Darren Endymion's Blog, page 30

Sailor Moon Crystal episode 1-01

Two things here: first, this is the last of the Sailor Moon entries until later this month. Don’t panic. Second, notice the numbering in the title here. You can tell that I may be reviewing or commenting on every episode. However, this may get old. I may hate it. I may have nothing to say and so don’t bother. Also, by that first “1″ you can tell that I am assuming that there will be more than one season. There were five seasons of the original anime — original, R, S, Super S, and Stars. The thought that they may make another five seasons makes me tingle in places too  inappropriate to mention.

So, this new series, Sailor Moon Crystal, is kind of a reboot, but one that is sticking more to the original manga. That being said, we will have more compact story, more attacks, new transformations, new Sailor Scouts (about six more, I think), etc. if we get all the manga made into the series. Here’s hoping.

This first episode was mostly an indication of what will come. It shows that the animation is way better than any previous season, even with the quality steadily increasing throughout each previous season. This season is gorgeous. We are in an era of computer graphics and it shows during the transformation sequence which I’m not 100% sure how I feel about. Instead of Moon Tiara Action, we have Moon Tiara Boomerang. The animation is more manga than anime, so I didn’t expect over the top anime action — no fountains of tears, no grievous mortal injuries, no chibi figures, and probably no Rei chasing Serena with a broom.

But that’s the boring stuff.

They hired the original voice actress for Serena/Usagi/Sailor Moon. Genius. When she first yelled, “Moon Prism Power…” I got good chills. Everywhere. The first episode is very close to the anime first episode, but things are about to take a turn and change. They are going to get serious. People are going to die.

Did anyone else who watched this think that the, uh, Negaverse is WAY creepier this time? Those jewelry-loving bitches with the red glowing eyes skulking through the darkness? And when Serena did Moon Tiara Boomerang and the Monster of the Day turned to ash and fell to the counter before disintegrating? And Jedite summoning the MotD? Fuck that. He was creepy. I loved it.

I’m excited and cannot wait for this. It’s my favorite, feel good, happy time series. It sounds lame, but every single frame was like being reunited with old friends. Sure, you can always go look at your old photo albums, but now your friends have moved back to town — prettier, full of new stories, funny, full of old charm, and you know the fun is just beginning. I’m very happy.

One last think I’m stupidly happy about: Darien/Mamoru/Tuxedo Mask. I once saw a parody of Sailor Moon where Tuxedo Mask swoops in, throws a rose (which does NOTHING), spits out some dramatic sentence, and jumps away, helping not at all. All the Sailor Scouts look up at him smiling and yell, “You’re fucking useless, Tuxedo Mask!” This may change, but for now it’s still true. He’s cute and totally useless.

I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Sailor Moon: In Defense of the Dub

For anyone who has been to my (woefully out of date) website, you will know that my pseudonym, Darren Endymion, came about because of a series of Sailor Moon related coincidences which I decided to take as a writing name (hoping it didn’t come off as a bad porn name or a pretentious boobery of a mythology reference). But, we’re not here to discuss my fake name.

This is the reason we’re here. So, pay attention, or you will be punished…in the name of the Moon!

Many years ago, my cousin gave me an old VHS tape of recorded Sailor Moon Super S episodes (the 4th season, the Pegasus/Dream season) for something to watch as I was partaking in some random creative endeavor with a friend. They were for background purposes and I was warned that this season was not the best. And it isn’t, but I loved it. Even though it was just a series of Monster of the Day episodes (more than any other season), it was just so freekin’ charming. About 917 episodes of the Amazon Trio later, they had a story arc that got good.

The Amazon Trio. We will refer to this picture later.

As I ran out of Super S episodes (right after the Amazon Trio bailed), the original DiC seasons were released on DVD. I decided to get the first one for the hell of it so I could see how it all started. It was amazing. However, imagine if your favorite show was hacked up, tortured into submission, re-voiced, and then had anything remotely controversial removed (spitting a drink, cross-dressing, gay love, death, etc.). Sounds horrible, right? You will get some people who will say yes, who turn their noses up at the English dubbed version that got them into Sailor Moon in the first place. I fling poo in their general direction.

