Saturday, October 1st
Update
- Jay Navok
Sanji no Yousei
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SUSHIL AND
USAGI |
First off, a big Happy 30
th Birthday to our
own Dr. Xadium. Remember Sushil, age is a mentality. In your case, a really
old one, because you’re old, get it?!
Near the beginning of this year I wrote that I’d be
moving to Tokyo in the fall as a Japanese government scholar. I leave on
October 5th, arrive in Tokyo on the 6th, and will be
spending the next few weeks adjusting to my new living situation. The
apartment I’m renting is supposed to have broadband internet, so I should be
up-and-running soon, but I’m not sure how much time I’ll have for updates
during this early period.
In the recent weeks I’ve become increasingly
preoccupied with preparations for my move, which is why updates have been
sparse. Moving half the world away is a very time-consuming procedure.
Here’s the scoop on what will be happening with all the
Genvid websites: everything will stay the same. Hosting of subsites will
continue, and the Soapbox will remain active. Perhaps fewer updates over the
next few weeks, but that’ll be counterbalanced by the fact that I’ll be able
to provide more direct live coverage from Japan as time passes.
As a bonus, we’ve also made the
Sailor Moon section of the Genvid forums public, so even if you don’t
have an account, you can now post there!
If you’re curious what it is the Japanese government is
paying me to do, I’ll be researching the history and anthropology of central
Tokyo. The benefit to the website with me living in Kanto is that if
something with the show happens, I’ll be able to provide much better
coverage than when I was in Connecticut. For example, I plan to pick up and
review Takeuchi’s new picture book [edit- I had art book before, by mistake]. What time I’ll be able to dedicate toward
this, though, I don’t know; I have academic and personal goals that need to
get met during my tenure in Tokyo, and the government stipend I receive is
thin compared to the cost of living in the central wards. (They're paying
for executive-class airfare on JAL though, so I can't complain too much.) Yet,
I promise not to bore you with life-in-Japan details; I have other outlets
for that. The Soapbox will remain dedicated to the works of Takeuchi,
animation, comics, etc.
The next Warriors of Legend book is progressing,
but we may delay it slightly. While the book’s text was completed last year,
there is a lot of editing to be done. I’d like to make it the best book I can,
and since I’ll be in Tokyo I’ll be able to do a lot more on-site research
than with Reflections of Japan. The next book is over three times as
long as Reflections of Japan in its current state (we’ll edit it down
a bit) and much more expansive in scope. We are hoping for release sometime
next year.
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Be vewy vewy
quiet, I'm hunting chibi-wabbits. |
For those wondering about the once-in-a-lifetime
Warriors of Legend Tour, it’s progressing on-schedule. In January I’ll
begin putting together the details and itinerary, and by March I hope we can
begin taking reservations for a tour next June. The current plan for the
tour remains only 10 first-come, first-serve slots.
And before I forget, two unrelated things. First, we
mentioned last month that we’d taped Roland Parliament’s voice acting
session at CN Anime Expo. We spoke with Roland and he’d like to decide on
clips to put up, so we’re waiting to hear back from him. Secondly, a word on
the Komatsu diaries. I recognize that there was a great deal of support for
these and I don’t like disappointing our readers, but I agreed to continue
if I had time to do them, and it’s looking like that isn’t the case. I have
to also admit I’m a bit disturbed by
her latest photobook, which Xadium notes crosses a line.
In the meantime, a story.
Not too long ago I plucked out from a cabinet in the
living room a tape that had been sitting there since sometime in the late
1990s. It was an off-air tape of the DiC dub, containing episodes of the
Chibiusa R arc, which had been removed from the rest of my collection
(housed in my room) for some reason that now escapes me. It had sat there
for well over a half decade, away from its cellophane siblings on the other
side of the house, and I never had a reason to put it back. You would think
that in the many years it had lay there I’d have occasion to return it, but
in all that time, such a situation simply never came to pass.
I took it in hand and decided to view the contents.
This is not the first time I’ve gone back and watched the dub, it still
holds significance to me as the delightful three 'o clock fairy that showed
up every weekday (on UPN 20) and every so often I go back and play a few
episodes. But how many years had it been since I last watched these
episodes? Even though the tape was in the other room, I was unsure if I’d
actually watched them at the time, or if I had brought it there with that
intention and didn’t follow through. In any case, the tape had remained unplayed at least since then.
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I don't know who
drew this picture I found on Google image search but I admit with
shame he or she is a far better artist than I. |
I’ve been a fan of the show since I was a young
teenager and early next year that’ll have been ten years. In that time I have, as is
likely the situation with many of those who read this website, come to
identify the series more with the original Japanese production than its
English-language adaptation. I don't mean for this next part to be another
book plug, since we've done that so much that it's become moot, but more as
a confession. Warriors of Legend was partially the result of trying
to come to grips with the Japanese-language Sailor Moon that I
thought by the early 00’s I knew to a T. What I found was that the more I looked into
it, the less I really did know, because there were so many dimensions
to the Japanese series that were lost to me.
Imagine owning a painting for half your life, and it
sits in your room, and you glance at it every day, and feel as though there
is not dab of ink on the canvas that has not escaped your expert eye. And
one day, you find that a corner has begun to wear a little, and is peeling
off. Behind that peel shines an alien glimmer, and your interest is piqued.
You tug a little, then a lot, and what you find is that the image you
thought you knew by heart was merely screen covering a more textured and
glorious piece of art than you had ever imagined.
This has happened to me twice with Sailor Moon.
First, in my transition from being a fan of the dub to a fan of the
original, and second, in researching and writing the Warriors of Legend
books. I can no longer watch those early episodes of the anime, such as
Ami’s introduction, without considering them as critiques of culture in
addition to entertainment.
For others this scenario may describe a different
situation, for example, when you first began to read the manga after
becoming engrossed with the anime. Either way, you probably understand the
sensation I’m describing.
So imagine going back and trying to put on that
original screen, at the very least out of nostalgia’s sake. No matter how
hard you try, you can never get it the way it was before. And even if you’re
close, just knowing what’s behind it means the experience has been changed.
But such is life.
It’s true that in many ways the magic of the dub to me
has been lost to time, and I can’t recapture it. Yet, I can still see in it
what I did before, I can still understand why I enjoyed it as much as I did.
And even if I can’t forget that it’s merely a screen, an audio dub over
another soundtrack, I can still appreciate its unique take on the Sailor
Moon universe.
I put that tape back in its sleeve which had sat in my
room empty for the better part of a decade, and checked off another thing on
my to-do list. Later tonight I’m going to watch a few of DiC’s episodes from
the end of the first season. I can’t think of a better way to prepare myself
for moving to Japan.
Except for to show you this.
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