Animanga

So this is a list of the animes and mangas that I enjoy, and recommend. For some I've seen both anime and manga (if both exist) so I'm putting my preferred format. Some of these series I'm still in the middle of, others I've finished.

Just wanted to do a thing and get them all in one place, really.

Manga

• Sailor Moon

• Yu-Gi-Oh
• Yu-Gi-Oh Duelist
• Dragon Ball/Dragon Ball Z

• Cardcaptor Sakura
• Attack on Titan

• Akira
• Death: At Death's Door

Anime

• Seven Deadly Sins
• Death Note
• One Punch Man
• Soul Eater

• Fullmetal Alchemist
• Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood 

•  Puella Magi Madoka Magica/ Puella Magi Madoka Magica: Rebellion
• My Bride is a Mermaid!
• Marvel Disk Wars

I'm currently in the middle of  Yu-Gi-Oh Duelist, Akira, Attack on Titan, Cardcaptor Sakura, My Bride is a Mermaid! and Marvel Disk Wars (more or less). The Animes are hard to find (off netflix, and subbed, not dubbed). Soon I'll start Black Butler, or Ouran Host Club, or one of the other series queued on my netflix.

...I was gone for THREE DAYS internet

So, I was on vacation this last weekend, with no internet access. And in that time, The Babadook became a LGBT icon.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with the top-hatted entity, The Babadook is the titular character from an Australian horror film; he moves into the home of a grieving wife and mother, tormenting her and her son. He also may be a physical embodiment of depression. Or not exist at all.

It's a really good, intense horror movie, with pretty much no gay over or undertones that I recall.

So why all of this?

For some reason, Netflix shuffled this into their LGBT category, and the internet ran with it. So, if you see a goth-looking specter at your local pride rally, that's why.

I'm not really sure how to feel about this. I've never seen a horror icon embraced so wholeheartedly by the LGBT community. Not even when Freddy Krueger was in the gayest horror movie of all time.

Seriously, there's a scene in a leather bar,  a guy is whipped to death, Freddy is trying to get into a young man's body, and the lead actress looks like Meryl Streep.

I'm not offended or displeased as a horror fan. My only worry is when people actually go watch the film. They are in for one hell of a shock. The Babadook is REALLY hardcore. It is not a loving, supportive entity. But if you want him for that, hey, more power too you.

Plus, I'd love to go to a rally and get a picture with some cosplayer...

Mini-Trippening

For the next few days I'm heading north with the family. So, enjoy another 'assortment' blog of stuff I like.

The IT Spot: rereading part 16

Bev returns home and almost gets killed, and it is awesome!

SPOILERS

The scene, again, is similar to the mini-series, but with several important differences.

In the novel the old lady doesn't just start to rot: she turns into the witch for Hansel and Gretel as the house around them becomes a candy trap. The process by which Bev becomes aware something is wrong is also much slower, with smaller details changing and her pretending not to notice, thinking she can escape IT if IT doesn't see that she's seen.

When IT starts wearing he father's face, the remarks become...foul. Essentially, IT blurts out Bev's deepest fears and suspicions; that her father wanted her sexually. There will be more of this later (earlier), but it's hardly a surprise by this point.

The other main takeaway is how Bev escapes IT. She says "The grackles know your real name!" and IT recoils. This hearkens back and forth in the novel, where Bev's memories are blocked my images of grackle birds, and she doesn't know why.

Despite the sheer uncomfortable of the section, or perhaps because of it, this is probably my favorite of all the encounters. It's written amazingly, and touches on a story that's universal among the readers, unlike lepers and library demons.

SAFE

Next up, Ritchie plays allllllll the hits.

Scarecrow's Pants

So, in honor of LGBT pride month, Billboard released a list of the top 20 gay anthems. Somewhere over the Rainbow is number #14. Should have been higher in my opinion, but hey, I'm not LBGT.

My letter falls under the Q, or A however.

Something people have also attributed to The Wizard of Oz is Jack Haley's performance playing the Tinman as gay.

Now, if you're less of a Wizard of Oz fan than I (and lets face it, who isn't less of a Wizard of Oz fan than I) you probably haven't heard the interview where Haley says the voice he was using in the movie was the same one he used to read to his kids. I.E. at least not trying for a "gay" voice.

For more info on sounding gay, watch this. Seriously. It's fantastic.

More than that, I'd argue that the Tinman isn't gay because in the movie (unlike the original book or Wicked) he's just a being made of tin. No sexual organs, no sexual feelings, no purpose for the tinsmith to include those as options, if he even had the ability.

We can clearly see the lack of sexual organs here:

The Lion is a biological being, so presumably could be attracted to another lion (or whatever, I'm not here to judge). But of the animated inhumans, the only one you could make an argument for is Scarecrow, since he has pants.

Not that I'm saying he DOES have straw-man-bits. It's merely possible. And I'm sure there are a bunch of X-rated parodies where things go on, but I'm not looking for them, you sickos.

In short: let the Tinman be nothing, because he literally cannot be anything else. Or don't. I'm not the boss of you. But at least look at the logic and facts in this movie about magic shoes taking a small-town girl to a glittering city where she and her three male friends go to the salon.

....I may need to rethink my argument.

The IT Spot: Rereading part 15

Eddie's trip down memory lane (or at least Kossuth lane) is at least as horrifying as Ben's if not moreso. It's another case of visiting a spot where he had some solo joy, only for IT to come by and fuck everything up with lepers and corpses.

SPOILERS

Kossuth lane is home to an old shipping yard where Eddie used to watch older boys play baseball, and sometimes go after fouls. As an adult he sees that the place has been abandoned, by owners and shipping company alike.