The DiC dubs were travesties, sucking much of the life and drama out of the series, but there is something charming and cute about them. I made myself stretch out the episodes as though they were really airing on TV again. Each DVD release date was a day I looked forward to. They turned gay lovers into cousins, making things worse than what they intended to avoid…

“Cousins”? Not unless you live in Alabama. They are both female, btw.

They changed males to females if there was gayness about them (Zoicite and FishEye, I’m looking at you…see that picture above of the Amazon Trio? All men. Let that sink in. This dub, while not by DiC, still changed the one in the middle to female). They refused to touch Sailor Stars, not only because the popularity was fading, but because no amount of editing and lies could change the gender-bending Sailor Stars into anything palatable for American children.

The Sailor Stars, before and after transformation. Male before, female after.

I loved the dubs, every second of them — even that abysmal first voice for Rini — because they are cute, happy pieces of wonderful. They make me happy when I’m down. They are bottled joy. Hacked? Obviously. Death became captured by the Negaverse. Made utterly PC? Yes. Is Sailor Moon Says terrible? Every second. And I love it all.

I have watched every episode in both English and uncut Japanese, and I love both. I will still watch both, depending on what mood I am in. There’s no question that the original uncut Japanese is vastly superior in almost every possible way. Yet the dub made obscure Japanese jokes and language/cultural idioms relateable to American audiences. They are homogenized, incomplete, and lacking something from the original. But they bring to the table a feeling all their own.

You want drama, suspense, death, gender bending, gayness, pain, and love? You want the main male character’s questionable friendship with other males? Cross-dressing villains? Go to the Japanese versions. Check out Stars. If Serena/Usagi’s scream at the end doesn’t give you chills, you may not be human. You want fluffy, funny, Americanized goofiness where the heroes call the villains tacky tarts, swamp witches, trashy has-beens, et al? Go for the dub.

With the first episode of the new series airing this past weekend after something like 20 years, and set to air a new episode every two weeks, you can expect at least two Sailor Moon related posts a month as I geek out and say hello to some old friends.

It’s Not Cancer!

So, if you’ve been around for a few months, I don’t need to mention that I had a recent health scare…but I am anyway. It’s one of the reasons I did the A to Z blog challenge thing — it gave me something to do every night other than obsess over the horror that might be awaiting me.

I won’t go into the specific symptoms, but something happened that sent me to the ER, horrified and in the throes of a panic attack. They thought it was something simple, gave me pills, sent samples off to my regular doctor, and told me to call her in a few days to get the results. The results were negative, meaning they didn’t know what it was.

I made an appointment with my doctor where the word “cancer” was uttered as a very real possibility. My doctor told me I would be very, very young to have this type of cancer (about two decades), but it was very possible and if it wasn’t that, there were other very unpleasant possibilities. I was sent to a specialist.

The specialist was busy. I didn’t get to see him for a fucking MONTH. Imagine that for a moment. Cancer is a possibility. You want to find out right away, but you can’t. So, you wait, hoping that your death isn’t growing inside of you. Try not thinking about that almost every waking moment.

I went to the specialist who confirmed that I would ruin the Bell curve if it was cancer, but it isn’t unheard of. I was to have a CT scan and a rather invasive, painful test after that to see what it was. I made my next appointment for the painful test. When was that appointment? A month later.

Seriously.

The doctor’s words were comforting, and he is a competent, able doctor, but his words were not enough. I had the CT scan and waited. My friends told me that no news was good news. Sounds good, right? Wrong. When I called, the doctor hadn’t even looked at my results. He called me back about 25 minutes later, just before I was about to launch into a serious panic attack, my little sense of comfort totally gone.

The CT scan showed nothing. No signs of tumors, lesions, cancer, nothing. He still wanted to do the painful test, which would seem sadistic, but it was to be 100% sure. I wouldn’t accept anything less. We hung up and my legs went weak. I nearly cried.

I had the painful test two days ago. It doesn’t need to be spoken of other than to say that it was negative. There was seemingly nothing wrong with me. The horrid symptom that sent me screaming to the ER was likely what they diagnosed it as. That the results of the test were negative suggests that it wasn’t done properly or that I’m some freak of nature and was already fighting whatever it was.

