Paper Core

Title: Death Note Another Note: The Los Angles BB Murder Cases
North American Distributor: VIZ Media
Release Date: February 19, 2008
Rating: 5/5

A prequel to the Death Note series, Death Note Another Note: The Los Angles BB Murder Cases covers the serial murders which are mentioned in passing a few times in both the anime and manga. A serial killer is loose in the City of Angels and the authorities there are stumped. Their killer is leaving is string of clues at each crime scene and they all appear to be indecipherable clues leading to the next victim. The world’s greatest detective L is already on the case, but needs someone to act as his shield, as he’s not willing to show his face in public. He entrusts this heavy task to Naomi Misora, an FBI agent and it becomes apparent that the crimes are a part of a maddening riddle for L himself. Between a psychotic killer and the world’s greatest detective, it lies to Misora to solve the cases.

After finishing the original Death Note manga, I was excited to read the light novel written by Nisio Isin. Light novels are a tricky thing; they can easily integrate with a current story or flop and appear as merely published fan fiction. Nisio Isin in fact achieves proper integration with the original Death Note series. He writes flawlessly as Mello (the narrator) and has readers believing that L has appeared in person, rather than behind his computer as we see in the first few chapters. He also achieved a good sense of who Mello was by having him insert himself into the story at times. It was also nice that Misora received more of a background than her manga and anime counterpart received and it also gave more background as to the story behind Wammy’s House and the gifted children there. The story was great as a mystery novel and has readers gripped as to what will happen next because nothing seems to add up until the last few pages. Obata’s artwork is a nice added touch that only asserts that the novel is cannon to the original series.

The only problem that I wasn’t satisfied with was how Beyond Birthday (or B) received his Shinigami Eyes. The fact he was just ‘born with them’ felt like a device to quickly wrap up his story quickly without getting into further details.

Otherwise, it’s a novel that any Death Note fan will love to add to their collection.

Title: Slayers REVOLUTION
Story & Art: J.C. Staff
North American Distributor: FUNimation
Release Date: March 10, 2010 (episodes are currently available through FUNimation website)
Rating: 5/5

After loosing the Sword of Light in the previous battle, Lina and her faithful swordsman Gourry continue their journey in search of a new weapon and find that they have run out of bandits. Along the way, Lina reunites with Seyruun’s princess Amelia and the mercenary Zelgadis and a series of events leads Lina to a investigator named Wizer who proclaims he’s searched for her, all to arrest her! What’s a sorceress to do?! Slayers is resurrected in a who new 13 episode series that follows an original storyline with subplots based on the novels and Takashi Watanabe and J.C. Staff all return to reprise their duties from the original TV series. FUNimation takes up the reigns and has since dubbed the series.

After ten years, it’s no surprise that Slayers is still as popular and beloved as it was ten years ago. The animation to Slayers has improved greatly through the use of brighter colours and the crispness of the animation. If there’s only one way to describe the look of Slayers REVOLUTION, it would be as this: years of animated evolution is demonstrated in this one series alone. This is not surprising, but what is surprising is that other studios have yet to demonstrate this, particularly Toei Animation who should have done a similar thing to Dragonball Z but chose not too.

The scripting FUNimation has done is close to the original and little has changed simply because Americanization isn’t needed for a series that never had many cultural references besides the ones created within the Slayers-verse. They keep fairly loyal to the original script with few improvisations.

Not surprisingly, FUNimation reunited the original voice cast from the original series and ten years of perfecting their craft has done wonders. Crispin Freeman (Zelgadis Greywords), Lisa Ortiz (Lina Inverse), Eric Stuart (Gourry Gabriev) and Veronica Taylor (Amelia Wil Tesla Seyruun) where diamonds in the rough when Slayers was first released and since then, they have undoubtedly finessed and refined their talents, bringing each lesson learned to the table. The welcomed change is Michael Sinterniklaas who is the fresh voice of Xelloss who replaces David Moo. This is also a welcomed change as I always had issues with Moo as Xelloss when Slayers NEXT was released. Joining them is Colleen O’Shaugnessey as Pokota who applies a close rendition of Konohamaru from Naruto to the role. She gives Pokata the edge and humor and takes it one step forward to remind viewers that Pokota is in-fact, a brat in the body of… something.

Without a doubt, fans of the original series will come to love the dubbed Slayers REVOLUTION as much as they did the original.

Title:Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D’s Tag Force 4
Developer: Konami
Rating: 4/5

A continuation of the Yu-Gi-Oh! Tag Force series, this fourth installment follows the Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D’s season 1 story arc of the Dark Signers but does not include the plot point of who the fifth and final Signer is; rather, it promptly skips this to force game players to watch the original series.

Until now, I had never played any of the Tag Force games, most likely due to a slight boredom I have for Yu-Gi-Oh! GX. However I will say I was incredibly impressed with Konami’s treatment of Tag Force 4. Konami has stayed true to story arc without any annoying ‘fillers’ you expect for a game that was released before the first season could be completed in North America, and allows fans to be apart of the story by including them in the critical battles of the series such as when Rudger, or Roman in the N.A. version, refers to how Yusei considers the main character ‘very important’ to him and thus must be defeated.

