While reading Osamu Tezuka's Apollo's Song I was overcome with a feeling that these comics probably worked better when originally serialized and read over the months (years?) instead of in one huge 500+ page chunk. It's motif of reincarnation, repetition, purgatory and/or hell doesn't make for the most smooth of bulk reading. Who wants to read essentially the same story told four or five different ways in a row? Tezuka's artwork, as almost always, is a pleasure to look at - particularly in the SF take (which is also the longest section of the book). That's another weird thing about this one, the different versions of each story vary in length, and also cut between in each other, in a way that feels surprisingly out of balance. The book has weird rhythm! The story, focused on a boy supposedly with the mental problem of hating love to the point of murder, is either going through psychological counseling (shock treatments and hypnosis) in search of a cure, or is being punished by a vengeful god for his cruelty (or both) to relive over and over lives where he finds love only to lose it. The book is a bit of a mess! But the individual stories have their moments, and the at times offbeat (for Tezuka) sexuality and perversity adds some unique twists and stunning moments. I particularly enjoyed the scene involving the main character's attempt to kill off a clone queen who claims to be in love with him, only to have clone after clone continue to appear at a faster pace, until he has to give up his murdering ways from exhaustion. While the stories don't add up to an entirely successful graphic novel, the do create something unique and at the least provide another window for those of us who unfortunately can't read Japanese, into the amazing, diverse and fascinating (almost endless) output of Osamu Tezuka. 12:43 PM >>> 0 comments

Close Radio 11:38 AM >>> 0 comments

Here's a really interesting Japanese documentary, with English subtitles, on the history of the Legend of Zelda video games. I watched about the first half so far, and the quality is really good. Lots of clips from the old games, which I never really played, and I'm not sure I want to, but it's fun to watch and listen to people who were really into the games talk about 'em - and especially to see how dramaticaly the games progressed over the years. I think you can stream it on the site, but I downloaded the (presumably higher quality) mp4 file - which took about an hour and a half, but it was worth it. 9:52 AM >>> 0 comments

The first trailer for the new Wes Anderson film, The Darjeeling Limited. 11:03 AM >>> 0 comments

The all-new 4th issue of my comic book series, Watching Days Become Years, is now available in the Sparkplug Comic Books Online Store. While there, I recommend checking out some of the other new books too. 9:02 AM >>> 2 comments

Good, interesting, over-view style article on the director Ken Russell here. Also found in the excellent July issue of Sight and Sound.

"He is not just a love-him-or-hate-him director; even for those with affection for his work, he is a love-him-and-hate-him figure. Directors with small but perfectly formed oeuvres have evaded the risks Russell has taken with his sprawling, prolific corpus - his reputation has risen and fallen in part because he has kept on working despite the vicissitudes of budget fluctuations and critical fickleness." 11:03 AM >>> 0 comments

To Terra by Keiko Takemiya was originally published in the late 1970s, and is now finally available in English in three volumes that run to around 1,000 pages total. It would be extremely appropriate to call it epic. Perhaps because I was reading it at about the same time as I was reading Slan (see below), I felt it had a surprising amount of similarities (not just because both main characters share essentially the same name Jomy / Jommy). The story To Terra tells is quite a bit larger, quite a bit more complex, but it is again basically the story of the conflict between humans and the next step in human evolution, which again just happens to be humans + mind reading abilities / telekinetic powers. I think the artwork in To Terra adds a lot to the story - it's usually really impressive - with lots of complex variety to the way panels on pages are laid out. At times the visual approach becomes (intentionally) a little confusing - going more for a sort of poetry than a straight forward 1, 2, 3 kind of thing. It helps to push the book from being just a sort of Star Wars clone space adventure, into some really unique territory. I really appreciated the way the story progresses, the way characters are introduced and developed, and the ensemble feel. The weirdness of it all. The fantastic sense of design. I do think, again similar to Slan, the ending (although less arbitrary) doesn't quite live up to the build up. Somehow the book goes out with a bit of a whimper - but the story does have several extremely powerful high points throughout its 1,000 page journey from the far reaches of space back to mother earth. 12:40 PM >>> 0 comments

