After careful rereading of previous chapters, which made me stayed up until two o'clock in the morning, I finally managed to somewhat grasp a few confusing aspects of Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle. And here they are:
Body
A person's shell, which gives him/her his/her outward appearance.
Feather
In TRC, feathers are representations of Sakura's soul. Actually, it was Fei Wong Reed that converted her soul to feathers so that they could scatter to different dimensions.
Heart/Soul
An aspect of a person where his/her feelings, memories, and consciousness lie. (Do not confuse it with our conventional understanding about heart/soul.) Thus, someone who was without heart, like C!Syaoran, couldn't feel any physical or mental pain and could easily kill people without flinching. Souls/hearts (Sakura's feathers included) are the things that Fei Wong Reed collects in order to fulfill his wish.
Heart/soul can be given, lent, and copied. However, it doesn't mean that the receiver would have the same heart as the heart/soul's real owner. Meaning, the one receiving the heart would be a different person from the one giving/lending/providing it.
Example 1: C!Sakura still ended up liking C!Syaoran despite not having a portion of past memory about him.
Example 2: It took some time for C!Syaoran to warm up to others, even though he had received a part of R!Syaoran's heart. Having R!Syaoran's heart didn't make him identical to Syaoran; he neither had R!Syaoran's memories nor temperaments.
Example 3: Before C!Sakura's soul perished, she gave it to C!Syaoran. Receiving clearly didn't turn C!Syaoran into Sakura. It just made him being able to feel again (bringing back the old C!Syaoran, perhaps?!).
I could go on and on about this forever, but alas, it's late already (at least it's late when I'm writing this). Buh-bye!
Note: If you wish to take a glance at TSUBASA RESERVoir CHRONiCLE, you can read it at One Manga. However, to support CLAMP, please buy it in your nearest bookstore once it's licensed and available in your country. TSUBASA RESERVoir CHRONiCLE is the property of CLAMP, Kodansha, and Production I. G. I own nothing.
Sunday, September 14, 2008
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
Too Much Love Will Kill You 9/10/2008 05:03:00 PM
I squealed when I heard that Hana Yori Dango made it to the big screen. As a fan of the series, I was looking forward to it. Maybe I wouldn’t get to watch it until the DVD is released. But for the time being, I decided to surf the internet and tried looking for some review.
Thankfully, Random Curiosity, which is the best blog about anime (and few doramas) out there, provided review as lengthy as I could expect. At first, it sounded quite promising. It seems that everyone who loves the series would have themselves ambushed with a sense of nostalgia watching the movie, which is good. But then, as I went further to the spoilery part of the review, a weird sensation started creep over me. It’s called nausea.
Hana Yori Dango Final follows the common pattern of every other romantic comedy on earth (or any of its predecessors for that matter; the TV series, I mean). A boy and a girl (or a man and a woman) having had to go through all adversities before realizing that they loved each other and finally living happily ever after. The problem is since Tsukushi and Tsukasa had already been an item, the adversities were limited to looking for something that they’d lost in Las Vegas and Hong Kong and being stranded in an uninhabited island. There’s no love-hate or we’re-cool-but-that’s-all or I-like-you-but-I-don’t-know-how-you-feel relationships. You know, the kind of thing you see in When Harry Met Sally or While You Were Sleeping (two of my all time favorite romantic comedies).
In their places, present all that stuff about is-he-the-one, are-we-destined-to-be-together, what’s-my/your-most-precious. I’m sorry, it’s just too much for me. The lovey-dovey stuff is so excessive (at least that’s the impression I got from the review) that I want to throw up. That’s why I never like Titanic or Romeo+Juliet.
But hey, look at the bright side. At least the ever-so-charming Matsumoto Jun starred it. That’s more than enough reason to watch Hana Yori Dango Final.
Thankfully, Random Curiosity, which is the best blog about anime (and few doramas) out there, provided review as lengthy as I could expect. At first, it sounded quite promising. It seems that everyone who loves the series would have themselves ambushed with a sense of nostalgia watching the movie, which is good. But then, as I went further to the spoilery part of the review, a weird sensation started creep over me. It’s called nausea.
