Ikoku Meiro no Croisee after episode 12 – Final Thoughts

Well this was a largely inconsequential anime. Sure there were a lot of talking, and walking, but really not a lot of things happened in the twelve episodes of Ikoku Meiro no Croisee. It was almost a purely character driven show. And as much as it was, I never really cared much about the main characters. In fact, I have more sympathy for the poor homeless boy than I do for Yune or Claude or Camille. Ikoku Meiro no Croisee borders on the line between entertainment and dullness. Yune’s charm alone cannot quite save this anime from banality.

2011 Fall Season of Anime

As rain and wind hammer the windows of my room, I am reminded that autumn has arrived in date and in weather. After reading their synopses and visiting their website, these are the anime of this fall season I will first follow:

Hunter X Hunter (2011) – A remake of Hunter x Hunter? Cool. I rather liked the original anime series and OVAs. Hunter x Hunter is a rare shounen martial arts anime that I enjoyed. Never followed the manga though.

Last Exile: Fam, the Silver Wing – The original Last Exile was arguably a masterpiece of anime in some eyes. It was not one of my favorite animes of all time, but there is no denying its production values and epic scope of its story. If this upcoming anime can even remotely emulate the efforts of the original, it should be well worth a watch.

UN-GO – I just can’t get enough of detective shows.

Windows 8 Developer Preview – First Impressions

In the same reign as the development of Windows 7, an early build of Windows 8 was officially released to the public last week. I have been playing around with it on and off a little bit on one of my test/work desktops since then. See screen captures for the desktop’s specifications.
As you may have heard or read somewhere, a main focus in Windows 8 is optimization for touch devices. The installation process and interface off of the disc is unchanged. After completing the install, you will encounter the biggest change of the new Windows: a new splash screen with programs represented as big touch friendly boxes. What you’re really seeing is the “Start Menu”, because when you click on the Start Menu, this splash screen comes up. Programs installed in a normal way will automatically show up as a new box in this splash screen. Individual executable files can also be added into the screen in a specific way, by adding in its shortcut under C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs. However, I am unable make “My Documents” show up on the splash screen…
When you click on the desktop, everything becomes familiar territory as the desktop essentially functions the same as Windows 7. The control panel is also dressed up in a more touch friendly manner, but the old design can be accessed as well. The task manager received an upgrade. Cool new graphs of resources, and more details on process footprints, presented all in a more clear and stylish manner. I installed the x64 version of Windows 8 Developer Preview, and it has a harddrive footprint of 10GB. The memory footprint is at around 600MB used idling right after startup. If I remember correctly, Windows 7 x64 idle memory usage is closer to 700-900MB. By the way, to no surprise, installing Windows 8 destroyed the GRUB Bootloader, rendering my Kubuntu installation on a second partition inaccessible. Is it too much to ask of Windows, or Microsoft for that matter, to play nice with *nix distributions?
One of the biggest differences in performance is the bootup and shutdown times of Windows 8. Through normal shutdown and startup methods, the durations are around 5 seconds and 10 seconds (BIOS post time removed) respectively for my test computer. This is very fast. Windows 8 introduces a new shutdown and bootup procedure called “Hybrid Boot” that is apparently different than the traditional shutdown and bootup procedures of previous versions of Windows. More details within the link. To do a “traditional” full shutdown and full startup, it can be done through the command prompt by typing “shutdown /s /full”. Then the shutdown time increases to about 25 seconds, timed right after entering the command, and bootup time to 40 seconds, more in line with previous Windows shutdown and startup times.
Personally, as someone who has very little interest in touch devices, Windows 8′s new touch-optimized interfaces falls upon apathetic eyes. As a gamer, the (slightly) smaller resource footprint and quicker boot/shutdown times are certainly welcome, and this an improvement everyone can appreciate.

Contagion

I saw a good movie over the weekend with my best friends. The movie was Contagion, and for those who haven’t heard or seen of it, you can probably infer from its title that it has something to do with contagious stuff, like virii, bacteria and whatnot. And you’d be right. It’s about a new virus, not unlike the H1N1 pandemic two years ago, that infects a few key people and eventually spreads to the entire world. It is a down-to-earth and realistic approach on a fictional yet deadly virus epidemic.
Warning, some minor spoilers follows. I quite liked the separate groups of characters and their own plotlines that this movie explores. The effect and consequences of the virus outbreak on people such as your average American Joe with a family who loses his son and cheating wife, and desperate to protect his daughter, to a Chinese man who just want to save his village from extinction, to a popular blogger that can gain from the outbreak, to researchers working on the virus itself, to the collapse of social order in major cities. All these people have understandable and believable motives, and perhaps the greatest strength in the movie lies in the fact that there really isn’t an antagonist in Contagion. Even the virus itself is presented in a very matter-of-fact way.
The few things that bothered me were some loose ends that this movie didn’t tie up or forgot about. What really happens to the brains of those killed by the virus? This question was posed in a specific scene by the movie, but never answered. And what about the village?
Whoever conceived of this film must’ve asked “Hey, what if the H1N1 infection was deadlier, and more infectious?”. If you’re interested in such a question, Contagion would be a realistic answer. No zombies running amok in this movie.

Kamisama no Memochou after episode 10

If you haven’t seen the tenth episode of Kamisama no Memochou to its very end, then I suggest you stop reading here, unless you do not mind being spoiled. So, I just have to unload a piece of my mind on Ayaka’s attempted suicide. In line with this shows tendency in things being not really what it seems, I do not believe Ayaka died. First of all, she jumped from the rooftop of a four stories building, which is not that high. Sure, injury is almost certain, and granted there is the possibility of death. But possibility of death also means possibility of life. If she jumped from the top of a skyscraper with a confirmed landing on a hard surface, then I would have no doubts on her survival. Secondly, she landed on a bed of flowers, or rather more specifically, soil. Soil is a softer material than concrete I’d say, and would increase her chances of survival.
The obvious question is, why? Hints were dropped, especially heavily in episode ten, and I would venture to guess it has something to do with depression arising from a combination of loneliness, helplessness, uselessness, and being ignored. I have noticed the anime has depicted her that way throughout the show. Despite her being the catalyst in Narumi meeting the NEET group, Akaya is much like a background character. Sure, she’s always there, but never really making a big impact in any of the stories.
Since I’m talking about Akaya, I might as well talk about the show itself so far. I quite like the fact that there is character development in every episode of the show. However, the plot resolutions are a little melodramatic and cheesy. The animation quality remains consistent and top notch. Kamisama no Memochou is still one of the best animes I’m watching of this summer season.