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ONE PIECE #608 - - Special Review

Posted by Unknown | Thursday, August 22, 2013
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ONE PIECE #608 - - Special Review



Well, as far as earning ‘antipathy points’ for your villain goes, you
can’t do much than having the baddie just ignore an assassin while he’s on a phone
call. I don’t know if the would-be avenger with the arsenal of ‘finger guns’
was introduced prior to this, or if Oda just pulled her out of the ol’ rabbit
hat, but the scene of her thwarted vengeance distills the distinct and
contradictory nature of the show nicely. It makes me think of the whole bloodied
smiley face visual metaphor from WATCHMEN, actually.

No bones about it, the character and the scene she’s in are patently
ridiculous. Like, it’s just free-association absurdity. Yet, there is still
an undeniably tragic pathos in her tearful, desperate attempt to avenge her boyfriend.
It’s just pushing on a lot different buttons at once - - playing like the
sickest black humor gag and the most exaggeratedly-rendered human drama -
- and I guess a lack of hesitation about
blurring lines is what ultimately defines ONE PIECE.

== TEASER ==

If I remark on this every episode, from one angle or another, it’s
because I’ll never get used to this show’s tone.

Now, some of you have lunatics have been rather insistently teasing me
about how Luffy’s eventually going to get madder than we’ve ever seen him after he
learns about something horrible that Caesar’s done. Considering how this
episode ends with an unusually understated cliffhanger revealing that the dragon
is actually the samurai’s mutated son (after we’ve watched that samurai
brutally pummel the dragon, no less) I’ll go ahead and point my nose to
that as the surest candidate for this forthcoming, unforgivable transgression.

Which probably means that the dragon’s going to die next episode… and
that’s is just as tragi-diculous as the scene with ‘gun hand’.

Watch this
episode, "A Mastermind Underground! Doflamingo Makes
His Move!” here and decide for yourself, then read my comments
about the previous episode here.

About the Author

Tom Pinchuk’s a writer and personality with a large number of comics, videos and features like this to his credit. Visit his website - - tompinchuk.com - - and follow his Twitter: @tompinchuk







ONE PIECE #608 - - Special Review

Posted by : Unknown
Date :Thursday, August 22, 2013
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HUNTER X HUNTER #2 - - Watch & Learn

Posted by Unknown | Wednesday, August 21, 2013
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HUNTER X HUNTER #2 - - Watch & Learn



As I’ve mentioned, my re-visit of DBZ is coming to an end soon. I’ve
been eying at FIST OF THE NORTH STAR as a replacement for W&L, already, of
course. However, as I’ve mentioned, it’s tough to resist when there are so many
shows just sitting there, waiting for instant streaming… so here we are.

You lunatics have been insistently recommending HUNTER X HUNTER to me.
First, while I was watching Togashi’s other epic (my beloved YU YU HAKUSHO),
and then any time I’ve ever griped about the quality of any current, long
running shonen. There’s something appealing about it being the ‘best kept
secret’ in anime, right now. I mean, it’s been trucking along steadily
for however many episodes, yet somehow not getting nearly as much as fanfare as ONE
PIECE, TORIKO, FAIRY TAIL, et al.

== TEASER ==

Of course, if I’ve being totally honest, I feel like I’m trying to like
this show in spite of itself. It’s a very specific quality to quantify, I
realize, but this feels like Togashi’s honed the storytelling fundamentals of
shonen so well that he can maintain audience interest even when the actual
ingredients of the show aren’t actually that compelling. Like, there’s really nothing
that memorable about Gon and his cohorts. Weirdly, they almost look like the
mascots of some junior appliance line at IKEA (as bizarre as that sounds) - -
cartoons that are as basically appealing as they are inoffensive.

At the same time, however, the whole trial of virtue that our heroes
pass in this episode was actually a well-constructed ‘Riddle of the Sphinx’
scene. Also, the concluding chase/battle with the monsters was making the
needle on the ol’ ‘thrill meter’ dance properly - - even if the critters didn’t
seem to fit that cohesively into this world. I’m not excited about coming back
for episode 3, but I am intrigued to watch it, neverthless, so I suppose that’s
Togashi’s aforementioned invisible craft at work?

Watch this episode, “Test x Of
x Tests" here and decide for
yourself, then read my comments on the previous episode here.

About the Author

Tom Pinchuk’s a writer and personality with a large number of comics, videos and features like this to his credit. Visit his website - - tompinchuk.com - - and follow his Twitter: @tompinchuk







HUNTER X HUNTER #2 - - Watch & Learn

Posted by : Unknown
Date :Wednesday, August 21, 2013
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Anime Questions Answered!!! -- 8/19/12 -- THE VICE PIT

Posted by Unknown |
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Anime Questions Answered!!! -- 8/19/12 -- THE VICE PIT



Recent Vice Pit sessions on...

