Comments for the week ending September 16, 2002

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ENTITY - You wrote: [DBZ - I just wanted to defend one of my favorite TV shows.]

Sure. Personally I don't hate DBZ although I wouldn't exactly call it one of my favorite TV shows. It had some good episodes and an arc or two that I liked. (And I should just add that I can say all this despite having seen it mostly dubbed; Some of the current Funimation voice acting doesn't bother me but after having seen some of the episodes in Japanese, well its like watching a completely different series.)

You wrote: [First of all, you can't say DB had "more" plot than DBZ, because both follow the same soap-opera-ish story-telling format. One is simply more comedy-oriented, while the other is action-oriented.]

I tend to ascribe more plot to DB over DBZ because I think that the story tends to flow smoother in DB; having 20 episodes of Goku staring at the Ginyu Force doesn't exactly make it seem like there is a plot or that anything is really happening.

You wrote: [Comedy is plot but action isn't?]

It isn't the action that I had anything against. I thought that when they actually finally did get down to doing something that some of the action sequences in DBZ were fantastic. But action should feel as though it is a result of the plot and not that the plot is just an excuse for action. DBZ doesn't give off that vibe; they spend so much time on either the battle or the buildup to the battle and gloss over a lot of characterization to do so that any little plot that they do have either doesn't shine or gets buried.

Before the Cell Saga I only felt that two battles meshed with the plot and weren't there just so that we'd get some action - Vegeta vs Goku and Freeza vs Super Saiyan Goku.

I thought that the best season out of all of DBZ shown to this point (I haven't seen all of the BUU Saga yet so I'll widthhold judgement on it for now) was the Trunk/Android/Cell Saga; that had the best plot and cohesion in all of DBZ. It felt like it had a point, that it was going somewhere, and that it would have some sort of consequences. And it did move everything along without the battle sequences feeling like that is all that the series was. I never got that in any of the series prior to that arc. The Freeza arc was just one long blur of the characters running away, then standing around looking at each other, and then fighting to kill time until Goku showed up to win so they could all go home.

You wrote: [Secondly, both have PLENTY of story.]

Most of my complaints come out of the Freeza arc which is where I first started watching the series way back when. Long, pointless, badly scripted (in the dub which is getting redone by the way) and by the time it limped to the end of it I had long lost interest. Even Goku fighting Freeza had at least 2 or 3 too many episodes involved. I know they wanted to give the Manga time to get ahead of the series but damn, spending 20 episodes so that Goku can shift his foot and turn his head to give an angry look at the Ginyu Force just isn't right.

You wrote: [The more you can pack into an episode doesn't equal a better episode.]

I agree with you. An episode doesn't need to be packed to be good. And just because an episode has a lot of plot points to it doesn't mean that it is going to be good. But endless filler or non-filler where nothing happens are just as bad as episodes filled with pointless plot. I'm not writing off DBZ as horrible. It has arcs that I enjoy (Cell Saga like I said above, and I liked the Great Saiyaman Arc too). It has some great actions sequences. But it has a lot of downsides to it too that helped to kill my first impressions of it when I first saw it.

At this point if I want to see a fighting anime then I'd either watch specific DBZ episodes (the ones where I know something interesting is going to happen like Super Saiyan Goku vs Majin Vegeta) or I'll just tune into a show like YU YU HAKUSHO.

I honestly prefered YYH to DBZ because while fighting was a big part of it and so was tournament style fighting (CN'll get to it eventually) the point of it wasn't just to fight and other plot points didn't get completely subverted to the battle. The battle was there and was important but the characters never lost sight of each other. DBZ for example always has the one episode in every arc where Goku dreams that Chi Chi is murdered if he doesn't fight and then goes to fight without her ever coming up again except in an occasional scene where she's screaming or complaining or crying at home. In comparison in YYH Yusuke is just as focused on his love interest and Keiko gets just as emotional (although not in the same manner) but the fight never overwrites that relationship; she's just as willing to seriously interfer and play some role in everything rather than just sit on the sidelines while the battle takes over everything.



SIRYN - You wrote: [Personally, when it comes to GTO (I haven't read the manga) I personally like the live action Japanese tv show the best. :)]

I've heard of it but I've never seen it. I'm planning to eventually get my hands on it. Its supposed to be very different from both the manga and the anime although it maintains the same spirit. I've really got to see it. :-)

At this point I've mainly been reading the manga which is hillarious. Pick it up; TOKYOPOP is putting out volumes every month or two. So far 5 translated out of something like 40 Japanese volumes are out so far. (And the 43 anime episodes end before the manga does; they only get to the end of a story arc and finish up the series while the manga continued on.)
Airwalker - [airwalker9999@yahoo.com]
Brooklyn, NY
Sunday, September 15, 2002 03:12:32 PM
IP: 12.88.85.218

My problem with DBZ isn't that it's slowly paced, it's the complete lack of anything interesting happening. The whole thing seems to be a bunch of muscle-bound idiots "powering up" for no apparent reason. One story arc runs an entire season and most of it is just them flying, or "charging up their power levels" or some such.
Jimmy
Sunday, September 15, 2002 02:38:08 PM
IP: 172.139.139.250

Personally, when it comes to GTO (I haven't read the manga) I personally like the live action Japanese tv show the best. :) Very cool ^_^
Siryn
Sunday, September 15, 2002 02:01:29 PM
IP: 129.21.145.6

DBZ> I just wanted to defend one of my favorite TV shows. First of all, you can't say DB had "more" plot than DBZ, because both follow the same soap-opera-ish story-telling format. One is simply more comedy-oriented, while the other is action-oriented. Comedy is plot but action isn't? Secondly, both have PLENTY of story. It just isn't as pretentious as American animation. The more you can pack into an episode doesn't equal a better episode. Shows nowadays are so impatiently-paced I sometimes wonder why they bothered, because any suspense or atmosphere is lost.
Entity
Sunday, September 15, 2002 01:35:09 PM
IP: 140.228.106.194

JIMMY - You wrote: [X-Men, Daredevil, and Green Lantern I only buy in back issues when the local store is having a sale.]

I don't really have an interest in DAREDEVIL outside of getting the TPB of Frank Millers run. X-MEN, well I used to buy it, then switched to reading it in the store, and now I can't stand to even pick up the book. GREEN LANTERN I still like but in general I'd rather flip through the monthly book and if it interests me then I'll pick up the TPB; mainly I prefer to the old back issues to the current material; Kyle Rayner still gets on my nerves and personally I prefer the Old Green Lantern Corp and Mosaic issues.

You wrote: [I will, however still buy the occasional Spider-Man or Batman.]

The only Spider book that I'll touch is SPIDER-GIRL; I wish that they'd finally TPB that series completely. (Thats something I hate about Marvel - they hardly TPB any good series. Tons of X-crap will get a TPB but SPIDER-GIRL and THUNDERBOLTS will never get more than one or two TPBs.)

As for BATMAN I actually prefer to pick up NIGHTWING TPB instead; the only BATMAN stuff I have or what to get are an occasional Elseworlds. BLOODSTORM (Batman as a Vampire) is one of the more interesting ones.

You wrote: [Never a fan of Superman, too powerful, just not an interesting character, but I can see how the kids would like him.]

I can see why he can still sustain so many books that are basically the same story - not only is he an icon but he's also not so much kid friendly as he is parent friendly. No parent is going to have a problem picking up a SUPERMAN issue for their kids after all; what objectionable material could be in there? (And to be honest sometimes he does have an interesting storyline; DEATH OF SUPERMAN and DEATH OF CLARK KENT were interesting. And he does get some pretty good ELSEWORLD stories done.) Personally I don't mind reading it but the character plays better when he's in some post Lois/Parents future and is struggling to find his humanity. Thats one of the aspects that made KINGDOM COME so interesting.



KIT KAT - You wrote: [Hello all]

Welcome!

You wrote: [What I'm wondering is if the market for merch. is good right now, or if it would be better to wait for a few more years before I sell.]

The only way I could really say that the market would be better for selling the merchandise is if the series made a comeback; that would probably have the merchandise from the original series go up considerably in value. Its probably a better idea like Jimmy mentioned to wait until sometime next year when the GARGOYLES DVD comes out; that might awaken more general interest and get you a higher price.

But in general if your not interested in waiting then no time is better than the present to try and sell; waiting for everything to go up in value could have you waiting a while for it to happen.

You wrote: [Is EBay going to be my best bet for selling? Or if any of you are personally interested in buying or know someone who is, e-mail me and I'll send you a list of what I have.]

In general your best bet is to either put everything up on Ebay (and post some links in here to your actions) or to announce in general what type of merchandise you have in here, in the TGS Comment Room, on the Newsgroup and wait for some interested parties to send some e-mail inquiring.



SHAN - You wrote: [Man-At-Arms is Optimus Prime (or at least, the Optimus Prime voice since BEAST WARS forward, Gary Chalk]

He's also doing the voice of Optimus Prime in TRANSFORMERS ARMADA; same with BEAST WARS Megatron doing the voice for ARMADA Megatron.

You wrote: [I'm happy for having somewhere to go and earn my money instead of watching unemployment dwindle.]

Congratulations! I'm still in the middle of looking for work; its not easy trying to find technology work in the NYC area; but I'm still optimistic.



SCOTT - You wrote: [First we watched GTO, then Justice League. It's amazing how differently the shows are paced.]

True. I think that mainly its a difference in perspective between the two countries - in Japan animation is seen as just another way to tell a story while here animation is just a way to entertain the kids. Thats why pacing is different - if your episode is just supposed to give a quick entertainment fix then its going to be more fast paced and action oriented as well as self contained.

On GTO just as a side note pick up the manga if you can; the anime is very good but they toned it down in comparison to the Manga.

You wrote: [The wonderful thing about anime is that they'll devote several episodes to a single plot, (DBZ being an extreme example).]

DBZ wasn't a story - it was one long running fight. DB sort of had a story before it started to morph into proto-DBZ and become one long fight scene. If your looking for a better example of storytelling in an action/fighting anime then YU YU HAKUSHO is probably a better example.

You wrote: [One of my favorite moments in anime is in episode five of Cowboy Bebop. Spike and Vicious are confronting one another.]

I love that episode although I liked Vicious better in Japanese than in the dub; not that the dub version was bad but he seemed more powerful, angry and evil in the sub than in the dub.

You wrote: [The revamp of Batman for the WB lost much of its drama in favor of action.]

It did start to shift the emphasis to action over drama when it switched channels. But I don't think it lost all its drama. It might just feel that way because they also changed the animation style; that as much as any story helps shape the feel of the series. And with the WB style it seemed more action oriented than drama oriented. But they still managed to maintain a pretty high standard. If anything I'd argue that BATMAN BEYOND was the shift completely from drama to action.

You wrote: [I think Gargoyles was the only show that stayed dramatically consistent, up to and including "The Journey."]

True. That was another problem with the TGC 12; they tend to lose a lot of the series drama in favor of action; the tension in the episodes was gone in favor of a lot of fighting with Quarrymen. And it wasn't even well animated fight scenes on top of everything else.

You wrote: [You can't watch too many American 'toons today and really *feel* the tension. Thank god for anime.]

I can't even really watch that many American cartoons anymore; most of whats on nowadays is crap or anime. Outside of CN there just isn't that much thats on that interesting or worthwhile to watch. Or even that entertaining to watch. I mean did you see some of the shows on this Saturday?

You wrote: [And of course, I've neglected to discuss movies. Plenty of drama there. Lion King. Hunchback. Prince of Egypt. More.]

Movies tend to be a different type of animal than TV series; TV has more infinite possibilites to use drama than the movies do and yet it isn't.



PHIL - You wrote: [My son, Henry Philip, was born this week!]

Congratulations!



MATT - You wrote: [unless Greg has told us and we missed it when really don't know when and how Demona got confirmation that Angela was her daughter. of course we can assume that Sevarius told her when they began plotting the events of "The Reckoning" but frankly we don't know.]

I don't remember if Greg mentioned specifically when Demona found out that Angela was her daughter but odds are good that it was confirmed by Sevarius. She probably had some sort of suspicion after seeing her in Paris but I don't think it seriously crossed her mind that Angela was her daughter at that point - she lacks too much information to be able to make the same judgement that Goliath was able to when he first met Angela. Sevarius is the only one who can really give her that missing piece of the puzzle.

I don't think though that Sevarius knows that Demona was Angela's biological mother until he went to work creating Delilah. Until that point its more probable that Thailog and Demona were talking and Sevarius brought up the fact that the Gargoyle they encountered is Goliath's biological daughter which put the final piece of information into place for Demona. (Its even possible that Demona may have suspected that Sevarius had created Angela as an explination for why she looked so much like Demona and he in response explained his Lock Ness Adventure and how he found out that Angela is Goliath's biological daughter which would put everything (or at least a lot of it) into persepective. Angela herself would fill in the rest later during THE RECKONING.)
Airwalker - [airwalker9999@yahoo.com]
Brooklyn, NY
Sunday, September 15, 2002 11:48:31 AM
IP: 12.88.84.173

congrats on the "hatchling" Phil!!!!!! be sure to pass Gargoyles on to the next generation!!

i didn't think about it til this week, but unless Greg has told us and we missed it when really don't know when and how Demona got confirmation that Angela was her daughter. of course we can assume that Sevarius told her when they began plotting the events of "The Reckoning" but frankly we don't know. unless someone remembers Greg commenting on this i'm gonna ask him...
matt
Sunday, September 15, 2002 01:49:59 AM
IP: 207.230.48.55

Phil> Congratalations! Here's to a happy father-son relationship!
Gabriel "gaygoyle"
Sunday, September 15, 2002 12:04:15 AM
IP: 66.169.210.231

Hello all! I haven't posted much lately; I mostly just lurk. But today I have an annoucement.

My son, Henry Philip, was born this week! He has three older sisters, but now I finally have a boy!

Of course I'll be introducing him to Gargoyles soon. My three girls already enjoy it, but they're really only interested in "Goliath's daughter" so far. (It must be a girl thing.)

Anyway, back to your regularly schedule programming!
Phil - [p1anderson@go.com]
Saturday, September 14, 2002 11:15:11 PM
IP: 67.209.186.160

Animated Storytelling > I was watching some of the cartoons I have on DVD with a friend last night. First we watched GTO, then Justice League. It's amazing how differently the shows are paced. The wonderful thing about anime is that they'll devote several episodes to a single plot, (DBZ being an extreme example). Meanwhile, American cartoons for the most part tell a complete story in one or two episodes. (The Justice League cartoon was actually in three parts, but without commercials it only runs for an hour.) I actually have trouble remembering scenes from American cartoons, and I think it's because they're too fast-paced. Meanwhile, even though Japanese cartoons may spend immeasurable seconds devoted to a still frame, (possibly panning horizontally or vertically), events in anime seem to carry more weight.

One of my favorite moments in anime is in episode five of Cowboy Bebop. Spike and Vicious are confronting one another. Spike is standing alone in an open space, waiting for Vicious. But Vicious doesn't burst into the scene like some comic book villain. He simply walks on in. You don't even see him right away, you just hear his echoing footsteps. Of course, these are all elements of drama, which American 'toons like to avoid. We were lucky to get the dramatic 'toons we did, the best examples being the old Batman-TAS and, of course, Gargoyles. The revamp of Batman for the WB lost much of its drama in favor of action. I think Gargoyles was the only show that stayed dramatically consistent, up to and including "The Journey." You can't watch too many American 'toons today and really *feel* the tension. Thank god for anime.

And of course, I've neglected to discuss movies. Plenty of drama there. Lion King. Hunchback. Prince of Egypt. More.

Erg. Wasn't expecting to go into a rant.
Scott Iskow - [smiskow@lycos.com]
Saturday, September 14, 2002 09:37:46 PM
IP: 68.50.37.201

Shan> Must be hard not having steady employment. I'm happy to see you've got something now. Wish you better luck in the future.

Kit-Kat> A Gargoyles DVD is coming out in a few years or so, the prices of your merchandise might go up after that but it's your call.
Jimmy
Saturday, September 14, 2002 08:58:12 PM
IP: 172.165.203.66

Hi all. Sorry it's been a while.

Allaine> I think you're right about the TRANSFORMERS voices you named. I *KNOW* Man-At-Arms is Optimus Prime (or at least, the Optimus Prime voice since BEAST WARS forward, Gary Chalk... Peter Cullen I believe some years back said he'd only work on shows that no longer "contained violence," or at least that's the rumor I heard).

Anyway, I'll try to pass through a I can but it looks like I have a temp job that will last through the end of the year. Isn't animation, but it is an office in the infrastructure of a major studio in an area I would benefit learning more about. So after ovr six months of barely working, I'm happy for having somewhere to go and earn my money instead of watching unemployment dwindle.

In the meantime, I'm also writing my freelance columns and product reviews I've been doing for the last six months or so. I'm happy to continue doing these too.

But as to next year and what lies ahead, I'm taking it slow.

Shan
Shan - [shan@dm.net]
Los Angeles, CA, USA
Saturday, September 14, 2002 01:45:49 PM
IP: 198.81.17.187

*A small magenta dot appears in the floor, growing larger and larger until a magenta lake floods the room. Then, just as suddenly as it came, the lake is gone, leaving only an old Garg fan -- who is sopping wet. You hear her mutter, "I've got to figure out a better entrance ..."*

Hello all --

I doubt many of you remember me, but I hung around Station 8 a few years ago. Todd and Bud-Clare are really the only faces I still recognize.... Anyway, I haven't really kept up with the fan-world for a while, and I'm looking to sell my collection of Gargoyles merchandise. I can sell it all at once, or in pieces -- it doesn't matter to me.

What I'm wondering is if the market for merch. is good right now, or if it would be better to wait for a few more years before I sell. I'm not looking to make a lot of money; I'm just not interested in keeping the stuff in my basement anymore.

I welcome comments about selling merchandise in general; I'll be hanging around the board for a few days. Is EBay going to be my best bet for selling? Or if any of you are personally interested in buying or know someone who is, e-mail me and I'll send you a list of what I have. (I've traded with Thailog and Bud-Clare before; they will tell you I'm a trustworthy person.)

Thanks for your time, and I welcome your reply.

*Kit Kat exits, leaving a trail of magenta footprints behind her.*
Kit Kat - [kitkat994@hotmail.com]
Saturday, September 14, 2002 01:21:27 PM
IP: 65.64.8.8

[Although to be honest I'd leave Spider-Man, Superman, and Batman as the main exceptions to this - they are the iconic heroes who tend to get audiences from all ages. But X-Men, Daredevil, Green Lantern, Flash, and Fantastic Four? Only people largely from the mid 20s to late 40's.]

Hmm, I had no idea that the X-Men people were that much older, but I guess you're right. X-Men, Daredevil, and Green Lantern I only buy in back issues when the local store is having a sale (Once a month all back issues under $10 are sold for $1.00). I will, however still buy the occasional Spider-Man or Batman. Never a fan of Superman, too powerful, just not an interesting character, but I can see how the kids would like him. I never really started buying Manga though, perhaps when I get a source of income, I'll look into it.
Jimmy
Saturday, September 14, 2002 11:59:11 AM
IP: 172.164.105.215

ALLAINE - You wrote: [Simply put, do Delilah's eyes glow red, because she's a female, or white, because everything about her is inverted?]

You know I don't think that this came up in her only appearance. All I know is that her eyes weren't Clone Red. It is possible that her eyes might glow white as an inversion but I think that its more likely that they'll probably glow red to mainly keep her in line with the rest of the clones.



JURGAN - You wrote: [I think Mac guessed at the plan instantly, but didn't care at that point.]

