Anime That I’ve Recently Watched

jared315Leave a comment

Other than rewatching and still going through Hunter x Hunter and One Piece, I have been pretty invigorated in anime. Although the subculture has not been filled with the best new anime this year, I am finding shows that I am loving. Some of these shows might not be for everybody but they are all unique and great in their own way.

Ranking of Kings

This anime from 2021 is special. It follows a decently simple design with its fable format. This anime is made to resonate with real-world emotions and difficulties that many may face such as depression and hopelessness. It opens up the world to disabilities and the difficulties of trying to work around them. The protagonist in this story Bojji is both deaf and mute, as well as is especially weak in a world sanctioned by power. Despite his setbacks in life he decides to work to become the best version of himself. This feel-good story is accompanied by a unique animation style that is enticing to the highest degree. The show has not ended yet but I am highly anticipating the finale.

9.1/10

Hajime No Ippo

This anime is a story of a rising superstar. A hard-hitting boxing talent is known as Ippo Makuonochi, and his journey to the Flyweight Title of Japan. This show is made for fans of boxing, bringing in-depth details of fighting, training, and experience in the fighting world. It’s a feel-good anime with an almost dangerously optimistic outlook on brain damage in the sport (until it’s explored at the end of the second season). I personally enjoyed this anime because of the evolutions the characters go through. The anime and the sport are both about harnessing talent and power to become something unintelligible. I would definitely recommend this anime to anybody that is a fan of boxing.

9.1/10

Space Dandy

Space Dandy, although not being a show that I’ve recently seen, it is something that I feel I must recommend. This show follows a classic blueprint similar to that of Cowboy Bebop, where a group of three eccentric characters travels through space collecting aliens from around the galaxy. This layout can feel overdone or boring to some, however, I don’t believe this to be an anime based on its plot, but rather on its animation. Every episode is created with a different director, writer, animation director, and storyboard director. This show about “A dandy guy in space” became grounds for many animators to build careers for themselves in the anime/manga world. This mysterious show about mysterious characters makes you ask questions with seemingly no answer other than weird space jibber-jabber, but every episode still finds its way to leave a viewer incredibly satisfied with the 20 minutes they spent watching an episode. The show is fantastic and I recommend it to anybody and everybody (I also recommend not skip the intro song as it is fire.

9.2/10

(Demo) Lyrics Part 2

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Baby tell me what you want

I can take you all over the world

Up through the sky (yeah)

Baby tell me what you need

I can give you everything

You know what you meant to me

It could,

be love or just a fantasy

Girl, you stay shining like diamonds in the dark

I know, 

 it’s only be our memories

Girl, just give me a chance to shine with you 

I –  can’t – wait – any – more

Tell me – what’s on your mind

And – you’re – talking – to –  him – now

I can’t stand 

you – stop –  looking – at me now

I’m dreaming

Now – your – kissing – him now

I’m losing my mind 

When I look back this year, I think it’ll worth all my tears

I work 24/7 just buy you gucci prada bag

You said you have the same one, then you tell me what you want

Then I guess I am not the one who will treat you good enough then

Photo Credit: lofi music

Cold

navraj22Leave a comment

I got a cold. It came on last week Thursday, with a dry throat. I suffered through two days of school, then went home, where it got much worse. I tried to hang out with a friend on Saturday and just felt horrible and fell asleep. I was in bed from then until Friday morning.

Being in bed all week actually gave me some much-needed rest and relaxation, but the looming stress of schoolwork hung over me, making it less enjoyable. I managed to get my work done, but I couldn’t turn a corner on my cold. I was, and still am stuffed up, even though I feel better now (Sunday).

I pushed myself to drive to school on Friday, an hour and forty-five-minute drive both ways which in retrospect I should not have attempted. I was still sick, so I woke up late, got to school late, went to two classes, and halfway through the third, decided to go home. I did take my important stats test and finalized a journalism story, but it wasn’t great.

photo credit: today

In addition to my fatigue, I got denied from my top school, which sucked. I spent the weekend resting, which was great, and I hope to catch up on my work this week, slowly climbing up a mountain of papers, tests, and materials. 9 more weeks soldiers.

