Anime Analysis/Series Criticism: Puella Magi Madoka Magica (2011)

What can I say about this? What can I say that hasn't already been said? How can I add my little spin of thought to a "conversation" that's been ongoing while I've been in the dark? Mostly, how can this show be so good and SO DARK while having that happy little poster image up there. I'm putting this in my October reviews month for precisely the reason that this series has its elements of horror, can sometimes be very hard to watch, and is way too good to not recommend to anybody. While this is a fairly short series (12 episodes long, I assume that counts as short even with anime like this. I suppose I could be wrong though.) I never expected it to be so good. I also never expected this to be so horrific. I so was unsure if I would or could enjoy it at all. I have said MANY TIMES I am the exact opposite of a manga or anime fan, sometimes going to the other extreme and hating them completely and admittedly unjustly. I tried out Junji Ito's stuff on a recommendation and really fell in love with what he could do with both stories, worlds, and characters. Even if a lot of his stuff is kind of same-y or a little dumb, I enjoyed so much of his stuff (although admittedly I didn't really like the movies based off of his works) that I thought that I might be able to give this series a try without hatred clouding my judgment.

My girlfriend and a very good friend of mine both recommended this to me. They've actually both been recommending it to me for the better part of a year, and mostly I kind of ignored them, thinking that there was no way that this could be my type of thing. I'm a hardcore male who loves horror, great books, and serious business stories. I didn't think an anime about magical girls in fanservice costumes would be for me. How could I? Look at that art up there and tell me where the horror is. Tell me where the sadness and beauty of the piece is shown. All I see are two girls and flashy colors and stupidity, not the quality I was promised. Thus, I avoided the series. I avoided it for a year or longer. I avoided it until this week when after we all went to the New York Comic Convention together, both my girlfriend and my friend told me in no uncertain terms that I had to see this anime. Sure, I still balked at it at the time, but then I watched it. I watched it and watched it... and after watching it all... well, now I understand why they were so insistent.

I will say for anybody who hasn't seen it, this will have no spoilers, and thus not be the greatest review of all time. I'll say my thoughts as easily and simply as I can and concentrate on the horror aspects as much as I can. I'll speak in generalities because this is a series that should not be spoiled. I have been told by the internet that this series is already spoiled to everyone, but somehow I avoided every spoiler, so I want to give anybody else that same courtesy.

First off, if you are watching, make sure you watch through the third episode. Also, watch it here! I provided you a link. It's that easy to watch. Please take advantage of it if you have never seen it! As I was saying, watch through the third episode. The first two episodes are set up, and frankly are the two worst in the show. I actually was going to quit watching because those episodes did nothing for me. It introduced some of the main cast and was generally kind of boring. I mean, yes, you might get more out of it in multiple viewings (you almost certainly will actually), but watching it the first time just makes the entire series look like some weird Sailor Moon rip-off. (I've also never watched that series, but you have to realized I'm generalizing to what I know. I've always heard that Sailor Moon is a silly anime with girls turning into MAGIC girls with a MAGIC transformation so they can use MAGIC for some reason... I'm assuming against foes! All the while not being interesting to me in the slightest. Because even writing that description has put me to sleep in real life.) But this series, this Puella Magi Madoka Magica is something of a deconstruction... or at the very least a subversion to every magical girl series out there. It takes the basic premise and makes it both realistic and frightening. It's not about spunky girls in skimpy clothing. It's about the fight. It's about what one loses while fighting as well.

The story here is brilliant, alternating between character developments and story plot seamlessly. The character moments range from sweet to heartbreaking. And every major character has a backstory. They all have something that makes you care about them as both characters and people struggling to do what they need to do to counter the witch threat, Yes, witches are the main enemy of this series, but they are not like any witch I've ever seen before. Ranging from the cute Charlotte

all the way to the hideous Gertrud

the series shifts in styles at a drop of a hat when witches are involved. They, the witches, also comprise the major horror elements of the series. Well, them and Kyubey up there.

Or rather right here.

There is something intrinsically creepy throughout the series. The main premise, once you learn it, is undeniably creepy, but so also is the disconnect between the gravity of the situation for the girls and their outlooks on the situations. I am not easily horrified or made to stare slackjawed as something awful happens, but this anime caused me to do that more than once. The overly cute art-style may seem irresistible at first, but it hides a much darker face and makes the terrible things that happen throughout the series that much harder to swallow. Things like that should not happen to these cutesy anime girls. It's not really allowed in our conscious mind... or at least not mine. I've been taught that cute does not equal creepy or emotional or scary. And I was wrong. This series proved me wrong. My mindset was wrong.

 While the series does have moments about the POWER OF FRIENDSHIP, it's incredibly well done, and seems to more often than not rely on one of the girls dealing with problems on her own without any friends to help her at all. I like that. I like how it's not always friends that can help. Sometimes it has to be up to yourself to seal your own fate, one way... or the other. It's brilliant and beautiful and works so well. The sadness emanating from this series is terrifying in its own right, leading to a singularity of darkness and broken characters. I've... well, I've never quite seen that before. I've never seen the amount of broken and scared characters. I've never imagined the horror that these "magical girls" might have to go through (probably specifically because I've avoided those series like THE PLAGUE) nor have I ever thought about what the cost might be to sell your soul. I've heard the series compared to Faust, and it's pretty obvious why once you understand exactly what is happening.

As for everything else, I love the art shifts throughout the series, specifically when witches are involved. It makes the disconnect and the fear factor both go up infinitely. I love the character interactions and the character decisions, even the more over-the-top ones. I love that each character and mindset is different, and I love how everything about that is consistent. The series wows from Episode 3 onward and never stops. It only gets better as it goes.

While the series has no direct gore, it really is for an older audience. It's incredibly dark, even as an intelligent deconstruction and criticism of the genre. It's not happy days and gumdrops while it attempts and succeeds at showing a darker side of what a magical girl actually means. It's brilliant in scope, terrifying in implications, and well done all around. The music is really awesome as well and sometimes has GREATER IMPLICATIONS for the story as a whole than you might think. I have to say I like that a great deal. I also like how the "Chosen One" in this series is not just random. There's a reason for everything, and I don't think I'll ever not like that happening in fiction.

