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Will reply to all the lovely comments later♥ Dude, you guys rock. :D
Merry Winter Holiday Of Your Choice. Whichever you choose (or choose NOT) to celebrate, I hope it was a good one. Us, we as a family bummed out, and then Mom and I went to see Phantom of the Opera.
So, there are a few things I could say. Overall, I thought it was a decent movie -- my parents and I were talking about this before Mom and I left; there is a lot more freedom in a movie as opposed to a stage production. You can do facial closeups, and not ALL of your emotion has to be projected in your voice; we can see the Phantom's face and his hope/anger/despair as the movie progresses. We get to see Christine's wide eyed OMG I AM DEER IN HEADLIGHTS look quite a lot, too. XD;
Now, see, I went to see the stage production in my, uh ... either my freshman or sophmore year of high school, so that's something like four, five years ago. Can't say I remember too much, but at the same time, the parts I DID remember were all there in the movie, and this pleased me immensely. I like how both old!Raoul and old!Meg were there at the auction, and how that part is in the grainy, old-style black and white film. However, I felt all the other black-and-white scenes, except for the last one in the graveyard, were rather extraneous; it's like they're so worried you'll forget the colorful part is the flashback that they have to remind you every thirty minutes.
Movie: Hey, it's a flashback!
Me: Ah, okay!
Movie: It's a flashback!
Me: Yes, I know.
Movie: ZOMG IT'S A FLASHBACK!
Me: Yes, I know.
Movie: OMG OMG OMG OMG FLAAASHBAAAAACK.
Me: ........... >_>
One thing I gotta hand to them, though, the first transition from black and white to color, with the chandelier lifting and the dust and grime falling away, was flipping awesome. The pieces coming back together, using lights to transition to color -- yow. The other parts were also well-handled, but dude. See above. XD;
My other major quibble was during the Masquerade scene -- when I first heard the soundtrack, and when I saw it on stage, it was colorful. It was the whole gamut of the rainbow, such as the song itself names -- but in the movie, it seemed that the scene was predominately black, white, and gold. I understand it makes a nice contrast for Christine (pink) and the Phantom (blood red, and was I the only one that had flashbacks to "The Masque of the Red Death" there?), but ... you know, overall, green was only really used in one part of the movie, and that's in the sitting room where the divas went after the show, and all the flowers were kept. LOTS of gold, LOTS of white, LOTS of black, and then lots of red at the end -- but not so much other balancing colors, which made the Masquerade scene feel a little off to me.
Also? Dude, they so abused the smoke machine in the 'Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again' scene. It was one of those moments were this little detail strikes you -- dude, you know that she's in a studio and it's can't be that cold 'cos there's this huge section of her neck and breasts exposed to the cold and she's not affected at all -- that just kind of niggles at you and doesn't let go. XD;
Other than that? I was quite impressed. Raoul was a lot more likeable to me in the movie than he was in the stage version. Christine didn't quite seem sixteen, but was the same wide-eyed ingeune that, you know, couldn't make up her mind of whether she wanted her rich prettyboy childhood sweetheart or the dark tortured music genius father-figure. XD;; Carlotta was hilarious, as I am fairly sure she's always been meant to be. XD
The Phantom himself ... was actually not bad, in spite of all the bitching I've heard from folks before the movie came out. XD; There are parts where he faltered a bit, but dude, he nailed 'The Phantom of the Opera' and 'Past the Point of No Return,' which are my personal favorites for him to sing, so hey. XD No complaints!
In the end, I liked it; it was pretty worth the six bucks for the ticket. Not entiiiirely sure if I'd go see it AGAIN, but not bad, not bad.
And, also, for Christmas, Mom got me Phantom Brave.
And you know, seriously, I didn't expect it to be as outright angsty as it is. XD;; Disgaea is the game that got me to buy a PS2 in the first place (stiiiill haven't finished it, but am working on it! XO), and it's all snarky tongue-in-cheek humor, especially with Laharl trying to be intimidating. Episode 8 is the closest the story gets to angsty (and it's pretty damn close!), but overall, not a sad story.
