152 insights into my soul

So the dubs have started coming out for "That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime" and "My Next Life As a Villainess", so I've been watching those in parallel to the current seasons, which are still in the middle of coming out. But looks like they finally started release a dub for "Moriarty the Patriot" and "The Honor in Magical High School", so I've been catching those too.

Also started finally watching Titans (particularly since I saw the latest season had Blackfire and Lady Vic, though I'm annoyed Rose Wilson is gone from the latest season without explanation), so I'm all caught up to what's been aired so far.

Hulu has a lot of shows on I'm currently catching- "Reservation Dogs", "Only Murders in the Building", and "Y the Last Man".

Oh, and Netflix finally aired the last season of Lucifer, which I thought was pretty good, but I can see why some people didn't like it. Though the hyperbole of people saying it was the worst series finale ever is annoying, because it doesn't even come close to being bad. Its like, ( spoiler cut )

But Lucifer and Rory do have a really good duet together:



Heh, I have neither seen Netflix's "A Week Away" nor Amazon's "Cinderella", but I have seen these two musical numbers, which totally slap:






I am annoyed that Dear Evan Hansen is coming out soon, but its not doing the simultaneous theater/streaming release thing (still haven't seen Shang Chi because of that, but I ain't going to know movie theater down here). But hey, I will always love "You Will Be Found":

So I finally saw the series finale of Head of the Class! So way back when, I missed it because I went to isabel79's house to stay over in the middle of the week for some reason. Looking at the original airdate, it was on 6/15/1991, so I guess I would've been finished with school for the year. Anyways, for some reason, that night I started watching Aliens (which I had seen already) and it wasn't until after the show would have finished that I realized I missed it! But yeah, noticed it was on HBO Max the other day, so it took three decades, but I finally finished that show up.

Anyways, in addition to my usual TV, been binging a lot of anime as of late. Which, its fine in the case of anime from several years ago, like Toradora! (which was a great love story, even if it did move pretty fast there at the end) or Duradura!, that are over and done with. But like I said last year with Railgun, I'm not used to having to "wait" on anime. Which speaking of Railgun, I know its my favorite of the "Certain" series, but I didn't realize it was everyone else's favorite also. That its more popular than Index, the show its a spin off of.

Anyways, so in addition to having to actually wait for new eps of Fire Force, I will eventually have to wait on That Time I was Reincarnated as a Slime, Re: Zero, and My Next Life as a Villainess.

At least with My Next Life as a Villainess (which is an incredibly cute show), the first season is done with and it ended in a good place. The new season comes out I think in June, but that means I'll have to wait even longer for the English dub.

Slime, I finished the 1st season, but the English dub is only up to the second episode of season 2. I took a break though- I'm actually spoiled for the upcoming storyline, so I'd rather let the story stack up and watch it all at once, rather than having to wait like weeks between episodes for this arc.

Started watch Re:Zero because of Isekai Quartet. Now, since that is a comedy, I for some reason thought Re:Zero would be funny and easy going like That Time I was Reincarnated as a Slime. I mean, the only two of the four I had already watched were Overlord and Saga of Tanya the Evil. But while Overlord is a little darker than Slime, I forgot Saga of Tanya the Evil is pretty gritty. I guess the characters as seen in Isekai Quartet made it seem like it was your typical isekai harem comedy.

And while there are comical moments in Re: Zero, its get pretty friggin dark. So the conceit of Re: Zero is that when he dies, he just "restarts" at a certain point in the past, allowing him to fix mistakes by acting on information he gained the first time through. Anyways, hearing that description, I thought, something bad happens, he comes back. But jeez, these deaths he experience end up being pretty visceral. So its not all fun and games, dying is pretty brutal, even if he comes back.

Anyways, it is frustrating that some things don't have a dub. Like I haven't watched the Saga of Tanya the Evil movie, because its only subbed, and I haven't had the time and sit down to devote the time to watch it. I also want to watch Irregular at Magic High School, and while the second season has been dubbed, the first has not. So that's gonna take a lot of commitment too.

Other TV stuff:

The Flash- Heh, I'm amused how they got around the Ralph thing by making him look all melty when they first had him back, then by having him in a special "healing helemt" there at the end. The thing that makes me really mad about this whole thing though is by getting rid of Ralph, we miss out on Sue. I mean, can't they keep her around without him?!

Superman and Lois- Hey, its Ellie from Degrassi! Glad to see her on this, playing the bad guy's number one henchman! And man Lana's husband is such a fucking douche.

Black Lightning- I heard China was leaving the show, I did not expect it so soon. But hey, clever way to do it without killing off Lightning. So she burst into energy, and when she reconstituted, her genes conveniently presented themselves differently, so now she looks all different!