Anyway, I wish I could say more. I wish I could rant and rave and rant and rave forever and spoil every little thing and say exactly what I like and hate. But I can't. I don't think I should. Hopefully, if you haven't watched the series, this small generalized analysis will give you some interest in the series. If it does, watch it. Watch it at least until the end of Episode 3. If you're lukewarm even then, then Episode 8 is also fantastic... and 10 is by far the best in the entire series. I can't help recommending this. It is incredible and just a great ride. The horror elements are well done. The story elements are well done. The subversion and deconstruction and criticism are well handled. The characters are all meaningful and written wonderfully.

I don't know if I'll ever like another anime series, but this one... this one is near-perfect. It's unforgettable, and will stick with me for a long, long time to come.

Series Criticism: Star Wars (Part 2): The Beginning of Expansion

As long as Star Wars has existed there has been an element of the expanded universe. Wait, no, that shouldn't be "expanded universe." I've always known it as the Expanded Universe. Capital letters for a proper title. These novels and comic books are wholly a different animal from the movies and action figures that came before. They were no longer gimmicks trying to bank off of the movies. They were legitimate stories in their own rights. Well, that's half true at least. I think at first they had to be marketed from the movies, put out to be sold as sequels to the stories seen in the movies. The first real novel, Splinter of the Mind's Eye, was certainly marketed as a sequel to Star Wars (the original movie) just in case the movie was not a success. It was basically a Plan B if things didn't go right. Splinter of the Mind's Eye is a special novel in its own right, not really adhering to the canon set out in the novels or movies that followed, but still having a certainly popularity and Star Wars feeling since it was penned by the same man who wrote the original Star Wars. The problem is that certain characters, very popular characters, don't return for the book, and Han Solo and Chewbacca were far too valuable as characters and marketing gimmicks to just thrown away to the wind.

The movies were ultimately very successful, bringing new life to both the space opera and the science fiction genres. It opened new doors that many thought could never be opened. George Lucas was a genius and his baby was the star of the moment. Of course things would change. Demographics would change. People would change. Hell, even Star Wars, both the movies and everything else, would change. But that was down the road a bit. First, we have to talk a little about the comics and some of the first Expanded Universe material.

Now, I'm not going to say I'm an expert on the comics from Star Wars. I've read some, most of the ones I've read are either very old, from my father's day, or fairly recent from a few years ago. The comics were never brilliant, never really needed to give insight into the story of Star Wars. Mostly they were little stories that expanded the Star Wars universe, giving life to different planets, different characters, villains, heroes, and many other things, to make the universe appear like an actual universe. It had depth, both emotionally and geographically, and most of all it had a soul to it. The Jedi story was expanded. The Empire's story was expanded. Everything about the main characters, even the things that ended up not being canon, were expanded. And although there were a great deal of silly ideas and executions, there was a love of the brand seen all over the products.

The things that I was really into when I was young and so full of love of Star Wars were the books. I loved the Expanded Universe books, all the little new adventures of the main cast of the movies. I loved the new characters that were introduced, and I loved the new planets, new conflicts, and new ideas that came streaming forth from those novels. Most of the books were poorly written. And I mean really poorly written. Some were written by established authors, but others were written by people trying to get their foot in the door of science fiction. My biggest gripes were the people who just wrote stories that were awful, simply awful, although that happened rarely, with only one particular series actually being close to unreadable.

The EU really started things off right though with The Thrawn Trilogy, and its books: Heir to the Empire, Dark Force Rising, and The Last Command. These were novels by Timothy Zahn, an already established writer, who wanted to tell some new stories in this budding universe. He really got the ball rolling, creating these books that felt very much like the movies they emulated. The characters were five years or so older than they were at the end of Return of the Jedi, but they felt consistent to those earlier characters, but also as if those characters had grown and evolved from their earlier forms. Timothy Zahn penned these novels, focused around the titular Grand Admiral Thrawn and his new Imperial potential, and they worked incredibly well, showing an amazing sense of grey in a universe that had always focused so heavily on black and white terms. He showed both redemption in the character of Mara Jade, a former apprentice of the Emperor, and a villain who was not evil at all in Thrawn. There were important and delicate conversations in the novel concerning philosophy and the philosophy of the Force, if the Empire was evil at all or if the man of the Emperor was the rotten thing of that institution, and racism. All of these topics were discussed in the universe of Star Wars giving an insightful look at both the fictional universe and our own. It was a groundbreaking series, being the first popular novels in the series and really kicking off the EU and what would become a central backbone to the entire series.

Timothy Zahn's books are of incredible quality, really being an expansion to the movies, almost so much so that they were for a time (and still kind of are) referred to as the "Sequel Trilogy." Most of the main themes from both the prequels and the original movies came into play here in these novels despite the fact that the prequels wouldn't even be considered for years. Elements from this series would end up in the prequels, most specifically Coruscant. In general the novels were brilliant, and they introduced Star Wars as a new type of series, one that could be taken seriously in both movie and novel form. These novels paved the way for Star Wars to be the multimedia franchise it certainly is today with their success.

Now, while I could go on for a very long time about just how amazing the Thrawn Trilogy is, there was one inherently bad aspect of them, and that was the idea that Luke Skywalker had to be paired off with a woman. It wouldn't have been bad if Mara Jade had been that woman and that was it, but for some reason she simply was not good enough for Luke, and another four years or so (ten in universe) would go by before Luke would successfully settle down with the character he worked so well with. So, while this isn't a negative aspect of these novels per se, it became a negative aspect when all the next four years of novels seemed to be were pairing off Luke with different women to see which one would stick the best. The next few years of novels were painful to say the least, with very few main series novels of any worth at all because of the focus on either Luke's love life or trying to make the series as sci-fi and different as possible.