Not Artistic

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http://www.artsy.net

I feel guilty for the grades I get in art class. I feel the pieces I do shouldn’t be called art, they are just drawings, sketches, and paintings. In other words, they are not artistic.

But what is considered artistic? Is there a standard to measure how artistic art is?

If we evaluate art on its aesthetics, many pieces will be disqualified. Because for pieces like Duchamp’s toilet and Maurizio Cattelan’s banana duct-taped to a wall, you can’t really tell if it’s atheistic. Especially in modern art, a lot of artworks don’t even have a concrete representation. With these cases, the value of art can’t be determined by if it looks pretty. Many artists also purposefully create art that is “disturbing” or “unpleasant” to the public, which is not “pretty” in the eyes of most viewers. But they are considered art.

Elden Ring Keeps Getting Better

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When I wrote my first blog post about Elden Ring I was about 25% through the game with about 20ish hours on record. Now, 2 or so weeks later, I have 106 hours and I’m almost done with my first playthrough. If I thought that Elden Ring was the peak of gaming at the time, I was wrong, because the mid to end game was getting ready to completely blow me away. The end game of Elden Ring is so fun. There is literally no other game that can feel so fresh even over a hundred hours into this game. Every single boss and area is a fresh and enjoyable challenge. Not only that, but the variety of builds that are possible in Elden Ring is insane. When I first picked up Dark Souls 3 I was bewildered by the variety of builds that I could run, but Elden ring is on another level. Elden Ring gives the players full creative control to switch their build at any time after a certain point, which was also a feature in Dark Souls 3. However, I have never respecked in my multiple playthroughs because it’s simply too short to want to switch builds mid-game so most players just try new builds on their next playthrough. However, the sheer size of Elden Ring almost encourages players to use this feature as switching builds to keep the playthrough fresh even to the end.

Photo Credit: nme.com

The end-game of Elden Ring is honestly my favorite part of the game. Before I got there, there were hundreds of posts all over the internet of people complaining about how unbalanced the late game portion is. I honestly have no idea what these people are talking about. It’s probably because most players don’t level vigor and just get one-shotted by literally every enemy past the Plateau. The Endgame is most definitely very difficult, but the game gives the players all the tools necessary to handle the Endgame. I mean even souls veterans who are well aware of how broken some builds can be are complaining about the difficulty of the endgame and speculating that it wasn’t playtested. I don’t believe that for one second. The increasing challenge of Elden Ring through to the end is exactly what drives me to keep coming back day after day for hours. Being slapped by every boss over and over again, learning their move set, and finally beating them after 10+ is literally the point of a Fromsoftware game. I seriously don’t understand this anti-difficulty sentiment in the Elden Ring community, not only does the game give you all the tools necessary to beat these enemies, but every other Souls or Fromsoftware game is insanely hard. I mean if you look at the Bloodborne and Dark Souls 3 DLC or the Sekiro Endgame, these are some of the most difficult bosses in the gaming period. These games have always been about overcoming what seems to be an insurmountable challenge. The point of these games is to die over and over again because these enemies are truly more powerful than you are but through trial and error, eventually, you will beat them and that adrenaline is absolutely unbeatable in gaming. Because Elden Ring is so big, the difficulty had to spike, it had to keep going up so that players had the challenge to overcome. I hate to be that classic Souls series troll, but if you find yourself complaining about the endgame difficulty, git gud shitter.

Photo Credit: https://assets.gamepur.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/07141317/Malenia-intro-elden-ring-hand-of-malenia-guide-e1646684005597.jpg