I'm not sure about that. I'm sure that he figured instantly that Thailog wasn't on her side and that he was up to no good beyond the plan Demona had just publically mentioned but Macbeth isn't really given enough time to think about whats happened. Between hearing the plan, escaping, suiting up, and then heading off to the fight with Demona plus considering his emotional state at the time I don't think he would have put two and two together so easily.

You wrote: [what does Elisa know that Angela doesn't?]

It wasn't so much asking Elisa to tell her the truth as to give her final confirmation; Angela might have all the fact and have put everything together but in a way it doesn't seem real until someone else gives confirmation that it is.

(Sort of the same case with Demona; between seeing Angela and whatever information Thailog might have told her about Angela from the battle and his encounter with her, she may have had a nagging suspicion that she might be her biological daughter. (Of course she has less information to work with than Angela has but Angela looks like her with Goliath's coloring; even if she is dismissive of the idea that the eggs survived and that she is her child its still something strange that she might think about.) It is something though that she can deny and puzzle about until she gets outside confirmation of the fact, probably from Sevarius.)



RAVYN - You wrote: [my thought immediately afterward was that maybe Goliath had told Elisa that Demona was Angela's mother at some point during their travels]

Actually Elisa figured it out within about a minute of seeing Angela in AVALON 2. And Goliath sort of confirmed it in a roundabout manner, saying that Hatchlings belong to the whole Clan - thus claiming Angela as his daughter without actually saying that she is his biological daughter.

(Still with the information that Elisa has about Goliath and Demona even if it might not be extremely detailed it should be enough for her to figure out off the bat that the young female Gargoyle who looks almost like an exact copy of Demona but with Goliath's coloring has some relation to the two of them. And technically that is what happened - nice homage to the fact that she's a detective who somehow still has a job despite showing up for maybe 2 days of work in 1995 :-) )



AARON - You wrote: [Lose money now "proving" that feature-length mature audiences animation "won't sell in America" or lose money to disappearing market share later?]

But it isn't disappearing market share for them if they have a major piece of it to begin with. Let's be honest that if mature animation was going to take hold then most of it is going to be coming out of the Japanese market; the last attempt at mature domestic animation was what, TITAN AE? Which bombed right off the bat. And Disney in control of Miyazaki films and with a Distribution system and brand name that would appeal to many Japanese companies that they could get to do business with them could give them the edge they need and a bigger part in controlling the market again. Its hard to believe that they would turn away from all that money and the chance to crush their competition and become the only major animation company in the states again.

You wrote: [The expensive dub, and the Neil Gaiman script, and the deal not to cut a frame of footage, were all part of the smokescreen.]

On one level I can lean towards believing this. But on the other hand it just seems a little bit too conspiracy theory to me. I need a little more evidence before I can agree with you - and I'll get it when I see how they treat SPIRITED AWAY. If they pull another MONONOKE then just remind me to admit defeat, ok? :-)

You wrote: [Disney wins all around.]

But they don't. Control in the Japanese market is extremely important when you consider that 60 percent of the animation in the world is coming out of Japan. Its a tremendous humiliation and blow to their reputation to have a movie like MONONOKE to be brought over here and have it bomb so badly. They didn't just not break even; they lost big. Its something that can hurt them in future negotiations in Japan for other movies at other companies.

I just don't think that the office of Michael Eisner is a big dark chamber that is filled with evil and human sacrifice. :-) He and the company in general want to make money and lots of it. They want new markets to appear as long as they are making lots of money off of it, can crush the competition in them, and can control them. I can't accept that they'd crash so big on MONONOKE when they could have stood to have done just as well with a wider release and more advertising. I really think that years of domestic crap dulled them to the potential and had them not knowing what exactly to do with the movie which is why it turned out the way it did. (Do you know how well it did on DVD? I'm curious if they saw a difference and if there was a difference; if it bombed on DVD then I don't know what to say since the DVD release was solid.)

You wrote: [Sadly, no it won't, and no, it isn't.]

My main thought in SPIRITED AWAY being a test was in marketing and release. If they do it well the way they would do it for any of their other releases (or at least as well as they do for crap like the endless direct to video sequels they've been doing) and it still fails then its the movie that isn't drawing the audience. If they don't even try like with MONONOKE then its them and their approach to the movie that will have failed.

I saw the commercial for it on again around 11:40 on channel 4 as the news was ending which makes it more ads than I ever saw for MONONOKE; if they put some ads up on CN during Adult Swim and during Toonami then we could say that they are trying to make a push for it.

SPIRITED AWAY and the rest of their advertising could be a test for the advertising of the GARGOYLES DVD. If they aren't willing to push this then what are the odds that they'll give a push to GARGOYLES? (When that DVD comes out I expect to see as many commericals as I saw for PETER PAN 2 which was craptastic and got 20 times more ad time than MONONOKE ever did as well as some push on their website.)

You wrote: [And, I hate to say this, 'cause I know it'll make me a pariah, but it's an awful movie. It's bad Miyazaki, like My Neighbor Totoro.]

I didn't think TOTORO was bad; not for my age group and a little dull but not bad. Just not geared for me as an audience. As for SPIRITED AWAY I'll reserve judgement until I see it. I judge it as near classic Disney in terms of the animation I have seen and in terms of the core story that I read of but I have also heard that it was a pretty weird movie. That could hurt it or it could help it; I've seen weirder movies than I've heard this one is do well. In the end it depends on what audience they want - I think that they are trying to go for a 15-25 year old audience given the times when they are advertising it, the same one that watches Adult Swim.

You wrote: [Beautifully animated, but not a damn thing actually happens for two and a half hours.]

So its just a longer version of a Classic Disney film? :-)

You wrote: [It's got the same problem the Final Fantasy movie did.]

FINAL FANTASY had the main problem of being so caught up in the pretty CGI that they forgot to actually put out a good and interesting story with a real point that anyone would give a damn staying awake through, forget about sitting through. (For the record I loved the CGI in that but I couldn't stand sitting through it - it was so damn boring and I don't mean lack of action. I can live with lack of action but every bit of dialogue seemed designed to cure insomnia. If a movie is going to use CGI then it shouldn't get so wrapped up in it that it forgets to keep the audience entertained. And FINAL FANTASY did forget.)

SPIRITED AWAY might be quiet and designed for a younger audience (this was a kids movie in Japan wasn't it? Just like TOTORO) but at least it has the core of a universal story in it (the Disney element - young girl hits adversity and is forced to overcome it ending the movie out learning something and having become more mature and understanding for it; if she had fins we could call it THE LITTLE MERMAID :-) ) that can keep people interested and thinking. It isn't just relying on animation to keep people awake while FF was leaning heavily on only its CGI.

You wrote: [the critics are going to say "WTF?"]

I don't bother listening to the critics. But given Eberts reaction to Miyazaki's other films I think that he'll give it a thumbs up.

You wrote: ["They showed blood in a Disney film! How could they?!?"]

I don't remember them mentioning Disney in their commercial; its officially MIYAZAKI'S SPIRITED AWAY not DISNEY PRESENTS MIYAZAKI'S SPIRITED AWAY. They'll probably show it through Miramax just like they did with MONONOKE. (Remember if it isn't typical Disney even a little bit such as showing blood or not appealing to a 3 year old then it doesn't get the Disney brand name until the very end of the credits and even then its in small eyechart size presentation. Even GARGOYLES was through BUENA VISTA; it was never DISNEY'S GARGOYLES and only had the logo really appear at the end of the credits; and even then it was more of an add-on after the credits finished that could easily be left off.)

You wrote: [Lessee, good, pretty good, okay, dunno, awful, that... thing Gainax did while they were recovering from Eva, excellent, excellent, okay, good, dunno, and old respectively.]

PEACH GIRL is a pretty good manga; shoujo with pretty interesting characters and nice art style. I'm just sorry that they didn't do an anime for it.

And GTO is a good story about a 22 year old virgin biker who becomes a teacher to meet girls but then got into the whole teaching thing in his own delinquient manner. Its much better than I may have made it sound. Its worth picking up; the first volume alone is hillarious and touching at the same time.

You wrote: [True, but the TokyoPop titles, except Cardcaptor and Bebop, don't have animated adverts running in heavy rotation on CN.]

True. They are trying to make a push to have INITIAL D be their flagship anime and get it on TV. They might have some success with it although the manga doesn't really interest me.

You wrote: [Even if they share the #1 spot, it's still manga dominating the American comic market.]

True. Go into any comic store and ask "who still buys Marvel and DC and other domestically produced material that is similar to it?" The answer shouldn't be that shocking - its mainly 20-40 year olds who still pick it up. X-Men tends to be read by 35 year old fans while the younger audience will pick up stuff like WITCHBLADE and various Manga. Hell I used to be a big Marvel/DC fan and now I won't bother with it outside of TPB and even then only a few of them.

(Although to be honest I'd leave Spider-Man, Superman, and Batman as the main exceptions to this - they are the iconic heroes who tend to get audiences from all ages. But X-Men, Daredevil, Green Lantern, Flash, and Fantastic Four? Only people largely from the mid 20s to late 40's.)



MOONCAT - You wrote: [COWBOY BEBOP - heard good things and bought the DVD, but doesn't really do that much for me]

Gets better as it goes along. When I first saw the first few episodes it didn't really appeal to me either. But by episode 6-7 its hard to stop watching. :-)

You wrote: [INITIAL D - absolutely love it, was watching it in raw Japanese a few years back and it was good even then]

The subtitled anime is going to come out completely accurate but the dub is going to be changing the names around to Americanize them. The manga while being accurate in most other respects has already done this and changed or shortened out the names of the characters completely. TOKYOPOP plans for this series to be its flagship series for mainstream distribution and has given that as its reason for the change.

You wrote: [KODACHA - my friends like it, but I can't stand it]

I like it; both the anime and manga are pretty good but then again I seem to have a taste for strange comedy/drama stories. Same reason Kare Kano appealed to me.

You wrote: [LOVE HINA - very funny! I think Tenchi fans will enjoy it]

I liked it but the wet rag of a main male character really got on my nerves. They really overplayed the beating and abusing the hell out of him joke. It stopped being funny after a while and got to be more distracting than anything else. (The specials and OVA which take a more romantic, serious twist tend to be much better in my opinion.)

You wrote: [MARMALADE BOY looks great, haven't seen it all thought]

Weird. Defintely weird. But in a soap opera sort of way.

You wrote: [PEACH GIRL - the manga looks nice but haven't really looked at it]

Take a look; its extremely good with a solid story and characters.

You wrote: [SAILOR MOON - confess, I like the uncut subtitles of it, especially the later seasons.]

I liked the series; the first two seasons are going to also be released uncut and subtitled by the same company putting out the cut dub DVDs of the same two seasons.

You wrote: [Current recommend if you go for anime, Noir (girl assassins, moody with fantastic music)]

Love that series although I've only seen the first 3 episodes. Its been picked up and should be coming out soon on DVD.

You wrote: [gotta dash, Sat Morn cartoon premieres!]

I took a look and it wasn't worth the effort of getting out of bed to do. Again we've reached the situation where the only thing good on is JACKIE CHAN ADVENTURES.
Airwalker - [airwalker9999@yahoo.com]
Brooklyn, NY
Saturday, September 14, 2002 11:11:45 AM
IP: 12.88.91.140

quickie comments anime thoughts -
ANGELIC LAYER - adore *^_^*, light, CARDCAPTER SAKURA - adore the Japanese version, US dub SUCKS, COWBOY BEBOP - heard good things and bought the DVD, but doesn't really do that much for me, GTO - unknown, INITIAL D - absolutely love it, was watching it in raw Japanese a few years back and it was good even then, KARE KANO (His and Her Circumstances)- same, drop dead funny I laugh till I hurt, KODACHA - my friends like it, but I can't stand it, LOVE HINA - very funny! I think Tenchi fans will enjoy it,
MAGIC KNIGHT RAYEARTH - good, but not really a favorite of mine, MARMALADE BOY looks great, haven't seen it all thought, PEACH GIRL - the manga looks nice but haven't really looked at it, and SAILOR MOON - confess, I like the uncut subtitles of it, especially the later seasons. I got the season that introduced the two older Sailors, yeah, the "cousins" in the original japanese on laser disk a long time ago.

that's my quick review of the day. Current recommend if you go for anime, Noir (girl assassins, moody with fantastic music)

gotta dash, Sat Morn cartoon premieres!
MC
>^,,^<
Mooncat
Saturday, September 14, 2002 10:22:58 AM
IP: 68.102.23.36

Airwalker> <<But I don't think that they wanted to lose so much money _ otherwise they wouldn't have spent the time on such an expensive dub.>> Lose money now "proving" that feature-length mature audiences animation "won't sell in America" or lose money to disappearing market share later? The expensive dub, and the Neil Gaiman script, and the deal not to cut a frame of footage, were all part of the smokescreen. Disney made a big show of clearing the road for Mononoke, and then shot it in both kneecaps and told it to crawl toward the finish line. You say they only wanted the rights to make money in the Asian markets? Fine, they recoup the loss there, improve their stated position on animation at home, and prevent somebody like Warner Brothers from having a Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon-style success with Mononoke to boot. Disney wins all around.

<<The real test for Disney's treatment of Miyazaki is going to be SPIRITED AWAY which is something much closer to Classic Disney fare than MONONOKE ever was.>> Sadly, no it won't, and no, it isn't. I got to watch a bootleg copy of Spirited Away a couple of months ago. And, I hate to say this, 'cause I know it'll make me a pariah, but it's an awful movie. It's bad Miyazaki, like My Neighbor Totoro. Beautifully animated, but not a damn thing actually happens for two and a half hours. It's got the same problem the Final Fantasy movie did. It's simply too far from Western story-telling convention for it to ever be a success here. Unless Disney does some kind of "What's up Tiger Lily" job on the dub, the little kids are going to get restless, the bigger kids are going to say "Huh?", the critics are going to say "WTF?" (Possibly tossing in an indictment on how "weird" this Japanimation stuff is) the concerned parent groups are going to say "They showed blood in a Disney film! How could they?!?" and it'll get pulled in two weeks. Bet me.

<<ANGELIC LAYER, CARDCAPTER SAKURA, COWBOY BEBOP, GTO, INITIAL D, KARE KANO (His and Her Circumstances), KODACHA, LOVE HINA, MAGIC KNIGHT RAYEARTH, MARMALADE BOY, PEACH GIRL, and SAILOR MOON>> Lessee, good, pretty good, okay, dunno, awful, that... thing Gainax did while they were recovering from Eva, excellent, excellent, okay, good, dunno, and old respectively.

<<Its DBZ, Pokemon and Tenchi that have them at number one. The only problem is that they aren't cheap and the competition can produce more faster and at a lower price. They can still compete but I don't know if they'll stay at number one. They might have to share it or at least have a harder time keeping the spot than they used to.>> True, but the TokyoPop titles, except Cardcaptor and Bebop, don't have animated adverts running in heavy rotation on CN. Even if they share the #1 spot, it's still manga dominating the American comic market.

<<So in other words since MONONOKE would bury crap like THE HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE DAME they decided to to do an expensive dub and not advertise the movie so that when it does fail and lose tons of money they can say that Miyazaki has no real place in the US market and shouldn't really be released in theatres here. :-)>> Got it in one.

Jurgan> <<As I understand, the theory is that if people saw what could be done with animation, then they would not accept mediocre products?>> Pretty much. My explanation for their treatment of the Clerks cartoon as well.

Aaron - [JCarnage@Yahoo.com]
Saturday, September 14, 2002 04:47:25 AM
IP: 204.30.195.246

Ok here's my add in. Elisa know Goliath and Demona had been mates. She knew that the eggs were the right age from Vows for there to be an egg from the two of them there. She is a detective and so it was very easy for her to put 2 and 2 together and get Angela. When they get to Paris and see Demona Angela is thrilled to see another living gargoyle. When she finds out the her Goliath and Demona were mates like any teenage girl she begains to question her life. Who she is and where she came from. Her whole life she lived with hymans and now is faced with having to discover her gargoyle family. It would be like finding out you are adopted and the having the chance to go and search for your really family. She wants to know her past and the history and family she missed out on. When she learns what Demona is really like I feel it would be very for her to reach out to Elisa and see her as her mother. Having been raised by humans the idea of a human mother would be nothing for her.
Jenna
Mi
Saturday, September 14, 2002 01:07:04 AM
IP: 166.90.228.172

My two cents on the ending of "Sanctuary"...

Elisa knew Goliath and Demona had been mates, and she knew gargoyles mated for life. And she keyed in on the resemblance of Angela to both Goliath and Demona from the first moment she met her in part two of "Avalon." So I don't think Elisa would have felt she was going out on a limb by telling Angela that Demona was her mother. She's a detective, and there were more than enough clues. She could put two and two together and get four whether or not Goliath confirmed it.
Patrick Toman
Friday, September 13, 2002 11:18:40 PM
IP: 67.38.250.55

"Sanctuary" - what a wonderful ep! Definitely one of my favorites. :) Love the romance between Goliath and Elisa here that neither of them will admit to, but they both know it's there ...

I thought it was strange that Elisa confirmed Angela's parentage to her as well ... but then my thought immediately afterward was that maybe Goliath had told Elisa that Demona was Angela's mother at some point during their travels ... kinda sharing the secret with Elisa to get it off his chest.

Oh, well, just a thought! :) I loved this ep, though, and great comments from everyone. I love reading everyone's rambles!
Ravyn
Friday, September 13, 2002 08:41:04 PM
IP: 150.135.118.250

Having just watched Sanctuary, I'm now going to go into it in a haphazard fashion with no real logical structure and probably very little that hasn't already been said.

First off, in regards to the silhouette and the newspaper: I don't know, I probably would have assumed it was Demona at first. I'm pretty sure Thailog never crossed my mind. I say "would have" because I really don't remember my first reactions to watching. I'm probably younger than most of you, and I was twelve when this first aired. I remembered most of the episodes, partly through internet synopses. On the other hand, my brother, who was even younger, had forgotten most of the episodes when we started watching them a few months ago (at the start of the World Tour, he asked me how many episodes were there before returning to Manhattan, and balked when I said twenty- he remembered maybe five of them). Anyway, I do remember, when Goliath flew up to the cathedral and Demona said "In here, my love," he jumped at that. "My love? What?"

There are a lot of good lines in this episode, but I always groan when I hear "It was love at first flight." Rimshot. Another thing: I always thought it would make a nice drinking game to down a shot every time someone says "tonight it ends."

I do very much enjoy the scene where Elisa asks Angela to protect her. It's so obvious that even Angela realizes Goliath's reasons, yet she goes along with it anyway. Well, not really. How far was it to Notre Dame? I assume they were following him the whole time, since Angela could hear when the battle started. Or was it close to where they first arrived? On the subject of possible contradictions: Elisa lost Demona at the Cathedral right before sunset. The next we see, she tells Goliath about Demona and he goes to Notre Dame. A couple minutes later, he says that the sun is about to rise. Did it take Elisa a long time to get back?

I never noticed before how Thailog leers at Angela, or at least never thought much about it. Actually, I still don't think there's much to say about it. I don't think he meant to do much, but he was certainly thinking about it, and it is creepy. He definitely wants someone he can control, although in Demona's case, she didn't realize that she was being controlled. Also consider that Greg has claimed gargoyles have scent markers to prevent incest, so in the end, she probably wouldn't have been that desirable.

I don't think Demona knew who Angela was. Maybe she considered it, but I think that since she assumed all the eggs were destroyed, she wouldn't have seriously believed it. Consider how the eggs were left when last she saw them: in the care of humans. These eggs required a lot of attention to hatch safely. What humans would go through all that trouble just to help gargoyles? None that Demona can imagine. So while the possibility might have crossed her mind, I imagine she quickly dismissed it.

