Or: Why I shouldn't be playing tennis in the evening in the fog.
Just got back from playing tennis with my brothers and their friend Matthew.
Had an awesome time.
I haven't played tennis in a while... forgot how fun it was. Anyway, bottom line is, I still suck at it. But that's okay, because so do my brothers.
Tennis is like the only sport I actually play because it's probably one of the only sports where I actually get to do anything (I suck at sports).
So the tennis court closest to where I live is set on the very edge of town and is pretty much surrounded by woods, an old abandonned playground, and some empty fields and buildings. So it's a pretty creepy place in the fog when it's starting to get dark, which I didn't remember until it started to get dark.
Seriously, at one point I looked around and went: "this is a scene for a horror movie."
And then a car, or a dirtbike or something to that effect, went by somewhere on the other side of the trees and it sounded like a growling noise, so then I started looking around waiting for bears or coyotes to come out of the fog.
Next time I'm playing tennis there it's going to be during the day, with sun and no fog (and probably a shit ton of mosquitos... but that's what bugspray is for).
But, yeah, I had fun.
Sunday, June 26, 2011
Thursday, June 23, 2011
My Love/Hate Relationship With InuYasha
I was in the seventh grade the first time I saw InuYasha.
It was New Years Eve 2003 and I was staying up in hopes of watching the Dragonball Z movie marathon I usually watched on YTV on New Years Eve (which is what YTV showed when the year before that, and probably the year before that as well. I very clearly remember that I first saw The History of Trunks and was almost traumatized by it, but that's a story for another day).
I don't remember if there were actually any Dragonball Z movies playing that night, but what I do remember is seeing the new anime line-up that YTV was starting with. I'm pretty sure it was the Friday night Bionix line-up, but I can't really remember. That night, I remember seeing Gundam Seed, Witch Hunter Robin, InuYasha, and probably some others. But InuYasha was the first one in the line-up and I was immediately hooked.
I was 12 at the time, and the only anime I had seen before that was pretty much directed at kids. Things like Sailor Moon, Dragonball Z, Escaflowne (which isn't really a kids show, but was dubbed as one, and it played in the afternoon with the other kids shows), Digimon, Pokémon, Shaman King, and so on. So this was really the first anime I'd seen that had cursing, bloody violence, and mature themes, it even has a viewer's discretion warning before the show started. And it was anime! Awesome!
So I got really into the show. So did a few friends of mine. We talked about it constantly, and were always looking at pictures of it online and listening to the music. We discovered the manga near the end of seventh grade, but we didn't get into that as much as we did the show.
And now here's where I ruin the reminiscing: I was not/am not/will never be obsessed with InuYasha.
When I think about what went on when I first got into the show, I can't really remember anything I did that could lead other people to believe that I was obsessed with the show. I watched the TV show (but it was far from the only show I watched), I saved pictures of it off the Internet (as I did with other pictures non-InuYasha related), I downloaded and listened to the music (as I did with a lot of other music, mostly country), and I talked about it with my other friends who watched the show (it wasn't the only thing we talked about). All this is normal behaviour, we had just discovered something brand-new and exciting and that was how we were going about it.
Now, I have a habit of going through these 'phases' where I get really into things for a period of time. It could be anything from Harry Potter, to Artemis Fowl, to scanning old pictures, to With the Light, to Tyrant, to drawing, to writing, to watching old movies, anything. I even get into these moods where I just want to organize and classify things. I suppose I'm a bit odd like that. And I suspect that this is what went on with InuYasha: I got really into it and then my interest died down a bit and I focused on other things.
And people implying that I was/am obsessed with InuYasha has become a sore spot for me now, just because it doesn't even make sense. The only person whose actually accused be of being obsessed with it is my 'cousin' (surprise, surprise), but other people must be thinking it because I remember it always coming up. Or maybe I'm just paranoid, who knows.
Not a lot of people I knew were interested in anime when I was growing up, and when InuYasha came out it was on the heels of Pokémon and Digimon and all those kinds of anime that were directed at kids. So to the people I grew up with, anime was probably the same as a kid's cartoon (even though anyone whose watched different kinds of anime will tell you that that's not always the case). So I guess everyone thought that InuYasha was just a stupid kid show. Either way, it seemed to me that almost everyone greatly disliked InuYasha.
I really don't know why. I know that anime is not for everyone, and I know that not everyone has to like the same things I do, but I just felt really personally attacked by the people (usually my peers) who didn't like InuYasha... probably because they just seemed to use it to insult me.
And I'm not saying that InuYasha is an awesome series and that everyone should like it. I'm a fan of it and I can list off many flaws about the series (like Kagome's dub voice actress... it almost hurts to listen to). What I am saying is that it's not right to look down on people for liking it.
I don't even know why people chose this series to start in on me for. I've been way into things both before and after InuYasha, and some probably closer to 'obsession'. Seriously, I grew up with Pokémon and owned a toy Pokédex, two of the guidebooks, the trading cards, some videos, the chapter books, the games, random toys, and I watched it nearly every time it was on. But no one says 'boo' about that. And that was just one major section of my childhood.
InuYasha has almost become like an insult to me now, or a source of embarrassment. And that sucks because I do like the series, I enjoy watching the show/movies and reading the manga. Do I think it's the best thing in the world ever? Of course not, but I do like it... and I'm almost afraid to admit it. I'm afraid to even mention it in the presence of other people. It's ridiculous.
It's like I can feel people starting to look down on me at my mention of it.
I can't even say that I watched an episode of it without following it right up with 'you know, since I haven't watched it in a long time'. And that makes me ashamed because it's like the bullies won.
I'm less 'obsessed' with the actual series, and more obsessed with proving that I'm not obsessed.