Why MMA is the Best Sport Known to Man

jared315Leave a comment

When many are told to think of sports that need extreme technicality, many people’s first thoughts would go to sports like golf, fencing, or F1 racing, however, my first and undisputed choice would be MMA. It is most definitely the most technical sport in the world, requiring multiple Olympic skills as well as multiple martial arts that can take years to learn. MMA doesn’t necessarily require profession in every single useful style of combat, but to stand a chance in an octagon, one must have mastery of some striking technique as well as a grappling technique. If a person enters the cage with a heavy background in wrestling and is completely lacking in defense and striking technique, they’re most likely leaving the cage with some fractured facial bones. The thing is, is that this would be the most likely outcome, but in a fight, nothing can be predicted. If the wrestler who only focuses on his wrestling is able to take down his opponent successfully he has a chance. If he lands a few punches in the ground and pound, as well as tiring his opponent on the ground, he has an even greater chance of submitting his opponent. MMA can go any way, it is a constant game of chess where every movement changes the possibilities of the match. One bad movement, with bad defense, while a fighter is fatigued can end a fight in a moment, but that’s only if they get caught in their blunder. This makes MMA a technical sport, however, if you want to make it more technical with advanced striking techniques like creating efficient combos where no movement is wasted, connecting the ending of one punch or kick, with the starting movement of your next strike, as well as taking into account the reaction and movement of the opponent. Things such as feints and reactions to feints can’t go unnoticed. Sharp observers and champions such as Isreal Adesanya and Sean O’Malley are masters of taking advantage of their opponent’s reactions and body language, while more instinctual fighters such as Kevin Holland, Jon Jones, and Jose Aldo are great at taking advantage of their opponents in quick thinking exchanges. It’s a brutal yet beautiful sport, that perfectly ties together technicality and intensity.

Photo credit: CBS Sports

Feminism on Simplified Chinese Internet

karolineticoLeave a comment

The recently revised Law on the Protection of Women’s Rights and Interests caused many arguments. Several famous male social media influencers posted comments against this revision which ignited more disputes than ever. 

From my personal experience on the Chinese internet, especially an online social platform called Zhihu, the tension between feminists and anti-feminists has grown stronger and stronger in recent years. A weird phenomenon is you can find feminists and anti-feminists fighting in the comments of almost any social media post.

Many anti-feminists believe that the word feminism means privilege for women because it includes the word women. In other words, they think it means the feminists want to put women in a higher position than men. Because of these voices, some feminists choose to use the phrase equalism when referring to women’s rights.

https://ckdofnf.com/

Girls‘ Last Tour

karolineticoLeave a comment

At that time, the earth’s surface is not suitable for living anymore, so people built new cities on top of old cities and they kept stacking higher and higher. Two girls left their family and started a journey on their German half-track motorcycle, with the goal of survival and trying to reach “the top”. But they travel up to higher levels, they only found war machines and other leftovers of human activities.

Even though their findings were depressing, they did not hold the girls back. They kept looking for resources and moving forward. They even gave up their most valuable things such as the dairy and books to keep themselves alive. The girls’ desire for survival in a world full of despair is admirable.

Lastly, this is a poem by Hermann Hesse that was cited in this manga.

Out Wandering

Don’t be sad, soon comes the night,
When we watch over the faint countryside,
As the cool moon secretly laughs
And we rest hand in hand.

Don’t be sad, soon comes the time,
When we rest. Our small crosses will stand
On the bright roadside together,
And it rains and snows,
And the winds come and go.

Auf Wanderung

Sei nicht traurig, bald ist es Nacht,
Da sehn wir über dem bleichen Land
Den kühlen Mond, wie er heimlich lacht,
Und ruhen Hand in Hand.

Sei night trauig, bald kommt die Zeit,
Da haben wir Ruh. Unsre Kreuzlein stehen
Am hellen Strassenrande zu zweit,
Und es regnet un schneit,
Und die Winde kommen und gehen.

photo credit: aminoapps.com

The Ultimate Smash Tourney

bartholomulethegreatLeave a comment

As many long-time readers are aware I wrote a blog a while back ranking how I felt the people in journalism would perform in our class smash tourney, this ranking list was quite controversial and amongst the class has labeled me as some not to good things. But as it turns out I am relatively good at reading how people will perform.

  • E.H.
  • N.J.
  • A.K.
  • C.C.
  • H.L.
  • Z.D.
  • S.H.
  • B.M.
  • E.S.

The list above was the previous list below is the actual ranking

  • N.J.
  • C.C.
  • Z.D.
  • H.L.
  • E.H.
  • F.A.
  • E.S.
  • B.M.
  • A.K.

