don't wanna talk to my doctor

[davemerrill]

It has been super crazy at work this week so I haven't had a lot of time at home away from the crazy to GET THINGS DONE, so there's no new Found Sound this week. But there is, rather are, new strips for you in the Zero Fighter and Element Of Surprise departments. Stupid Comics will be appearing this week, but I make no claims as to its relevance or its laugh-creating capabilities. So, business as usual, then.

Meanwhile if you think there's nothing left to buy, think again because The Right Stuf is releasing the 1985 Dirty Pair TV series on DVD. I am pre-ordered already! Won't you?

Article about Toronto's Comic Book Convention WAR!! is up at Torontoist, with corrections in the first comment by Anime North's onw David Simmons. The article goes into fairly comprehensive depth about Toronto's comicon scene, but gets some curious facts skewed. Well, it's Torontoist. I've never been to the Fan Expo and I will never go to a Wizard convention so I don't have a dog in this fight.

Somebody should start a comic book show in Toronto that is nothing but a 50,000 square foot hall full of dealers, with a special outreach or cheap prices or something designed to get people to unload all the weird stuff in their closets. Forget the guests and the wrestlers and the movie stars and the TV personalities and the rock stars, I just want tables filled with longboxes. I would pay five or even ten bucks to go to a show like that.

You know what town doesn't have a comic book show? Buffalo. I bet you could get some sweet deals on comic books at a Buffalo convention. Also Mighty Taco. It's a win-win situation!

Comments

[mpceccato.livejournal.com]

"It has been super crazy at work this week so I haven't had a lot of time at home away from the crazy to GET THINGS DONE..."

Isn't that the truth? We'll enjoy last week's Found Sound again and look forward to the next installment.

As for Buffalo, is there any culture in that town? Sure, the wings are great and I like the Bills and Sabers, but...

[davemerrill.livejournal.com]

There's Mighty Taco, and, um...

From driving through and shopping there, it seems like one of those towns that people get the hell out of as soon as they can, but it does have nice neighborhoods and funky stores. And the Customs guys are ALWAYS friendlier than they are in Detroit. And that's where Off Beat Cinema comes from. http://www.offbeatcinema.com/ , advertised by Terrapin Station, a head shop where you're always invited to drop in and say "high." So there are beautiful mutants there, I suspect of a surprisingly hardy breed. They should have a comic book show so we have an excuse to visit.

[hayama-sb.livejournal.com]

On the Dirty Pair DVDs, TRSI has a sale that ends today (03/18) to where you can get 40% the MSRP of any TRSI, Nozomi Ent, or Critical Mass DVDs (http://www.rightstuf.com/rssite/main/news/individual/?ForumThreadName=FT0000001453&ReturnTo=Main) & this sale includes pre-orders, so the two Dirty Pair DVD sets instead of costing $49.99 MSRP each, would cost $29.99 each. (Normal TRSI price is $37.49 each)

[davemerrill.livejournal.com]

Those who don't take advantage of this limited time offer are fools! FOOLS I TELL YOU!

[tochiro998.livejournal.com]

And Discotek FINALLY put out some news about the Fist of the North Star sets

http://www.discotekmedia.com/blog/?p=29

Man, I hope Neil is still doing the translation and they're not going off Toei's in-house generated crap...

[davemerrill.livejournal.com]

I would be a lot more likely to buy a FOTNS box if FOTNS was 25 episodes instead of 225. Because a lot of those episodes are guys hitting each other once each, talking about that thing that happened 34 episodes ago where those other guys hit each other, and then they're about to hit each other, and then that episode is over.

[animejump.livejournal.com]

Have to agree. The first series is wonderful but not something I intend to watch over and over. I find owning the movie scratches my itch pretty well.

Also, the entire series is legally streaming via Hulu. Makes me hesitate to commit to paying more than $100 for the whole shebang. But we'll see; if they offer a large enough discount the second time around, I may buy.

Preordered those DP sets with extreme prejudice. If Right Stuf is gonna go this route, I want them to rescue GIANT GORG next.

[tochiro998.livejournal.com]

I can dig that, but the nice thing is, since they're doing 4 boxes at 36 episodes a box, I think if you buy the first two boxes you'll have all the 'good stuff' including the fun Rei story arc with the wonderful macho posturing between Ken and Rei. At least I thought it was goofy fun.

[coderjoe.livejournal.com]

But do they defeat... Bigus Dickus?

Having not really looked at FOTNS, Dave's description turns me off. It sounds similar to DBZ in that way. Everything stretched out to ridiculous lengths in order to fill episodes.

... and DP TV sets ordered. Thanks Dave and hayama_sb for the heads-up.

[tochiro998.livejournal.com]

Dave is being a little over the top, but having to be honest, not THAT much over the top.

I mean, DBZ got the whole 'fight that lasts x number of episodes' from Fist of the North Star, so it's got to carry that load.

