The defining and most beneficial distinction between Death Note and Black Butler is the sheer amount of feeling put into the latter, even if it does seem at times to be to the expense of the thought behind the former. For me, at least, this difference is what makes Black Butler more memorable, as it paves it's way into your heart, not just your head.
The Phantomhive family are known not just for their wealth and their links to nobility, but also their nurturance of youthful joy in their standing as the most profitable toy industry in Elizabethan England. When the Earl and his wife die in an all consuming fire and their son, Ciel, is kidnapped and tortured by the perpetrators, the Phantomhive estate fell into tragic obscurity. After two years of public absence, Ceil returns to resume the duties of his birthright, accompanied by the charming and seemingly infallible butler Sebastian. Seeking a way to return his family name to proud reverence once again, Ceil takes on London's criminal underworld in an effort to subject them to the same pain and humiliation he suffered at their hands, with Sebastian following him in every endeavour. While waging war to end the darkness plaguing London's streets, Ciel begins decaying from the darkness he himself now harbours, while Sebastian remains, forever, his devoted and deadly servant.
The strengths of the context leap right out at you from the very beginning. This is mostly due to the fantastic effort behind the English dub, neglegted by most other animes I've come across. Each characters accent is representative of their social standing, playing well themeatically with the trap the 1800 social system actually becomes in that Ciel is caught in stasis as an employer and a nobleman as well as a tortured soul to the extent he has little hope of freedom to live his own life. Clashes of culture appearing throughout, such as immigration tensions with caniving Italian businessmen and the growing mafia presence, civility and hedonism between the fiercley dutiful Sebastian and the boarderless and deliriously entertaining Grell contribute such passion in delivering tension you can't help but be sucked in.
Expanding on how well the English dub was constructed, it's also endearing how much the love for English Literature the creators and writers share and how seamlessly they weave in their characterisations that range between the demeaur and uppity Ceil and the farcically loveable house staff, in particular the short sighted and obnoxiously clumsy May Rin. The interactions between the characters is not only enjoyable, but is informed by components of Elizabethan plays, such as Dr Faustus, more than likely the insperation for this story of status and boundaries, ever more present in the supernatural elements such as the demons, angels and grim reapers. Also, easy parrallels can be made into the work of one of my favourite fantasy novelists Neil Gaiman in the precise yet somehow almost satirical construction of a business like and official economy of good and evil and the behaviour of their emissaries. The time and affectionate treatment spent on each of these elements sets Black Butler apart from Death Note, which at times could get monotonus adding to how stale it felt by the end.
While Black Butler flourishes in tone where Death Note fell short, it unfortunatley suffers from doing not enough of what Death Note did too much : exposition. The reveals characters make, principally the revelation of Sebastians true nature, is so poorly timed it's as if the audience knew them already. Not giving weight to such developments is almost a big no-no in the fantasy genre, as it places the convenience of the story over the layers of wonder and interest in the world it's trying to create. While Black Butler's characters are entertaining in their own characteurish way, there are times when we are so quickly demanded to care about them through rushed development, the balance they try to strike to keep the tone even (not too dark, not too silly) is off putting, particularly seen in the fate of my initial favourite characateur Madame Red, who, after having her back story thrown in my face like a wet rag, I was completley indifferent to. Even this failing,though, is not so affecting to reach Death Note levels of inconvenience, as the story elements remain strong enough to bare the brunt of overly modest reveals that don't tend to alienate or draw you out of proceedings.
All things considered, while it may not be as traditionally 'good' as Death Note, being neither as careful or thought provoking, the warmth of emotion behind Black Butler sets it above Death Note in terms of overall entertainment value. Truely, it's a joyful thing to behold.
