VFTF1

Well - I'm back from my Christmas present to my girlfriend (took her on an all expenses paid new years trip to Berlin with shopping and sight-seeing thrown into the batch!). She's a happy girl We actually didn't so much sight-see as we visited a few museums - she's a big fan of Helmut Newton's work/life and his stuff was on display amongst other things. Anyways, we checked out a couple of hobby/comic shops for the present she promised me (something hobby/anime related and top tier) - but honestly I just couldn't find anything that I really wanted...soooo.... in the end - she suggestively decided to get me this instead: Now - this thing thing is awesome It goes perfectly with my clothes, I like how it feels, and it looks cool I'm not one for playing or fiddling with all the gizmos - but as far as designer watches go, I'm a happy guy Can't wait for my birthday in just a bit over a month! Woot! Pete

Zoooooooooooooooo..... Just watched episodes 18 and 19...and 17. I skipped 16 altogether (as soon as I saw that it was the compilation/review episode)... Some thoughts: 1. I hope that Yoko was the only one who didn't change radically - I can imagine that she ventured off into the desert to continue living just as before. I wonder WHY exactly everyone else settled on the political life rather than the poetic life and only she was smart enough to take the latter choice? In any event - I miss her - but I'm happy she isn't being corrupted by the city like the rest of the crew... 2. Simon seems to have done a pretty good job building peace - after all, while everyone suddenly gets peeved at him for being too hotheaded and charging in and causing damage during the Anti-Spiral attacks, you have to admit that he has achieved very very much over the course of 7 years of his rule. A pity that we do not see any "political capital" from this achievement - don't people like him at all for liberating them and for ruling over seven years of steady prosperity? Or do people forget so quickly that they had nothing, and now complain that they have "not enough" and therefore Simon has no "political capital" beyond his status as a legendary hero (which is immediately tarnished as people see him in action; and see that his legend is not so perfect). 3. Forehead - Riouu... well... he grew up to be an a$$ like his dad. Go figure. 4. Nia's "transformation" is a bit too sudden - and a bit too convenient. But then again, I guess it's at least in line with her character being so full of surprises. 5. Kitan's sister who loves Forehead so much as to strap a bomb to her waiste - or maybe she believes in what forehead is doing? In any event - she's changed. Oh - speaking of change... It's hard to come to grips with how much the characters have changed; but then again, if you look back at your own life and compare yourself to how you were 7 years or 10 years ago - then it sinks in that people do really change in time... so - I guess the series has to be praised. Still - it's kind of sad to see how far things have come. The only thing - ironically - that made me happy - was seeing Lord Genome "brought back" - he had a wisdom, a nobility and a sadness to him that went unexplored in his role as "the main bad guy" - and it was most obvious in how he dealt with his henchment. Cytomander and Adiene were just megalomaniacal psychotics and he dealt with them lowly. The Armodillo beastman was a wise old animal, and so Genome respected and even slightly feared him. Viral - on the other hand - was above all an honorable and loyal servant - and so he was given honor by Genome. Not bad. My point is that Genome was not arbitrary nor unitary in how he dealt with others. He even respected Simon...and warned him where this power would take him... Very interesting... There is however - one 'good' thing in Simon's fall from power: namely he has always been in his element as a rebel; government did not suit him. Perhaps now that he is a criminal then he will be better able to "fight the power." Well - in any event... the show has definitely taken a twist. Yoko's boobs are no where to be seen. And Nia doesn't wear those short short mini skirts any more. All that is left is Ron and his ice cream... Pete

Sorry to say but... That movie Prime is STILL a dissapointment. I mean - it looks nothing like the CG rendering and the comparisson pic just underscores that. It's like - if I put a blue beach ball on the left of the CG rendering and then a red beachball with blue highlights and flames on the right and said "hey now - that beachball on the right looks like Prime!" - it would be the same. It's just so annoying. The usual hope is that TROF Prime is mistransformed and looking at those arms he well could be - then again, I thought the same might hold true for 25th Cheetor... So - maybe I shouldn't be complaining. With MP and Henkei, there's nothing for me to wine about. Animated is also pretty good. TROF so far is shaping up to be just as weak a line as the original movie line. Sigh... Oh well.. I'm content. Instead of TROF I'll just go Beast Wars II and Neo hunting some more... Pete