"At this point, she knows the truth. Her father might be the legend of the Avalon Clan, but her mother is the scourge of it." How is she the clan's scourge? Goliath was a legend amongst them before he ever showed up, but Demona had been presumed dead all along. The only other time they saw her, she was under control of the Weird Sisters. So I don't think she thought much of Demona at that time. On the other hand, who knows what Elisa and Goliath told her during the down time on their trip? My question is, what does she know about Demona before this episode? When she says that she never knew he and Demona were in love, why should that bother her? What is Demona to her?

I don't see anything awkward about Elisa's musing to herself. That's something I'd do in that situation, and it's nice to see her using those detective skills.

"I don't know about the world. I could imagine he might enjoy conquering the world although I doubt that he'd want the trouble of having to rule it; too much effort when you can keep the current system going and continue staying occupied and having fun. I am sure though that he wants to dominate Xanatos and his empire; sort of in the tradition of Alexander who he has named himself after in this episode."

Well, no, he wouldn't literally conquer the world in the sense of having "Thailog shock troops" marching down the streets. However, he does want power and control over as much as he can get. There are many types of domination, and having a multi-billion dollar company gives immense power. "But then you wanted to conquer the world, and you don't realize that there's no world anymore! It's only corporations!" Number 2, Austin Powers.

One thing that interests me, and I didn't start thinking about until just recently, is Thailog's obsession with one-upping his fathers. He says he'll be on equal footing with Xanatos. At first, I thought he just chose Xanatos as an arbitrary reference point, but now I see that he really wanted to outdo him. Aside: look at the similarities of Xanatos and Thailog's starts. One has 20,000, one has 20,000,000, and both had to jump through some unusual hoops to get it. Then there's Goliath. I think one of the main reasons he "joined" (for lack of a better term) with Demona was to show that he was good enough for anything his father had. The bond with Sevarius isn't as strong, but we'll see it in The Reckoning. Ultimately, if you strip away all the bravado, I think Thailog is the classic neglected child. I do not say abused. By all accounts, Xanatos treated him fine. But none of his fathers actually cared about him. To Xanatos, he was just a tool, and to Sevarius, he was an experiment. Goliath started to care for him, but too little, too late. While he won't admit it, he wants nothing more than for his fathers, particularly Xanatos, to just show him a little respect. I love this in works of fiction. I've seen it in countless places, from Venom in Spider-man to Shinji in Evangelion to Josiah Bartlet in The West Wing. No child should ever doubt his parents' love, or he'll do anything to justify his own existence. A shame; I really wanted a Gargoyles villain I could hate, but in the end, they're all pitiable, aren't they? I'm glad Greg held out on him being viewed as a son, rather than the trite "evil twin" scenario.

I don't have all day here, but I've hit most everything I wanted, and some things I wasn't planning on, except for Demona and Macbeth. Best for last, as it were. I'm on record with Macbeth as my favorite character, and when he's around, Demona gets that much more interesting. After City of Stone, he seems to have decided not to kill Demona, but suddenly she's in his face, tricking and betraying him all over again, and he's pushed over the edge. I wonder what he thought when Thailog handed him the gun. I think Mac guessed at the plan instantly, but didn't care at that point. He didn't know what Thailog's game was, but he realized that Thailog wanted them to kill each other, and he was more than happy to oblige.

'"How can she believe that Thailog still cares about her?" Elisa asks. Because she wants to, Elisa. She really, really wants to.'

Beautiful. That perfectly illustrates both Demona and Macbeth's mindsets. They are both desperately lonely, and want so badly to have someone to live with. My favorite moment in the entire series is at the end of City of Stone. "The access code is... alone." That one line speaks volumes about Demona, and applies to Macbeth as well. They are blinded by a desire to have some end to their loneliness.

We get some more confusion, on my part, when Elisa "kills" Demona, because I didn't realize at first that the Weird Sisters had filled them in on the link. The other characters' knowledge, or lack thereof, about Demona and Macbeth's immortality was a constant point of confusion for me, and still is at times.

I like Macbeth's ending speech, and Goliath's kind rebuke. Yes, he does sound somewhat Shakespearian, though I've always assumed that Macbeth would have hated Shakespeare for the way he tore apart his life. Ironic that, while Disney is known for altering old stories when they make movies out of them, they were actually more accurate than Shakespeare.

And then the epilogue with Angela and Elisa. To be honest, I don't get this. Here's my question: what does Elisa know that Angela doesn't? Angela knew that Goliath was her father. She had figured out earlier this episode that Goliath and Demona used to be together. She's already put two and two together, yet she asks Elisa for confirmation. Not so much why, I understand why she wants to know, but how can Elisa confirm anything? Angela knows as much as she does.
Jurgan - [jurgan6@yahoo.com]
Friday, September 13, 2002 06:37:52 PM
IP: 206.74.212.254

Speaking of Ellen . . . this is a question that has me stumped, and I can't find information about it in the archives. Simply put, do Delilah's eyes glow red, because she's a female, or white, because everything about her is inverted?

Sincerely, Allaine
Allaine - [eac2nd@yahoo.com]
Philadelphia, PA
Friday, September 13, 2002 05:14:18 PM
IP: 64.12.96.138

ELLEN - You wrote: [If you all will indulge me for a ramble of, well, immodest length…]

Don't worry about it. :-) Lord knows I tend to do a few of them myself. :-) :-) (I never mean for my posts to go onto epic scale - they just somehow end up that way! :-) )

You wrote: [The next scene sets the tone of the episode beautifully, however, with the attraction between a lovestruck Macbeth and his French beauty simmering in a scene steamy even by this series' standards.]

It does set up the interesting situation between Macbeth and the redhead we know is really Demona; it does start an interesting scenario moving in the viewers minds. But it plays better as direct contrast to Elisa arriving with Goliath and Company- between a true love that is wanted yet being avoided (Elisa and Goliath) and trickery that is being embraced as love but is just leading to heartbreak and humiliation (Macbeth and Dominique).

You wrote: [What is it about Paris? The air? The water? The Citroen exhaust fumes?]

Good Marketing. :-) Go to a "City of Love" of love and you expect romance. Go to a "Big Apple" and well, uh I'm not sure what you should expect. :-)

You wrote: [This leads to the brief but rich little scene in which Goliath tells Angela to remain with Elisa while he heads off to the cathedral of Notre Dame. It has to hurt Elisa like anything to play the role of a damsel in distress, which she tacitly agrees to do, because she too wants to keep Angela away from Demona.]

I loved that bit! Its probably one of the few moments in the series where we get a female lead playing as a damsel in distress (sort of). And like everything else that would be ordinary in any other series, here she has to be forced into doing it just like Xanatos has to be forced into doing anything an ordinary villain wouldn't hesitate to do on first reflex.

Although I don't think that she did it to keep Angela away from Demona - it was more of her giving into Goliath than anything else. She agreed with Goliaths desire to keep distance between Angela and Demona but still Goliaths suggestion took her completely by suprise and she was very much put out by it. I love how the voice acting carried all this out - a resigned and unsure voice because she would never under normal circumstances have asked for protection like Goliath had forced her to do.

You wrote: [For his part, Goliath appeals directly to Thailog, speaking to him in the fatherly manner that would be expected of him, pointing out Thailog's inexperience in the ways of the world in general and Demona in particular.]

He is talking in a sort of fatherly manner although I didn't really take it that way when I was watching the episode. While Goliath did once describe Thailog as his son at the same time he hasn't really acted towards him like a father; he actually tends to treat him more like he would talk if he was talking to a misguided version of his younger self. I wonder if he really until the end of this episode saw Thailog as his own person and not as a slightly different copy of himself. His entire talk to Thailog here sounded to me more like something that while labeled for Thailog would have been something he would have liked to have told himself in the area of Season 1 and suffer less heartache.

You wrote: [At this point, she knows the truth. Her father might be the legend of the Avalon Clan, but her mother is the scourge of it.]

I don't know if she would have thought her to be a scourge since after all on Avalon she was under mind control. She doesn't seem that uncomfortable around Macbeth either; I think that for the most part she wouldn't really blame them for what happened on Avalon or see them as evil because of it. Its more Demona's conversation and Goliath's reaction to it that would tend to give her more reason to be upset. After all listen to what Demona's saying and what Goliath is saying in response. She's taunting and baiting him while he's reacting with anger, hurt, and a little raw hate. Its not suprising that Angela had the reaction she did - being depressed about the whole thing. Up to that point she might have figured that maybe her biological mother wasn't alive anymore and instead she finds out that shes alive and that the two of them hate each other.

You wrote: [My mother is a criminal, so what does that make me?]

While its a logical next step to think about I don't think that this exactly was on her mind at that moment; its possible that it did cross her mind at one point but I don't think that she was judging herself so much against Demona and Goliath. She is her own person and knows it - if she were the type of person to attach to someone or something and bury her personality under it then she'd probably have never left Avalon.

You wrote: [She goes straight for the emotion, identifying them as having been "in love." Her choice of words may have been influenced by what Demona said in the tower, but they evidently find their mark. Goliath angrily snaps at her in reply]

Well to say that they were "in love" is really the only nice way to say it; after all Gargoyles and this Clan in particular don't really have a tradition of marriage and saying that the obvious, that they were mates might be too harsh a thing to say considering what she just heard that evening. As for Goliath I can understand his reaction; first he didn't want her to hear that or even know it but also even if he has given up and "divorced" Demona the whole subject is still an open wound. I don't think that he likes to deal with it from the angle that Angela addressed it (he might deal in strategy against Demona but I wonder how much he thinks about the past and time he spent with her) and considering the exchange that just happened on the tower and how he might subconsciously feel towards Thailog as well, it isn't going to give him an easy reaction.

You wrote: [Isn't it a little late in the game for this, Lennox?]

I don't know about that. After all showing her before runs the risk of her thinking he's crazy or having her run off to tell the latest tabloid. Once the ceremony happens the siginificant other might be more willing to listen to a story like his than doubt it. (It might also have made a HIGHLANDER demonstartion like stabbing himself to death and then getting up a bit easier for her to swallow.)

You wrote: ["Do you think I'd miss my own wedding night?" Only Demona can say that so effectively.]

Thats another line that I love; this is an episode full of great dialogue and wonderful moments for everyone involved. And given what we know of Demona and her experience with weddings and relationships, it does even add a bit of underlying tragedy AND humor to the moment.

You wrote: [I can't help wondering what Thailog must have thought when he joined her at the chateau and saw her like that.]

"Too bad she'll be dead in a half hour. Oh well, Ce' la vie." :-)

You wrote: [his scheme to assume financial dominance of, presumably, the world in general and David Xanatos in particular.]

I don't know about the world. I could imagine he might enjoy conquering the world although I doubt that he'd want the trouble of having to rule it; too much effort when you can keep the current system going and continue staying occupied and having fun. I am sure though that he wants to dominate Xanatos and his empire; sort of in the tradition of Alexander who he has named himself after in this episode.

You wrote: [Especially in light of his track record in dealing with the opposite sex, he indicates here that he's just plain promiscuous, and, by extension, that his females are expendable to him.]

Everyone is expendable to him. I don't think that its just his female relationships that are the only things that he'd be willing to sell down the river (although to be honest the only relationship he's had at this point is with Demona; He was interested in Elisa but that was about it - they didn't have anything together. And later with Delilah we don't know if he abandons her; he just didn't have a chance to show up again before the series went off the air).

And its more likely that he'd focus on Angela rather than the two people he already knows - first how many other Gargoyles would he ever run into besides the few he has already encountered which might make him curious. And I don't deny the sexual undertone he's trying to inject here. But I think that we might be reading too much into Thailog and that one line. He could just be feigning interest. Remember he has a hundred plans running at once in his mind and has every point covered - even the ones he didn't know existed until they show themselves.

You wrote: [Also, the aforementioned track record makes me believe that there's some other, and far baser, element in Thailog's reaction to the sight of Angela than, as Airwalker indicates, the desire to yank Goliath's chain.]

Again he only has one relationship in his track record up to this point - attraction to Elisa in DOUBLE JEOPARDY can't count as a relationship. It is significant in that he wasn't willing to spare her despite attraction but that only proves ruthlessness. And later with Delilah, again we don't know if he dismissed her as expendable post THE RECKONING. He didn't get a chance to show up again and try to reclaim her. And after everything is said and done he might actually want to have a solid female relationship ala Xanatos and Fox or Goliath and Elisa. He is a lot like the two of them after all - he just wants it on his own terms.

You wrote: [Such a cruel awakening for this naïve, sweet-natured girl.]

I don't know about naive; I'd be more inclinded to say unexperienced. After all the only relationships that she's ever seen are between Tom and Katharine or between her various siblings. And those aren't really going to be anything near what she's seeing here. And they aren't really preperation for anything she's seeing her either.

You wrote: [Thailog isn't so taken with Angela that he can't grab hold of her here, fling her against the wall, and bring an avalanche of bricks down onto her.]

See this is why I don't think that he was really that interested and that most of his reaction was half interest and half stalling. He has an opportunity to taunt her at a more up close and more personal (any way you want to take that on any level - mental, physical, emotional) level and instead just makes a move to get rid of her because she's getting on his nerves. "Aren't you spunky" indeed. :-)

You wrote: [Thailog shows his inexperience by carelessly assuming that silence equals the success of his plan, and off he goes.]

I don't think that its immaturity that he's showing here; its not a huge leap to say that once Demona and Macbeth start fighting it doesn't stop until one of them is dead (which is basically what happens here and sort of in their other battle in CITY OF STONE 4). Silence means that the battle is over and he has no reason to be there anymore. I think that it speaks volumes more for him that he actually started leaving and then turned back to make sure that everything went through - in any other series the villain would have gone home to celebrate the victory without looking for a body. The fact that he had a working plan B (and even C) which he could use to keep the situation going with Demona speaks even more about him.

You wrote: [Demona is naturally stunned to awaken to a mirror image of herself, infused with her former mate's coloring.]

I don't think that this is the moment that she realized that Angela was her child. I think she was more in shock at seeing another Gargoyle walking around. She is someone who claims to know every remaining Gargoyle after all - seeing someone new should be a shock.

(I don't think that she knew about her connection to Angela outright until Sevarius came into the picture right before THE RECKONING. She may have suspected after thinking on it for a while and after questioning Thailog on what he might know but there is the question of how she could be alive and be an adult that would throw any calculations off mark until Demona has some irrefutable evidence to lean on.)

You wrote: [Nevertheless, it's poignantly disturbing to see this hardened villainness literally run straight back into the arms of what amounts to domestic abuse of (at least) a psychological nature.]

To be honest we don't know much about their relationship; Thailog plotting to have her die aside, they might have gotten along quite well and may have agreed on more than they disagreed on. And he can account for not coming to help her - he was busy with Goliath and Company; It took him time to get to her because he had to dig himself out after they left him thinking he was defeated. Thailog's plotting can be compared at the same time to that of Xanatos in EYE OF THE BEHOLDER except that Thailog doesn't see Demona as reliable or as someone worthy of him given her ultimate goals and how they conflict with his. (There is also the identity issues he has to deal with - she hooked up with him as a cheap replacement for Goliath and that can't be a great way to start a relationship.)


Great ramble Ellen!



JURGAN - You wrote: [As I understand, the theory is that if people saw what could be done with animation, then they would not accept mediocre products?]

The idea is that by killing the theatrical releases of his films in the US they are keeping competition and higher expections from being unleashed against the domestic animation that they produce.

So in other words since MONONOKE would bury crap like THE HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE DAME they decided to to do an expensive dub and not advertise the movie so that when it does fail and lose tons of money they can say that Miyazaki has no real place in the US market and shouldn't really be released in theatres here. :-)

You wrote: [They got A-list actors on this dub (I wouldn't have thought 50-100 million dollars- the top salary for a role in a movie is 20 million last I heard, and most of the voices in Mononoke, while respectable, couldn't command anywhere near that much- but it was still expensive), so $2 million revenue is definitely a loss.]

I put the figure in that range because I don't remember the exact number; it may have been closer to 30 or 40 million. But I do know for sure that the release only made 2 million so no matter what the number was they still lost tons of money on it.

You wrote: [Really, in terms of quality, there's no reason why they had to get well-known actors.]

They learned their lesson. They went for still talented but cheaper talent for both LAPUTA (which they produced a dub for but haven't released yet - its supposed to be direct to DVD in early 2003) and SPIRITED AWAY.

You wrote: [Flipping manga is something I don't like.]

Only VIZ and DARK HORSE still do it. TOKYOPOP is completely unflipped except on series that have a few volumes already done that were flipped. (PEACH GIRL for example had five volumes out flipped so they decided to keep the series this way to maintain continuity for it in TPB form; I have heard some rumors that they will at one point rerelease all their flipped TPBs in unflipped format one of these days.)

And the new anthology magazines that are coming out - NEWTYPE (which has FULL METAL PANIC manga running in it; ADV is supposed to be starting up a manga division soon), SHONEN JUMP (DBZ, YU YU HAKUSHO, ONE PIECE, SHAMAN KING, etc) and RAIJIN COMICS (FIST OF THE BLUE SKY, SLAM DUNK, MAMOTTE SHUGOGETTEN, CITY HUNTER, etc) are all unflipped and in a reasonable price range.
Airwalker - [airwalker9999@yahoo.com]
Brooklyn, NY
Friday, September 13, 2002 03:17:18 PM
IP: 12.88.87.6

I'll save whatever I have to say on "Sanctuary" 'til this afternoon, after rewatching it (I've been too busy working with interpolating polynomials to watch TV). However, on the subject of great lines, I can't believe no one's mentioned this one:

"The newlyweds are having a difference of opinion. I thought it best not to take sides." That's both hillarious and terrifyingly callous. Bravo!

On other subjects: Miyazaki. I'm trying to figure out what Disney would have to gain by preventing this movie's success. As I understand, the theory is that if people saw what could be done with animation, then they would not accept mediocre products? Or am I missing something? I'm confused. They got A-list actors on this dub (I wouldn't have thought 50-100 million dollars- the top salary for a role in a movie is 20 million last I heard, and most of the voices in Mononoke, while respectable, couldn't command anywhere near that much- but it was still expensive), so $2 million revenue is definitely a loss. Really, in terms of quality, there's no reason why they had to get well-known actors. Being good at live action does not necessarily mean one will be good at voice acting. The only reason to get recognizable names is for marketability.

Flipping manga is something I don't like. Just like colorizing films, you go against the creators original intent. Now in this case, it's not quite that bad and most of the appeal is intact, but it can cause problems. I remember, while reading Eagle, not being able to figure out why a character kept shaking hands with people using his left hand.
Jurgan - [jurgan6@yahoo.com]
Friday, September 13, 2002 10:24:46 AM
IP: 199.79.253.18

ELLEN - Yes, I've also often thought that Macbeth's gloomy remarks about his life being a "sad, endless existence" do have more than a little in common with his Shakespearean counterpart's "Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow" speech. I rather wonder what the "Gargoyles" Macbeth must have thought of that particular part of Shakespeare's play.
Todd Jensen - [merlyn1@mindspring.com]
St. Louis, MO
Friday, September 13, 2002 08:11:18 AM
IP: 67.28.95.167

Ellen - Brava!!! Said with a depth and eloquence and a sensuality of language that fill me with envy. A true gem of a ramble.

Mooncat
>^,,^<
Mooncat
Friday, September 13, 2002 04:39:59 AM
IP: 68.102.23.36

If you all will indulge me for a ramble of, well, immodest length…

Ahh, "Sanctuary." Eroticism both subtle and blatant, double-crossing and deception, dark mystery, shocking revelations, and courageous fiction that reflects disturbing real-life truths - now THAT'S the "Gargoyles" I know and love!

There's a distinct yin-and-yang feel to this episode. Besides the male/female dynamic permeating it, there's youth/inexperience (Angela's and, in a way, Thailog's) contrasted with age/experience, loyalty versus betrayal, and, of course, dark contrasted with light - the last literally, in the case of Demona's daytime and nighttime lives, and figuratively, in the case of Angela grappling with the knowledge of the dark side of her biological parentage.