It was New Years Eve 2003 and I was staying up in hopes of watching the Dragonball Z movie marathon I usually watched on YTV on New Years Eve (which is what YTV showed when the year before that, and probably the year before that as well. I very clearly remember that I first saw The History of Trunks and was almost traumatized by it, but that's a story for another day).
I don't remember if there were actually any Dragonball Z movies playing that night, but what I do remember is seeing the new anime line-up that YTV was starting with. I'm pretty sure it was the Friday night Bionix line-up, but I can't really remember. That night, I remember seeing Gundam Seed, Witch Hunter Robin, InuYasha, and probably some others. But InuYasha was the first one in the line-up and I was immediately hooked.
I was 12 at the time, and the only anime I had seen before that was pretty much directed at kids. Things like Sailor Moon, Dragonball Z, Escaflowne (which isn't really a kids show, but was dubbed as one, and it played in the afternoon with the other kids shows), Digimon, Pokémon, Shaman King, and so on. So this was really the first anime I'd seen that had cursing, bloody violence, and mature themes, it even has a viewer's discretion warning before the show started. And it was anime! Awesome!
So I got really into the show. So did a few friends of mine. We talked about it constantly, and were always looking at pictures of it online and listening to the music. We discovered the manga near the end of seventh grade, but we didn't get into that as much as we did the show.
And now here's where I ruin the reminiscing: I was not/am not/will never be obsessed with InuYasha.
When I think about what went on when I first got into the show, I can't really remember anything I did that could lead other people to believe that I was obsessed with the show. I watched the TV show (but it was far from the only show I watched), I saved pictures of it off the Internet (as I did with other pictures non-InuYasha related), I downloaded and listened to the music (as I did with a lot of other music, mostly country), and I talked about it with my other friends who watched the show (it wasn't the only thing we talked about). All this is normal behaviour, we had just discovered something brand-new and exciting and that was how we were going about it.
Now, I have a habit of going through these 'phases' where I get really into things for a period of time. It could be anything from Harry Potter, to Artemis Fowl, to scanning old pictures, to With the Light, to Tyrant, to drawing, to writing, to watching old movies, anything. I even get into these moods where I just want to organize and classify things. I suppose I'm a bit odd like that. And I suspect that this is what went on with InuYasha: I got really into it and then my interest died down a bit and I focused on other things.
And people implying that I was/am obsessed with InuYasha has become a sore spot for me now, just because it doesn't even make sense. The only person whose actually accused be of being obsessed with it is my 'cousin' (surprise, surprise), but other people must be thinking it because I remember it always coming up. Or maybe I'm just paranoid, who knows.
Not a lot of people I knew were interested in anime when I was growing up, and when InuYasha came out it was on the heels of Pokémon and Digimon and all those kinds of anime that were directed at kids. So to the people I grew up with, anime was probably the same as a kid's cartoon (even though anyone whose watched different kinds of anime will tell you that that's not always the case). So I guess everyone thought that InuYasha was just a stupid kid show. Either way, it seemed to me that almost everyone greatly disliked InuYasha.
I really don't know why. I know that anime is not for everyone, and I know that not everyone has to like the same things I do, but I just felt really personally attacked by the people (usually my peers) who didn't like InuYasha... probably because they just seemed to use it to insult me.
And I'm not saying that InuYasha is an awesome series and that everyone should like it. I'm a fan of it and I can list off many flaws about the series (like Kagome's dub voice actress... it almost hurts to listen to). What I am saying is that it's not right to look down on people for liking it.
I don't even know why people chose this series to start in on me for. I've been way into things both before and after InuYasha, and some probably closer to 'obsession'. Seriously, I grew up with Pokémon and owned a toy Pokédex, two of the guidebooks, the trading cards, some videos, the chapter books, the games, random toys, and I watched it nearly every time it was on. But no one says 'boo' about that. And that was just one major section of my childhood.
InuYasha has almost become like an insult to me now, or a source of embarrassment. And that sucks because I do like the series, I enjoy watching the show/movies and reading the manga. Do I think it's the best thing in the world ever? Of course not, but I do like it... and I'm almost afraid to admit it. I'm afraid to even mention it in the presence of other people. It's ridiculous.
It's like I can feel people starting to look down on me at my mention of it.
I can't even say that I watched an episode of it without following it right up with 'you know, since I haven't watched it in a long time'. And that makes me ashamed because it's like the bullies won.
I'm less 'obsessed' with the actual series, and more obsessed with proving that I'm not obsessed.
Monday, June 20, 2011
The Difference Between a Carnation, a Croissant, and a Corsage
Here's a short story from the time when I was fundraising for a school trip to Europe (back in 2006-2007):
Me, Meaghan and Samantha were selling tickets at Superstore, we had a little table set up near the entrence doors. Our friend Jake was also there, for whatever reason (I don't think he was selling tickets with us at the time, he was just at the store).
So we had been there for a while, and we figured that it must have been prom night or something because there were a bunch of teenagers coming in dressed in tuxes and fancy dresses (so this might have taken place around June 2006).
The teenagers were there buying corsages for the prom, something we didn't really catch onto until we saw people leaving with them. Then we started talking about how it must have been prom night at the local high school, or something.
Of course, none of us could remember the word 'corsage'. So we started talking about 'those things' and trying to figure out what the word was.
'Carnation' was my guess, and that's what we were leaning to when a teenage boy wearing a tux came out and decided to buy some tickets from us. He had a corsage with him and put it on the table to fill out his tickets. Somewhere around this time is when Jake came out with his suggestion: croissant. We all argued back and forth about it until the teenage boy told us it was called a corsage.
We all had a laugh about it and thanked the boy for buying tickets.
