Category: Events

Brooklyn Museum: Takashi Murakami’s Superflat Exhibit

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I saw some of his sculptures a couple of years ago displayed in Rockefeller Center and really found them fun and entertaining. So when I saw he was going to have a full exhibit here, well I was excited. The Brooklyn Museum is one of my favorite museums anyway. The Murakami show goes through July 13 and it has a set price of $10.00 to get in.

I had heard somewhat of Takashi Murakami through his involvement with the superflat movement. Other than that he was sort of just a name that people threw around to me. Since Anime World Order mentions superflat every once in a while and it is mentioned in Internet discussions about anime and manga, I decided I might as well go as well and see what it was all about.

I would describe the superflat aesthetic with a few broad ideas. You usually see a lot of flat color, and bright color, along with little shadowing. You also often get a very definite line or hard edge. And of course superflat is influenced by cartoons and comics, especially calling upon the looks of anime and otaku culture.

Murakami is credited with creating this art movement. But it is not just the look that is creating. He challenges, just as many artist before him, the ideas of what fine art is. He tries to blur the line between commercial art and fine art. Murakami paints on large canvases, sculpts out of fiberglass but then turns around and designs bags for Louis Vuitton and gashapon figures.

He also uses fine art concepts in products that he sells as commercial art and visa versa. He sells and merchandises what would easily be considered high concept art pieces while giving all his commercial good distinct elements you would normally find in fine art pieces.

The exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum is really amazing and quite large. Everything from the carpet in the viewing room to the walls of the next are designed by him to lead you through his artwork and immerse the viewer in it. You are greeted with a fiberglass sculpture of a magical girl with the proverbial short skirt, long legs, and large chest (though not as large as a girl you see later on). You can then make your way through the rest of the exhibit of enter the viewing room which boasts bright characters on the wall before entering and a pile of poop on the ceiling.

He does have two very different styles of art in his collection. His 3-D models seem to reflect the cheesecake anime style where as his other pieces seem to echo the super cute mascot style ala Hello Kitty. He clearly has a grasp of the extremes in the otaku market. I’m not sure if it is because he has a fondness of otaku culture and blends it into his art or if it is meant to be satire and spark a critical analysis of otaku culture. Perhaps it is even both.

We watched all the videos he directed on display, one of which was a music video for Kanye West. I am not familiar with his music or his videos though he did do that one with Daft Punk that had lots of Akira influences. But with this is was a combinations of cute mixed with a steady rap beat, the contrast made it worth watching. Then we saw two episodes of Kaikai and Kiki which were very child-like and humorous. And then there was this odd preview of a live-action film where we basically watched a girl wash her hair which, as you might imagine, was insanely boring.

I found the Kaikai and Kiki episodes mostly child-like and humorous but one part of the second episode threw me for a loop. Most of the humor revolved around poop and fart jokes which are the staples of Japanese children humor mixed in with general story plots of a children’s anime. Then out of no where Kaikai has a flashback to how his mentor sacrificed himself during the great space war to save his life. That was extremely non sequitur. The live-action film was called Dharma and it is about a hit-man who encounters a man who looks exactly like him. The odd thing is they give you two screens of text describing this assassin and then the next five minutes we get two very brief flashes of a man who might be the assassin mixed in with the daily routine of some unmentioned girl. I did not get it but I guess that is why I was never a film major.

As we continued our journey we ran into a number of interesting pieces including a three-sequence sculpture of a girl transforming into a jet; a girl with enormous breasts shooting milk in deadly sharp spurts; and a guy who looked like he went super saiyan before ejaculating. All of his human-like sculptures have an element of sex to them, which is not really seen with most of his other work. It was hilarious to watch parents rushing their children by these works.

In contrast, I feel that all his non-human work seems to have an element of mortality to it. The mushrooms having the atomic bomb imagery tied to them and pieces like the one pictured above often having imagery of death and dying somewhere in them.