... then again, I'm on episode 12 and if it suddenly changes after that, I doooon't know about it. XD;
In Phantom Brave, I'm about twenty hours in, and on episode 5. And the main character, Marona, has already lost her parents and spent most of her short life being hated and feared for her ability to talk to Phantoms, given a horrible nickname ("the Possessed") and is constantly being cheated and ridiculed even by people who hire her. She's already been raised up and happy by thinking this old owl matron was praising her, only to get shot down and shouted at when the matron found out who she really was.
And then there's Ash -- who's, you know, Marona's Phantom guardian, who was with her parents when they were killed eight years before game start. (Well, he died too, and you know, that's a sucky way to start a game for any character. XD;) Only episode five, and he's angsted several times about how it's his fault Marona's life is so difficult, and if not for him, people wouldn't call Marona "the Possessed."
Uh, never minding that it's the simple fact that she CAN see spirits that earned her that nickname, and she was something like, FIVE when her parents died, and who knows how long she would've lasted otherwise? XD;
I have some quibbles with the translation -- Ash's Solemn Vow, for instance, they translate to make it sound like he's swearing his final turn to first Jasmine, and then to Marona. But someone posted the actual Japanese text of his speech -- and he's calling upon the power of this one blade, and (I think) the name of the hero of the era, Scarlett the Brave. Same with Marona's Chartreuse chant, but I don't quite remember the text for it.
And okay, so, I SUCK with using the analogue sticks. One of the main reasons I never got as into Kingdom Hearts as I could've is because I suck with analogue. Seriously. XD; But everything about moving around and manipulating characters in Phantom Brave requires that, so I had to get used to it pretty fast. Gotten a lot better at it too, if I do say so myself. X3;;;
The battle system's a lot more free-for-all than Disgaea, since there's no grid -- there's a circle around the character, allowing for him/her to move the length of its radius (depending on their MOVE stat), and after that, you can be anywhere you want to position your attacks -- and, beautifully enough, you CAN move after you attack. ♥
... on the other hand, OMG COMPLICATED. The title system alone took me a while to get used to -- and now it's like, OMG THAT ITEM HAS A HIGHER RANK TITLE THAN ANY I HAVE! I MUST OBTAIN IT! XO Plus, the fact that characters (and items?) can suffer souldeath, which means I have to sacrifice an item to get it BACK, and I've been trying to actually cultivate all my items so I can fuse them to get stronger/better attacks ... well. >_>
Still, I think it might be worth the price of admission just to have your little Ash sprite jump everywhere when you're on your homebase map. XD XD XD BOUNCE, little sprite, BOUNCE! XD
Annnd, that's all she wrote. Merry winter holidays, y'all. XD Now back to writing for meeeeeee♥
Merry Winter Holiday Of Your Choice. Whichever you choose (or choose NOT) to celebrate, I hope it was a good one. Us, we as a family bummed out, and then Mom and I went to see Phantom of the Opera.
So, there are a few things I could say. Overall, I thought it was a decent movie -- my parents and I were talking about this before Mom and I left; there is a lot more freedom in a movie as opposed to a stage production. You can do facial closeups, and not ALL of your emotion has to be projected in your voice; we can see the Phantom's face and his hope/anger/despair as the movie progresses. We get to see Christine's wide eyed OMG I AM DEER IN HEADLIGHTS look quite a lot, too. XD;
Now, see, I went to see the stage production in my, uh ... either my freshman or sophmore year of high school, so that's something like four, five years ago. Can't say I remember too much, but at the same time, the parts I DID remember were all there in the movie, and this pleased me immensely. I like how both old!Raoul and old!Meg were there at the auction, and how that part is in the grainy, old-style black and white film. However, I felt all the other black-and-white scenes, except for the last one in the graveyard, were rather extraneous; it's like they're so worried you'll forget the colorful part is the flashback that they have to remind you every thirty minutes.
Movie: Hey, it's a flashback!
Me: Ah, okay!
Movie: It's a flashback!