Then we told him that we hoped his girlfriend would like the corsage, and he told us that he hoped the same thing.
Me, Meaghan and Samantha were selling tickets at Superstore, we had a little table set up near the entrence doors. Our friend Jake was also there, for whatever reason (I don't think he was selling tickets with us at the time, he was just at the store).
So we had been there for a while, and we figured that it must have been prom night or something because there were a bunch of teenagers coming in dressed in tuxes and fancy dresses (so this might have taken place around June 2006).
The teenagers were there buying corsages for the prom, something we didn't really catch onto until we saw people leaving with them. Then we started talking about how it must have been prom night at the local high school, or something.
Of course, none of us could remember the word 'corsage'. So we started talking about 'those things' and trying to figure out what the word was.
'Carnation' was my guess, and that's what we were leaning to when a teenage boy wearing a tux came out and decided to buy some tickets from us. He had a corsage with him and put it on the table to fill out his tickets. Somewhere around this time is when Jake came out with his suggestion: croissant. We all argued back and forth about it until the teenage boy told us it was called a corsage.
We all had a laugh about it and thanked the boy for buying tickets.
Then we told him that we hoped his girlfriend would like the corsage, and he told us that he hoped the same thing.
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
grar, cliffhangers!
Okay, I was gonna talk about this week's episode of Secret Life, but then the latest chapter of Tyrant came out and I like that better so here we go:
This month's chapter of Tyrant starts off right where last month's chapter left off. For the moment, Sempai has come to accept that, yes, he wants Morinaga around and the feelings he has for him probably go far beyond that of 'just friends'. He tells Morinaga that he wants him to stay with him, which is probably the closest thing to an 'I love you' that Morinaga's gonna get from Sempai at the moment. And yes, this is a big development.
After this, Sempai passes out. It turns out that he hasn't really been eating or sleeping properly while he and Morinaga were fighting/separated.
It's only hunger and exhaustion though, so it's fixed pretty easily.
Now Morinaga and Sempai are back together in their apartment. It's going pretty well, all things considering, except that Sempai is now being pretty overly cautious and very aware of Morinaga's presence, to the point where it's almost like they're angry at each other or avoiding each other (which they aren't).
This all comes to a head near the end of the chapter where Sempai gathers the nerve to try to ask Morinaga why he hasn't tried anything (sexual) yet. He doesn't actually ask, his shyness kinda gets in the way, but Morinaga does realize what's going on.
He tells Sempai that he doesn't want to drive him away again, so they're gonna go at Sempai's pace. So he leaves the choice up to Sempai: what does he want to do?
This series isn't really big on seriousness, there're pretty serious undertones throughout the whole story, but nothing as big as this arc, or as long, as happened until now. This particular arc (which started at the beginning of volume 7) has been very low on humour and sexual content, but still keeps our interest by throwing new and important things our way.
Along with this being Morinaga and Sempai's first major, serious fight... ever, this arc brings in Masaki, Morinaga's first lover. Sempai gets jealous about everything and all his feelings come up to the surface, but he can't deal with them so he lashes out instead, telling Morinaga that their relationship has been a farce all this time.
This is the point where everyone finally realizes that something needs to change in this relationship. Sempai has to come to terms with these new and strange feelings, and Morinaga has to realize how much this is affecting Sempai and how.
But it's all come down to this point (this chapter is apparently the second-last chapter in this arc, so we'll have the conclusion next month). Morinaga is now trying harder than ever to consider Sempai's feelings, and Sempai now has to make a desicion and confront his feelings towards Morinaga, their relationship, and how his though process has changed (remember, he was pretty anti-homosexual in the beginning of the series... that and he has his shyness and mountain of pride to deal with).
So what will he do now?
This month's chapter of Tyrant starts off right where last month's chapter left off. For the moment, Sempai has come to accept that, yes, he wants Morinaga around and the feelings he has for him probably go far beyond that of 'just friends'. He tells Morinaga that he wants him to stay with him, which is probably the closest thing to an 'I love you' that Morinaga's gonna get from Sempai at the moment. And yes, this is a big development.
After this, Sempai passes out. It turns out that he hasn't really been eating or sleeping properly while he and Morinaga were fighting/separated.
It's only hunger and exhaustion though, so it's fixed pretty easily.
Now Morinaga and Sempai are back together in their apartment. It's going pretty well, all things considering, except that Sempai is now being pretty overly cautious and very aware of Morinaga's presence, to the point where it's almost like they're angry at each other or avoiding each other (which they aren't).
This all comes to a head near the end of the chapter where Sempai gathers the nerve to try to ask Morinaga why he hasn't tried anything (sexual) yet. He doesn't actually ask, his shyness kinda gets in the way, but Morinaga does realize what's going on.
He tells Sempai that he doesn't want to drive him away again, so they're gonna go at Sempai's pace. So he leaves the choice up to Sempai: what does he want to do?
This series isn't really big on seriousness, there're pretty serious undertones throughout the whole story, but nothing as big as this arc, or as long, as happened until now. This particular arc (which started at the beginning of volume 7) has been very low on humour and sexual content, but still keeps our interest by throwing new and important things our way.
Along with this being Morinaga and Sempai's first major, serious fight... ever, this arc brings in Masaki, Morinaga's first lover. Sempai gets jealous about everything and all his feelings come up to the surface, but he can't deal with them so he lashes out instead, telling Morinaga that their relationship has been a farce all this time.
This is the point where everyone finally realizes that something needs to change in this relationship. Sempai has to come to terms with these new and strange feelings, and Morinaga has to realize how much this is affecting Sempai and how.
