The Rising of: Misogyny?

I watched the first episode of Rising of the Shield Hero and while this does seem like it might turn out to be a pretty awesome underdog story in the long run, I find a few elements troubling right off the bat. The first of these is the so-called matriarchy. So I knew about Malty, I had been spoiled so I was expecting it. When she tried to ply him with wine and told him he shouldn't refuse because it was a "matriarchy" I thought to myself that she was obviously using his ignorance to trick him. Because the first thing that stood out to me in this so-called matriarchy was that the place was run by a man. They were brought before a king. All the people summoned were also male, and (in a place where magic exists, mind you) it is assumed that men are more powerful and therefore the rape law's existence. None of these things suggest a place where women hold any sort of power, let alone power that is greater than that of a man. So the only thing I can think is that the writer came up with this matriarchy nonsense to explain why there was such a harsh punishment for rape. There have existed many patriarchal societies in which women have little to no leverage where rape still held the death penalty. The other explanation I can think of is that this is written by a misogynist as a "warning" of sorts kind of like the character Nurse Ratchet was written to suggest that women couldn't be trusted with power in the wake of the women's lib movement in America. I will probably continue the series because I like a good underdog story, but the underlying message does seem to be one that might tend to piss me off at times. When that happens, I'll just come here to rant about whatever and perhaps I will even end up giving the show a high recommendation by the time I'm finished. We'll see.  

Nice guys finish... Where exactly?

So I just finished watching the anime Kiss Him, Not Me. Despite its problematic elements, I ended up enjoying the show with its many and varied anime references, interesting characters, and unique reverse-harem concept. I also enjoyed reading the comments from fellow fans on Crunchyroll. I've always had trouble believing that truly nice guys finish last and are consistently passed over for more aggressive types, and the comment section proved me right since the one truly nice guy in the show is the one that consistently got the most overall love from fans of the show most of whom I assume were straight or bi girls because the show is marketed for its pro-BL and fujoshi content.

So the premise of the show is that a big girl is a huge BL nerd (also known as a fujoshi in Japan) and is friends with a bunch of hot guys who she secretly ships with one another, but various circumstances (comical ones) cause her to lose weight and suddenly all these guys who were her friends are pursuing her romantically. Except they're not all "suddenly" interested in her. There is one guy who seems to have always felt some degree of interest and he also seems happy when she's happy and goes along with whatever. He's just happy she allows him to be a part of her friend group. He's a nice guy. He's the guy I wanted her to end up with (even though the show also presents a female alternative to all the guys who was also interested in her prior to her weight loss). The only problem is that he doesn't even realize he actually likes her romantically until almost the end, at which point he just flat out confesses with no hesitation whatsoever while everyone else tries their best to keep him from telling her how he feels because none of them genuinely want to know how she feels because they don't actually care (or at least that was my interpretation). The great part is that he seems to be the overall choice of fans as well. Sure there are fans that ship the more problematic characters (even the two who push to get her to relose the weight when she ends up gaining it back for a short time), but overall the consensus seems to be the Matsume is best boi. I agree. 

But the whole thing got me to thinking about the whole "nice guys finish last" idea and where it actually comes from. You see, I think actually nice guys finish first, but to be an actual nice guy you can't be superficial. Superficial guys are only interested in girls who look good and they consistently go after girls who are out of their league in the looks department and they finish last because those girls are interesting in guys who look good too. If a guy is superficial about who he wants to date, why is it a bad thing that the girl he's interested in is also superficial about who she wants to date? It's a double standard. People who actually fall for personalities over looks tend to end up with people who also like them because people with good personalities don't pass over a person because they don't measure up in the looks department. Well, that's my two cents anyway.

Ah Love, What a Funny thing: Exploring my taste in Anime Rom-Coms

So I've been watching a lot of Rom-com anime shows lately. Some were full of generic Shojou (anime directed at teen girls mostly) tropes and lots had problematic elements, especially the older shows. I've seen quite a few and there were some that I liked more than others and I thought I'd take a minute to explore the shows I really liked as opposed to the shows I thought were just meh and what concepts and characters I liked more than others. So, starting off, I've narrowed the list down to shows that were both centrally focused on romance (eliminating shows such as SAO which had a romance in it without it being the defining element of the show) and shows that I felt were less rom-com and just general romantic drama (such as: Say I love you, Library Wars, Dusk Maiden of Amnesia, Sasaki and Miyano, Horimiya and Given). I've tried to keep it to shows that have one central romance, but included one harem show (The World God only Knows) because I just like the way it was done with that one. I also excluded comedies which had romance but it was less prevalent and not as important to the story (The Disastrous life of Saiki K) and shows I've started but not finished (Quintessential Quintuplets). Finally, keep in mind that some of these shows I watched years ago so I'm relying on my memory for certain details as I have lost access to some.