There's nothing necessarily remarkable about the foreshadowing in the opening scene, with the silhouette of the unidentified gargoyle gliding through the Paris night. The next scene sets the tone of the episode beautifully, however, with the attraction between a lovestruck Macbeth and his French beauty simmering in a scene steamy even by this series' standards. This scene also foreshadows in a sinister manner, however, since we recognize la belle francaise to be the human Demona.

Then comes the scene of Elisa and the stone gargoyles in the skiff. She's musing aloud, and her words, besides helping to stoke the underlying heat of the plot established in the opening scenes, signify a milestone of sorts. (We learn later that they're a bookend of sorts as well.) She remarks to herself that they're in the world's most romantic city, and Goliath isn't even awake to enjoy it with her. Now, wait a minute. Her feelings are no secret to us, but how close, before now, has she come to actually admitting this much, tongue-in-cheek though her tone may be? And yet, the electricity between her and Goliath is relegated to an entirely subordinate position by the triangle of passion established by Macbeth, Demona/Dominique, and Thailog in this episode.

What is it about Paris? The air? The water? The Citroen exhaust fumes? Recalling my own experience, as soon as I set foot on the Champs-Elysees, my head was spinning. Why is this crew sent to Paris? Why NOT? The magic in Avalon's atmosphere has nothing on the City of Light. I wonder what would have happened if this gang had been stuck in this town for longer than they were.

Elisa shows Goliath evidence of at least one other gargoyle in Paris by showing him a newspaper photo. It didn't take Le Figaro long to spot something peculiar in the skies above. What have the New York papers been reporting on for all this time? ;-D

I feel particularly sorry for Elisa in this episode. She's caught in the middle of Goliath and Angela wrangling about parentage, and enjoys it about as much as anyone in real life would. Goliath is determined to keep Angela and Demona separated. And Angela is simply reflecting her upbringing (by humans), compounded by her natural curiosity. This leads to the brief but rich little scene in which Goliath tells Angela to remain with Elisa while he heads off to the cathedral of Notre Dame. It has to hurt Elisa like anything to play the role of a damsel in distress, which she tacitly agrees to do, because she too wants to keep Angela away from Demona. And it hurts Angela like anything to be kept from her father's side as he goes off to a potential battle, but she is obedient to him. Nobody wins here, and their faces show it.

And then comes the glorious three-way exchange, which Angela overhears, of course, having needed little prompting to rush off to the cathedral to join the battle. Demona is at her absolute best here, nasty and fetching and playing up to both males. She doesn't direct anger at Goliath, she teases him. Baits him. Insults his manhood (for want of a better term), even. For his part, Goliath appeals directly to Thailog, speaking to him in the fatherly manner that would be expected of him, pointing out Thailog's inexperience in the ways of the world in general and Demona in particular. The irony is that Thailog, just like the man who programmed his thinking, is far ahead of the others here. It isn't until later that we learn that, while Goliath refuses to take Demona's bait here, the lover standing behind her is her would-be murderer as well. It's a terribly chilling concept, made all the more so by the fact that it's such a ruthless survivor as her in this position of ghastly vulnerability.

Angela returns to the skiff stunned. At this point, she knows the truth. Her father might be the legend of the Avalon Clan, but her mother is the scourge of it. It isn't difficult to imagine her wondering about the implications for herself as well: My mother is a criminal, so what does that make me?

She confronts Goliath regarding Demona in a particularly evocative way. This is Paris, after all, and this is "Sanctuary." Ergo, she doesn't identify her biological parents as having been mated, or paired in any other relatively prosaic sense. She goes straight for the emotion, identifying them as having been "in love." Her choice of words may have been influenced by what Demona said in the tower, but they evidently find their mark. Goliath angrily snaps at her in reply, unlike in previous instances, when he merely addresses her sternly when he feels she's talking out of turn. Elisa has rarely seemed so relieved to see the sun's appearance.

The wedding scene at the chateau is simply steeped in sensuality. The way the bride and groom gaze at each other. The breathlessness in Dominique's voice when she says, "I do." The fade-out on their kiss, suggesting that it goes on and on… And then, when they're alone, Macbeth broaches the subject of secrets. Isn't it a little late in the game for this, Lennox? This shows that this was truly a whirlwind romance for the evidently lonely and emotionally vulnerable Macbeth.

"Do you think I'd miss my own wedding night?" Only Demona can say that so effectively. Even as she voices this line so nastily, Marina Sirtis hits nothing but net on the double entendre. Hide your eyes and cover your ears, kiddies. And pay no attention to how beautifully that wedding dress is shredded and torn. I can't help wondering what Thailog must have thought when he joined her at the chateau and saw her like that. Shame on me.

The three-way exchange in the dungeon is a nice parallel to the three-way in the tower with Goliath. In this instance, as in the last, even as she acts like she's got the upper hand, Demona is nothing more to Thailog than a plaything and a component of his scheme to assume financial dominance of, presumably, the world in general and David Xanatos in particular. Whereas Goliath was a nuisance earlier, however, Macbeth here is a key to the success of his scheme.

At this point in the drama, we simply sit back and enjoy the obvious relish with which Keith David delivers the line that, in so many ways, encapsulates Thailog's villainous duplicity: "Didn't you search him?" Oh, how I adore that line. Fifteen yards for piling on, Thailog. You filthy wretch.

When the heroes arrive and confront Thailog on the roof, the clone's reaction is so telling. Who does he focus on first? Goliath? Elisa, whose cheek he stroked so suggestively when he last saw her on the oil rig? No. It's Angela. A new gargoyle - a female, and, as he says, a young one at that. Especially in light of his track record in dealing with the opposite sex, he indicates here that he's just plain promiscuous, and, by extension, that his females are expendable to him. I agree with Todd Jensen; I don't envision Thailog drawing the line at incest, unless it were to interfere in some way with his plans for dominance. Also, the aforementioned track record makes me believe that there's some other, and far baser, element in Thailog's reaction to the sight of Angela than, as Airwalker indicates, the desire to yank Goliath's chain. We can expect no more, and no less, from someone whose sole purpose in life is his own gratification. Isn't the terrible truth behind Thailog's tremendous appeal as a villain the fact that, deep down, on a level that most of us don't even care to acknowledge, we all want to be him, and know that we mustn't/shouldn't/can't? Send the kiddies to bed early-this is a villain reserved for us grown-ups.

The antidote to Thailog's unctuous slime is the righteous anger of Goliath's reaction. He lashes out both physically and verbally as the father he is, leaving no doubt that if Thailog goes for Angela, he'll have to go through Goliath first.

As Thailog explains his scheme with typical bravado, Angela is once again subjected to a baptism of fire into the unpleasant side of the world away from her Avalon. Brigitte Bako infuses her voice with tremendous hurt when Angela says, "I thought she meant something to you." Such a cruel awakening for this naïve, sweet-natured girl. She's standing face-to-face with evil the likes of which she hasn't seen before - i.e., the cold-blooded betrayal of a lover - and she's horrified by the sight.

As for the disgust Goliath expresses upon learning Thailog's plan, it's evident that Goliath still views Thailog as his own progeny, in a way. Is this what his offspring is capable of? The concept only magnifies Goliath's revulsion.

At this point, of course, the physical battle is on. Thailog isn't so taken with Angela that he can't grab hold of her here, fling her against the wall, and bring an avalanche of bricks down onto her. As I observed earlier, his females are expendable to him.

Meanwhile, Elisa is attempting to talk sense into Demona and Macbeth. Her efforts are doomed to failure because the two combatants have a separate, deeper agenda, which Thailog evidently has recognized well before this. Macbeth himself acknowledges it aloud just before Elisa immobilizes Demona - there is a dark edge of despair to their existence, a despair driving him, at least, to the brink of suicide. This is yet another chilling aspect of these two characters and the dynamic between them, and one that makes them all the more compelling to those of us who most appreciate the maturity and complexity of this impressive series.

By the way, how often in this entire series do we see Demona so physically beaten and drained that she's actually staggering?

When silence reigns at last and the gargoyles on the roof notice it, Thailog shows his inexperience by carelessly assuming that silence equals the success of his plan, and off he goes. He doesn't need to fight the others any more; he simply needed to keep them from preventing his plan from succeeding.

The conflict below is then analyzed almost poetically in the exchange of Macbeth and Goliath. Goliath's fundamental optimism emerges, as it always does when he waxes philosophical in quiet moments. In an appealing and endearing soliloquy, he sees the silver lining not only in Macbeth's experience, but even in Demona's treachery toward him. And he does so in terms of the reappearance of love in Macbeth's life and the reemergence of Macbeth's ability to love. It's emphasized that this is the voice of experience talking, when he caps his little speech off with the other bookend - the response, in its own way, to Elisa's opening observation. Just as Elisa surprised us by admitting her feelings aloud in the opening moments of this episode, Goliath surprises us here with his own admission of sorts - and he courageously makes this admission when he knows Elisa can hear him say it. (If only the physical bounds of animation could have been stretched further to allow Elisa's reaction a little more subtlety. After all, it's so much fun to see a control freak like her flustered, if only for a moment.)

Goliath's optimism is met by Macbeth's fundamental pessimism, appropriate to the tragic figure that he is. The marvelous homage paid to the beautiful soliloquy that Shakespeare wrote for his own Macbeth then shines through. The animated Macbeth remarks here on "a sad, endless existence that I must face alone." This utterance immediately triggers the centuries-old words in my head: "Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, creeps in this petty pace from day to day, to the last syllable of recorded time…" Bouquets once again to the Team Weisman writers. Nicely done.

The drama isn't over yet, of course. While this is going on, Angela is off to one side, coming to grips face-to-face, literally, with what she now knows to be the darker side of her parentage. Demona is naturally stunned to awaken to a mirror image of herself, infused with her former mate's coloring. As is confirmed to us later in the series, she knows who Angela is right off the bat; her question regarding Angela's identity is superfluous. Her shock at coming face-to-face with her progeny is not so great, however, that it prevents her from rushing to Thailog's side when he appears on the scene to claim her. This is vintage Xanatos-programmed Thailog. The brilliant clone apparently has recognized his scheme's failure, has gotten over it, and has moved on to plan B in this short a time. And why should he worry? He still has Demona to amuse him while he comes up with other ideas (ideas to at least some of which we are introduced in "The Reckoning"). It's no surprise to see that Demona hasn't given Elisa the least bit of credence following the latter's efforts to tell her that, in essence, Thailog is a rat. Nevertheless, it's poignantly disturbing to see this hardened villainness literally run straight back into the arms of what amounts to domestic abuse of (at least) a psychological nature. "How can she believe that Thailog still cares about her?" Elisa asks. Because she wants to, Elisa. She really, really wants to. This sequence ends with the two knowing males, inured by their own respective emotional traumas, agreeing that "love can be blind."

The turmoil and passion of this remarkable episode finally wind down in the closing moments in the skiff, when Angela receives confirmation of what she now knows is the full truth of her parentage. She's calm now; she's over the initial shock of what has happened to her in Paris and simply seeks closure. Elisa expresses aloud what Goliath cannot, and his stolid silence and unwavering, granite-like expression are every bit as eloquent as the words of his companions, and the way those words are spoken.

-- -- -- -- -- -- -- --

Finally, just a brief word. The Maza family may be involved with the NYPD only fictitiously, but the trauma that organization and its other public protection counterparts suffered a year ago was horrifically real. God bless them and their families.

Ellen - [efstolfa@aol.com]
Chicago
Friday, September 13, 2002 02:05:17 AM
IP: 205.188.208.9

AARON - You wrote: [Are they trying to get it after Fox's deal expires?]

Yes; they wanted it before but FOX outbid them at the time without watching it. Then they thought that they could edit onto Saturday Morning. And we all know how that turned out.

You wrote: [And are they trying to get Slayers from them as well?]

I don't know for sure but I imagine that they would. The only reason that FOX picked this one up was just so CN wouldn't have it. Literally that was the given reason; they heard someone at CN mention off-handedly that they were interested in it so FOX picked it up so that they wouldn't have to compete with it. (And then they took a look at it; at first they thought that they might be able to get it on the air with some editing; they'd have what, 3 minutes left if they tried that? :-) )

You wrote: [I beg to differ. If the Disney hype machine can get people into theaters to see dogs like Atlantis and Return to Never-Never Land, it could have made a success of Mononoke.]

I'm not saying that they did a good job marketing MONONOKE; I saw a commercial for it once at about 1 AM when they were advertising it theatrical release and that was about it. It was a horrible thing. But I don't think that they wanted to lose so much money - otherwise they wouldn't have spent the time on such an expensive dub. They would have gotten some cheaper talent or even unknowns for it. They dubbed it without seeing it and then didn't know how to deal with it. The real test for Disney's treatment of Miyazaki is going to be SPIRITED AWAY which is something much closer to Classic Disney fare than MONONOKE ever was.

In fact I just saw about an hour ago the first commerical for SPIRITED AWAY; it supposed to be out on September 20 although I didn't hear if it was a general release or a limited release.

(I was listening to some music with the TV muted and suddenly saw something Miyazaki on the screen; until it registered and I turned the music down and the TV up it was mostly over. But it still looked beautiful. I wonder how the dub will be overall. I heard that it was accurate but I mean in terms of how it will sound.)

If they bury this and don't hype this then its a definite that they are trying to bury Miyazaki in America outside of DVD release. This is a show that should be hyped, heavily advertised, and widely released since it can largely meet the general Disney audience. Its not something where they would have the excuse of not knowing what to do with it and which audience to gear it to (that was the MONONOKE excuse); this is a movie that they could easily get an audience for. (And did I mention that the commercial looked fabulous? Unbelievable. Shown at times other than during the 10 o'clock newsbreak it should easily draw in enough of an audience to be a hit.)

You wrote: [And I think they were acting as a business, to protect their own future product-revenues.]

They did that by getting the rights to Miyazaki. We have to remember that the only reason they got the rights at all is that they wanted the Japanese market. And thats what they got. And they made tons of money on MONONOKE and SPIRITED AWAY over there.

The problem is that they don't know how to deal with Miyazaki in the American Market. They thought that he was something like the Japanese Disney so that everything they just got the rights too would be similar to Disney stuff and they could easily release it. So they didn't bother to watch most of it; with MONONOKE all they knew is that it was the top grossing movie in Japan for a while (until TITANTIC came along anyway) so they figured that they'd dub it and have a hit here. But then after it was dubbed they actually sat through it. And thats when it hit them that this wasn't anything close to what Disney does for the movies. And they didn't know how to react to it or how to advertise it or even how to release it. They had a mature intelligent animated feature with heavy themes and a lot of graphic violence. This is Disney - they aren't supposed to know what any of that stuff is. :-)

Now they have SPIRITED AWAY which managed to beat out TITANIC and take the place of number 1 in Japan. But its nothing like MONONOKE; it is done in an intelligent manner and deals with heavy themes too but it is more in line with the type of stuff that you might expect to come out Disney. So they might do better with this. If they don't then I can confidently come in here and say "They ARE trying to bury Miyazaki in America!" But until then I can write MONONOKE off as having failed due to shock and stupidity on Disney's part rather than deliberatly trying to ruin it.

You wrote: [C'mon. Mononoke was showing morning to night in sold out theaters in Hawaii for three weeks, before orders came down from on high to pull it. Is that a decision a business would make if they weren't trying to bury the film?]

But wasn't that when they in general pulled the film across the US? So while it does sound fishy (and pretty stupid since they could have continued to show it and make money there even if it would be pulled across the rest of the country) it would have to be seen in the general context of Disney seeing the top grossing film of all time in Japan bombing out completely in the US within a few days and losing them millions in the process. That dub was pretty expensive - even if they were going to crash Miyazaki which I can buy and I'm not writing off completely, I still find it hard to believe that they would crash it before they at least made back the money. They spend something like 50 to 100 million dubbing it; the entire release made 2 million. That can't be something that they wanted.

You wrote: [Out of curiosity, what licences does TOPYOPOP have?]

ANGELIC LAYER, CARDCAPTER SAKURA, COWBOY BEBOP, GTO, INITIAL D, KARE KANO (His and Her Circumstances), KODACHA, LOVE HINA, MAGIC KNIGHT RAYEARTH, MARMALADE BOY, PEACH GIRL, and SAILOR MOON to name a few series. And they tend to pick up more every few months. They tend to pick up stuff by CLAMP that nobody else has gotten their hands on. And they tend to pick up Shojou romances and sports manga on top of general action manga that other companies put out.

The secret to their success so far is that they don't flip the books - its printed in the same reading direction as in Japan (just like the DBZ manga); its just translated and released at about 10 bucks a book. They ended all of their monthly releases and tend to do monthly to bi-monthly TPB releases.

(The only real problem they have is sometimes an error might slip through and since they don't have the benefit of an individual release to spot mistakes, they have to spot them in the TPB release. They tend to fix them by the second printing so I try to keep an ear out to hear about any releases that might have some errors and wait for the 2nd printing to get them.

You can tell what printing it is by looking at the information page in the beginning of the book - it has a line of numbers running from 1 to 10. Whenever they do a new printing they leave off the last number - so on the second printing the line starts with the number 2 and the third printing has the line start with number 3 and so on.)

You wrote: [Not bad, as far as market share goes.]

Its DBZ, Pokemon and Tenchi that have them at number one. The only problem is that they aren't cheap and the competition can produce more faster and at a lower price. They can still compete but I don't know if they'll stay at number one. They might have to share it or at least have a harder time keeping the spot than they used to.
Airwalker - [airwalker9999@yahoo.com]
Brooklyn, NY
Thursday, September 12, 2002 11:27:47 PM
IP: 12.88.87.81

Today, Sept 12th, fanfiction.net announced they are no longer hosting fiction with adult content. On Oct 12 all NC17 fictions will be purged from fanfiction.net.

If you are a paying member of fanfiction.net and have NC17 stories on the site or read NC17 fiction on that site, please request a return of your membership fees.

The address for fanfiction.net

support@fanfiction.net

Please be polite, and ask for the return of your money. I already have.

There is an online petition for fanfiction.net to reverse it's new policy is at:

http://www.PetitionOnline.com/mod_perl/signed.cgi?KEEPNC17

Don't know how much good it will do, but it's already gotten over a thousand signatures in just the few hours it's been up. Reading the comments is pretty refreshing.

I have been a paying/supporting member of fanfiction.net because of it's marvelous archive that included the entire range of fanfiction, gen. het to slash and lemon to NC17. The majority of my own work on the site is hard R to NC17. With their new policy, announced just today with No Previous Warnings, I feel they solicited and taken my money under false pretenses.

Words cannot describe the shock and upset this is causing me and countless other fan authors and readers. I suggest if there are stories you are following on fanfiction.net that are rated NC17 or even hard R, to go and download them while you can.

Mooncat
>^,,^<
Mooncat
pThursday, September 12, 2002 11:08:27 PM
IP: 68.102.23.36

AIRWALKER - Good point on how many people these days might not even be that familiar with the Shakespearean Macbeth. It's a sad comment about cultural literacy these days. Although the play has pervaded our popular culture enough (look at how often the three witches' "Double, double, toil and trouble" scene has been parodied).

One other thing that I remembered after writing the ramble this morning. That newspaper photo of Thailog flying about against the moon looked almost reminiscent of the Bat-Signal. (Good thing that this was a second season episode, made long after the period when they were worrying that people would mistake "Gargoyles" for a "Batman" ripoff :) ).
Todd Jensen - [merlyn1@mindspring.com]
St. Louis, MO
Thursday, September 12, 2002 07:15:29 PM
IP: 63.208.62.150

Airwalker> <<NADIA spliced together by committee. That's the only way to really describe it.>> Well, Nadia spliced together by some people who didn't speak Japanese, so they borrowed some bits out of Star Wars and the Transformers movie, and a few other things, to make up the lack. I forget the exact list of things we said it ripped o- excuse me, paid homage to, but it was rather long. (Robby, do you remember?)

