrifying animation doesn't quite pack the same punch without sound and, of course, music. For Tower of God, the soundtrack is in the hands of one of the most prolific composers of late: Kevin Penkin. In just the last couple years alone you've heard his work in hit series like Made in Abyss and The Rising of the Shield Hero, and we're definitely looking forward to all the ways his soundtrack will enhance the dynamic action and drama of Tower of God.

  Strong compositions make shows like Shield Hero even more memorable.

  What about you? What aspects of the Tower of God staff have you looking forward to the adaptation? Hopefully we'll learn more about the other folks behind the series soon, and stay tuned for a closer dive into the cast announced thus far! 

    Additional credits sourced via Anime News Network's encyclopedia. 

  -------

Joseph Luster is the Games and Web editor at Otaku USA Magazine. You can read his webcomic, BIG DUMB FIGHTING IDIOTS at subhumanzoids. Follow him on Twitter @Moldilox. 

By: news+feed@crunchyroll.com