Yamato should surprise us all by releasing action figures that are poseable of the human and Zendradi cast of the shows they have licenses for. Pete

That's because the topic title is so wierd. Macross Saga "based" movie?... I think I remember reading this thread, but I forgot what it said and am too lazy to go re-read it Pete

Anybody got pictures of the Macross chopsticks? I didn't know they existed, and they would be very useful Pete

Well - not completely. We have the works of Plato's contemporaries; the most important of which is Xenophon (read Xenophon's rendition of the Apology; it is a radically different version of the events than what Plato presents). Xenophon's Dialogues give us a highly different account of Socrates; which we can consider as a commentary to Plato's works. We also have Aristophanes' Clouds, which you mentioned, which is another commentary by one of Plato's contemporaries. I would just add that it is impossible for "any view of Plato" to be conditioned by Neo-Platonism. Xenophon's view of Plato, as well as Aristophanes' view of Plato, could not have been conditioned by "Neo-Platonism, since there was no such thing as "Neo-Platonism" in either of their writings. Edit: Oh..err..and of course we have the works of Aristotle - who was Plato's student... that's a very good example of how Plato's works were initially recieved. As usual, the cause of the confusion is probably my inability to write coherently, for which I apologize. So - here I go trying to explain myself (again): Yes, we are talking about subs. But subs do not exist in a vacuum. They always accompany the original visual and audio presentation. Ergo - good subs ought to take into account what is being said, and what the situation is. This is not contradictory to the principle of being literal, since "literal" does not mean, in the case of anime "to the letter," because there are - for the most part - no letters in anime, but rather dialogue which is spoken. If we were translating a book, where EVERYTHING (even context) arises from letters; then yes - we would have to be "to the letter." However, since we are talking about subs for anime, which is an audio and visual presentation, then in order for the subs to be "literal" they need to accord with the whole of what is being presented (this means four elements: the words themselves, the tone/emotion in which they are spoken, the character speaking and the situation). My comparisson to Shakespeare was specific because Shakespeare's plays are written to be performed. As such, when translating them, we need to look at the words as a theater artist would look at them. Good theater artists do not read plays with their eyes - instead - they read plays aloud, with actors speaking the lines. They do this in order to get a grasp of the theatricality of the material. Ergo - if we are going to translate Shakespeare's plays, we must see them not as merely words on a page, but rather - the words are meant to be spoken and acted - and the translation must try to take this into account. It is somewhat pointless to keep trying to find more and more arcane and remote idioms with which to try to demonstrate to me that their literal translation will not always make immediate sense, because I never denied this. My only point was to say that I prefer a literal translation of idioms which does not make sense and therefore compels me to ask "what is the sense of this idiom for the particular language that it comes from" rather than having the idiom translated into some english language equivalent which is immediately perceptible. I would rather sit there wondering what someone could have meant by calling someone else a mythical carp with the head of a lion and the body of a fish than getting an interpretive translation which results in a familiar english language idiom. I would not recommend starting from Being and Time. If anything, try and get a hold of Heidegger's book(s) called "Nietzsche" which is a series of interpretive lectures on the works of Nietzsche. These will get you accustomed to Heidegger's specific way of looking at things and his particular vocabulary with which he tends to grasp at things. Because Nietzsche's work is so poetically accessible, then Heidegger is forced to be "more accessible" in discussing them - since he must always reference them, than Heidegger usually is when simply writing about his own ideas. Pete

Maya was just being hysterical as usual Pete

I never got the impression that Asuka died. I simply got the impression that her EVA was mangled, and I imagine she simply passed out from the experience. But I didn't notice that her arm was split, or that her eye was bleeding, or that her intenstines were hanging out. I simply noticed that these things happened to EVA-02, and Asuka covered her eye, and grabbed her stomach in pain etc. I imagine the mental shock of the nerve connection - and feeling all of EVA-02's pain led her to go into a trauma induced state of unconsciousness and perhaps even to "think" that she was dead. But - this doesn't mean she died. I mean - EVA-01 smashed EVA-04's head, but Toshi didn't have his skull bashed in because of it. Pete