Recent sessions in Vice Pit: Undercover...

You can check out every episode of the Vice Pit here.

Be sure to submit questions and topics for a future Vice Pit session here. We will answer them!








Anime Questions Answered!!! -- 8/19/12 -- THE VICE PIT

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ATTACK ON TITAN #18 - - Watch & Learn

Posted by Unknown | Tuesday, August 20, 2013
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ATTACK ON TITAN #18 - - Watch & Learn



So we’ve got Eren, Armin and Erwin, now? Wonderful. They won’t be hard
to mix up in dialog, at all.

This episode puts a fine point on why I had less patience for the
amount of ‘tactical exposition’ we’ve had to sit through over the past few
episodes (and why I have less patience for any serious discussion of power
levels, in general). Levi has an absolutely lucid strategy, here, luring
the female Titan into the forest. The 3D gear is all-but-useless on an open
field with nothing elevated to grapple onto, and the Titans have a much greater
advantage there, because they have plenty of room to move around in and an
unobstructed view to spot humans.

In the logic of the story, the team should have completely switched the
balance of this battle to their favor by changing the location. Instead, the show just junks that for the sake of the story. We see
the Female Titan continue to stalk our heroes with just as much as ease,
swatting guardsmen like flies and plowing through giant evergreens like they
were made of cardboard.

== TEASER ==

On the one hand, that bolsters TITAN as a horror. The Titans get the same kind of menace that Jason Voorhees and the Terminator exude when they
just shrug off any number of death traps that should’ve killed them.

On the
other hand, it makes it harder not to see how irrelevant all the screen time
devoted to 'shop talk' is. I knew that
when they were laying out all the attack plans for the last battle. You only
show the heroes succeeding, hypothetically, because you’re then going to show
them failing when they actually go ahead with it.

Well, I’ve already seen this trick before, so it’s harder for me to sit patiently while it's set-up a second or third time.

Watch this
episode, "Forest of Giant Trees -
57th Expedition Beyond the Walls" here and decide for yourself, then read
my write-up on the previous episode here.

About the Author

Tom Pinchuk’s a writer and personality with a large number of comics, videos and features like this to his credit. Visit his website - - tompinchuk.com - - and follow his Twitter: @tompinchuk







ATTACK ON TITAN #18 - - Watch & Learn

Posted by : Unknown
Date :Tuesday, August 20, 2013
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ATTACK ON TITAN #18 - - Watch & Learn

Posted by Unknown |
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ATTACK ON TITAN #18 - - Watch & Learn



So we’ve got Eren, Armin and Erwin, now? Wonderful. They won’t be hard
to mix up in dialog, at all.

This episode puts a fine point on why I had less patience for the
amount of ‘tactical exposition’ we’ve had to sit through over the past few
episodes (and why I have less patience for any serious discussion of power
levels, in general). Levi has an absolutely lucid strategy, here, luring
the female Titan into the forest. The 3D gear is all-but-useless on an open
field with nothing elevated to grapple onto, and the Titans have a much greater
advantage there, because they have plenty of room to move around in and an
unobstructed view to spot humans.

In the logic of the story, the team should have completely switched the
balance of this battle to their favor by changing the location. Instead, the show just junks that for the sake of the story. We see
the Female Titan continue to stalk our heroes with just as much as ease,
swatting guardsmen like flies and plowing through giant evergreens like they
were made of cardboard.

== TEASER ==

On the one hand, that bolsters TITAN as a horror. The Titans get the same kind of menace that Jason Voorhees and the Terminator exude when they
just shrug off any number of death traps that should’ve killed them.

On the
other hand, it makes it harder not to see how irrelevant all the screen time
devoted to 'shop talk' is. I knew that
when they were laying out all the attack plans for the last battle. You only
show the heroes succeeding, hypothetically, because you’re then going to show
them failing when they actually go ahead with it.

Well, I’ve already seen this trick before, so it’s harder for me to sit patiently while it's set-up a second or third time.

Watch this
episode, "Forest of Giant Trees -
57th Expedition Beyond the Walls" here and decide for yourself, then read
my write-up on the previous episode here.

