reading update mini-omnibus

[meganbmoore]

*whips out a Darkness icon in honor of Jackie actually appearing somewhere*

So, yesterday I go through the pain of moving to one of the few computers with the internet(trust me, major pain as I have to take the long route to get to some programs and still have to come back to my computer at the end of the night) and they turn on Eureka, a show I’ve been wanting to check out.  Today I want to get some reading done(and have things to do at my desk) and hopefully get to watch Eureka…and  Jason didn’t have the second disc, so it was American Dad all night long.  I don’t mind AD(unlike a lot of what they watch)  but my ability to have any degree of appreciation for it expires after an episode or two.

Hob’s Bargain by Patricia Briggs

Exhibit 5 in “I really like the Mercy Thompson books, but I like Briggs’s high fantasy books better.”  Unlike most high fantasy, Briggs’s books tend to be smaller, personal stories that affect that world at large. Hob’s Bargain is set in the countryside of a world a few generations after that world’s version of the inquisition, where all supernatural races were banished, and all people with any magic are executed.  Aryn is a recently married woman who has hidden her power of the Sight her entire life, but after an attack on her village that kills her entire family, she has a vision that warns her that the magic, good and bad is returning, she sets out with her childhood friend, Kith, a berserker, both to warn other villages about the raiders and to investigate the returning magic.  In their travels they meet (or rather, are saved and later approached by) Caefawn, the last surviving member of a race of protectors called the Hob, who was bound by his people to the mountain the villages are located near during the events decades before to save his life.  Returning to their village with them, me strikes a bargain:  He’ll protect the villages from both the raiders and the returning magical creatures that would harm them, in exchange for a (willing) wife.

Like Briggs’s other high fantasy books, it’s rather light on the actual magic, and is about a normal person living her life when she gets caught up in bigger events, as opposed to someone with a “Special Destiny,” like most fantasy, and while the events and impact are huge, the setting and story itself are fairly small and contained.

Hoshin Engi Vol 1 by Ryu Fujisaki

I think I covered the plot fairly well in my posts on the anime, so the short version is that Hoshin Engi is based on the Chinese novel The Creation of the Gods.  In it, a fox demon named Dakki has seduced and corrupted the Yin emperor and now effectively rules the country.  A young immortal, Taikobu, is sent to Earth to stop her, and to return her and other demons to the Sennin world where they belong.  Based on this volume, the anime is effectively a faithful readers digest version of the manga.  The storyline and characters and themes are pretty faithful, just extremely condensed.  Just from the first volume, a less condensed version would require about a 100 episodes to cover.

In the manga, Dakki has assumed many forms and seduced a steady string of Yin emperors, wearing a new face each time.  Her spell also seduces everyone around her, instead of just the king, and only tose with the strongest will can resist.  So far, that’s limited to Ko Hiko and Taikobo.  We also see a fair bit of Ko Hiko before his life is destroyed and he him as the cheerful, energetic guy, not the man at the end of his ropes he’ll probably still become eventually.  Dakki and Taikobo are also more immediately developed and shown to be clever, and we get an earlier, more developed explanation of how Taikobo became an immortal.  The only major plot difference so far is that Shinkohyo, the odd looking guy on the flying cat who showed up and offered random bits of commentary throughout the anime, but never really interacted outside of his earlier fight with Taikobo.  Here, he’s still an ambiguous, unaffiliated party, but he’s a “guest” of Dakki’s and keeps both sides aware of what’s going on…his chief interest remains his personal entertainment and curiosity, but here he’s an active participant and seems to be manipulating things to keep both sides going.

I liked the anime a lot, but so far this is obviously much better.

Emma Vol 2 by Kaoru Mori

My opinion of the second volume is largely the same as my opinion of the first.  I like it, it’s more a modern rich boy/poor girl/parental disapproval romance than it is a Victorian romance.  While closer to the historical mindset this time, the approach to class distinction and “forbidden” was much more modern than Victorian, and the part where both Emma and William were relatively unfazed about getting locked up alone together in the Crystal Palace and then kissed had me twitching.  Still, while I’m neutral about the character designs themselves, I’m somewhat in love with the clothing and the background, and the mangaka’s obviously love for England-Victorian or otherwise-is very engaging.  Aside from the Crystal Palace part, though, I’m able to look at it as a romance for young teens and can keep the inaccurate attitudes and mindsets and approaches from bothering me too much and enjoy it.  One thing of note is that Emma’s backstory was, sadly, a pretty common thing for the period, though most girls weren’t lucky enough to escape being sold to a brothel, much less eventually get taken in, trained and educated.  I do wish, though, that Emma and William were more developed characters.  I can't help but feel that I know William's siblings better than I know the leads.