I don't think so... although I'm completely unfamiliar with what being a "Neo-Platonist" entails (I know what Plato wrote that Socrates said, but I don't have a clue what "Neo-Platonism" entails). In any case, my view differs from Socrates insofar as Socrates contended that the things existed "Kath Alto" (the ancient Greek for "As such" (aka "alone" or without intermediary) and physical objects were always becoming (between being and not being) and at best reflected the thing itself which was pure Being. My view differs from this insofar as, like I wrote, I think that the path to a thing is in its' grasping, which is a process by which we uncover it - yet in the process - also cover it again (because our grasping disfigures the thing, although without grasping it, we don't even know it is there). If anything, my view is therefore closer to the evil Martin Heidegger. Edit: Gubaba: I strongly (and respectfully) disagree. Do you think that a translation of Shakespeare's plays can not take into account how the "voice actress" is going to handle the words? A good dub - if we are going to have dubs - must take this into consideration, ergo a good translation for a dub must take this into consideration. Pete

From conjecture Just like 99% of everything that I write As for the Rei Soul Harvester. It seemed to me, judging by how everyone else was turned into LCL, that the process was initiated, and everyone saw an image of someone they loved - basically making their reduction to LCL "pleasant" - or rather dulling the fear, showing them, that indeed they are evolving to something better - happier. Misato's body was seen being torn in half by the explosion - we saw that. I don't think Rei could have harvested her soul if she were already dead. Also, if she was turned into LCL (which I equate to be the physical representation of being harvested), then we wouldn't have seen her body being ripped in half by the explosion. Ritsuka was dead long before Rei appeared before her - even if the gunshot didn't kill her, she had enough time to drown. Sorry to sound so morbid; but I don't think - I can't fathom - that NGE would just end on a retcon of "and now everyone is alive." Also - my point about "all dead people from the past" can be put differently: For example - what if, far away from the battle, some people died naturally, in their homes, on the street, in the office - just part of life...the day before Instrumentality. Are we to presume that they were also harvested? If so - then the question arises - so where is the "cut off point?" If you die five minutes before Insttrumentality (Ritsuko) and still get harvested and get to come back, then does that mean that people who died 24 hours prior to Instrumentality also get the same chance? If so - then how far back can it go? A week before? A year? A century? A few hundred thousand years? It seems to me that Neon Genesis Evangelon has a clearly Aristotelian view of the soul - meaning Anthropomorphic. The soul in NGE is part of the body. Without the body - or at least without the physical chemical components that make up the distinct human person - there is no soul. Ergo - if someone died prior to Instrumentality - they are simply dead. Perhaps they too can be reduced to LCL - but the LCL is simply the liquid form of a dead body as opposed to a living one. It is no longer human in the full sense. Also - as I wrote above - if we can accept that turning the dead into LCL suddenly gives their souls the chance to come back - then clearly the transformation to LCL would become an avenue towards immortality for humans. If someone died - you could rush them to NERV, turn them into LCL goop and then "recover them" (if their souls wanted to come back) - and hey presto - they'd be alive. This would clearly be ridiculous, and nowhere in NGE is it shown that this is even a possibility. Pete

If Bandai is going to make chunky MF toys, they could at least use the chunkiness to their advantage. Make the Macross Quarter like a big Teddy-Ruxpin toy. Sell it with a retro tape with Ranka's songs on it. Put the tape in, press play, and the Quarter will sing Aimo for us. Pete

Gubaba - I hate to burst your bubble - but there was a Rei the size of the planet Earth over every human being - living and dead - and unless we accept that every single person whose bones were buried in the ground since the first homo sapiens walked the Earth was harvested into LCL and now gets to choose to come back or not, then we have to accept that... Misato is dead Hate to be the bearer of bad news - but it just seems logical to me... sad, but logical. Pete