I’m fine, though I think I aged seven years in the two months it took for this ordeal to unravel.

And now my friends are calling me Wolverine, saying that I have his healing power. This is not the first time that my body has baffled doctors and I have bounced back with astounding rapidity. I would prefer Jean Grey’s powers, but I’ll take it.

Now, my life is no longer on pause. I can move forward. It gives new perspective, this type of scare. I’d rather it come another way, but I’m okay, and that’s what matters.

Reluctant Big Ideas

So, after my last blog entry I went back and read my recently published short story The Snow Queen. As any writer would with his/her own work, I found flaws, things I wish I had spent more time on, dialogue choices I wasn’t as fond of, etc. I still love it, I’m still proud of it, and I learned a lot from it.

But, I held back. I limited myself when I could have done more, been more imaginative, gone further. I’ve never written a complete short story before and I wanted to try it (note: it’s hard. A novel gives you all sorts of room to work. The short story is, well, short. Duuuuuh. Therefore, every word counts, your time is limited, etc. Even 30 pages can feel short.) I tried a few new things with it (for me), let some of the language fly, and has fun with it.

What concerns me is that I held back at all. My reasons have been obsessed over, chatted on, and now blogged about. The result of the over-thinking? None of my reasons are good ones; in fact, some are quite stupid and insulting.

Since I’m in the process of mapping out a new story, I analyzed what I was doing. I had to — I read a very good novel in the meantime which had several overwhelming similarities to what I was planning out. I should be proud that I could think of a story which could be so clever and good — in very talented, capable, self-assured hands. Instead of being proud, I was bitter and joked that I needed a check and a movie deal. I got over it and, after deciding not to scrap the whole project, let my imagination go for a walk.

Instead of a walk, the freekin thing sprinted through a marathon. I lost it, don’t know where it is, but from the images it’s sending back, It’s somewhere on this planet (I think) but several hundred years and possibly a dimension away. I didn’t tell it to go there! Who authorized this much travel? Why is it sending book excerpts back from the time period it’s in? Is my imagination harvesting crops out there? Then why do I know about the most lucrative horticulture output? Who told it this type of behavior was acceptable? It’s keeping me up at night.

No, I’m happy. Really, I’m probably bragplaining, but it really forces the issues I mentioned before. Now I have to see how far I want to go with this, how detailed I want to get, and (possibly) where I want to send it. It was supposed to be an anthology but it now has no limits.

I think I’m used to holding myself back, always keeping a little (or a lot) in reserve. It’s easier to say, “I wasn’t trying that hard” than to really put yourself out there and potentially fail. But doesn’t that also mean that you’re a failure anyway? And a coward?

Geez. Do other aspiring writers deal with this crap, or am I way too into my own head? Anyone…?

Review Roundup

So, with my recent health scare (which I have recently been told is almost certainly nothing. Wooo!), I failed to update my web site at all, or to promote in any way my most recent release, The Snow Queen. I just found out that I didn’t even mention it to one of my best friends and former beta readers. (Sorry!) I have been living in a state of almost total anxiety and fear and trying to blah, blah, blah. That’s not the point.

The point is that, despite my total lack of activity, my publisher has been doing what they do. Since The Snow Queen was only a 30 page story in a much longer anthology, many sites didn’t review it. Many will only review stand alone novels and novellas.

That being said, I have garnered two reviews, both of which are very positive. As a way of weak ass promotion and of phoning  in this blog entry (my hands are aching…more on that later), here are the links to the reviews I have garnered:

Rainbow Book Reviews: (They don’t do stars, but it was very positive)

http://www.rainbowbookreviews.com/book-reviews/the-snow-queen-by-darren-endymion-at-torquere-press

Joyfully Jay: (4.75 stars out of 5 for my story, though the review has a huge spoiler…or at least I hope my story wasn’t so transparent so that it wasn’t at least a little bit of a spoiler. Who can say?)

http://joyfullyjay.com/2014/05/review-torqued-tales-anthology.html

Very cool, right? I’m very happy to have been reviewed (and so positively) by these sites (especially considering what the laughable Amazon ranking for The Snow Queen is…Go ahead. Go look at that pathetic number. Ha! My novel, Winter’s Trial, which is much more expensive and much longer, is like a million ranks higher. Hahaha. Sucks, right?). Thankfully, the anthology as a whole is doing better than my individual story.

