Detritus of the Mind

It's the most wonderful time of the year: Precure Leak Season! I have to admit, through not much fault of its own, I've kind of drifted away from Kira Kira Precure a la Mode ; the site I used decided to make like every other fansub site and align with some shady advertisers that every form of protection I have on my devices rebelled against me ever visiting.  I found some of what I could watch boring (I missed the fights & flashy attacks that weren't just glitter water), and thanks to my situation, I wound up missing really interesting developments with the characters (especially the villains). Because of this, I'm not too optimistic I'll be able to even watch Hugtto Precure  when it comes out, unless I find a safer place to do so.  Which kind of stinks cuz I really dig these designs. The theme this year apparently, according to a translation of the preview page on the official site, is "follow your dreams, you can do anything". So it seems prett...

Okay, so I've been putting this one off for a bunch of reasons (90% of them personal), but there's a big one - Maho Girls Precure was boring. It was DULL. And it's not because it followed in the wake of a really strong season - the fights were lackluster, the villains were rather bland, the stakes never felt dramatic in any way, and the universe didn't feel very fun (it really felt like someone had recently read the Harry Potter books & wanted to make them more cutesy). It just didn't have the humor or character pieces that even Precure's weaker seasons have managed, and it actively made me wonder if I still liked Precure at all because it was just so... blah. Somehow, blah is worse than bad, since with bad, you can at least see things that could have been executed well; with blah, there isn't even that squandered potential or that urge to rage-watch & see how much worse things get. I liked the designs a lot (especially the deliberate ridiculousness...

As sure as family crises and the occasional head cold, the newest Precure series has been announced this Christmas.   Maho Tsukai Precure  (a.k.a. Maho Girls Precure ) feels like a throwback in several ways - the two-girl team with a joint transformation, the monstrous-sounding villains, the visible age difference between civilian & Cure forms, etc. It also has some fun new concepts, such as having the girls attend a school for witches in training.  ANN has info on the overall premise, so I'll direct you there instead of repeating it.  Either way, it sounds like a deliberate nod to both Toei's own Ojamajo Doremi  series and the "cute witch" roots of the magical girl genre.  Since this past season was really very solid, I'm looking forward to this one.  But of course, I wanna review the new designs. First, the civilian forms for Mirai (top) and Riko (bottom).  Very cute - I like Mirai in particular, since she looks like she could be ...

So of course, after I say I can't think of anything to say, I have something to say. And it needs to be said. You are not entitled to information leaks about a TV show and/or movie. Again, you are not entitled to leaks. You are not entitled to leaks. As much as December info leaks are seen as a sort of Pretty Cure tradition at this point, they are not something the staff of the show actually wants to happen.  They want you to be surprised & interested in the show because of the information they offer, not because someone found an early design in a detail-reduced form on a candy wrapper.  They want you to enjoy the plot twists, not have them spoiled months in advance by copyright registrations being trolled for info.  Have a bit of basic respect for the creators wanting to give you the best experience they can. Toei has, on the whole, gotten pretty good at thwarting the leak-makers.  After the aforementioned copyright searchers spoiled the reveal of Cure...

Yes, the leaks for the new Precure season, Go! Princess Precure , have been revealed via a candy company, quickly followed by an official debut on the next Precure All-Stars poster.  Here, see for yourselves. Now, this is another Shibata season, so I'm not super optimistic.  But I just wanna put this out here, since it's apparently a minority opinion - I love  these designs.  About the only thing I don't like is the mascot, who looks like 80s Poochie got lost trying to infiltrate the next season of Jewelpet  (even then, I'm happy to see a mascot that's specifically a dog).  Here's a quick bullet point of the stuff that I like: The Pink Cure (no official name yet) looks younger & less mature than her teammates, which sounds like a potential plot point. In a nice break from a minor tradition, only one Cure has an eye color that matches her theme color.  This started with Yes!  & sort of became an unofficial rule, but a break...

Because it's a genre I like & talk about a LOT, I've decided to create yet another sub-category.  Welcome to the inaugural Magical Girl Obsession (MGO) entry, not the first of its topic but the first to bear the name. Since October is traditionally when news about the next Precure series starts to be found (usually by people combing patent info), I've heard some folks start speculating what they'd like to see in the next season of Precure.  I usually reserve full judgement until I at least hear a title & see one bit of imagery (increasingly, it's from merchandise listings rather than releases), but given the past couple of seasons, I am making a short wish list of things I want from the next season of Precure. A New Showrunner:   This one should be obvious.  Ever since Hiroaki Shibata took over starting with Doki Doki, the series has been known more for its wasted potential & gross missteps than actual decent plots/characters.  HaChaPre should st...

The last couple of seasons of Precure have been... rough.   Doki Doki  was a carnival of wasted ideas that were thrown out throughout the series (Cure Sword's world having a standing army of Precures to defend it, the existence of Cure Empress & her unnamed teammates spring most readily to mind), and it chose to focus on a main character in Mana who was dully infallible.  And while Happiness Charge started strong & has addressed many of the character problems with The Mana Show (along with giving fandom a gift on a silver platter as far as creating new fan Cures), one character & said character's impending story arc has more than soured me on watching the rest.  But then I encountered  this translated interview  and one quote in particular: ...Speaking of which, Pretty Cure is separated into three periods by which producer is doing the show.  First is the  Washio era,  starting from Futari wa to Yes! 5 GoGo. Second is the...