The last few of June’s comics got misplaced during the reorganization and culling, but they were relocated over the weekend.

Cable & Deadpool #41-42:  Still the X-Men X-over so still the rather lost Megan.  Still the “so bad your eyes bleed” covers (WHY does Marvel insist on paying Skottie Young?  I’m sure he’s a perfectly nice guy, but outside of promotional interviews and solicits-you know, where people are paid to praise him-I’ve never heard anything resembling a kind word about his art.)  The crossover actually looks good and I might check out the trade when it comes out, but may eyes had the “I’m so lost” glaze(I can follow the main action, but I was totally lost with Gambit, Sunfire and the Acolytes attacking Providence.)  The highlight of these issues, though was DEFINITELY Deadpool vs Sabretooth:  Wade is one of the few characters who can really go one-on-one with Creed without Creed having to be watered down to keep the lead character from being chopped into bits, so it was a good fight.  And since it was Deadpool, it was a funny fight.

Fables #62;  Hmm…I seem to be reading Arthurian-based-partly or wholly-stuff a lot lately.  We get The Forsworn Knight’s backstory here and Flycatcher back to his old self(as in, before wars and such) but more mature.  I’m not quite sure about this “One True King” bit…it seems like we’re supposed to assume Fly will be the king of everything while Fly just thinks he has to reclaim his own kingdom, which makes me think it won’t be either in the end.  He looks quite…Irish…in the armor, though.  Prince Charming  seems to literally be living to stick it to Hansel, and I do quite like their ultimatum.  I rather hope he refrains from referring to Bigby as “Snow’s pet wolf” around the cubs, though…could give them issues.

Witchblade #107: No Dani! You can’t give the Witchblade back…when you do there will be no escaping Gary Stu Gleason and the PodSara who replaces Sara anytime he’s around.  Granted, Dani is no replacement for Sara before she got the personality transplant to make her “suitable” for GSG, but she’s better than that.  It’s a sad, sad thing when I’m driven to the point where I actually don’t want one of my favorite characters to be in her own book much because of the way she gets rewritten to work with a new character.  Hopefully, though, Dani WILL be around for a bit, as I’ve come to rather like her.  The New Orleans story was fun, though a little too close to outright horror for my tastes.  Fortunately, the book rarely ventures into straightup horror.

First Born First Look:  The first half was recycled art with character/recent events descriptions (I twitched at the near-saint-like description for GSG) but then we got Darkness and Angelus, and there was a very, very happy Megan.  Just like Marz “got” Sara before giving her a personality transplant to try to make Sara/GSG work, Marz gets Jackie very well, though I already knew that from his short Darkness stint.  Oddly, what Marz tried to do with Sara/GSG-provide a nice, normal person to be a haven of normality in the messed up life of the lead-would work for Jackie, and there’s already a precedent for it with Jenny.  Ah well.  Looking forward to First Born, and hoping GSG has a noble hero’s death(though hopefully not at Ian’s hands) and Sara returns to her hard, edgy, prickly self.

Comments

[chomiji]

I tried to like Hoshin Engi, but I found it really superficial - I couldn't get into the characters at all. I'm hoping it will improve ... .

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Aside from the very start, the anime takes place further into the main action...except for Ko Hiko(the big guy who wasn't under Dakki's spell) none of the best characters have shown up yet, and Ko Hiko goes through...well, pretty much literally hell and ends up a pretty tragic, noble guy. There are a few vestiges of how he is now in the place in the story the anime largely takes place in, but it's kinda like comparing Hakkai as Gonno with Hakkai in the bulk of Saiyuki. I have a soft spot for him(Ko Hiko...and Hakkai too, of course) because, even though he's from a long line of heroes, he's the only one with no magic or talismans to help him out or give him powers...it's all what he was born with

Emma

[danavalkyrie.livejournal.com]

I love Emma too, the anime and the Manga have different endings but eventually they... ooops hehehe, just read the Manga first then watch the anime, It's so beautiful, touching and really makes you think and ask - is it really good to Label (society, branding, names etc) people or not?