But I think it does it much better. It really doesn't kick in until the 3rd 'book', where they get all messed up trying to build a mythology (hint: it's all messed up) and have to give screen time to Raoh (aka "he's HOW BIG?!") and Toki (aka Jesus) while Kenshiro is trying to figure out how to beat up Daryl Surat, I mean Sauzer/Souther/Thouzer (pick one, they've all been used in official materials)...while children build a pyramid of sorrow and a blind guy does stuff.

I sound like I mock, but I mock with love. It's the single most melodramatic TV cartoon you will ever watch and I love every single minute of it.

[davemerrill.livejournal.com]

I haven't seen the entire series - the first ten or so, and a chunk around 30-40, and some later ones here and there, we'd get current episodes of FOTNS and FOTNS 2 from the Japanese grocery - but later episodes suffered from that DBZ syndrome of Ken defeating some awesome bad guy who can split rocks with his eyelashes, only to face an even awesomer bad guy in the next episode. As it turns out, shockingly, this new awesome bad guy, whose farts can destroy mountains, is Ken's half-brothers' cousin's dentist. They are just about to punch each other when he reveals this revelation, and bam, commercial time. After the break, Ken flashes back to when he was 14, before the atomic war, and he was at the dentist, who impacted a molar and left a little spot. Ken checks his mouth, he's got the spot. Oh my god. There's another flashback to how his half brother's cousins died carving a giant warning in the side of a mountain to beware the dent... and everybody thought they were warning about the dents in the side of cars, those are annoying, but really they were warning about the dentist, who spent 50 years training as a super martial artist who can bend time and space with his fingernails. Ken figures he'll just start punching the guy and see what happens. Suddenly a supporting character who has spent the last 5 episodes hoping loudly he won't be killed by some super martial artist leaps at the dentist swearing vengeance. There's another flashback where we learn that the dentist once ran over this guy's dog, before the atomic war. Dentist spits, the spittle is like a howitzer shell and blows a big hole through the supporting character, who spends five minutes dying. Ken is mad and makes funny noises and glows, and they're just about to fight each other. TO BE CONTINUED NEXT EPISODE.

I dunno. Is there a musical comedy episode? Is there an episode where they take a break and visit a spa for a relaxing weekend? Does Ken get hit on the head and dream they're all in the Wizard Of Oz? The show is that one note, over and over and over and over and over again, without any sense of irony or self-awareness or humor. It resists being seen as a metaphor, it has no social or sociological or cultural dimension, except to exude this vague fake martial-arts spiritualism. Everybody in the future is a super martial artist, everybody is somehow related to Kenshiro, everybody wanders through the same grim rocky wilderness, except when they are using slaves to build Babylonian-style cities, of course. The show is like watching two 12 year olds argue about WHAT'S COOLER, GETTING PUNCHED IN THE FACE OR PUNCHED IN THE FACE HARDER. Over and over and over.

The movie gets all this across in less than two hours, and then you're free to go do something else. The TV show eventually resulted in guest-starring wrestlers The Junkyard Dogs.

[(Anonymous)]

You say that like it's a bad thing. I think you're mostly talking about Ken 2, which on its own is not very good. Not very good at all. But Ken 1 is still on my top-10-forever list because when you get to the main course you're rewarded in spades for sitting through all those appetizers.

Anyone looking to end-run it should watch the original movie then pick up the series with episode 50. From there to 108 you can't go wrong. There are filler episodes, but not nearly as many as in the first 50. Those are for purists who can't get enough.

I hear Steve about to start banging on his keyboard as he reads this, but he (like me) is a purist.

-Tim E. again

[tochiro998.livejournal.com]

I am known too well.

I can't tell anyone why Fist of the North Star works and Dragonball Z doesn't, at least for me. I think it has to do with the dripping from every pore melodrama. Like you say Dave, it's not a punch to the face, it's the ULTIMATE PUNCH OF DEATH and then *DUNNNNNN* "IMPOSSIBLE! IT DIDN'T WORK" and Ken can hear a fart from a mile away and catch arrows with his ear hair and kill an entire nation with one punch (But Raoh can do that just by LOOKING at them! And his horse too!!)...

Maybe it's just insane appeal to my inner 8 year old. The music cues up, you hear a sound effect, Ken starts to fart blue gas and you KNOW people are gunna blow up, blow up REAL good. HEBIDUUUUUUU! *SPLORT*

And I do disagree with Tim, can't skip early episodes, that's where most of the character fun is. esp. the whole 'lets go find Toki, who we didn't even know existed last week' arc.

But again, that's me. And I'm probably insane.

[davemerrill.livejournal.com]

Oh I don't mind the insane manliness and the over the top nonsense. I mind hundreds and hundreds of episodes of it, over and over and over and over. It doesn't suit my needs at this present time.

[parasitegirl.livejournal.com]

OMG! I might have to buy me some goddamned anime!

[(Anonymous)]

Re: FotNS

I'll just say this...if you watch every episode from the beginning and stick with it all the way to #100 you won't regret one minute. The payoff is AMAZING. (Then, of course, you'll want to keep going. First series ends in #108.)

-Tim E. (DP ordered)