But it's all come down to this point (this chapter is apparently the second-last chapter in this arc, so we'll have the conclusion next month). Morinaga is now trying harder than ever to consider Sempai's feelings, and Sempai now has to make a desicion and confront his feelings towards Morinaga, their relationship, and how his though process has changed (remember, he was pretty anti-homosexual in the beginning of the series... that and he has his shyness and mountain of pride to deal with).
So what will he do now?
Tuesday, June 7, 2011
... maybe with a different show
So, I just saw the latest episode of The Secret Life of the American Teenager (or, as I like to call it, Why Am I Even Still Watching This? I Barely Like Anything About It!), and it was a doozy.
Ben and Adrian, who have been expecting a baby for the whole season, and who have just gotten married, have just had a stillborn baby girl. At 16/17 years old. Ouch doesn't even begin to cover it.
This was a sad, serious episode and the dramatic parts were very well done and very heartbreaking. It was sad to see everyone's reactions to this tragedy, especially Ben and Adrian, whose actors did very good jobs at portraying grief.
... and now here're my complaints.
First of all, all this drama and good acting (and watchable TV) happened at the end of the episode. Like the last couple of minutes were devoted specifically to deal with this.
This episode, Episode 26, is supposed to directly follow the events of last week's episode, Episode 25. It picks up directly where 25 left off, instead of a week later. At the end of 26, Adrian and Ben are in bed when Adrian says that she feels that something isn't right, and when we see them in 26 it's the next morning and the two are headed to the hospital.
So there's my first problem really: Episode 26 takes place over the course of the day where Adrian and Ben have their baby, and we see very little of all this. Actually, we see none of this. During the episode, we see small snips of what's going on at the hospital smushed in between scenes of the other characters of the show being annoying. There's also a big gap there because we go from seeing Ben and Adrian being admitted in the hospital, then something else happened with other people (I don't care or remember what) and then the next time we see them, Ben is standing in the hospital hallway looking traumatized and the audience knows that something bad has happened. This is the point where Ben and Adrian know that the baby is dead, but, and I'm assuming here, before the baby is actually out. Then someone else does something, and then we're back with Adrian and Ben, but Adrian is in the hospital bed and visibly no longer pregnant and they hold each other and cry. So we pretty much know what happened, but everything is now over. And then the next time we see them is at the end of the episode where everyone shows up to comfort them and all that.
I saw the preview for this show last week and I thought that the show was gonna be all about Adrian and Ben and their loss (since that's really all that was shown in the previews). I was wrong. I mean, I'm pretty sure that the episode where John was born all took place in the hospital (uh... as far as I can remember, I haven't seen it in a while), and that whole episode was dedicated to that, for the most part. So it wouldn't be much of a stretch to expect the same for this baby, especially since this episode was more emotionally charged.
I'm not saying that they should've shown the birth, or Ben and Adrian holding a dead baby (it is a show for teens on a family channel after all), but they could've shown a little more. Maybe them first hearing the news firsthand, maybe Ben wandering aimlessly around the hospital, maybe 'what if' daydreams, maybe Ben wandering into the nursery area thing, anything really. I mean, they were at the hospital for the whole day, and they only called their parents later on, like in the afternoon or something.
So I didn't like it that we didn't spend much time with Adrian and Ben. Instead, we got to hear about Tom's new girlfriend, Madison and Jack harping about sex, Lauren being annoying, Ricky and Amy doing... something, and everyone else but Ben and Adrian. At least there was a scene early on with Alice and Henry where they were talking about things having to do with Ben and Adrian (weird foreshadowing if you ask me). But I don't care about all that, I often don't but now less than ever. What I care about this episode is what's going on with Adrian and Ben. We know that something is wrong, and it's something really serious and life-changing and not good.
And my other problem: why the dead baby? Why did that baby have to die? Why Ben and Adrian's baby? Why did something like this need to happen to them at this time? I know that miscarriages and stillbirths happen, and I know that this show can't have the same outcome happen for every pregnancy in the show (somehow I'm convinced that this can't be the last pregnancy in the show), but what were the writers going for here? I'm not against having this kind of thing happen, but I have to wonder why it happened.
It could be an interesting development. The real reason why Adrian and Ben got married was because of the baby, but what are they gonna do now that the baby is gone? How will their relationship change, and how will they grow and change as people? What will they do now? Will we even find out?
I mean, the most of what I take from this show when I watch it (which is not that often because it grates on my nerves) is that everyone is always talking about sex. It's always who's having sex with who, when someone's having sex, will someone or won't someone have sex with so-and-so... GRAH!
And I've read comments from other people on the Internet saying that a happy ending for Ben and Adrian would be boring, or that it wouldn't be good plot lines to have Ben and Adrian's pregnancy end the same as Amy and Ricky's, and they do have good points. But, 1) happy endings aren't boring, 2) just because Ben and Adrian are married with a baby doesn't automatically lead to a happy ending, and 3) Ben and Adrian's situation is not the same as Ricky and Amy's situation.
Let's just say that the baby had lived, we would've gotten a happy episode, but that doesn't mean that Ben and Adrian's lives would be all sunshine and roses. Amy managed to have a baby and juggle motherhood, school and work and yeah, that is boring, but I think that's only because we don't see any of that. We see Amy at school complaining about it, or Amy at home complaining about it. But we don't see her taking care of John, or at work (I keep forgetting that she even has a job... she does, right?), or anything. Every so often she'll mention it, but all we really see of her is her complaining about Ricky, talking about sex, her in the halls at school, and not much else. Ben and Adrian having a baby would be a different scenario since they're married and living together. It would be a happy ending, but with different issues. There could be Ben and Adrian arguing about who's taking care of the baby too much or not enough, them juggling parenthood, work and school (because we actually see Ben at work), can they really handle this or are they just playing house? So they could have their 'happy ending'.