<<But otherwise they'd rather spend the time getting ESCAFLOWNE.>> Are they trying to get it after Fox's deal expires? And are they trying to get Slayers from them as well?

<<And I don't think that they purposefully buried PRINCESS MONONOKE;>> I beg to differ. If the Disney hype machine can get people into theaters to see dogs like Atlantis and Return to Never-Never Land, it could have made a success of Mononoke. I admit, the hype machine falls down on the job sometimes. The commercials for Emperors New Groove that made it look like an awful movie, for instance. But really, a real advertising campaign and a coordinated release would have made all the difference.

<<they are a business after all and would have liked to at least break even on paying for the dub.>> And I think they were acting as a business, to protect their own future product-revenues. Same way the oil companies discourage experimentation with solar power. Same way Microsoft buys out anybody that might make a superior product to theirs. Maintain market share by whatever means necessary. C'mon. Mononoke was showing morning to night in sold out theaters in Hawaii for three weeks, before orders came down from on high to pull it. Is that a decision a business would make if they weren't trying to bury the film?

<<HITMAN's gone>> I know. More's the pity. Nobody wrote Gotham like Ennis.

<<Although I don't know if it will be VIZ since TOKYOPOP can put out more material at a faster rate and a lot of it is very popular and extremely affordable.>> Out of curiosity, what licences does TOPYOPOP have? Viz has Big O, Dragon Ball, various Gundams, all the Rumic world books, Eva, Pokemon, and Tenchi. Not bad, as far as market share goes.

<<"Oh, Macbeth, you mean like out of Shakespeare? I've heard of it but I never really read the play....">> And nobody's done a notable movie adaptation since Roman Polanski in the 70s, so that's not a likely source either. (Why is that anyway? Why no MacBeth movie in two decades? Even Ken Braunagh hasn't attempted one)

Greg> <<When X says Angela is lovely in "Cloud Fathers" I don't think anyone thought he was being salacious.>> I dunno. Angie looks enough like her mother, and Xanatos is a man of rare tastes. You can't tell me the thought didn't ever cross his mind the whole time he worked with Demona. (And was probably filed away immediately under either "Pipedream" or "Dangerous Hobbies For *After* I Gain My Immortality")


Aaron - [JCarnage@Yahoo.com]
Thursday, September 12, 2002 06:17:42 PM
IP: 66.142.70.253

I had a much longer and detailed post written up but my computer stalled and it was all lost which upset the hell out of me. Anyway:


MOONCAT - You wrote: [Is CN trying to get ahold of it?]

Yes. They originally wanted it which was why FOX went after it. CN is waiting for the rights granted to FOX to expire and then is going to try again to get it.

You wrote: [It was a fabulous series, uncut.]

And subtitled. The dub was good, one of the better dubs I've heard but the original is still much better. As for uncut I don't think that even on CN that we'd get an uncut version. Still Toonami/Adult Swim edits are done much better than the butchering job we got on FOX. I think that they wouldn't hurt it as much.



JURGAN - You wrote: [See, it was my impression that that was the norm, not the exception.]

In general it all depends. Most recently in Japan most series run 13 episodes and if they are popular or didn't finish up the main storyline or both then they get another series which in the end basically amounts to a second season (Ex: VANDRED, MAHOROMATIC). 26 episode series nowadays tend to be ones that are designed to be like COWBOY BEBOP - self contained and ending out their storylines in the episodes given to them (Ex: GXP). The longer series tend to be based on popular manga and run as long as the manga provides fresh material to animate (Ex: INU YASHA, ONE PIECE).

But the point is really that they aren't tied to that limit - it all depends on how much material there is and how popular the series is. So a 100+ episode series isn't out of the question like it is here. They don't have to get to 39 or 65 episodes and then just stop; they can carry the story to the end or go on endlessly as long as its popular and can keep its ratings up.

You wrote: [How long was Yu Yu Hakusho?]

112 episodes and 2 movies. CN has only shown the first story arc; the next one will take the series into a sort of DBZ tournament style storyline except that in the case of this series it doesn't go on forever, has a point to it, doesn't have 80 episodes for 5 minutes of battle and maintains characterization. In other words a tournament but better than anything DBZ.

You wrote: [You don't need to tell me about Tenchi. I've been highly active in the TM! fandom for the last year]

I'm not active but I tend to lurk alot. TENCHI is one of my favorite anime so I try to keep up with the information.

You wrote: [The only difference is that Shin was never intended as canon to the original and so couldn't drag it down.]

That's another flexibile thing about Anime - you can have tons of alternate storyline series for the same characters. It doesn't always work out well as in the case of SHIN TENCHI but at least they had the opportunity and flexibility to try.

You wrote: [I'm afraid now that Funimation has the rights. If this means they're getting OAV 3, they'd better get the original voice actors back.]

They've done well with BLUE GENDER and I've heard that they have good intentions for FRUIT BASKETS so I think that they'll treat GXP well. They will most probably use their own in house dub talent for the series meaning that the characters will all sound like the cast of DBZ but they did mention at BAAF/AXNY that they would try to get the original dub voice cast back for the original characters who show up. And they really only have one episode devoted to them (episode 17) so largely its not such a huge concern. Still I'm hoping they get the dub cast back - I can't picture the dub for those characters being done by anyone else.

They don't have OVA 3; I imagine Pioneer will try to keep that one since it deals with the main Tenchi cast. I can't see them letting go of the main TENCHI franchise; since GXP is a spinoff it might not mean as much to them as the main OVA might.



GREG - You wrote: [Thank God for that French minister, eh?]

I was a bit suprised that Macbeth actually went and got a Priest for his ceremony rather than a Judge. Could Macbeth still be a little religious? I always figured Macbeth for either an agnostic or an aethist given all he went through and has seen in his life. (I'm attributing the choice of Priest to Macbeth because I just can't see Demona really giving a damn. Her main goal is to just get his wealth so it wouldn't have mattered either way to her.)

You wrote: [Now had he been awake, do you think she would have made that request? Or would she in fact be distancing herself from him simply BECAUSE she had that impulse?]

She probably wouldn't have brought it up if they were both awake. Although I have to wonder if Goliath ever really understood how she might view being in Paris. After all while it is a romantic city to Humans, to him its just another city that they are visiting while travelling. Angela was interested in Notre Dame but she heard stories from Princess Katherine. Would he have even realized (if they hadn't been distracted by the Quest mission) that Elisa would see it as a City of Love? (And to be honest would anything have come of it even even he knew and she asked? After all what kind of romantic evening can you have travelling with your adult daughter and your pet? :-) )

You wrote: [He's afraid of what the knowledge will do to Angela. He's afraid of what Demona will do with Angela, should Angela share that knowledge. And is he perhaps afraid of what -- under Demona's influence -- Angela might become?]

So basically he's acting like a Parent even when he's trying not to be recognized as one.

I think that he was really being dismissive of Angela in general although to be honest he doesn't really know that much about her so he doesn't have that much to dismiss his fear with. After all can we say that they've really talked to each other up to this point? (Elisa being around doesn't help since it might make the situation a bit uncomfortable to have free conversation. There might be things he doesn't want Elisa to hear or know that he might want to tell Angela.)

In the end he's being more tied to biology that she is. Her personal interest started because she found out that they were biologically related but it could have just as easily developed out of the Gargoyle Way as well - after all Demona is her mother either way you look at it. She might have taken an interest in her either way. Goliath in the meantime is being a bit more possessive that the Gargoyle Way he's preaching probably intended. He has a good reason but still he's not putting alot of confidence in Angela; she hasn't shown any inclination towards the dark side and her judgement that he's seen up to this point has been solid. All she's been doing is asking valid if slightly more personal questions than the she might ask if she didn't know about a biological connection. He's much more paranoid about it than she is and it doesn't help that they both have a temper and stubborn streak (as illustrated later in the episode and just by the fact that she's still interested in asking even after all Goliath's discouragement).

You wrote: [What did you all think of that line? At this point we had only seen one silhouetted monster from a distance.]

All evidence at the point lean towards it being Demona except that in the newspaper she's holding the silhouette is Goliath-ish which gives Thailog as a clue. But its shown right before a battle that distracts from it; I didn't notice that clue the first time I saw the episode - I mean I saw it but Thailog didn't register. It was a suprise for him to show up but especially since when he does show up he's in the distance and not easy to make out. All you can hear is his voice and THEN a close-up which makes the enterance even more shocking.

You wrote: [Elisa sits at a french cafe talking out loud to herself. Ugh. Very awkward.]

Didn't mind. Actually all things considered I'm suprised she didn't start to talk to herself even earlier. (It could even sort of feed into her speech in HIGH NOON about how she yearns so much for a normal life - this life has her in Paris and all she can do is sit in a cafe and talk to herself about Demona. :-) ) It would have been nice though if the narrartion had been done in a bit of a whisper so that it came off as her muttering to herself instead of doing outright narraration which should have had the french waiters shaking their heads at the crazy American tourist. :-) (It might have been nice to have Margot in the table next to her glancing at Elisa, shaking her head in pity and disgust for ruining her quiet lunch in Paris. :-) )

You wrote: [Demona kicks Macbeth into unconsciousness, and Erin asks: "Why didn't she get hurt?"]

I always thought that since this was the first time (to Macbeth anyway) that he went through her transformation that he was more affected by it and thus easier to knock unconscious while at the same time due to nightly transformations she had developed a higher tolerance for pain and could widthstand a hit easier that he could. (It would have been nice to see her able to deal with pain in battle much easier after THE MIRROR since she would have gotten used to a high level of it and it shouldn't bother her as much anymore. Sort of how Superman isn't as affected by lesser pain after having gone through the pain of Kryptonite exposure.)

You wrote: ["Aren't you spunky?'"]

I love that line! It fits Thailog perfectly and the way its said is wonderful acting. Keith as Goliath was great but I really loved how Keith did Thailog. So powerful.

You wrote: [To be fair, he couldn't immediately know that Angela was blood kin, but still doesn't his reaction to her give you the creeps?]

It is creepy which is why I think he did it; he didn't really show any interest in Angela after that in the episode but he did get a reaction out of Goliath which is what he was going for. And every reaction from Goliath gives a little more time for his plan to work. (Besides its not that difficult from a first glance to realize a connection to Goliath considering that Angela has the same coloring and looks a lot like Demona. Anyone with the information that Thailog has can put two and two together and figure out that there is some sort of a connection even if having a grown daughter doesn't make complete logical sense without knowing about Avalon. Still its enough to give Thailog ammunition to get a rise out of Goliath. Which is a bit of fun for Thailog to do.)

You wrote: [Of course, Goliath finally gets the picture after this one. Up to this point, he was thinking Demona's the lost cause but maybe Thailog is salvagable. Now he knows better. At least about T anyway.]

Goliath never really made that much of an effort to "save" Thailog. He gave him a speech on the Gargoyle way in DOUBLE JEOPARDY but that was mostly it. I always figured that despite how he tried to make an effort consciously, that subconsciously his first reaction of disgust and hatred was influencing him a bit. After all he gave Demona a season and a half before he largely gave up on her; he gave up on Thailog in his second appearance. I think that might be why Thailog had such a hate for Goliath - because he was more in tune than he might be given credit for and could see that on some level he'd always be a monster and cheap copy to Goliath.



TODD - You wrote: [all of the romances except for Goliath's and Elisa's that are involved in it don't work out well.]

Well actually in the episode their relationship doesn't work out either. They don't actually pursue it and that could be seen as a sort of failure, an even more tragic one considering that they have a better basis for a personal relationship than any of the ones that are happening outright in the episode itself. This episode doesn't really have a happy ending for anyone - even those who end up on a positive note like Goliath, Elisa, and Macbeth suffer in the episode and end it out if not badly then unhappily. (Goliath and Elisa not only don't pursue a relationship but they end the episode basically in disagreement with Elisa doing the one thing that Goliath didn't want done - confirming that Demona is Angela's mother. Even if it wasn't a secret anymore I think that he might have wanted her to still keep quiet about it too even if it doesn't make sense to do so anymore. And as for Macbeth he might realize that he has something to live for but that doesn't make what happened to him that evening any more easier to swallow. He's deeply embarrassed and humiliated. How's he going to explain to this to his henchmen who were the witnesses at the wedding? :-) )

You wrote: [Anybody else besides me think that Dominique's French accent was remarkably hokey? :)]

Yeah. But I can see why it didn't bother Macbeth. Like I said last week, its probably the same reason he fell for her so quickly - long legged redhead frenchwoman who isn't asking any questions about the past and is interested in him is talking. Why bring up anything about the accent? :-)

You wrote: [he'd have an additional little challenge here when he revealed himself to be *the* Macbeth.]

Its possible it would have caused him problems since the most likely version of Macbeth anyone is really familiar with is the Shakespearean version but still if the situation had been as he really thought it was then what guarantee would there be that she had read the play? How many people stay awake in High School English anymore? :-) There is an equally strong possibility that she'd just say "Oh, Macbeth, you mean like out of Shakespeare? I've heard of it but I never really read the play...."

You wrote: [when Angela got buried underneath the rubble, I found myself half-wondering if she wasn't going to make it out alive.]

I didn't think that here. I figured that she was just introduced so it was unlikely that she'd get killed off so soon; we still hadn't really gotten to know the character yet. In HUNTERS MOON 1 though it was a different story - there I thought that her dying was a strong possibility.
Airwalker - [airwalker9999@yahoo.com]
Brooklyn, NY
Thursday, September 12, 2002 04:07:14 PM
IP: 12.88.94.206

I work at a doctors office and today, a patient came in, who was very old and in a wheelchair. His daughter was telling us that he hasn't been sleeping the past few nights because he swears that there are Gargoyles living in the cave outside his house. I just thought I'd share that.
Jimmy
Thursday, September 12, 2002 03:51:01 PM
IP: 172.169.216.136

Gargoyles Musical > I was just thinking the other day about how certain songs made me think of Gargoyles characters (which is different from Supertramp's "Give a Little Bit" - ever since that GAP commercial, when I hear this song, I think of series of shots of Garg characters singing *sigh*). If you had to do a musical with rock songs, instead of original music, what would you pick?

*grin* Demona - The Bitch is Back, Elton John
David and Fox - Life in the Fast Lane, Eagles
Brooklyn - Every Breath You Take, Police (and I wonder who he's singing about :P)

Sincerely, Allaine
Allaine - [eac2nd@yahoo.com]
Philadelphia, PA
Thursday, September 12, 2002 03:50:51 PM
IP: 205.188.208.9

Ah, a fresh ramble at last! (Looks as though Greg's had to shift these to every other week now). Some thoughts of mine on "Sanctuary".

"Sanctuary" is one of three episodes of "Gargoyles" that I watch once a year (alongside the "Gargoyles summer review") on my tapes, timed for holidays. I watch it regularly on Valentine's Day. (The other two are "Eye of the Beholder", which I watch on Halloween, and "The Hound of Ulster", which I watch on St. Patrick's Day). It does seem nicely suited for that day.

Although something that I realized only very recently is that it's a bit on the melancholy side where it comes to love; all of the romances except for Goliath's and Elisa's that are involved in it don't work out well. Macbeth falls in love with Dominique Destine - it turns out that she's Demona duping and betraying him. But Demona, in her turn, is being betrayed by her "romantic partner", Thailog, although she won't find that out until "The Reckoning". And we get references back to when Goliath and Demona were a couple - and we know how that turned out. Goliath and Elisa are the only ones who do have things going, more or less, right, and they aren't willing, as yet, to fully confess it (although we still have that lovely moment where Goliath tells Macbeth to "find [his] special someone; she's out there", and then glances at Elisa).

Anybody else besides me think that Dominique's French accent was remarkably hokey? :)

After marrying Macbeth, Demona becomes (for a short while) Lady Macbeth, and if you ask me, she fits that role (from the Shakespearean perspective) far better than Gruoch ever did.

I don't blame Goliath for worrying over how Angela will respond to Demona being her mother, but I wonder if Angela really is in that much danger of being corrupted by her. After all, aside from the fact that Angela is a very gentle and caring soul, unlikely to engage in genocidal schemes, her general interactions with humanity have been a lot more positive than have Demona's. She was raised by loving human foster-parents (and if she knows how Princess Katharine and the Magus used to regard gargoyles, she'd see that as all the more indication that humans can change their beliefs about gargoyles for the better), and after that, spends all that time on the skiff with Elisa, whom she looks up to. That's going to have to more than outweigh whatever she sees of "anti-gargoyle" attitudes. In fact, short of Elisa betraying the clan (which would obviously never happen), I doubt that Angela would develop a view of humanity similar to Demona's.

I also picked up on how Thailog and Alex both go by the name of "Alexander", and find it almost creepy. But, as Greg says, very appropriate.

(As a sideline about the significance of Alex having that name - well, it's obvious that Xanatos named his son after Alexander the Great, the famous Macedonian conqueror - and I certainly suspect that Thailog also had Alexander the Great in mind when he chose his first name. But Larry Davidson brought up an interesting fact about that name some years ago - in Greek, it means "protector of mankind", and Alex is growing up alongside a clan of gargoyles, and is particularly close to Lexington. As Larry said, it makes one suspect whether Alex's future is going to be somewhat different from what Xanatos thought it would be).

My own response to the "This is a job for the gargoyles" line was different from Greg's; I cringed at it. It makes the gargoyles sound a little too much like, well, "hokey super-heroes". (Don't get mad at me for saying this, Superman fans! :) ). I certainly never really saw "Gargoyles" as part of the super-hero genre.

I do agree with Greg, however, about Thailog's cunning in, after slipping Macbeth the gun, immediately diverting suspicion from himself by the cry of "Didn't you search him?" That guy's definitely a cunning one.

I also agree about the unsettling nature of Thailog leering at Angela. (And, frankly, I don't think that he'd be at all bothered by the incest element).

One thing that I found myself wondering recently about the bit where Macbeth is about to tell Dominique about himself. It's a very touching moment, as he's about to tell the person whom he believes to be a "normal" young woman from the modern world that he's really an immortal Scotsman almost a thousand years old and not quite so normal, and expressing some concern over it. But I can't help but suspect that, if the situation had been what he believed it to be, he'd have an additional little challenge here when he revealed himself to be *the* Macbeth. After all, nearly everybody knows of Macbeth (outside of "Gargoyles" fans like us, of course) from the Shakespeare play, with a much smaller percentage of the population knowing about the Macbeth of real history. Macbeth might well have had to spend some time explaining to Dominique that he wasn't the murderous tyrant that Shakespeare portrayed him as being, setting the record straight about how Duncan died, etc.

One odd little side-note: the first time that I saw this episode, when Angela got buried underneath the rubble, I found myself half-wondering if she wasn't going to make it out alive. I don't know why, but some part of me was half-suspecting, during the Avalon World Tour, that Angela wouldn't actually make it to the clock tower or New York. (Maybe the influence of too many "status quo" cartoons; that's one thing that I liked about "Gargoyles" - that it didn't preserve the "status quo", that it was willing to make changes - such as inserting a new regular halfway through the second season and keeping that regular inserted).

I've also noticed those portraits of Elisa in Macbeth's mansion. Really makes one wonder how they got there. (Maybe something to do with Brooklyn's Timedancer adventures? :) ).

