Anti-brian’s Anime Corner: Hellsing V1
Hellsing V1: Impure Souls
When I first heard of Hellsing, it was in an issue of Play magazine, where they had reviewed this, the first volume. Play always has a great art style to it but their choice of Hellsing pictures screamed to me, "READ THIS." Read I did and when I found out that we got a copy of the collector's box of Hellsing V1 at work, I stuck it on hold until I could afford it. And now that I've finished the DVD, I find my impressions when I first saw it's review weren't too far off.
Hellsing is an anime series centered around an organization (The Hellsing Organization) within London that hunts and "silences" artificially spawned vampires whenever they show up. It's focal members are Arucard, a true vampire, and Victoria, his progeny. The first episode is your basic introductory episode. You meet the good guys and Victoria is entered into the organization when her life is threatened and Arucard offers her the choice of death or being a vampire. The second episode is more-or-less a filler episode meant to highlight Victoria's struggle in her new un-life. The third and final (or at least for this DVD) episode is the first to introduce what appears to be a recurring villain of sorts while also being the first episode to unveil that the vampires you've seen the last 2 episodes were not actual vampires but artificial vampires.
Play compares Hellsing to Cowboy Bebop but with vampires. I can only consider it a passing reference if that. Fight scenes in the first 2 episodes are no more than a vampire being shot and turning into dust. The third episode has a great fight scene though between Arucard and the Catholic "sword dancer" that is rather reminescent of fight scenes in Cowboy Bebop. Hellsing also features a rather jazz heavy soundtrack. Beyond that, these series' are two different creatures.
Hellsing does a great job of pointing out that Arucard is not the kind of vampire that he's killing. Arucard is calm, exhibits more class, and maintains a presence far beyond any vampires seen in the three episodes. The art is also very solid. Colors and shapes bear resemblence to those in Blood: The Last Vampire. The DVD itself is also well constructed. Easy to navigate menus, lots of options, as much as you'd expect from a Pioneer product.
Hellsing does, however, fall short in a couple catagories. The voice acting is okay at best. Nothing terrible but this is definitely on the level with Gundam Wing and, dare I say it, Dragonball Z of being good enough to get the job done without detracting from the experience. The animation is also good but not great. This is most likely a result of the show being based after a comic book. But again, it's good enough and done with enough style that the show remains enjoyable to watch.
The production values may have their ups and downs but Hellsing is a fun, stylish show. With hints at a deeper storyline contained within the third episode, it's compelling enough to warrant the purchase of the next volume to see what happens with Arucard and Victoria and the rest of the Hellsing organization. At a price of $29.99 for the collector's box, this volume is not cheap. It contains a very cool Hellsing bloodbag and the box is very nice itself but this is just filler to pad the price another $10. If you can find the stand-alone DVD (which I've spotted at my local Best Buy for $19.99), you'll get more of your money's worth with it than with the collector's edition. But don't pass on Hellsing entirely, it's better than your average anime series.
As the Hellsing V1 Collector's Edition, this DVD is a 7. As a stand-alone DVD, this anime rates an 8.
Where Everybody Knows Your Name
Katie's home. And safe. Home and safe. And no one's taking her from me!
I spent all of Sunday and most of today sitting here. I'm avoiding spending money. There's a reason for this, but I'll bother with that later. I did more ass-kicking in Frequency. And Matt and I made a crazy remix of "Science Genius Girl"!
And someone on Shacknews posted how to get Quake working with my Radeon. It was such a simple solution, I can't believe I didn't think about it myself. I love Quake. And I don't have anything else to say!
Not Justice Fruit Pies!
Dexter's Laboratory is fucking hilarious. Even if I still haven't figured out what his accent is. German? Swiss? DUTCH?!
I went to sleep EARLY last night. 11:30pm, right after Mission Hill. I was tired as hell. Which is weird because I did absolutely nothing yesterday and woke up late. I finally got Hellsing on DVD. It cost me Pokemon Yellow and Grand Theft Auto on gameboy but who cares, those games suck anyway. Hellsing kicks ass. Vampires! And the blood bag makes the cost all worth it.
I've been playing more Frequency too. That game kicks my ass like nobody's business. Some of those songs just go WAY too fast.
And I'm bored. And 10pm is too far away.
I Miss Her Sometimes
So she's only been gone for 2 days. Big fucking deal. I've gone longer without seeing her. I don't get to see her on weekends anyway. And she doesn't have the internet or anything so I can't really talk to her through AIM. I've gone longer without seeing her. I miss her more when she's gone.
When the Girlfriend’s Away
So Katie's off in California by now. Do you know what that means? Yes, it's a Claim Your Sexual Favors weekend! And you know, if I don't owe you one, you can get one for a MERE $50. Yes, just $50 can buy me for a full hour of HOT WET LOVE. ORDER NOW!
Really, I don't have anything to do. Work Friday night, work Saturday night, and the rest of my weekend is in the air. I've got a Mat Hoffman's Pro BMX 2 trade demo. Could be good for 20 minutes of fun. I've been playing more Resident Evil 2. Resident Evil on DVD at the end of the month!!! WOO! Milla!!!
And the bowgun in Resident Evil 2 doesn't suck as bad as it does in Code: Veronica!
