So, what do you all think? This appears to be the completed cover art for the upcoming release.
Month: August 2018
‘Jake and the Dynamo’ Cover Art is Finished.
Just got the cover art for Jake and the Dynamo. I’m pretty excited. I think I have to wait to show it to you, but stay tuned.
Book Review: ‘Battle Royale’
The original bloody mess.
Battle Royale: Remastered
Here it is, the instant classic that has informed so much of Japanese pop culture in the twenty-first century. If you like anime and manga, you sooner or later run into allusions to Battle Royale. Indeed, if you’ve followed this blog, the anime version of Magical Girl Raising Project, which I discussed at length, is basically Battle Royale with magical girls.
This novel by Koushun Takami appeared in 1999 and was an instant sensation probably in part because it resulted in some pearl-clutching. As an exercise in ultraviolence, it received some condemnations, and its notoriety was secured in the following year when the movie adaptation received criticism from members of the Japanese parliament. I noticed a DVD of the film at the store one day and saw that the blurb on the back proudly boasts that it is banned in several countries.
The effect of Battle Royale on pop culture reaches outside Japan: it is arguably the source of the slew of teen dystopias that have populated YA fiction of late, as it is a likely inspiration for The Hunger Games
Check the New Header!
You may have noticed a new header at the top of the blog as well as a new browser symbol. To give credit where it is due, this is Pretty Dynamo’s insignia as interpreted by Lee Madison, who is working on the cover art for the novel release of Jake and the Dynamo.
Mr. Madison has run into a lot of difficulty and has been swamped with work, which is partly why the book’s release has been delayed. Nonetheless, he’s still turning out top-notch work, and I’ve been really impressed by what I’ve seen from him. I don’t know about you, but I’m looking forward to the completed cover.
If things go as planned, the book should be out in time for Dragon Con, which will be in Atlanta from August 30th to September 3rd. I’m crossing my fingers that we’ll have the book out by then.
‘Captain Power’ is the Greatest Sci-Fi Television Show of All Time
All praise to the Machine! All glory to my Lord Dread!
At the moment, I’m unable to play DVDs on my computer, but I ask you to forgive the picture quality and to watch this video. In fact, since this is from a TV show that originally broadcast in the 1980s, the quality you see here is probably close to what you would have got back when this originally aired:
This is from the episode “Freedom One,” from the short-lived 1987 television series Captain Power and the Soldiers of the Future. This is in some ways the most ambitious television show ever made, being the first live-action show to have CGI-rendered characters (you can see one on screen here), being replete with action sequences and special effects, and full of innovative set design combined with miniatures. The show cost a cool million per half-hour episode and during its brief run had more-or-less taken over every film-processing studio in Toronto. Most of it was filmed inside a gigantic, abandoned bus depot that the creators, led by Gary Goddard, had filled with sets, miniatures, computers, and other equipment. J. Michael Straczynski, who became the de facto lead writer, credits Captain Power with teaching him the techniques of making a complex sci-fi television show on a budget, techniques he later used on Babylon 5. Continue reading “‘Captain Power’ is the Greatest Sci-Fi Television Show of All Time”
Tesla’s New Look
I just got another update on the cover art for Jake and the Dynamo, which included this steampunkish image of Pretty Dynamo’s familiar, Tesla the lightning bug.
‘My Little Pony’ Animator Arrested for Child Pornography
According to the Ottawa Citizen, Tom Wysom, who worked extensively in animation for My Little Pony and Littlest Pet Shop, both Hasbro franchises, was just arrested for possession and distribution of child pornography.
He had over 60,000 images and 1,600 videos on his computer. And I must say that these numbers always fascinate me in a perverse sort of way: surely if the first 59,000 images didn’t satisfy him, he should have figured that the 60,000th wouldn’t either. But then again, I probably don’t quite grasp how these people actually think.
I would bet even money that there is a lot of this in the field of children’s entertainment. The whole establishment is probably in need of burning with fire, starting with animation and moving from there.