For shows I really enjoyed one of the common elements is good characters and/or dialog. Many of the shows feature rich casts of side characters whose antics are just as interesting (in some cases more so) as the main romance (Toradora and Kaguya-Sama Love is war are prime examples of this). All of the shows I picked have interesting concepts. Two are about a normie being forced to live amongst a bunch of oddballs (Pet Girl of Sakura Hall and Boku wa Minna Kawai-sou), a few are about learning to love or first love (My Love Story, Over the Moon for You, Love Chuunibyou and Other Delusions, Kaguya-Sama Love is War), and a few are about a couple of social outcasts finding love with each other (My Teen Romantic Comedy Snafu, Love is hard for an Otaku, and Komi can't Communicate). A lot of the ones I chose for my favorites list have the most adorable couples (I'm Being Harassed by the Sexiest man Alive, My Dress up Darling, My Love Story, Over the Moon for You, and Love is hard for an Otaku). The final two on my list both have interesting concepts. The World God only Knows is about a gamer who is so much of a nerd that he prefers 2D girls to actual female company and is the king of in-game conquests, but when he is forcibly recruited to extract demons who have latched onto the heart of various girls he needs to figure out a way to make real girls fall for him too or quite literally lose his head. So I can't Play H is about a reaper who feeds on the perverted energy of the guy she's paired with in order to fight. Toradora bends gender norms having the guy be the one who is domestic and pairing him with a girl who is not only a slob, but can't do much of anything domestic. My Dress up Darling also bends gender norms with the guy being a good cook and knowing how to sew while the girl is less handy with these things. 

For the list of shows I liked but wasn't insanely into, most of them have simple characters that fit generic tropes. They are mostly all cute, some are very frustrating because of the long wait for any kind of romantic resolution and the many, many, misunderstandings that crop up along the way. Take, for example Lovely Complex. Most of the characters are pretty generic. Your main duo both have insecurities which cause them to be self-conscious, but everyone else is able to see how great a couple they'd make before either of them do. In Wolf Girl and the Black Prince you have the shared secret trope. In this case, the secret that they share is that the main female character is lying her ass off to fit in with her friend group. Mayo Chiki follows this same formula a little differently, as the main girl of this is cross-dressing and pretending to be a boy and is found out by the main male character. Kamisama Kiss has a pretty unique concept, but the characters are all very generic down to the tsundere male lead. A lot of the shows on this list also have problematic dynamics between the main duo (such as the petty violence in My Pet Monster, the Black Prince's sadistic side, or the joke treatment of a trans girl in Lovely Complex and the vast age difference in Kamisama Kiss). Some of them have male leads that are beyond clueless and therefore extremely frustrating (Monthly Girls Nozaki-kun and Lovely Complex) where even when the female lead directly confesses attraction the male lead misunderstands. The only one on this list that has somewhat interesting characters is I can't understand What my Husband is Saying, but because that show is just very short (three min an episode) I wasn't able to get enough of the characters to really fall in love with it.

So I guess the elements that make a rom-com good in my mind are: a rich cast of characters, an adorable couple that may or may not break gender norms,  comedy that isn't a bunch of silly tropes and doesn't make fun of trans people, rich and engaging dialogue, and a unique story line that pulls me in.

*Edit, despite my combing of MAL to find all the shows I've seen in the past so that I included most, if not all the shows I truly enjoyed from the bottom of my heart, it seems that I left out one of the best. I was reminded of this by a Facebook post from Crunchyroll alerting me to the fact that this show has a second season. The show is called Science Fell in Love so I tried to Prove it! and both the comedy and the romance is everything I could ever wish from a rom-com. It is, along with Love is Hard for an Otaku, one of my personal favorites because the cast are all adults (which makes me feel less guilty thinking about them in compromising situations) and it doesn't really have a lot of problematic elements played off for comedic effect either.

