Jul
4

Evangelion 1.0 : You Are (Not) Alone Exclusive Screening

Evangelion 1.0 : You Are (Not) Alone Exclusive Screening

First, let me say, Evangelion 1.0 is a masterpiece by any standards. Watching it on the big screen after so many years is still quite an experience to remember. If you don’t already know, Evangelion 1.0 is a remake of the original Evangelion TV series back in the 90s comprising of the first few episodes’s storyline and scenes which were reanimated and improved upon. I had the opportunity of catching Eva 1.0 at The Cathay Cineplex Damansara thanks to an online contest hosted by LowYat.net’s AnimeShrine.

I have to say that although Eva 1.0 was a great movie the theater was kind of a let down and this ruins the show. The movie was screened at Hall 3 or The Picturehouse as they call it. It’s a much smaller hall with only about 8 rows of 12 seats each. Oddly though, they are divided at the center, so you don’t actually get to sit in the middle of the screen. My BIGGEST complain would be the screen itself ! You see, this version of Eva remake had some of the same exact frames redrawn. It wasn’t very noticable at first but then you suddenly realise that about 10% of the top screen was CUT OFF ! Yeap, you heard me right, it was just cut off. It doesn’t appear as bad in some sequence but when you only see 2 halves of a character talking onscreen, its really very annoying (SPOILER ALERT: If you don’t believe me, the scene where the first Angel exploded, the explosion should form a cross, in my screening, you only see a vertical explosion).

It’s been years since I watched the original, but I could still recall some of those scenes and it is very obvious that the framing of those scenes were just off. I couldn’t really tell if the sides were cut off as well but I’m guessing the screen ratio was probably screwed up anyway, so you’re really getting short changed if you are planning on watching Eva here. Anyway enough of rant on the cinema, the other minus point is…. Rei’s famous “Can you get off of me ?” scene was censored :( No escaping our censorship board there.

Anyway back to the movie. Eva 1.0 closely follows the events in the original series. The creators did a great job in squeezing in the 6 episodes it was based on into a full length movie without disrupting the pacing of the story. In the movie, we are introduced to Shinji Ikari and how he was incepted into the Nerv organization to pilot the Evangelions, humanoid robots that seems rather organic, to battle Angels, myterious beings of unknown origins. The rest of the story shows how Shinji tries to deals with all these changes in his life as he take on the pilot of an Evagelion.

A number of the scenes were exact remakes with some new details added while others were based off new storyboards. The animation quality was top notch and some of the scenes were really polished with high quality CGI especially the last Angel battle sequence which was a fantastic redesign.

The score which was composed and arranged by Shiru Sagisu was reworked from the original series and gives a very epic feel to the movie. Watching the Evas fighting the Angels on the big screen with the score was pretty intense experience. According to some websites that I’ve visited, it seems that the Japanese screening had previews of the second movie, however I stayed until the credit roll was over but there were no signs of the preview. Overall Eva1.0 is a great movie. It’s no wonder that it has won many film accolades in Japan. Truly a classic for all anime fans.

Rating: ★★★★★★★★★★

Chief Director: Hideaki Anno

Director:
Kazuya Tsurumaki
Masayuki

Screenplay: Hideaki Anno

Storyboard:
Shinji Higuchi
Tomoki Kyoda

Music: Shiro Sagisu
Original creator: Hideaki Anno
Character Design: Yoshiyuki Sadamoto

Art director:
Hiroshi Kato
Tatsuya Kushida
Chief Animation Director: Shunji Suzuki

Animation director:
Atsushi Okuda
Hidenori Matsubara
Kazuchika Kise
Yuji Moriyama

Mechanical design: Ikuto Yamashita
Co-director: Kobun Shizuno
Director of Photography: Toru Fukushi
Executive producer: Toshimichi Ootsuki

Running Time : 100 minutes
Rated : G

Evangelion Official Site

Popularity: 2% [?]

Jul
1

And The Heavens Shall Tremble….

Diablo 3

…With Mankind Deprived of Sleep Once Again…

Blizzard Entertainment - Diablo 3

Popularity: 4% [?]

Jun
30

Evangelion 1.0 Movie Passes Giveaway Results

Evangelion Cathay Cinema

Cool I just won 2 tickets to the screening of Evangelion 1.0 on July 1st ! The full results are out at their website. If you have not been notified by email, check out their site to see if your name is listed there. The second contest is now open for participation as well. Good Luck.

Lowyat.net Anime Shrine - Evangelion 1.0 Movie Passes Giveaway Contest 

Popularity: 4% [?]

Jun
29

Anime Stamps !

Patlabor Stamps

Via AnimeNewsNetwork

The Japan Post Service has recently announced their 8th installment of their Anime Hero/Heroine series of stamps with the latest Patlabor anime to be available in August. Their previous releases in the series includes animes like Evangelion, Galaxy Express 999, Detective Conan and of course, Gundam. Costing about 800yen for a set of 10 stamps, the Evangelion and Patlabor series of stamps are a definite keep for any stamp collecting otakus out there.

Japan Post - Anime Hero/Heroine Stamps

Popularity: 5% [?]