Hana Yori Dango Final follows the common pattern of every other romantic comedy on earth (or any of its predecessors for that matter; the TV series, I mean). A boy and a girl (or a man and a woman) having had to go through all adversities before realizing that they loved each other and finally living happily ever after. The problem is since Tsukushi and Tsukasa had already been an item, the adversities were limited to looking for something that they’d lost in Las Vegas and Hong Kong and being stranded in an uninhabited island. There’s no love-hate or we’re-cool-but-that’s-all or I-like-you-but-I-don’t-know-how-you-feel relationships. You know, the kind of thing you see in When Harry Met Sally or While You Were Sleeping (two of my all time favorite romantic comedies).
In their places, present all that stuff about is-he-the-one, are-we-destined-to-be-together, what’s-my/your-most-precious. I’m sorry, it’s just too much for me. The lovey-dovey stuff is so excessive (at least that’s the impression I got from the review) that I want to throw up. That’s why I never like Titanic or Romeo+Juliet.
But hey, look at the bright side. At least the ever-so-charming Matsumoto Jun starred it. That’s more than enough reason to watch Hana Yori Dango Final.
Friday, September 05, 2008
Good Omens (Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett) 9/05/2008 12:56:00 PM
Exchanged babies, American diplomat, Antichrist. Ring a bell? If you say The Omen, you're almost right. Only that it's a different kind of Omen, not THE Omen, but Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett's Good Omens.
The idea is actually very simple, just like any ideas that make good books usually are. What if the satanic worshipper got it all wrong? What if, instead of exchanging the American diplomat's child with her master's son, she switched an accountant's (whose foster parents--the American attaché and his wife--were successfully persuaded to name him Warlock) with her master's (later called Adam)? This poses another question: would he be just as "evil" as he supposed to be, since he's undetected and thus, wouldn't have a satanic worshipper guided him to the dark side and all? To put it differently, which would be the dominant side determining his actions, genes or environment? (In The Omen, the answer was the former; Damien had already had devilish tendency, it seemed, even without having that nanny sent to him.)
Fortunately, unlike many stories whose only good point is their main idea (like that Chick-Lits that are all about getting men and living happily ever after), Good Omens has unpredictable plot and solid characterizations. Its characters are the kinds whom you'd know how they would act in a certain condition, since each and every characters' has such distinguishable nature. Like Aziraphale the metrosexual angel ("...gayer than a tree full of monkeys on nitrous oxide."), or Witchfinder Sergeant Shadwell ("'Awa' wi' ye, harlot,'...") who's a grumbler but really a softy at heart and happens to be my favorite character ;p.
Of course, it's not Neil Gaiman's unless it's full of metaphors, puns, and plain funniness. It's not always easy to understand them because (a) I'm not British; (b) English isn't my first language. And so the references he made didn't always make sense to me, considering I wasn't familiar with what he was referring to. But most of the times, I still found them funny, such as "Two shadowy figures, one hunched and squat, the other lean and menacing, both of them Olympic-grade lurkers. If Bruce Springsteen had ever recorded 'Born to Lurk,' these two would have been on the album cover." or the "Four Bikers of the Apocalypse" instead of the "Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse" because they rode motorbikes and not horses or "Shadwell hated all southerners and, by inference, was standing at the North Pole."
It's safe to say that Good Omens has been very entertaining, which is why I now list them among my favorite books (I like it better than other Gaiman's works that I've read, Anansi Boys and Neverwhere). But if you want something more than "entertaining", don't worry, it has it. Good Omens is not just about the Apocalypse and the Antichrist being brought up in a nice, lovely countryside. It's also about humans who most of the times are neither being good or evil, but simply being humans. And if we want our problems sorted out, we'd better sort ourselves up rather than hoping for Divine intervention, just like Adam said, "...if you stopped tellin' people it's all sorted out after they're dead, they might try sorting it all out while they're alive."
The idea is actually very simple, just like any ideas that make good books usually are. What if the satanic worshipper got it all wrong? What if, instead of exchanging the American diplomat's child with her master's son, she switched an accountant's (whose foster parents--the American attaché and his wife--were successfully persuaded to name him Warlock) with her master's (later called Adam)? This poses another question: would he be just as "evil" as he supposed to be, since he's undetected and thus, wouldn't have a satanic worshipper guided him to the dark side and all? To put it differently, which would be the dominant side determining his actions, genes or environment? (In The Omen, the answer was the former; Damien had already had devilish tendency, it seemed, even without having that nanny sent to him.)