Truth to tell, it would be interesting to have Elisa be indeed treated as Angela's stepmother. It would certainly be a big change of pace for Disney on that one - a good stepmother for a change - with the biological mother being the "wicked witch"!
Todd Jensen - [merlyn1@mindspring.com]
St. Louis, MO
Thursday, September 12, 2002 07:39:49 AM
IP: 65.57.58.148

ooh! Greg's Ramble! *^_^*

Yes, somehow when Thailog says something, you get a lot of sexual innuendo. I think it's the voice. That incredibly yummy voice *^_^* -- on Goliath it's all noble and virtue, but on Thailog it's decadence and temptation... grr! A good boy with a sexy voice is still a good boy, but a *bad boy* with a sexy voice... yum!

just a quickie comment. mini ramble at best. maybe more later.

MC
>^,,^<
Mooncat
Thursday, September 12, 2002 04:15:32 AM
IP: 68.102.23.36

 Rambled on Thursday, September 12, 2002 02:21:11 AM 

Chapter XLII: "Sanctuary"

Time to ramble...

This episode was directed by Dennis Woodyard, written and story edited by Cary Bates.

The one word title, as usual, was one of mine. I thought initially that we'd be even more focused on the Cathedral. That we might play a Quasimodo character. Heck, if Disney's "Hunchback" movie was going to have living gargoyles bouncing around, then I could have a Quasimodo swinging from the bell-ropes.

But the story, thank goodness, rightly evolved into a family drama with Goliath, Elisa, Angela, Demona, Macbeth and Thailog (and Bronx) providing us with one very ODD family. Quasimodo went away in favor of Thailog.

And we had to work a bit to make sure the thematic idea of the heart as a Sanctuary worked its way into the picture. Thank God for that French minister, eh?

-------

During the "Previously..." recap the following exchange was heard between my eight year old daughter Erin and my five year old son Ben, after Angela learns (in that scene from "Monsters") that Goliath is her biological father:

Benny: He IS her father. He laid the egg.
Erin: Girls lay eggs.
Benny: His wife laid the egg.

-------
ROMANCE

Enter, for the third time or the first (or, depending on your point of view, maybe this one doesn't count either), Ms. Dominique Destine. She tells Mac, "We have all the time in the world..."

This for me (and I know for Bond expert Cary) was a very memorable line from "On Her Majesty's Secret Service." And always a good sign that a relationship is going to come to a bad end.

Elisa tips her hand, which she can do cuz no one is awake, about how she really feels about Goliath here. "The most romantic city in the world and Goliath isn't awake to share it with me." (Or something like that, all quotations are approximate.) That's what she'd like to do, I'd wager. Soar over Paris with G. the way they soared over Manhattan in "Awakenings". Now had he been awake, do you think she would have made that request? Or would she in fact be distancing herself from him simply BECAUSE she had that impulse?

------
After her adventure on the Loch, it's nice to see Margot on a pleasant little stroll through Paris.
------

THE GARGOYLE WAY

Why is Goliath so resistant to parenting Angela? After all, though they're really more like younger brothers, he does his fair share of parenting the Trio.

He falls back on "The Gargoyle Way", but that's certainly inadequate, as Diane Maza will later point out. Yes, he's only one of her rookery fathers, but he's (a) the only one there and (b) the only one left alive except for the two souls trapped inside the AWOL Coldstone.

Ultimately, I think the answer is that Angela's sudden obssession with her "BIOLOGICAL" parentage makes him nervous because of the obvious extrapolation to what comes next. If she's obssessed with me as Daddy, then what happens when she learns who Mommy is?

And that's the key. He's divorced Demona. His wife who laid the egg. It took centuries and months, but after "Vows" he moved on. Now he sees Demona as a nemesis. A painful one to be sure, but a nemesis none the less. He's afraid of what the knowledge will do to Angela. He's afraid of what Demona will do with Angela, should Angela share that knowledge. And is he perhaps afraid of what -- under Demona's influence -- Angela might become?

-----
THE CATHEDRAL

There's some nice animation in this episode -- but none of it is at Notre Dame. That sequence put us through fits in retakes and editing. Ugghh. It's still painful to look at.

But there's some nice stuff going on...

Demona says: "In here my love." to Goliath before she realizes its not Thailog. What did you all think of that line? At this point we had only seen one silhouetted monster from a distance. And since you knew Demona was in town, we intentionally tried to lead you to belive that she was the Monster at Notre Dame. Were you expecting Thailog? Or did you think that Demona was addressing G as 'my love'?

Goliath's arrival is a shock to her, so what did you think then?

Then Thailog's arrival is supposed to be a bigger shock to you guys. Was it?

I love hearing Thailog say: "My angel of the night."

Demona has a good line too: "Jealous and paranoid."

Later, we set up Nightstone Unlimited and their two "human" identities, Alexander Thailog and Dominique Destine.

At this point in production, we knew that Fox was going to have a baby but we had not named it yet. I couldn't think of a better first name for Thailog and later I couldn't think of a better first name for Alexander Xanatos. At first this bugged me. But I began to realize it made perfect sense. Xanatos had programmed his "first" son well. If X would pick Alexander, why wouldn't T have picked it as well. And there's something so symmetrical about both his kids being named Alexander.

------

TOURISTS

Elisa sits at a french cafe talking out loud to herself. Ugh. Very awkward. Obviously, we couldn't come up with a solution we liked better. I'm sure it occured to me to do it in voice over, but just chucking a V.O. sequence in the middle of an ep is very awkward too. Suddenly, the movie is POV Elisa, and we weren't doing that here. (Cf. "Revelations" and Matt's VO narration.)

I do like her last line though, coming as it did from a long time Superman scripter, Cary Bates: "This is a job... for the Gargoyles!"

-------

THE WEDDING NIGHT

We had Macbeth use the Lennox Macbeth name instead of Lennox Macduff because we thought it would be too confusing to give him an entirely different name to any new viewers. And it makes sense that he has multiple aliases. But it still bugs me and I think in hindsight, I wish we had just been consistent.

Demona kicks Macbeth into unconsciousness, and Erin asks: "Why didn't she get hurt?"

And that's a very fair question. As usual with D&M's Corsican Brother connection, we tried very hard to be faithful to it, but it was very hard. And we wound up being a bit inconsistent. The best I can suggest is that when Demona knows she's going to hurt M and it isn't just on impulse, she can more or less steel herself against the magical feedback. It's still painful. But she doesn't show it as much.

------

The Gargoyles wake up and Elisa says: "Look alive, guys!" Well, they do now, don't they?

-------

I love how Thailog slips Mac the gun and then later yells at Demona, "Didn't you search him?!" He's an evil genius that one. And passive-aggressive too.

Thailog's plan is brilliant, I think. So elegant. So simple. And if not for Elisa, so effective.

Mac's suicidal tendencies resurface. Demona's legendary temper gets the better of her common sense.

Thailog really comes into his own in this ep. Sure, Xanatos said he may have created a monster, but now Thailog has outsmarted X, D and M. Who the hell is left to outsmart?

And he has some great lines too:

"You and what clan?"

"Teamwork is so overrated."

"Aren't you spunky?'" (Another Lou Grant reference of course.)

To be fair, he couldn't immediately know that Angela was blood kin, but still doesn't his reaction to her give you the creeps? When X says Angela is lovely in "Cloud Fathers" I don't think anyone thought he was being salacious. But T? Yeah, baby.

Of course, Goliath finally gets the picture after this one. Up to this point, he was thinking Demona's the lost cause but maybe Thailog is salvagable. Now he knows better. At least about T anyway.

------

BATTLE

There's a lot of water in that water tower. It looks cool though. The animation here makes up for the Cathedral stuff.

I love Goliath's two-handed punch.

I love Demona's punch-drunken sway, as she makes her move to, as Mac says, "put us out of our misery..."

But I've always wondered why the background painters put multiple pictures of Elisa on the wall of Macbeth's chateau. Odd, that.

-------

When I was young, I used to love MASH, particularly back in the Wayne Rogers days. (And, yes, Wayne is a friend of my dad's now. But they didn't know each other back then so I was unbiased.) But one thing that used to drive me nuts was the repetition of the following exchange:

<LOTS OF SHELLING IS ROCKING THE HOSPITAL. SUDDENLY, IT STOPS.>

Hawkeye: Do you hear that?
Someone else: Hear what?
Hawkeye: Silence! The shelling's stopped!

This was fine the first time they used it. By the twentieth time it got VERY old.

But we do a version of it here after Elisa shoots Demona ending the battle.

Why? When it used to drive me nuts? It's amazing what I'll pay tribute too.

------

KEITH meet MR. DAVID

I love playing Thailog against Goliath, because I love those Thailog/Goliath exchanges where Keith plays both roles. That's one of the main reasons we created Thailog. To enjoy listening to Keith go to town.

------

1st Epilogue:

Goliath: "She has done you a favor, Macbeth."

That line should be a bit of a shock when G first says it. But it makes a lot of sense after he explains. And I love the look that Goliath and Elisa share. They aren't even pretending they don't share those feelings. They just won't act on them.

And how about Goliath actually telling a joke: "Just make sure you get a good look at her at night." Word.

2nd Epilogue:

One of the things I like about our series is we didn't have to end each episode the same way.

This one ends rather darkly. Goliath won't acknowledge the obvious. He just broods. Angela turns to Elisa: "Elisa, I have to know." And Elisa confirms that Demona is Angela's mother, because it's ridiculous to either lie or to not confirm the obvious that Angela has already figured out. But she knows G didn't want A to know that. So everyone is left unhappy as we sail into the fog.

And Erin ends the episode saying: "I think Elisa should be her mother."

(Me, I've always seen them sharing a more sisterly relationship. But I thought Erin's idea was sweet, and certainly came out of the sexual tension between E&G.)

Anyway, that's my ramble. Where's yours?

Greg Weisman
Thursday, September 12, 2002 02:23:03 AM
IP: 67.219.78.41

You know, I start to wonder if maybe Greg was thinking of Planet of the Apes when he came up with New Olympians. Not necessarily, but there are some similarities.

"COWBOY BEBOP was specifically designed and ended after 26 episodes. The director and creator both stated that they have no desire or intention to do more and that it is a finished story which it basically is since it resolved its main plots more or less."

See, it was my impression that that was the norm, not the exception. I don't know, I'd have to do some more research on this, but I haven't seen very many animes that go much longer. How long was Yu Yu Hakusho? CN has been playing that once a week, and they've gone through a full cycle since about half a year ago, which works out to about twenty-six weeks, so I unless they're only showing part...

You don't need to tell me about Tenchi. I've been highly active in the TM! fandom for the last year (incidentally, I'm writing the first ever Gargoyles/Tenchi crossover, involving both Timedancer and 2198). The whole AIC rant was a joke mostly. I was making fun of some of the more rabid Tenchi fans who are constantly bitching about something that was done wrong (just look up the name "K'thardin"). The next step is to call Masaki Kajishima a talentless incestual hack. I agree that Shin Tenchi had some good parts, but compared to the original I think it is analogous to TGC. The only difference is that Shin was never intended as canon to the original and so couldn't drag it down. I know about GXP- I've seen a couple episodes, but I'm afraid now that Funimation has the rights. If this means they're getting OAV 3, they'd better get the original voice actors back. As for OAV 4- [snort] I'll believe that when I see it.
Jurgan - [jurgan6@yahoo.com]
Wednesday, September 11, 2002 11:24:53 PM
IP: 206.74.212.254

Airwalker - re Escaflowne. Is CN trying to get ahold of it? I hope they will show it without the horrible ripcuts and re-edits it got on Network TV. It was a fabulous series, uncut.

MC
>^,,^<
Mooncat
Wednesday, September 11, 2002 08:59:37 PM
IP: 68.102.23.36

Sorry about the double post but I noticed Aaron put something up while I was typing and I figured that as long as I'm here I might as well respond. :-) Anyway:


AARON - You wrote: [Miramax Animation sounds good.]

I could live with that. :-)

You wrote: [Well, we can't say for certain that the series would have been like that.]

I didn't mean the TEAM ATLANTIS series that Greg was working on. That I know would have been something original and interesting. I meant that the actual ATLANTIS movie that Disney already put out was basically NADIA spliced together by committee. That's the only way to really describe it.

You wrote: [if CN had picked up the rights to Nadia, quick-dubbed it]

Its already dubbed. I don't think CN would spend time trying to get this series; maybe if ATLANTIS had been a hit. But otherwise they'd rather spend the time getting ESCAFLOWNE.

You wrote: [Wasn't Eisner creative and experimental in approach when he came in?]

Sort of. And GARGOYLES did technically happen under his rule. Its just that since the mid 90's he and Disney have just gotten stale and repetative. They are starting to improve slightly (Stuff like LILO AND STITCH help) but its not enough.

You wrote: [Personally, I think they did exactly what they wanted with the Ghibli films: Buried them so America couldn't see what big screen, mature-theme animation looks like.]

To be honest the only really wanted the Ghibli films so they could make money in the Japanese market; however they had to buy the worldwide right to get the rights in Japan so that's what they did. I don't think that they really had huge plans for Ghibli in America.

And I don't think that they purposefully buried PRINCESS MONONOKE; they are a business after all and would have liked to at least break even on paying for the dub. The problem I think is that they didn't bother to watch it until after the dub was done. They thought that it was just the Japanese equivilent of BEAUTY AND THE BEAST the way I hear it and then once they took a look at it to watch the dub they were shocked. They'd probably have had better luck with LAPUTA which would have been closer to Disneyish sensibilities. But they stuck with MONONOKE and didn't know what to do with it.

I will say one thing - if a movie is impossible to find in NYC and the one place that does have it plays it only once a month then you have no right to say its a failure. Market and release it better and you wouldn't have a problem.

You wrote: [Uhhhhhhh, if I smile and nod, and pretend like I know what that means, can we not expose my hopeless ignorance of DC's regular titles? 'Cause the only thing I ever read that was set in the regular DC universe was Garth Ennis' Hitman.]

HITMAN's gone and Ennis is at Marvel doing PUNISHER and a few SPIDER MAN specials.

KINGDOM COME was the painted story by Alex Ross where the DC universe basically almost comes to an end because Superman is an idiot. They later did a mini-series sequel to it which they used to reestablish the multiverse concept in the DC Universe which they had eliminated several years before in ZERO HOUR, the story where Hal Jordan aka Silver Age Green Lantern goes insane and tries to become god but is stopped short of it. He eliminated the idea that the DC universe could have alternate realities there and they used KINGDOM COME to get rid of that because they ran out of ways to ruin one DC universe and needed a few more of them to play with.

Krypto the Super Dog was Superman's pet dog from Krypton before 1986 rebooted him out of existance. He was a dog with superpowers. And now he's back. Bat-Mite was an annoying imp in the 1950's Batman comics who basically was a cross between a hard core Otaku and the Comic Book Guy from the Simpsons but with Superpowers and a Batman fetish. He followed Batman around and tried to be his mascot but always ended up causing problems.

You wrote: [Barnes & Noble intends to establish their own franchise of comicbook shops.]

It would be a better idea to just expand the TPB section that they have in current bookstores. Comic Shops have been dying since after the early 90's speculator market dried up. I agree that there would be advantages to B&N having Comic stores in terms of stock and distribution but at the same time you get more general audience going into bookstores rather than comic shops because they are less embarassed to do so. Most regular people won't step foot in a comic shop but will flip through TPB/Manga in a bookstore.

You wrote: [Three, if the current trends at B&N are any indicators, the major movers in the industry are going to do a reshuffle. Of the top ten selling TPBs at B&N right now, five of them belong to, not DC, or Marvel, or even Image, but Viz Comics.]

I think that the market will eventually move to Manga. Although I don't know if it will be VIZ since TOKYOPOP can put out more material at a faster rate and a lot of it is very popular and extremely affordable. (They have TPBs for ten bucks compared with VIZ and DARK HORSE 15-20 dollar manga.)

You wrote: [It's been estimated that if this comes to pass, many books may stop doing single issues altogether, in favor of simply releasing a TPB every three or four months, containing the stories that would have been released singly during that time.]

TOKYOPOP is already doing that. And everyone else is moving to merge single issued books into anthologies. Shonen Jump and Raijin Comics are pure anthologies with TPB release every few months. And DARK HORSE has Super Manga Blast to work its way into that market. (I hope that Disney might want to get in on the action and ask Greg to do GARGOYLES and maybe some spinoffs in an anthology magazine or work on some GARGOYLES related TPB/GN format release. This is the perfect property that they have for this format.)
Airwalker - [airwalker9999@yahoo.com]
Brooklyn, NY
Wednesday, September 11, 2002 07:14:30 PM
IP: 12.88.86.159

Sorry about the double post, but I just read Todd's.

[So knight are mythical after all]
lol.

Okay, that's out of my system.
Jimmy
Wednesday, September 11, 2002 07:11:46 PM
IP: 172.140.120.194

[I still would have liked for Macbeth to have been a little more respectful/awed in Arthur's presence]
Aside from what Airwalker said, Macbeth still might have some subconcious residual notion that Arthur is out there. Besides, I don't think Macbeth's reaction would be awe like ours would be. It would probably be something like when a celebrity meets a celebrity. When most normal people meet celebrities, they are awestruck, but to others it's no big deal. Similarly, Macbeth meets Arthur and thinks "Hey, he's my idol. Too bad I'll have to kick his ass." Macbeth has seen some crazy stuff in his day, so it's unlikely that he would be starstruck be seeing King Arthur.
Jimmy
Wednesday, September 11, 2002 07:08:07 PM
IP: 172.140.120.194

AIRWALKER - Good points about the "New Olympians" episode. (I'm staying out of the anime discussion since my knowledge of it is so low that I wouldn't be able to contribute anything worthwhile to the conversation). Yes, you're probably right that only Taurus and Boreas would know about the incident. But we do see that Taurus had to reassess his attitude towards humans - or at least, towards Elisa - after she helped stop Proteus.

No doubt, Greg Weisman will be able to explain some of the snags that you brought up about this episode when he gets to it - though we've a long wait, since he hasn't even gotten to "Sanctuary" as yet.

One other bit about this episode that I rather like: the bit where Taurus, at the end, comments that Elisa isn't like the "humans of legend". I thought that was a particularly fun line for a few reasons. First of all, the humans that he's most likely referring to (in light of the New Olympians' origins and especially his earlier mention of the fate of his ancestor the Minotaur) are the heroes of Greek mythology, such as Theseus, Heracles, Perseus, etc. So the "humans of legend" are "humans of legend" for us, as well as for the New Olympians.

But also, it gives an interesting "turn the tables" effect on humanity, with the notion that here, on New Olympus, an island inhabited by mythical creatures such as minotaurs and centaurs, it's humans who are mythical. A case of "throwing things in reverse" here.

(There's a similar scene in a short story by Tolkien, "Farmer Giles of Ham", which is set in early medieval Britain. A giant wanders down from the Welsh mountains, where - in the story - giants and dragons live, goes trampsing around England for a bit until Farmer Giles chases him off with shot from his blunderbuss - which the giant mistakes for stinging flies - and then returns home, to tell his neighbors about his adventures in a seemingly prosperous and unguarded England. The dragons, listening to his story, comment "So knights are mythical after all!")
Todd Jensen - [merlyn1@mindspring.com]
St. Louis, MO
Wednesday, September 11, 2002 06:49:52 PM
IP: 65.56.169.90

TODD - You wrote: [To be perfectly fair here, I believe that it's inevitable that, at that stage, practically all the New Olympians are going to be anti-human, given that the only humans that they're familiar with are the ones from their records who persecuted them back in ancient times and drove them into hiding.]

I'm not so sure. I can see that in general the direction of the New Olympian feeling in general would not be positive. But on the other hand it was largely an academic issue to anyone on the island outside of the inner circle of government. I would think that there might be some who might not take the old legends at face value just as we don't accept Greek Mythology as truthful anymore.

