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Due to anime conventions, magazine deadlines, and to a lesser extent DE REEPAZ we missed our chance to release this way back in March when this was initially recorded. But in this episode, after dispensing some advice on running mecha panels at anime conventions Gerald reviews the unjustifiably recent theatrical film, Trigun: Badlands Rumble.
Turns out that OSMCast! still isn’t posted yet, nor has the Anime Fans Give Back marathon been uploaded. But Daryl was on the ANNCast with Tim Eldred to discuss “Top 10 Anime of the 1980s.” Note that Daryl’s list is completely volatile such that the contents and rankings could change from moment to moment, but the ten he picked are all pretty darned good. Why, several of them have been reviewed already on THIS VERY PODCAST. Also, both Daryl and Gerald were guests on the Greatest Movie EVER! podcast to discuss The Perfect Weapon, featuring Jeff Speakman and the Hawaiian Mormon fist. You can get the links to those by clicking on Guest Spots up above.
I have two stories about encounters in this country that have to do with Trigun and Redline.
One is that I just met one Japanese dude whose favorite anime are all the Toonami and Adult Swim stuff, and among that list was Trigun.
The other is that I went to a flower viewing gathering and the guy who ran it has a friend who works at Madhouse. Apparently he was one of the guys on Redline. According to the guy who hosted the gathering, his friend is a little crazy…
As for the manga, it did finish its run in America a few years ago. I know because I was basically buying each volume as they came out since I was about in high school.
The manga isn’t very good. The artwork is very difficult to understand–especially in the action scenes–and the whole thing just kind of fizzles out in the end. If it was polished it could be a really awesome surreal action thing, but as it is it’s just nonsensical and difficult to understand.
To be fair, it starts off decently, but once you get to the fourth or fifth volume of Maximum, the quality starts to drop rapidly.
I’m in the “Bebop is overrated” minority, too. Still, I don’t hate Trigun, per se. I just didn’t really feel compelled to see where it was going for very long.
If Bebop is overrated, then what deserves the respect you feel Bebop doesn’t?
Thanks for posting, thought you guys all died. Keep up the good work, really appreciate it.
Hmmm, the stream isn’t buffering and the MP3 I downloaded is only 4KB . Has anybody else encountered this problem?
I only got a 5K MP3.
I just tried downloading it from the RSS as well as from the direct link in this post, and both downloaded the episode in full. Clicking on the Flash player also works, both here and via Google Reader. As some of the feedback pertains to things we talked about, the issue you are encountering does not seem to be one people are running into universally.
Therefore, it’s probably not on our end. But if you try to get the show again and it still won’t download, I need you to be much more specific with how you’re trying to get the show in order for me to try and replicate the issue.
If I click on the “Click here to download” link in Firefox a file named “AnimeWorldOrder-2012-04-14-105.mp3” is downloaded. It’s 4.1K in size and contains PHP/HTML code. Same through IE or FeedReader (RSS downloader). [I am unable to replicate this in IE 7.0.5730.11 or Firefox 11.0 using Windows XP SP3. Do the other links work? Perhaps you’re using some sort of redirect blocking (plugin, antivirus, etc) that Libsyn doesn’t like? –Daryl]
Today with no changes on my machine I was able to download the MP3.
Had similar issues using Chrome and Firefox, but it worked fine with IE. Probably one of my antivirus plugins.
I was able to enjoy Badlands Rumble, and I’m taking the advice of the podcast: when I finally do watch Trigun in order, I will stop around episode 20.
[That’s not “the podcast’s” advice, it’s just Gerald’s. While I maintain the show is inconsistent, personally I (and well, most people) think Trigun TV ends quite strongly. –Daryl]
I couldn’t remember who said what.
Count me as one who doesn’t get the issue that people (that would be Gerald and Zac Bertschy) have with the wacky comedy jumping into darkness. I didn’t feel like it was jarring, but I have only watched Trigun about 1 1/3 times in my life, and not totally in order.
I felt like the darkness was always present in the show, and the comedy was just a mask.
i think that Trigun would be in my top 20.
I will not even address what was said about Cowboy Bebop, or I will have to flip a table, Welcome to the NHK style.
Gerald is def wrong with the “Ranma can’t be a gateway anime.” Although, I was inundated with anime all at the same time. With Ranma I started to seek out other shows (Trigun, other Rumiko works, and even things like Uzumaki). I still look fondly back at Ranma, but haven’t read it in a while so I’m not sure if it will engage me the way it used to.
Oh yeah, and the username I use today comes from my early fandom of Ranma. I even had a ranmamail.com email when that was a thing.