I think this depends on the Japanese understanding of "God" - and what that entails.... Which I don't know anything about - but we'd certainly have to know what the concept means to them to get a grasp of what Fuyutsuki was saying... As for whether Misato and everyone else who was killed prior to the onset of Instrumentality can "come back" (aka prior to the transformation of everyone into LCL)... I don't know.... but I think that not really. LCL is simply the primordial liquid form of a human being as he is "now." Aka - if a 15 year old who is healthy is turned into LCL he can come back/be brought back (barring any malfunctions/failures) and will return as a healthy 15 year old. He cannot - for instance - be brought back as a 45 year old with a potbelly. Genetic manipulation and the transformation between LCL and "regular" human form are two different things. Conesquently; Misato's body can indeed be brought back - technically - although it is questionable whether her soul/consciousness is still around to make that choice. To put it another way: Being turned into LCL is NOT the same as dying. Transformation into LCL is the evolution of life towards something more perfect. Death is simply death - and - barring the existence of an afterlife - it is finite. Ergo - I conjecture that - sadly (because I loved her) - Misato is simply dead. As is Ritsuko and all of the other people who died in the battle prior to LCL transformation. This also goes for people who, for instance, died of natural causes the day before. After all - people in their graves are not turning into LCL and suddenly chosing to be reborn. And - the choice to return to individuality from LCL is not coequal with immortality. Shinji and Asuka, who returned from LCL, will eventually die of old age or other causes - just like the rest of us. Pete

Wasn't there some other Japanese anime with naked pilots? Pete

How did you know that the EVA-02 SOC is what I'm dreaming of??? Pete

Well, even though I share Valkyrie Addicts view of ass,and voted for ass ftw, I think that in all fairness to boobies, there is PLENTY you can do with them other than just stare. Of course, the question is in many ways kind of terrible because it's like asking whether we prefer to live with only a right arm or only a left arm... Obviously great pleasure can be had from both - my vote was cast on the basis of the thought that one is talking about a woman who offers both, but I still have to choose which one I prefer a bit more. And I see I'm in the minority...again! Pete

Gubaba: Actually, the most obvious objection to me is that flesh itself - embodiment - is also a falsification of a person - pretty much on the same level as a painting. But again, maybe now the word "falsification" is falsifying the thing I'm trying to get at: I am by no means contending that there exists outside of the realm of language (or painting or flesh) something "truth" as such - because to a great extent, the truth of things is dependent on their grasping; and language (like painting and flesh) bring them closer to hand. So of course, it would be just as "false" to claim that we would be closer to "the truth" if we stripped things bear - of art, language, flesh etc - as it is false to claim that we have grasped the truth when covering things with art, language, flesh etc. In short; my view is not static, but rather I see a dynamic at work; and I find subs, particularly literal subs, more revealing of this dynamic, whereas dubs, particularly interpretive dubs, cover more than they reveal. As for the contention that we're talking about merely scripts - I disagree. The subs in an anime always come with the original voice work; and in the case of good anime - that means with original very good, emotive and pronounced voice work. Also - there are facial expressions and various forms of animation which convey feelings and moods. All of this comes together and I enjoy watching, listening and reading it. To go back to Macross Plus - remember when Guld and Mung were on the mountain -Star hill wasn't it called? - and they were talking. There is a scene where Mung hestitates in the original Japanese and it is OBVIOUS from her tone of voice that she is embarrassed (possibly at admitting that she gave up singing) - or at least that's how I felt watching the original Japanese. In the sub version - it's totally different. The embarassment is not conveyed by the voice actor - we only see it in the animation (when she hesitates) - but the hesitation is not matched by the voice acting. To me - this is a touching scene in the original Japanese which was ruined by the dubs. Again - I agree with Kieth who noted that subbed works are not just about texts, but about also having access to sounds, tones and experiencing the work more naturally. Pete