2 Days Without a Good Nights’ Sleep Does Things
CNN.com has been running articles lately about this "snakehead" fish that was found in Maryland. Apparantly they're in other states too. It's a fish with the body of a fish but the head of a snake. The articles say it can live for up to 3 days without water and when it needs to, it'll hop out of one lake, crawl and wander until it finds a new lake, and eat everything there. I think this snakeheaded fish sounds pretty badass. Sure, there's all kinds of shit that it can do to the ecosystem by eating anything it can fit in it's gaping, killing mouth but ignoring that blatantly detrimental fact, this is one fish I wouldn't want to run into in a dark alley. Hell, I wouldn't want to run into it ANYWHERE. If I was walking through the woods one day and saw a fish crawling around on the ground, I think I'd shit myself. Not to mention the pointy teeth and the head of a snake! Damn fish.
Splitting Skulls Until the Sun Rises
Chapter 3. I flipped through the strategy guide at work and I was right, Chapter 3 is shorter than the rest and Chapter 4 is even shorter. I just chopped and slashed my way through the first big dungeon in this chapter. Bioware got pretty inventive with some of these encounters.
Work last night rather interesting! First, a lot of people I went to school with appeared out of nowhere. Steve, Pradeep, and Brian I. all were there at some point in time. And then some guy comes in with $100 and wants to reserve 10 X-Box games. That was on top of the 3 or 4 I'd already sold. And then the crazy rain forced Chris and Amanda to stop their trip back with some stupid sports game they were sent to pick up so they won't be here till later this morning. And THEN customer service calls and says they caught a shoplifter who had some of our stuff. And since Shane can't leave the store, I got to go down to Bergner's and meet up with some guy from Foot Locker who had a bag of socks stolen and I got to say "Nope, I didn't sell any of that tonight. Neither did Shane". And since Gamestop prosecutes EVERYONE, I was told that I might get to go to court! And John asked me to come in to work today from 10am - 1pm because our district manager is coming down to rearrange the store and she wants a part-timer (me) to run the register. And on top of ALL of this, the phone was ringing off the hook. A billion people were calling, it was nuts. Probably one of the most entertaining, if not THE BEST, night I've ever had working at Gamestop. Last night kicked ass.
And I finally finished my computer science programming project final. If you want to play a boring game or laugh at my HORRIBLY inefficient code, it's right here.
I Squash Bugs with my Mad 5K1LLZ
So I was playing Neverwinter Nights and I was getting to the end of Chapter 2 when I got to a door (in an area I couldn't get out of) that wouldn't open. At all. Important things were on the other side of the door (okay, not door, gate) but I couldn't get to them because the fucking door wouldn't open. So I shot at them with my bow and killed a few things but nothing would open that goddamn door! And I get to the Neverwinter Nights forums and I see that a bunch of other people can't get the damn door open either. It's not a gameplay thing, it's a bug. A bug that will be fixed "in the next patch". Well, fuck. How am I supposed to wait for the next patch!? I wanna play more NOW! So I pick through the idiocy that is the Neverwinter Nights Official Forums and someone posts a workaround. Open up the module, change a script, and pop it back into place. And it worked! Wonderfully! And now I'm in Chapter 3.
It took me like 2 hours of fucking around to get to that point. And now I'm sitting in class, with Neverwinter Nights a couple miles away, calling my name. I know the last 2 chapters are shorter than the first 2. I'm so damn close to beating this game. I've never made it all the way through a Bioware RPG before. I'm hoping this is the start of a trend. First Neverwinter Nights, then Baldur's Gate, then Icewind Dale, then Baldur's Gate 2, then maybe Planescape: Torment, and by then Icewind Dale 2 will be out and I can beat that too!
I've been awake for 16 hours. I give myself till around 11am before I'm a walking corpse.
I Sleep When I’m Tired
I go to bed at 2am, wake up at 3pm. Almost 5am and I'm not even feeling tired yet. What. The. Fuck? Blah. Who cares. I'll stay up till I get tired and go to sleep only if it's past 10pm. I'll do whatever it takes to stay awake today. Wash my car, dick around with Neverwinter Nights, play Resident Evil 2, go for a walk, go for a bike ride. I don't care. I'll be so tired tonight that I'll pass right out.
This is my last week of summer classes. Register for Fall semester today and then I get to play the waiting game. Without summer classes, I'm not going to have ANYTHING to do with my time. So I'm going to get a full-time job to pass the time. Exciting, eh? Nothing shitty though. And if it does suck, it's going to pay well. And if it doesn't suck, hopefully it'll work with my fall school schedule.
I love Weezer. I love the Pixies. But Weezer's cover of "Velouria" is nothing I was expecting. A karaoke copy of the original would've been fine with me. But they slowed it down. And dammit, I guess I'm listening to too much Pixies because I'm picking apart a cover by Weezer. Help me?
Land of the Habbo Hobos
3 fucking hours of goddamned Dragonball. I hate Dragonball.
Last night, Katie wanted me to play battleship with her on this website called Habbo Hotel. It's an avatar chat with games and crap like that. It was damned amusing because almost no one there speaks english and the ones that do are your stereotypical chatroom wackos. Teenage kids looking for avatar sex and cyber-handjobs. But battleship is fun!
Work work work. I wish I got paid weekly.