Sunday, September 11, 2011

It’s not what you think. But it’s close.

I went to the comic book store today, hoping to find Sailormoon and Codename Sailor V. The new books are due out this week, and I’m anxious to see them. My brother just wanted the latest Sonic and Mega Man comics from Archie. This sounds like a simple day, right?

Well if you’ve been reading my blogs to this point, then you already know that simple doesn’t always happen to me.

No sooner did I start my ill-fated search for my favorite manga, did Mama get an emergency phone-call from my dad. Did I mention that I’m happy they are separated? I should say that. So she dashes out of the store, leaving my brother and I to wonder about for a bit.

To my dismay, not only don’t they have Sailormoon and Sailor V, they’re downsizing the manga section at the Amazing Fantasy, chucking most of the titles that are interesting, (I.E. No more Gen 13, Tick, Manga University, Single issues of Darkstalkers or Pre-Current-52 DC, which is NOT the same as the last 52 that fucked up the continuity of Starfire’s storyline between her escape & meeting Dick Grayson) can’t seem to order more than 3 issues of Sonic or Mega Man if their lives depended upon it, refuse to carry ANY trading card that isn’t Magic, Yu-Gi-Oh or Little Monsters, and they won’t order ANY Starfire merchandise under $40, apparently. Suddenly, Amazon.com is looking REALLY good.

But fortunately, they still carry Tom Strong… from months ago. In fact hardly any of the shelves have a NEW issue of anything, save but for DC’s NEW 52 and a few kiddie comics. This is not a good sign, but screw it, Tesla and Val FINALLY got married and she’s pregnant (as of January’s issue) so I’m happy.

Well now that my comic questions have been answered, in comes my mother, looking very tense. “What happened?” I say with a droll tone, knowing I’m about to hear something absolutely stupid.

… And I’m right.

“Well I left your father in the emergency room” is how the conversation starts.

Hmm. No job, no insurance, we’re off to a GREAT start, folks! “Okay what happened?” I reply.
“Well remember when I bought him that electric lawn mower after we moved?”

I know what you’re thinking. Because I thought the same thing. That somehow this dolt had managed to chop off an appendage or two. I remember telling my mother NOT to let him have ANYTHING more dangerous than a push-mower, and I even made my brother stand witness as I declared that handing him anything with a motor would only cause chaos.

“No he didn’t chop anything off.”

“Ok what happened then?”

“Well he claims he needed the extension cord from the garage, and then another one.”

I know what you’re thinking. He could have electrocuted himself, fried himself, or run the lawnmower over one of the cords. He’s actually done the third thing before. No it isn’t any of those things either.

“He went into the garage to go get a cord. He had trouble getting around the big heavy boxes I told him not to stack one on top of the other.”

I know what you’re thinking. No nothing fell on him, and he did not crack his skull open.
“So he finds the cord just out of reach, on a shelf.”

“Okay”

“And even though he’s the moron that put it up there, he can’t reach it.”
“Okay…”

And then she says something highly unlikely. In fact it was so stupid, the man behind the counter dropped what he was doing, and asked if he had really heard this.

“So he tried to stand on top of a glass aquarium to go get it. The fucker snapped, and shards of glass went into his leg.”

………. He tried to stand… on a glass, fish-less aquarium, to obtain an electrical cord.
I can’t make this up.

Now the aquarium had been left by the previous owner of my house. We’ve never had fish. It was left in the darkest corner of the attic, and this “genius” decided to move it to the garage, where he SWEARS he has “always” used it as a stool. “Glass is sturdy, why did it break under my weight?” He screamed to my mother.

So she took him to the hospital, and as they were removing one of several shards of glass, he spurted and passed out. He’s anemic. Great.

Now he has returned home, and is already goofing about his apartment. But needless to say this threw a monkey wrench into my Sunday.

Friday, September 2, 2011

Moonies in distress? Toonmakers rises from the dead!


Oh no..... Oh dear God no....

Toonmakers... LIVES!!???
http://www.toonmakers.com/
And I'm sorry to say that they are PROUD of this video!

I cleaned this up myself. So now you can see how this cheap company bastardized my favorite anime... color corrected and in HD!



You'll note that they made Jupiter handicapped, Mercury Asian, Moon White, and Venus and Mars different ethnicities. Also, Luna and Artemis are the SAME cat, a female.