Thursday, 20 September 2012
Saturday, 7 July 2012
Death Note - Adventures into Anime 1
Look what the cat dragged in and pissed all over, I'm back! Going to attempt to be more disciplined with my whole watching things and then writing about them thing that I do hopefully, so let's get right to it. Broadening my horizons (and hopefully yours as well) I've begun Adventures into Anime. This is where I was so interested in a new medium I made an exciting title about it. Got a list of Japanese-y or at least Eastern anime TV series and films to fuel this here blog. Open to any more suggestions if they can be given, but I'm doing fairly well known series from the anime community TV series wise and mainly Studio Ghibli films and shouting about what I like about them. So saddle up for part 1 of an indeterminate amount of numbered posts. Reviewing HO!
First I need to incriminate myself by saying I watched this series on Youtube, so I can be sent to jail for some piracy bullshit. Yet more incrimination in the fact, for this series at least, I stuck with the English dub, a cardinal anime sin if the 'otaku' devils are to be believed. If this little blog whets your brain appetites enough to check them out (and why wouldn't it?) this would probably be the best, cheapest place to watch them, as the DVDs come in awkward 'volumes' costing about a tenner each and are mostly not region 1. Also, DO NOT READ THE COMMENTS!. There are unsavoury types who type the endings on each and every video and spoiled this particular prog for me when I was less than halfway through. Conduct all sorted? Cool. Let's talk about Death Note.
Light Yagami, an honour role high school student, stumbles upon a note-book lying on the grass outside. On the inside cover, there is a long list of instructions, principal among them 'Whoevers name is written in this note shall die'. At first sceptical, he soon finds that the book does what it says as he writes the name of an escaped convict he sees on the news died of a heart attack 40 seconds after his name was written in the note book. He is then approached by the owner of the Death Note, the Shinygami Ryuk, a god of Death. Ryuk left the book for Light, sheerly to see what he'd do with it. Light quickly comes to the only logical conclusion; he'll use the book to kill every criminal in the world and become the God of a new world free from evil. Once the police realise what's going on, they bring in the bizarre, genuis detective known only as 'L' to help catch the perpetrator of these crimes. Light must then assume the identity of Kira, a vengeful God with the power to kill anyone, anywhere with only their name and their face in his mind, outmaneuver L and maintain his regular life whilst reaching ever closer to his goal of Godhood.
Probably the most enjoyable thing about the series is the subtext. In the information age, where anyone can collect facts enough to claim they know the truth of the world and use this knowledge along with their anonymity as a weapon against anyone who might disagree, there would be no stopping someone with the kind of power the Death Note can give to do exactly as Light does. In fact, Light uses forthcoming information on the internet to kill any criminals, even if they've already been arrested, along with anyone who tries to stop him from doing so whilst not revelaing himself in any other way than the hand of a pissed off God. Killing from a distance as he does is also endemic of the desensitisation to crime and violence present in todays culture, making the Death Note a very easy fantastical instrument to envision and for the audience to buy overall. Exemplarily, many of the Youtube audience were rallying behind Light and the morality that, as soon as someone commits any crime, they have forfeited their life. Admitedly, it's quite hard not to stick to someone with this kind of staunch belief in their own morality but when one of the comments was 'I'd use the Death Note to kill people in all kinds of really fucked up ways', you get some perspective.
The strength of the subtext is equal to the strengths of Light as a character. While not explored vastly, the rapidity in which he jumps to wanting to become an all powerful deity is as intimidating as the brave choice of subject matter. In much the same way as Sherlock does with it's titular character, the strength of the character is grasped upon so much you're engaged by their thought processess as much as them as a person which provides a more inventive guide through the series. From his perspective, all the people in his life are dialled back to simply obstacles or pawns to be manipulated in his battle against L. As both L and Light share this perspective, a carefully plotted and very intelligent story ensues. At times, though, this gets very frustrating, as we're only really engaged by the twists and turns of how others are being used by L and Light, meaning we don't really care about them if they end up hurt or dead. This is a majorish downgrade as the writers are consumed by this perspective as well. Any character death, irrespective of their presence in the series, is instantly glossed over to get right back to the battle of wits between Light and L, when more emotion would have proven an interesting test for Light maintaining his appearence of control against his ever growing insanity.