Some of my favorite pieces were his large, wall sized paintings done with acrylics and then sandblasted to create a great texture. They were mostly of his signature character DOB. These pieces had the most fine art like presence. It made them especially stand out when the opposite wall displayed something much more two-dimensional like the mushrooms or jellyfish eyes. His multi-panel mushroom painting was especially great to get close to and see all the tiny details. On display next to this were two process pieces to show you how he gets from concept to finish work.

I think my favorite pieces in the collection were the portraits of Bodhidharma with the titles that were Zen Koans. I felt their otherworldly nature reflected well on the subject. And the mixture of digital techniques to make classic style portraits was quite clever. Plus I think that I have an odd fondness for Zen Buddhism is general. I also thought that the little videos of the not quite human looking robot boy, Inochi, were rather amusing.

I also enjoyed seeing displays of the merchandise he has created, everything from notebooks to cell phone straps and beyond. You could even buy his Louis Vuitton bags in the middle of the exhibit if you were so inclined. There was also plenty of stuff to buy at the end, I picked up a couple of postcards (as I normally do when going to the museum) and a dinosaur plush key chain.

Well, since I accidentally left my wallet brimming with hundred dollar bills at home I decided to skip on picking up one of the Louis Vuitton bags. There was a good amount of Takashi Murakami merchandise as well as several books on superflat in general. And there were also several books by Patrick Macias and the ubiquitous How to Draw Manga books. For some reason I found the How to Draw Manga books quite amusing.

Narutaki Currently!
Watching Sexy Voice and Robo
Reading D.Gray Man
Listening to AAA

Hisui (Brainwasher Detective) Currently:
Watching Allison and Lilia
Reading Sexy Voice and Robo
Listening to a special version of Makka Na Chikai by Yoshiki Fukuyama

Special Screening: Death Note the Movie, I needs more L

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So, all around the country, for two special nights, Death Note the live-action movie was playing in theaters. I was not about to miss this as I quite enjoyed this movie and its sequel. I love the chance to see movies on the big screen, I always wish I could do it more often. But in NYC you pay 10-11 dollars to see a movie…I swear. So I only bust out that hard earned cash for special moments, this was one of them.

I too like to see anime movies in the theaters as well. I would really like to see a good comedy, as good comedies are only enhanced by an audience. Though I don’t know of any comedy anime that would be popular enough for their movies to be playing in American theaters. I suppose that I will take what I can get. I know they are going to be showing the Bleach movie soon as well. The dub alone will keep Narutaki away but I might just go out of random curiosity, since I’m one of the few people who has not seen it. No amount of loyalty to anime fandom will make me pay money to watch a Naruto movie though. I would not so secretly like to see the Kara no Kyoukai movies in theaters but there are going to seven of them and that it’s not popular in the U.S. so that makes it almost impossible. I am also sure that the Evangelion movies would be simply amazing on the big screen but someone has to shell out some serious cash before that will ever happen.

We saw the film, along with other friends, at the Regal Cinema at Union Square. We pre-ordered our tickets but I didn’t see any big line for the event. Also, I noted before we went up (maybe 15 minutes before show time) that the event had yet to sell out. The theater was pretty crowded though and our seats were forced to near the front. I have some friends in Indianapolis and they said their theater was pretty crowded, too. So I’ll assume it was pretty much the same all over.

It was crowded enough that they will hopefully do something like this again. It was not enough to have it to play for several weeks but I think it’s enough to get two showing for those who want them.

Unlike the manga and anime Death Note the movie starts slightly in medias res. The movie begins with criminals all over the word suddenly dying of heart attacks. Law enforcement agents around the world are baffled as to who is doing the killing and how exactly they are doing it. It turns out that they are being performed by Light Yagami a young college student you uses a Shinigami’s magical note book to kill people. When Light writes anyones’ name in the book, while think about their face, the person who’s name he writes dies. As the Japanese police force start their investigations, they are approached by L the world’s greatest detective who has some theories about these murders. The Japanese form a task force with L at the helm to try and solve the mystery of the deaths.

