The number of posts don’t seem to be letting up any time soon. Ditto this. While I’m officially semi-tired of all the true tears discussion that’s been going on as of late, I still consider it to be awesome even if I’m kind burnt out from people talking about it — you know what they say about too much of a good thing. When was the last time something from this maligned genre provoked so much discussion and dissection, on such a rich level, too? I can understand the rationale behind Shinkai not making that leap from movies to a TV series, if only somewhat.

It happened previously to me with ef, and I don’t know why getting burnt out on discussion about a good anime happens, because it technically shouldn’t. Maybe everyone’s already repeating what I already know, and I can’t be arsed to comment, even if I’ve read their posts. Maybe I like talking about a series better when it’s indie, although that wouldn’t explain Clannad. Maybe I need to read less blogs, even if this goes against what I believe about reading more. But I digress.

This rather lengthy dialogue I had with Mike of AnimeDiet was conducted last Sunday, under the guise of dissecting what I felt was the core theme of both kimikiss and true tears, and what makes them such a powerful experience: character inconsistency, and the difference between what a character feels and what he or she subsequently demonstrates. That part’s still there, but it’s buried in a plethora of other stuff, all of which I came up on the fly. The second half of this dialogue is linked to at the end of this post.

Happy Chinese New Year to those of you descended from the motherland, and may you collect more of those delicious red packets this festive season. I spent the reunion dinner eve in bed, with a majority of the New Year’s Day going towards getting more sleep in view of my erratic nocturnal schedule. While part of me felt like Nobita in that chapter of Doraemon where he decides to spend the first day of the new year in his room with gadgets in lieu of real human company, I figured trying it just this once wouldn’t hurt.

obligatory picture since it’s the year of Yuki Sohma the Mouse

In other news, the discussion over at In Search of Number Nine and a later post by Cameron Probert reminded me that I should stick to this rule in 2008: If comments don’t achieve their required effect after the first one, taking it to a post would be more productive given the growing length.

This was inspired by the slew of StrikerS episodes (18-24) that yesy decided to release this whole month. Naturally, the idea for a dialogue came to mind due to the mind-blowing, epic quality of said episodes, so I got introspect of transientem and Roxas of a stone and a small ripple to talk about our favourite White Devil.

There should be two other dialogue threads by both Roxas and introspect after this one; part of why I wanted to do this dialogue thing was the lack of attention and/or bad publicity that StrikerS has been getting from the anime blogosphere as a whole. The only blogs talking about them are the episode summary ones, and not a lot of them at that.

I hope to get people thinking with this series of dialogues: are the reasons they’re disliking StrikerS reasonable or sound by any definition? What is the Nanoha series all about? Has the latest instalment in the series really been sucking, or is it just the obtuse English-speaking anime fanbase and their kneejerk reaction to something new? With regards to the last question, I’ve always regarded the latter as being the case, but I digress. On with the discussion.

When I went and asked if anime was deep, or was it just entertainment, dragging my fellow bloggers into the fray, I knew full what I was getting into. The statement, “Is anime deep, or is it just entertainment?” is flawed in that it makes the unstated assumption that it has to be either/or, which means that those reading the statement have to make a stand for one or another.

Of course, this isn’t exactly the case given how we’re rational, thinking human beings. Anime is the term we give to a medium, like cartoon or live-action shows, and therefore there can be no assigning of values to it in the first place. Why then did I go ahead and use such a misleading statement for a topic in the first place? It’s simple — the statement was my little exercise in social engineering and symbolic interactionism.

Blumer, in his coining of the term, basically states that our reaction to objects are based on what understanding we have of them. This understanding is in turn derived from, or comes as a result of the interaction between our fellow men. We take the understanding of an object, and then use or modify them as circumstances see fit.

The latest reply to sethjohnson is one of the longest yet.

“I musn’t run away! I musn’t run away!”

Also, if any of you are interested in more debate, expect late replies. Sorry bettynoire, I had quite a bit to say about what you did but sethjohnson’s comment piqued my interest more, and all the words have run away, and I’ve got a sore throat plus mild fever and need sleep. That is all.

and it wasn’t a comfortable thought. Let me clear possible misconceptions and state hard facts first: It wasn’t a h-doujin, just like all my Touhou doujins are. It was Reimu x Marisa, which obviously wasn’t yaoi. The author was Aki Eda — one of my favourites and a damn good artist — and it was the recently translated 5th volume, from the Pestermom archive over at TouhouWiki, called “Yellow Flower that Blooms in Chest”, which I’ll assume is a euphemism for yuri.

Ever had one of those moments hit you and you get a sense of perfect empathy? Your senses are heightened, your feelings are in sync to an extent where you’re now like the proverbial mech pilot with a harmonising rate of over 90%. You are the mech, the mech is you, there is no mech. Well, yesterday’s realization was nothing like that. I kid. But damn, was it close. Too close, in fact.