Background: Trigun aired on Japanese TV in the spring and summer of 1998, and came to American shores not long after. It didn’t garner much of an audience in its home country, but was a huge hit on this side of the Pacific, especially once it aired on Adult Swim in 2003. Hot Topic sold replica Vash the Stampede coats, people. 26 episodes were originally released over 8 DVDs at $30 each by Pioneer/Geneon, but now I think you can get the whole thing in one Thinpak set from FUNimation for, like, 2 pennies and a song or something, or watch it for free online. You kids get offa my lawn.

So how does it hold up? In the interest of full disclosure, I have a Trigun tattoo. Just so you know.

Trigun was animated by the famous MadHouse studios, but I remember thinking back in 2001 that the animation quality was uneven, and it’s only highlighted even more now. There are episodes and sequences that look amazing, and then there are episodes and sequences that look like MH spent all their money on the good bits, so everyone’s animated at 3 frames per second and colored in crayon. Episode 2 looks like it was farmed out to some sort of magical girl animation team who never came back. So if you, or someone you want to introduce the series to, is a snob about such things, ply them with a few drinks first so maybe they’ll get involved with the story and won’t notice until it’s too late and they’re hooked. (If you want to stay on theme, ask me for the recipe for the Pink Derringer, an ill-advised recipe I made up that my gracious friends choked down at anime cons. If I recall correctly, it involves Jagermeister and Cheerwine, so, y’know, you were warned.)

I watched it dubbed, as that is the way I first watched it and fell in love with it. Also, if an anime is supposed to take place in an English-speaking or Western world, I have a weird tick about needing to see it dubbed, even if the dub is terrible (see: Hellsing TV series). What I learned is that I was remembering the dub a little more fondly than I should have. The main actors are fantastic – no complaints about them. However, the scriptwriting and sync really could’ve used some work. There are some awkward pauses, only highlighted more in emotional moments, which happen exponentially as the series progresses (by the final episode, there are dramatic speeches about the beauty of life every 30 seconds). This was one of Johnny Yong Bosch’s first roles before he became an anime dub superstar, so you get to hear him while he’s all virginal and shit.

Plotwise, it holds up fairly well. There was once a time in my life where I was watching this show so often that I could tell with one glance what episode any given screencap or cel was from. Those times have passed and been replaced with maniacal rewatches of Doctor Who, so I was seeing this with somewhat fresh eyes. Some of the filler episodes are pretty ridiculous (wow, I had completely forgotten about “Quick Draw”), but when it’s good, it’s REALLY good. When Vash first seriously draws his gun in “Hard Puncher” (let’s ignore the Engrish episode titles), I still held my breath. I fell asleep during the recap episode, but was enough of a fangirl that I snapped awake at the moment that actual plot happens. And even the stupid episodes exist to further character development of our main 4 good guys, which is where the real strength of the series lies. Though the TV series had a really great ending (more on that later), it legitimately could’ve continued longer on the strength of its awesome characters. As I said to a friend, rewatching Utena makes me think, “This show is so AWESOME.” Rewatching Trigun made me think, “I want to write fanfiction!” (Don’t worry, it only goes in private notebooks and you all shall be spared, unless you’re really curious.)

One of the biggest complaints about Trigun is that it takes a sharp turn in tone halfway through the series. Episodes 1-11 are wacky madcap action with an occasional serious note. Twelve and on, the series becomes dramatic action with occasional jokes. This was a turn that never bothered me – we spend the first 11 episodes with a character who behaves like an idiot, but we’re reminded that he turned a major city into rubble 30 years ago, and he’s a crack shot who’s really concerned that no one EVER dies. If you didn’t read that as giant warning signs that the ToonTown highway was ending and Route Serious Backstory was going to begin, I feel bad for you, son; I got 99 problems, but genre switch ain’t one. Watching it again, I still had no problems with this changeup, though I admittedly like my comedy spiked with drama (and a side of UST biscotti).

