Born with a destiny of roses

Sometimes strange things happen to me. Like just a while ago, when I ended up watching the anime series The Rose of Versailles... No spoilers ahead.

It started as an innocent experiment and search for some comedy and ended with bittersweet tears.

I have a thing for old anime titles which were dubbed and released in Finnish years, years ago in bad quality. I watched some in my childhood and loved them, and sometimes I get particularly nostalgic and want to watch them again, even though I have trouble keeping a poker face with the horrifying voice acting. So, a while ago, I took up the Finnish VHS releases of Lady Oscar (the series is known as The Rose of Versailles or Lady Oscar, depending on the country, though the former is an actual translation of the original Japanese title whereas Lady Oscar is the main character) and watched them, laughing while I did so, mostly at the wrong time. The dub quality was bad and I'm glad I never ate while watching it since I might have choked on my food more than once.

However, they never released more than three videos in Finnish, each one consisting of four episodes of this 40-episode-long series. Having watched these videos, I realized I was somewhat addicted and I had to see the whole series, so I continued in Japanese with English subtitles. Last night I found myself watching the last twelve episodes...

At the beginning I thought it was overly dramatic (even to my taste) and slightly ridiculous, especially with Marie Antoinette acting strangely. But I did my homework and learnt, much to my dismay, that many of those scenes or details at which I was rolling my eyes were historically accurate. At that point I no longer questioned the original author's, Riyoko Ikeda's sanity, and eagerly watched the story of the French Revolution (and other historical events) unfold before me.

And in the end, I cried. I thought I would only be laughing at some light-themed girls' animation badly dubbed in Finnish, but the Finnish age limits (or the lack thereof; I doubt this series was truly checked when it was released here) deceived me and left me watching the 18th century France in dire straits. And what's worse – now I'm longing for more. And it isn't particularly easy to find much evidence or information of the related anime movies...

If I had watched Lady Oscar as a little girl, I know for sure who would have been my idol.

Have you seen The Rose of Versailles and if you have, did you like it? Do you like some other old anime classics? Do you know of The Rose of Versailles anime movies, if they are available somewhere?

The night is dark and full of terrors

♫ Sequester – Night's Watch

No spoilers here, don't worry! I don't like to be spoiled myself, and I will protect others from it too! And the song I'm listening to is actually about this series!

I'm not much of a reader. I don't know how much I read "on average", but I'm not the type who always has at least one book in progress. However, something strange has obviously happened to me since I've already finished two books this year – well, I had started the first one last year and read the first half quite slowly... Until I got a grip of myself in spring and sped up. 

I've been reading A Song Of Ice And Fire – in other words, the Game of Thrones novel series, for a few fears I guess. It took me quite a while to finish the first book. It took me something like half a year to read half of the second book, A Clash of Kings. But as I sped up in spring, I finished the latter half of it in a few months... And at the beginning of summer, I started the third book, A Storm of Swords. It's over one thousand pages long, and I finished it a few days ago... And that is damn fast for me!

I bought the first four books in a bundle when I began because I figured I'd be a slow reader. It was true at first, but obviously something happened to me. Although all three books so far have contained some bloody boring chapters, they've been very enjoyable too – especially the third one since I devoured it with such appetite. Those of you who have watched the HBO TV series, and especially the third season, know the amount of extreme drama in the third book... But yes, it was the most interesting piece so far.

Now I'm moving onto A Feast for Crows. I think it'll be very different from the earlier volumes – I even heard a rumor it's not nearly as good as the preceding ones... But we'll see, eventually. I can barely wait for the fourth season of the TV series!

As all the fans know, it's not particularly safe to root for any character in the series as they might as well die next, but nevertheless, I support Jon Snow! Mostly in the books, though. Peter Dinklage does such awesome job as Tyrion Lannister in the show that it's difficult not to like the character, not that he wouldn't have the same wits in the book. And strangely enough, I've found myself liking Sansa Stark in the books too, maybe because her chapters have often been interesting.

Do you watch Game of Thrones or read A Song of Ice and Fire? Who are your favorite characters?

April goodies!

♫ Verjnuarmu – Kuuvven sylen syvyyvessä

Recently, I realized quite a funny thing; I noticed I am looking forward to the release dates of some movies and TV shows, which is quite exceptional for me. Even more so, since they are not animations! ...yet not exactly realistic portrayals of this world either, but that's another thing.

The Raven
This movie just sounds way too good! I suppose I'm not the only avid Edgar Allan Poe fan who's looking forward to this movie, yet I know it could always be a major disappointment too. The director is James McTeigue and the movie is starring John Cusack as Poe himself. (Some Poe fans have already got upset because of that.)

"A fictionalized account of the last days of Edgar Allan Poe's life, in which the poet pursues a serial killer whose murders mirror those in the writer's stories."

The US release date is April 27th, so... I'm not sure when it will hit the theaters in Finland. It seems it doesn't have a world premiere date.

Click here to watch the trailer! I think it looked good, does anyone agree with me?

Iron Sky
Almost here! Less than a month left before the tour with sneak previews begins in Finland and it will hit the theaters some time in spring (the beginning of April in Finnkino theaters in Finland)! I heard about this movie for the first time in the summer of 2009 when a panel discussion type of event related to it was held as a part of Lumous Gothic Festival. Later, I got to hear about it a lot at school – and I would have had a theoretical chance to end up as part of the graphics crew, but practically, well, that's not the type of stuff I do. I never started practicing 3d graphics seriously. Anyway, I know a few people who are part of the crew.

The plot in brief: After World War II, nazis fled to the dark side of the Moon and set up a military base there. In 2018 their descendants return to the Earth.

I have contradictory feelings about sci-fi; it can be interesting for sure, but many sci-fi themes don't interest me by default. Space is one of those themes which doesn't get me immediately excited, yet I was a Star Wars fan as a kid... Thus, I'm quite sure I wouldn't be looking forward to this movie this much if its origin wasn't in my hometown. However – it's an international production, and its languages are English and German.

Click here to see the trailer!

Game of Thrones Season 2
April 1st! Well, maybe not for me, gotta wait longer and figure out how I am going to watch it, but anyway; a person like me, who rarely watches TV series (and with "rarely" I mean that I've barely seen a single episode of any popular TV series you could come up with) fell in love with this one last summer! It's an HBO production, and a very good quality series in my opinion.

Haven't even heard of it? Well, it's based on George R. R. Martin's fantasy novel series A Song of Ice and Fire. Does fantasy genre make you shiver of disgust? Well, I know people who are not particularly fond of fantasy, but who loved this series nevertheless!

Click for a trailer!

I will most likely write more about those movies once I've seen them. And then, well, I haven't yet written about the first season of Game of Thrones. I will probably make a more elaborate post of it as well, some time in the future. These were just interesting sneak peaks of the things I'm looking forward to! So long!