Mega Megane Moé
Hell and Heaven Moéltdown
Posts tagged Cardcaptor Sakura
Track Two: KimiKaiji, School Days LxH, and old-school fandom
Feb 8th
Day before yesterday I saw a Not Boat,
yesterday an sentimental fic,
and today, you…weird…music video…thing.
I keep trying to be a crazy anime fan. As a guy, I watch magical girl shows, as a realist, I watch ridiculous harems and visual novel adaptations, I fanboy over 2D things more than anything 3D, and I have an adoration of glasses-sporting characters that will put me in a straightjacket someday.
Yet somehow, I always seem to be one-upped by the manic minds across the sea, of what undoubtedly are self-labeled the “true otaku”, those who really have no shame nor sanity. Read the rest of this entry »
Artbook Check! II: Da Capo / Cardcaptor Sakura
Jan 7th
It’s been a while since my last – not to mention only – artbook post, not in the least because I don’t do much purchasing of obscure anime goods; somehow, my sense of reason has managed to continue outstripping the little anime fan in my head that screams “moeeeeee~” at every figurine, pencil board, and plushie that I see.
This may be a result of the fact that these novelty goods are, to be subtle, ridiculously expensive at times. Probably mostly because I’m a student on an overly cheap budget, first and foremost, but secondly because, well, I don’t see what you can do with a figurine outside of taking pictures of it, playing Smash Bros. with it, or making disturbing 4chan gifs with it.
Artbooks, though, have been a fondness of mine, if only because they tend to give some semblance of value to me – after all, you can browse them over and over, they have lots of pretty pictures, and if I ever actually manage to learn Japanese they might just be good reading material.
Additionally, I’ve recently become figuratively married to a little bookstore chain in southern California called Book Off, which offers a lot of new and used books (of which I can hardly tell the difference), ranging from standard English novels, to manga in both languages, to magazines, and – as you may have guessed – quite a few anime artbooks. Depending on the chain, you might even find some DVDs of both regions (spotted some Japanese Shuffle! LEs and AIR and Tsukihime boxsets), or import video games.And all at great prices too – my previous purchase of the Shuffle! On the Stage artbook was half the price I saw at Kinokuniya. Good stuff.
Unfortunately however I am not getting paid royalty fees for this post so I’ll move on to the two latest artbooks I added to my meager collection, and that would be that of Cardcaptor Sakura and Da Capo.
(Note this post actually has pictures, so those of you stuck under a 56K rock still, look out. And for those wondering about the camera work, well, let’s say my house was undergoing a small earthquake during the five minutes I was filming. Or maybe my camera hand was drunk. Maybe you need glasses. Or maybe it was a rush job and I was using a borrowed camera.)
Read the rest of this entry »
Screw lame dubs, here’s the real heart of the cards
Nov 11th
Although, somehow I feel that I am tarnishing the reputation of Cardcaptor Sakura just be alluding to it in the same sentence as a obscurely-ruled, spiky-haired, localization-mauled card game show.
Or at least, I cannot as fondly recall my two years spent watching Americanized Yu-Gi-Oh, which has a comparative lack of hanyaa~n.
Cardcaptor Sakura is one of those strange enigmas of a show, in that unlike Haruhi, Azumanga, Kanon, or any other show widely considered by many people to be ‘good’, it lacks the haters, the anti-crowd that troll on a show simply because it’s popular, or because it’s unrealistic, flat, 2D, overly moe, unfunny, or whatever.
Doubly strange when you consider that in the scheme of things, Cardcaptor Sakura is a ‘low-level’ show, in that many American anime fans can recgonize and go into obsessive mode over just like any hyperactive love interest worth their salt. As with most Clamp titles, it’s as good a brand name at times as any of the shonen shows like Naruto or Bleach, or maybe even other romance-style supernaturals like D.N.Angel. Pretty much, if you can find it in a public library, it’s probably a ‘low-level’ show.
Yet, disregarding the fact that many ‘low-level’ shows can be good (as if this would prove otherwise), Cardcaptor Sakura lacks that kind of internet scorn given upon ‘common’ shows. It’s not looked down upon in that haughty internet way, with nobody scoffing and going “why watch that when you could watch x?”
Cardcaptor Sakura truly is nearly a shining pillar of untouchableness, one show that is nearly universally acclaimed. It really is amazing.
Step aside, miss Suzumiya. This is the kind of reverence which at least I and some other people look with upon our goddess Sakura Kinomoto, and today I’m going to try to explore a bit into this years-old show and see just what makes it a classic.
Read the rest of this entry »