Ultimately, rewatching Trigun was enjoyable, but it made me want to get back into Trigun fandom more than it made me want to re-rewatch Trigun. It also piqued my interest in maybe finally reading all of Trigun Maximum, which I never finished because HOLY FUCK WAS THAT STORY MEANDERING AND ENDLESS. Which brings me to another point – the ending. When the Trigun anime was in production, the Trigun Maximum manga was still going with no end in sight. Don’t you hate that when that happens? When an anime just keeps going for its 26-episode contract, but you never get closure because there’s not a real ending since the comic was still–

Oh wait. You know what the Trigun anime team did?

THEY MADE THEIR OWN FUCKING ENDING.

And honestly? That might be the kicker that pushes Trigun from “fun anime” into “awesome show I will keep forever and would totally buy on Blu-Ray if FUNimation ever cleaned it up and released it HINT HINT.” MadHouse talked things out with Yasuhiro Nightow, manga artist, and got his plan for where things were maybe kinda going, and then they WRAPPED THAT SHIT UP. They wrapped that shit up with a satisfying ending that made sense and properly reflected the characters, and made ALL THE SHIPPERS happy. Just think about how amazing that is, also factoring in that when the manga finally ended, it had an insane ending that was, like, a million years in the making and made no sense and made no one happy. When I think about the Trigun manga, my left eye starts to twitch. When I think about the anime ending, I feel warm and fuzzy and happy.

So, 13 years later: Yay or Nay? YAY! Trigun is a series that can be silly and dumb, but it can also be really emotional and touching. There is something for everybody in this show, and Western enough that it’s a good introduction for someone who maybe doesn’t think of themselves as an anime fan. And the fandom, if it still exists, is pretty awesome. Now excuse me while I go back to translating all my dirty Vash/Meryl doujinshi.

P.S. – When I got into Trigun, I had disposable income, an interest in anime, and no reliable way of checking out shows other than just buying them and hoping they were good. As a way of trying to gauge if I’d like the show, I downloaded the opening theme from Napster (did you not see above that I got into this show in 2001?), and that sealed the deal for me. Give a listen and tell me this doesn’t get you excited for something awesome.

Click here to view the embedded video.

WHY GOD!?! WHY DID WE DO THIS!!!

Koshi’s picks

Tiger and Bunny – A show about buddy-cop superheroes (with nary a zord or morpher in sight) and the crass commercialization thereof, and it’s from Japan? Color me impressed!

Besides the title heroes, it’s especially worth watching for the supporting cast which includes a tarted-up superhero who really just wanted to be a tarted-up pop star; a flaming energy magnate; and a ninja who made a career out of photobombing all the other heroes.

Admittingly, Tiger and Bunny is probably not as subversive as it could be if it were in the hands of, say, Warren Ellis, but that may be expected when actual companies bought up adspace on the characters.

Toriko – Because something has to step in and fill the Shonen void now that 2 out of Jump’s Big 3 have become an interminable slog. Toriko is the story of a manly man and his manly friends who have manly battles to eat manly food. They live in a world that’s kind of like that of Pokemon, except it revolves completely around food. I’m feeling hungry. I’m in the mood to get a food. Who wants to go out and get a food?

Once Naruto and Bleach kick the bucket, this show will have enough awesome to fill in all of their shoes. Unfortunately, this means Gintama will still be bumped out of being in Shonen Jump’s Big 3.

Dororon Enma-kun! *MeraMera* – Satan’s nephew is sent from hell to kick the asses of renegade penis demons (who in fact do have asses). There isn’t one part of that sentence I didn’t like. Add in the retro 70’s aethstetic, completely bizarre cast of characters, and increasingly more bizarre monsters of the week and there isn’t one part of this whole damn show I don’t like.

Since it’s based on a Go Nagai comic, it should probably go without saying that this show is unabashedly juvenile, but that never stopped me from liking anything. To paraphrase one Something Awful goon, “Panty & Stocking saw poop and sex jokes as a means to an end. Enma thinks that’s ridiculous; sex and poop jokes should serve no purpose but their own.”

