Pop Culture’s Relentless March Continues

February 4th, 2008 by Brack

MONK - MR MONK PAINTS HIS MASTERPIECE


This episode was noteworthy as being Jon Wurster’s debut script for Monk. Wurster, as well as being Superchunk’s drummer, is the character playing half of Scharpling & Wurster, alongside Monk writer/producer Tom Scharpling. You can catch them weekly on the Best Show on WFMU, or on their compilations through their Stereolaffs labels. Their material started as a sort of Phil Hendrie-esque prank on the audience, before turning into something more. Over the years they’ve woven an comedy world centred on New Bridge, NJ. It’s a world populated by a range of malicious idiots, all played by Wurster, who ring into (or are rung by) Tom Scharpling’s radio show, and invariably end up threatening to kill Scharpling by the end of their phone call. It’s a wonderful thing, and I highly recommend checking out the Best Show podcast.

So how does Wurster shape up as a Monk writer? If you like the episodes that focus on comedy then this should work wonders. There is an element of mystery, but it’s fairly obvious, and there’s never really a question of whodunnit. It’s more an opportunity of Shalhoub and guest star Peter Stormare to indulge in some great comic acting. Not my favourite episode of the season so far, but still full of good fun.

HAKABA KITARO - EPISODE 1


Apart from Yatterman, this adaptation of Shigeru Mizuki’s original Kitaro manga was the only winter anime that caught my eye. This time in the popular noitaminA slot, rather than more family friendly slots that the GeGeGe no Kitaro anime have occupied, it’s a lot more macabre that the previous shows. As AniPages Daily has mentioned, the OP is probably more impressive than the show itself. Unfortunately, set against last years Mononoke, the show fails to really inspire the right sort of mood. It’s close, but the bar has been raised. That being said, it’s still better than most shows, and I may come back to it later, if the word is good about future episodes.

MOBILE SUIT GUNDAM 00 - EPISODE 1

Not exactly got my finger on the pulse for this one.

This was, well OK. I wasn’t angry at it in the way I was after I watched the first episode of Gundam SEED. It didn’t feel like they were trying to remake a previous Gundam series. Instead it unfortunately reminded me of the dreadful Dancougar series from last year. Both felt like hamfisted attempts to say something important about the world today, but with giant robots. As it turned out this first episode of Gundam 00 wasn’t anywhere near as clumsy as Dancougar, but it was a bad first impression. The main problem was that a lot of the characters seemed very faceless in this first episode, only the strategist and the sniper seemed to get personalities, and they were both fairly one note. I’m not sure there’s enough to entice me to keep watching.

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GeGeGe no Kitaro (2007) Episode 1

June 29th, 2007 by Brack

As mentioned when I did a knee jerk look at spring anime a few months back, there was yet another adaptation of Shigeru Mizuki’s kid’s horror comic this year. Of course it being a show based on one of the most important and influential manga, and aimed at a mainstream audience, it was ignored by fansub groups until recently.

Quick recap of the concept of the show, good yokai (a spirit-monster of Japanese Folk Lore) fight bad yokai to protect humankind. Though often the reason the bad yokai pursue humans is human ignorance of the spirit world.

Isamu Tanonaka returns as Kitaro’s eye-ball father, Medama Oyaji. Tanonaka has portrayed him in every incarnation of Kitaro in film, including the recent live action film. Minami Takayama, the voice of Detective Conan, takes the lead role of Kitaro.

Which is probably why when I watched it Detective Conan sprang to mind, not just because of Takayama’s voice, the clean look of the show and pacing felt very Conan-like too. And there’s an element to the next episode previews that has echoes of early Conan episodes.

However it does feel a little too clean and modern. I think I preferred the first black and white episode of the 60s series that was fansubbed a year or so back. It’s an unfortunate truth that Toei’s animation quality has in general fallen from the great heights it had in that decade. Which is not to say this was terribly animated, it just felt it had more visual cues that came from the typical Toei look in 2007 than from Mizuki. But that probably doesn’t matter to it’s target audience of kids new to the series. The first episode felt like a good, fun horror show for kids that draws on folklore and complete with a moral to respect for cultural history. I’m not sure I’ll make a point of watching it regularly, I’d prefer to see more of the original series, but it’s good that English language anime fandom has paid attention to this character once again.

GeGeGe no Kitaro @ Animesuki

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#32. Gegege no Kitaro

December 31st, 2006 by Brack

I thought I'd written about this already when the fansub of episode 1 surfaced in October this year, but apparantly I didn't.

Another landmark series, GeGeGe no Kitaro is based on the manga of the same name by Shigeru Mizuki. There have been 4 anime series in 1968, 1971, 1985, & 1996.

The 1968 series has some early Isao Takahata work, the 1971 has more Takahata work with him contributing the OP and ED. Interestingly, for me, is that the 1996 contained early work from Mamoru Hosoda (Digimon Movies 1 & 2, One Piece Movie 6, The Girl Who Leap Through Time).

GeGeGe no Kitaro concerns the relationships between Yokai and humans. Yokai is a fairly broad Japanese folklore term to describe a number of supernatural creatures, which is reflected by the wide range of creatures depicted in the series. Kitaro is one such of Yokai, but unlike many of creatures appearing in the series, protects humans from the more malicious Yokai. He is a one eyed child, with hair covering his left eyesocket, and possesses a range of supernatural powers. He is invariably accompanied by his father, who following a bout of body eating disease is simply an eye (with tiny arms and legs).

The design of the central character, Kitaro, echoes through manga and anime following GeGeGe no Kitaro, for example, Sanji from One Piece, and more pertinently, Ginko from Mushishi. In many ways Mushishi uses the same raw material as GeGeGe no Kitaro to different ends.

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