The Devil is in the Details

Or in this case being raised by a perfectly average middle class family in the small British town of Tadfield. This, of course being a mistake on the part of several parties not the least of which is one of the two protagonists of this tale Crowley the demon. If you've seen the show, you'll know immediately that I'm talking about the series Good Omens which was based on a book co-written by Neil Gaiman. There is a lot to like about this show, and it is what I consider dark comedy at its best. But the best thing about it are the characters. You have the demon Crowley played by David Tennant (you might recognize him from his portrayal as one of the better looking versions of Dr. Who, or you may have seen him in his riveting portrayal of Hamlet) and his best friend, the angel Aziraphale. The whole story revolves around the relationship between these two men and their forbidden trysts. Some shows take two characters with obvious chemistry and flirt around the idea of letting you see them get together (I'm looking at you x-files with your 7-seasons-before-the-first-kiss nonsense). I feel like many shows do this way too often with homo-erotic pairings and it's a bit of a problem, I admit. However, I will say that despite the lack of a romantic resolution between these two, the solution they found which (for the time being) solved the problem of "being on the wrong side" was probably more intimate than any kiss or hug or sex scene would have been.

So let's delve a little deeper into the characters. The ones I liked include (obviously) the main two Crowley and Aziraphale, but also Adam Young and to a lesser extent Anathema Device (the oddball witch who follows her ancestor's prophesies to the letter). I didn't really care for the romance between Newton Pulsifer (the descendant of someone who literally murdered one of her ancestors) and her, but mainly because it tends to seem like the story is adding a hetero romance to distract one from the obvious attraction that exists between Crowley and Aziraphale. And it does this one more time, much more subtly with two other minor characters Witchfinder Shadwell and Madame Tracy (his landlord). The character of Pulsifer did end up being crucial to the plot, but I would argue that the romance element was not. They could have had him do the very same things in the very same way to resolve things without the sex. However, it was a bit comedic especially as Shadwell describes the heinous things he imagines his poor private Pulsifer is being subjected to by the witch.

So Crowley is a demon, but he's grown attached to humanity and human inventions and, well his friendship with Aziraphale, so when he's asked to deliver the antichrist to jumpstart the apocalypse, he's none too pleased. He can't just say no, Hell doesn't take kindly to rebels after all, so he attempts to do as he's asked but a comedy of errors puts the baby not in the hands of the wealthy and influential American diplomat to whom it was supposed to be delivered, but to a middle class family from Tadfield. Crowley has no idea this mistake has been made, and for eleven years he and Aziraphale try to influence the (wrong) child each more towards their side hoping that in the end he'll turn out normal and not start the apocalypse. On his eleventh birthday a hellhound is released and the boy is supposed to name him something that will cause him to take the shape that forms his identity. Since they are monitoring the wrong boy they aren't there to see that the dog comes to the real antichrist Adam Young and the free-spirited (and very normal) boy names him 'dog' and so the hellhound becomes a mutt and the boy adopts him.

Antics ensue as heaven and hell try to figure out what went wrong all as the clock is ticking to the end of the world. Not only that, but our main duo must keep their superiors from finding out about their connection lest it be severed forever. The show does a nice job (with flashbacks) of showing various stages of the relationship between Crowley and Aziraphale and it is just so clear that these two love each other it seems a shame that there was no romance other than small flirtations. I've heard the term for this type of homo-erotic media that tantalizes you with hints but never gives you any definitive proof is called "queer-baiting". That being said, the fact that it has a little bit of that is the only down-side to an otherwise perfect story. The comedy is perfect, the story arc is just ludicrous enough to be hilarious and not so ludicrous that you have no idea what in the world you just watched. It kind of gives off Monty Python and Douglas Adams vibes, but that could be because MP is written by British writers and DA was British. I think there's something to that dry, sardonic, wit that I just find absolutely fascinating.

I can't tell you too much without ruining the story but I can tell you that it is really worth the watch and I hope you like it as much as I did. Thanks for reading, signing off for now.

The Woman in -- Who can remember a title that long? You get the idea.

I watched this Netflix special with the absurdly long name of "The Woman in the house across the street from the girl in the mirror" starring Kristen Bell and I have to say it was absurd but not exactly funny. I'm no stranger to dark comedy, and it isn't that Kristen Bell can't deliver comedic material. "The Good Place" had me in stitches, but there's something less funny about the untimely death of a 9-year-old girl and a mother so grief stricken she can't go out in the rain. The show is filled with absurdity, and absurdity can be funny if done right. Perhaps it is because I am less filled with schadenfreude (taking joy from the misery of others) that this show did not elicit a single laugh even in the most absurd and potentially comical of times. It seems that the show is trying to parody horror films that get their thrills from mining the human psyche (like rear-window, vertigo, etc) without realizing that the same empathy which makes those classic horror films work would stifle any potential laughter for this piece of work. 