Furthering this, the writing throughout, literally start to finish, is so content with itself in the questions it raises and the webs it weaves that it comes off very smug and patronizing. Refering back to Sherlock which brakes up it's little clues with always fresh, pertinant and mostly hilarious character interaction (especially between Sherlock and John), Death Note deviates from this so much it's hard to get as engrossed as your being told to be. One such example of this is, while trying to shake off an FBI investigator following him, Light organises an extremly convoluded plan to manipulate a criminal into hijacking a bus, touching a page in the Death Note and making him go insane. While interesting and gratifying to watch when in the aforementioned Light-mindset, afterwards the show takes great pleasure in minutley explaining what they just did. It's exactly the same as having an over the hill cynical magician pull a rabbit out of his hat and tell you it was in there the whole time. While you may not have understood what you'd seen totally, you'd build on the evidence you had to come to a reasonable conclusion without needing to be told. Knowing the rules of the Death Note (there's lots of them and they're very hard to follow at times) we could have figured out what was done on our own. While the exposition is helpful when the show invariably backs up with convoludedness from the inventive rules of the world it's created, it leaves you feeling hollow and disengaged.
A fix is attempted in the admittedly catch-y music to draw you back in, but, again, there's so much focus on getting to the next convuluded scenario that the gap between you and the show becomes desperate, resulting in incredibly, sometimes laughably, melodramatic sequences. The final episode does this particularly badly, with rampant, grizzly blood effects going from dramatic to outright ridiculousness once the expositon has been so carefully layed out in front of you. These moments are pretty enjoyable, I have to say, but for the wrong reasons, which cheapens the amazing precision of what came before it.
Even so, the very fact that this has parellels to Sherlock gives this series it's worth and can be easily prided on it's unashamed intelligence, ambition and lack of deference to ambiguity as we've become accustomed to from Inception and Prometheus styles. If you're a fan of crime drama, this is a very fresh and worthwhile watch. Even when it leaves you behind, you'll always make the effort to catch back up.
There's 37 episodes, each 20 minutes long. If you've got a free weekend, marathon viewing is most effective and hard to resist.
First I need to incriminate myself by saying I watched this series on Youtube, so I can be sent to jail for some piracy bullshit. Yet more incrimination in the fact, for this series at least, I stuck with the English dub, a cardinal anime sin if the 'otaku' devils are to be believed. If this little blog whets your brain appetites enough to check them out (and why wouldn't it?) this would probably be the best, cheapest place to watch them, as the DVDs come in awkward 'volumes' costing about a tenner each and are mostly not region 1. Also, DO NOT READ THE COMMENTS!. There are unsavoury types who type the endings on each and every video and spoiled this particular prog for me when I was less than halfway through. Conduct all sorted? Cool. Let's talk about Death Note.
Light Yagami, an honour role high school student, stumbles upon a note-book lying on the grass outside. On the inside cover, there is a long list of instructions, principal among them 'Whoevers name is written in this note shall die'. At first sceptical, he soon finds that the book does what it says as he writes the name of an escaped convict he sees on the news died of a heart attack 40 seconds after his name was written in the note book. He is then approached by the owner of the Death Note, the Shinygami Ryuk, a god of Death. Ryuk left the book for Light, sheerly to see what he'd do with it. Light quickly comes to the only logical conclusion; he'll use the book to kill every criminal in the world and become the God of a new world free from evil. Once the police realise what's going on, they bring in the bizarre, genuis detective known only as 'L' to help catch the perpetrator of these crimes. Light must then assume the identity of Kira, a vengeful God with the power to kill anyone, anywhere with only their name and their face in his mind, outmaneuver L and maintain his regular life whilst reaching ever closer to his goal of Godhood.