Me: Yes, I know.
Movie: ZOMG IT'S A FLASHBACK!
Me: Yes, I know.
Movie: OMG OMG OMG OMG FLAAASHBAAAAACK.
Me: ........... >_>
One thing I gotta hand to them, though, the first transition from black and white to color, with the chandelier lifting and the dust and grime falling away, was flipping awesome. The pieces coming back together, using lights to transition to color -- yow. The other parts were also well-handled, but dude. See above. XD;
My other major quibble was during the Masquerade scene -- when I first heard the soundtrack, and when I saw it on stage, it was colorful. It was the whole gamut of the rainbow, such as the song itself names -- but in the movie, it seemed that the scene was predominately black, white, and gold. I understand it makes a nice contrast for Christine (pink) and the Phantom (blood red, and was I the only one that had flashbacks to "The Masque of the Red Death" there?), but ... you know, overall, green was only really used in one part of the movie, and that's in the sitting room where the divas went after the show, and all the flowers were kept. LOTS of gold, LOTS of white, LOTS of black, and then lots of red at the end -- but not so much other balancing colors, which made the Masquerade scene feel a little off to me.
Also? Dude, they so abused the smoke machine in the 'Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again' scene. It was one of those moments were this little detail strikes you -- dude, you know that she's in a studio and it's can't be that cold 'cos there's this huge section of her neck and breasts exposed to the cold and she's not affected at all -- that just kind of niggles at you and doesn't let go. XD;
Other than that? I was quite impressed. Raoul was a lot more likeable to me in the movie than he was in the stage version. Christine didn't quite seem sixteen, but was the same wide-eyed ingeune that, you know, couldn't make up her mind of whether she wanted her rich prettyboy childhood sweetheart or the dark tortured music genius father-figure. XD;; Carlotta was hilarious, as I am fairly sure she's always been meant to be. XD
The Phantom himself ... was actually not bad, in spite of all the bitching I've heard from folks before the movie came out. XD; There are parts where he faltered a bit, but dude, he nailed 'The Phantom of the Opera' and 'Past the Point of No Return,' which are my personal favorites for him to sing, so hey. XD No complaints!
In the end, I liked it; it was pretty worth the six bucks for the ticket. Not entiiiirely sure if I'd go see it AGAIN, but not bad, not bad.
And, also, for Christmas, Mom got me Phantom Brave.
And you know, seriously, I didn't expect it to be as outright angsty as it is. XD;; Disgaea is the game that got me to buy a PS2 in the first place (stiiiill haven't finished it, but am working on it! XO), and it's all snarky tongue-in-cheek humor, especially with Laharl trying to be intimidating. Episode 8 is the closest the story gets to angsty (and it's pretty damn close!), but overall, not a sad story.
... then again, I'm on episode 12 and if it suddenly changes after that, I doooon't know about it. XD;
In Phantom Brave, I'm about twenty hours in, and on episode 5. And the main character, Marona, has already lost her parents and spent most of her short life being hated and feared for her ability to talk to Phantoms, given a horrible nickname ("the Possessed") and is constantly being cheated and ridiculed even by people who hire her. She's already been raised up and happy by thinking this old owl matron was praising her, only to get shot down and shouted at when the matron found out who she really was.
And then there's Ash -- who's, you know, Marona's Phantom guardian, who was with her parents when they were killed eight years before game start. (Well, he died too, and you know, that's a sucky way to start a game for any character. XD;) Only episode five, and he's angsted several times about how it's his fault Marona's life is so difficult, and if not for him, people wouldn't call Marona "the Possessed."
Uh, never minding that it's the simple fact that she CAN see spirits that earned her that nickname, and she was something like, FIVE when her parents died, and who knows how long she would've lasted otherwise? XD;
I have some quibbles with the translation -- Ash's Solemn Vow, for instance, they translate to make it sound like he's swearing his final turn to first Jasmine, and then to Marona. But someone posted the actual Japanese text of his speech -- and he's calling upon the power of this one blade, and (I think) the name of the hero of the era, Scarlett the Brave. Same with Marona's Chartreuse chant, but I don't quite remember the text for it.