Who are Toonmakers? Well here's how they describe themselves:

"Toon Makers Inc. was founded in 1991 to provide superior quality Animation and Production Management for feature films, television, commercial productions and interactive games. Our client list includes Universal Studios, Fox, Disney, ABC, Turner Entertainment, Warner Brothers, Film Roman, Saban, Colgate, Burger King and Bandai (USA) Toys.Our studio has contributed animation and production management for the feature films "The Pagemaster," "Once Upon a Forest," Tom and Jerry the Movie," "Fern Gully" and "Thumbelina." Television projects include "The Pink Panther," "Fievel Goes West," "Back to the Future," "The Adventures of Oliver Twist," "Spy Dogs," " Flint the Time Detective," Bad Dog" and "Mon Colle Knights" among others.Toon Makers’ producers have overseen the production of over 200 half hours of animation for Fox Family, Fox Kids Network and ABC Family and our Development Team created and produced pilots for Bandai International (Sailor Moon) Levy-Mann (Itty Bitty Heartbeats) and Colgate Palmolive (Doctor Rabbit and the Adventures of Tooth Kingdom).Current projects in production include "Phantom of the Opera," The Ornament" "Dick Danger Space Mercenary" and "The Adventures of the Talking Crayons" as well as educational programming for Colgate International and The National Nutritional Network.Animation, Character Design, Illustrations, Writing, Music, Pitch Packaging and Branding are just a few of the services provide by Toon Makers. Our studio provides 2D/3D animation along with Digital Ink and Paint, Motion Capture, Live Action and Live Action/Animation Composite. Toon Makers will provide everything needed to take your animation or live action project from "Concept to Screen.""

And this is the Wikipedia entry about the video:

The Toon Makers Music VideoWhen Sailor Moon was up for bids by Toei to be produced in North America, Renaissance-Atlantic Entertainment, who worked closely with Bandai and Toon Makers, Inc., conceptualized their own version of the property, which was half live-action and half Western-style animation. Toon Makers produced a 17-minute proof of concept presentation video, as well as a two-minute music video, for this concept, which Renaissance-Atlantic presented to Toei. Toei ultimately rejected Renaissance-Atlantic's bid because the series as Renaissance-Atlantic and Toon Makers envisioned it would have cost significantly more than simply exporting and dubbing the original anime. The music video was exhibited at a panel at Anime Expo 1998 by Allen Hastings, then with NewTek, Inc., and met with scorn, ridicule, and derision. A convention attendee taped the music video off the screen and uploaded the footage, which includes an introduction by Hastings and brief comments by other convention attendees afterwards, to the Internet. The clip has since been copied numerous times and can currently be viewed on many streaming video sites. Because of the relatively poor quality of the source video and circulated footage, many anime fans believed that the music video was actually a leaked trailer for the now-inactive project instead of an exhibition of a promotion piece. Additional copies of the footage, with Hastings' intro excised, have since been uploaded to the Internet and served only to bolster the mistaken belief. Because Renaissance-Atlantic had previously been instrumental in Saban Entertainment's acquisition of Toei's Super Sentai series for reimagining as Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers, people who viewed the music video mistakenly believed that Saban had actually created it and began to call it "Saban Moon." The Toon Makers music video has been called a worst-case scenario with regards to how Sailor Moon would have been presented in North America, in comparison to the original anime episodes that were eventually dubbed by DIC Entertainment and Cloverway Inc. and aired. Rocky Solotoff, Toon Makers' president and founder, wrote, directed, and produced the pilot episode of Renaissance-Atlantic's version of Sailor Moon, which to this day, has not been exhibited publicly.All five Guardian Senshi are depicted in the music video. Though Solotoff is legally prohibited from divulging much information regarding the Renaissance-Atlantic/Toon Makers version of Sailor Moon, he does reveal, in an interview with Animefringe magazine, the origin of the concept and music video, debunking many of the stories and speculations that had been connected to both. Details revealed in the interview include confirmation that both a white and black cat were planned to be in the series, although only a fluffy white cat is seen in the music video (according to the lyrics, this cat was meant to be Luna), and that each Senshi was written to be of a different nationality.Two curious remnants of Toon Makers' involvement with Sailor Moon remained after Renaissance-Atlantic shelved the project. The Renaissance-Atlantic series featured vehicles which did not appear in the original metaseries. One of these was the Moon Cycle, which Bandai manufactured a toy version of as part of the North American line of Sailor Moon toys. The Moon Cycle toy remains one of the more curious pieces of Sailor Moon merchandise produced for the North American market. More prominently, the Sailor Moon logo featured at the end of the music video was retained as the official North American Sailor Moon logo for the metaseries and all related programs and merchandising.

Let us never forget the horror... of Saban Moon.

The ONLY way to see Sailormoon is uncensored and as the series was originally made.