I quite liked the pacing of the movie. It kept the wonderful cat and mouse that drew me into the original manga. We got a lot of the defining moments from the beginning of the story, like: the L TV broadcast, the bus scene, all the Raye scenes really, and the chips. There were new additions as well, especially the twist at the end which is completely new and you really see the director moving things to his own needs at that point. But I liked that, I am happy with the way he is telling this lengthy story in a just a few short hours. Also the Death Note manga is extremely word heavy and I was glad to see they didn’t bring that to the movie, not tons of internal monologues or any such thing. You were really able to read the characters emotions form the actors.

I think you just like the fact that Misa Misa was kept to a minimum in this movie. When you only have two movies to adapt a 12 book series, I suppose it helps that several arcs in the manga are weaker than others and can mostly be axed out with no problem. The director certainly knew how to show and not tell which helped cut down on the need for lengthy mental dialogues, while still showing the back and forth between people trying to outwit each other. I also like that Naomi Misora was given a little more time in the movie. I had always wished she stuck around longer in the manga.

Fujiwara Tatsuya comes out of the gate being the charming and intelligent, young man with a god complex, Light Yagami. It is always engrossing to know what Light is up to unbeknownst to the rest of the characters (except possibly L) and realize how cunning his interactions with them are. After Light falls into L’s first trap, he wises up and starts to push the envelope of how far one can think ahead. Fujiwara takes acting with his CG partner, Ryuk, in stride and never over acts to compensate. However, Ryuk comes off as much more comic like than I felt in the original story. Which added some downright laugh out loud audience moments.

I think everyone noticed that really odd scene where they used a cardboard cutout instead of CG to make Ryuk’s shadow. It was an interesting bit on unintentional comedy. I don’t think they played up Ryuk’s comedic aspects as much as minimized the creepy/scary moments. Oh and I think you have forgotten a most important fact: Light’s father is played by none of than Chairman Kaga from Iron Chef. I admit it’s not easy to see, especially when at no point in the movie does he dramatically bite into a pepper or wear a flashy suit.

I was quite amused and couldn’t help getting caught up with the crowd when L appeared on the screen; the theater went into applause. Kenichi Matsuyama really looks the part of L and once he opens his mouth he solidifies his rendition of the eccentric, but brilliant, detective. L’s character is very much in tune with his manga counter-part, he thinks like no one else and is able to get results, albeit not always by ethical means. And as he sat on the couch making pastry-kebabs I knew the character was spot on.

From what I can tell, L seems to be the most popular character in Death Note so they better have picked a good actor for him. I was happy with L as well. I think Kenichi put in the right combination of playful, creepy, eccentric, and amazingly brilliant to his portrayal of the world famous detective.

I was really surprised it was dubbed, really wasn’t expecting that. Because as most people can attest, possibly from watching some swanky kung-fu movies, dubbing real people is a whole different ball game than dubbing animation. It is just plain more difficult. This was probably done due to its popularity on Adult Swim. However, the most important ones were decently done. Though I’d be lying by saying it was great and preferable. Light and L’s voicing was close to their characters’ original sound at least and most of the time they didn’t speak like William Shatner. I can’t say the same for the rest of the cast. I can also blame the major amount of chuckling to the dub, too. I am glad to have seen it fan-subbed first. And what I couldn’t understand was the lack of subtitles for cell phone messages, newspapers, etc it was just plain lazy.

Odd that you mention swanky kung-fu movies because the dub really does come off as an old Shaw Brothers movie dub at times. I half expected Light to comment on the weakness of L’s crane style investigation-fu at the end of the movie. All the live action Japanese movies and TV dramas we have watched together have been subbed so I wonder if it’s just the way most live action movies come off or is this movie weaker than others? I have noticed for some reason when they play Japanese movies, be it live action or anime, they tend to play them without the option for subtitled signs in theaters. Most of the time you can get away with it but there are far too many scenes where plot was being conveyed by text for it to be anything less than very silly.