I love the Thrawn Trilogy for what it is. I would gladly read those novels again, but when we talk about the Kevin J. Anderson novels, the Vonda McIntyre novel, and heaven help me, the Barbara Hambly novels, we get into territory best left for only the most hardcore of fans... or at least the fans who can put up with simply awful things. Kevin J. Anderson's novels, specifically the Jedi Academy novels, Jedi Search, Dark Apprentice, and Champions of the Force, were incredibly difficult to enjoy. Honestly they were at times painful to read, often focusing on plots and characters that made no sense, portraying certain characters from the movies as basically being superhuman, knowing everybody in the galaxy, and generally making everybody seem awful to be around for any period of time. Han Solo comes off as the best thing in the entire galaxy when in the movies he had been portrayed as a screw-up who got hit with the wrong end of the intelligence stick. Starting in these novels and continuing in many others, Han Solo is suddenly the best there ever was: the best pilot, the best husband, the best survivor, and the best of everything. It's sickening and a large reason why I dislike the character so strongly. I won't go as far as saying Kevin J. Anderson is a hack. He does have some decent novels to his credit, specifically the Young Jedi Knight series, but the Jedi Academy series and even moreso, Darksaber, are some of the worst things that Star Wars offers.

I can create an entire diatribe out of what Vonda McIntyre was thinking in writing The Crystal Star, having that be one of the most baffling books in all of existence. I will admit it isn't badly written. It simply was not Star Wars, not even slightly.With multiple dimensions and a being of infinite power, it comes off as a jumble of ideas better left for sci-fi than the space opera of Star Wars. The portrayal as Han as a character who could easily cheat on Leia at any moment and Luke as a bumbling fool also leaves a lot to be desired. It's easy enough to avoid though, even if you are the biggest Canon junkie of them all.

The real dark part of the early Star Wars novels has to be Barbara Hambly's mess. Children of the Jedi is unreadable, with one of the worst plots I have ever seen, with some of the worst writing I have ever read. It is a novel terrible in every conceivable way. Even my ten year old self couldn't abide taking the time to read that piece of crud, and I read everything Star Wars related back then. The fact that I hated, hated, hated Callista and everything she represented, and that the entire plot was an excuse to make Luke and Callista be in love whether Luke, Canon, or anything agreed was too much for me. It was awful, painful, and terrible. I hated the Eye of Palpatine, a weird ship that did things that made no sense. I hated the contrived plot, the terrible love story... the everything. It was the first and only Star Wars novel I ever stopped reading simply because it angered and annoyed me so much. No, it disgusted me. The saddest thing about that novel is that today it is considered one of the better ones from the era of novels. What is wrong with people? If you are reading this and enjoyed that freaking novel, shame on you. Shame on your existence. I am disappointed with you, internet reader whom I've probably never met and never will. You now represent everything that is terrible in Star Wars. While Kevin J. Anderson was mediocre, Barbara Hambly started something in the EU (and even in the prequels) that never stopped: contrived romances, melodrama, a focus on getting girls and women to read the novels rather than just making it for the people who loved the series regardless of age, gender, sex, or whatever. It was selling out, pure and simple, and you'll see that the novels that are out today I have very little to say about because I have not read or bought a Star Wars novel in about five years or so. But I'll be getting to that in another review. Children of the Jedi is almost as bad... or would be if I remembered any of it. It was so rough that I basically forgot about it all. I know it was mostly about Luke looking for Callista, finding her, and then her disappearing from his life FINALLY. For all intent's this is the low point of the early EU, and it would not be matched for quite some time.

Now, yes, there were some bad novels in this era and some equally bad writers, but most of the stuff to come out of it was pretty mediocre. I mean, forgettable and just plain average in execution and intent. The Black Fleet Crisis Trilogy was just another way to try to get Luke with yet another woman, this one named Akanah. Lando features pretty prominently in that series, but largely this and many of the other series of this period I didn't mention are just there. They exist.

But, despite the terrible books, the mediocre books, and the ones that are so forgettable I didn't even mention them despite reading and owning them, there were some amazing gems to come out of the terrible stuff. Michael Stackpole and Aaron Allston both wrote the excellent side-series X-Wing, which is one of the better series of all time, focusing on the pilots and missions of the Rogue Squadron, the squadron that Luke and Wedge Antilles created between Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back, and Wraith Squadron which was created during the series. The trials and tribulations of the pilots are some of the best writing in all of Star Wars fiction. Of course it had to take place for a side-series, right?

I, Jedi, also written by Stackpole, went and did something amazing, something only Zahn had been able to do before. He retconned some of stupid out of the EU, taking large chunks of the Jedi Academy Trilogy and making it make sense. It was a brilliant way of showing that even Canon with a capital C could be changed to have a greater quality than it had previously. I, Jedi stands in my head as one of the greatest literary achievements of Star Wars, not only retconning stupidity, but also having a first person perspective and really delving into a character that had never been in the movies with Corran Horn.

Zahn would come back in incredible fashion as well, giving two of the greatest novels in Star Wars with The Hand of Thrawn Duology with the books, Specter of the Past and Vision of the Future. The novels tell an amazing story certainly, but also exist to throw punches at most of the novels that came out between The Thrawn Trilogy and this series. Mara Jade, a character known for speaking her mind, seems to speak with Zahn's own voice for a time, telling Luke how stupid everything has been for so long, telling him how many bad decisions and baffling mistakes he's made, and arguably giving one of the best rants against other novelists who don't understand what they are writing in all of literature. I have to respect Zahn for what he accomplished here, writing the best Star Wars novel, hell, one of the best novels of all time, in Vision of the Future, and telling off both the Star Wars EU and the authors continually making mistakes at the same time. And somehow he got away with it and still writes Star Wars novels. The man is basically that good. And the duology stands as one of the great deconstructions of the Star Wars brand as well as being one of the most insightful, and certainly the best written.

With I, Jedi and the even more amazing Hand of Thrawn Duology, this era of Star Wars came to a close with an incredible bang. 1998 stands as the end of an era. It was a time before the prequels, a time when the original trilogy was the only movie trilogy. It was a time of innocence and trial. Many authors were still testing the waters of Star Wars, trying to get their feet wet, trying to make a universe that could be understood and emulated. It was still young, still vibrant. Twenty-one years has past since the advent of Star Wars, and only a year was left before a new trilogy would begin that would yet again shake up the Star Wars name. But in 1998 there was nothing better than being a fan of this series, believing that everything would be amazing. The books were so much better than they had ever been, the movie, Episode I of the franchise, looked incredibly promising, and so much was there to believe in...

So, there's my second part of this series. Tune in next time for a discussion of the early video games of franchise and maybe a little delving into what would become abhorrent to most pre-prequel fans of the series...