I watched it straight through from start to finish, but never laughed once. The absurdity was enough of a disconnect to confuse me and cause me to realize that the show could not be in earnest, but never made it to the point of making me laugh. There is enough of a psychological connection with the main character to make you binge, but too much for you to laugh at her pain, if that makes sense. Because I haven't really come up with a numerical system for rating movies, I won't try to give this a rating, but I believe it deserves to go somewhere in the middle. It completely failed at being a comedy. It felt rather tone-deaf and all the absurdity in the world can't make you laugh at the woes of a person you feel connected to. One of the selling points of "The Good Place" was that her character was just enough of a bad person that it didn't feel wrong to laugh at her misfortunes. However, I can't exactly give it the lowest of ratings because I did binge it from start to finish. It was more because it felt like a train wreck and I couldn't look away for wanting to know what happened.

I did figure out the twist villain very early on in the series, but there was another suspect I had in mind and they almost got me to believe it was that person for about five minutes before he was taken down. Perhaps horror parodies just aren't my think. I don't doubt that there may be some that could find the absurdity in this piece funny, given the volumes of people who laugh at shows like Family Guy which has always fallen flat for me as well. The difference is that at least Family Guy elicits some laughs (however few and far between) whenever I decide to give it another chance, even though I always decide it is not funny enough to offset the annoying nature of the voice acting.

Under the Surface: What "Encanto" says, and doesn't say, about anxiety and familial pressure

The new Disney film Encanto may be a goldmine of accurate cultural references (unlike past films, we're looking at you Pocahontas and Mulan) but there's more to it than a peep into the world of Columbia. At its heart, Encanto is about family. Three generations live under the same roof and the family matriarch guides all their paths so there is a great familial pressure to live up to her expectations. We see this as Mirabel (the movie's protagonist) frets about her place in the family and it comes to a climax when Mirabel finally confronts her Abuela about the pressure she and both her siblings feel.

Mirabel and her two sisters, all pressured by their grandmother Alma in different ways, are the main focus of the film, while it kind of glosses over the estranged son Bruno who hid himself away (forsaking his gift) because it didn't meet her expectations. It does show enough to let you know that Bruno also feels this pressure. His siblings are shown dealing with Alma in different ways, but neither too afraid to speak up to her as Bruno and the three sisters seem to be. For one thing, Mirabel's mom Julietta is seen several times in the film confronting her mother about how she treats Mirabel, and Tia Pepa, although she does try to keep it together, is too emotional to stay quiet when Alma scolds her for her inability to reign in her feelings. 

It makes sense that Mirabel's immediate family, and how they relate to her, are the main focus of the film, since she is at its center, but it is disappointing that there was not enough time to show the ways in which Alma's influence affected the other members of her family. Sure technically Deloris is standing idly by while the man she longs for pursues her cousin, but she seems to have her own catty way of dealing with that as shown in the scene where she states that he "wants five kids", probably to scare Isabella. Neither of the male cousins seem to have a problem with their gifts, although it is uncertain whether Antonio might have developed the same issues had things gone on the way they were indefinitely. So, since the most we get, and definitely all that Alma is called out for, is Mirabel's family, let's examine how each of these is handled.

Isabella, the oldest, is the seemingly perfect sister. She does little early in the film to indicate she feels pressure and there is no indication (save perhaps for the fact she punched Mariano with a flower in the proposal scene, and that certainly seemed, to all involved anyway, to have been a result of the magic going haywire much like Camilo's random shapeshifting) that she is at all unhappy with the way things are except where it involves Mirabel. Their contention is finally put aside when Isabella realizes that she doesn't need to be perfect, and Mirabel encourages her to be her authentic self rather than some idealized version. Her character arc is mostly about showing the cracks in the Madrigal family and how the weight of Alma's expectations created them and nurture them and how all that is needed to heal the family is some honest communication and authenticity. Her character isn't very flushed out, but it is clear she is using perfectionism to win Alma's approval, even going so far as to marry someone she doesn't like to please her Abuela.