The bonus, a making-of featurette after the movie, was mundane at best. There were no real insights, a very brief interview with the director, and mostly us seeing scenes from the movie but with all the equipment in the shots. The only nice thing was the preview for Death Note: The Last Name. I would guess that Viz plans to release that theatrically in a similar manner. When is yet to be determined.

Other than getting a laugh out of a few of the directors odd comments I don’t think we got any grand insight into the movies though the featurette. It was nice to have a little extra that you did not get with the fan-sub but I’m sure Narutaki just wanted more Kenichi Matsuyama running around as L. I suppose that explains why L: Change the WorLd and Death Note: Another Note got made in the first place. The world just needs more L.

New York Comic Con 2008

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I know this will be hard to believe but my geekdom spreads further than anime and manga. In fact, I was a comic book reader from about fourth grade. I also read fantasy literature. So Comic Con was all sorts of my hobbies mashed up together and actually I spent most of my time there on things outside of anime.

As far as I can tell for Kohaku and Narutaki this was a TM Revolution concert with a comic convention thrown in at no additional cost. The comic convention was fun for both of them but I have a feeling they would have paid the same price just to see TMR and been just as happy. I myself had fun at the convention but I don’t think I had anywhere the near orgasmic time that they had with the convention.

Okay, that too! But hey I still would have gone to comic-con regardless of TMR. It just so happens that he was there and I was super excited about it. But since you brought him up I will say that the concert was a lot of fun and a good length, 90 minutes. It also, surprisingly, started on time. There were a couple of girls from Japan in front of us and they knew all the dances. Me and Kohaku tried to follow along but I think we just ended up looking silly. Not to mention I have about -5% rhythm. He played all of his songs from various anime (since most of the audience probably knew him from those more than anything else). He didn’t however play my favorite song. We also went to his panel which was basically useless and annoying. He had his own interpreter and the guy never really said anything or asked any good questions. It mostly consisted of him saying, You guys love TMR, right? insert audience cheering. Same went for his event at Kinokuniya which was on Sunday. The did play the b-side from his upcoming single release which was exciting! Also me and Kohaku were a mere three feet from him and he waved! We rule.

Although I did not attend the Bandai panel they did announce some very interesting things. The first was they had the license to Gundam 00 and Gurren Lagann. I don’t think anyone was really surprised that Bandai is releasing Gundam 00. I think it has the potential to be the next Gundam Wing here in the states. It’s certainly not guaranteed but it is possible. Gurren Lagann on the other hand was out of left field. Nobody knew what has going to happen to Gurren Lagann after the whole ADV/Sojitz deal fell apart. I know there are a lot of people predicting even more doom and gloom for ADV now knowing that Bandai has stepped in and snatched away ADV’s guaranteed hit of the year. I’m not sure this is any more or less of a sign that ADV is on it’s way out but it is something worth watching.

Well, you know they had Gundam Seed on TV and no one cared. So I dunno. But I only care about getting my lovely Gundam 00 DVDs so I am a happy camper. I wonder if they will start coming out before the second half is done. I would really like them right now. RIGHT NOW. The whole Gurren Lagann fiasco kind of makes me chuckle. But really I would hate to see the death of another anime company in the near future. There have been few announcements and that just does not bode well. The bubble is bursting and quite frankly I’m not surprised.

Their second announcement is that Bandai hinted/practically said outright that is there is little to no chance of Gundam X and Turn A Gundam being licensed in the U.S. in the foreseeable future. It clearly shows that Bandai is being more conservative about its already somewhat cautious outlook towards Gundam in the states. I’m pretty sure that Bandai’s mishandling of certain Gundam series in the past has a lot to do with this. I’m looking right at the original Gundam and Zeta Gundam. I think it also shows even beyond Gundam that if you are an older series your chance are slim to none of getting licensed. More and more companies are realizing that the current market schemes are not working enough as it is. Old shows will not work at all with the current methods used in the U.S. The problem is this: they are basically giving up on older titles rather than trying to find better way to sell them.

