July Stuff

I don't plan on writing on like every single *nerd voice* piece of media I check on on here. I simply don't have thoughts on all of it worth putting out into the aether. I think that kind of makes me feel bad sometimes. I keep a little monthly list of things of merit, and even then I don't always add like, the 3 kinda trashy romcom manga I read that month, even if I probably got more joy out of them than other things on the list for the month. Am I making like a stament there - that these things are lesser? I dont think I feel that way.

anyway here's stuff I have words about, unmarked spoilers.

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Kowloon Generic Romance (Ongoing)

Fuck, I had like a whole thing on this one, and it's fallen out the back of my skull.

So I really loved Mayuzuki's previous manga, After the Rain. It's a really beautiful slice of life that I kind of struggled to get into the first time I tried to read it beucase I couldn't get past the surface level premise of "Teen girl in love with middle-aged man." Reading beyond that on a second try, I fell for it as the manga slowly rolls out these character's lives chapter by chapter. I can't remember exatly when, but there's a point where enough has been unfurled, and I suddenly saw what the stories really about - this tapestry of people who are missing something, and searching for it in other people.

Kowloon is also about people search for something, but that something is long gone, and they know it. There's an excellent first volume reveal that reframes and introduces the story going forward. "Reveal" is a very telling word here; In addition to the slow evolution of the cast and their entertwined relationships, there's a larger sci-fi mystery weaved through their lives. These two elements kind of vie for page time, often with the plot winning out. It makes the whole thing feel start-and-stopy a bit, and it's not really what I'm onboard for. Not that it's bad, but it just like, dictates the larger drama in a way that feels forced?

There's a few volumes untranslated, and it seems like it's building up a final, so I'm still curious to see where it ends for me.

[I gave up on the thread thing I was doing there.]

Baccano! (Anime) & Baccano! (Light Novel Vol 1)

An old favorite for me. I burned through a rewatch after recommending it to a friend on his maiden anime voyage. Some of the novelty has worn off, but it's still a vibrant and fun romp. Now that a non-linear narrative isn't mindblowing like it was in highschool, I think it struggles a bit to hang togehter. Of the four volumes they interweave, the Flying Pussyfoot (lol, lmao) takes up two books, and eats up the runtime accordingly. It puts the first and especially the fourth book events struggling to breathe, even with the extra time from the ovas, which mostly cover connective tissue from later volumes, to my understanding.

Still had a blast though, I really love the bombast and spectacle every character has. In highschool I described it as Tarantino-esque, becuase thats the person I was, and the internet posts I read said so. I dont agree with that anymore; I can defo feel some of the threads it's pulling in from the larger crime film canon, but my knowledge fails me a bit. I really want to check some movies cited by the Director and Screnplay writer, and see what inspired the author.

Speaking of, I nabbed the translation of the first volume, and've been digging it. Since it's just that first story, theres more time for all the characters it juggles to breath and have interiority. Everyone is also a bit grimier? No less likeable, but it feels like the anime cleaned up the casts criminal records for prime time. Makes it all feel fresh, even after just watching it.

My Hero Academia: Vigilantes

There's stuff in My Hero Academia thats clearly coming from an uncritical space that is so insane. The primary conflict of this show is a designer drug being passed around that makes a user and their Quirk (superpowers) go crazy. Anyone who takes these drugs, regardless of intent, or weather they were forced, are immediately branded as Instant Villians. Villians who're are stopped by Heroes. Sometimes the show tries to cleary establish the drug users as victims, both inocent bystanders and even the more violent outcasts who intentionally take it, and then immediately doubles down by having them dose up again and get More Villiany.

Pushing the nuts-ass logisitics of MHA aside, it's fun. I caught clips of this recommened on youtube and was charmed enough to give it a whirl. I think MHA proper gets massively caught up in shonen tropes that never really mix with american super hero stuff (see: the Proper Noun shit above,) but Vigilantes feels very superhero - it's a ramshakle groundlevel team of capes stoping crime and solving an Overarching Mystery. I'm in the middle of it, but I probably wont report back unless something particulary stupid happens. [Editor's Note: A vigilante punching the shit out of his daughter with a taser/knuckleduster is given the full heroic soaring musical climax and sakuga animation moment. It's part of a plan to save her life but it's still WILD to witness.]

Tactical Nexus

Steam says I have 108 minutes in Tactical Nexus. I played two times, once for about an hour, and then for 40 minutes and some change. Both times I went fully in, no sense of time as I clicked away.

The entire evening I saw floors of the tower in my head. I could close my eyes and try out a slightly different path, rotate all the possiblities of those 108 minutes.

Tactical Nexus is a magical game of simple, satisfying, infintely playable chunks of meticulously designed, meticulously unraveling puzzles. fantastic little thing.

I immediately uninstalled it the next morning.

These two posts by Joey Schutz floated top of mind while processing the images tactial nexus branded into my mind (This is the morning after I played it btws, theyre still fuckin here, I feel the pull.) I'm resentful of the compusion video games try to instill, and the repetition and excess thats so often paired with it. I think it felt good to play tactical nexus, but I also dont think I really felt good playing it; there was no joy, just a rote mechanical satsifcation. And I want more, I still want more - I've uninstalled it, marked it hidden in my library to make it that much easier to find and I'm still like 2:12am... going back for more olive about this shit.

I played a game for 108, and went fully out of my gourd for going on 14 hours. Whatever I good I got out of Tactical Nexus, I dont know if it's worth it for me.

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I've got some albums I want to write about but I think I'm saving those. "How the fuck to write about music" is a big goal for me in posting, so I want to put the work in.