(You won't have to wait as long for the next part as you did for this one. I took way too long getting this out. The next should be fairly soon. Look for me kind of crushing out reviews for the next few weeks more than likely.)

Series Criticism: Star Wars (Part 1.75: Where did the fun go?)

Okay, now we're getting into the bread-and-butter of my criticisms of the franchise itself. Look, the prequels are bad. We all know that. (Well, besides some writers who want to be controversial and go against the crowd, often saying that the prequels are better because of... uh... reasons? I'm guessing stuff like OH CGI IS BETTER and THE PREQUELS ARE SMART... but come on, does anybody really believe those things?) The prequels failed, maybe not in terms of money, but certainly in terms of support in the thinking people of the world because there was no heart to them.

Now, this is going to get complex and very opinionated, and I can't help that. All of this is opinion, and my opinions can sometimes be controversial or downright insane. Most of my reviews don't really go into some of my more crackpot theories, and I tend to try to avoid complex ideas of what people (actors, directors, writers) were thinking. But sometimes I have to point out when I think people are having fun or when they're not... and also when there are more abstract ideas of what makes something good or bad.

I don't like sell-outs. I like my moral high ground. I like having this idea that nobody ever has to sell out. Selling out=bad to me. And that's the problem. Star Wars was already a franchise based on selling crap, selling media, selling toys to the kids who would see it, but it always had a soul, a heart, in the center of it. Watch A New Hope or Empire Strikes Back and go and tell me that there wasn't a heart to those movies. The actors had passion for their parts. The directors and writers had passion for the story. Yes, they were making money, but there was care for quality. Everybody put in their time and effort. They went to locations and shot their scenes in deserts, in tundras... forests for Return of the Jedi. They built sets, sometimes, like with the original Death Star, from thousands of battleship models put together. That's insane and brilliant. It made the whole movie feel not only more real, but used up in so many ways. It added to the aesthetic which added to the mood which added to why the movies were so good. Practical sets are hard, but they pay off in the end by having stunning visuals that CGI just cannot replicate.

CGI is the bane of existence today. It makes good movies into cartoons and makes bad movies so much worse. George Lucas wanted to push the boundaries of CGI with the prequels and he did. I can't argue that. He pushed the boundaries of what can be done with CGI and movies. The problem is that he sacrificed story, characters, and the Star Wars franchise to do so. You can tell what he wanted. He wanted full control, he wanted to make money, and he wanted the movies to hold up against modern movies in terms of the look of the movies. He wanted to compete with other gorgeous movies, using every trick in his book to make his movies better. He wanted to appeal to every demographic, wanted Star Wars to be KING.

The problem is the movies, at their center, had no soul. There was no reason to care about Anakin or Obi-Wan. Hell, I barely had any reason to care about any of the characters. Anakin was a supreme jerk in the latter two movies of the prequels and in the first he was an annoying kid. Yes, he had some moments of trying to appeal to the audience, like when his mother died and whatnot, but ultimately it failed and fell extremely flat. I don't care about Hayden Christiansen as an actor one way or another. He could have been the best actor ever, his emotions still would have fell flat. Christopher Lee is a case in point. The guy is a very good, very accomplished actor. He's certainly had some bad films, but he's always had dignity in his roles. Compare his role as Count Dooku in the prequels to his role as Saruman in The Lord of the Rings films. There is no comparison. Count Dooku is both lackluster and unneeded. He has no personality, no reason for me to care about him or think about him at all. In fact he's become the punchline to a lot of jokes I make. But then you see Saruman and see that Christopher Lee is a damn good actor who can put in a performance that is simply brilliant. The Star Wars prequels didn't have the good direction that LotR did. That's for sure. But they also didn't have the well-written, well thought of characters. None of them mattered. Yes, we knew the story, we knew what would happen, but did it have to be so full of nothing? I mean, I've seen very few movies where both the settings and characters suffered so much because of issues on the filmmaker's part. Was the plot okay? I have no idea. Maybe it could have been, but the characters were so flat that I didn't care about that either.

Go ahead and tell me there characters are well-done. Go ahead. I dare you. You can't even do it with a straight face, can you? It would make your brain explode to call Anakin or Padme great characters worthy of being etched in history. I mean, Palpatine was the only character I enjoyed watching in the prequels and only because he was evil and didn't give a damn. His complications come from the fact he's playing both sides, acting both good and bad simultaneously. It gives him the illusion of complexity while he remains just as flat and stupid as every other character. Yoda was ruined by the prequels, although I guess everybody knows that by now. Mace Windu was garbage. And do any of the others even matter?

Compare any character from the prequels to the original trilogy and tell me what you get. The original trilogy, is always better. The characters are almost never flat, and the situations and scripts are well done. Watch The Empire Strikes Back and tell me that Luke and Han don't seem like best friends despite spending almost no time in the actual movie together. They do. And yet Anakin and Obi-Wan say they're best friends, spend half of Attack of the Clones together and never feel close at all. Do you see?

The prequels and Star Wars in general has lost their respective hearts and souls. They have sold out beyond comprehension, hoping to sell, to appeal, to look great, to be funny, serious, tragic, comedic... the list goes on and on, but the ending is always the same: the spirit of Star Wars was sacrificed to make room for a "vision," a vision that couldn't work, didn't work, and alienated people away from the franchise. And that's all I can say. The fun of the movies, the enjoyment... the adventure... was stripped out in favor of looks and flashing lights and a focus on a romance that not only didn't work, but couldn't work. The characters were broken beyond repair, flat and dead on arrival. And there was nothing that could be done once that happened.

I used to read the Star Wars novels back in my misspent youth. Most of them were not good, but they weren't brain-crushingly terrible either. They had silly plots sometimes, and each of them (before 1997 or so) seemed to be intent on getting Luke to marry their girl of the month or whatever, but in general, although there were some very high quality ones and some very bad ones, most were humbly mediocre... and that's fine. I still read them. I still pretty much enjoyed them. But after the prequels came out, the whole soul of Star Wars seemed to shift. First it was the genre shifts as seen in The New Jedi Order books with the Yuuzhan Vong, bringing out a focus on both gore, grittiness, horror, and realism that Star Wars had long lacked. These elements were a break from the romantic and adventurous ideal Star Wars had been based upon, but maybe it was time for a change. maybe it could work. There were a few of the books in the, I believe, 19 book series that were pretty good. Some were awful too, but that's to be expected. On the whole though, the books and Star Wars, were stepping on thin ice, pushing the boundaries of what is Star Wars.

