Of Swords and Parasols

Has anyone checked out the manhwa, Hotel Africa?  I saw it at Hastings today, and it looked interesting.  Amazon's description:

Alone, in the middle of the Utah desert, lies the Hotel Africa. Anything is possible here. A world of joy, heartache, and friendship has traveled through its doors. Follow along with Elvis, our narrator, as he brings the history of this desolate hotel to life, weaving tales of his widowed mother, an unlikely pair of vagabonds, and a strange hotel guest... 

Also, has anyone read Watsuki's Gun Blaze West?  I love Rurouni Kenshin, but dumped Buso Renkin 4 or so volumes in because I was tired of it's Bleach knockoff feel, and the fact that it felt more and more like Bleach, and not like it's own book.

Also, I have been hearing lately about a person who thinks Joss Whedon rapes his wife, hates all women, etc. etc.  Thank's to booster17,  I can now read these diabtribes.  I read the second one first because...well, it's what he linked to.

Apparently, men cannot be feminists, all sex is rape, all men are evil oppressors, and to be a feminist means you must hate men.  In fact, it seems that hating all men and calling them murderous rapists is all there is to feminism.  

The second one is about Our Mrs. Reynolds.  Apparently, Zoe thinks slavery is awesome, Mal is a swine because he doesn't rape Saffron, and Book's speech about not taking advantage of a helpless woman is proof that Joss Whedon likes kiddie porn.  Oh, and Wash wants to oppress and dominate Zoe because he's white and she's black.  I won't comment about the first post for the benefit of all.

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Our Mrs. Reynolds post

Personal opinion of Whedon in this area:  He creates a lot of strong and interesting female characters of many varieties, and makes them strong in different ways.  But by the end of Buffy/Angel, he'd screwed over most of them in one way or the other.  Granted, the same is true of most male characters, too, but it stands out a little more with the female characters, partly because "strong female characters" is a driving force of that universe.  He did, however,  put more effort into female empowerment in his work than a lot of female creators bother to.

Honestly, there ARE problems in Firefly, it's not perfect, but I'm positive that person and I didn't watch the same show, and any good points she had were lost almost the second she started typing.  Also, a good feminist rant has more to it than calling all men evil rapists and woman haters, and calling all women in a work weak and submissive and existing only for sex.  Actually, you're probably better off avoiding those topics, esp. when huge chunks of your rant revolve around a female in the military calling her commanding officer "sir."

Let me know if you'd rather have a different crop or anything different on it.  This is the best I could come up with for all the text you wanted(I could probably get something different for the abbreviated text, though.)

 

So, was still inthe Firefly mood, but I left the DVDs at work(in a locked drawer) because I didn't want to forgetthem on Monday as the boys want to watch it(YAY!) so I went to youtube.  I know that, when it coming to the romantic pairings, most fans seem to like Mal/Inara and/or Kaylee/Simon best, and while I love both, I've always like Zoe/Wash best, plus they(and Mal) are my favorites as individuals.  Of course, one of the nice things about Firefly is that all the pairings are great(though, as kinkytinky and I have discussed, the main reason people probably pair River/Jayne off in fanfic is because she's the only unattached female and the only other available male is a priest.)

(now, my favorite relationship-in a completely non-shippy non-romantic way-is Zoe/Mal, but that's another thing altogether)

Anyway, naturally, I first went after Zoe/Wash vids and scenes, and

Our DVD player at work doesn't have any arrows or anything, so without a remote or "play all" we can only watch subsequent episodes if the indicator automatically goes to the nect ep.  Naturally, we don't have the remote today and Firefly discs don't to that, so all we get to watch is the Serenity 2 parter.

*sigh*

OTOH, the flist is likely spared Firefly spam.  *makes note to do a proper rewatch soon*

You know, it's really a VERY good thing that Kaylee fell for a guy that most of her "family" largely approves of.  3 of them love their guns(one likes his guns more than he likes people) and the other 2 could make your life extremely difficult...or just send their gunloving SOs after you.  Actually, one wonders how on earth even a guy as lucky as Simon managed to survive that ultimatum...

And, you know, after their conversatioon at the end, and later in Ariel, if there really is enough money out there for Jayne to turn on Mal.  Even though it doesn't always look it, he really is very loyal to Mal, he just defines being loyal to Mal as being loyal to Mal specifically, while Mal defines loyalty to him as being loyalty to him and his people(which Jayne has theoretically been set straight about)

And now, back to Zelda.  Soon level one dragon guy, son I shall learn how to kill you and you will go all flashy and die.