I’d like to point out that I was not perfectly accurate but it was pretty damn close for a majority of the people in the tourney (S.H. didn’t play). For starters, I put C.C. under N.J. and that was true Z.D. beat H.L. which I will admit was wrong but I didn’t expect H.L. to lose. E.S. was accidentally given a bypass of the first game by me so B.M. didn’t get to play but I think they would have lost. F.A. was a wildcard in my last ranking and he lost his first match so not much to say there. E.H. was a bit weird because he was the person that owned the switch and he was the expected winner, I think he would have won if he picked his main not duck hunt. Overall I think that most everyone had fun and would play again.

credit: nintendo

Reviewing the Movies I watched this Weekend

cannassuerLeave a comment

Over the weekend I had an awful cold. One of those colds that just shut down both your brain and your respiratory system to the point that playing video games or doing anything that’s not lying down feels like a chore. So instead of doing my ritual video gaming I did something totally out of character and actually sat through not just one but three movies. Long ones too. Over the course of Saturday afternoon, I watched Marvel’s Eternals, The Dark Knight Rises, and Joker.

I started with Marvel’s Eternals, one of the first Marvel films in years to get a trash rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Going into this movie, I was already expecting this movie to be not that great. I wasn’t exactly sure what to expect, but this movie fully exceeded my expectations. It is not a good film. First of all, they bring in an entirely new group of heroes who are supposed to be immortal and help birth planets but they’re pitifully weak for the task they’re put up to. Secondly, they implant a completely new villain who was nowhere to be found in any other marvel movie despite being seemingly pretty abundant in the world, so much so that an entire group of heroes was created to fight them. Not only that, but the whole point of these heroes’ existence is to help life flourish throughout the universe and then continue to neglect a situation in which Thanos tries to wipe out half of all life. In general, this movie suffers from a pretty unrelatable cast of characters and more plot holes than the entire franchise so I really don’t understand how Marvel pulled off such a mediocre film after such a reigning decade of great movies.

Photo Credit: The Cosmic Circus

The next movie I watched was The Dark Knight Rises which was a long-overdue viewing experience for me. I had seen the first of the trilogy at a very young age and then watched Dark Knight multiple times throughout my life because that movie absolutely slaps. I honestly don’t know what I was thinking about not watching Dark Knight Rises for so long I mean Christopher Nolan’s Batman movies are awesome. Although this one doesn’t have as compelling or coherent of a plot as the one preceding it, Dark Knight rises is a very good-looking and well-shot movie with a pretty moving plot for a DC/Batman movie. Christopher Nolan does a great job of blurring the line between good and evil to create a tangible dilemma that Batman/Bruce Wayne has to face throughout the plot. Although this movie doesn’t live up to its predecessor, it is a great continuation of the trilogy and a good way to cap it off.

Photo Credit: Slant Magazine

Joker was the last movie I watched and this one was a very different story. This movie is straight-up depressing. This movie is a fantastic example of the direction that DC needs to take to be taken seriously in Hollywood. This movie takes Gotham, a city that is very prevalent in the DC universe and makes it a very tangible, and very depressing place with deep-rooted economical issues that caused an uproar of poverty. And it doesn’t just show that by having a lot of crime. There are living in rundown apartment buildings, suffering to find a living, and even budget cuts in mental health institutions. Instead of Gotham just seeming like a playground for Batman, it is now a mirror of the depressing reality that is living in poverty in a city, the neglect of the U.S government to fix these many problems such as mental health and care, and the empty promises by those who are wealthy to fix all of this. This whole film completely flips the Batman story on its head. Now you have this horrible and unsavable town in which people are doing whatever they can to help themselves out of this crushing situation that they didn’t even cause. It makes all the people previously beaten into a coma by Batman seem almost innocent for their crimes compared to the heinous neglect of the lower class by both him and his father. By the end of the movie I was kind of waiting for them to kill Bruce’s parents because, in all honesty, Thomas deserved it. Overall, this movie is the direction that DC needs to take with their films because this is a clear improvement over everything they made after the Dark Knight Trilogy.

Photo Credit: The New Yorker