In general though, it is funny how obvious all these shows are finishing the arcs they would have ended on had it not been for the pandemic. But hey, I guess they're doing what the need to.

So randomly internetting, I saw someone's recommendation for the top 10 gun action anime:

10) Madlax
9) Gungrave
8) Trigun
7) Hellsing
6) Gunslinger Girl
5) Noir
4) Phantom: Requiem for the Phantom
3) Canaan
2) Jormungand
1) Black Lagoon

I've seen 70% of the list, with Gungrave, Canaan, and Jormungand the only three I hadn't watched yet. Jormungand seemed pretty appealing from what I'd googled, so decided to give it a whirl since its on Hulu.

I'm enjoying it so far, though I'm annoyed only the first 4 eps are dubbed, with Hulu only having subtitled versions of the rest of them. Which is total BS, because looking at youtube, the later eps were definitely dubbed. Heh, part of me is annoyed because subtitled shows means I can't take my eyes away from the screen to check something on the computer or whatever. (Which oh no, I have to actually watch the thing I'm watching) But part of me is annoyed because I was pleasantly surprised to see one of the secondary characters was a bad-ass hottie English chick, but in the subbed version, obviously she does not have that accent.

So the other day, having not paid attention in the longest while, I saw that there was a new Black Lagoon OVA that came out last year, Roberta's Blood Trail. Which obviously involves the Hound herself. Its a little long for an OVA, and really its more a 5 episode mini-season.

I've always like Black Lagoon, its gritty and action packed, but it doesn't fall into that same BS a lot of these bad-ass killer anti-hero animes often do. You know, where the deadly super assassin laments his or her life all, "Oh, I hate all this killing, I want to live in a small town somewhere doing something lame like farming or running a general store!" Or they get really weird and philosophical, and the characters imagine themselves in another world, one where they're at peace. And its like there's two of them one in the real world, and one in this other world and there's some weird crap about where their consciousness really resides. Then in the climax of the series, when the protagonist finally bites it, they wake up in the other world, like its a metaphor for heaven or some such crap. I mean, is it some weird cultural thing that I'm not getting, where such stories make sense to the Japanese? Its like, why can't there be a protagonist good at killing, he faces terrorists or criminal empires or global conspiracies, and in the end he either wins or loses. Why do they need to add weird stuff to it?

But like I said, that's why I like Black Lagoon, there's nothing weird like that. I mean, it is more than just the action though, its a story about a world of corruption and death, and what happens to a "normal" person like Rock when they're forcibly dragged into that world. ( spoiler cut )

So, Netflix had suggested the anime Phantom: Requiem for the Phantom for me. I've been watching it since the series seems interesting enough. Its one of those super-competent teen assassin animes, though this time its a boy and a girl, rather than a bunch of girls.

Its interesting so far, though in my initial search to find out what the hell netflix was suggesting for me, I see in typical anime fashion, it eventually strays from crime/spy intrigue into some weird spiritual BS. But I'll prolly still watch it through to the end. The soundtrack is kinda odd though, because the male assasssin's "killing" theme music sounds exactly like "Burly Brawl" from the Matrix Reloaded, only its not that song. Though there was also a fight scene where the background music is kinda a mix of one of the Matrix songs with something out of the Conan movies, if you can imagine that.

TV commentary:

Burn Notice- So, Burn Notice is back. Interesting ep, particularly in how Michael gets back together with the gang and how he ends up back in Miami. ( spoiler cut )

Tried hitting Willy's trivia with the usual suspects but arrving just ten minutes later than we normally do and the place was packed. So we just hit Mama Fu's instead. Hadn't been there in a while. Tried something knew, one of their chicken salads that had some sort of peanut sauce based dressing. I love peanut sauce (who doesn't?! Well, I guess those who have peanut allergies aren't big fans) so I thought it was good.

Getting back to crowded things, the roomie and C-note were planning to see a midnight showing of Dark Knight last night, but the roomie didn't expect the movie to be as popular as it apparently is (he was never a big Batman fan, so he was skeptical), so he didn't get tickets early enough so they were sold out. I mean, by 930 last night, the 12 midnight to 1230 showings at Parkway Pointe and Atlantic Station were all sold out, and as poodleface had mentioned, that's 2000 just at Atlantic Station. That's like LotR/Star Wars size crowds! I knew the movie was going to be popular, just not that popular! I hear its a really good movie, but did Heath Ledger's death end up increasing interest in his movie, as its his last, great work?

But that's on my list of things to watch this weekend. That and "Mamma Mia!" of course. And then there's the backlog of stuff that will be on the DVR. I guess since we didn't do trivia last night, got back in time to see My Boys and Burn Notice. But haven't caught last night's Swingtown yet. And tonight is the season premieres of Psych and Monk. Plus Stargate Atlantis and Doctor Who. I actually heard what's happening in this final arc for the fourth season of Doctor Who, and it definitely sounds exciting. And sad/bittersweet.

