Following a little procrastination, we finally managed to finish watching the last two DVDs in the Neon Genesis Evangelion saga. Naturally we saw Death and Rebirth first, which really was nothing new. It essentially condenses the last four episodes of the series, presents them in a re-cut/re-edited fashion, with a very small number of new cells added here and there. And when I say I very small number, I mean you can count them on one hand.



My recommendation is to probably just watch the "director's cut" version of the full episodes, included on the last DVD in the Platinum Thinpack. Although at this point, such recommendations are really superfluous on account of most people having already watched Evangelion years ago. So I guess this may be for the benefit of that one person I know is out there who hasn't seen it yet, just as I hadn't until recently.

In either case, Death and Rebirth serves well as a refresher, and that's what I think its purpose really was on account of its release a few years after the initial series. The real meat, however, is to be found entirely in The End of Evangelion. It presents the final events of the story in a dramatically different way, and a more mature way than any previous episodes.



The characters seem much more vibrant, and the writing is significantly stronger. This makes for a rather new Evangelion experience. The ending itself creates a more tangible resolution, though satisfaction is still ever-so-slightly out of reach in an Arthur C. Clarke kind of way. So no, I'm not providing any spoilers here. Again, mostly because many people already know what happens.



Ultimately, though Neon Genesis Evangelion is one of the best anime I have ever seen, its influence and effect on anime history being undeniable, it did not sway me from my position about Serial Experiments: Lain. Where Evangelion is an over-the-top tour de force, Lain is a subtle Chopin piano piece suffused with enough sadness to parallel that of Evangelion. Both anime series are excellent, and different enough to stand on their own, which does not make me view them as being in competition with one another.

Just wanted to wish everyone a Happy Winter Solstice. Thank you very much for visiting this humble blog of mine. I think this year in particular has been somewhat trying for many I know. I suppose that would include us as well in a way, though I would say we have been relatively fortunate.

I believe that 2008 will be a very good year. And I'm not just saying that because it's customary during the holiday season, but I know it to be true. I at least know it to be true for us. It will be a year of many changes, most of which will be positive. It marks my first return to my country of origin after thirteen years, and that's kind of a big deal.

In addition, I will be pursuing my art with greater interest and determination than ever before. It is being put forth as one of my greatest priorities for the year, and I have already taken step to ensure that this resolution will be realized. Not to mention the Presidential Elections are coming up, and this will be the first time I will be allowed to vote (if you don't know, this is why).

As for now, I hope that everyone can keep above the commercial holiday flood-waters. I have been lucky to not have to drive through that traffic but once so far. A huge difference from previous years of working at the front-lines of consumerism. I think that is true for several of us, most notably the old "CHGS" folks. You know who you are!

So once again, Happy Solstice, Blessed Yule, and Merry Christmas to all of you. The darkest days of the year are passing, and my best wishes to you extend with the dawn-light of tomorrow.

On account of my recent post about Lain, I feel inclined to talk a little about how it has influenced my art. As I think I may have mentioned before somewhere, Lain was what inspired me to begin painting anime. The reason for this is that Lain is a very powerful work, and I was deeply moved by its characters, story, and art. At the time it was also the first anime I had seen with such a high level of maturity, which made me realize just how powerful of a medium anime can be.

The first anime style painting I made was a portrait of Lain, in very vivid colors of course. I can't be sure as to my exact intentions then, and this was about six years ago, but I believe my choice to use more intense colors to make her "glow" reflected just how strongly I felt about Lain then.

Little did I know, how this first painting would change the focus of my artistic endeavors. Now, I'm not sure how long it took me before I would attempt Akogare after this. I suspect it was a while. Though I did work on another doujinshi piece entitled Mai only several months after the Lain piece. In that school year, as this was during my art studies at RMC, I may have created somewhere around four finished paintings in this style.



Sometime in 2001 when I first painted Lain, I created another portrait of her. In all honesty I don't recall which came first, but this was a charcoal drawing of the same character. It may have been a practice run to see if I could even do this style, but given my obsession with Lain it's difficult to be sure.