But the baby didn't make it, so we have to work with that. I'm not a fan of this plot twist, I'm not a fan of dead babies (no matter how much I hate the show), but I do like the way the reveal to the rest of the cast was handled here (except for that one line Leo had, he's all like "but Ben and Adrian will never be the same again"... thank you, Captain Obvious). It's an unbelievably sad and life changing event, and it has to be done in certain ways, especially in a show aimed at young viewers. Anyway, I already talked about the content of the episode so, moving on.
Where do we go from here? Well, this could go many ways. Ben and Adrian have to recover from this loss, both emotionally and physically. Adrian has to get over that she is no longer pregnant, but neither does she have a baby to care for. Both were pretty excited about being parents, but that's pretty much shot for the time being. So now they're both living together, married, in a condo where there was probably a nursery set up and everything. How will they deal with the loss, with each other, and with everyone else? What are they going to do now? Will they both move back in with their parents, will they stay in their condo, will they divorce, will this help to strengthen their relationship, will they draw away from each other, will they come together to help each other deal? Where will they go from here?
Well, this is Secret Life, and from the previews for next week's show it looks (to me) like everything is going to cause more relationship drama between Amy, Adrian, Ricky and Ben.
Oh, fuck me.
Do we have to go into that right away, or at all? Can't this show steer away from dating and sex for a bit to deal with this blow? We saw all the characters crying and sad because of the death of the baby, now we have to see them deal with it all in their everyday lives. The news still has to circulate, people have to know, and Adrian and Ben have to deal (preferably with no big fanfare), and so do their families.
Ben and Adrian, who have been expecting a baby for the whole season, and who have just gotten married, have just had a stillborn baby girl. At 16/17 years old. Ouch doesn't even begin to cover it.
This was a sad, serious episode and the dramatic parts were very well done and very heartbreaking. It was sad to see everyone's reactions to this tragedy, especially Ben and Adrian, whose actors did very good jobs at portraying grief.
... and now here're my complaints.
First of all, all this drama and good acting (and watchable TV) happened at the end of the episode. Like the last couple of minutes were devoted specifically to deal with this.
This episode, Episode 26, is supposed to directly follow the events of last week's episode, Episode 25. It picks up directly where 25 left off, instead of a week later. At the end of 26, Adrian and Ben are in bed when Adrian says that she feels that something isn't right, and when we see them in 26 it's the next morning and the two are headed to the hospital.
So there's my first problem really: Episode 26 takes place over the course of the day where Adrian and Ben have their baby, and we see very little of all this. Actually, we see none of this. During the episode, we see small snips of what's going on at the hospital smushed in between scenes of the other characters of the show being annoying. There's also a big gap there because we go from seeing Ben and Adrian being admitted in the hospital, then something else happened with other people (I don't care or remember what) and then the next time we see them, Ben is standing in the hospital hallway looking traumatized and the audience knows that something bad has happened. This is the point where Ben and Adrian know that the baby is dead, but, and I'm assuming here, before the baby is actually out. Then someone else does something, and then we're back with Adrian and Ben, but Adrian is in the hospital bed and visibly no longer pregnant and they hold each other and cry. So we pretty much know what happened, but everything is now over. And then the next time we see them is at the end of the episode where everyone shows up to comfort them and all that.
I saw the preview for this show last week and I thought that the show was gonna be all about Adrian and Ben and their loss (since that's really all that was shown in the previews). I was wrong. I mean, I'm pretty sure that the episode where John was born all took place in the hospital (uh... as far as I can remember, I haven't seen it in a while), and that whole episode was dedicated to that, for the most part. So it wouldn't be much of a stretch to expect the same for this baby, especially since this episode was more emotionally charged.
I'm not saying that they should've shown the birth, or Ben and Adrian holding a dead baby (it is a show for teens on a family channel after all), but they could've shown a little more. Maybe them first hearing the news firsthand, maybe Ben wandering aimlessly around the hospital, maybe 'what if' daydreams, maybe Ben wandering into the nursery area thing, anything really. I mean, they were at the hospital for the whole day, and they only called their parents later on, like in the afternoon or something.
So I didn't like it that we didn't spend much time with Adrian and Ben. Instead, we got to hear about Tom's new girlfriend, Madison and Jack harping about sex, Lauren being annoying, Ricky and Amy doing... something, and everyone else but Ben and Adrian. At least there was a scene early on with Alice and Henry where they were talking about things having to do with Ben and Adrian (weird foreshadowing if you ask me). But I don't care about all that, I often don't but now less than ever. What I care about this episode is what's going on with Adrian and Ben. We know that something is wrong, and it's something really serious and life-changing and not good.
And my other problem: why the dead baby? Why did that baby have to die? Why Ben and Adrian's baby? Why did something like this need to happen to them at this time? I know that miscarriages and stillbirths happen, and I know that this show can't have the same outcome happen for every pregnancy in the show (somehow I'm convinced that this can't be the last pregnancy in the show), but what were the writers going for here? I'm not against having this kind of thing happen, but I have to wonder why it happened.
It could be an interesting development. The real reason why Adrian and Ben got married was because of the baby, but what are they gonna do now that the baby is gone? How will their relationship change, and how will they grow and change as people? What will they do now? Will we even find out?
I mean, the most of what I take from this show when I watch it (which is not that often because it grates on my nerves) is that everyone is always talking about sex. It's always who's having sex with who, when someone's having sex, will someone or won't someone have sex with so-and-so... GRAH!