And okay, so, I SUCK with using the analogue sticks. One of the main reasons I never got as into Kingdom Hearts as I could've is because I suck with analogue. Seriously. XD; But everything about moving around and manipulating characters in Phantom Brave requires that, so I had to get used to it pretty fast. Gotten a lot better at it too, if I do say so myself. X3;;;
The battle system's a lot more free-for-all than Disgaea, since there's no grid -- there's a circle around the character, allowing for him/her to move the length of its radius (depending on their MOVE stat), and after that, you can be anywhere you want to position your attacks -- and, beautifully enough, you CAN move after you attack. ♥
... on the other hand, OMG COMPLICATED. The title system alone took me a while to get used to -- and now it's like, OMG THAT ITEM HAS A HIGHER RANK TITLE THAN ANY I HAVE! I MUST OBTAIN IT! XO Plus, the fact that characters (and items?) can suffer souldeath, which means I have to sacrifice an item to get it BACK, and I've been trying to actually cultivate all my items so I can fuse them to get stronger/better attacks ... well. >_>
Still, I think it might be worth the price of admission just to have your little Ash sprite jump everywhere when you're on your homebase map. XD XD XD BOUNCE, little sprite, BOUNCE! XD
Annnd, that's all she wrote. Merry winter holidays, y'all. XD Now back to writing for meeeeeee♥
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From:
no subject
I used to SUCK with analogue. It was actually KH that got me used to it, and fast. XD But the good thing about analogue is that once youhave to do it, you DO get used to it.
In other news, Laharl is Insanely Powerful considering I'm only at 70 hours (ha ha beat a Maijin) and I now own a Horse's Weiner. It doesn't seem to do much.
Back to Family Stuff -- look forward to seeing you around tomorrow. XO
- Haru
From:
no subject
Dude, it took me a lot longer to beat the Majin -- but then, I think you were leveling up a lot more vigorously than I was, at an earlier point in the game. XD (I think the Horse's Weiner is supposed to increase your attack stat? That's what I remember hearing, at least ...)
See you tonight! :D
From:
no subject
I believe you're supposed to. :) That's his costume.
From:
no subject
From:
no subject
Carlotta was good, though, Minnie Driver = love.
Merry Xmas! I don't talk to you ernough, but you are still v.v.cool and smrt and <3. ^__^
From:
no subject
I kind of liked all the extra flairs and drama that was added into the movie production (the COSTUMES, dude, that Carlotta wore XD) -- but yeah, you're right, I could see why it'd be more suited to a theater; I remember when I went to see it live, I was actually in one of the box seats, and they hooked up the speakers so it seemed like the Phantom was singing right behind us, when he was catcalling unseen. XD
Merry winter holidays to you too, though belated~ XD Am very glad I still come off as entertaining, at the least. XD
From:
no subject
From:
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And really, I shouldn't be taking too many games back with me; it'd be really bad for my study time. XD; omg pchem. But will I get to see you at all this break? I leave on the second, so I dunno if you'll be around ... :D;;
From:
no subject
I just dropped into your hanashika website and I decided to drop a quick line to you via your livejournal. I just wanted to say that I've been a fan of your writings since 1998 (mostly GWing, YYH and RuroKen); and since Winglow's page went down, couldn't find your fics anywhere!
Anyways, I'm just glad I found your site and your fics again. BTW, along with Kuwabara no Miko, Talya Firedancer and Tera, you are the only ones who actually write GOOD slash (unless you have other recommendations.. ^^v)
Have a nice day!
-- Cielo (fka Willow-chan)
From:
no subject
Anyway, I'm really glad to know you enjoy my fics -- though ye gods and fishes, I think I'm flattered that you could have read my old stuff and still been following me now. XD; Thanks terribly fot the kind comments! They really help make my day♥
As for recs, depends on what fandoms you like. I don't really have much time to read that much these days, though I have some talented friends I could pimp out, if you're interested. ^^