doyouloveanime

Before I begin here’s the adorable Zuna the LandMate operator/cop from Appleseed Ex Machina. She’s been in all the Appleseed anime movies. Her boyfriend’s a cyborg thing robotoid like Robocop only he ain’t roshii (dead).

Hey hazu (gang)- Last night Sci Fi Channel didn’t show Earthshock. Instead they showed the pilot film for Serenity. It’s about a devil may care adventurer/merc/bounty hunter and his spaceship crew of misfits. They battle the Allince and then try to rescue a ‘Super Soldier’ type of neogene test tube warrior lass named River Tam.

Malcolm or Mal is the ex-soldier turned arms dealer/smuggler/merc/bounty hunter/gun for hire captain of the ‘Firefly’ and when he finally wrecks that ship he steals one, paints it red and re-christens it ‘Serenity’. Rive is his first new crewmate most of the rest of his crew dead or captured by the Alliance.

Seems the Alliance was trying to prevent war by conditioning people to be at peace. It worked so well that the experimentees stopped fighting, killing, quarrelling and finally- existing and breathing! Of course the ’supersoldiers’ wiped them out. The Alliance tried to cover it up and Mal and tomos (friends) made certain the universe found out about it.

Then it was off to new fun ad adventures for Mal and River. Sound familiar? It should since they ‘borrowed’ liberally from at least half a dozen animes!

First the ‘red ship’ is a dead giveaway for the crew heded up by Gene Starwind and Jim Hawking- the ‘Outlaw Star’.

Next the perfect Utopian world is like the perfect city in the ‘Appleseed’ movie trilogy.

The ’super soldier warriors’ are reminiscent of several animes like Bison’s ‘perfect warriors’ in ‘Street Fighter’ and Hallelujah Kurio and his female nemesis the kawaii (lovely) lieutenant pilot in ‘Gundam 00′ aka ‘Mobile Suit Gundam 000′ and don’t forget the ‘neogenes’ bred to wield the ‘Witchblade’ like Maria.

Space going bounty hunters? How about Spike Steigel (To be portrayed by Keanu Reeves in the upcoming film), Jett Black, Faye Valentine, ‘Ed’ the towheaded redhead tomboy computer hacker whiz kid and Ein the data dog on ‘Cowboy Bebop’?

A ship full of ex-patriates and malcontents? Can anyone remember ‘Blake’s 7′ the old chestnut from the BBC which ran for 52 episodes on PBS many many years ago?

‘Firefly’ and ‘Serenity’ are subtle hints at how the Japanese view the after life. In the ‘CB’ anime film the villain as he lies dying sees fireflies which are usually sent to convey the ‘tama’ or soul to ‘Otherworld’ or the ‘Netherworld’. On ‘Bleach’ soul reapers receive messages from black ‘Hell butterflies’ and a reaper is sent to bring a tortured soul ’serenit and peace’ before it becomes a ‘hollow’ or evil soul. In ‘InuYasha’ the evil villainous hanyou (half demon/half human) mastermind Naraku (Naraku means place of evil or Hell) protects himself from IY’s and Miroku’s ‘air void’ or ‘wind tunnel’ attacks with poisonous wasps known as ‘Saimyosho’ and have strayed a bit eh?

Funny how different governmental groups mean different things in different series, is it not? In ‘Firefly’ and ‘Serenity’ the ‘Alliance’ are the baddies while in ‘Star Wars’ the ‘Rebel Alliance’ are the heroes who defeat the evil ‘Empire’ and re-establish the ‘New Republic’ at ‘Coruscant’.

In ‘Star Trek’ the ‘Federation’ are the heroes so I made the 3WA (Kei and Yuri’s galactic police organization) part of the ‘United Galactica Federation of Galaxies’ or ‘UG’ for short. Yet in ‘Blake’s 7′ the ‘Federation’ is more akin to George Lucas’s ‘Empire’ in ‘SW’. Wonder if GL named his boy hero Luke Skywalker after himself? The ‘Earth Alliance’ in ‘Gundam Seed’ are the good guys too but the ‘Earth Federation’, the ‘Union’ and the ‘Human Defense League’ of ‘Gundam’ fme are questionable. After all Vega’s ‘Celestial Beings’ pilots or ‘Gundam meisters’ (Masters of Gundams) are trying to end war, aren’t they?

