Chaos and Kanji is the blog where I write about my adventures through Japan!

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Wednesday, August 28, 2013

Anime is fun!

 There doesn't seem to be too much interest in the anime cards I've posted to the blog. That's okay, it's about what I like. And while you've seen the two cards just above and blow this paragraph, I wanted to bring them back again.
 If you remember, they're actually postcards, released as a promotional item for the Evangelion 3.0 movie. At the time, I mentioned there were supposedly six different postcards issued  in the set. Well, I had the first two above, so I went back to the store to find the rest.

Evangelion, by the way, is about a boy (Shinji) and others (including Rei, Asuka, and Mari) who get into gigantic machines and fight evil in a futuristic post-apocalyptic Tokyo. Yeah, okay. To be honest, I have not yet seen a single episode.
 Shinji is the lead character, a boy who is almost female-like in persona and appearance. Seriously - grow the hair out a bit and change the cut of his shirt and he becomes a she! Apparently, the show's creator wanted Shinji's character to be a girl, but changed his mind.
 Mari is a less-popular girl on the show. I really don't know anything about her. On the other hand, Rei (with the blue hair, seen above) is a very mature young lady who seems to be able to keep her cool all the time. Rei almost seems to serve as a motherly figure occasionally.
 Asuka was, I believe, originally going to be a boy. (Actually, all the main characters' genders may have been switched before the show was actually created). Her personality matches her hair color, as she has a very fiery temper and is quite emotional (not in the emo way, either). Asuka is almost like a college student or even a 20-something adult sometimes, but can regress into childish ways and react extremely in situations where she isn't happy. She's also pretty self-centered. And if you're wondering why she looks kind of non-Japanese (and has a name such as Langley), that's because one of her parents was German.
But Asuka is my favorite character on the show I've never really seen. I was introduced to the show through someone at work, and most of what I've seen involves Asuka (and her relationship with Shinji).The scene above is hilarious, especially at the end.

Okay, that's five cards. Where's number six? I couldn't find it. They had tons of the others. I wonder if the last card was ever issued, and what it might look like (possibly Shinji with Asuka, since there's a Shinji and Rei card above, or possibly one of the machines). Maybe I'll come across it some day.

I did come across a couple of cards from a different Evangelion set, though.
 EVA-02 is the name of the red machine that the redhead wearing the red suit commands (yes, this is Asuka's machine). This is a set from a company called Carddass that issued several sets about two decades ago. I have a large majority of the set already that this card comes from (I found a couple lots very cheap at a store).
The other card looks to be from the same release (and features Asuka yet again) but the numbering and design are different enough that I have no idea where it belongs. There are other Evangelion issues but my research (thanks to a few dedicated Evangelion fans with websites, really) was not successful. Oh well, maybe I can put together this set too.
Here is an English-language trailer for the first Evangelion movie. The host pronounces the show's name differently from the Japanese pronunciation (most noticeably "gel" which in Japan is a hard "g" like "Gary").
Remember to stay away from evil cows. (Not Evangelion. Just really freaking strange, and I came across it while looking for videos for the post.)
And one funny scene leads to another.
Even though I don't usually understand the language, when I see an anime show on TV I tend to watch it. I know enough Japanese and there are enough context clues to understand the basic story, and there's a good bit of comic relief scattered into most episodes. Just stay away from those anime shows where the girls have gigantic eyes. Those are just too strange for me.

6 comments:

  1. I've never really spent time watching anime, but I did read a few of the Death Note books. I liked the story, but I couldn't keep dropping $8 a pop for them.

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  2. I've heard of Death Note. A series of capsule toys was released a year or two ago, and they are extremely popular so they sold out quite fast. I don't know much about the series beyond Wikipedia-style articles.

    Did you read the English translations or Japanese? And do you read any other anime?

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  3. You missed the best female character in Evangelion: Katsouragi Misato.
    You read Manga. That's the jap comic books. And watch Anime on tv which is the tv cartoon version of many mangas.
    Death Note begins well but somehow in the middle of it you feel it got out of hand a little bit.
    Glad to see other NGE fan ;-)

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  4. Ana: even here in Japan, I rarely see Misato stuff. I don't look for Evangelion merchandise often, but I certainly see lots of Rei and Asuka figurines and Mari seems to have a couple new larger figures recently.

    I'm wondering, since the cards are from the cartoon (movie) and not a comic, shouldn't they still be called anime cards? Or because they are cards, even if they feature images from the show, are they now manga? (I realize now in my last comment on this post I used the wrong word. I tend to do that fairly often.)

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  5. Re: Death Note. I've only tried the English version. I think I got through book 4. Interesting concept. But not interesting enough for me to finish the series.

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  6. Yeah it seems that despite the figures' popularity, I don't hear anything about it from my students - unlike series like Evangelion which is still going (granted that's anime, not manga...). But I ask my comic book-reading students what they like to read and Death Note never comes up.

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