Having A Look At Seiyuu Motivations (Also Known As: Yui Horie Is A Creepy Old Bat)
March 9, 2010, 3:52 pm
Filed under: Horie Yui, Seiyuu, Toradora | Tags: kikuko inoue, pv, Seiyuu, Toradora, vanilla salt, voice actress, yui horie
Filed under: Horie Yui, Seiyuu, Toradora | Tags: kikuko inoue, pv, Seiyuu, Toradora, vanilla salt, voice actress, yui horie
Do me a favor and tell me how long you can stomach this video.
Not fucking long, right? I’ve loved Vanilla Salt, the first ending theme from Toradora, ever since Digital Boy used to play it all the god damn time. However, the two of us came to the consensus that the music video was a sin against all things righteous and should be blocked from our collective minds. Easy to see why: Yui Horie is fucking creepy. I always find plastic surgery unnerving and noticeable, but this is crazy. Her face looks like it’s made of fucking plastic. You can feel the sense that she either thinks that she’s cute, or wants to think it, but she is totally not. [By the way, she is a member of Kikuko Inoue's 'forever 17 cult'. I'm pretty sure Kikuko Inoue is joking when she claims to still be 17. Yui Horie is less convincing.]
Leaving aside her creepiness, though, I want to take a look at her career. I rather like Yui Horie as an actress, though she can be grating at times; but hey, you’ve got a lot to go by. She’s in fucking everything, and more often than not, she’s playing a major role. When I first saw her appearing in everything on TV, I just attributed it to being a Japanese person. After all, the Japanese entertainment industry is all about output. Most of the Japanese bands I’ve heard of put out an album on a yearly basis if not even more frequently (as opposed to every 2 or 3 years as is common in the US). I just assumed that she needed that many voice acting jobs to sustain a living.
But hold on, that can’t be right. It’s not like every seiyuu is playing major roles in 4 different shows at all given times. No, I don’t think Horie quite needs this much work so much as wants it. Working as a seiyuu doesn’t strike me as a very glamorous job. Being well-known doesn’t spare you from doing bad shows, and I doubt that it gets you paid a whole lot more than other seiyuu. It’s probably accurate to say that, like anyone else, a seiyuu’s pay is directly proportional to the amount of work they do. So if one seiyuu is getting by on one or two shows a season, then it gives me reason to believe that a seiyuu who does four major roles a season is simply living an expensive lifestyle.
Plastic surgery is not necessarily cheap, but it’s quite obvious that Yui Horie gets a fuckload of it done. I wonder how many side-jobs that face cost her?
This is, of course, all speculation.
As A Kanokon Fan, That OVA Really Did Suck [Minor NSFW]
February 27, 2010, 10:39 pm
Filed under: Anime, Kanokon, Manatsu no Daishanikusai | Tags: Anime, Kanokon, Manatsu no Daishanikusai, OVA
Filed under: Anime, Kanokon, Manatsu no Daishanikusai | Tags: Anime, Kanokon, Manatsu no Daishanikusai, OVA
I know, UltraEternalBlackout did a post about it sucking on this site already, but the post comes with a massive grain of salt when you look at how seriously UEB takes Kanokon as a whole, and how hyper-active this post is. Well, I assure you that he’s very right. The Kanokon OVA is one of those rare additions to a series that doesn’t just suck, but actually tarnishes the source material in a way. I find it rather surprising that the same director and writer of the series produced the OVA, because I honestly feel like they didn’t even understand the core series.
What I love about Kanokon is that the series is very sexually ‘open’. The characters deal immediately with the fact that the way they behave is not accepted in their surroundings, but they are in love enough not to care. In the series, it’s rather obvious that Kouta really wants to bone Chizuru. When he tells her ‘no’, it’s in the ‘no means yes’ way that Japanese women always use in bed. He doesn’t really resist her (even in the first episode he explains to the class rep that ‘it’s not like I don’t enjoy it.’) That’s what makes Kouta fun – he’s trying his hardest to not be seen as a pervert, but he IS a pervert, as all men are, so he can’t help but be drawn in (to Chizuru’s tits).
The OVA is ignorant of this. In the OVA, Kouta outright denies Chizuru’s sexual advances. He acts like he doesn’t love her, like he isn’t a pervert, but some kind of prude. I have a hard time seeing this as the same character who is fun to watch in the series.
This, I admit, was awesome.