Fortunately, unlike many stories whose only good point is their main idea (like that Chick-Lits that are all about getting men and living happily ever after), Good Omens has unpredictable plot and solid characterizations. Its characters are the kinds whom you'd know how they would act in a certain condition, since each and every characters' has such distinguishable nature. Like Aziraphale the metrosexual angel ("...gayer than a tree full of monkeys on nitrous oxide."), or Witchfinder Sergeant Shadwell ("'Awa' wi' ye, harlot,'...") who's a grumbler but really a softy at heart and happens to be my favorite character ;p.
Of course, it's not Neil Gaiman's unless it's full of metaphors, puns, and plain funniness. It's not always easy to understand them because (a) I'm not British; (b) English isn't my first language. And so the references he made didn't always make sense to me, considering I wasn't familiar with what he was referring to. But most of the times, I still found them funny, such as "Two shadowy figures, one hunched and squat, the other lean and menacing, both of them Olympic-grade lurkers. If Bruce Springsteen had ever recorded 'Born to Lurk,' these two would have been on the album cover." or the "Four Bikers of the Apocalypse" instead of the "Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse" because they rode motorbikes and not horses or "Shadwell hated all southerners and, by inference, was standing at the North Pole."
It's safe to say that Good Omens has been very entertaining, which is why I now list them among my favorite books (I like it better than other Gaiman's works that I've read, Anansi Boys and Neverwhere). But if you want something more than "entertaining", don't worry, it has it. Good Omens is not just about the Apocalypse and the Antichrist being brought up in a nice, lovely countryside. It's also about humans who most of the times are neither being good or evil, but simply being humans. And if we want our problems sorted out, we'd better sort ourselves up rather than hoping for Divine intervention, just like Adam said, "...if you stopped tellin' people it's all sorted out after they're dead, they might try sorting it all out while they're alive."
Thank God for the Reruns 9/05/2008 12:53:00 PM
Ever since I learned the joy of watching football, the English Premier League in particular, I'd been indulged with top quality matches, served for free before me. In other words, instead of having to pay for cable to watch them, like so many did in other countries, I got to see them as long as I had a TV set. No decoder or receiver or monthly fee.
However, the it's-all-for-free ended this season (it was last season actually, but then because of all the protesting, we got to see some matches, despite most of them being Middlesborough's for who knows what reason) and I was left in the state of despair. Seriously! Not being able to watch Manchester United is bad enough, but not being able to watch any EPL match is abysmal. Of course, I can go to that cable TV representative office and ask for a subscription anytime. It's just that I have more pressing matters on which to spend my money to.
But then, something happened. This godsend came in the form of reruns. It was not many, only two matches per week (three, if you count Arsenal TV, but I don't watch Arsenal unless they lose or tie, which is, sadly, not that often), but let me tell you something. Once you lost something and had no hope of getting it back, the time that "something" was given to you, even though it's just a scrap of what it used to be, you'd find yourself being more grateful than you could possibly be under normal circumstances. In other words, I'm very thankful that I can at least watch some Premier League.
The drawback would be that I would already know how the matches ended, which is more or less takes the fun of it, especially when the team I rooted for lost. But again, it's better than nothing. And now if you'll excuse me, I've got Portsmouth vs. Everton to watch.
However, the it's-all-for-free ended this season (it was last season actually, but then because of all the protesting, we got to see some matches, despite most of them being Middlesborough's for who knows what reason) and I was left in the state of despair. Seriously! Not being able to watch Manchester United is bad enough, but not being able to watch any EPL match is abysmal. Of course, I can go to that cable TV representative office and ask for a subscription anytime. It's just that I have more pressing matters on which to spend my money to.
But then, something happened. This godsend came in the form of reruns. It was not many, only two matches per week (three, if you count Arsenal TV, but I don't watch Arsenal unless they lose or tie, which is, sadly, not that often), but let me tell you something. Once you lost something and had no hope of getting it back, the time that "something" was given to you, even though it's just a scrap of what it used to be, you'd find yourself being more grateful than you could possibly be under normal circumstances. In other words, I'm very thankful that I can at least watch some Premier League.
The drawback would be that I would already know how the matches ended, which is more or less takes the fun of it, especially when the team I rooted for lost. But again, it's better than nothing. And now if you'll excuse me, I've got Portsmouth vs. Everton to watch.