The point I guess I'm trying to make is twofold. First, Lain is an incredible anime which inspired me to do what I do with my art. I think we got that one covered though. Second, Yoshitoshi Abe has been my most important influence artistically from that moment on. This is not to discount my primary influences prior to Lain, as they still show up in parts of my work. Yet I think it takes a lot to change an artist's focus so dramatically, and that change I credit to Abe.

Someday, I intend to meet this man and tell this to him personally. Someday when I'm in Japan, as I intend to be there in the not so distant future.

During the time I was reading up on Lain, I came across the obligatory nay-sayers. One of the complaints was that Lain is a mere Evangelion ripoff. In fact, the two series have been often compared on account of some similar themes. This fact did not escape the press either, and the question was brought to Lain's writer:


Since this seemed to come up time and again in my reading, I was at last determined to make up my own mind about the issue. And this is the moment where I have to admit to what some anime fans might consider a cardinal sin: I had never seen Neon Genesis Evangelion. Not until a week ago. My not having watched it was not the result of some lack of desire. It was nothing more than circumstance. It was never really accessible to me until recently. That's because Evangelion now comes in the Platinum Thinpack, which is much more affordable than the series used to be.

Having re-watched Lain to refresh my memory of it, and how, I was ready to venture down a new path. Well, actually an old path, but one which inadvertently seems to overshadow my beloved Lain. Still, I was prepared to keep an open mind and enjoy Evangelion as much as possible. I had enjoyed other works by Gainax before, and it's not exactly like Eva's list of recommendations is short.



I managed to do about one DVD per night, usually after I would get off of work. Things moved along fairly normally until the introduction of Asuka, because every anime needs an obnoxiously spoiled brat I guess. I didn't like her character from the get-go, and still don't by the end of it. But I digress. Admittedly she makes for more interesting group dynamics, and creates conflict in an initially placid plot line. It's just that her actions make it hard for me to feel any sympathy towards her even when her suffering becomes clear.

After they toss Asuka into the mix, things do pick up. Tensions rise steadily and seem to climax heavily in the second half of the series. It's been a long time for me since an anime hit me as hard as the episode I'm about to tell you about next. I felt something bad was coming. The eighteenth episode, Ambivalence, is one of the most gut-wrenching pieces of anime I have ever seen. Certainly the most powerful episode in the Eva series. I was literally on the edge of my seat at the end of it, hardly believing what I was seeing. Part of that is probably due to the overall unexpected nature of the turn of events. After this, the rest of the episodes maintain a lot of the uneasy momentum gathered in Ambivalence, even if they do not quite manage to equal or exceed it.



Eva's final episode is a bit of a controversy. It's unusual execution, unconventional presentation, and unexpected structure make some people love it, and a lot of others hate it. This is where Eva and Lain have the most in common, with imagery that questions the nature of reality itself, offered in a less than coherent manner. Fragmented visuals and dialogue only serve to enhance the confusion, and the viewer is left with virtually all important questions of the series unresolved.

This is as far as I have gotten, and now I am in the process of acquiring the next to DVDs which contain some supposed closure to the whole ordeal. Took me some reading to figure out exactly what I'm supposed to be looking for, what with all the revisions and remakes of those final "episodes." Known as Death & Rebirth and The End of Evangelion, they hold the promise of some type of resolution, and I think I may just go and hunt them down tonight.

A few weeks ago I was reading up on one of my all-time favorite anime series: Lain. The wikipedia article on Lain has a lot of good information, as well as links to additional good articles. Felicity J. Colman wrote an interesting article entitled The Sight of Your God Disturbs Me: Questioning the Post-Christian Bodies of Buffy, Lain, and Goerge (link). Another, and shorter, piece of interest is an interview with the series' producer called Lain Men: Yasuyuki Ueda (link).