And the OVA utterly lacks substance. Now, I’m not trying to say that the series was a shining example of substance. I’m also not going to say that the fanservice wasn’t something that the series spent a lot of time on. I’ve made a case for Strike Witches before wherein I stated that while the fanservice is ever-present, it doesn’t get in the way of the show’s plot at all, so the fault of being distracted is more on the viewer (same can be said of Queen’s Blade.) This is not true for Kanokon – there really is time taken out of the episodes for fanservice. However, there is also plot, and comedy, and other things to keep things interesting. Some episodes had fights, some had warm messages of togetherness, and some had some genuinely hilarious comedy. This OVA has none of those. It’s like a cold and calculated attempt to throw out fanservice and cash in on the series’ success.
But we don’t NEED that. There was enough fanservice in the main Kanokon series, there’s no point to rehashing it for another hour in an OVA with no substance. It would be so much more fulfilling to just watch the series over again, and have just as much fap-worthy material along with your fun plot and characters.
I think I get what this OVA was supposed to be. I’ve seen plenty of these ‘slow summer day’ episodes of anime. Kyoto Animation is the master of them, having had ones in Haruhi and in the K-On! OVA (sans summer for winter), and even in those good ones, there are still people who will say that they are worthless, reasonably. I think it’s nice to be introspective sometimes, because it lets you really recognize the show at it’s barest level and perhaps come to appreciate exactly what it is that you like about the series… but Kanokon’s OVA is not successful as a ‘slow summer day’ episode because it just isn’t Kanokon. If it had instead captured the core elements of the series that made it fun to watch, it could have been a success, but instead it is a boring and trite failure.
Follicle Talk: Grabbing Your Characters By The Hair Part 1 – Hair Color
Prominent Examples: Sanzenin Nagi of Hayate no Gotoku, Marisa Kirisame of Touhou, Saber and Gilgamesh from Fate/Stay Night, Onizuka from Great Teacher Onizuka, Char Aznable from Gundam, Aeru from Simoun
Prominent Examples: Sakuraba Aoi from Aoi Yori Aoshi, Mahoro from Mahoromatic, Izumi Konata from Lucky Star, Sae from Hidamari Sketch, Shinobu Maehara from Love Hina, Edmond Dantes from Gankutsuou
Prominent Examples: Lina Inverse of Slayers, Shana from Shakugan no Shana, Hanamichi Sakuragi from Slam Dunk, Asuka Langley Sohryu from Neon Genesis Evangelion, Vita from Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha A’s, Amamiya Manami from Gakuen Utopia Manabi Straight
Prominent Examples: Asa Shigure from SHUFFLE!, Litte Ratius from Prism Ark, Karakuri Chachamaru from Negima!, Yotsuba from Yotsuba&!, Sonozaki Shion and Sonozaki Mion from Higurashi, Lum from Urusei Yatsura
Prominent Examples: Cenes Crawford from Thunderforce V, Yin from Darker Than Black, Nero Chaos from Tsukihime, Archer and Ilyasviel Von Einsbern from Fate/Stay Night, Canaan from Canaan
February 17, 2010, 11:20 am
Filed under: Anime, Follicle Talk, Hair Color | Tags: Anime, Characters, Follicle Talk, Hair Color
Filed under: Anime, Follicle Talk, Hair Color | Tags: Anime, Characters, Follicle Talk, Hair Color
It can’t be avoided. It can’t also be helped. Sometime, someday, you’ll eventually have to categorize your anime, manga, and game characters. Sure, we can do that. But aside from the usual and generic black, can we do it – WITH HAIR? We’ll see.
This is the only time you’ll see a king being officially moe. Trust me.
Yellow
Shance: Yellow-haired characters are personifications of power. They have money, the looks, the attitude that fits their already extravagant status, and power levels that can go OVER NINE THOUSAAAAAAAAAND. They almost always get what they want, be it more riches, more power (in whatever form, be it political, or the real destructive thing you shoot out of your very own hands), or people (regardless of gender, which, of course, works if you’re a lesbian or a trap).
Prominent Examples: Sanzenin Nagi of Hayate no Gotoku, Marisa Kirisame of Touhou, Saber and Gilgamesh from Fate/Stay Night, Onizuka from Great Teacher Onizuka, Char Aznable from Gundam, Aeru from Simoun
Digiboy: At least, that’s true for some of them. On the other side of the coin, some see yellow as the calming color of placidity. Yellow can be your energetic best friend who actually manages to put effort into relaxation, and is always a blast to be around just for being so awesome.