A question I will now pose to you to ponder if you will as Rod Serling used to say on both ‘Night Gallery’ and ‘Twilight Zone’ series.

What exactly does ‘Gundam’ mean? Gun for weapon is OK but what is dam (dom)? In anime as we all pretty much know almost everything has meaning or meanings. Names, places, weapons, things, terms, you name it and chances are it means something.

For instance Inu Yasha means literally dog (inu is dog while neko is cat) ghost or demon (a yasha is a spirit, a ghost, a demonic being or presence. IY is a ‘hanyou’ or half dog demon/half human boy as opposed to a ‘youkai’ like the young kitsune Shippou who is a full fledged fox (kitsune means small fox) demon (youkai means full or whole demon) even if his skills are limited to magical illusions)

His female schoolgirl companion from our era is Kagome. She travels back and forth through the well in her family’s shrine in Tokyo. From her own time in modern day Japan to the 16th Century Warring States Era in ancient Japan. Her name is from anancient Japanse children’s game called ‘Kagome, Kagome’ which is sort of like a circular form of Tag you’re it over here. This game is even featured in both Demon Eyed Kou and Hell Girl.

Sango means ‘coral’ and ‘Kouga’ means ‘wolf’ just to name a few. I have found several websites which research name meanings and if you like I’ll be happy to PM them to you. Just drop me a line at keiman0@yahoo.com because being previously published material I cannot repost it here. Gomen er sorry about that folks.

Oh yeah just remembered that there was a climactic scene toward the end of the ‘Appleseed’ film that aired Monday on AniMonday on Sci Fi Channel. There are 3 or 4 ‘Appleseed’ films and the first three are all called ‘Appleseed’ while the last is called ‘Appleseed Ex Machina’ and they all feature Zuna and her cyborg thing boyfriend.

Anyway if you saw it you’ll recall that in order to shut down ‘Gaia’s control over the villain’s cannons Athena and Zuna had to knock out the control box at ‘Gaia’s apex. ‘Gaia’ (Old Latin for Earth from the Earth goddess Galatea aka Terra) was a supercomputer like the ‘Magi’ of ‘Neon Genesis Evangelian’ and ran the city. That meant one of them had to shoot the damned thing. Zuna’s right arm was injured and Athena couldn’t hit the broad ass side of a barn. Athena insists that Zuna use her left hand and do it while she guided her and lined up the target. Zuna got it with her last round.

This was quite similar to an earlier ‘Original Dirty Pair’ adventure (Episod 7 ‘Revenge of the Muscle Lady’) where Sandra Guts (Goots) was trying to make her getaway aboard her drugstore space ship and the only way to stop her was as usual blow up the ship. Yuri had planted a bomb but forgot to set the timer on it before she came don from the craft. Kei was the better shot but her right arm had been broken by ‘Scary Sandra’ in a fight and Kei is not ambidextrous like Zuna. To make matters worse Yuri had been temporarily blinded by a flash of light when another bomb had gone off prematurely. So Kei became Yuri’s eyes like Athena did for Zuna and guided Yuri’s arm. Yuri hit the bomb with her second plasmatic ion energy bolt from Kei’s Mark XIII ion cannon and the blast knocked them both unconscious while Sandra’s ship and drugs went up like napalm! Later Yuri discovered the concussion had broke her arm as well as Kei’s leg but it brought back Yuri’s sight! By the way Yuri means ‘lily’ and Kei means ‘leader’ or ‘level’ as in staircase levels.

Fitting since Kei is clearly the team’s leader and Yuri is the more demure and cultured of the ‘Deadly Dynamic Duo’! However, they both send their chiefs making a beeline for the ‘Galusol’, ‘Hydroxylein’, booze and tobacco! Lest I forget later let us wish an early happy birthday to both Yuris- the Classic and the Flash (March 3 and 18). Classic Kei’s is 27 November and her Flash counterpart’s is 1 January.