It’s also interesting to hear Gerald say that he liked the comedy more than the drama in Trigun. When I was introduced to Trigun, the person who showed it to me skipped many of the first episodes because of their silliness and said you didn’t necessarily need them for the plot. I loved the story of the two brothers striving to find their place among humans and Vash’s struggle to keep people happy for Rem while at the same time holding himself back from hurting even those who were dangerous.
I myself see this kind of struggle every day when dealing with family members or friends. I can relate to trying to keep everyone happy but finding people moving farther and farther apart even in violent ways. That’s what makes Vash a compelling hero to me: his desire for everyone to be happy and that despite all his physical power, it is hard to move people’s hearts away from their pain or resentment.
For me, the dramatic and serious parts are my favorite bits of the series. Whenever I show the DVDs to friends of mine, I do the same thing my friend did and tell them to skip the first few episodes. Eventually it’s fun to go back, but it does drag Vash around for awhile without accomplishing a lot.
As someone who checked out Trigun only a few months ago and dropped away after just a couple of episodes, this review definitely got me interested in seeing the movie. So good job!
With regards to Cowboy Bebop, I wonder how much of its status is due to the anime music fandom you guys discussed. I love the series, but then I’m extremely musically oriented, and probably 80% of what stuck with me from that series is Yoko Kanno’s amazing, haunting work on it. I have to say that the humor/drama balance in CB and what little of Trigun TV I watched is completely different. In Trigun the main character Vash is played for comedy quite often, while in CB most of the comedy is either “irony of life” or coming from Ed and Ein. I remember Trigun TV’s first episode being sort of a wacky slapstick sequence, while CB’s first episode has a very grim ending.
The plus side of never knowing when y’all will have time to record and upload an episode means that it always feels a treat when a new episode shows up in my itunes.
Thanks for making my afternoon!
A random thank you.
When I started listening to this podcast way back when, I’d never thought to look at who directed an anime, or what animation studio produced it. Amazing what a difference it made. In 2010, I was lucky enough to be responsible for deciding on the programming for a small anime convention’s video rooms. The theme? Director’s retrospectives on Katsuhiro Otomo, Mamoru Oshii, and Satoshi Kon. Lately I’ve been trying to introduce other fans I know to Studio 4°C…not sure if it made any difference ultimately, but I realized the difference.
Thanks, guys.
I kinda like your show.
But Daryl, you are probably the greatest asshole that I’ve ever heard. I hope you have several types of ass cancer and die painfully, not even being able to take a dump without the help of someone.
I don’t suppose you could elaborate upon why that is? I barely even spoke in this episode…
It’s the pheromones. A small segment of the population exeriences pheromones over the internet through their auditory nerves. JayZee is probably just confused by the rush of extreme emotions and sensations. That or he senses from your tone that you enthusiastically approve of illegal searches and seizures.
I guess it makes sense that someone you think is an asshole should get ass cancer.
I frequently have to remind myself that I don’t hate Trigun. It was a decent little show. I am with Gerald on the abrupt drama turn towards the end, but, given that it’s a development I don’t care for, there were many elements in the ending that were handled extremely well. Those freaking cosplayers, though. Such rage. Both the rage of the many near beanings by giant crosses of cardboard, and the many cheap, wrinkled red trenchcoats. Ew. I’ve seen a couple of decent looking Vashes (the secret is investing in the coat.), but I can’t remember a single effective Wolfwood cross. Even writing about it make my blood boil a little. It’s just because craft is so very important to me.
The other Trigun anecdate I have is that a friend’s father, a jazz musician, got completely addicted to Cowboy Bebop and wanted to watch more anime like it. Not knowing a lot of anime, she asked on lj for recommendations for him. People overwhelmingly suggested Trigun, y’know goofy space western. I suggested Castle of Cagliostro. They were wrong. I was right. I attribute this entirely to superior discernment on my part and not at all to the fact that everyone else was making a recommendation to a complete stranger while I was making a recommendation to a man I’ve known since I was 3. So, um, I guess this is relevent because Trigun, and also Trigun is a fairly narrow show compared to Bebop. While they frequently get lumped together, their styles are very different both in terms of art and storytelling, but also in terms of breadth of reference. I never got hugely into Bebop, but there are still scene and images that stick with me (beyond the fact that the pilot is Desperado). I enjoyed Trigun while I watched it, but it didn’t feel connected to Westerns for all that there was plenty of Western slapped all over the place.
My advice on panels is pick a topic so obscure that you can say whatever the hell you want, and no one will be able to contradict you. This may limit the appeal of your panel.
Why does the e-mail notification say this?
“They had this to say about Robocop:”
Am I better off not knowing?