Jun
29

Tokyo Toy Show 2008

Via Gunota Headlines

Tokyo Toy Show

Moe Yo has posted 3 galleries on the recent Tokyo Toy Show held last week covering Bandai’s booth. Check them out below:

Moe Yo -Tokyo Toy Show Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

Popularity: 5% [?]

Jun
29

June Gunpla Updates

Via Gunota Headlines

Some updates for the end of the month. Enjoy. Avalanche Exia … looks a bit cluttered, while GN-X looks like something out of the Patlabor series.

Exia Avalanche

Hobbyist - 1/100 Gundam Avalanche Exia

GN-X

Hobbyist - HG GN-X

BB Senshi Sangokuden Choun Gundam w/ Hieisen

Hobbyist - BB Senshi Sangokuden Choun Gundam w/ Hieisen

SCHM Pro Zaku

GA Graphic -  SHCM-Pro Zaku II Mass Production Type

Popularity: 5% [?]

Jun
26

Sega To Make Girlfriends… no seriously..

EMA vs Chii

According to MSNBC, Sega Toys has built a 15″ tall robotic “female companion” aka girlfriend targeting the lonely adult male market in Japan. EMA, as it is known, stands for Eternal Maiden Actualization (whatever the heck that’s suppose to mean) is capable of singing, dancing, handing out business cards and of course… kissing. It’s priced at $ 175 and will be on sale this September but there’s no word on what other abilities it can perform or if you could train it to do….. erm.. other stuff :P. Rumour has it that TakaraTomy is producing a robotic wife, while Sony is still putting their final touches to robotic mistress =))

*Pic on the left is Chii from from Chobits while EMA is on the right.

MSNBC - Japan makes robot girlfriend for lonely men

Popularity: 8% [?]

Jun
25

No love for my MX518.. not on my Mac at least

mx518

I just got myself a new mouse to replace my crappy no-brand optical mouse which I have been using with my Mac. I was having a hard time choosing one till I finally settled with the Logitech MX518. I’m currently using a Microsoft Wireless Laser Mouse 6000 on my desktop and it doesn’t come any close to the MX518. With an adjustable resolution of up to 1800dpi and 8 configurable buttons including 2 DPI switching buttons, the MX518 is truly an impressive mouse. Given the feature set and the price, the MX518 seems like a reasonable purchase considering there’s a lot of good reviews on this model even though its been around for a while (still one of the top rated ones compared to the laser alternatives).

Sadly, there is no love for the MX518 on my Mac. The package came with drivers for Windows Vista and XP only and even Logitech’s official site does not offer proper drivers for it, so I was only able to use the standard 3 buttons and scroll wheel on my Mac out of the box. So folks, be sure to look for that smiley Mac face before buying a peripheral for your Mac next time.

Fortunately though, there are third party drivers that allows you to detect and configure these buttons. One of these is a shareware called USB Overdrive which lets you assign functions to the additional buttons. However, I couldn’t assign anything to the DPI  switching buttons on the mouse itself so I’m only able to use 6 of its buttons, but the 2 DPI switching buttons are still pretty handy for me since I could switch the responsiveness when I’m doing graphics or when I’m gaming. To get the full experience, the drivers that works in Windows lets you customize the mouse even further, but I’ve yet to try that out. Overall I still find the MX518 to be a great mouse since it fits my hand really well and it is very responsive when you set the DPI to its highest settings.

Logitech - MX518 Gaming-Grade Optical Mouse
USB Overdrive

Popularity: 8% [?]

Jun
22

Firefox 3 Download Day

 Firefox 3 Download Day

A heartiest congratulations to the Firefox team for breaking the world record of 8 MILLION downloads of Firefox in 24 hours ! This is no small feat and thanks to everyone who downloaded FF3 who made it happen. The folks at Guiness Records are still in the process of validating the results which should be out anytime soon.

In the mean time, check out this old post on Danny’s adventure spreading Firefox in Akihabara with a bunch of lovely maids :P

DannyChoo - Maid Trooper

Popularity: 9% [?]

Jun
17

Death Note Gets the Hollywood Treatment !

Death Note

Via kezins.com

One of the more successful mangas to be turned into an anime series followed by 3 live-action movies and sequels, Death Note will finally be getting the Hollywood treatment ! Death Note, in case you haven’t been following, tells the tale of a college student, Light, who picks up a mysterious note book called the Death Note. The Death Note, as its name implies, lets the owner of the book write a person’s name and with their face in mind, kills them. However there are rules as to how the book can be used and soon Light realizes that he can change the world with the power of the Death Note. The story quickly becomes a very interesting cat and mouse drama with L, a genius, trying to outwit Light to discover his real identity and the secret behind the DeathNote.

So far we have Robotech, Akira and Ghost in the Shell lined up for a Western remake and with Dragonball’s release next year. It’d be interesting to see how these remake will translate into an American market. Death Note will be a very sharp and intense drama if they keep the storyline and script tight. So folks, you can start crossing your fingers.

kezins.com - ‘Death Note’: American Remake By Vertigo On The Way… 

Death Note Anime Official US website

Popularity: 12% [?]

J-Pop Music