Prominent Examples: Kirino Chiba of Bamboo Blade, Miyako of Hidamari Sketch, Triela from Gunslinger Girl, Kamikishiro Naoko from Boogiepop
Blue
Shance: Blue is usually associated with peacefulness and that amazing, silent air of maturity, which you can find on a character wearing said color on his/her hair. Blue-haired characters have that mature and sophisticated feel that even the most mundane activities become very worthwhile and enjoyable if they are the ones doing them. Of course, this means they are mostly regarded as your ideal waifus, if not your ideal parents, or elder siblings.
Prominent Examples: Sakuraba Aoi from Aoi Yori Aoshi, Mahoro from Mahoromatic, Izumi Konata from Lucky Star, Sae from Hidamari Sketch, Shinobu Maehara from Love Hina, Edmond Dantes from Gankutsuou
Digiboy: However, that calm blue can also be a symbol of insecurity. Sometimes, a character who looks blue may also spend most of their time feeling blue, or at least criminally shy. If you aren’t the most up-beat fellow yourself, stay away from some blue-haired angst-balls or you could find yourself being dragged even further down.
Prominent Examples: Ayanami Rei from Neon Genesis Evangelion, Tabitha from Zero no Tsukaima, Inamori Mikan from Gakuen Utopia Manabi Straight
Asuka, Asuka, why are you so red? Are you Player 1 like they said?
Red
Shance: Ah, yes, that fiery color of the spectrum. Most of the characters that associate their hair with the color red are mostly hot-blooded, adrenaline-driven people. They don’t listen to what others say, and do what they will without any regard to what the outside world has to say to him/her. Of course, that being said, they throw the most violent of tantrums or the most devious of pranks if they get flatly rejected, belittled or humiliated.
Prominent Examples: Lina Inverse of Slayers, Shana from Shakugan no Shana, Hanamichi Sakuragi from Slam Dunk, Asuka Langley Sohryu from Neon Genesis Evangelion, Vita from Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha A’s, Amamiya Manami from Gakuen Utopia Manabi Straight
Digiboy: Yeah, most red-haired characters are quite fiery, and always violent, but some of them are plum fucking crazy. We’re talking about super-powered god-modding badasses who will fuck you up before you even know what you’ve done to deserve it. These characters don’t just have red hair – their hair is STAINED red, with the blood of all the poor fools in their way.
Prominent Examples: Etna from Disgaea, Claire Stanfield from Baccano!, Revy from Black Lagoon, early Himura Kenshin from Rurouni Kenshin Tsuiokuhen
OG
Green
Shance: Green-haired people are mostly the bubbly types. They’re adventurous, they’re curious, they’re lively (but not in a fiery kind of way like in the case of red-haired characters), and they get the most out of any situation that involves anything of interest. However, don’t be fooled. Some of them only have these personalities as a facade, and some of them are hurt or broken so bad, they don’t even understand themselves anymore.
Prominent Examples: Asa Shigure from SHUFFLE!, Litte Ratius from Prism Ark, Karakuri Chachamaru from Negima!, Yotsuba from Yotsuba&!, Sonozaki Shion and Sonozaki Mion from Higurashi, Lum from Urusei Yatsura
Digiboy: Some green-haired characters, though, are far from lively, and are, if anything, distant. Green hair my symbolize that the character hasn’t quite found their place in life, limboing between the platonic blue state and wishing that they could be as lively and fun as the yellows. Some green-haired characters need just a little more time to decide where they are, but in the end will come into their own as great people.
Prominent Examples: Alice Carroll from Aria, Rimone from Simoun, C.C. from Code Geass, Kochiya Sanae from Touhou, Kino from Kino no Tabi
Ladies and Gentlemen, your Izanami.
White/Silver
Shance: This type of hair color is an enigma to me, simply because the characters with this kind of hair color seem like helpless, emotionless puppets. Despite having the power to do anything for themselves, they get passed around by their overwhelming instincts or cruel masters and benefactors, as if they were pieces of a chess board serving a more higher purpose. Hence, white or silver-haired characters sport a blank, emotionless face, a sly, hard-as-stone demeanor, and possibly even cold-blooded murderous intent, all for the task at hand.
Prominent Examples: Cenes Crawford from Thunderforce V, Yin from Darker Than Black, Nero Chaos from Tsukihime, Archer and Ilyasviel Von Einsbern from Fate/Stay Night, Canaan from Canaan
Digiboy: Unless they are male. There has been a long pervading theme in anime fandom that ‘long white hair’ = bishounen. This most likely began with a combination of Rumiko Takahashi creations and a certain video game about long swords, but it has become an essential staple of bishiehood.