The problem was that despite the seriousness, the characters never seemed to change. Luke, Han, and Leia were essentially the same characters from the original trilogy of movies. Their twenty years of character development, relationships, and losses were all but forgotten under the guise of a new series, with new writers trying their best to make these characters their own. And the series fell into what I like to consider at the best of times "Fanfiction" and the worst of times something unspeakable. The things that are called Star Wars novels today are but a shadow of even the worst of the novels of the nineties. And that's terrible. I haven't read any new novels in years... probably since the Legacy of the Force novels, where I became so insulted at the writers of that series that I actually quit Star Wars. How could I not with such egregious violations of the fans' trust? Killing off a popular character in order to prop up an unpopular one? How is that even... I'm not getting into this. My point is that there were a lot of bad decisions and I hope that the teenage girls reading the Star Wars novels now are really happy in just how screwed up the franchise is. It has been a long fall,and it's still going.

Again, the heart of the franchise has been torn out and eaten. There's nothing left but the terrible parts of Star Wars. When no KotOR III established itself, I knew the franchise, to me, was dead, finally. Have there been some good thing in the past few years? Yeah, I guess. I liked some parts of the Legacy comics, and I like the idea of horror and Star Wars combining... but beyond that, I'm done with the series.

In a way Star Wars reminds me of some of my more hated franchises, like Harry Potter, which I felt sold out a long time ago... or, and I may like the webcomic all right, but the soul of it is now gone: Homestuck. Now, these two franchises are certainly, at this point in time, examples, in my opinion, of creators selling out, forgetting original visions, and appealing to the blind mass of fans rather than the art of the thing. Maybe it's just me, but that's how I feel: utterly disappointed in the creators.

I need to take a breath for a while, but Part 2 in which I rant about the early Star Wars expanded universe and Return of the Jedi will be coming soon.

Series Criticism: Star Wars (Part 1)

I start off this with a piece of concept art for the last good thing in Star Wars, Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords. It's a video game, and my favorite video game of all time, for reasons that I'll kind of get into here, and get way more into whenever I review this fantastic game. I start with the last great thing to come from Star Wars because it came out nearly seven years ago. And yet a lot of Star Wars has been coming out since. Very little of it has been any kind of quality, and for the most part, it has essentially kicked the fan of the series that I once had been in the teeth. I can't be the fan I was. Hell, I can't even be a fan at all.

Once this series stood for something. Back in the old days, days I don't even remember, when there were only movies, some comics, some action figures, and maybe a book or two, this series stood for something great. It was a series with infinite possibilities, an entire galaxy at the disposal of a great writer, a great thinker, and it was available to the masses. At one point you could watch the movies and know exactly all there was to know or care about in Star Wars. I've reviewed the original Star Wars movie, and I'm pretty sure I've made some of my feelings on the series known already. Star Wars was once great. Hell, the first time I saw A New Hope it was in theaters when the special edition came out in 1997. I probably saw it before then, my dad was a fan of Star Wars too, but the first time I really remember it, I was eight and I was in a crowded theater, loving the movie, falling into it every bit as much as I could fall into a good book. I fell in love with Star Wars from that moment on. I ate it up. I saw The Empire Strike Back, easily one of the BEST MOVIES OF ALL TIME, in a nearly empty theater at midnight, possibly the most appropriate way to watch that bleak film. And then I saw Return of the Jedi and fell in love with the characters and the story all over again, even if ROTJ does have its own issues.

I believed in Star Wars. I believed that it could be great, that it was great. I believed that there could be a galaxy far, far away... a long time ago... that housed Jedi and smugglers, and amazing spaceships, and everything else. Wookiees, Hutts, Greedo, Darth Vader, Grand Moff Tarkin... the list can go on and on. My point here is that I fell into the same TRAP that a lot of people did. I believed in Star Wars, and I believed in George Lucas. And today, I believe in nothing but lies.

It wasn't the prequel trilogy that broke me. No. Of course none of the movies were good, but I saw them when I was young. I knew things were wrong, but I never hated the movies. I still don't. I wish they didn't exist, and I treat them as if they don't exist, but I have ambivalence for them, not hatred. They didn't single-handedly ruin Star Wars, and they certainly didn't ruin the original trilogy for me. What they did was bring Star Wars into the mortal realm, the realm of fallibility, the realm of not being the best. Star Wars fans have, for years, wondered what the prequels did... why did they have to be so bad? Why did the acting have to suck? Why CGI? Why everything? The problem is that the times- they are a-changing. I know plenty of people who love the prequels, despite my own disgust with hearing that. I know plenty of people who like the prequels more than the originals. I know it's a travesty, but it happens. The reason for this is that the times are different. People have their opinions and even if they are wrong, they're opinions.

So, the prequels are simply white noise to me. They didn't affect me, didn't bring about some kind of change. I didn't watch the screen and believe in this unbelievable universe. Instead it brought the harsh reality to my young mind that Star Wars wasn't real. It wasn't real.

It wasn't real.

Nothing could have prepared me for that disappointment. I was a lonely child, a nerd of nerds, a reader of novels at a time I should have been reading crappy little  pop-up dog books or whatever. "See Spot run (away from Darth Maul, what a terrible name)." I was holding onto Star Wars, putting it up as some kind of king of stories, of movies, of everything... and the day that I learned it was a broken series was the day I also learned that nothing in this world was perfect. I became cynical so long before I ever should have. I brought myself into horror, into other pursuits that were far removed from the atrocities of Star Wars. You think, my reader, that you have seen war crimes? No, not until you read some of the Star Wars novels, not until YOU UNDERSTAND the worst the world has to offer. Let me proceed, but I warn you, if you haven't been a big part of the Star Wars fandom or fanbase or whatever over the course of the last fifteen years or so, much of this will not make any sense to you. I speak of Yuuzhan Vong, New Jedi Orders, comics, Karen Traviss, the deaths of characters for convenience, and how so many characters never change, never evolve, never adapt, and... at eighty are just the same as they were at thirty. I talk of character assassination, galaxy destruction, the butchering of stories, and an absolutely broken fanbase that simultaneously praises and hates.