Kirk’s picks

Ano Hana – Count on noitaminA to come out with a show more devastating than Tokyo Magnitude 8.0. Kannon figured that the best way to make the main character’s love interest emotionally impacting was to reveal in the last episode that she’s already dead. Ano Hana does this in the first scene. Juxtaposing happy little kids with sullen, damaged teenagers is the best thing since Nakige.

C: The Money of Soul and Possibility Control – In the fourth episode, the main character hits his opponent so hard that his two children and his wife’s pregnancy all vanish. C is an anime that’s directed by the guy that did Trapeze, written by the guy that did Durarara!!, has character designs by the guy that did Black Rock Shooter, and conceptual designs by the guy that did Big O. This is the best dream team since ProStars. It’s a testament to Ano Hana to say that I like it more than C.

X-Men MADHOUSE anime – It can’t be worse than the MADHOUSE Wolverine series.

Kirk’s Anti-Picks

A Channel / Nichijou – Two 4-koma style slice-of-life moe gag anime, neither are that great. I’ll just watch Lucky Star and Soredemo Machi wa Mawatteiru again this season.

Hanasaku Iroha – I would love to watch the adventures of a 16 year old city girl living the rough, dramatic life at her grandma’s bath house if I was half my age and the opposite gender. Though I guess the fact that I gave this a shot might say something about my age/gender identity.

Mike’s Pick

Steins; Gate – The story of a Mad Scientist fan boy and the damage he does to the space time continuum. Because everyone needs the ability send texts to the past. It also has a microwave that turns backwards and causes bananas placed inside to have been turned to Green Gel in the past. ARG time travel makes my head hurt.

Casey’s Anti-Picks

Lotte no Omocha – This anime season left me cold. “Ooh! Lotte no Omocha! It’s a show about a vampire princess! With a male harem! And she needs to drink something called ‘Sauzfryma’ to survive! I’m curious about this new spin on vampire mytho– oh. Sauzfryma means semen. And she looks like she’s 10. Oh she IS 10? Is that 10 in vampire year– no, really just an actual sexualized 10 year old girl being told she needs to start drinking semen right away.” You know what, Japan? Maybe you WERE asking for it.*

*Ohmigodohmigod I didn’t really mean it, I deal with tragedy and catastrophe with gallows humor and in no way meant to suggest that the current suffering of the Japanese is in any way deserved, no matter how bad Dance in the Vampire Bund was.

Maria+holic: Alive – “Oh, well, at least there’s another season of Maria+holic! It’s that shoujo-ai schoolgirl anime where the main lesbian character is essentially a horny teenage boy archetype and the tsundere character is actually a cross-dressing man, and women become lesbians because they HATE MEN and break out into hives when they touch one, and before the episode loads up, I’m really curious as to what this entire bottle of sleeping pills tastes like!”

Casey’s Picks

Trigun: Badlands Rumble – Badlands Rumble is the movie I’ve been waiting 5 years for, and while I knew it wasn’t going to be canon-shattering (Hey, check out Wolfwood in the poster, bein’ all alive and shit!), I think I had expected something slightly more awesome. Instead, this was a REALLY NICELY ANIMATED 90 minute Trigun episode. But random episodes of Trigun go like this:

Vash the Stampede shows up and people think he’s lame.

Actual danger threatens town where Vash is.

Meryl is vexed; Milly is darling.

Wolfwood smokes and is morally ambiguous.

Vash solves issue and someone has their life touched by the Humanoid Typhoon.

This is not a great 90 minute formula. There’s a villain, and I think his name is Gasbag? And a bounty hunter out to catch him because he’s really her father, a fact that isn’t a twist when you introduce two new characters separated by a generation who both have red hair. I remember immediately after watching the movie that I liked the bounty hunter and thought she was awesome and badass*, but now can’t recall why she was badass or what her motivations were or WHAT HER NAME WAS. I think Wolfwood was Gasbag’s bodyguard. Why? Well, because the moviemakers realised that as a fan favorite, Wolfwood needed to be back in, and that the audience wanted to see a firefight between he and Vash and that never happened in the anime. Oh, why is he a bad guy bodyguard in the narrative? Fuck if I know.