IT comes as the leper, as the owner of the business, and as a girl that Eddie sort of knew and fantasized about, all dead and rotting. Unlike Ben's encounter, IT doesn't emphasize that IT will kill Eddie if he tries anything. I'm not sure if this is because IT thinks Eddie can't hurt IT, or because IT knows IT will end up killing Eddie. Spoilers: of the reduced loser's club, Eddie is the only one who dies.

It's another short segment, but a nice jaunt to classic King-style creeps.

SAFE

Next is Bev, who may have my 'favorite' solo encounter.

Stuff I wanted to share

I am having a TIME this weekend, so here's just some stuff I want to share.

The IT Spot: Rereading, part 14

So, the losers are walking around town, waiting for IT to come to them, and horrible memories to be unearthed. These sections are relatively short, but packed full of prose and psychological baggage. Let's get crackin'!

SPOILERS

Ben goes to the Library, the site of his positive (but solo) childhood memories. There's a lot of musing over the passage of time and how Ben now feels like an outsider before Pennywise shows up.

This scene plays a bit like the one in the mini series, despite Ritchie (for some reason) taking Ben's place.

Curry's Pennywise is spot on. What they don't get into is him becoming Dracula (hey, there's another Universal monster form I referenced before!). Ben is also not dumb enough to reply to Pennywise's taunts and come-hither words aloud. Also, there's no cloud of balloons, just one that constantly changes slogans.

Ben's holy ground being fouled by Pennywise, and by Dracula the unholiest of the Universal Monsters, isn't exactly deep, but it gets the job done.

What's more important is Pennywise's insistence (repeated insistence) that the Losers cannot stop him, as they're too old, and he will kill them if they try. These threats were present during the Loser's childhoods, but it wasn't insistant: IT was just telling them a fact. This time IT knows IT can be hurt, and the people that hurt IT have returned. IT is angry, and IT is sure...but not completely.

IT is scared. Not much, but the fact that IT can even feel fear is amazing. We'll get more on that later, when King delves into IT's mind.

IT uses a few more taunts, screaming that Ben killed the kids (of course, nobody else can hear), doing one of  Ritchie's voices, etc. IT even offers to talk it out with Ben, as the library is neutral ground. I'm sure if Ben went up Pennywise would have simply pushed him over the railing, but it's still weird that IT even offered. Out of character is serious business: IT is spooked.

SAFE

Next we'll walk with Eddie to a baseball diamond, and meet a few old horrors from his past.

Ashkia or Ashia?

I’ve had two strange dreams. Nightmares. Not sure what to make of them.

In the first one I was being stalked by a grudge-like Japanese ghost demon lady, called either Ashkia (aaaahhh-ski-uh) or Ashia (aaaahhh-shee-uh). 

I don’t remember much, but I had to let the thing come to me for 7 days, where it would rip off a piece of my soul while being generally creepy, then at the end pass the curse on to someone else or get killed. I did so and forgot all about it.

Then this week, in my dreams a little girl (again Japanese) come by my house, dropped a blue rubber ball, smiled at me (clearly an evil, taunting smile), whispered “Ashkia (or Ashia)” and left. I was angry: I just got rid of the curse, why was it back?

This time it was different. The demon ghost lady was an American teen girl. She spoke to me almost normally at times, but taunted me when I was too weak banish a random ghost head, still ripping away pieces of my soul. At the end of this dream one 'soul rip' had happened, and I had led her to my room to try and figure out how to help her, so she would move on. In the dream I was only a little older than the girl, and my bedroom was still arranged like it was in high school.

I recently watched a video about Japanese urban myths, so I’m not clueless about where the imagery came from. There were a lot of recurring dream demons in the 40 or so legends. 

What’s weird is I’m sure I’ve heard the name, Ashkia or Ashia, somewhere before. I thought it was from a World of Darkness RPG or Magic the Gathering, but my husband couldn’t identify it.

If I didn’t hear that name anywhere, I guess I could have conjured it from thin air. But I really think I’ve heard it elsewhere. Any thoughts, readers?

The IT Spot: rereading part 13

You'd think with the 13th part of this series, I'd get down to something really scary, right?

Bill takes a cab ride to have lunch with the surviving losers, and there's a lot of talk about how Ben lost the weight, how Ritchie's vasectomy reversed itself, and about how nine children have been murdered by IT.

SPOILERS

The section starts with Bill getting a call from Mike about lunch where Mike advises him that Stan is dead. He waits until the lunch to let everyone know it was a suicide, but Bill already suspects IT as a culprit. Not that that's big leap at this point.

 Most of this section boils down to change and similarity. Bill watches the altered streets of Derry go by, but can still spot landmarks buried beneath the exterior, much like how IT is buried below the town (both literally and figuratively, but more on that later).

The remains of the Losers club are the same: the remnants of childhood echo in their faces, and await excavation as time spent with each other goes on.

They all marvel at how the murders haven't been brought to national attention, except Mike. Mike postulates that IT feeds every 27 years or so, and in turn has made the town semi-prosperous. In turn, the citizens either leave, or sort of turn a blind eye (again, more on that later).

The section ends with they voting to actually kill IT this time, though without Stan it may not even be possible. In the Mini-series Ritchie holds out until the end, but here he agrees pretty quickly. As they agree to walk around town, their fortune cookies explode into gouts of blood, bugs, eyes, and anything else currently haunting them: IT is up to IT's old tricks.

Oh, and one other thing of note in the section: on the ride over, Bill half-heard about an escaped mental patient who was dangerous. Later, that person will turn out to be Henry Bowers. King really knew what he was doing with this one, folks.

SAFE

This is the first time the adult losers join up, and for the next large chunk of the book they'll be separate again, letting IT come to them. It's a nice echo back to their childhood circumstances.

So next, we go back with Ben to the library, and see Pennywise up close. Oh boy!