And I've read comments from other people on the Internet saying that a happy ending for Ben and Adrian would be boring, or that it wouldn't be good plot lines to have Ben and Adrian's pregnancy end the same as Amy and Ricky's, and they do have good points. But, 1) happy endings aren't boring, 2) just because Ben and Adrian are married with a baby doesn't automatically lead to a happy ending, and 3) Ben and Adrian's situation is not the same as Ricky and Amy's situation.
Let's just say that the baby had lived, we would've gotten a happy episode, but that doesn't mean that Ben and Adrian's lives would be all sunshine and roses. Amy managed to have a baby and juggle motherhood, school and work and yeah, that is boring, but I think that's only because we don't see any of that. We see Amy at school complaining about it, or Amy at home complaining about it. But we don't see her taking care of John, or at work (I keep forgetting that she even has a job... she does, right?), or anything. Every so often she'll mention it, but all we really see of her is her complaining about Ricky, talking about sex, her in the halls at school, and not much else. Ben and Adrian having a baby would be a different scenario since they're married and living together. It would be a happy ending, but with different issues. There could be Ben and Adrian arguing about who's taking care of the baby too much or not enough, them juggling parenthood, work and school (because we actually see Ben at work), can they really handle this or are they just playing house? So they could have their 'happy ending'.
But the baby didn't make it, so we have to work with that. I'm not a fan of this plot twist, I'm not a fan of dead babies (no matter how much I hate the show), but I do like the way the reveal to the rest of the cast was handled here (except for that one line Leo had, he's all like "but Ben and Adrian will never be the same again"... thank you, Captain Obvious). It's an unbelievably sad and life changing event, and it has to be done in certain ways, especially in a show aimed at young viewers. Anyway, I already talked about the content of the episode so, moving on.
Where do we go from here? Well, this could go many ways. Ben and Adrian have to recover from this loss, both emotionally and physically. Adrian has to get over that she is no longer pregnant, but neither does she have a baby to care for. Both were pretty excited about being parents, but that's pretty much shot for the time being. So now they're both living together, married, in a condo where there was probably a nursery set up and everything. How will they deal with the loss, with each other, and with everyone else? What are they going to do now? Will they both move back in with their parents, will they stay in their condo, will they divorce, will this help to strengthen their relationship, will they draw away from each other, will they come together to help each other deal? Where will they go from here?
Well, this is Secret Life, and from the previews for next week's show it looks (to me) like everything is going to cause more relationship drama between Amy, Adrian, Ricky and Ben.
Oh, fuck me.
Do we have to go into that right away, or at all? Can't this show steer away from dating and sex for a bit to deal with this blow? We saw all the characters crying and sad because of the death of the baby, now we have to see them deal with it all in their everyday lives. The news still has to circulate, people have to know, and Adrian and Ben have to deal (preferably with no big fanfare), and so do their families.
Friday, June 3, 2011
... I probably shouldn't find this as funny as I do
"Onani means masturbation. And that's what this guy is good at. Every day after school, he sneaks into the mostly unused girls bathroom on the 3rd floor, and masturbates. Until one day when he's caught..."
This is part of the summary that mangatraders.com has for Ise Katsura's Onani Master Kurosawa.
This was one of mangatraders' series of the week for the week of May 15th (along with Aogiri Natsu's Flat), so I found this on the front page. I read the summary and was compelled to actually read the series just to answer all the questions now bouncing around in my head (some of which were: "wtf?" "how?" and "why?").
Well, I read it, all four volumes, and spent most of that time either laughing or disturbed.
Before I start explaining the story, I'll mention the first thing that someone reading this series will notice: it's not inked. The whole series looks as if it was sent to the publisher just drawn and shaded in pencil, and that's probably what happened. That doesn't mean it doesn't look good, the drawings are well done and if it were inked it would look like any other manga. The reason for this, I think, is that Kurosawa is a doujinshi (self-published work).
Anyway, moving on. Spoilers ahead.
So the story moves along right from the first page where we find our main character, Kurosawa Kakeru age 14, masturbating in the girl's bathroom on the 3rd floor. Despite the title and summary, this really isn't the main focus of the story (there's a plot? ...sort of, it's more a slice-of-life manga than anything else), but it is a big part.
We go on to learn that this is a daily occurence for Kurosawa. Every day after school he waits in the library until he's sure that the school's practically empty so that he can hide out in the 3rd floor girls' bathroom and have at it. This has apparently been going on for about a year now. He eventually gets caught in the bathroom, of course (even if the summary hadn't said it everyone would've seen it coming), by a female classmate named Kitahara Aya.
Kitahara is being bullied by some other girls in her class, and has been for a while. Two of her bullies are in class with her (I forget their names) and are constantly forcing her to embarrass herself in public. Feeling sorry for her, I guess, Kurosawa decides to get back at the two girls by stealing their uniforms and ejaculating on them before returning them to their rightful owners (all this is done in secret, naturally). No one figures out it's him that did it and the two girls tone down the bullying a bit.
But Kitahara eventually realises what Kurosawa did and purposefully confronts him in the bathroom. She knows what he's doing in there, but she could care less about that. Surprisingly, she hasn't come to tell on him, she's come to ask for his help. She wants Kurosawa to use his 'special method' and get revenge on some other girls that have been mean to her. And if he doesn't go along with it, she'll tell everybody what he's up to.
And there is main focus of Onani Master Kurosawa: revenge. The story also serves to tell the readers how the two main characters are arseholes.