Before I wrote this review I decided to go onto YouTube and see about the previous games. One of the things that I have to say that this game brought forward that should have back when the first game was released was the fact that you don’t have to choose a character as your partner permanently, but can switch after the day has ended and choose another character. These characters can range from our main heroes to their nemesis the Dark Signers (I can’t tell you how sickeningly happy I was to have Kiryu and Carly as tag partners). It’s good for fans who don’t want to be stuck with one character and allows for a more interesting game play. However, because you have so many characters, it can be hard to manage their heart gauges (example – I left Rua alone for far too long and apparently he dislikes me now – then again I was never good with kids).

The CGI graphics are decent, but nothing to boast about. The treatment of the cards, such as Stardust Dragon and Black Rose Dragon are fabulous and makes up for the fact that the CGI proportions of some of the characters seems a bit off. In addition, for Konami to include perfectly drawn characters during the ‘acted out’ storylines, also makes up for this slight downside.

However, the fact that many of my PSP games have voices and this game does not, is probably my biggest qualm for this game. I can’t for the life of me think why Konami thought it was great idea to omit the English voice cast, or a voice cast in general for this game (admit I have issues with 99% of the English speaking cast, but I would still prefer a voice to a character over nothing). While you get use to it eventually, it would be nice to actually hear the characters speak for a sense of interaction.

Another point that I can’t forget is that Konami has once again chosen to not include a female avatar for the females out there. This was surprising considering that they had included the ability to create a female avatar for some of their Nintendo DS games. It can be a down point at times, but not something I would hold against the game.

If you loved the series, and love playing the card game, I would suggest fans buy the game. It was worth the money I put down for it and still love playing it despite finishing the storylines off.

Title: Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 8: The Long Way Home
Author: Joss Whedon
Artist: Georges Jeanty
Rating: 4/5

After the unparalleled success of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Joss Whedon returns with what is known as ‘Season 8′ of the series. A couple of years have passed since the series finale in 2005 and Buffy and Xander lead command-central, now situated in Scotland. Unlike before, they now have an army of psychics, seers, witches and of course, 1,800 Slayers worldwide. In the wake of Sunnydale’s destruction, the U.S. Government views Buffy and her Scoobies as terrorists and are willing to do anything to kill and stop her, including bringing Amy Madison and Warren Mears to the party. With that going on, larger problems (quite literally) loom in the form of Dawn and her recent growth spurt that has her the size of Godzilla after a questionable relationship with a “Thricewise” demon. With the stage set, and the players waiting their turns under the spotlight, what will Buffy have to face?

I will admit, I loved Buffy when I first started watching it. Joss Whedon has a knack for writing and creating amazing characters, but I have to admit, I was concerned. Four years have passed since the series finale and I wondered if Joss and the other Buffy writers still had their knack or if this was going to be a poor attempt to bring back something so amazing. My fears were unwarrented. The story line itself is quite intriguing as it now deals with the thousands of Slayers now awaken versus the ever annoying story line of whiny, helpless potentials. One thing that the new volume reminds us of is that no character that Joss Whedon creates is ever truly dead. Each line is crafted and I don’t know whether I’ve gone crazy, but sometimes I can ‘hear’ the original actors saying each line, almost as if they are working on a TV show rather than a comic book series.

Jo Chen’s cover artwork is gorgeous. She captures the original actor’s looks down to a ‘t’ and puts them in outfits you’d think the costume designer picked out. The only issue I have is with Georges Jeanty’s artwork. Unfortunately it flounders. I can’t help but wonder if he’s ever really looked at how the actors look because almost every actress in the series appears quite petite until this comic book. Even some of the outfits that Buffy is in makes me wonder if he’s even studied how Buffy not only carries herself, but looks. Just because she’s the head Slayer never meant that she skipped out on fashion.

Besides Jeanty’s artwork. I have no qualms otherwise. The story does it all and makes the negatives about the artwork irrelevant. Definitely something any Buffy fan would love.

Title:Vampire Hunter D Volume 1
Author: Hideyuki Kikuchi
Rating: 5/5

The year is 12,090 A.D. The world we know has long since ended, destroyed by the wars and chaos created by man. Despite this, a few humans – and something else – survive. Enter Doris Lang, a young woman bitten by a vampire lord named Count Magnus Lee. She’s aware of the agonizing pain and transformation into the undead that the lord has thrust upon her, as well as the alienation from the village she will have to go through. She is forced to make a decision: become the Count’s undead bride, or face an eternity of torment, constantly driven for the thirst of human blood. She stood outside of the town, waiting for him to appear and give her salvation.

Unlike most Vampire Hunter D fans, I didn’t start with the book. I had originally bought the novel for my best friend who was in love with the series, but never picked up a copy because I wasn’t sure if I wanted it. Years later I bought the first volume of the manga for her, only to find out that not only had she purchased it long before, but that I couldn’t return it. I read it and was held by the story enough that I wanted to find the first volume of the novel. It wasn’t easy; I searched for a long time before I found it on Indigo’s website and paid a small price for it. It was well worth it and I was not disappointed. Unlike the manga that skims over the key points of the first novel, the novel itself delves deeper into the individual characters, battles and the relationship shared between D, Doris and Dan, a relationship that I adore. The writing is fabulous and truly pulls you into the story, but I have to admit, sometimes I got confused with the details and lost the feeling of the story. Regardless, it’s a series worth reading and sticking with.