Okay, Part 1 was Gripe-a-palooza.  Part 2 is the stuff I liked, and I’ll try really hard to make it more than just fannish gushing.  Also, as part of my Shift to Positive, I’ll be offering a Mea Culpa for some initial knee-jerk reactions in the past, since my revisits have changed my impressions. As I said before, SPOILERS, SPOILERS, SPOILERS for stuff that’s mentioned. BEST TV SHOW: Steven Universe:  “If every pork chop was perfect, we wouldn’t have hot dogs!”  Promoted largely because it’s from the first female original-show creator in Cartoon Network’s history (which surprised me, since they usually want to avoid acknowledging females in any way), it is a damn fine show.  Steven himself is a refreshingly sweet & dorky change of pace from the usual sassy & wiseass kid hero (which you do get a break from on Gumball & Adventure Time), the Gems all have great personalities & work well as his surrogate family, his supporting cast is growin...

Ah, 2013.  It was another year of pointless stress but what do you expect for adulthood?  It was the year I got back into anime, the year I finally figured out how the hell Tumblr works, the year I belatedly got hooked on Pokemon.  Everything outside of pop culture was trying extra, extra hard to make this a bad year, but the balance was otherwise such that I managed to stay sane. Like last year, I have decided to break this down into two parts, and since this is the year I made the choice to try & be more positive, I’m going to get any negativity out of the way in this first entry.  So here’s my disappointments & one bafflement for 2013. (Please note that video games are not on this list.  There weren’t a lot of new games that came out that interested me – so that will be the Disappointment for 2013 for gaming – and the ones that did interest me were on the 3DS, which I just got for Christmas (whoo-hoo!).  So games are benched for this year, a...

Two posts in as many days?  Yeah, I know, Satan's probably looking for the blankets right now.  But thanks to the very smart & insightful Jeff Harris on Twitter, I have another rambling train of thought to address: "Speaking of that new Sailor Moon series, when are we going to see anything from it? A sketch, a publicity shot, anything? I know more about Ladybug than the new Sailor Moon, and they've been working on that for a couple of years." - Jeff "Nemalki" Harris Once he said that, I realized he was right - I haven't heard anything about Toei's new Sailor Moon series since last year.  Usually, about now, you'd at least see ads or a one-minute preview making the rounds; after all, the series is supposed to air in May of this year.  Yet, Toei's been pretty silent.  But I have a theory. Y'see, Toei is one of the biggest backers of a new international streaming service that's due to roll out called Daisuki.  I wouldn't b...

Another year, another Precure new series announcement.  It's the tenth anniversary or season, too (not sure which).  After the Hibiki-ness of Suite and the meandering dullness of Smile , it's hard to be optimistic.  It really is.  I detailed why earlier, so I won't repeat myself.   But you need to go into a new season with at least a semblence of a clean slate, so let's review the new Doki Doki! Precure official announcement poster. First things first, I LOVE the card suit theme.  I thought using it as a sort of secondary theme in Fresh felt a bit wasted, and I like how they're playing around with some of the European & Tarot suits, too (for instance, Cure Sword is the spade & Cure Rosetta is the club, both parallels from those traditions).  So I'm looking forward to what they'll do with that. Second, I like the throwback to the original Futari wa Precure series by having the mascots/transformation items be cell phone anima...

I'm home sick, which is when my mind goes to strange places.  Recently, I've been thinking about Precure again. I like the Precure franchise.  It's a magical girl series where there's still some kinetic physical action, it emphasizes familial love & friendship over romantic love for a change, and while it has a basic formula, it is still broad enough to allow for a LOT of variety.  Until fairly recently, it also did a good job focusing on the girls' lives as normal people and not just as superheroes, and it could keep a sense of stakes even during the lighter-hearted filler episodes without slipping into grimdark territory. The last two seasons, however, have left me cold.  Suite could've been much better than it was; the side characters were more interesting than the main pair, and the main conflict playing out how it did should've been epic.  But by focusing on the annoying Hibiki (easily the worst character in the franchise's history), basica...

We interrupt Final Fantasy Month for an absolutely vital Precure rant. First, I'll be honest - I have seen about 55 minutes of New Stage , and it was in the raw, so I can only guess at the deeper story points from context.  But what I've seen hasn't impressed me.  The biggest complaint I've heard from everyone else is that the older Cures get very little screen time and not a lot of dialogue.  That I expect - the older casts get less & less to do as the All-Star movie series, and with the franchise running for a decade, it'd be hard to justify giving everyone a plot line in a single movie.  I was disappointed that there was no dazzling new form for everyone, nor a group attack, nor that we had to spend more time with my least-favorite season above all the rest (that would be Suite , a.k.a. Hibiki the Loudmouth and Three Other Girls ).  But that was not my biggest bother. No, that would be the face fault that is the introduction of the new movie...