That is not really an announcement, it’s more like a confession.

Viz announced that they will be releasing Vagabond in 3 volume omnibuses and that they will be releasing One Pound Gospel to usher in the first time release of the final fourth volume of the series. I’m sure that Narutaki is thrilled that he can finally start collecting Vagabond in a slightly cheaper format. I’m probably going to be a sucker and re-buy One Pound Gospel even though I have already bought the original three manga. Because if I don’t Rumiko Takahashi will surely starve to death, penniless, in the gutter.

It seems like every time I decide today is the day I will buy Vagabond the place I go will not have the first book. So as long as they can keep this in stock for more than ten minutes hopefully I can get myself a copy. I wonder how fans of Inu-Yasha like this series in comparisons, haha. I really like One Pound Gospel in fact, it was my first encounter with Rumiko’s work. I am down the middle about her series though.

Del Ray Manga said a lot but there were only two announcements that mattered to me. The first was the fact that Sayonara Zetsubo Sensei was licensed and the second was more details on Del Ray attempt at making a manga version of the X-Men. I mean I can’t not buy, Sayonara Zetsubo Sensei, the manga representation of my life if I were a Japanese school teacher. Despair. Despair. Despair. I am in Despair because it so accurately captures my essence.The manga versions of the X-Men just looked so silly that I’m curious how they turn out. I mean they had a version of Beast that looked very much like a certain Studio Ghibli character that rides a cat bus. Plus Kitty Pride is the main character. That makes me happy. Oh and they are going to have a separate Wolverine comic. Gosh I wonder why? Wolverine is such a minor and unpopular character. It would be like giving M.O.D.O.K. his own comic and we all know that would never happen.

Yen Press had two of the most shocking announcements of the convention. The first was Yen Press has the license for the Haruhi manga and light novel series. People have been asking for the light novels since the first episode of Haruhi popped up on fan-sub so theoretically this will make a lot of people very happy. The only thing that might make people a little wary is that Yen Press had to bring in the big guns and get Little Brown and Company to license it with them. While that means they will have a much better chance of a better translation, it could also mean that they will insist on making the story as Americanized as possible. Now I don’t think they change Haruhi and Kyon from Japan to Holly and Kyle from California but they might try and reduce the number of Japanese references as much as possible. I’m sure we can all image how the internet is going to light up if they change a reference to Ayumi Hamasaki to Britney Spears.

Yen Press fills me with love. They are nice to talk to and they happen to be picking up some really great work. I will take this moment to say I love Spiral! Two thumbs up. I am definitely curious to see how the Japanese-isms for go over in the Haruhi books. Although with the covers they have, people are going to be mistaking it for manga at first glance. I doubt it will end up anywhere else in the bookstore. Also Ayu is 1000% more talented that Britney Spears. So there. Yes Press also brought Judith Park, a manhwa creator, to the convention. They gave away the first book in her series they are releasing and you could jump right in line to get it signed. Which we did. It took a while a we read a bit of the manga before we got up to her. She was drawing pictures for everyone! What a treat! And on the last day of the con, as an added bonus, all the books at their book were just 5 bucks! Score.