In short (too late), Badlands Rumble was a 90 minute pretty piece of fanservice. And there’s nothing strictly WRONG with that. Funimation is releasing the movie in theaters this summer, and I’ll be in line for it, along with all my Trigun fandom queens. But I’m still holding out for a Trigun series Blu-ray release to hug at night. And fanfic about Knives. Smutty, smutty Knives fanfic.

*and wanted to write Meryl/bounty hunter fanfic don’t judge

30-sai no Hoken Taiiku – So I hereby dub this anime season “bizarro time”, because, to recap, there are both a vampire series and a shoujo-ai series that I’m not interested in, and the movie version of one of my all-time favorites was just okay. So I figured I might as well give a shot to the anime that made me most likely to roll my eyes and make faces – 30-sai no Hoken Taiiku, “Health and Physical Education for 30-year-olds.” It’s based on a manga that’s based on a book series aimed at 30-year-old virgins, and might be the most charming thing I’ve seen so far this year.

Rob’s Pick

Dog Days -  This show is so awesomely bad. Have you seen Combat Butler Hayate? Dog Days is like if Hayate had been just as bad, but did it more awesomely.

It’s about this middle-school kid who’s obsessed with gymnastics and likes to play with big long sticks, though I was disappointed to find he’s way straighter than that description makes him sound. He gets transported to a world of furries, where a princess who’s also a pop idol wants him to be a hero and save her country from losing a war. And by “war” she means “Japanese game show.”

See, everyone in this world is so nice and polite, they have “wars” where everyone’s really friends and you turn into a chibi-furry instead of dying and the heroes do big spectacular spells and combat stunts to show off because it’s all on TV. Oh, and when you take damage your armor falls off, where “armor” means “metal wristbands” for the guys and “all your clothes” for the girls. And he’s not even missing anything on Earth because it’s spring break and his parents are away. So he’s fighting in a war, if war was like paintball, and paintball was like Exalted, and Exalted had more doggie ears and underaged boobies. And the writers have absolutely no shame about any of this.

I keep waiting for them to go, “oh, haha, it’s a Last Exile spoof, get it? Isn’t war and the dramatization of war ridiculous?” But no sign of it yet, they just keep playing this ludicrous concept 100% straight.

Awesomely.

Johncon, over at Johns Hopkins University was nice enough to invite us back to set the convention on fire with our own breed of insanity again! Once again they have been nice enough to shack us up in a decent hotel and pay our way down to the great city of… what is Baltimore know for? Giant enemy crabs?

Johncon is a great con because it’s kind of small. It’s all about anime, video games, sci-fi, and really just geekery of any sort, but since the whole thing is pretty intimate and held on a college campus a good part of the con is just hanging out and chilling with all your fellow geeks and all the con guests. Other than us, who will be performing Fanfiction: From Mary Sue to Shakespeare, Spoiler: The Panel 4, and once again doing our hilarious fanfiction contest that got so many laughs last year, Johncon will also be flying in the authors/artists of Cyanide and Happiness, Surviving the World, Strawberry Death Cake, and Manly Guys Doing Manly Things!

There will also be lots of gaming. Look forward to a Magic: the Gathering tournament, events for popular fighting games such as Blazblue and Marvel VS Capcom 3, TONS of differnet roleplaying games including an annual Paranoia game that runs through midnight, and beta tests of games you’ve never even played before, and much much more!

There’s a non stop anime room and movie room that you can even bring your own shows to. Last year we just showed up with Durarara and people just watched it! There’s a rave Saturday night, and possibly Quidditch on Sunday!

Not only that, but the convention runs twenty four hours long. From start to finish it never closes down from the opening on Friday to the closing on Sunday and guess what? There are couches and beds and shit that you can crash on right in the con space!

