This is more or less a post apologising for real life. Feel free to skip it if this sort of thing makes you rip small animals in half.

*coughs*

Some of you know I’ve recently graduated from college — yesterday actually, with a BAA in Illustration. That is, my ceremony was yesterday. I’ve been taking time off and recouping with little bits of my life. Not an easy process, as you may imagine, but a good choice nonetheless. I now need to start looking for work — there are bills to be paid and wages to make. As a result, I’ve had to limit how much time I spend writing, and that’s a shame because I love writing so.

The problem is, I’m not yet a skilled enough writer that I feel I can make money from it. I’m a much better artist now, and I hope that’ll carry me for a few years to come. Heck, maybe I can even do that career thing… Yeah!

What does this mean for TNK? Not much. Less updates, obviously, but I’ve been told time and again to go at my own pace. The problem is that I don’t think I’ll ever be a “series blogger”, because I don’t really like what that demands from me. Perhaps in that I’m a disappointment to some people, but I don’t hold myself responsible to them.

I’ll probably end up posting a fair bit about Macross Frontier when it’s finished its run. I love the series; I really do. But unlike when Lucky Star came out, the “magic” of blogging has run a bit thin on me. I’d prefer to recap and talk in-depth about something, rather than topically gouging through it. What you may hear from me while it’s being fanlated is Rookies, one of my favourite contemporary manga titles. I’ve been up for countless hours reading it. ^^;

I like to think of myself as a liberated gamer. Liberated in the sense that the whole of my participation in the so-called “console war” is limited to disparaging remarks towards the people who are wholly entrenched in that sordid affair.

I grew up in the midst of what can be referred to with hyperbole as the “World War II” of consoles — the SNES and Genesis era. Information was bought on paper, the internet was being developed in secret basements by secret people, and the war was conducted in neighbourhoods everywhere merely because it was something to do. You see, children have this necessity to latch onto make-believe, and joyfully so. Without make-believe I feel my childhood would have been a dull, colourless place, devoid of imagination.

Yet at a certain age we have to realise that our make-believe isn’t part of our real life, but peripheral to it. Now that we’re onto — what, World War V? VI? I’m not sure anymore — my generation should have grown up some years prior. My generation is anyone around 25, who was born in the early section of the 1980’s. My generation may have played the NES and Master System, but the real heyday began with the SNES and Genesis. The generation right after me (anyone born in the mid-to-late 80’s) picked up said systems near the end of their lives, but still participated in the war. They were just late recruits.
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A few days ago I had the rather onerous conversation that I’ve been fearing for some years now: What exactly is shoujo versus shounen? What defines them, and who is “allowed” to read them?

Had this been asked of me a few years ago, I might have argued that the Japanese system pinpoints target audiences a fair bit better than the North American, but now I’m pretty convinced they’re both screwed because of how interrelated most media tends to be. For instance, is Claymore shounen? Most people would seem to think so, yet at the same time the entire series is about strong female archetypes, which would make its audience (at least over here) more pointed at women. Conversely, Cutey Honey is a rather erotic series about a busty superheroine who gets naked between costume changes, yet a sizeable chunk of her fanbase back in Japan is made up of young girls idolising her.
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When considering Macross Frontier, I have the onerous duty of taking two viewpoints: That of the existent Macross fan, and that of the ignorant first-time adopter.

Macross Frontier, considered as a science-fiction, big-mecha show, is an excellent example of the genre. It comes complete with intriguing characters, excellent animation, and a storyline that introduces the universe well to new adopters, as well as making reference to older material, without alienating anyone in the process. Macross has never been politically charged, and so it stands as a very different from its contemporary cousins Code Geass and Gundam 00. Certainly, it is superior to the latter in several key areas, including character design. Where Gundam 00 came across to me as a pale imitation of Yoshiyuki Tomino’s great Universal Century work, Macross Frontier still has the hand of its creator — Shoji Kawamori — present. It’s a much stronger continuation of the themes found in SDF Macross and Macross Plus, than the more recent Macross Zero.
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This is not an anime-directed post, clearly, but it deals with archetypes anime frequently encounters, and therefore falls under this blog’s general coverage. That said, let’s move on.

I saw Ironman the other night and masturbated furiously throughout. It’s a stupendous piece of cinema, an excellent action flick, and yet not a very good superhero movie on the whole. Why you ask? Because it betrays everything a superhero movie is regularly about, and for that I wholeheartedly applaud it.
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Heh. Found this in my “keywords used to find you” section today. I’m like one step away from being listed as a porn site.

Okay, one more week to go and then I’m a graduate. That means… no updates until then. See you all next Tuesday. That’ll be the earliest. ^^; Sorry about this.

Armoured Trooper VOTOMS was a major milestone in the history of animated storytelling. It was proof that a hard-edge, real-world feel could go hand in hand with mecha, delivering a world that was not only compellingly believable in its nightmare, but as far removed as possible from the super-weapon space age that permeated its siblings.

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I am an artist and a damn proud one at that. I’ve spent my entire life drawing and painting and the last four years in particular have been concerned solely with acquiring a degree in the field of Illustration. My viewpoints on art and its value however, would probably make other men of similar ilk cringe and foam at the mouth. Women too.

You see, I believe fine art is dead and has been since the Impressionists made their way out. I think cubism is pointless, and most people who live in this fanciful realm are really just playing at how-much-can-we-squeeze-out-the-next-gullible-bugger. I say this not because the people are untalented or stupid, but because they’re incredibly lazy. All you really need to do is pretend that the colour red and a wavy, badly painted line has some significance in your life, make it sound good, and then sell it to whatever bleeding-heart asshole has enough money.

That is not to say there aren’t some very talented, honest people in the realm of fine art, there certainly are, but by and large the true spirit of art resides in the commercial realm. Art tends to be at its best when it is painted not for one’s own ego, but for someone else and their purpose. You see, I tend to view fine art as useless. It serves no more purpose than vain decoration and artistic snobbery these days, both of which I despise. Commercial art is removed by and large from its own personal ego and is therefore a bit more honest about its place in life. It wants to be used, to be developed, refined, and ultimately serve something more than itself.
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I’m 25 today.

I figured the world should know.

Pip pip, carry on.