So I got blocked by Toshio Okada for pointing out that he’s calling people who stream criminals while he worked for a company which didn’t think it needed to pay taxes, and which didn’t seem to care about “copyright infringement” when it came to Daicon IV and Otaku No Video. Now, I don’t really have a good reason for posting this here of all places. But I just wanted to let everyone know and see that I had an interaction with someone in the industry, even if the result was that they blocked all further communication from me. Which seems to happen quite a bit to me for underlying reasons I won’t bother to consider in detail.
Yes, why did you post this here?
Well, while you’re here, why don’t you copy and paste EXACTLY what you said to him to get blocked. I wonder if you perceive yourself as calmly expressing constructive criticism when you probably sent him 10 tweets badgering him.
People who stream content which doesn’t belong to them and they get paid off of it are straight up criminals. If they don’t, they’re still breaking copyright laws– a criminal offense. Just because you can say “gotcha” to this dude doesn’t mean his point isn’t any less valid.
I’m really glad you replied to this guy. I completely skimmed his remark when it first posted, and I missed just how hilarious it was.
I’m not entirely sure this was a genuine post ^_^ but I responded to some of these issues here.
I didn’t discuss the tax evasion issue, but, as others have pointed out, it occurred several years after Okada left the company.
Here’s a take nobody has ever seemed to look at. I’m not at all concerned about the question of ‘borrowing’ all the various I.P. seen in the Daicon IV film as produced by General Products/Daicon Film. As you say, that’s seen as similar to dojinshi. Cool.
What I want to know is, did they pay JASRAC the proper licensing fee for the use of ELO’s ‘Twilight’? the film was shown before a crowd which makes it a public performance in the eyes of the music industry, and that requires paying fees. We’re not even in the territory of asking if they had written permission from ELO.
And nowhere NEAR the discussion of putting the film with the music on VHS, Beta and LD. Even if it wasn’t ‘officially’ sold and was treated as a ‘bonus service’ item when one bought an art book.
THAT would be interesting to know. 🙂
I’m sure people have wondered about this very topic ^_^ Interestingly, Yasuhiro Takeda has written about filling out JASRAC paperwork for another event at Daicon IV–namely, the Osaka Philharmonic’s performance of a suite of SF themes.
I found AWO January of this year, and it revitalized my passion for learning about the anime and manga that I’ve enjoyed so much over the years. Now I’ve listened to every show, and just wanted to say thank you for being awesome!
On an aside, I’m sure you’ve heard about the unfortunate passing of the legendary Noboru Ishiguro (director of Macross, Yamato, Megazone, LoGH and many others). I was really looking forward to seeing him at Animazement this year, and hearing him talk about his experiences working on these shows, but I guess it wasn’t to be.
On a lighter note, Ichiro Itano will be attending in his place. I now have a mission. Ichiro Itano is of course most famous for his action sequences in different anime works (Macross being one of them) and most recently worked on the Asura’s Wrath video game (basically a cross between Berserk, Gunbuster and FotNS… pretty effin’ awesome). He also co-wrote a manga called Angel Cop, AND wrote/directed the OVA. This show is his brain child. I legitimately love that anime. Guarantee nobody asks about Angel Cop. Nobody. So I will! I am going to dress up as Raiden (shirtless biker mode) and present him my original Episode 5 script for signing (that sucker was hard to find!), and have a list of questions prepared. I’m a nobody, and I may not be able to get any of them answered, but dammit it’s worth a shot! Wish me luck.
I’ve got to disagree a little with Daryl’s analysis of why 3D does not work in anime. I do agree that it often looks wrong when they reduce the number of frames to match the frame rate of the hand drawn animation, but I do not agree that Tezuka’s limited animation techniques result in 3D looking wonky. I think that the problem with 3D in anime is more due to a failure to utilize the same limited animation techniques, producing an inconsistency in the way things move. Part of the technique for reducing animation is to limit how much things actually move on screen apart from panning or sliding, so you have characters that stand pretty still and only move a little or in short bursts, unless its an action scene where the motion is really central to what is going on. Long sweeping motions that would require tons of tweening would just be avoided. Since its easy to animate smooth motion in 3D, its tempting to use it to show movement that would have been avoided in 2D, but then you have the problem where moving it too smoothly stands out but using too few frames also looks wrong. If movements that required a huge amount of tweening were avoided, even in 3D, then I think it would fit in better.
This is probably splitting hairs a little, but I am pretty interested in cel-shaded 3D, so wanted to give my thoughts. Good episode!
I think 3d tends to work well in anime for the same reason it works well in live action: when the crew knows how to employ it correctly. Even with early, “chunky” CG effects, there were those who had a better time of integrating those effects.
It’s certainly going to take more time there.
It’s vey late at night now but I noticed this wasn’t in the review index. [Fixed it, thanks! –Daryl]
The Humanoid Typhoon dropped by the Philippines recently. Made quite a mess.