The Classic duo are 19, the Flash duo are 17, the Original original’s from the subbed never dubbed first tv series of 26 episodes are 21 or 23 and their ages vary between 22 and 30-somethingish in the three films ‘Affair at Nolandia’, ‘Conspiracy on Flight 009′ and ‘Project EDEN’. In their 15 second debut in ‘Crusher Joe the Movie’ their ages are unclear but they look to be more mature than in any of their other appearances. Mid thirties maybe? Wonder if Haruka knows? Haruka Takachiho created the Angels. His inspiration was the ‘Beauty Pair’- a female tag team wrestling duo! Kei and Yuri may have been taken from his two kawaii (lovely) co-worker companions at the matches that day. One was a blonde and the other a brunette while Classic Kei’s a stunning redhead and Classic Yuri has ankle length bluish black tresses. Flash Kei’s a tomboy with a punk rocker hairdo. It’s multi-coloured in yellow, orange, black, red and white! Flash Yuri’s mane is still super long but now it’s colour ranges from light lilac to deep violet with the darker shade being more prevalent.

The debut dueo and the movies’ Angels’ hair directly mimics the Classic pair. Redheaded Amazon firebrand Hellcat and bluish black elfin vixen. Is it any wonder I nicknamed them the ‘Demon of Dublin’ and the ‘Rose of Tralee’ in my fanfictions where Kei is O’Halloran and Yuri is Donovan.

Now for the pix:

Here are the Flash Angels with a co-worker tomo (friend).

This is Rankuku Matsumoto the kawaii (lovely) babe lieutenant soul reaper of Squad 10 in Bleach. I used her as my avatar on adultswim.com because she reminded me of the very first Lovely Angel- Iris. Later she became an assassin but redeemed herself before dying in Chief Garner’s arms after successfully defeating Waldess and Project SIREN. She saved Garner, Kei, Yuri and the known Universe in DP Flash/Act 1/Episode 6.

Two from ‘Serenity’. First the cast photo of Cptain Mlcolm, Rive Tam and the crew.

Next River Tam the ’super soldier neogene warrior’ herself.

This is Gene Starwind’s ‘Outlaw Star’. Note its similarity to ‘Firefly’ and ‘Serenity’.

OK here’s a pix of that trio of poilice officers from New Tokyo Polic Force called the Burn Up Warriors. They are the Terran version of the Lovely Angels ‘Dirty Pair’- the Angels blow things up and the Warriors burn ‘em up! It’s here because I used the dipstick blond warrior in my fanfictions. There she is Subby or Sub-Ensign (like a junior warrant officer) Rio Delcroix. Her uncle is head of something or other in the 3WA or the ‘UG’. She’s a trouble consultant or tro-con in training. She’s definitely still a trainee and a first year cadet at Takachiho Academy where Kei and Yuri are running the place.

This is InuYasha and fair Kagome who has Kikyo’s soul which makes her a miko or preistess (Shintoism) in her own right. She was chosen as a vessel to carry the ’shikon no tama’ (the jewel of the four souls) within her body. Shortly after arriving in ancient Japan she allowed a death crow demon to steal it and then fire an arrow at it. Bad move because it shattered the jewel and now just like the elf hunters Ari, Junpei and Ryosko (’Those Who Hunt Elves’) who must hunt for spell fragments (on the bodies of female elves in Elfland) throughout the land InuYasha, Kaggie and tomos (friends) must search the lnd for the shikon fragments. Each shard of the sacred jewel is powerful and the more it is tainted by evil the more horribly powerful it becomes. The plan was to have Kikyo the miko purify the whole thing when it is whole once more but Naraku killed her. Don’t despair because the ‘bruja’ (brew-ha) or witch Urasue raised her from the dead only now she has to live on souls of the newly dead. A bit vampirish to say the least. And worse yet she thinks IY killed her and now has a new GF- Kagome! The one thing they must not do ever is allow Naraku to possess the entire jewel because he’ll well we dunno what the Hell he wants it for do we? Something naughty of course! This is hard to accomplish what with Naraku on the go, in cahoots with everyone who has a dark shard and with Kaggie coming and going to and from Feudal Japan and school in the modern day! If I could reach Feudal Japan I’d stay there! It’d be an o’oni’ (devil) of a lot safer than here! OK the pix:

Finally the Mystery Pix of the Post. It’s from Fuilmetal Alchemist but oro (what) is it? Good luck!

SFN/SYS/JM/KBYA/KYSOTI/Toodles-K&K

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