I was very impressed by Slan, a fast paced, complex and filled with ideas SF novel by A. E. Van Vogt, originally serialized in 1940, then published as a novel in 1946. Perhaps unlike a lot of early SF, I think it has aged very well - it still reads pretty fresh 67 years later - not an easy feat to pull off when one is writing speculative fiction. The story is set some ways into the future (perhaps a long, long ways) as humankind has begun to evolve into a telepathic species. For along time humans, and the (possible) next step of humans of humans have been involved with trying to wipe each other out or survive. The book has a lot of layers. To some extent it's an indictment of racism. To some extent it's an argument in favor of reason, logic, learning and progress. And to some extent it's just a fun, page turning boy's adventure story with cool technology - like spaceships and atomic guns. My one disappointment is that as you approach the end of the pages, it becomes clear, there's no way the author is going to even try to wrap up all these cool threads he has been unwinding - and in a way, the book's ending feels a little arbitrary - it doesn't really reach a satisfying conclusion - but yeah, the journey there is great. 10:07 AM >>> 3 comments

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Here's the absurb, intimidatingly long list of retail games that I already know of, supposedly coming out before the end of the year, that I'm seriously interested in playing if somehow I can find the time...

Stranglehold (August 6)
Lair (August 14)
Bioshock (August 21)
Metroid Prime 3 (August 27)
Medal of Honor Airborne (August 28)
Warhawk (August 28)
Unreal Tournament 3 (September 3)
Heavenly Sword (September 4)
Halo 3 (September 25)
Zelda: Phantom Hourglass (October 1)
Virtua Fighter 5 (October 2)
Ratchet and Clank Future (October 2)
Half Life Orange Box (October 9)
Contra 4 (October 15)
GTA IV (October 16)
Ninja Gaiden: Dragon Sword (October)
Folklore (November 17)
Super Mario Galaxy (November 20)
Call of Duty 4 (November 26)
Assassin's Creed (November)
Haze (November)
Mass Effect (November)
Uncharted: Drake's Fortune (November)
Little Big Planet (Fall/Winter?)

I'm sure that before long more will be added to the list 5:27 PM >>> 0 comments

A game I'm really looking forward to is Everyday Shooter... check out the short trailer here. Unique! I wish the release date was more specific than fall. 9:21 PM >>> 0 comments

The Darkness is a fun, first person shooter, with really nice graphics and one of the better stories (with a couple of truly great twists) that I've found in a video game. It's also a little short and not particularly challenging - I beat the game in probably about ten hours (though I skipped some of the side quests). At sixty bucks, it's probably a bit overpriced. There's some multi-player included but I've heard bad things about it, and so far haven't been inclined to give it a run - though I probably will at some point.

The graphics however, are a real treat - at times so good (for instance, the subway station design) that I almost felt like I was actually there. However, there are times when the character animation seems a little off (lips that barely move when people are talking) but at other times it seemed really good - very realistic, almost movie-like.

The game has a great pace. There's plenty of combat, but also lots of walking around, exploring, talking to people and a few semi-puzzles to figure out - that give the game a nice sense of variety and a surprisingly relaxing feel - there are no times missions. I did get stuck a few times, especially early on, as some of the mechanics were a bit tricky to get used to - there's a learning curve, which is kind of nice, actually. I liked how you build up your darkness powers throughout the game (by devouring the hearts of your victims). Once you can create mini black holes that suck up enemies the combat becomes a lot more fun. Also the creeping darkness mechanism, in which you become a sort of snake arm that crawls along the floor, walls, or ceilings to attack enemies hidden behinds corners and the like, is a blast, once you get used to using it. The other powers you gain, darkness guns & a sort of spiky arm attack, were less interesting. You also gain the ability to summon four varieties of darklings, little guys with specific abilities (a gunner, a guy who turns out lights, a beserker and a kamikaze) to help you out, but honestly, they were never much help (maybe I never figured out how to use them properly).

The story, basically a mob story of betrayal and revenge set in a nighttime New York city of warehouses, brownstones and subway stations, with the hook that your character is cursed/impowered by the darkness, is actually surprisingly focused, good and at times, almost moving. Several twists (that I don't want to go into for spoiler type reasons) really knocked my socks off. The game features several powerful cut scenes. If the game was longer it might not have been as compelling, but at this length I'm not sure it's worth the price of admission either. Interesting dilemma. 12:52 PM >>> 0 comments