The real shame is how Luisa's character is treated, because the song "Surface Pressure" sums up the anxiety that being "the strong one" in a family brings along with it. The lyrics include lines like: "Who am I if I don't have what it takes?" and "Give it to your sister and never wonder, if the same pressure would have pulled you under." Although generally the role of the "strong one" in a family falls on the mother, it can be pushed onto an elder sister, father or brother. This person is usually expected to shoulder the problems of the rest of the family, and be the rock that holds the family together. The shame in Luisa's character was that the song was the height of her character arc. Her anxiety for the rest of the film seems to be a punchline rather than being taken seriously. Like "ooh, look, this big strong character is crying" when the song brought up real issues of inadequacy and fear that plague many people who suffer from anxiety and depression but try to hide it for the sake of their loved ones.

So let's look at the character whose anxiety and fear is taken seriously, the star of the film: Mirabel. Mirabel puts on a façade of being upbeat and positive, but secretly she's hoping that Antonio's door dissolves the same way hers did as can be seen in the song "waiting on a miracle" after the realization comes that she will still be the only child born into her family who isn't granted a gift. As she begins to unravel, so does the house and the rest of the family follows suit. Mirabel is like the anti-Alma. While Alma puts pressure on the characters to live up to expectations and serve the community, Mirabel focuses on the characters themselves and what makes them special with or without their gifts. Alma drove Bruno into hiding and Mirabel pulls him back out (literally, since it is to save her that he finally shows himself after the house falls and Mirabel has had her reconciliation with Alma, but also in that promise to bring him home after she has fixed the magic). Alma pressures Luisa to be strong, but Mirabel suggests that she take it easier on herself. Everywhere that Alma can be seen to cause problems within the family, Mirabel does the opposite. That is, until the final confrontation where Alma realizes that she really is the problem and apologizes for the damage she has done to her family. In real life the problems would not be fixed this easily because many people who damage their families in the way that Alma has, cannot admit to themselves that they were wrong. They may look at the devastation and see only the foolishness of the people around them. And because not many children raised with these unhealthy expectations are willing to confront the abuser, the cycle continues as they pass the very same messages and trauma on to their own kids.

Breaking the first rule, let's talk about "Fight Club".

I just watched the film "Fight Club", which I had heard so much about, for the first time. The ending had long since been spoiled, so I was not surprised to find out that the Brad Pitt character Tyler Durden was the same person as the Edward Norton character who narrates the film. As I watched, I was constantly asking myself why? Why does this person feel the need to hurt, to cause chaos and destruction? Is this merely a representation of toxic masculinity? Is it suggesting that men (because it is made clear that the club exists solely for men) have this primal urge to destroy? Then the cult arrived and I began to question whether any of this was real or if it was all a figment of the narrator's imagination, a fever dream of power and influence he would never have just as Tyler was the embodiment of his darkest and most base desires. Did his apartment really get blown up at the beginning? Did any of the story actually happen? 

I had my doubts about the reality of the Helena Botham Carter character Marla from the beginning. The moment she showed up to his support groups smoking her cigarette, I suspected that she may not be real. For one thing, there are parallels between her character and Tyler Durden. First, as I saw pointed out in a different review, they dress similarly. Second, neither Marla nor Tyler ever face consequences for their actions. They steal, lie, and cheat with impunity. Only the narrator shows concern for their lack of morality, suggesting that he is the conscience and they are both the darker parts of his psyche.

But the movie is more than a look at one man's descent into madness. It is a critique. Not just of the capitalism and consumerism which render the narrator's macabre job realistic, but of the toxic masculinity that Fight Club represents. We see this criticism as things spiral out of the narrator's control, and in the threat of castration which is levered over anyone who dares to defy the cult leader and foil his plans. We see this criticism in the narrator's interactions with Marla (whether she is real or a figment of his imagination, she is representative of women in this story). When he isn't screwing her, he treats her either coldly or as an awkward friend he doesn't really understand his relationship with. 

But what if Marla is a representation of  the narrator's feminine side? What then does the ending of the movie represent when he kills Tyler and welcomes Marla holding her hand as they watch the chaos that Tyler sewed come to fruition? Tyler must always be a representation of toxic masculinity. He is the violent one. The one who defies rules. Who uses women and then tosses them aside. And it is also important to realize that it is just as the narrator is getting in touch with his feelings that Marla makes her first appearance. He is beginning to let himself feel, cry, be vulnerable. That all stops when Tyler Durden appears and he is instead gripped by the catharsis of violence and destruction. So if Tyler represents toxic masculinity and Marla represents his feminine side, which won? On the one hand, Tyler's plan of destroying the credit card companies to plunge the world into financial chaos was successful, on the other the narrator was able to fight off Tyler, killing him, and keep Marla by his side. I think the end is up for interpretation. What do you think?