And once a Human (Elisa) did show up I was a bit suprised that at least a few not too friendly yet curious academics who might feel differently than the rest of the population didn't show up. Its supposed to be a democracy after all - there would have been at least some sort of contrast in opinion. I'm just sorry that we didn't have enough time to get into it. If THE NEW OLYMPIANS had been an hour long episode we would have had the opportunity to see some NOlympians put forward a different viewpoint instead of having a completely hostile island of mythological beings vs Goliath and Angela's argument in Elisa's favor.

You wrote: [It's after Elisa saves their island from Proteus that they would start having reason to reconsider their views about humanity.]

I think that a bit of the hostility might get toned down or at the very least the NOlympian population (or at least a few of them) would be willing to be more open minded. But I do wonder - was the general population informed of how Proteus escaped and how Elisa saved the island?

Considering the level of hostility we saw it would cause political problems for both Taurus and Boreas if it were to get out into the open that not only did Proteus escape and not only was he stopped by a Human but also that they took the risk of letting that Human leave the island. I wouldn't be suprised if there might have been a cover-up or if the story had been modified slightly for public consumption. The public might not even really know about Elisa's part in the Proteus Affair. Except for Taurus none of the other witnesses saw her save anyone - they have her breaking out of prison and attacking Helios before joyriding through the skys of the city. Even Talos was offline at that point. And her leaving could have been presented to the population an escape (thus putting Proteus as her accomplice who she abandoned when she left the island). In fact its possible that Boreas could have said she was killed while trying to escape to cover up letting her go.

So I'm not so sure that she would have been seen as the great savior of New Olympus and as an example that Humanity might be trustworthy. Its more possible that her presence started up a debate and that this episode serves as good prologue for what Greg had in mind for the spinoff.



JURGAN - You wrote: [my understanding is that a lot of people really hated this one.]

Its not that I hate it; its that it irritates me. I have a hard time sitting through it. But that doesn't mean that I think its a bad episode.

You wrote: [I thought there was a lot of wasted potential. The problem, I agree, was the one-dimensionality of the New Olympians.]

I think that it was more time induced wasted potential rather than something major that was missing in the episode. I could accept the feelings of the New Olympians. And much of it was well done - Boreas alone was a powerfully done character in the little screentime he got. Trying to be fair on the one hand but at the same time being shaped by his prejudice and ending up committing an injustice. The problem is lack of time - we can't get into a philosophical debate or have a New Olympian opposition show up. Everything has to be resolved in 22 minutes. So a lot of stuff has to be left out. And since this is GARGOYLES and not THE NEW OLYMPIANS we can't take out the Goliath and Company stuff to include material on the New Olympians. That was the main serious defect of the episode - we never get an opportunity to get a sympathetic (even if still hostile) side to the New Olympians. Except for one or two characters they largely stay a screaming mob.

Lack of time takes away other directions that could have been followed. I can't believe that they wouldn't want to question her on Human civilization and capability. What I really wonder is what exactly the New Olympians think the Human world really knows outside of advancing technological development. I was disappointed that Elisa or Goliath didn't try to make the arguement that even if she did want to tell anyone in the outside world about New Olympus that nobody would believe her since nobody believes in the Myths anymore; that she'd be thrown in the nearest asylum if she even mentioned any of this (or her other adventures) to anyone.

You wrote: [I still would have liked for Macbeth to have been a little more respectful/awed in Arthur's presence.]

Well we didn't actually see his reaction when he first (in PENDRAGON) hears that the stranger he saw was actually Arthur Pendragon. He may have been shocked and in a bit of awe. But once that went away I wasn't that unhappy with his reaction - he's an immortal who has interacted with the three races and seen and done things which most people would never even dream of. King Arthur standing in front of him shouldn't be that shocking. (And Arthur should be even less shocking considering that Macbeth's goal after finding out about Excalibur was to get to the Sword and then keep it rather than meet and talk and fight with King Arthur.)

You wrote: [It sounds like you're suggesting that 100+ episode series are common in Japan, when that's just not true.]

I wasn't trying to say that it is a standard but it has a better chance of happening. While the standard in Japan has recently become 26 episodes they aren't married to that number or formula. For example DA DA DA ran 72 (or 76) episodes and finished recently. NADIA ran 39 episodes. SABER MARIONETTE J (which is just one long storyline into its sequels J Again and JtoX) is 57 episodes. INU YASHA is somewhere in the 80's and is still going. DETECTIVE CONAN is well in the area of 250+ and still going. And ONE PIECE is something 100+.

And if we start to go back in Anime Time a few years we get much longer series happening; the times used to be that we'd get endless shows like RANMA 1/2, MAISON IKKUKO, URUSEI YATSURA, DRAGONBALL (and DBZ), YU YU HAKUSHO, DR SLUMP, YAWARA, KODOMO NO OMOCHA, RUROUNI KENSHIN and so on and so forth.

So while 26 episode series have been coming out of Japan it doesn't always and hasn't always been so. (And I didn't even mention the various GUNDAM series or even the Go Nagi sagas.) I attribute that sort of flexibility to Anime; American animation doesn't have that sort of flexibility. In Japan if GARGOYLES were popular (even mildly popular) it would if not get more episodes then at least get a few spinoffs done or at least a few OVA stories. It would have been milked for all its worth just like EVANGELION was or TENCHI and TRANSFORMERS are.

You wrote: [Even incredibly popular series like Cowboy Bebop typically don't go any farther than that.]

COWBOY BEBOP was specifically designed and ended after 26 episodes. The director and creator both stated that they have no desire or intention to do more and that it is a finished story which it basically is since it resolved its main plots more or less. (CN is begging for new episodes but I don't think that they'll be successful and doing them with a new staff is an easy way to wreck the series.) Even the movie only takes place during the run of the series and is really just a longer episode. (In fact its really episode 22 1/2 since it takes place between episode 22 and 23.)

You wrote: [There's a different attitude towards storytelling over there. The producers of these series are given twenty-six episodes in which to tell a complete story. In America, you tell a few stories and hope you're given a chance to tell more.]

It honestly depends on the series and its popularity. The less popular the less likely to have long runs. And if the run is designed to be self contained then it is ala COWBOY BEBOP. To be honest most anime is based on manga and they tend to go on as long as the manga provides material to be animated. That tends to be the dynamic in most cases unless it is an original series not based on a manga. (In the case of COWBOY BEBOP the anime came first and then the manga was created to capitalize on its popularity and make more money.)

You wrote: [Tenchi Muyo! has had countless spinoffs.]

Only due to popularity. Even the Manga is based off the OVA and wouldn't have been done if the series hadn't been a success.

You wrote: [Shin Tenchi (in Tokyo), the Goliath Chronicles of Tenchi]

It wasn't THAT bad. It was bad but it had a few episodes and themes here and there that were redeemable. The first 7 episodes though were horrible; it was so bad that the team working on it got fired off the series and a new team was brought in. That's why some small part of a storyline starts out around episode 7 or 8. The problem is that the damage was already done. I still enjoy an occasional episode now and then. But I'll take the OVA or TENCHI UNIVERSE over TENCHI IN TOKYO any day.

You wrote: [while never finsihing the original, dragging it out for over ten years, milking it for everything it's worth, driving away Hayashi, those bastards at AIC!]

At least they are doing more of it now - TENCHI GXP is a spinoff side story that is airing currently in Japan and which Funimation picked up the rights to while the 3rd OVA is being worked on as we speak. If it does well then there are plans for a 4th one as well.

You wrote: [Very few shows are extended beyond the twenty-six- remember, we only see the most popular stuff over here anyway.]

There are fansub/digisubs of the less popular not picked up material. Thats how you can see most of SLAM DUNK (90+ subtitled so far) FLAME OF RECCA (42 episodes), GAOGAIGAR (47 episodes), HAJIME NO IPPO (33 episodes subbed so far and its likely that Rajiin Comics is going to pick it up soon), HIKARU NO GO (46 episodes subbed so far), HUNTER X HUNTER (62 episode series and likely to be picked up since its by the same guy who did YU YU HAKUSHO), and tons of others.

And we're going to be getting longer series in the future too from various Anime Companies - RAVE (45+ and still going in Japan last I heard), CITY HUNTER (something like three seasons and tons of movies and specials), INITAL D, LUPIN III, ONE PIECE (I'd give episode counts but I'm not sure - I know LUPIN is in the 50-100 level depending on the season in question and ONE PIECE is 100+ but I don't have exact numbers. And INITAL D had at least 3-5 seasons to it so its plenty long) just to name a few.
Airwalker - [airwalker9999@yahoo.com]
Brooklyn, NY
Wednesday, September 11, 2002 06:37:03 PM
IP: 12.88.86.159

Late, but better than never...

MoonCat> Ah. I see. In an ironic twist, the punk Misfits now have their own line of dolls...

Airwalker> <<Maybe it might be a good idea for them to get a seperate mature animation label for themselves so that they could keep the Disney brand name sanitized and still make money for other markets.>> Miramax Animation sounds good.

<<(ATLANTIS would have been a great first step towards originality and fresh ideas except for the fact that it was basically 39 episodes of NADIA THE SECRET OF BLUE WATER pieced together by some committee.)>> Well, we can't say for certain that the series would have been like that. The movie was an awful rip-off to be sure, (And so is the much more beloved Lion King for that matter) but with Greg voice directing it, the series might have managed to rise from it's origins.

(On a side note, someone once pointed out that, although they wouldn't want this to happen since Greg was working on the series, that it would be a kind of poetic justice if CN had picked up the rights to Nadia, quick-dubbed it, and released it before Disney could get Team Atlantis to market. At which point, someone else pointed out that, the American viewing public being what it is, that would probably lead to nothing except Nadia being labeled "an Atlantis rip-off." Sad, but true.

<<And there is no guarentee that his successor will be more creative and experimental in approach. Still one can hope....>> Wasn't Eisner creative and experimental in approach when he came in? Heralded as the savior of Disney and all that? Trouble is, he's gotten complacent, surrounded by yes-men, and should probably step down to preserve his legacy before suffering the indignity of being fired. (Of course, he'll probably get a multi-million dollar severance package, so maybe he should stick around after all) I won't say they couldn't get anybody worse, because fate has a way of jinxing such statements, but I don't think this is a case where the devil we know is a better choice.

<<And they did pick up the rights to all those Miyazaki films even if they have completely botched how they marketed PRINCESS MONONOKE>> Personally, I think they did exactly what they wanted with the Ghibli films: Buried them so America couldn't see what big screen, mature-theme animation looks like.

<<Now DC is in the rut; milking KINGDOM COME to eliminate Zero Hour isn't exactly what I'd call the best writing in the world. And I shouldn't mention it but - Krypto the Super Dog is actual continuity these days. What's next, Bat-mite?>> Uhhhhhhh, if I smile and nod, and pretend like I know what that means, can we not expose my hopeless ignorance of DC's regular titles? 'Cause the only thing I ever read that was set in the regular DC universe was Garth Ennis' Hitman.

<<What changes?>> (Dr. Science voice) I'm glad you asked me that question, Rodney.

What I keep hearing is this: Barnes & Noble intends to establish their own franchise of comicbook shops. But they won't sell single issues. Like the regular B&N stores, they'll only carry trade paperbacks. This is significant for a number of reasons.

One, B&N has money. If they want to do this, it'll happen. They can compete on an equal (or better) level with anybody. They could become the WalMart of the comic world, the place that's open later and has (bigger/better/more) stuff. (And, like WalMart, they could end up putting all their little mom-and-pop competitors out of business)

Two, B&N has their own distribution system. Which means they effectively get to make an end run around the Microsoft of comics, Diamond Distribution, the evil monopoly that's held comicdom hostage since at least the early 90s. The effect this has on Diamond and the industry in general should be interesting to watch.

Three, if the current trends at B&N are any indicators, the major movers in the industry are going to do a reshuffle. Of the top ten selling TPBs at B&N right now, five of them belong to, not DC, or Marvel, or even Image, but Viz Comics. The translated manga people. Viz could become the number one volume comic company in the US. Below them are DC, (on the strength of their Vertigo line, not their superhero books) Dark Horse, (The Star Wars licences) and then Marvel.

It's been estimated that if this comes to pass, many books may stop doing single issues altogether, in favor of simply releasing a TPB every three or four months, containing the stories that would have been released singly during that time.

Matt> Nah, I'm not selling my Battle Beasts right now. Got too many fond memories of them still. (Besides, I'd have to find where I put them)

Sanctuary> Yes, this was about the time I started to really, *really* dislike Thailog...

Todd> <<For one thing, I've never heard Xanatos give an evil chuckle while carrying out one of his schemes.>> Well, there is that one time in Reawakening, even if it was for ironic effect. I dunno, maybe he's just laughing maniacally on the inside.

Bud-Clare> My condolences about your father. <<he only reason I thought of that now is that I just read a fanfic which used that particular cliche.)>> Really? Who's it by? I'm always on the look-out for good fanfic. (So much of what appears in the archive these days is... distressing, to say the least)

Allaine> <<Normally I'm somebody who likes to say nice things about Demona, but I don't think I ever heard someone refer to her as an "idealist".>> You must have missed our last debate then. I did. (Idealist: (n) One who holds unworkable, impractical, and often fanciful, opinions, dreams, or beliefs, often in the face of logic, reason, and common sense) Goliath and Demona are both idealists, they just happen to hold different ideals. Scary, isn't it. <<well, they could have done a LOT worse. Like Texas.>> :p At least we bathe.


Aaron - [JCarnage@Yahoo.com]
Wednesday, September 11, 2002 06:34:34 PM
IP: 66.136.51.3

A Gargoyles musical I can't see working, unless it were just done as a joke. There was that "Weird Macbeth" story Greg was talking about. There are some characters that would workp I can very easily see Puck singing. For the most part, though, I'd steer clear, but maybe they could use background music.

New Olympians: my understanding is that a lot of people really hated this one. I thought there was a lot of wasted potential. The problem, I agree, was the one-dimensionality of the New Olympians. When they talked about having been persecuted because they "looked different" it was so obvious that there was more to it, and I'm sure that there were some Olympians who weren't squeaky clean (not Proteus, I mean back in the old days). It's the whole cyclical nature of vengeance all over again- neither side of the conflict can ever claim perfection. My problem was that we never saw any NO's even consider that they might have had some share of the guilt in the past.

Demona with the New Olympians: There's a lot that could be done with that. I'd be willing to bet it would have come up in the spin-off.

Pendragon: Okay, I see that it was a little more complex than I gave it credit for. But hey, that's what these forums are for. I still would have liked for Macbeth to have been a little more respectful/awed in Arthur's presence. We've still got a while 'til Greg gets there, and we seemed to have skipped a couple episodes. What about Kingdom? Monsters?

Airwalker: "If GARGOYLES (and American animation in general) were more like Anime then we'd be able to get not only 100+ episode series and endless spin-offs but also specials that could be almost completely unrelated to the series except to be played as comedy or like Gargoyles in concert. (We could get something like the MINIGODDESS series which is just 8 minute comedy shorts with the cast in super deformed mode or something along the line of the Rurouni Kenshin Specials which are flashback episodes with funny framing sequences.)"

Assuming facts not in evidence. It sounds like you're suggesting that 100+ episode series are common in Japan, when that's just not true. The average anime television series lasts twenty-six episodes (I'd guess that this applies to all Japanese television). Even incredibly popular series like Cowboy Bebop typically don't go any farther than that. There's a different attitude towards storytelling over there. The producers of these series are given twenty-six episodes in which to tell a complete story. In America, you tell a few stories and hope you're given a chance to tell more. In Japan, you tell one big story, or twenty-six small stories, and then move on to something else. Most of those stories are based on manga, anyway. Oh, sure, there are exceptions. Tenchi Muyo! has had countless spinoffs. Of course, this started as an OAV, not a TV series, while all the TV series lasted twenty-six episodes. But the OAV was incredibly popular, which allowed them to make twenty thousand spinoffs, including Shin Tenchi (in Tokyo), the Goliath Chronicles of Tenchi, while never finsihing the original, dragging it out for over ten years, milking it for everything it's worth, driving away Hayashi, those bastards at AIC! Oops, went off on a little rant there. Kenshin is also an exception, I suppose. And let's not for get the unbearably long DragonBall. But most TV series in Japan are only twenty-six episodes, and that's all they're supposed to be. Cartoon Network has made an effort to get the creators of Cowboy Bebop to make more of it, and most of the fans have resoundingly said no, because they realize that the show was completed, and making more would ruin it. Very few shows are extended beyond the twenty-six- remember, we only see the most popular stuff over here anyway.
Jurgan - [jurgan6@yahoo.com]
Wednesday, September 11, 2002 03:07:11 PM
IP: 199.79.252.49

Gargoyles: The musical
I take it the following (modern) songs wouldn't be in it:
Angela and Broadway: 'Bad Touch' by the Bloodhound Gang
'Everybody must get stoned'

BUT what about...
Queen: "Stone Cold crazy!" (Modified: Coldstone's crazy!"
Queen: Hammer to fall
Queen: We will rock you

Fire Storm
Wednesday, September 11, 2002 01:20:05 PM
IP: 66.72.179.237

Gargoyles the Musical???? Would this be anything like the Buffy Musical??? Come on I can just see it now.
Sevariius dancing around in his lab.
Puck going into a little ditty while giving Alex a lesson.
Romatic songs between fox and Xanatos... and another one between Goliath and Elisa.
and of course we have to have song sung by both Robyn and Jason.

Spacebabie - [LadyAndromeda@smstars.zzn.com]
Orlando, Fl
Wednesday, September 11, 2002 10:41:28 AM
IP: 67.24.16.70

Ekidna > She had a name? I thought she was nameless. Damn. (Note to self - alter future disclaimers.)

Speaking of the Simpsons, Cartoon Network has announced that it has just bought the rights to the first 72 episodes of "Futurama" and will be airing them during Adult Swim. Since I never watched this show (you know, 60 Minutes and all), this will be a great opportunity to pick it up.

Sincerely, Allaine
Allaine - [eac2nd@yahoo.com]
Philadelphia, PA
Wednesday, September 11, 2002 08:40:41 AM
IP: 64.12.96.138

Yes, I definitely don't think either that they should ever do a musical episode of "Gargoyles"; it's just not "typical Disney" enough for that.

Re Demona and the New Olympians: Airwalker's remarks reminded me of a creativity demon that I once had where Demona decides to go to New Olympus and recruit the locals there for her campaign against humanity. The trouble is that, through a miscalculation on her part, she arrives in the daytime, and the New Olympians promptly view her as another human intruder and give her a very unpleasant reception. (Of course, it makes you wonder what happens when the sun goes down after that :) ).

As for the uniform anti-human prejudice among the NOs: well, technically speaking, Talos didn't display any of it (of course, he's a robot, and therefore very unlikely to develop an attitude of prejudice or xenophobia; you need to be an "irrational" organic being for those kinds of flaws). To be perfectly fair here, I believe that it's inevitable that, at that stage, practically all the New Olympians are going to be anti-human, given that the only humans that they're familiar with are the ones from their records who persecuted them back in ancient times and drove them into hiding. It's after Elisa saves their island from Proteus that they would start having reason to reconsider their views about humanity.
Todd Jensen - [merlyn1@mindspring.com]
St. Louis, MO
Wednesday, September 11, 2002 07:24:23 AM
IP: 67.28.91.192

LORD SLOTH - You wrote: [I was just thinking about how your typical cute (or not so cute) Disney song (with lyrics) would work in GARGOYLES.]

Played seriously I don't think that it would work in GARGOYLES. The GARGOYLES Universe as a whole isn't really designed to take spontaneous singing on a LION KING/DISNEY level very well.

