The Land of Obscusion's Twelve Favorite Posts of 2018!! Part 1

After an entire year of looking back at what I had done in the past & putting a close to as many loose ends as I could over the course of the past (nearly) 365 days, I close out 2018 by looking back at what I had done over the course of the entire year. Because, yo dawg, we heard you like reminiscing so we put a reminiscence in yo reminiscence so yo can look back while you look back.

In other words, reminisception... Yeah, I went to those old memes.

Anyway, I already mentioned in the 8th Anniversary post about how well I feel the "Year of Unfinished Business" worked out, and that's no lie. If anything, this has been one of the most difficult years for me to properly whittle down to the usual favorites list, and that's because it's like having to pick & choose from some of my all-time most enjoyable pieces of writing. You know when you ask an actor who their favorite character to play is, or a creator what they're favorite work is, & they respond with, "That's hard to answer, because it's like having to pick which of my children is my favorite"? That's kind of how this year feels in regards to having to make choices. Sure, there are always some that were fun to write but otherwise are obviously not going to be worthy of being my favorites, but in this year's case there really aren't too many of those. But, after deliberating & procrastinating throughout this entire month, here are what I feel are my favorite posts of "Unfinished Business".

The Truth Behind "The Disaster Anime": Game Lab's Musashi Gundoh Interview Translated! (April 1)
Being the shy & (much too) humble guy that I am, it is honestly rare for me to be the one to initiate contact with another if I feel that I am incapable of doing something, especially if it's one-on-one; contacting a company feels much more anonymous. But when I found an opportunity to get a hold of Volume 140 of Sansai Books' Game Labo Tokubestsu Henshu Gendai Shikaku Bunka Kenkyu, which held within it an infamous interview with two of the people behind the equally infamous kuso anime Gundoh Musashi, producer Nobuyuki Sugaya & director Yuki Kinoshita, just days after the show finished airing, I knew that I had to get some help to translate the two interviews. While I do know some people who know people who translate, I don't really know any personally, which is where my natural inclination to hesitate came in. After some searching, I remembered that I had previously heard of the site Chic Pixel, run by professional writer & translator Anne Lee, and I saw that she was open to offers, so I decided to see what she'd say. Anne not only was interested in the project, but her price seemed more than fair (of course, I had no prior concept of translation costs), so I scanned the pages with the interview & we were off! For the first time ever, I actually had to be the equivalent to a producer or editor, which was definitely interesting.

When Anne got back to me with the completed translation, we were both pretty shocked at what exactly was being said in the interview. Sugaya seemingly put the blame on everything, from the Chinese & Korean animation studios being used to the satellite network & streaming service nearly getting the show canceled before it even began, and then gleefully admitted some pride in taking advantage of the end product's terribleness as a way to market & promote it, regardless of what his fellow industry colleagues thought of him. Kinoshita, in comparison, was both ashamed at his seeming inability to turn things around & make the show better, no matter what they did, & pleased that people deemed Gundoh Musashi worthy of parody & ridicule, which at least showed that what he directed was worth some sort of attention. Still, he wanted to fix whatever he could, either during the original airing or for the DVD boxset, but neither opportunity came about, so I do feel for him. It's also interesting that Kinoshita stated that, "There are too many shows in the anime industry right now," and this was back at the end of 2006; twelve years later, and things have seemingly only gotten worse. He also went as far as to say that, "It wouldn’t be strange to see another show end up like Musashi," and just this past season there was the anime My Sister, My Writer, which had such poor animation in it on a consistent basis that the staff snuck a animation credit into Episode 6 that could be translated as, "Honestly, I'm Screwed." Look, all I'm saying is that Yuki Kinoshita is a smart man & saw this kind of trouble over a decade ago.

So, for one last time this year, I want to give Anne a gigantic "THANK YOU!" for helping me out with this, because I think she did an outstanding job. Again, if you like what saw with this interview, then by all means check out her site, especially if you're a fan of visual novels & otome games, and you can also support her over at Patreon.