And act 3 of Dr. Horrible comes out tomorrow. Heh, I've actually watched the first two acts several times now. Hey, its catchy! I've actually had "Freeze Ray" stuck in my head for a while. I wonder if they'll release an official soundtrack like they did with "Once More with Feeling"?

Also, need to finish up The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya. Heh, I switched to watching the English dubs, but looking up the order on wikipedia to watch it in the original broadcast order. I can see what turdburgler was saying that if you don't watch it that way, the exciting climax is in the middle of the series and then you're left with a bunch of random eps, even if that means watching it out of chronological order. Like the last ep I saw is 9th in the broadcast order, but last in chronological order. And its like, nothing happens in it! Had I watched that as the last ep, I'd be kind annoyed, because it'd be like, "The series ended like that?!" (As a quick aside, this'll prolly come as a surprise, but I'd actually pick Haruhi over Mikuru.)

Ugh, I couldn't get to sleep last night, so I ended up getting only two and a half hours of sleep. But its the weekend, so hopefully I'll be able to catch up.

I forget if I've mentioned this before, but the Mountain Dew commercial where they were all, "The Yo Yo as invented as a weapon, its a fact!" like who didn't know that?! ojv('Man, its obvious!') It was invented by my peeps from Flipland! That's why you don't mess with us, not only can we kill you with knives and sticks, but flying circle-thingies on a piece of string! The other Dew commercial that's all "men are four times more likely to get hit by lightning than women?" I'm guessing that's because men are more likely to be outside in the middle of a lightning storm?

Anyways, while setting EHC to record, saw the description for tonight's Aliens in America sounded interesting (they do a community theater production of Rent!) and then the commercial showed Larisa Oleynik was gonna be in it, so that cemented me watching the ep. After all, I've always found her mad cute. But its not a show I watch regularly. I mean, when I first heard about the show, I knew the mom was gonna be Caroline in the City's best friend, but I had no idea until an ep a few weeks ago that Luke from GG was the dad. In any case, I was amused they actually did a couple of the songs, though a kid and his mom playing Roger and Mimi? That's kinda messed up.

Speaking of shows I don't watch regularly, just watching Unhitched while I type this up. Its okay, but hey, Rashida Jones is cute. Its nice to see her in something other than the pantsuits she sported on the Office. Its like the show couldn't have Karen sport a business skirt and boots combo a few times?

Through my random internet wanderings, learned about the twelve sisters from the Coyote Ragtime Show, which made me want to check it out. But I hear while the show started promising, it kinda fizzled out. And the 12 Sisters don't figure as prominently as they did in the first ep. Like this short 2 minute thing:



is the only time in the series where you get to see them all kick ass, but after that they're just in the background. Which is a waste, given that their character designs are pretty cool.

And now watching Dirt right now, is Courteney Cox still married to David Arquette? Because I just realized they've been billing her as "Cox" this whole time instead of "Cox-Arquette", and I thought back five years ago, she made a big deal of making it "Cox-Arquette" to try and avoid all the Cox jokes.

Finally finished the third Hellsing Ultimate OVA. Finally its new stuff. Or at least I don't remember Pip Bernadette and the Wild Geese or Alucard fighting the Dandy Man in South America from the original TV series, so I'm guessing they're finally on stuff from the manga. Geez, that was a particularly violent and gory ep. Dang, we see various members of the Millenium group, including the Captain. But alas, we don't get to see him in action. I hear he's a bad-ass werewolf. Oh, and ha, so the spirit of Seras Victoria's Harkonnen rifle shows up in her dream, and it looks exactly like the Baron Harkonnen from Dune.

Anyhoo, I'm trying to figure out what the images in the background of the credits at the end of the OVAs are supposed to be. The second somewhat makes sense, its shows the Hellsing high council and Seras Victoria at some funeral, I assume of their slaughtered troops. And there's some random images of Pip and the Wild Geese and the Dandy Man showing his skills to Montana Max. But the images at the end of the first and third just seem to be random images of the Millenium group. Are they flashbacks? Random glimpses of what they're doing now? It prolly is flashbacks at the end of the 3rd one, as they also show what looks like a young Walter. And what's with the Nazi catboy?!

Also started reading The Losers. Its a re-imagining of an old and obscure DC comic about WWII commandos. This takes place in the present, and is about a special forces team that got burned by the CIA, so they've decided to declare war on them. Its cool spy/black ops action, and its gotten some pretty good reviews. Its supposedly going to be made into a movie.