I don’t regret anything about The Snow Queen, though. I let my imagination out of the box a little more, I tried on fantasy, and though it’s not as full as I would have liked (with a word limit of 10,000 words, or about 30 pages I was somewhat stunted), I still had so much fun writing it, and though I had to mentally chop out a full part of the journey to barely scrape under the maximum word requirement, I actually like it very much.

Today my hands are hurting because I hand wrote two pages of notes about my next potential story. It was intended to be for an anthology (my publisher has raised the anthology story limit to 20,000 words), but I have decided to let the story be as big as it wants to be. If that means I separate it from the anthology and send it as a novella, then that’s what I plan to do. I like the back story a LOT, and that’s what I was working on today.

Here’s hoping. Wish me luck!

For Love of He-Man

Because of the weird week I have had, I am going back to a simpler time…a time when I was a kid and obsessed with He-Man. I could be common and discuss the homoeroticism involved with He-Man and the line of toys.

But why go the easy route?

I can talk about the fact that I also wanted She-Ra toys, but my overly religious parents wouldn’t let me have them because they were “dolls”. Those of you who have been around a while may think you’ve read wrong. You haven’t. My mother would rather let me read Stephen King’s ‘Salem’s lot as a fifth grader than let me play with She-Ra. Why? Because she had hair you could comb and that very act would turn me gay.

Funny, I thought it was my desire to lick this man that made me gay.

I was allowed to have the She-Ra villains, though. They were mostly boys. My aunt, aware of the hypocrisy of my mother (and not giving a shit if I liked men or not), went out and got me the gayest She-Ra action figure available to her evil, apparently gay-inducing, plotting mind.

Evidence.

So, as an adult gay male who never got to even watch much She-Ra (or to lick the above Brazilian model), I brought the DVD set of both He-Man and She-Ra.

Ah, bless them and bless us idiot kids for being into a cartoon which had about three animated actions for each character — laughing, punching, and running. Maybe flipping or somersaulting for the action characters. As a kid, I didn’t notice. Didn’t care. Couldn’t care. I was too busy pretending I was on Eternia hanging with Prince Adam or He-Man, going to weapons training with Teela, riding Battle Cat, or outsmarting Skeletor (which, if the cartoon was any indication, a special needs, half-eaten shellfish could do).

The show was lame, cheesy, homoerotic, good fun. As a kid, I didn’t care about the lack of clothes, steroidal pecs, rampant man-flesh, overuse of the stock footage, or ridiculous plot devices. I wasn’t aware of the supposedly anti-religious images my (different) crazy aunt was ranting about. Something about Skeletor’s staff; Zodac, perpetrator of paganistic astrology, and Castle Greyskull. The Sorceress, ironically, was of little concern.

Heathen Mirror Magic

But it takes me back and makes me happy. And so I shall watch it. Even She-Ra.

Update: The two heart attack patients mentioned last week are doing better. One was less severe and is back home. The other will recover. Neither, I imagine, will do anything the doctors told them to. It was a very stressful weekend.

Not Today, Guys

Today’s entry will be very brief, for which I apologize. Two people I know — one of my best friend’s mothers and one of my roommates (the owner of the house in which I am renting a room) — have had heart attacks today. Both are in the hospital.

So, the rest of today will be spent eating comfort food, relaxing, and hoping.

I shall be back on Monday.

Hoarders: Making Yourself Feel Better

I was reaching for something to write about tonight and randomly put on an episode of Hoarders: Buried Alive. I’ve watched most of season 1 and 2; I even have a “favorite” episode — first season, takes place in Portland, OR titled “Filling the Void”. Dunno why. Just like it. The outside scenery is gorgeous, I like the older woman’s quirky personality, the family’s college-age gay son will probably be cute when he’s no longer a twink, etc. I think the thing here is that I can watch it without being horrified or grossed out.