"Tell me a story of how greatness falls." That is the statement that initiated this writing, this "article", this diatribe on the good things that can turn so bad so quickly. It's not that the series fell from grace, or even that it broke apart just as it was on top. Instead it was a downward spiral. It was as if the series that was so dear to many of us was addicted to something terrible. Call it CGI, call it overdone and contrived plots, call it terrible romance plots, or fanfiction styled writing. Hell, call it what it is: a trainwreck. I loved Star Wars once, at a time when I could dream beyond the stars and see the world full of infinite possibilities. I used to think about what other wonderful worlds there were, if Luke ever found more Jedi, or if he truly would be the last. I used to think about what would happen now that the Emperor was dead and the Rebels would celebrating it up with a bunch of teddy bears. Would there be Ewok pilots? Would they have an embassy or something? What about Jabba's palace and all of his dancing girls?

What I'm saying is that the universe felt so large because it left me asking so many questions, but not caring about the answers. I can truly say that Star Wars is the series that gave me the desire to first start writing. It was also the series that sparked me to do this blog for the internet. I didn't want to blast the prequels or yell or rant or hate, I just wanted to be able to speak my mind, to say that I have been disappointed, fans of Star Wars have been disappointed. Some people may read this, may agree, may even like it, but I wish that people who had control over the franchise would read it. I wish that they could understand that Star Wars was never about gimmicks and crappy romances and appealing to the masses. It was a world of infinite possibilities. It was an action space fantasy about a ragtag group of rebels facing off against some terrible empire, even if the Empire seemed as okay as the rebels. Yes, some Imperials were bad like Tarkin and the Emperor, but most were simply regular guys. Some didn't even want to face off with the rebels. And the rebels probably had the same kinds of good and bad people too. Look, it created a realistic world where people acted like people and the universe made sense, not like the YOU ARE EITHER GOOD OR EVIL sense that the prequels gave to Star Wars.

Darth Vader wasn't evil, he just had different ideas. He disagreed with Obi-Wan and he disliked incompetence when his time was limited. He was focused and driven. Obi-Wan's term of describing him as "twisted" works well and fits. Then you look at Darth Maul. Yeah, not really feeling the complexities there. You can compare the bland and lackluster, almost confounding, General Grievous (What a name...) to Grand Admiral Thrawn from Timothy Zahn's Thrawn Trilogy of novels. How can you even compare the two characters? How can they even be seen as comparable at all? Yes, both are commanders of military things or whatever, but General Grievous is an absolute travesty of a character, whereas Grand Admiral Thrawn is a well done morally ambiguous "antagonist" to the main characters. He is both well-written and well thought out, which can be easily said for all of Zahn's characters, most of Michael Stackpole's characters, and Aaron Allston's characters in the X-Wing series before he became a big part of what is wrong with the Star Wars expanded universe.

So, this is my first part of an entire series analysis and criticism of Star Wars. I'm just getting started, giving you an introduction. I have no idea how many parts this will be, but next time I'll be focusing on where Return of the Jedi screwed over Star Wars, and the expanded universe stuff that came out until around the time the prequels came out. We're going to touch upon some incredibly awful parts of Star Wars, including Kevin J. Anderson, Barbara Hambly, The Crystal Star, Luke's love life, and the end of an age. Stay tuned...

Series Criticism: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (1998) by J. K. Rowling

The Harry Potter series is like a wave. Everybody (and by that I mean people who have the chance to live in first world countries and to read) knows about it, knows the little guy with the circular glasses on the cover above this writing, with his orphan-status, his sad state of affairs living with his aunt, uncle, and cousin, and his entrance into the magical world of witchcraft and wizardry. That one is kind of a main point for this series, wouldn't you say?

I'm actually going to be rereading all of the Harry Potter books, and I will be looking at them from, I think, a unique perspective. I was a crazy little person in love with this series from around the time I was eleven until I hit about eighteen, when the final book of the series came out. I was really into the books for about the same amount of time that Harry Potter was in his magical school having his tales told to us... but then the seventh book happened as well as all of the abortions that call themselves films, and I became jaded and cynical. I had a deep and terrible falling out with the Harry Potter series. I started hating the world. The ending of the Harry Potter series along with the Star Wars prequel trilogy, the fourth Indiana Jones film, and Futurama and Firefly being cancelled all helped to create the jaded and cynical madman writing this review. Sure, there were probably other reasons, like maybe possible mental imbalance and a massive overload of psychological horror films (and Jacob's Ladder), college, House of Leaves, and massive overdoses of caffeine, but those are totally not the point of this review.

This review is about the first book of the Harry Potter series as reviewed by a person who can no longer stand Harry Potter. I say this because I lived in the years of this book series. I was ten or eleven when I read the first book and all of eighteen when I read the final abomination of the English language, but you know, I'm going to be fair here, not letting my own personal history hating the Harry Potter books get in the way of an honest and reliable review for all of you who might want that. I will be rereading the books, even the ones that make me angrier than I've ever been, bringing me to the verge of a heart-attack and a massive brain aneurysm together making a double-hatred death... but I will do this, mostly because I love torturing myself, and partially because I feel like I should give the series another chance, let it try its best to redeem itself in my eyes. And well, I wrote this introduction before reading the first book, so everything that follows will be my honest opinion of the book twelve years after first reading it, taking into consideration that I am no longer ten, and pretending very strongly I have never read the books before. Expect a large review, full of plot analysis. I will be going all out here. I will be looking at the five musts of book writing as well: tone, theme, plot, characters, and setting, and will also drive a focus on writing style and skill, trying to accurately describe my experience. Anyway, this will be a ride-and-a-half and I hope to get it all done before the end of summer, so sit back and enjoy this sucker. I hope I do too!

Okay, I did not finish the book by the end of the summer. Hey, you get busy, it happens. Then my October reviews came along and college, blasted college, and I've been playing catch up for a while now, but here it is: my crown jewel reviews, the ones that I am really looking forward to. This first book in the series, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (Also subtitled as Philosopher's Stone in most other markets that aren't America... and that would make more sense too. The Sorcerer's Stone isn't anything, while the Philosopher's Stone is what is featured in this book as used by Nicholas Flamel and desired by Voldemort and his "host" Prof. Quirrell.) Oh, by the way, expect spoilers. I say this after I just wrote a major one, but I am heavily expecting only people who know about Harry Potter to read this. If you don't, it's been out for over ten years! I think I can spoil something that was spoiled over ten years ago, you hypothetical stupid git.