Oh I agree that nobody should be forced to suffer through what happens to bring me pleasure. I think I've been pretty careful to make it clear that I am not arguing that there should only be literal translations; I'm simply a) stating my preference and b) giving my reasons. I also understand the "entertainment" argument - but I agree with Kieth that it's better to listen to the emotions/intonation in the original Japanese. Even if I probably am missing 99% of the meaning - even in the sound of someone's voice - then I still get the feeling that the characters are more vibrant and alive. And just to repeat - I am basing all of this off of having only ONCE watched a dub - of Macross Plus - and that was just a terrible experience for me Well, the words we use in introducing ourselves do not contain the characteristics of the things they supposedly signify; although they often contain allusions based on conventions springing from multiple uses of the word. This goes for all words. (although I grant that there are those who disagree with me for a completely different reason than you - namely; others would say that words do not signify things; and that there are actually no things beyond words - they would argue that words give birth to meaning rather than signifying it - something I disagree with; but as with all things - there is never going to be a consensus. Yes - I think this sounds very lovely. It makes it seem like people in Japan just talk in arcane poetic verse It's great. Thank you for sharing this, Pete

My choices - despite all of my moaning and whining in the DX toy thread were: 1) FAN! 2) Buy all of them 3) Ass FTW Pete

Fine, fine. I'm still getting mine after all... Don't have the skill to paint the durned model anyways... and I guess if that cockpit placement in Battroid mode is just Kawamori's crazy idea then yeah - can't blame Bandai. I've now moved into the "acceptance" phase and will be happy to have these DXs when they arrive....though I would really love a custom Mikhael with speakers and little Ranka figure which can sing songs:) Pete

Words are lies insofar as they always fall short of signifying the things they aim to describe and often times cover the chasm between the thing and the word. If we are conscious of this, then we are at least true in our lies. If we are not conscious of it, then we lie even when we tell the truth. My pot dealer comes from Germany; albeit I have momentarily forgotten what city. Will let you know when I remember to look it up. As to the idioms - thank you for clearing up their meaning. However, please note that in doing so, you only prove my point - which is that I am very interested in literal translations in order to uncover the strangeness of a different language and learn a new way of thinking that has been covered up by words which I use in my language. The fact that I never would have concieved such idioms in english, or would have trouble deducing the meaning of such idioms were they presented in english merely demonstrates that english language/grammar have burdened me and made it impossible to see things differently. As for hajimemashite meaning "this is the first time" - I think that is a very beautiful greeting. I also agree that it would be good for me to try to learn Japanese. Perhaps one day I will try to study this language - but as I grow older, I grow more lazy and fall deeper into set patterns and habits. Doing something new is hard. Maybe with the new year, I'll find the time and energy to do it. Pete

I agree with Valkyrie Addict. As much as I love Yamato and as much as I defend their prices I would really have had nothing against being shown by Bandai that a superior sculpt and finish is possible at a good price. And what did Bandai show me? Bandai basically said: "Well kid, it's like this. Yamato takes Macross very seriously, and they want lots of money for it. We on the other hand just want lots of money." Pete

I'm trying, but Yoko crying over his memory isn't helping because it's like I wrote earlier - this bravado leads to death which is not just bad for the dying person, but leaves great sadness in the hearts of those who loved him I'm done with 9 and 10 now and I'm STILL sad Although -Princess Nia is a ray of hope and sunshine. Also, Viral's honor and devotion are very note worthy. But Princess Nia is very very very wise and a ray of light. One other thing - from the beginning - this series has reminded me of Mad Max - it's like Mad Max only better; more - it's exactly the way life should be. I love how the Gai Gurren Brigade has slowly come together, how everyone is important and how there's now a ship with a community. The old man's cooking... all of it - a bunch of little things... Oh - and I also note that the brigade has had a beast on its' side from the very beginning - I wonder if Boota will play any more significant role in the future...? But for now I'm sad. The hero character is not supposed to die 8 episodes in.. he's supposed to die at least two years after the pilot and two season and then return to life in the third season anyways.... Kamina was so cool. Pete

Hello. I have given up all hope in the DX now that there are pictures and have some questions about the 1/72 model, just to be sure: 1) Is it basically the same as a Mastergrade Gundam in terms of durability, complexity, detail and color finish? 2) It's snap fit right? 3) Are the yellow/red stripes applied watermark decals? 4) Do I HAVE to paint it? Will it look really ugly if I don't? I don't paint my Gundams and they don't look ugly to me... 5) I've seen pictures of an upcoming Luca - so is it safe to assume they're working on Mikhael and there will hopefully be more coming up? Thanks Pete