Probably the most enjoyable thing about the series is the subtext. In the information age, where anyone can collect facts enough to claim they know the truth of the world and use this knowledge along with their anonymity as a weapon against anyone who might disagree, there would be no stopping someone with the kind of power the Death Note can give to do exactly as Light does. In fact, Light uses forthcoming information on the internet to kill any criminals, even if they've already been arrested, along with anyone who tries to stop him from doing so whilst not revelaing himself in any other way than the hand of a pissed off God. Killing from a distance as he does is also endemic of the desensitisation to crime and violence present in todays culture, making the Death Note a very easy fantastical instrument to envision and for the audience to buy overall. Exemplarily, many of the Youtube audience were rallying behind Light and the morality that, as soon as someone commits any crime, they have forfeited their life. Admitedly, it's quite hard not to stick to someone with this kind of staunch belief in their own morality but when one of the comments was 'I'd use the Death Note to kill people in all kinds of really fucked up ways', you get some perspective.
The strength of the subtext is equal to the strengths of Light as a character. While not explored vastly, the rapidity in which he jumps to wanting to become an all powerful deity is as intimidating as the brave choice of subject matter. In much the same way as Sherlock does with it's titular character, the strength of the character is grasped upon so much you're engaged by their thought processess as much as them as a person which provides a more inventive guide through the series. From his perspective, all the people in his life are dialled back to simply obstacles or pawns to be manipulated in his battle against L. As both L and Light share this perspective, a carefully plotted and very intelligent story ensues. At times, though, this gets very frustrating, as we're only really engaged by the twists and turns of how others are being used by L and Light, meaning we don't really care about them if they end up hurt or dead. This is a majorish downgrade as the writers are consumed by this perspective as well. Any character death, irrespective of their presence in the series, is instantly glossed over to get right back to the battle of wits between Light and L, when more emotion would have proven an interesting test for Light maintaining his appearence of control against his ever growing insanity.
Furthering this, the writing throughout, literally start to finish, is so content with itself in the questions it raises and the webs it weaves that it comes off very smug and patronizing. Refering back to Sherlock which brakes up it's little clues with always fresh, pertinant and mostly hilarious character interaction (especially between Sherlock and John), Death Note deviates from this so much it's hard to get as engrossed as your being told to be. One such example of this is, while trying to shake off an FBI investigator following him, Light organises an extremly convoluded plan to manipulate a criminal into hijacking a bus, touching a page in the Death Note and making him go insane. While interesting and gratifying to watch when in the aforementioned Light-mindset, afterwards the show takes great pleasure in minutley explaining what they just did. It's exactly the same as having an over the hill cynical magician pull a rabbit out of his hat and tell you it was in there the whole time. While you may not have understood what you'd seen totally, you'd build on the evidence you had to come to a reasonable conclusion without needing to be told. Knowing the rules of the Death Note (there's lots of them and they're very hard to follow at times) we could have figured out what was done on our own. While the exposition is helpful when the show invariably backs up with convoludedness from the inventive rules of the world it's created, it leaves you feeling hollow and disengaged.
A fix is attempted in the admittedly catch-y music to draw you back in, but, again, there's so much focus on getting to the next convuluded scenario that the gap between you and the show becomes desperate, resulting in incredibly, sometimes laughably, melodramatic sequences. The final episode does this particularly badly, with rampant, grizzly blood effects going from dramatic to outright ridiculousness once the expositon has been so carefully layed out in front of you. These moments are pretty enjoyable, I have to say, but for the wrong reasons, which cheapens the amazing precision of what came before it.
Even so, the very fact that this has parellels to Sherlock gives this series it's worth and can be easily prided on it's unashamed intelligence, ambition and lack of deference to ambiguity as we've become accustomed to from Inception and Prometheus styles. If you're a fan of crime drama, this is a very fresh and worthwhile watch. Even when it leaves you behind, you'll always make the effort to catch back up.
There's 37 episodes, each 20 minutes long. If you've got a free weekend, marathon viewing is most effective and hard to resist.
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