No, Bento isn’t some weird Japanese yell. Bento is food! It is a meal for one made from fish, rice, and vegetables. So what makes bento special enough that it needs a specific name? Like many things in Japan, bento is an art form. Yeah, you read that right, lunch can be art. There are…
Takeshi’s Castle
Someone HAD to have been hurt on this game show. Takeshi’s Castle was a Japanese game show that ran between 1986 and 1989. A volunteer “army” of 100 and 142 people (commanded by Commander Tani) plow through a series of obstacles in an effort to defeat Count Takeshi and his army. The contestants sported costumes,…
Anime Annoyances: Humor
Anime humor itself isn’t annoying (often weird, but not annoying). It is the when and what that makes anime humor annoying. Anime has the bad habit of interjecting humor during serious scenes and having characters that are more annoying than funny. Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood is especially prone to injecting humor during serious scenes. Several times…
There is Personality in the Blood
Ever wonder what is up with all the blood types in celebrity bios and anime? Well, apparently in Japan blood type affects personality. The idea started with Furukawa Takeji and his paper “The Study of Temperament Through Blood Type” published in the scholarly journal Psychological Research. Since then, blood type is used as shorthand for…
Xam’d: Lost Memories
One part studio Ghibli and one part Eureka Seven, Xam’d is a different entry into the mecha genre. In the world of Xam’d, the mechs are living things evolved from people (aptly called Human Forms). That’s right. The pilot is the mech. Xam’d begins on quiet Sentan Island. The island is cut off from the…
Air Gear
Air Gear follows Itsuki Minami and his friends as they form a gang to compete against other AT gangs. AT stands for Air Treks, special inline skates that allow the rider to do impossible things. ATs let people scale vertical walls and even fly. It all begins when Ikki is beat senseless by a gang…