"That's for making me think nasty thoughts about my mother. And Rei. And
Asuka. And Misato. And Ritsuko. And -- oh, who cares? Everybody's dead."
- Cosplay Shinji after giving in to his Oedipal patricidal tendencies
I went to Neko-Con and had a magical time! Most of us did,
actually, even Mike, whom we accidentally left in Williamsburg the first time
around. There were lots of fun things to do at Neko-con, although most of the
anime was so-so, but we did get to see the epilepsy-causing episode of Pokemon.
Everyone was warned in advance of the showing, so there were fortunately only
two Pokemon-related fatalities. Just kidding! Actually, some difference between
American and Japanese televisions may have rendered the epileptic effect of that
Pokemon episode harmless. Everyone came out OK.
I
personally got to hear a character designer explain the plot of Virgin
Fleet ("So what happens if they're no longer virgins?" "Then they lose their
powers." -- actually, I would have liked to hear how he came up with the idea
for Moldiver, but I couldn't think of a nice way to ask what possessed
him to create that crack trip), talked to a whole bunch of comic-book people,
saw a lot of music videos, participated in a lame dance party (who at an anime
con is dancing, besides the people who did the "Bust a Move" routine?), and
watched other club members buy all sorts of products, some of which affect the
club. I also saw the end of Key the Metal Idol in Japanese because tape
eight isn't coming out subtitled for some time. One spoiler: the Mima shrine was
a close affiliate of the Masaki shrine.
Okay, so I lied.
You're going to have to solve this one for yourselves. I will, of course, let
everyone know about The End of Evangelion, which a lot of members watched
and few members liked. I didn't see it, and from what I hear I'm glad. Ask me at
the meeting, or ask Kevin, because he saw it and he loves details, especially if
they involve entrails. Thanks to Kevin for giving me a plot summary during lunch
at the con.
So, back to club business. Tina and Craig
seem to have conducted the meetings well, seeing as how they didn't need to use
their executive authority to release the club Eva under the sunken gardens. And
a good thing too, because replacing those magnetic brake pads alone is about
four million dollars per launch. Next week we should be back, unless something
awful happens.
There's a whole bunch of stuff percolating
in Club Central here, some of it due to G'xqlx's eating some bad positrons last
night. Mostly, though, it involves club business.
1. A
library. WMAS could have a library of tapes if we really really wanted to, but
that would involve a dues collection infrastructure, and problems with
containing the library. However, it would be guaranteed to be around until who
knows when for later reference purposes or controversial tapes. This would be
for individual reference, This will be discussed at the next meeting; however,
if you have any immediate input or questions, let me know.
2. Work on the site. The site has all the QTQ's up,
including this week's answers. Congratulations to Marc Cassell, who got the
answer to the hard question, and to Tina, Marc, and everyone else who was honest
in answering the easy question but whose names I cannot find right now. Send me
an e-mail. However, the work on the Deathmatch (and on another idea which will
be discussed below) will require your help. The big things are writing the
Deathmatch scripts (they must be good enough to do Shockwave from) and literally
doing the Shockwave stuff. If you have any interest, send me what you're
interested in doing and the amount of time you want to spend on it, and I'll try
to get you something suitable.
3. The online voting form
has been postponed due to our not wanting to get sued. If there's a great demand
for it, I can contact all the involved companies about getting the rights to do
the voting thing.
4. The brainstorm I referred to above
is a project Aaron has titled "Anime Freak-out." It is a similar execution to
the deathmatch (i.e. Shockwavc on the web), but is a series of stories crossing
anime titles without respect to copyright, continuity, or the sanity of the
viewers. It will also have a running gag involving Dr. Mima. In it, you would
see things like Alielle as the smallest Knight Saber ("Sylia oniisama!"),
Zelgadis as Sailor Mercury (although Sailor Moon would be replaced by Kiki), and
the world's weirdest fight for the fate of the Earth on the Tokyo Tower between
Miaka as Kamui and Yui as Kamui. And let us not forget the high school
relationship drama ("Amelia, Shinji is mine! Lay off or I'll have no choice but
to banish you to the dark."). We need some seriously twisted but funny people to
work on scripting and production for this. Perhaps the Anime Babes, the
secretive subgroup of the Anime Club (its membership is only known to a select
few), may wish to take one of these things up.
5. Name
the Website woman! What is the name of the red-haired wanton that graces our
club page? Don't ask us, we don't know. Tell us. We'll pick it from the
responses hopefully at the next meeting.
6. Club mascots,
anyone? Your caricature can be a club mascot. Our resident artist is wondering
if anyone is interested.
So, that's it for now. See you this Friday in Blair 223 at 7 PM. If the video machine doesn't work, I'm going to be upset.
- Ben
HARD: Name a more efficient power source for Yuri from Galaxy Fraulein Yuna.
EASY: Better food preparation: Video Girl Ai or Mononoke Hime?
HINTS: Yuri is Yuna's android roommate. She looks like a little girl
with small triangles on her head. Her current power source is food, and lots of
it. Video Girl Ai is an anime about a girl named Ai who materializes out
of a video to comfort people. Unfortunately, the video Ai pops out of in the
anime is in a malfunctioning VCR, and some of her domestic skills suffer.
Mononoke Hime, or Princess of the Wolves, is from a Miyazaki film bearing her
name. She's a feral girl who has rejected civilization to live with wolf demons.
Her domestic skills are, um...different.
Clamp School- the fansubtitlers rendered it as "CLAMP Campus Detectives," which is more accurate to the Japanese but not totally for the show. It's about the world's most talented elementary school students in the world's best school. The school is a city unto itself, and outfitted with the latest technology. Apparently not having very taxing classes, the class officers of the fourth, fifth, and sixth grade are available to right wrongs and help out women. I don't know why they picked women as the objects of their assistance, but it's hilariously funny shojo stuff.
Saber Marionette J- It's about a planet with no women but robots and a boy who finds some very special friends among the "Marionette," or female android, population. They face discrimination and international incident, but they manage. The Marionettes also squeak when they walk. This series is really good for a lot of reasons, not the least of which is its humor.
Gundam 0080: War in the Pocket- Less hilarious than it sounds. Giant robots blow the living daylights out of each other. I don't really enjoy many robot series (I've even soured on Evangelion), but you might. It's got some serious stuff to say about war and Gundam design.
Vision of Escaflowne- It's got fantasy, it's got tarot cards, it's got giant robots. What else could you ask for? Oh yeah -- it's got a cat girl too.
El Hazard 2- A four episode series that picks up some of what happens before the characters get back to Earth. It's fun.
Daiundoukai/Battle Athletes- The Pioneer/AIC series following a bunch
of girls with wacky hair at the end of the fifth milennium. They participate in
a bunch of full contact sports in order to win a sort of Federation Olympics.
They are hilariously funny. I laughed so incredibly hard the first time I saw it
that I thought I had watched some bad Pokemon.
http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/Flats/4000/mainpage.html – a Tenchi page that is absolutely gigantic. It’s got a poll, too. Caveat: background graphics are a little complex.
http://members.tripod.com/~magicalrpg/
- the Magical Knights Rayearth online RPG. It looks kinda interesting, and in
case you wanted more info on anime-related RPGs.