Prominent Examples: Inu-yasha and Sesshoumaru from Inu-Yasha, Sephiroth from Final Fantasy VII, Griffith from Berserk
Brown
Shance: This should be easy. Brown-haired people are straightforward, brimming with determination. Once they set their minds to a goal, they never stop until they achieve it. Of course, if they can’t, they’ll just find another way to, easy as that. Details are for later, and actions speak louder than words. Ain’t that so human a trait, you’ll feel for them?
Oh, and some, if not most of them, are voiced by Rina Satou (at least that’s what I know).
Prominent Examples: Negi Springfield from Negima!, Misaka Mikoto from To Aru Kagaku No Railgun, Yoshika Miyafuji from Strike Witches, Saki from Saki, Uehara Mutsuki from Gakuen Utopia Manabi Straight, Ryuuguu Rena from Higurashi, Horo from Spice and Wolf, Kazuma from S-Cry-Ed, Suzumiya Haruhi from Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuutsu, Aisaka Taiga from Toradora, Emiya Shirou of Fate/Stay Night, Amuro Ray of Gundam
Digiboy: Brown hair can also be a symbol of, well, normalcy. Maybe the character is meant to be an average Joe thrown into crazy circumstances. The brown hair, one of the few colors actually attainable by human beings, pulls the character down to relatable levels, as if you can feel the person enjoying all the excitement!
Prominent Examples: Renton Thurston from Eureka Seven, Hitotsubashi Yurie from Kamichu!, Rakka from Haibane Ranmei, Suema Kazuko from Boogiepop, Yunocchi from Hidamari Sketch, Maebara Keiichi from Higurashi, Iwakura Lain from Serial Experiments Lain
No amount of proper comprehension can describe the epicness of this picture.
Pink
Shance: Surprisingly, I think a character’s a foreigner or gaijin when he/she wears the color pink. Stranger than that, it strikes a more foreign feeling to me than blond or yellow. They have the weirdest accents, they live in the most absurd of places (how about Hell?), they’re with the most strangest of companions, they’re way too polite (probably because Japanese think most foreigners are British), they have strange orientations with their sexuality (lesbos and traps, I’m looking at you), and they sound too serious even when joking. Of course, that tends to confuse people, especially if they’re either joking or pissed off.
Prominent Examples: Utena from Revolutionary Girl Utena, Wilhelmina Carmel of Shakugan No Shana, Louise Francoise Le Blanc De La Valliere of Zero No Tsukaima, Satori Komeiji of Touhou, Rider from Fate/Stay Night
Digiboy: Of course, by the old stand-by, pink can just represent quintessential girlishness. Pink is most often associated with little girls and their dolls and their ponies and their fruity candies, and aw, you know what I’m talkin’ ’bout. These girls could be described by any number of phrases, that can more easily be summarized as ‘so she’s a girl, right?’
Prominent Examples: Hinamori Amu from Shugo Chara!, Sakura from Naruto, Ahiru from Princess Tutu, Takara Miyuki from Lucky Star, Euphemia vi Britannia from Code Geass, Naeguino Sora from Kaleido Star
Mukyuu~
Purple/Violet
Shance: I like this color. No, seriously. It’s not a matter of personal preference, but I like it simply because. People who sport this kind of hair color are the in-between of bookworms and carefree people. They have the knowledge, but lives the take-it-easy, yukkuri life. These kind of characters have the capacity to take center stage, but prefers the supporting role. It isn’t self-flagellation on their part. I repeat, it isn’t. They’re just too busy with their own matters to bother with the main story, and that’s that.
Prominent Examples: Ayase Yue from Negima!, Nagato Yuki from Suzumiya Haruhi No Yuutsu, Matou Sakura from Fate/Stay Night, Patchouli Knowledge from Touhou, Hiiragi Kagami from Lucky Star, Daidouji Tomoyo from Card Captor Sakura
Digiboy: But sometimes, purple-haired characters can be quite headstrong. They don’t overdo it and get violent like the red-haired ones, but they have sort of a cool, collected, and yet powerfully imposing nature. These are characters who don’t just think that they won’t lose – they KNOW it.
Prominent Examples: Cornelie vi Britannia from Code Geass, Remilia Scarlet from Touhou, Misato Katsuragi from Neon Genesis Evangelion, Shihouin Yoruichi from Bleach, Akito Sohma from Fruits Basket