The second shocking announcement was that Yen Press is starting their own manga anthology line much like Shonen Jump USA. I think it is definitely something to watch. It looks like it has enough going for it that it might succeed but enough against it that it could crash and burn with force of a thousand suns. The anthology will be called Yen Plus and it will contain a mixture of manga, manhwa, and American comics. All the manga in the magazine will come from Square Enix for the first two years. So it will be running Soul Eater and Nabari No Ou. Narutaki and I are both assuming that those titles maybe the two shows that get the most chatter on the fun-sub circuit this season. Also Higurashi, Bamboo Blade, and Sumomomo will be seen. I like Higurashi, heck I made it my anime of the month, but I’m not sure how much fandom it has outside of a cult following. From what I know of Bamboo Blade it seems generally cute but I can’t see it as being a huge seller. Sumomomo Momomo looks very silly but other than the general story and that it has an anime I don’t know much about it. As I mentioned in our first article Svetlana Chmakova is the only OEL artist I like so I guess she is the best pick for the OEL section. I had never heard of Maximum Ride before the Comic Con but it seems wildly popular. I know next to nothing about manhwa so I don’t know how good or popular Pig Bride or Jack Frost are.

While I like the ideas of anthology series, I don’t buy the ones that are out now and this one seems an even less likely buy for me personally. But it is a nice way of sampling a whole lot of things at once. There are so many other resources for helping me with my choices. Beside that, the manga has either already finished or is far ahead in Japan which seems to take away some of the point of the monthly anthology. And while I do steal Shonen Jump USA from Hisui’s brother to read Bleach I find it more of an annoyance than anything else. I would rather my manga be coming out faster.

I remember Dallas Middaugh mentioning that the only way he felt that a new manga anthology could succeed in the U.S. was for it to have a popular title on Television and I have to agree with him. I feel in order for this magazine to succeed they need to get either Soul Eater and/or Nabari No Ou on Cartoon Network. The Maximum Ride manga will help the magazine greatly but I think it needs both of these factors to be financially viable.

Yes, James Patterson is insanely popular. Personally, I can’t understand why. And although I have never Maximum Ride, I’ve actually talked to quite a few people that thought it was quite terrible along with its sequel. But he does sell well, though I don’t know if that is just adults buying is younger literature. I suspect a good portion are.

I’m not sure if I’m the only person who did not know about this but it seems that Dark Horse has picked up the rights to CLAMP’s Clover and is releasing all four books in one 20 dollar collection. I wonder if this means that Dark Horse is going to pick up all of the old CLAMP series that TokyoPop’s licenses have run out on. I also wonder if this means that Dark horse is interested in building more than just a seinen line or if they just realize that CLAMP is money in the bank. It might also just be part of the deal for that new manga CLAMP is writing for Dark Horse starting in 2009.

As far as the dealers room went there wasn’t a whole lot of anime and manga related stuff to speak of. TokyoPop had a great big set-up but the price of manga was the same. There were quite a few industry booths displaying figures but most of it was not for sale. However Square Enix had some very nice pieces for sale but the most enticing stuff was the preview for the coming year of their figures. Like the amazingly beautiful Leneth from Valkyrie Profile at a whooping 420 dollars!

Comic Con is one of those professionally run conventions where it would be more surprising if it did not run smoothly. It had a wide vareity of comics, anime, and video game related subjects. A nerd paradise. If nothing else I really enjoyed the Venture Brothers panel. The Venture Brothers panel is always livey and fun. The fact that I got to see a preview of season 3 was just icing on the cake. All in all I think we both had a great time.

Everything went fine for me. Though I did see the IGN theater was running behind thanks to those pesky technical difficulties. But really the whole experience was wonderful! I definitely think it fills me up with geek culture, rather than just anime. I saw Stan Lee. STAN LEE. So if you have hobbies outside of anime in the nerd realm it is a perfect catch all.

Narutaki Currently!
Watching Kaiba
Reading Dragon Eye
Listening to Chihiro Onitsuka

Hisui (Brainwasher Detective) Currently:
Watching Macross Frontier
Reading With the Light
Listening to DANZEN! Futari wa Precure by Mayumi Gojo

Top 5 things I did at Comic Con
5. Getting exclusive Marvel Civil War Minimates
4. Going to the Cup o Joe Panel
3. Getting my book signed by Shannon Hale
2. Going to the Stan Lee Panel
1. Seeing the T.M.R. concert