There’s also dealer’s rooms, food right in the con, booze … uh… if you bring it … not that we condone underage drinking as awesome as it may be. Oh and the hotel we are staying at has a spa! I guess that’s more awesome for us than you guys … unless you wanna hang in a steam room with a bunch of half naked geeks. I mean, whatever floats your boat man.

Honestly, what more can you ask for from a convention that only costs ten bucks for the entire weekend. Hell if you come with a group of ten or more, it actually only costs seven bucks for the entire weekend! That’s a steal!

Johncon invited us back because … we were funny and made dick jokes, but honestly we want to give something back to them too. So if you are in the Baltimore area or driving distance of the Baltimore area, come down to Johncon and make this the coolest goddamn convention ever. It’s YOUR convention and you can do what YOU want at it. Hope to see you there! (We may bake you cookies.)

Johncon takes place the weekend of April 8th-10th 2011 at John’s Hopkins University. Directions, schedules, and more info can be found at http://www.jhu.edu/johncon/index.html

We will post the rules for the fanfiction contest when we know what day we will be doing it.

Beck is a story about … uh … just watch the damn video.

Download the MP3 here. Do it! DO IT NOW!!!

(P.S. Sorry for the audio quality. What? You want an excuse? Fuck you. I’m sure your first ever podcast was fucking crystal clear wasn’t it? Why do you hate us so much? We try so hard for you! WHY DON’T YOU LOVE ME DAD!!! … er … I mean the audio quality will get better next time.)

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Download the MP3 here and then we will give you cards of Mario asking about druids.

(P.S. Sorry for the audio quality. Godzilla attacked me in the middle of editing. I managed to save the day, but the audio quality suffered. You can thank me for saving your lives later..)

Part 1

Part 2

Part 4

Download the MP3 here! … You bastards.

(P.S. Sorry for the audio quality. Apparently there was some issue with the sampling rate. I don’t know, I’m just learning this shit.)

Part 1

Part 3

Part 4

Download the MP3 here!

(P.S. Sorry for the audio quality. Still getting the hang of this.)

Part 2
Part 3
Part 4

Thankfully, Hulu and Viz post new episodes of this show on Saturdays, when I usually have nothing else to do, but still want to drink.  Right now many of the guys of DO XIII are on the couchbed, playing Dead Space and reading astronaut logs in funny voices.

Last time on Inuyasha, Kagura turned into a puff of feathers and smegma, Koga got the awesome Hot Topic jewelry of the dog face tribe, and Naraku’s heart is actually a baby inside a mutant demon/Frankenstein’s monster creature with Gamera’s hard candy shell.

Sesshoumaru is standing on the cliffs of thoughtful recappyness, reminding us that Kagura’s dead and he may or may not be sad about such a thing.  Happosai appears on a three-eyed cow and tells Sesh that his not-broken sword has been making noise and summoned him.  It is now time to reforge Tenseiga into a weapon.

…But Tenseiga’s a sword, right?  It’s already a weapon.  Why does it need to be reforged into a weapon?  Is it really just a sword hilt, and there are corndogs in the sheath? Seriously, the episode title hasn’t even appeared, and I need a new drink.  Whiskey, you are my true friend.

This week’s title is Meido Zangetsuha, which breaks the previous streak of “Character’s Metaphorical Object” titling we’ve had.  I guess we’ll never get to see Kikyo’s Baloney Sandwich then…  The closest thing I recognize from that is “Zangetsu,” which is the name of Ichigo’s sword in Bleach.  Let’s see, we’re talking about Sesshoumaru getting a sword…is Zangetsu a Japanese word for “obnoxiously powerful anime weaponry”?

Sango and PervMonk are hanging out in the rolling hills of suggestive fanfic shipping, catching us up to speed Sango’s little brother – he ran off to help Kikyo defeat Naraku by uniting the Shikon MacGuffin, which would kill him.  Then Sango grabs his butt.  This is important.