Otoko Zaka (The Weekly PlayNews Run) (February 16)
In 2015, I reviewed the first three volumes of Masami Kurumada's 1984 manga Otoko Zaka, which was meant to be his magnum opus but got quickly canceled due to how much had changed in terms of what readers wanted to see in their shonen action manga compared to just a decade prior; some of this was even due to Kurumada's own contributions beforehand. Up until 2014, those three volumes were all there was to this manga, but to celebrate his 40th Anniversary in the industry, Kurumada brought the series back, and has put out a new volume-worth of content pretty much once a year; Volume 8 just came out last month in Japan. In 2017, the manga moved from Weekly PlayNews, the digital manga-front for Weekly Playboy magazine, to Shonen Jump+, so this year I decided to review the next three volumes, 4 through 6, which were what got serialized via Weekly PlayNews. I saw the potential in the first three volumes, and was curious about what Kurumada had planned for the continuation, over 30 years later. What I wound up reading what something that felt familiar to the original '84-'85 run, but also had with it a feeling of maturity that I think could only have come about with a multi-decade gap.

The original Jump run of Otoko Zaka was "oldest-school" manliness at some of its most extreme & romanticized; hell, Jingi literally jumped off of a cliff to prove his seriousness in being trained by Kenka Oni! In comparison, when Jingi winds up facing off with Julie of Hama, we see the absolute opposite from our lead, taking the pacifist route in order to appeal to the last remaining scraps of care for decent humanity left deep inside him, instead of simply fighting him to prove how wrong Julie's way of thinking is. Now, sure, we still see some good-ol'-fashioned fighting with Ken Kamui & (especially) Kyosuke Takasugi, but even here they don't quite go to the lengths that Jingi went to in the original Jump run, like stopping a sword with his bare palm. I fully believe that, though the characters & basic outline of the plot are likely unchanged from his original plans, Kurumada would not have written these events in this fashion had he been able to continue making Otoko Zaka back in the 80s. Combined with good showings from the rest of the supporting cast, some great Kurumada artwork, & simply a more mature execution of this "oldest-school" mentality, the Weekly PlayNews run of Otoko Zaka is honestly one of the best bits of manga I've read this year, and I am just all the more curious where the story winds up going next. If anything, I'll return to reviewing Otoko Zaka once again whenever Volume 9 comes out (which I guess would be "The Jump+ Run, Part 1"?), I promise that.

Yes, it's not a "real" pinball table, but it just looks cool.

Akira Psycho Ball (July 16)
2018 marked the 30th Anniversary of Akira, the iconic anime movie based on Katsuhiro Otomo's manga of the same name. Even though this is a place that looks at the obscure & forgotten, I'm always up for trying to celebrate an anniversary for something that is celebrated, and if I can do so by covering a lesser known aspect of it, then at least I keep it relevant to my focus here. Therefore, when it comes to Akira, I just knew that it had to be the video game that some just can't accept is the best video game adaptation of the movie out there. The history of games based on this Otomo series isn't a celebrated one, with a Famicom adventure game that relishes in impossible choices, a Europe-exclusive Amiga action game that does nothing well, a bunch of canceled games by THQ in the 90s that didn't look all that great in the first place, & then a video pinball game for the PlayStation 2 in 2002... That's actually really good, but apparently the fact that the best Akira video game is a pinball game actually annoys people so much that they wind up hating its existence anyway.

Yeah, sometimes people just want to be negative, I guess.

Anyway, Akira Psycho Ball was technically the final entry in Japanese game developer KAZe's Digital Pinball series, which was home to two of the best video pinball games of the 90s, due to their dedication to recreating the feel of a real pinball table. Compared to Last Gladiators & Necronomicon, Psycho Ball is definitely much more of a fantastical take on the game, but at the same time it's superb ball physics, excellent game flow, & well done visuals combine together to create possibly the best entry in the DP series, though it really comes down to what you're looking for in a game of video pinball: Realism vs. Fantasy. Even to this day, people are still reviewing Akira Psycho Ball & putting it down, simply because the best Akira video game is a freaking pinball game, even though said reviews still admit that, as a pinball game, it's really good. Personally, I find that to be a ridiculous thing to say, because a good game is a good game, and just because a beloved movie's best video game adaptation isn't something like a more "traditional" title it shouldn't mean that Psycho Ball isn't worth checking out, regardless of the actual quality of the game itself.