About the Author

Tom Pinchuk’s a writer and personality with a large number of comics, videos and features like this to his credit. Visit his website - - tompinchuk.com - - and follow his Twitter: @tompinchuk







ATTACK ON TITAN #18 - - Watch & Learn

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FIST OF THE NORTH STAR #2 - - Watch & Learn

Posted by Unknown | Monday, August 19, 2013
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FIST OF THE NORTH STAR #2 - - Watch & Learn



Since I’ll be wrapping up the Saiyan Saga soon, I’ve already started
thinking which classic series to re-visit after DBZ. Of course, I’m in
impatient guy and Hulu’s instant streaming makes it hard to resist my
entertainment impulses… so I went ahead and picked FIST OF THE NORTH STAR up
again.

Amusingly enough, I didn’t realize that Toei produced this show - -
meaning it’s part a lineage of top shonens which went into DRAGON BALL,
and then continued up into ONE PIECE before its current permutation in TORIKO.
Considering how Toriko himself seem likes Ken in Goku’s uniform, I’m also
starting to understand the shonen formula a little more holistically. There’s
probably some greater point about Japanese pop culture which can be read into
here (how the hyper-masculinity of a more grounded series like GOLGO 13 eventually mixed with the high fantasy of a show like VOLTRON, for one)… but we’ll hold
off on that for now. == TEASER ==

As Sam and I both mention in the Vice Pit episode running today, there’s
something fundamentally appealing about the clear simplicity of the morality
plays in this show. I get the feeling that this comes from the more episodic
era of anime TV, before there was this insistence on advancing a macro plot with
every single installment. I figure that, much like how GALAXY EXPRESS 999 episodes fit
into five or six basic plots, the typical structure of FIST episodes will start
to get very familiar, very fast.

(Of course, what’s amusing is that, while 999 more or less kept
confronting Tetsuro with injustices that he just had to learn to accept, FIST
confronts Kenshiro with injustices that he’ll always deal outrageously bloody
retribution upon. At least that’s how it seems to be…)

What can I say, though? Skulls collapsing, heads exploding and organs rupturing
will never, ever get old for me.

Watch this
episode, “The Fist of Lingering Regret and
Certain Death!! The Future is sighted in the Barren Wasteland!!" here and
decide for yourself, then read my comments on the previous episode .

About the Author

Tom Pinchuk’s a writer and personality with a large number of comics, videos and features like this to his credit. Visit his website - - tompinchuk.com - - and follow his Twitter: @tompinchuk







FIST OF THE NORTH STAR #2 - - Watch & Learn

Posted by : Unknown
Date :Monday, August 19, 2013
With 0comments
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FIST OF THE NORTH STAR #2 - - Watch & Learn

Posted by Unknown |
Read more »



Anime Vice News Feed





FIST OF THE NORTH STAR #2 - - Watch & Learn



Since I’ll be wrapping up the Saiyan Saga soon, I’ve already started
thinking which classic series to re-visit after DBZ. Of course, I’m in
impatient guy and Hulu’s instant streaming makes it hard to resist my
entertainment impulses… so I went ahead and picked FIST OF THE NORTH STAR up
again.

Amusingly enough, I didn’t realize that Toei produced this show - -
meaning it’s part a lineage of top shonens which went into DRAGON BALL,
and then continued up into ONE PIECE before its current permutation in TORIKO.
Considering how Toriko himself seem likes Ken in Goku’s uniform, I’m also
starting to understand the shonen formula a little more holistically. There’s
probably some greater point about Japanese pop culture which can be read into
here (how the hyper-masculinity of a more grounded series like GOLGO 13 eventually mixed with the high fantasy of a show like VOLTRON, for one)… but we’ll hold
off on that for now. == TEASER ==

As Sam and I both mention in the Vice Pit episode running today, there’s
something fundamentally appealing about the clear simplicity of the morality
plays in this show. I get the feeling that this comes from the more episodic
era of anime TV, before there was this insistence on advancing a macro plot with
every single installment. I figure that, much like how GALAXY EXPRESS 999 episodes fit
into five or six basic plots, the typical structure of FIST episodes will start
to get very familiar, very fast.

(Of course, what’s amusing is that, while 999 more or less kept
confronting Tetsuro with injustices that he just had to learn to accept, FIST
confronts Kenshiro with injustices that he’ll always deal outrageously bloody
retribution upon. At least that’s how it seems to be…)

What can I say, though? Skulls collapsing, heads exploding and organs rupturing
will never, ever get old for me.

Watch this
episode, “The Fist of Lingering Regret and
Certain Death!! The Future is sighted in the Barren Wasteland!!" here and
decide for yourself, then read my comments on the previous episode .

About the Author

Tom Pinchuk’s a writer and personality with a large number of comics, videos and features like this to his credit. Visit his website - - tompinchuk.com - - and follow his Twitter: @tompinchuk







FIST OF THE NORTH STAR #2 - - Watch & Learn

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Date :
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