Saturday 26^th November, 2011

After the Event Afternoon, the tentative JAFWA program for Saturday 26^th November 2011 is below. To be held in the Collins Street Community Center on Collins Street just off Canning Highway in South Perth.

Things of Note:
1) Last week we discovered that we could get the Hall for this week, and the JAFWA attendees voted overwhelmingly in favour of this action.
2) During the evening of December 17, a Special General Meeting of JAFWA will be called to implement a constitution change regarding auditing. Could all paid up members be available to vote.
3) Movie Night! We are going to put on a movie tonight, the 15^th theatrical movie of Great Detective Conan. Appropriate cosplay gets in free.

Dale’s Suggestive Remarks, based on suggestion sheets handed in at JAFWA:
An unsigned missive that I suspect originated from one of our regular correspondents:

1.’Beelzebub’: Very funny. Although I doubt how long they can keep the quality of jokes & humour up as they always make a good episode 1 but mess up the rest of the show. About the ‘nudity’, I think it is insignificant by today’s standards.
2. ‘Read or Die’: Slightly anti-america, but acceptable. Although the fighting scene is kind of …. illogical. (How could a glider that can’t be shot down by Apache be shot down by a M-4 carbine on … another glider?)

Never underestimate how long a single joke can be run in anime. The first example I can think of is ‘Ranma 1/2’ where they made the martial arts boy can turn into girl supposition/joke stretch out for 38 manga volumes and as 161 anime TV episodes. Mind you the joke did wear thin after a while.
However with so much anime now available in this rich, rich period, the competition for viewer eyeballs is fierce, so you are correct that they really try and wow you with the first (or sometimes the first and second) episode, unlike earlier years where several episodes could go by before the main elements of the story appeared. Mind you, lately anime series tend to be only 13 episodes long, so they can’t faff around much.
As for the ‘nudity’, that was a joke comment by your ever loving MC. First ‘Dragon Half’ had a low anatomical resolution topless flash by the female character, so I thought it was appropriate that the next show that the naked baby’s low anatomical resolution full frontal nudity would balance things out. It got a laugh at least.

I am not certain that there was a specific anti-American bias to ‘Read or Die’, more a bias against the American president/leadership. But considering the show was animated before September 2011 (you can see the Twin Towers in the New York scenes and mobile phones had extendable antennas), it is unlikely that the author had had much exposure to George W. Bush’s shortcomings. Perhaps it should be seen as a polemic against the shortcomings of complacency and indolence of the modern consumer generation who have inherited the works of previous generations’ geniuses, when exposed to the raw nature of a previous generation’s genius. Or some such. What am I , a philosopher?
As for illogical battles, you have probably either not read super-hero comics and/or have been spoiled by the quality and consistency of anime. But if you were asking me to pull an explanation out of thin air, then the Lillienthal ‘Air King’ I-jin was using his superior maneouverability against long range rear attacks by obvious Apache helicopters, while was caught by surprise against a shorter range, more accurate attack from an unexpected glider to the fore. You try and do better. Exposition is limited in this series.

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All items in the original Japanese language with English subtitles