(Kitahara and Kurosawa)
We'll start with Kurosawa. Now, he's not really a bad guy, at all. He's kind of shy and a loner, and he's only got one friend in class: Nagatsuka, the class' king otaku. And that's how Kurosawa looks to the average observer. But readers of the manga are basically inside his head, since the manga is told from his point of view, and we know that he's kind of a jerk. He's kind of arrogant, he thinks he's above everyone else, and he doesn't really seem to like anyone. Except for girls, he likes girls a lot. Also, his fantasies during his bathroom time are slightly disturbing as they involve whatever girl he's after that day and him in very rape-ish situations. They also suggest that he doesn't really respect women, especially since he refers to the girls around him as 'lessons' or 'meals'... our hero, ladies and gentlemen.
Kitahara also has two different faces, depending on where you're looking from. She's even more shy than Kurosawa. She really has no friends and seems scared of everyone around her, which is probably because she's constantly being bullied and made fun of by almost everyone. She's also very small and wears huge glasses, so she has that cute and innocent look. And then she gets close to Kurosawa and he (and us readers) find out that she's kind of scary. And vengeful. And bitter. Throughout the story, she basically wants Kurosawa to perform these gross acts of revenge on other girls who've done anything from outright bully her, to just laugh at her in the background. At points she's so hell bent on getting these things done that she even starts to scare Kurosawa, especially when she targets the girl that Kurosawa develops a crush on.
Yeah, Kurosawa gets a crush on a girl, and that series of events takes Kurosawa from being just a teenager with an odd passtime (seriously, do it at home), to a teenager in love, to a jerk.
At some point in the series, Kurosawa can't make it to his bathroom right away and spends more time in the library, that's where he first starts to get to know his classmate Takigawa Magisteru. They get to talking and the more they hang out the more Kurosawa realizes how much he likes this girl. He even starts looking forward to his time in the library (as opposed to just waiting for it to be over so he could move on to the bathroom), and he goes so far as to hope to meet Takigawa outside of school. It even gets to the point where fantasizing about her as he masturbates makes him physically ill, as in he actually vomits (an interesting insight as to how he actually views his bathroom activities).
During this time, Kurosawa becomes more likable, and I started rooting for him. On the flip side is Kitahara, who becomes more unlikable and pessimistic and even predicts that Kurosawa's happiness won't last.
It doesn't, of course, as Kurosawa comes to class one day and comes face to face with the fact that the girl he's in love with is now dating his only friend (Nagatsuka, mentioned above). There's a full page dedicated to Kurosawa's reaction, and it almost hurt me. The expression on his face and the knowledge of what was about to go on inside his head actually made me go 'ouch'. And that's probably the last time I ever sympathized with him, because then he just goes into full on asshole mode.
In retaliation, he agrees to Kitahara's revenge plan on Takigawa and makes a mess of Takigawa's school bag. Takigawa becomes traumatized by this, and the series ends with our two mains continuing on their revenge spree.
(One of Kurosawa's fantasies)
So yeah, this really is a pretty unusual story, but it's a pretty good read. The art is nice, the story moves along fairly quickly, it is fairly interesting. Also, the masturbation scenes and fantasies aren't too explicit, not much is really shown, although it's pretty obvious what's going on.
And now to explain the humour in the whole deal because I don't think I said anything yet that could be considered as funny. Well, the story doesn't really have a lot of humour in it, at least from my point of view. Nope, the really funny part of this manga only comes up if you've watch/read/are familiar with/are a fan of Death Note.
(This is Kurosawa. You can't not see the resemblence here if you tried.)
Kurosawa Kakeru is Yagami Light. There are differences (mostly because I'm pretty sure that Kurosawa has a functional soul), but they're so alike it's not even fit. Their thought patterns are similar, and they even look alike. Also, the stories are kind of the same. Light kills criminals with a notebook, Kurosawa... masturbate-revenges people... it's the same idea, trust me.
There's such an association there that one of the names people call this series is Fap Note. Also, the scanlation team that worked on this manga made their credit page look like the rules page from the Death Note.
I even realized this before I saw the credit page. I was reading it and I said to myself that Kurosawa is an awful lot like Light. And that's where most of the humour comes from, I find. Because I spent most of this time imagining Light in place of Kurosawa, which made things that much more funny.
So yeah, that's Onani Master Kurosawa. It's a pretty interesting little series, and it has a lot of laughs if you're a Death Note fan. It's also more of a character study than a story. There really isn't a set plot, but it's pretty fun to watch the characters react and change to what's going on around them (even if our two mains aren't always very likable). It hasn't been liscenced in English, but it is available to read online. It also got some pretty good reviews on mangaupdates.com.
This is part of the summary that mangatraders.com has for Ise Katsura's Onani Master Kurosawa.
This was one of mangatraders' series of the week for the week of May 15th (along with Aogiri Natsu's Flat), so I found this on the front page. I read the summary and was compelled to actually read the series just to answer all the questions now bouncing around in my head (some of which were: "wtf?" "how?" and "why?").
Well, I read it, all four volumes, and spent most of that time either laughing or disturbed.
Before I start explaining the story, I'll mention the first thing that someone reading this series will notice: it's not inked. The whole series looks as if it was sent to the publisher just drawn and shaded in pencil, and that's probably what happened. That doesn't mean it doesn't look good, the drawings are well done and if it were inked it would look like any other manga. The reason for this, I think, is that Kurosawa is a doujinshi (self-published work).
Anyway, moving on. Spoilers ahead.
So the story moves along right from the first page where we find our main character, Kurosawa Kakeru age 14, masturbating in the girl's bathroom on the 3rd floor. Despite the title and summary, this really isn't the main focus of the story (there's a plot? ...sort of, it's more a slice-of-life manga than anything else), but it is a big part.
We go on to learn that this is a daily occurence for Kurosawa. Every day after school he waits in the library until he's sure that the school's practically empty so that he can hide out in the 3rd floor girls' bathroom and have at it. This has apparently been going on for about a year now. He eventually gets caught in the bathroom, of course (even if the summary hadn't said it everyone would've seen it coming), by a female classmate named Kitahara Aya.