Again, sometimes people just want to be negative, I guess.

Retrospect in Retrograde: Monkey Turn & Monkey Turn V (April 17 & May 3)
As the name indicates, the "Year of Unfinished Business" was conceived of so as to make sure I finally go back & get to stuff that ties into other articles I had done, and one of those concepts was to cover things like sequels or second seasons of shows. One in particular was Monkey Turn V, the continuation of the 2004 TV series I reviewed way back in 2011. Back then, I was unable to actually watch V, but now I had to ability to do so, but I didn't simply want to jump right in to this second season, especially since it had been over a decade since I saw the first season. So, before I jumped into the "new" content, I really wanted to revisit the original Monkey Turn TV series, and since the original review from 2011 was rather barren, I wanted to think of a way to write about it again. This is what lead to me creating a new "segment" for the blog which was all about revisiting the subjects of old reviews & giving them a fresh retake. This wound up being Retrospect in Retrograde, a rather silly title, but I'm fond of it.

So how did I feel about Monkey Turn after watching it for the first time in over a decade-ish, and was the wait for finally watching Monkey Turn V worth it? Absofreakinggoddamnlutely! When I first saw the original season, I instantly felt that it was one of the best sports anime I had ever seen, and I think that feeling still holds up today. The characters are relatable & fun to watch, the storytelling is tight & never dragging its feet, that theme song is utterly brilliant, & the way it portrays kyotei racing is still just as exhilarating as I remember it being; also, "bootleg Black Eyed Peas" in the soundtrack never gets old. As for the second season, it was certainly not quite what I had expected, though I wasn't fully sure what to expect in the first place. The initial injury story arc was just amazingly well done, but after that was simply a look at the careers of not just lead character Kenji Hatano, but also his fellow friends & rivals, which was just great. We saw Doguchi's dedication to being the best screwing over his budding relationship with Aoshima, who in turn wanted to push herself farther as a racer, new character Hidetaka Gamou was introduced & had his occasional focus put towards, and Kenji's story about proving that his initial championship victory wasn't just a one-time-only moment was consistently interesting.

It's such a saddening thought that Monkey Turn will remain unknown & ignored by anime fandom, even though Viz Media still apparently has the master rights to it, because if this was actually given an opportunity to shine, I'm sure that it could certainly find itself a cult fanbase. This is just such an outstanding anime.

Waffenhund Panzer: A Metal Max Retrospective (September 25)
Open-world video games are such a popular idea right now, with pretty much every single AAA game franchise utilizing the idea to some extent, even if they originally weren't made to work with it. This also applies to Japanese developers, who have only more recently started to focus more on the idea of letting the player explore a giant environment & do things at their own pace, but open-world isn't a new concept to that country by any means, and like many JRPGs it all started with inspiration from Dragon Quest. Specifically, Hiroshi Miyaoka first made his name in the industry working on the first three entries of the iconic RPG franchise, as he was a friend of Yuji Horii, but afterwards opened his own studio, Crea-Tech, and wanted to make as open-world of an RPG as the Famicom could allow, with the end result being 1991's Metal Max, which would only be the start of one of the most understated & unique RPG series out there.