I should just find a documentary about this place. Seriously.

Hoarders, as with any show, feels like it has to get more and more shocking as time goes on. The later seasons start involving bugs and animals, and just get worse and worse. I will tell you a secret to watching Hoarders and not being grossed out: look for the kitchen and the bathrooms. If there is no running water, turn the fucking program off. If the bathroom is unusable, just move on, watch some Power Rangers or something less offensive, and spare your psyche. I learned this rule the hard way.

I have a very strong stomach. It takes a lot to make me gag or gross out. A few of my friends and I were watching an episode together, and the kitchen was totally unusable. There was no running water. No running water means no working shower. Or toilet.  This hoarder’s solution?

Behold and tremble with queasiness!

**Warning! This next paragraph is freekin’ gross. Feel free to skip it entirely and I will have changed subjects and have moved on to something less offensive!** This was her toilet. A bucket. Being a hoarder, and not one into upkeep or cleanliness, she was a little neglectful about emptying this chamberpot. And so, it would fill up. To the fucking brim. And when it was FULL, she would carry it out, laboring, panting, and straining under the weight, allowing the contents to slop over the sides…and dump it in front of her house, not two yards from her front door. Friends, the producers at Hoarders showed the content of the bucket slopping over as this woman carried it out front. I gagged. Looked again, gagged again. I NEVER gag. My eyes watered just imagining the stench. My ex and I were about to leave, and this episode hastened that exodus. I couldn’t watch Hoarders for about a year (partially because I just have trouble keeping up with shows, honestly). **End foulness. You may read after this again, and do so without fear.**

Just something pretty to look at.

Okay, still with me? I decided to watch some episode tonight from the fourth season, titled “Tiny Monsters.” I got 3 minutes and 17 seconds in before I turned it off. The oven didn’t work, there was one working burner, and as the poor daughter was cooking, the surrounding area was crawling with various bugs. They flashed to a big ass black widow spider cruising around the house. And the bathroom looked inoperative. There were rusted tin cans in the sink. They opened the fridge…and I turned off the episode.

My beloved grandmother, gone three years this summer, was like a mother to me. Better than a mother in some cases. She was also a mild hoarder. Reading more and watching this show, I realize that she was not that bad. Nor was she the kind I have described. It was bad, but not extreme. She was a reader, and so the house had a lot of papers, novels, mail, and magazines. My aunt — Ursula, the Half-Leech Half-Bison — decided to sell Avon and, since my grandmother’s house was untidy anyway, she would leave all her Avon merchandise at my grandmother’s house, thereby adding the element of cardboard to the ghastly mess.

Cardboard: the bane of hoarders and those who love them.

I love my grandmother, hated the hoard, and resented my aunt for callously adding to it. Being around that has done strange things to me. I can tolerate some mess, but not filth (the aforementioned bucket would send me screaming away). Yet, mess in my room and surroundings can only get so bad before I freak and clean/throw away/Hulk out. Watching Hoarders makes me feel better about all that. It relaxes me and makes me feel better about my organizational skills, allowing me to approach organizing from a calm place of inner peace, mixed with determination.

I feel for the hoarders on the show. I see hints of someone I love very much in this show. I know it isn’t easy to live with or to experience. And it makes me feel better about myself.

And isn’t that what reality TV is all about?

Friday the 13th Marathon impending

Every time there is a Friday the 13th, I will watch at least one Friday the 13th movie, but usually four or more. Am I the only idiot who does this?

Granted, I don’t usually sit there and slaver over them, watching every second and analyzing Jason Voorhees’ actions and psyche. No, bitch. These are campy comedy or murderous fun. The deaths range from boring (stabbed in the stomach), to ironic (impaling a cheating boyfriend through his crotch), to downright hilarious (the sleeping bag. If you haven’t seen it, at least search for it on YouTube.)

This is not going to end well…for the one in the sleeping bag. For viewers, I suggest putting down any beverages.

It’s become a source of fun and I scan the calendar to see which months I should get excited for. Usually, I end up like this:

But on those rare occasions where Friday the 13th lands in a summer month, I get ready early. I cancel plans, I tell nobody what I plan to do (one can only say, “Don’t judge me” so much before one wonders if the judgment is deserved), I get pizza or plan meals in advance, and I am MIA to the world.