Kitahara is being bullied by some other girls in her class, and has been for a while. Two of her bullies are in class with her (I forget their names) and are constantly forcing her to embarrass herself in public. Feeling sorry for her, I guess, Kurosawa decides to get back at the two girls by stealing their uniforms and ejaculating on them before returning them to their rightful owners (all this is done in secret, naturally). No one figures out it's him that did it and the two girls tone down the bullying a bit.
But Kitahara eventually realises what Kurosawa did and purposefully confronts him in the bathroom. She knows what he's doing in there, but she could care less about that. Surprisingly, she hasn't come to tell on him, she's come to ask for his help. She wants Kurosawa to use his 'special method' and get revenge on some other girls that have been mean to her. And if he doesn't go along with it, she'll tell everybody what he's up to.
And there is main focus of Onani Master Kurosawa: revenge. The story also serves to tell the readers how the two main characters are arseholes.
(Kitahara and Kurosawa)
We'll start with Kurosawa. Now, he's not really a bad guy, at all. He's kind of shy and a loner, and he's only got one friend in class: Nagatsuka, the class' king otaku. And that's how Kurosawa looks to the average observer. But readers of the manga are basically inside his head, since the manga is told from his point of view, and we know that he's kind of a jerk. He's kind of arrogant, he thinks he's above everyone else, and he doesn't really seem to like anyone. Except for girls, he likes girls a lot. Also, his fantasies during his bathroom time are slightly disturbing as they involve whatever girl he's after that day and him in very rape-ish situations. They also suggest that he doesn't really respect women, especially since he refers to the girls around him as 'lessons' or 'meals'... our hero, ladies and gentlemen.
Kitahara also has two different faces, depending on where you're looking from. She's even more shy than Kurosawa. She really has no friends and seems scared of everyone around her, which is probably because she's constantly being bullied and made fun of by almost everyone. She's also very small and wears huge glasses, so she has that cute and innocent look. And then she gets close to Kurosawa and he (and us readers) find out that she's kind of scary. And vengeful. And bitter. Throughout the story, she basically wants Kurosawa to perform these gross acts of revenge on other girls who've done anything from outright bully her, to just laugh at her in the background. At points she's so hell bent on getting these things done that she even starts to scare Kurosawa, especially when she targets the girl that Kurosawa develops a crush on.
Yeah, Kurosawa gets a crush on a girl, and that series of events takes Kurosawa from being just a teenager with an odd passtime (seriously, do it at home), to a teenager in love, to a jerk.
At some point in the series, Kurosawa can't make it to his bathroom right away and spends more time in the library, that's where he first starts to get to know his classmate Takigawa Magisteru. They get to talking and the more they hang out the more Kurosawa realizes how much he likes this girl. He even starts looking forward to his time in the library (as opposed to just waiting for it to be over so he could move on to the bathroom), and he goes so far as to hope to meet Takigawa outside of school. It even gets to the point where fantasizing about her as he masturbates makes him physically ill, as in he actually vomits (an interesting insight as to how he actually views his bathroom activities).
During this time, Kurosawa becomes more likable, and I started rooting for him. On the flip side is Kitahara, who becomes more unlikable and pessimistic and even predicts that Kurosawa's happiness won't last.
It doesn't, of course, as Kurosawa comes to class one day and comes face to face with the fact that the girl he's in love with is now dating his only friend (Nagatsuka, mentioned above). There's a full page dedicated to Kurosawa's reaction, and it almost hurt me. The expression on his face and the knowledge of what was about to go on inside his head actually made me go 'ouch'. And that's probably the last time I ever sympathized with him, because then he just goes into full on asshole mode.
In retaliation, he agrees to Kitahara's revenge plan on Takigawa and makes a mess of Takigawa's school bag. Takigawa becomes traumatized by this, and the series ends with our two mains continuing on their revenge spree.
(One of Kurosawa's fantasies)
So yeah, this really is a pretty unusual story, but it's a pretty good read. The art is nice, the story moves along fairly quickly, it is fairly interesting. Also, the masturbation scenes and fantasies aren't too explicit, not much is really shown, although it's pretty obvious what's going on.
And now to explain the humour in the whole deal because I don't think I said anything yet that could be considered as funny. Well, the story doesn't really have a lot of humour in it, at least from my point of view. Nope, the really funny part of this manga only comes up if you've watch/read/are familiar with/are a fan of Death Note.
(This is Kurosawa. You can't not see the resemblence here if you tried.)
Kurosawa Kakeru is Yagami Light. There are differences (mostly because I'm pretty sure that Kurosawa has a functional soul), but they're so alike it's not even fit. Their thought patterns are similar, and they even look alike. Also, the stories are kind of the same. Light kills criminals with a notebook, Kurosawa... masturbate-revenges people... it's the same idea, trust me.
There's such an association there that one of the names people call this series is Fap Note. Also, the scanlation team that worked on this manga made their credit page look like the rules page from the Death Note.
I even realized this before I saw the credit page. I was reading it and I said to myself that Kurosawa is an awful lot like Light. And that's where most of the humour comes from, I find. Because I spent most of this time imagining Light in place of Kurosawa, which made things that much more funny.
So yeah, that's Onani Master Kurosawa. It's a pretty interesting little series, and it has a lot of laughs if you're a Death Note fan. It's also more of a character study than a story. There really isn't a set plot, but it's pretty fun to watch the characters react and change to what's going on around them (even if our two mains aren't always very likable). It hasn't been liscenced in English, but it is available to read online. It also got some pretty good reviews on mangaupdates.com.
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