Okay, I'm going to start with plot and plot analysis first because the plot here is pretty meaningful to the book. It starts off years before with an opening prologue discussing the recent deaths of certain characters we won't see again for some time. These characters include Harry Potter's parents as well as Voldemort, the great evil wizard who has it out for the wizard world because he's evil and terrible and likes death and pain and he's evil. Did I mention that he's evil? Because he is evil.

Well, we are introduced in the prologue to Dumbledore and McGonagall, a wizard and a witch who respectfully work as the headmaster and Transfigurations professor (and deputy headmistress) at Hogwarts, a school for witchcraft and wizardry. Oh, God... this is hurting to write. You all should know this already if you're reading this review... Anyway, eventually a hairy big dude named Hagrid comes down from a flying motorcycle thing owned by one Sirius Black with a hairy potter in his arms... uh... wait... I mean, Harry Potter, the titular character of the series in his arms. Harry's a baby by the way and he has this wicked lightning scar on his forehead, surviving the spell of death, which his parents had succumbed to, and vanquishing Lord Voldemort (he's evil by the way) because he's a baby who's pure and innocent and bleh. I get it, book. I get it. Evil versus good. Fight!

So, little Harry Potter is given to his aunt and uncle because he has no other family to speak of. They happen to be horrible guardians of this unnatural  ilk, often treating him as one might treat a dog or a cat rather than a sensitive young person who needs to be nurtured and made into a hipster. Wait... look, he's treated pretty awfully, to the point of it being incredibly fairy-tale-like. And I have to say, it's pretty well done. You sympathize with him. You want him to get out of his bad situation. And yet you know that he's stuck there, stuck there with no way out, under the thumbs of guardians who can't stand him and a cousin who uses him like a punching bag. He has no friends to speak of, rarely goes outside, and is basically stuck in a cupboard constantly. In short, he has a pretty horrid life.

This is all written in a highly convincing manner. Certainly there are some amateurish parts here and there, but you can certainly feel what's going on. The language is not superb, but it is well done and sufficient to get the point across. There is a little while spent on Harry being weird, doing stuff no normal person should be able to do, disappearing glass, talking with a snake... you know, the usual. And then he starts receiving the letters, the letters of his acceptance to Hogwarts. Well, the Dursleys, his aunt and uncle, are incredibly unhappy about this, going so far as to nail things shut and never go outside so that the letters will not reach their nephew. They eventually flee to a house on a rock in the middle of a body of water and are confronted by an angry Hagrid, telling them off for not saying that Harry Potter is a................. WIZARD.

Most of the introductory chapters are written in an almost surreal fashion. It is extremely over-the-top, but not unenjoyable. I could compare it to Roald Dahl and some of his more absurdist books that I read when I was younger. James and the Giant Peach and  Matilda really stick out, both having somewhat similar feelings and even plots to this book in the very beginning of it. And yet... it's enjoyable. It's fun. You like the main character of Harry Potter. Hagrid is new and interesting. The Dursleys are horrible people, petty and antagonistic in some ways, and Harry's goal is one of being accepted, growing in a nurturing environment rather than being stifled and stepped-upon. And it works. The tone is fitting, the plot interesting, the characters, while not three-dimensional, are engaging and mystifying.

And then the book gets better.

Think about all the possibilities that a normal kid, treated in a subpar way, can think of after this. The scenarios, the everything... it's mindboggling. And this giant, Hagrid, basically kidnaps Harry away to a sleazy alley. Oh... oh God... Hagrid... I hope this isn't going where I seriously don't want it to go. No. No, of course not. Hagrid's a good person, which is very good, and the sleazy alley is Diagon Alley, the mall of the wizards. I have no idea if British people... I can call the British, British people, right? Well, I have no idea if they even have malls or if those malls are all set up like this, but where I'm from it sounds like some kind of cozy little seedy mall. And I like it. The feeling here is somewhat claustrophobic and hectic, but neither feeling is wrong in this circumstance.

Hagrid leads Harry to Gringotts, a wizard bank, and learns that his parents were fairly well off before they died. Harry takes out as much money as he'll need and goes off to get the things he'll need for the upcoming school year. He gets a wand, robes, books, and... well, of course, a pet owl from Hagrid because owls are where it is at. Hedwig becomes Harry's friend throughout his adventures, a stalwart and constant companion. Anyway, Harry also meets a few other people in his adventure in Diagon Alley, including one little blond boy named Draco Malfoy and scores of strange characters.

Well, the story has to keep moving on. Harry is brought back home by Hagrid and Harry has to wait for a while until school starts up. He feels like a prisoner and a villain within his house and is glad when he gets to leave for school. He's eventually, after the long summer, dropped off at the train station with everything in hand, only to discover, OH NO! The platform that he needs is nine-and-three-quarters. Well, that's strange and kind of weird and probably doesn't exist. Harry's been duped! And the rest of the story is him getting legal action on Hagrid for fraud.

No, I'm yanking your chain, foolish reader. Harry just has to believe in it. Yes, he starts doubting, but then a family of friendly gingers come and board the platform, helping Harry out because they are simply very nice people. Harry meets Mrs. Weasley and some of her children, namely Ron (a new student like Harry), Percy, a prefect, twins George and Fred, and the young lady who is not old enough for school yet, Ginny.

Well, it's all very interesting. Harry and Ron become fast friends as Ron explains to Harry the knowledge of Hogwarts that he has gained whilst being in an actual wizard family. Some shenanigans ensue, Draco Malfoy is met again, this time clearly disliking Ron and very much desirous of Harry's friendship, which Harry does not seem to want to give.

The story moves on then. Hogwarts is seen, the Sorting Hat sorts the kids into one of four different houses in the school... uh... kind of like how you might have been in different teams in middle school or something. Each house has its own flavor and only certain personalities go into a certain house. Gryffindor is populated by smug, self-righteous people who think they're better than the rest of the school population. I suppose they are supposed to be courageous or something, but that's not always entirely true and seems vaguely stupid. Ravenclaw is full of know-it-alls and clever people even though nothing interesting ever seems to ever come out of Ravenclaw. Slytherin is made up of evil people and bullies, which seems kind of smart if you want a way to get rid of them all quickly, but really stupid if you have a house made up of the biggest pricks of the school population just reinforcing their own shoddy ideas. And then there's Hufflepuff that... uh... I still have no idea what Hufflepuff does. I think they're the rejects or something...

