TV: What Are You Watching?

[Tornado]

Did you watch the anime or live action?

[Ninja Status]

The anime, I've only heard awful things about the live action. I will note that I watched the dub and not sub version, and for all the hate dub'd animes get it was very well done IMO.

[Agent Minivann]

The dub is the only way to go with Bebop.

[Tornado]

Cool. Bebop is.top notch.

[Tornado]

PBS: American Masters: Brian Wilson

Very insightful look at a troubled genius.

[MegaSilver]

Originally Posted by Ninja Status

The anime, I've only heard awful things about the live action. I will note that I watched the dub and not sub version, and for all the hate dub'd animes get it was very well done IMO.

Necro quote but:

I'm pretty sure the creator of Cowboy Bebop said that he prefers the dubbed version as well.

It certainly is one of the few animes where I think the dub is better than the sub.

[Agent Minivann]

The Cowboy Bebop live action is weird in that it is too much like the anime and not enough like the anime at the same time. It's too much in really superficial meaningless ways, and not enough in all the important ways. It has all kinds of little visual nods to the anime that are background set dressing, but they used so many in the few episodes there are that I wonder if they could actually do a season 2. But in story and character, and actually getting what makes Bebop great, they blaze their own trail, and it usually doesn't work.

[Master Roshi]

Starting my yearly rewatch of Avatar the Last Airbender tomorrow. I watch 2 episodes per day so it takes me through the whole month.
The show would have been much better were it made for Cartoon Network or Toonami rather than Nickelodean, because CN allows for more intense content. The show as it is pulls too many punches during important moments because of how strict Nickelodeon is on being kid-friendly

A good examples is the Aang vs Ozai fight; it's very similar in theme to the first Goku vs Frieza fight, where you have a naive optimistic character facing an evil character. Because Toonami allows more intense content, you get to see things like Goku being punished for his naivete in thinking sparing Frieza is noble, which causes him to waste time and die in Namek's explosion. Instead Goku spares Frieza twice, Freiza takes advantage of it both times with a sneak attack, and Goku is forced to kill him at the very end anyway so nothing was gained from Goku being merciful. (Toriyama ruined this by bringing Goku back, the story should have ended here. Bringing Goku back means Goku doesn't does not have to suffer any consequences for his flaws)
In contrast, Aang nearly does the exact same thing with Ozai, however he emerges victorious nonetheless, having learned nothing and not having to change. The writers put themselves in a very difficult position, because they wrote a scenario that's very dark in it's implications: a 40+ year old psychopathic man is trying to murder a 12 year old so he can then go on to genocide a country; however, this is written for a Nickelodeon show, so they couldn't actually flesh it out entirely without being too dark. So the result is they play it way too safe and the ending is really unsatisfying. If they didn't want to include adult themes in the story, which is fine, then they shouldn't have setup the climax to their show as such an intense conflict, where the villain is clearly evil and needs to be killed, even if only in self-defense. The show needed to be a little closer to DBZ in that regard. I don't think there's a single time in the entire 3 seasons of Avatar where a character gets punched in the face, it doesn't need to go nearly as far as DBZ, but c'mon man..

Most of the show doesn't run into this problem, because most episodes don't revolve around such an intense conflict, for example the episodes where Aang is training with Toph in the second season, or when Aang goes with Zuko to learn firebending in the third season. But every so often the plot steers towards a darker plot, that can only be told well if you commit to the intensity, but doesn't stick the landing because of how restricted the show needed to be

[caps]

I've been watching and (mostly) enjoying Rings of Power. Also slowly making my way through Wandavision.

I haven't finished Avatar yet; somewhere in season 2 with my kids. We haven't picked it up in a while now.

[AMIS]

Started Rings of Power...it's slow.


Real slow.


Reminds me of the reason behind the book Bored of The Rings. Which, if you enjoyed Lord of the Rings and haven't read Bored, you probably should.

[chas]

Rewatching the anime Gate, one of my favorites, which I just bought, with a pal. The main character is 33 years old, which is different. Modern Japanese army troops go to a fantasy world! 24 episodes of goodness.

[Master Roshi]

The most recent episode of Rings of Power was a big step up in quality I think, in interested in what happens next now. I think the 5 episodes before this were too uneventful, so maybe the season should have been 6 episodes instead of 8.
Adar is becoming more and more entertaining to watch so I hope they keep him around for a bit longer