All this reading gave me new insights into the series, and it reignited my interest in watching it again. Surprisingly enough, it's only been the third or fourth time that I have seen it. My thinking has been that I didn't want to watch it too much, lest I become bored with it and the work loose its vibrancy in my mind. My previous times of watching Lain were also primarily in English. Being a predominantly visual work, the dialog is sometimes limited, and so I wanted to focus on the visual aspects without the distraction of subtitles.



I decided to approach watching the series a little differently this time. My determination was to see it in its entirety in Japanese, and to pay special attention to all the little visual clues as well. Armed with the knowledge of my previous research and experience with Lain, I set out to discover further uncharted dimensions within its frames.

After only a few episodes, I had already found new knowledge in this anime and was enthusiastic to see what else I might discover. By the end of it all, I realized that I had a much better grasp on this work than at any other time of having viewed it. So all that reading really did do some good.

Now, I'm not going to give you an analysis of the whole series here, as that is something each person should come to on their own. What I can do, is to describe some of my impressions at this point. Unlike the first time I saw Lain, which filled me with sadness, this time I thought it much more positive.

Most of the good anime out there seems to be filled with sadness to me, and I think it's easier to see this in Lain than many other series. Yet knowing who Lain is, and understanding her role in the series, helps to dispel some of this gloom. Unfortunately, coming to know her character on this level isn't really possible without having seen the series more than once.



Once you get past the ever-present barrage of emotions in Lain, the heart of the matter becomes evident. Lain is about identity. It's about personal identity as much as national and human identity. This seems fairly logical given what I know of Japanese culture and of the statements made by the series' creators.

The one thing which still fascinates me the most about Lain is, as previously mentioned, its visual vocabulary. Much, if not most, of what each episode tries to communicate is done visually. Dialogue is limited, and sometimes even background music is absent with little more than the hum of electrical lines left for ambiance. As a visual artist, this is of inherent interest to me. Yoshitoshi Abe created a world where every color choice, every compositional element, and every movement is of great significance. Blink, and you may have already missed a piece of the puzzle, a clue crucial to the story.



Questionable patterns in the shadows serve as a constant reminder that things are not as they seem. High contrast scenes, juxtaposing power lines against natural or suburban imagery, speak of the barrier between the wired and the "real" world. In the end, the only thing that remains clear throughout Lain is that all things are subjective and relative, while existential questions are left without definite resolution.

To me, Lain will always be a masterpiece of Japanese animation. Hideaki Anno may think that "over the past 12 years, there has been no anime newer than Eva," (link) but I beg to differ. Lain may share some motifs with Evangelion, but I find it a more mature and intelligent approach to the issues at hand. Not to mention that Lain's execution and artistry put it in a class of its own.

A few days ago I finished another painting. This one follows my series of "eye paintings." In part it was inspired by my recent re-watching of Serial Experiments: Lain. Lain was the series which compelled me to begin painting anime in the first place, and I wanted to do another study of Abe's style. This result is a closer examination of some stylistic attributes in the style of Yoshitoshi Abe.

I have made some changes of course, but his work is rather distinctly different than that of other mangaka and anime artists. I wouldn't say that I am completely satisfied with the painting, but I would also not call this piece unsatisfactory. All in all, it turned out well. It just isn't as "perfect" as I would like it to be. Next time perhaps.

I'm not sure why, but for many years I didn't want to be on DeviantART. Something about it didn't appeal to me. I think it just seemed too "big." As in, the Microsoft of online art communities. Toeng seemed much better at the time, and when that went under I switched to Minitokyo. But DA has been around for a very very long time, and it's become the most successful online art community of them all.

In recent months I wanted to reconnect with the old toengers. Currently I'm working on some art research, and a few artists I had to contact also had nothing by DA pages. So it would seem that me getting a DA account was primarily due to wanting to communicate with specific individuals. I suppose it's just as well. After all, it can't hurt to broaden my online presence.

So if you want to see my DeviantART page, just go on over to mentisworks.deviantart.com and say hello.