The rest of the story is about Harry and Ron learning about their studies, learning about their classmates, and finding adventure in the worst places. Harry joins a sports team as their seeker, which is him basically playing a big game of hide-and-seek with a small golden ball called a snitch, while the others on the team play the actual game. Quidditch sounds interesting, I suppose, if impractical. Ron and Harry meet a girl named Hermione eventually, who is Gryffindor and a know-it-all, which shouldn't be the case given the rules for the houses, but... okay, I guess? Anyway, she becomes their friend as well and they get into all sorts of trouble with an invisible cloak that they, for some reason, can all fit underneath, a baby dragon, and detention in the forest which leads Harry to start looking for some great Unicorn killing villain. Also, there's Neville Longbottom, who has one of the most unfortunate names in history and is treated like a butt-monkey throughout the book by our lead characters and others despite being a fairly good person. Let's yell our praises to the heroes for that, huh?

I like the Christmas scene for some reason. I feel that it is incredibly appropriate to the feeling of the book as a whole. Characters opening presents and being happy on a day that should be happy is kind of neat. Harry's awkwardness around Christmas also expands upon his character quite a bit. He has never really had a good Christmas and... well, it works here. It is very effective.

The forest scenes, though, are some of the best of the book, equal parts mystery and creepy. Harry being forced to share the scene with Draco makes it all the more interesting as the two characters act as interesting foils for one another even this early in the series. Draco is somewhat selfish and somewhat cowardly, but is only eleven years old, whereas Harry is much more brave and willing to put himself in harm's way to do something good.

The story moves on and reaches its climax as Harry suspects that Severus Snape, his Potions professor, is up to no good. Ron, Harry, and Hermione go and explore a labyrinth of tests to reach a magical mirror introduced earlier in the novel. They solve these tests saying once again that one should not design an impregnable labyrinth to be solves by an eleven year old. Well, solved it is and the figure at the maze is none other than cowardly and stuttering Professor Quirrel who wore a turban to disguise the fact that he had Voldemort on the back of his head. Huh, that's an incredibly odd climax to this book, I have to say.

Well, Harry defeats Voldemort with the power of his mother's love somehow and ends up happy and alive in the end while Dumbledore praises him all over. Then Harry goes home and... that's it.

Well, the book was certainly fairly good for a while. The earlier half of the book is incredibly well thought out and well paced. Once the train is boarded though, it seems as if the pacing goes all to hell and the story starts making some peculiar choices. The houses being made up of the stereotypes I mentioned is just the tip of the iceberg. Why are there no math classes here at Hogwarts? Isn't math important? What about literature classes? Or... anything really? How can an entire society be absolutely removed from the "muggle" (non-magical) world? I guess that always confused me. It still does, especially with what little we see of actual magical society. They seem completely removed from the muggles, almost a completely separate offshoot of humanity, ignorant of our life as we are ignorant of theirs... but that makes no sense. Certainly it makes sense in something like Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere because it's all happening underground or secretly, but that's because they can't get back up into the real world. They're stuck beneath society, forgotten. The magical society though, is right next to the muggle one, right in the same area, and everything and yet... they don't meet, or at least rarely do. I don't quite get it and it doesn't seem right to me.

The latter half of the book, besides the forest part and Christmas, mostly feels too quick-paced and unneeded for my taste. There's a lot of hints for the ending of the story, what with fluffy, the mirror, and Quirrel, but they are absolutely superfluous and just seem to make the story longer without any real character or plot development to speak of. Honestly, besides the Quidditch matches, classes, Christmas, and the forest, there is very little development of anything in the latter half of the story. With such an interesting opening, the ending of the book feels very much stagnant and dry.

Certainly there are some other set pieces that work well, like Harry and Ron saving Hermione from a mountain troll in the girls' bathroom, and some of the scenes that Neville gets kicked around in. I have a lot of sympathy for Neville and also for Draco. Both characters are very well characterized, but mostly seemed very undeveloped, used instead as comic relief, butt-monkeys, or as a distinct bully character. Both have the issue of not appearing three-dimensional despite the reader's desire to want to make them three-dimensional. It almost seems as if J. K. Rowling had an issue with both character types.

The fantasy elements are mostly well put together, if a little amateurish, and the school itself very much feels like home after just a little while there. There's something cozy about it, something very much warm about its atmosphere except in the very depths of night. That being said, the writing for the most part is well done for a young adult/kid's book, and for the most part flows very well from beginning to end even in the more extraneous parts. The tone is fairly consistent throughout, with a fairly dark feeling that emanates from every corner of the story. The characters are mostly fairly strong except those that are very one-sided, like Snape, Draco, Neville, and most of the side characters. Only Harry, Dumbledore, and perhaps Hermione have any real depth to them, something that becomes more apparent over the course of the series rather than less apparent. 

Anyway, I have to end this review now. It's taken a long time to get this one out because of the complicated nature of the material and also the fact that I have a dark history with the Harry Potter series. It took a lot of cajoling to get me to read this book again, and... the second half of it I wasn't very happy at all. The main characters solving the puzzles despite being eleven seems to be a particularly glaring example of lazy writing all around. Why would the school even do that? It seems so dumb and ridiculous. Yes, the story is fairly ridiculous already, but come on, you know exactly what I mean here.

In the end, I found this book to be satisfactory. It's nothing incredibly special, but it is certainly not terrible. The beginning is very well put together and the character of Harry Potter is both complex and interesting. I guess the next book beckons.

God help me.
God help us all.
Six books left and I could barely get through this one. Somebody help me. Somebody shake me and tell me "No!"

*Sigh* I do this for the writing, readers. I do this because I want my voice to be read by somebody and maybe, just maybe, I'll have somebody agreeing with me... or people screaming at me telling me that the story is perfect, how dare I say anything critical about such a masterpiece... I don't really care what people say. These are my thoughts and opinions and... well, first book down...