The eternal question is which of the 10 that I have will get watched (I don’t own part nine or ten yet. Nine sucks ass, so I’m not upset. Ten is hilarious and terrible — especially the homo emo kid we are supposed to believe has ever touched a girl.)

— I usually watch part one, because it is the first and has a very young Kevin Bacon in it. It’s tame, it’s one of two where the killer was not Jason (or his spirit. LAME!), and it sets everything up.

— Part two because it ties in and it actually is pretty good. Not only that, but you see something terrible that you normally don’t see in horror movies that don’t take place in Texas — someone with a disability gets it.

— Part three I usually skip, even though Jason gets his mask in this one. There aren’t enough hours in the day, so this one usually gets eliminated.

— Four because that was good and was supposed to end the series.

— I love part five because it’s Jason vs. the Insane Asylum/Special Needs Halfway House and has the hottest Tommy ever…I heard the actor eventually found Jesus and refused to be in subsequent sequels. This makes checking him out all the more satisfying for me…I like to imagine him looking up from prayer, shuddering, and thinking that Satan is close with the sin of homosexuality to jab him in the butt (where else?). Why? Because I’m sick, I guess.

— Six almost always gets skipped. It doesn’t do anything special for me, though the moterhome scene is hilarious.

— I will always watch part seven because of the sleeping bag scene and because it involves telekinesis. It’s Jason vs. Carrie and I love it.

— I usually skip part eight because it is terrible.

— I will then cap the night off with Freddy vs. Jason, or the remake of Friday the 13th.

The remake was woefully unbalanced. Boobs all over the place. And they are nice. Stupendous in one case. I think we see ass, too. But I think we see only two bare male chests in the whole movie (one in the scene with said stupendous breasts). That’s it. Jared Padalecki has arms and chest for days yet keeps tight in his shirt like a Pilgrim in a cold climate. Boy ass? Forget it. This was made in the modern era where male nudity is more and more common. Hell, nudity isn’t necessary. But could I get some male side boob at least? (And not Peter Griffin’s, thankyouverymuch.) Would it be too scandalous to show a back? Ugh. The movie is lucky it made Jason scary again, or I would never watch it.

*As a side note, if anyone has ready my novel Winter’s Trial and wants to know who I based the evil Tim’s looks on (which I don’t normally do, but it worked because the actor was beautiful and a total douchebag in that role), then you can watch Friday the 13th remake and look for the guy who plays Trent. I think he was in Transformers as the same character.

So, think of me and my obsession this Friday the 13th. Hell, any Friday the 13th. But this one is in June, technically a summer month. And I’m breaking my silence and allowing/forcing my friend to join in the madness. We’re gonna eat camp food and s’mores and laugh until we pee. Perhaps you can all join in. Together but apart. *confetti*

The many faces of Jason Voorhees.

Oceanic Superpredator

When your first thought for a blog entry starts, “Granted, a 9 foot shark isn’t that big, but…” you know there is terror to be dealt.

This actually happened. Keep this in mind. The short version is that a 9 foot great white shark was tagged and released. Four months later the tag washed up on shore with signs it had been eaten. Data on the tag showed abrupt changes in depth and temperature, something scary like 1,500 feet.

Some think that a superpredator, likely another shark, ate the tagged beast and dove toward the depths of hell where a shark big enough to eat this beast would reside.

There are a lot of ifs, right? It could have died and been eaten by anything. It could have bled and been eaten by a bunch of other creatures, one with the diving capability of the Titanic. (Poor taste? Probably.)

Yep. Poor taste.

But, the thought is terrifying. What eats a great white that size? They are doing a documentary about the search for what might be a really big shark. But…a really big shark? Isn’t that enough? As a reader of Steve Alten’s Meg novels, my mind automatically goes to Megalodon. Terror of the deep and all that. For visual terror, think about this roaming our oceans, having lived in the depths for years, ready to surface and eat everything:

It’s about to get a pissy, shitty meal. Enjoy!