With newest entry Metal Max Xeno seeing an English release this year, I figured now would be the perfect time to finally write this retrospective on the entire franchise. In the end, I did cover every single game released, though focus was given primarily to the "regular" entries on consoles & handheld platforms; cell phone & mobile games were only given basic acknowledgements. I also made sure to cover the unfinished games that were in the works, like Metal Max: Wild Eyes, which Xeno really does seem to take a lot after. Naturally, I also covered the Metal Saga spin-off franchise that Success started up after the Metal Max copyright got stuck in licensing limbo for a few years, and it is interesting to see that both now coexist. Really, the main thing to take from this retrospective is that Miyaoka really did deliver on giving Japanese gamers something innately different from the norm, whether it was the open-world concept (though Xeno is lighter on that than usual), the post-apocalyptic setting, or the downright bizarre enemies, creatures, & robots that you can come across in any of the games. In fact, this retrospective even managed to see inclusion over at Gamasutra via Simon Carless' Video Game Deep Cuts segment, which I seriously didn't think would be possible. I have a lot of love & respect for Metal Max, & it was a ton of fun researching into this franchise & seeing what each game brought to the table.

Again, this is "Peak Knights of the Zodiac".

DiC's Knights of the Zodiac (August 30)
So, earlier this month, Netflix finally unveiled the first trailer for Knights of the Zodiac, its upcoming CG reboot of Saint Seiya, and to say that it was divisive would be a slight understatement. Some didn't like the CG, others were disappointed to see that it won't be a simple adaptation of the original manga, and the reaction to Andromeda Shun being made into a girl was given two reactions: "Why couldn't you make another character a woman instead? Seriously, Shun is the laziest choice, to be honest," or "Let's complain to head writer Eugene Son so much that he shuts down his entire Twitter account!" I fully understand the annoyance & even some of the hatred about gender bending Shun for this new take on the series, but there's simply no excuse for harassing someone, who honestly tried to open a dialog with the fanbase, so much that he decided it was better to close himself off from said fanbase, because they couldn't be civil about their grievances. Yes, his reasons weren't all that great, & even had Toei questioning it, but at least he explained himself & honestly wanted to talk to fans.

Still, I guess we can just chalk all of this up to that dreaded Specter (let's call it the 109th one) that is the "Kurumada Curse", or "Kurse" if you're feeling kombative (no fatalities, though, please). In short, just about anything created by Masami Kurumada, but primarily Saint Seiya, is either brought over to "North of Mexico" by companies who simply want to take advantage of its international notoriety, only to mess it up royally because of something stupid (see: Eugene Son wanting to make Shun a girl, even though that misses the point of the character being a guy in the first place), or is brought over to "North of Mexico" by companies that actually care about it, only for it to fail to sell at all, usually because of the prior companies that didn't care ruining everything & failing to make anime fans over here care in the first place. It's a vicious cycle to be sure, and it all started 15 years ago when DiC debuted Knights of the Zodiac, its own edited version of Saint Seiya, on Cartoon Network in mid-2003.

For years, I had heard of the notoriety behind DiC's KotZ, but had never bothered to see it for myself. I skipped out on watching it on Cartoon Network, because the ads didn't make me interested, and I only got into Saint Seiya because I had later become a fan of B't X & Ring ni Kakero 1 first. Still, I always was curious, so last year I acquired the seven DVDs that ADV released, which covered the first 28 episodes (out of a total 32 that aired on TV [40 in Canada]), so I finally watched all of them to "celebrate" the 15th Anniversary of Saint Seiya (& Masami Kurumada in general) finally making it to the United States & Canada. Needless to say, I experienced nothing but self-inflicted pain due to idiotic censorship, braindead portrayals of characters ("Surfer Hyoga", anyone?), completely generic new music, & piss-poor writing that actively neutered characters (Ikki was definitely hit the hardest). While it's not quite the worst edited English dub I've ever seen for an anime, 4Kids' One Piece is still the "King of Crap", DiC's Knights of the Zodiac is definitely down there, and I had plenty to write about it back in August. While I am still going to give the Netflix reboot somewhat of the benefit of the doubt & a fair chance, it certainly wasn't good seeing Eugene Son typing the name "Sienna" in place of Saori Kido in a (now deleted) tweet, because it does give the feeling that nothing was learned from DiC's original effort, an effort that still is effecting Saint Seiya's reception here in "North of Mexico" to this very day, over a decade later.
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This brings an end to Part 1 of will likely be the last yearly favorites list. Check back in on New Year's Eve for the second half, and enjoy the last week of 2018!