Idle Master

So recently there is this manga that is fucking great and that I look forward to reading every week cause I really, really, really, really, really love it. Here is some of the reasons why: I love every single one of the girls from the tops of their heads to the tips of their toenails and I love Kusuri-senpai’s energetic innocence and I love the way Shizuka-chan is like a cute little animal and I love Hakari’s modest grace and I love the way Hahari-san completely falls apart around cute things and I love how Mei-san is both sweet and overwhelmingly competent as a maid and I love the way Kurumi makes everything she eats look delicious and I love the way Karane is a tsundere and I love the way Kusuri-senpai gets so single-minded in her love of developing drugs and I love Nano’s beautifully glossy silver hair that flows behind her and I love the way Iku stoically sticks it out against all the odds and I love how Shizuka-chan’s timidity makes me want to protect her and I love the way Hakari...

  The days are blending together Pretending like I don't notice Drowning in mental fog so thick my hands might close where my throat is Not gonna rap that "I'm cursed" My words got heavy And sure enough the steady ebb-and-flow of life subsided, but I wasn't ready Last night, I thought up a song But I'm too wired to hum it Inspired sight, like tunnel-vision on the life I got from it  Not tired yet, right? Hah. "It's fun," I'll tell ya that much Adventures oughta be remembered as such But, I'm not well. The lyrics are sung by Calli who seems to have achieved a level of success at this point of time as a rapper, singing that she has "thought up a song" for her fans. Like she said, her once "steady ebb-and-flow of life (has) subsided"; 'Ebb and flow' describing predictability in her past days is mostly gone now due to her being in the limelight. Note how interesting this phrase is of using the word 'subsided...

Watching K-On episode 13 has made me thought a lot about the act of rumination in anime. In the opening minutes of the episode, we get a view into the girls going about their daily routines detached from the presence of each other. Mio is brainstorming for ideas for a new song; Ritsu is walking to school; Mugi is waiting for the train; Azusa tries to pet a cat and Yui is together with Ui. Each of them don't have much dialogue or are engaged in anything interesting. They are separate of the influence of each other and are each engaged in their own actions, and in Mugi and Ritsu's case, they are even portrayed pensively in their own space. I can't shake the thought of how relatable this makes them. Often times K-On is a show with many fun or chaotic high-jinks that makes for a sort of episodic high school adventure. But in moments like this when the characters only have themselves to engage with, it really adds a flavour into the characters that I find really humanising. An a...

The most memorable episode of Hanasaku Iroha for me will always be its pilot episode, for it highlights an issue rarely explored by anime, or many other popular mediums to my knowledge -- The hard workers' drudgery. Ohana has lived her whole life in a bustling city, where as a high schooler, most of her immediate needs are taken cared of. She has a shelter over her head, food on the table and a school to go to that would prepare her for her future. Having lived in such a forgiving and yet static environment, she laments boredly on how she will probably get a common job and get buried three blocks down the street. "Only a small fraction of the sky is visible, with the rest blocked off by tall buildings," is how she described it as. She thus wishes for motion, or a life of greater excitement. Which is why when she was sent off to the boonies to work in her grandma's inn, she welcomes it with open arms. "Dramatic" was the first word that shone before her pa...

When I first saw the movie poster of "Parasite", I assumed that it was a horror movie. There was something terribly uncanny about it, with all the people staring straight into the camera and yet their eyes were censored. We aren't given a clue to their emotions, their face stoned and seemingly unflinching, as if in the next second something would erupt. Watching the movie made me realise that this movie wasn't horror, it was something worse -- It was shamelessly violent. Upon the death of his wife, the unstable man bashed someone's head in with a rock, stabbed someone in the heart, got skewered himself with a barbeque pick, followed by the father killing the seemingly innocent head of the park family. That's fucking extreme and the movie spares no expense in protraying the scene as violently as possible; Unnecesarily bringing the stone down upon Ki-Woo's head for the second time, the violent tension between him drawing the knife till his first stabbin...