So Sango’s brother might die, Kagura is dead, and Kikyo absorbed someone else’s soul into her body…let’s see what high schools Kagome’s applying to!  And here, in the grand tradition of shojo anime heroines, we see her interact with “easily forgotten normal BFFs.”  I have seen your type in Sailor Moon and Pretear and Utena, and I’m not even trying to remember your names.

Cut to: Kagome at home.  Her grandfather is giving her a lucky charm, and telling her a foreshadowy story behind it. Apparently, when the Shikon Jewel was won, the winner made the “only correct wish” and everything was peachy.  Kagome, who has been spending about 20 years hanging out in an alternate dimension where this sort of thing is really important, smartly tunes her grandfather out, but wonders what the correct wish is.  (The correct wish is obviously for the High School Musical franchise to continue into College Musical.)

Upstairs in her bedroom, InuYasha pulls his best Edward Cullen, not only in that he comes in through the window to watch her sleep, but then blames her for being cold when he’s the one who opened the window.  Oh, InuYasha.  Isn’t it your fucking time of the month yet?

Shippo takes a laserbeam leaf to the face, and then the demon inn appears.  This next portion of the episode is brought to you by sweet, sweet Amaretto.

The demon inn is full of sexy ladies in kimonos, so PervMonk predictably is all, “Shit, bitch, let’s check in.”  But then the sexy ladies turn out to be foxes, who are trying to go up in rank for the Demon Promotion Exam.  How did my glass get empty so quickly?

The laserbeam leaf that hit Shippo is his exam ticket to get “promoted”.  A couple other fox kids show up and explain that since the Scoobies are such hero archetypes, they’ll get beau coup points for fooling them with foxy magic.  Shippo himself goes up 5 ranks just for smacking InuYasha around a bit.  Wasn’t this series supposed to make up for the fact that the original series was 9,000 episodes of running around?  We’re in episode 3 and we’ve already hit wacky filler?  REALLY?

Oh, I get it!  It’s a parallel!  Kagome’s freaking out about her exams in the real world, and now Shippo’s going through exams in this world, and getting so caught up, he forgets what’s important!  See, it’s funny because– whiskey! You came back!

InuYasha’s sword is made with Time Lord technology, because that sheath’s gotta be bigger on the inside.  Also, if I crossover shitty anime in my mind with good shows, it makes things more bearable.  Anyway, a demonette shows up to steal the demon power from InuYasha’s sword, and Shippo helps her because he’s a retarded mascot character who believes anything a villain of the week says.  Within the span of 2 minutes, max, the following happens:

1. Tetsusaiga runs out of demonic energy
2. The demonette fires said energy at InuYasha
3. InuYasha is believed to be dead
4. But he’s okay!
5. The demonette is sorry
6. But then she isn’t!
7. And she’s really a raccoon!
8. InuYasha gets his sword’s energy back.

Rumiko Takahashi, you are trying to destroy my liver.

We’re almost at the end of the episode when something that actually matters happens.  I’ve gotta admit, this was pretty badass.  Sesshoumaru and his party are with Happosai and his supercow in some sort of freaky sperm world.  Sesh wields his sword against a giant ogre and seemingly does nothing.  But then!  A giant crescent moon-shaped hole to the underworld opens up and sucks the ogre into it.  HOLY CRAP.

Happosai explains: Tenseiga is connected to the underworld, which is why he can bring dead people back from it (hey, maybe you shoulda tried that with Kagura, buddy, I’m just sayin’).  So NOW, he can cut a hole into the underworld offensively to have his enemies get sucked into the darkness.  And he’s got beef with Naraku.

Which is unfortunate, because the end theme has taught me that Naraku will be defeated by rapping pinwheels.

Next time on InuYasha – The Final Act!  Tetsusaiga’s turned to shit and InuYasha has to get energy back!  The dog-faced boy returns to fight somebody!  These plots may or may not have anything to do with anything!  Perhaps I’ll have Crystal Head Vodka by then!