I could see something along the lines of the "Batman The Musical" episode of BATMAN BEYOND taking place in G2198 - a sort of romantic play about Elisa and Goliath that gets all the details wrong. And even then I'm not so sure that it would fit. (But it would sort of be fun to see. :-) )

You wrote: [WOULD it be appropriate for Carl Johnson to create a sing song for Gargoyles?]

If GARGOYLES (and American animation in general) were more like Anime then we'd be able to get not only 100+ episode series and endless spin-offs but also specials that could be almost completely unrelated to the series except to be played as comedy or like Gargoyles in concert. (We could get something like the MINIGODDESS series which is just 8 minute comedy shorts with the cast in super deformed mode or something along the line of the Rurouni Kenshin Specials which are flashback episodes with funny framing sequences.) Then I could see some long Disney like songs being done for GARGOYLES. (It'd be great to see a GARGOYLES musical comedy special done. :-) I'd love to see that. :-) ) If they only did Disney like songs for a soundtrack then it would be nice to hear but I still don't think it would fit in the series itself that well.

You wrote: [He very likely decided then and there to attempt to turn a new leaf; and what better way to do that then to become the Once and Future King and lead the human race]

The thing is that he didn't originally know that he was going to end up going after Excalibur. When the episode started he was after a random power; all he knew was that something was coming and that he wanted it. So it is a good possibility that his motives weren't exactly pure in the beginning of the episode. (It doesn't mean that he was in outright evil villain mode; it could be that he was more directionless in the aftermath of SANCTUARY and moved back into a mode of behavior that had become familiar to him - ambitious sort of villainish territory without really meaning to be evil.)

While it is a good possibility that the idea of what being the Once and Future King demands had crossed his mind as he went to get the sword, I don't think that was the driving force behind him going to get the sword. It was more the idea of just being the King of legend rather than what he would be doing once he reached that point. And that desire to be King is really being driven by a variety of motives from ambition to childhood fantasy to father-son issues. Pretty complex for a 30 second dialogue free scene. :-)

You wrote: [If there's something I've noticed from people who post a lot, it's that they repeat themselves a lot (no offence Mr. Walker, but you do it a fair bit as well (but don't feel bad, U make a ton of interesting new revelations too, and I do like your posts for the record)).]

Sometimes I do tend to repeat myself. Some of it is me trying to hammer home a point and some of it is the fact that without much new material coming in some of the discussion is going to get repetative. Still I hope that I'm not too repetative most of the time. :-) I try not to be repetative. I just don't like to be repetative. Its like so repetative. :-) :-) :-)



TODD - You wrote: [Speaking of which, I've sometimes wondered what Demona would have thought if she could have seen Elisa's mistreatment at the hands of the New Olympians. I suspect that she'd have enjoyed it, not just on account of her general hatred of Elisa, but also the fact that now a human was receiving the same sort of treatment that they'd been dealing out to gargoyles for thousands of years.]

I wonder how she would react in general to New Olympus and how they would react to her. Before THE MIRROR I think that she would have been well received and have fit in pretty well among the general New Olympian population. But post THE MIRROR is questionable.

Would they view her as a Human who turns into a Gargoyle or as what she really is - a Gargoyle that turns into a Human? Would they hate her for it? Would they pity her? Would she be seen as hero who managed to survive in the Human world but ended up with a tragic curse of being turned Human everyday? (Would that sort of partial greek tragic element appeal to them and make her or at least her story even more popular? :-) )

I really wonder how they would react and how they would see her in G2198 as well. If she and her story become widely known in the Gargoyles Universe in the Future and she is either shunned or hated or ignored, how would the New Olympians view her? Tragic Hero, Hopeless Villain, an ally against Humanity, even a bulkward of New Olympus in the form of a constant threat to Humanity? Or just as someone who should be shunned for her daylight appearance?



JIMMY - You wrote: [Is Ekidne the snake woman?]

Yes I think. Its been a while since I watched the episode.

(Its a good episode, probably one of the more powerful episodes in the series in term of themes addressed; its just that it sometimes frustrates me to watch the episode. I know it was time limitation that feeds into my main complaint but the New Olympians just come out so negative on all levels except a bit near the end. If there was more time it would have been nice to see a counterpoint from them that would have sided with Goliath and Elisa.)
Airwalker - [airwalker9999@yahoo.com]
Brooklyn, NY
Tuesday, September 10, 2002 10:21:40 PM
IP: 12.88.86.247

Glowing eyes... The fay have eyes that glow, too. And aren't the New Olympians are the descendants of the original Olympians, who themselves were the result of fay interbreeding with mortals?

Singing gargs... I'm glad they didn't. I really am. It just wouldn't have worked with the "look" of the show for the characters to be breaking into song. Show-stopping musical numbers as a regular occurence work fine on shows like "The Simpsons," but have you ever seen them done in a show like "Batman: TAS" (aside from the Joker, who's just flat-out crazy)?
"See my loafers, former gophers / It was that or skin my chauffers / But a greyhound fur tuxedo would be best!" - Mr. Burns, to the tune of "Be Our Guest"
Patrick Toman
Tuesday, September 10, 2002 08:17:45 PM
IP: 67.38.251.209

Is Ekidne the snake woman?
Jimmy
Tuesday, September 10, 2002 07:49:59 PM
IP: 172.149.83.135

I was watching my tape of "The New Olympians" today, and caught something new; Ekidne's eyes actually glow red at one point, during an anti-human diatribe. It makes one wonder whether there may be a bit of gargoyle blood in her somewhere. (For that matter, she displayed a strongly "Demona-ish" tone throughout, especially when she shouted at Elisa during the riot scene, "Treacherous human!")

Speaking of which, I've sometimes wondered what Demona would have thought if she could have seen Elisa's mistreatment at the hands of the New Olympians. I suspect that she'd have enjoyed it, not just on account of her general hatred of Elisa, but also the fact that now a human was receiving the same sort of treatment that they'd been dealing out to gargoyles for thousands of years.
Todd Jensen - [merlyn1@mindspring.com]
St. Louis, MO
Tuesday, September 10, 2002 06:39:12 PM
IP: 63.208.40.65

<ENTER LORD SLOTH>

Topic> Oh, I have a topic. Pick me, Pick me!
Ok, I've been chewing on this idea for a while, but have been unable to create a good strong bubble. I was just thinking about how your typical cute (or not so cute) Disney song (with lyrics) would work in GARGOYLES. I know and greatly appreciate how it adds to the realism that the characters don't make up a complex song on the spot every half hour to describe their situation, but when I listen to the Pocahontas song "if I never knew you", I can't help thinking of Goliath with either Demona or Elisa, one of them being on their death bed, singing their hearts out; and it gives me a chill (despite the good quantity of cheese). Another one I like is Heaven light/Hellfire with Brooklyn as Quazimoto, the Archmage as the Archdekon guy (he sounds most like Tony Jay with the exception of Anubis), and both of them obsessing over..... DEMONA (it's a stretch, but I think both could have a thing for her (Iago and Desdemona are also a good pair to use)).
But Anyway, if I may go all hypothetical for a moment, if the series was still going and they've aired like 1000 episodes, and all lose ends were coming together all at once, and for some reason they've stated writing songs for TV series; WOULD it be appropriate for Carl Johnson to create a sing song for Gargoyles. Could you picture it happening?
And that's my topic's pilot paragraph, hope you liked it.

Macbeth and Excalibur> When I first saw Pendragon, I too thought that Macbeth was acting way out of character, it took me a while before I understood the deeper complexities of the son of Findlaech. Something else that wasn't mentioned here though, was that Macbeth had just recently learned from Goliath's pep talk that he isn't doomed to either be a villain or a suicide. He very likely decided then and there to attempt to turn a new leaf; and what better way to do that then to become the Once and Future King and lead the human race (or at least the British) to victory and "take the torn remnants of warring tribes and knit them into a country of beauty and civilization; with Banquo at his side until it falls" <thunder crash>. Unfortunately, he has always been very ambitious, and those kinds of fish are perhaps a tad too big for his frying pan, as he discovered to his shame. I only wish he'd treated Arthur with a bit more respect on their first meeting, that still feels a bit off to me (even though technically, he was praising Merlin alone in his speech in "Lighthouse" it's all part of the same package. I was pleased however that Arthur came off as pretty arrogant and ambitious; I was afraid when he first woke up that he'd be turn out as benevolent as Jesus (probably because he looks like him), but I like him quite a bit now. I should save the rest for "Pendragon" now though, and concentrate instead on "Sanctuary" to "Kingdom".

Airwalker> Yes, but that's not to say that Todd's posts aren't epic in Quality rather then quantity. I still may use a lot more words then he (as I usually), but still take my time dancing around the point I think I'm trying to make. If there's something I've noticed from people who post a lot, it's that they repeat themselves a lot (no offence Mr. Walker, but you do it a fair bit as well (but don't feel bad, U make a ton of interesting new revelations too, and I do like your posts for the record)). I know I did/do it a lot myself (not to mention my habit of going on about me and my kingdom (it seems to interest Matt and a few others, but I don't know about anyone else). But in the end, it's all just a way to let loose the Demons that breed in our heads to go and play with the other peoples demons (when they don't try to kill each other) so it matters not wither your "to the point" or a rambler.

RL> And on the school front, today I drew a picture of Demona with a halo for one class, and spent about three hours doing life drawing (which I think I'll soon be despising) for another.

<EXIT LORD SLOTH>
Lord Sloth - [spunkidge13@hotmail.com]
Oakville, ON, Canada
Tuesday, September 10, 2002 03:48:05 PM
IP: 142.55.21.45

Pretty quiet in here. AGAIN. Wow.

We really need a new topic to talk about.
Airwalker - [airwalker9999@yahoo.com]
Brooklyn, NY
Tuesday, September 10, 2002 09:24:38 AM
IP: 12.88.116.47

LORD SLOTH - You wrote: [And if I'm going to make another attempt to start communing in here on at least a Todd Jenson level again, if not an Airwalker]

So now an epic sized post is an "Airwalker" and long yet not epic post is a "Todd Jensen"? :-) That's quite an honor. :-)



ALLAINE - You wrote: [I think it's fitting that people have been using "childhood fantasy" to describe why Macbeth pursued Excalibur in "Pendragon".]

I can accept that the idea of getting Excalibur and being the Once and Future King would appeal to him on a childhood fantasy level. I'm sure that it might have crossed his mind as he approached the Stone Dragon to get what he thought was the sword. But I don't think that it was the primary thought that was driving him to run after it - it was probably one of many thoughts but I think that other thoughts might have been stronger in his mind.

You wrote: [Although I wonder why Macbeth thought Thailog was giving him that gun. He probably never thought it through.]

At the time I don't think that it really mattered to him although he did pause for a second when Thailog offered it to him.
Airwalker - [airwalker9999@yahoo.com]
Brooklyn, NY
Monday, September 9, 2002 11:49:39 PM
IP: 12.88.86.161

Vashkoda> *hugs back and waves* how's it going? :)

Wingless> Sorry I wasn't around yesterday. My phone line is dead... no dialtone, no DSL, no dial-up, nothing. Pacbell is supposed to come out to fix it today.

Allaine> Glad you decided to check out the Gargoyles videogame :) It definitely shows signs of one of Disney Interactive's 16-bit era games. A lot of games produced by them (Lion King and Aladdin) at that time relied heavily on a spiked learning curve of difficulty after a significant event in the game and a lot of timed platform jumps (if you've ever played the final levels of The Lion King, you know what I'm talking about). It's not necessarily as hard as some of the games in this type of genre (Battletoads) but, unfortunately, it loses fun fast. One of the things that really impressed me were some of the artwork and visuals used in both Goliath's animation sprites and the cutscenes. I wish KEGA could take screenshots so I could post some more animated gif compilations (like the Gargoyles logo with the flame behind it) on Avalon, including Goliath's death sequence (although I doubt it would have the same impact without Keith David's digitized voice).
IRC Goliath - [goliath1@pacbell.net]
Monday, September 9, 2002 02:39:32 PM
IP: 207.126.67.60

Now something entered my head last night.
Did Castaway have any say in the design of the Q-men uniforms? If so why did he choose that color? and well it hit me. When Jason was partnered with Elisa he wore a blue jacket. His hunter uniform was black and BLUE, Maybe Blue is Jason's favorite color and Jon decided to make the quarrymen armor and hoods blue out of the guilt he felt for hurting his brother???? Any thoughts?

Airwalker]--"he's invested in Demona over the years I can't help but think he'd be a little disgusted at the same time."

So he was thinking he couldn't believe he kissed Demona yet…it wasn't so bad afterall, but it was Demona?!?!

Jimmy]---"But seriously, if "Sanctuary" was a tad bit more cheezy and campy, it would be a soap."

And now for some reason Fang just popped into my head.

Allaine]---"It suddenly occurred to me one day that would actually be Htailog." That is kind of hard to pronounce though


Spacebabie - [LadyAndromeda@smstars.zzn.com]
Orlando, Fl, U.S.A
Monday, September 9, 2002 10:56:43 AM
IP: 67.25.48.149

TALEWEAVER -- Thailog's name > Myself, it was a long time before I realized that Thailog wasn't a perfect reverse of Goliath's name. It suddenly occurred to me one day that would actually be Htailog.

JURGAN -- Demona > Normally I'm somebody who likes to say nice things about Demona, but I don't think I ever heard someone refer to her as an "idealist".

SPACEBABIE -- What soaps do you watch? > I'm an All My Children man myself (although some of you probably knew that).

TODD -- Dominique vs. Deirdre > Personally, I like the name Deirdre a lot, but it's a good thing they didn't use it, because then I'd have needed to use a different name for a character in my stories. And as you know, it's all about me. (On a side note, I just rented _Amelie_, and there's a scene where Audrey Tatou is tracking down people named Dominique, and one of them - the look, the attitude, she just reminded me a lot of Dominique Destine. Great flick, btw.)

AIRWALKER -- Macbeth & Arthur > I think it's fitting that people have been using "childhood fantasy" to describe why Macbeth pursued Excalibur in "Pendragon". After all, we learned in "Avalon, Part III" that Macbeth wondered as a child how he would have fared against King Arthur. So on a subconscious level, this was his chance to prove he was worthier a king than Arthur (actually, his second chance to test himself against Arthur, but he wouldn't remember the first one). And I agree that his actions AFTER Arthur claimed the real Excalibur offered a better glimpse of the man's character than his actions BEFORE.

"Sanctuary" > Truly, a classic episode. Although I wonder why Macbeth thought Thailog was giving him that gun. He probably never thought it through. As for why they went to Paris - well, they could have done a LOT worse. Like Texas.

IRC Goliath -- Gargoyles ROM > Thanks for the download, I had always wondered why it was so hard to find. Having played it, I was disappointed, personally. Even on Easy setting, it's very hard. A lot of the challenge involves timed jumps from ledge to ledge while people attack you, which I find very tiresome. Demona is the main boss, when Xanatos would have made a more logical choice, considering hordes of mechanical monsters are being created with the help of the Eye. And the Eye is a more sentient item in the game than it was in the cartoon - kind of like the One Ring from Lord of the Rings, or Dragonlance's Graygem. I think I see why this game wasn't a big hit. (And on level 4, Goliath fights a battle much like in "The Edge" - Steel Clan robots led by a red robot. But Xanatos isn't inside the red one - at least, I hope not, because otherwise he's very dead.)

Last night, our old pal Clancy Brown made a double appearance on Cartoon Network - of course he reprised his role as Lex Luthor on Justice League's "Injustice for All", and then surprisingly appeared as a flatulent dragon on Samurai Jack, episode XXI. Perhaps this means more celebrity voices in the new season? Good hearing his Luthor again (along with that rat bastard the Joker, always voiced so well by Mark Hamill), although I would liked to have seen Mercy as well. Unfortunately, JLA had two striking errors of continuity - in the two-parter "Fury", several criminals were in a gang, including Star Sapphire, Solomon Grundy, Copperhead, and Shade. These four were all hired by Luthor in "Injustice". But when they met, Copperhead asked Shade who he was. And Star Sapphire resented associating with such "common criminals" - apparently she's raised her standards since "Fury".

(And Tim Curry's "Family Affair" premieres on WB this Thursday. For his sake, I _really_ hope this show is better than it looks.)

One last, silly little aside: watching He-Man the other day, I thought some of the gargoyles in Castle Greyskull looked a lot like Goliath. (And hey, Merman has Waspinator's voice, and I think TriKlops has Dinobot's.)

Sincerely, Allaine
Allaine - [eac2nd@yahoo.com]
Philadelphia, PA
Monday, September 9, 2002 10:17:51 AM
IP: 152.163.189.68

I knew it, someone always beats me to it.
10th then.
Jim R.
Monday, September 9, 2002 09:39:51 AM
IP: 65.173.83.254

9th! I finally made top ten in who knows how long?

Bud-Clare> I am also sorry for your loss.

Lord Sloth> Welcome back.
Jim R.
Monday, September 9, 2002 09:39:16 AM
IP: 65.173.83.254

9th!
Airwalker - [airwalker9999@yahoo.com]
Brooklyn, NY
Monday, September 9, 2002 09:36:47 AM
IP: 12.88.90.217

8th!!
Morgana Fae
Monday, September 9, 2002 07:30:32 AM
IP: 152.163.188.164

7th in the name of the Fay

Mooncat
>^,,^<
Mooncat
Monday, September 9, 2002 02:23:16 AM
IP: 68.102.23.36

<ENTER LORD SLOTH>

Sixth.
Reports of my demise (although nonexistent) have been greatly exaggerated. Instead I have been disconnected from the Internet for the past 2 weeks as I moved 3 hours west of Kingston to the somewhat sparse Oakville (a small part of Toronto) to attend and live at Sheridan College! And boy is this different; there's not really that much work this first week yet I can really feel the weight of things to come. I'm not certain if I'm going to like this place or despise it, but they really pamper you with the rooms (High speed internet at LAST!) so...I dunno, we will see. Slothatopia depends on me getting a good edjumacation.

I'm also now quite hooked on all the Gargoyles software that has become available for downloading this past summer, both 3d and 2d. That Sega thing is hard though, specially in the rockery which is filled with molten rock for some reason. And the 3D Gargoyle simulator is beautiful, first time I played I spent nearly an hour gliding around and admiring the island. Try it if you haven't.

And if I'm going to make another attempt to start communing in here on at least a Todd Jenson level again, if not an Airwalker (not that I have anymore time then I did before), then there is just one thing I want to make clear even though no one else is going to remember it. 2 months or so ago, Lurking Fish mentioned that I was a male named sue; well only half of that is right. "Sue" is the person whose E mail I was using. Forgive me, but the little details nag at me and won't let me advance until I clear them. And there's one less possibility to my name in the human world (which is generally a male name).

Vilija> Hey wasup neighbor! Do ye live anywhere near me?
<Pet's Devil Doll>
<Eats five cookies>
<EXIT LORD SLOTH>
Lord Sloth - [spunkidge13@hotmail.com]
Oakville, ON, Canada
Monday, September 9, 2002 12:59:44 AM
IP: 142.55.21.45

5th
DPH
AR
Monday, September 9, 2002 12:33:07 AM
IP: 204.94.193.63

forgot the pic
Gabriel "gaygoyle"
Monday, September 9, 2002 12:19:05 AM
IP: 66.169.210.231

fourth
Gabriel "gaygoyle"
Monday, September 9, 2002 12:18:47 AM
IP: 66.169.210.231

Third!
Lady Baltimore
MD, USA
Monday, September 9, 2002 12:18:31 AM
IP: 206.214.2.137

Second? :)
Ravyn
Monday, September 9, 2002 12:11:17 AM
IP: 150.135.118.166

Hello. I guess I'll take number: One!!!!!!


Princess Alexandria - [princess_alex24@hotmail.com]
Monday, September 9, 2002 12:00:28 AM
IP: 64.91.100.177