Yet another year of Ad Astra is in the books! This was my 3rd year in attendance, and once again I was invited to participate as a stage ninja. The convention took place a bit earlier this year than it usually does, and the burst of snowy weather from earlier in the week took a big dent out of the attendance, but it was still a very enjoyable experience.

I went to a few panels about things like comics, web comics, and Japanese clothing, all of which were pretty informative. At the dealers’ room I bought the Batman manga by Kia Asamiya and 2 amazingly beautiful artbooks from Dark Horse, one about Star Wars and the other about Alien and Predator. All worthy additions to the library, and all had for a decent price.

During the masquerade I was again in the role of a catcher, meaning I was to be a person who sacrifices one’s body to protect a performer should someone accidently fall off the stage. Luckily, there were no accidents. However, I didn’t get a free pass for the night. For one particular skit, all the stage ninjas had to go up on stage and, well, get killed. So I took a dive for a certain fictional character that, due to certain values and viewpoints I have, I would rather not disclose. The audience seemed to enjoy it though, and it all worked out in the end because he gave me a ride in his car to the subway later on.

I usually only go to this show for one day, and I figured that would be the case again this time, but I smartened up and figured that staying at home and doing nothing was boring and that didn’t make any sense when there was fun to be had elsewhere. So I went on both Saturday and Sunday, and I’m really glad I did. When I showed up on Sunday, I met up with the head ninja and went up to the head ninja hotel room accompanied by a luggage cart. When it was announced that both the luggage cart and I had been found, I was told that I am better than a luggage cart. That was a very nice thing to hear. However, the cart was better at doing what it was meant to do than I would have been.

Most of the time was spent hanging around and just shooting the breeze, and quite frankly I wouldn’t have wanted anything else. It’s been far too long since I’ve really been able to do that. After the show ended on Sunday, a big group of us convention people went to a resturant called “Memories of Japan” for some teppanyaki, which is when the chef cooks your food right in front of you on these large grilling surfaces connected to your table. It was totally awesome. The chef was really intense, looked very busy, and did an incredible job. It was the best food I have had in a long time. I could go for some more right now.

All in all, this weekend was the most fun I’ve had in several months. As usual though, that had more to do with the people there than the actual convention itself. And I am really thankful to those people because I sure as hell needed to go and have a good time for a change, since things have still kinda been in that “not so good” sort of mode for a long time now. Towards the end of the show a lot of people were feeling really tired and run down from all the fun they were having, but I felt surprisingly healthy and charged up! I’m hoping that feeling lasts. I could really use it!

Sayonara.

February is over. Good riddance.

However, February did bring at least one good thing. And that is the long awaited DVD release of the classic anime series, Gunbuster!

Gunbuster is a totally cool 6-episode show from the 80’s about girls and giant robots. What’s not to like about that? I had never seen it, but knew it from reputation, so I felt comfortable buying it right away. It was the directorial debut of Hideaki Anno, who of course would later go on to great fame as the creator of Neon Genesis Evangelion. As he and the rest of the Gainax studio were formed as a bunch of hardcore anime fans, it has a lot of parody and homage to many classic shows. It’s a very pure series, created not to sell toys or adapt comics. It’s anime for the sake of the art form. So from a historical perspective, it’s very important and a total must see for anyone that considers themselves a serious anime fan. It’s also the first anime that contains, well, “bounce“, if you catch my drift… so take that for what you will.

The DVD set is released by Bandai Visual’s Honneamise label. The 6 episodes are on 3 disks, and the visual quality is superb considering that the first episode is almost 20 years old. There is no English dub. In fact, as far as I can tell, there has never been an English dub, even when it released on VHS back in the day. I don’t miss it because I’m perfectly comfortable reading subtitles, but I suppose it’d have been nice to have. The major negative side, however, is the price. At about $60 for the set, it’s pretty expensive. That comes to around $10 per episode. With anything else, I’d say that’s just too much. But this is Gunbuster, so it’s worth it.

The show itself is really enjoyable, and spans many years despite only being 6 episodes long. The message of the show, that hard work and guts will bear fruit, is very simple and universal. One can imagine that was the motto of the artists working on it while in production, since they were really just a bunch of fanboys. It uses a lot of hard science that probably make sense if you care to figure it all out. It doesn’t really take itself all that seriously at times, but it can often be very deep. One of the most interesting topics that the show covers is time dilation, how characters in outer space age differently than characters on Earth. The final episode looks completely different than the rest of the series, and is a very satisfying and beautiful conclusion.

It’s not ending there, though. Just a few years ago, Gainax went back to the old well and pulled out Diebuster, the sequel to GunBuster. That’ll be getting a licensed DVD release here in North America at some point this spring, and I’ll definitely be picking that up too.

So go watch Gunbuster, and aim for the top!

Sayonara.

And I’m sick today too, so it’s just as well.

Sayonara.

They say that you learn something new everyday. Not only have I just learned something new, but this new thing that I have learned is so unbearably awesome that I had to share it.

You see, there is a town in Colorado, USA, that has the most amazing name ever. It is a name I would never in a million years expect a town to be called, and yet all other towns wish they had names this cool.

The name of this town is DINOSAUR! That’s right, Dinosaur, Colorado. Just wrap you head around how amazing that is. It’s a real town. A real town called Dinosaur! The people who live there get the privilege of writing DINOSAUR on the return address of their outgoing mail. That’s just mind blowing! Why am I just learning about it now? Had I known much earlier, I would have made it my life’s mission to see that I relocate to this incredible land of Dinosaur.

I wish I lived there! Someone from Dinosaur, please invite me to your town and I will bring my Jurassic Park DVDs.

Sayonara.

In my last post I talked about how the CBC is totally cool. Well, this past week they aired a pair of shows that officially cemented that reputation. It’s pretty rare for me to talk about TV shows in this way, because I really don’t go out of my way to watch very many television programs. But these two shows are really great, and are definitely worth watching no matter where you’re living.

The first show is called Dragon Boys, a 2-part miniseries that aired this past Sunday and Monday. It’s all about Asian gangs in western Canada and the people who’s lives are effected by them. It was a very well done series with lots of twists and turns. While watching I could swear that I had seen the actor who played the lead detective character in something else that I had seen. In fact, I was sure that he was in my DVD collection somewhere. So I looked it up and I was quite embarrassed to say that I was right, because he played Ryu in the live action Street Fighter movie, and I do happen to own a copy of that film on DVD for some reason. But anyway, I won’t hold that against anyone, because Dragon Boys was excellent, and I hope they do a sequel. A DVD release is forthcoming, so hopefully a wider audience will get to check it out then.

The other show I want to talk about is getting a lot of buzz. It’s called Little Mosque on the Prairie and it’s about a community of Muslims living in small town Saskatchewan. It’s also a comedy. Obviously this show is dealing with some sensitive issues, but it is very funny. I think I’ll be making an effort to catch this show whenever I can.

What’s really great about both of these shows is that there is no way that anything like these could ever be a Hollywood product. It that were the case, the people in charge would go out of their way to make these shows as bland and generic as possible by casting few minorities and taking away pretty much anything that could be considered ethnic, thus ripping the heart and soul out of the entire project. Only Canada could be the birthplace of shows like this, and that’s yet another reason why I’m proud to live in this country right now.

Sayonara.