For the impatient: if you are viewing this in a feed reader and were expecting this to be a post about anime, I strongly suggest you change your feed subscription to the anime category rather than the general site one. In the very near future there may be some non-anime related posts that, if you’re just here for words on Japanese cartoons, may not appeal.
With that out of the way. I seldom post anything about my site itself primarily because it very rarely warrants it and accruing that much meta will no doubt bite karmically later. However in this instance there’s a few noteworthy topics, so in order of perceived importance:
Personally motivated posts really aren’t my forte, the reasons for which I won’t elaborate on because that would paradoxically make this post more personal. Regardless, introversion is a topic I take an active interest in primarily because I have been medically identified as introverted and I suppose my Meyers-BriggsINTJ classification would make me lean towards introspection as a pastime. I rarely talk or identify as introverted because doing so would put unconscious constrictions on my behaviour and because it naturally invokes thoughts in other people as to how I will act; neither situation I find favourable.
whose introversion isn’t treated as a social malady
Watching Kawaisou recently though did make me think more about introversion in anime because the lead, Ritsu Kawai, shows a lot of the “classic” symptoms: seclusion, tiredness from social interactions, overthinking situations etc. I found it odd because I had never consciously “spotted” an introvert in anime before.
Sunday is all about putting your feet up, turning the volume up and queuing some music to get wholly lost in. During the week music always seems to accompany doing something: programming, walking, writing, pretending you can't hear the other people in the office talking about you. It seems somewhat of a lost past-time to simply sit and listen.
there's something alluringly infectious about this sentai inspired quintet
What better way to celebrate this than the release of the Kids on the Slope soundtrack? Any Yoko Kanno release is a cause for celebration; that this has jazz ensembles from Takashi Matsunaga, a noted master of the genre, as well as vocal tracks from well-known artists such as Aoi Teshima is a special treat. I can't claim to know the first thing about jazz or how to approach it for a better appreciation, but as the adage goes, I know what I like. It's still on heavy rotation so my final opinion is still gestating but the tracks effortlessly blend easy listening and jazz sessions with Kanno's signature background melodies - unique but not overpowering.
Accel World owes a lot to Serial Experiments Lain. The script may not be penned by Chiaki J. Konaka and has yet to deal with digital deities but a great many of this new series' ideas can be traced back to it.
there is a fundamental stumbling block to the kind of time-stoppage seen in Accel World: biology
Lain itself is of course based on volumes of, what was then considered fringe, research on the unstoppable onset of the Internet and digital devices - Project Xanadu and Memex are just a couple of its mentioned inspirations. When Lain was released mobile phones weren't remotely close to the technological marvels they are today and the concept of wireless access to the Internet (ne. The Wired) was still far fetched. The beating heart of the series though was the eponymous Lain's attempts to be subsumed into the digital world by pursuing a "deviceless" way to access the network.
The third episode of Dusk Maiden of Amnesia (Tasogare Otome x Amnesia) has a fascinating hook: perception.
it is critical to the nature of Yuuko - she only exists because others can see her
In the context of the episode it arrives when Kirie challenges Teiichi's vision of Yuuko as a busty, alabaster skinned school-girl and instead claims she is "dripping with hatred" with filthy, cracked skin. From then on Teiichi can only see this ghoulish visage of Yuuko until he forcibly excises it from his mind. It's claimed in an earlier episode that Yuuko only exists in the form of the beholder, so if someone believes her to be a wandering spirit then that's what they'll see her as.
