So please stand by; we will return to Almost A Hero’s (ir)regular blogging as soon as possible.

Super rats over at HappySoda has released a photo book consisting of a select number of his photos, some of which are accompanied by explanatory text. I’m a big fan of his work; if anyone’s figure photos had to be the subject of an artbook, I’d place my money on HappySoda’s. Without rambling too much, he has a PDF preview available so you can have a browse before you decide to purchase. According to his post, it will only be available between October 21-28, so best head on over if you have even the slighest interest.

Perhaps you don’t want it explained in due course, but want answers now. Understandably so; you’re feeling a little tetchy, what with the global economic crisis that looks set to sweep most financial institutions off their feet with a firm roundhouse kick, although there are some notable exceptions.

Interesting is the response, with many governments announcing bailout plans for the banks: a motion which seems paramount to medieval Europeans attempting to halt the Black Death by overfeeding vermin cheese until they perish in bodily explosions of gluttonous ecstasy.

Shylock: lolis loathe bankers; yea, verily, they chase them through the streets for their unmoeness.

I somehow doubt that the higher-ups who got us into this mess are going to be the ones to suffer the repercussions of their “financial mismanagement”, which is a nice, politically-correct and euphemistic phrase that basically means, “Duuuurrrrr you done gone and catched us, but you cant dooz nothin’, we gonna fuck your shit up and we’re gonna need more (your) money to fix it, kthxbye newbs.”

Despite this, those who put their faith in the banking system – which is largely ridiculous, if you think about it carefully – have very little recourse. I’m no fiscal expert, and that’s not really the subject of this post: if you’re looking for some intelligent discourse on its effects (lol no Evangelion 2.0?) , you can always saunter over to these here x’s one the map. I’m more into vengeance, vendettas and vigilantism myself (nana nana), and Akumetsu supplies these in bucketloads of heavy-handed lines of inked goodness.

Akumetsu follows Shou, a high school student that stumbles upon a fairly useful power. Lamenting the collapse of Japan, he decides to use his power to destroy evil in a public one-man, one-kill kamikaze approach which proves to be spectacular in execution as he weeds out Japan’s corrupt underbelly. Donning the mantle of a demonic mask and proclaiming himself Akumetsu – Destroyer of Evil – what makes Akumetsu interesting is that the “evil” Shou typically targets is the bureaucracy and corrupt financial institutions.

Akumetsu is classified as shōnen, yet at its base it deals largely with seinen themes. The artwork is excellent, and the story is refreshing – and, in today’s current climate, has a certain topical air to it. Unfortunately, a lot of its less obvious satirical content passes right over my head and I imagine that other, more informed readers of Japanese business and politics may appreciate some of the more subtle nuances.

Akumetsu is edgy, dramatic, over-the-top, and well-written (if the translations offer any indication of the original content). While I am loathe to give anything away, the fact that Shou basically sacrifices himself for each kill provides an interesting twist in the usual vigilante tale. If I had to offer an American comparison, I’d argue he’s a compromise between Batman and the Punisher – while he similarly has no qualms in employing violent and gruesome tactics to achieve his ends, it is balanced by his adherence to the “one-man, one-kill” philosophy and the fact that he offers his own death as a sort of justification.

Likewise, he employs this brutal approach in a blinkered view. Despite his public appearance and clashes with law enforcement officials that attempt to bar his way, he will not kill any of them, focusing on his target alone.

Akumetsu by itself is superior in many aspects, but with the economic crisis we’re all facing it is bound to send an additional current of dark, guilty pleasure up your spine as Shou delivers lax, lazy and corrupt financial officials their come-uppance. If you haven’t had a chance to read it, or have been turned off by it shōnen origins, I suggest you give it another look.

P.S: Banksta 4 Life, ya’ll.

]]> http://almostahero.wordpress.com/2008/10/10/economic-crisis-akumetsu-hates-on-dem-bankstas-dawgs/feed/ 1 Almost A Hero http://almostahero.wordpress.com/2008/10/07/eve-no-jikan-of-goodness-in-golems/ http://almostahero.wordpress.com/2008/10/07/eve-no-jikan-of-goodness-in-golems/#comments Tue, 07 Oct 2008 10:51:10 +0000 Almost A Hero http://almostahero.wordpress.com/?p=51 ]]> What is it about robots and coffee? Is the future to be populated with darling droids and ye old coffee shops? Is the fragrance of the Brazilian blend to be the scent of the new technological era? Will coffeehouses always serve as the germination for revolutionary seeds?

Influenced by the Robot Ethics Committee, it’s become common sense for people to treat androids like household appliances. Their appearance – indistinguishable from humans except for the ring over each android’s head – has lead some people to empathize unnecessarily with androids. Known as “android-holics,” such people have become a social problem.

Rikuo (Jun Fukuyama), a high school student, has been taught from childhood that androids are not to be viewed as humans, and has always used them as convenient tools. One day Rikuo discovers some strange data in the behavior records of his family’s household android.

Rikuo and his friend Masaki (Kenji Nojima) trace Sammy’s (Rie Tanaka) movements, only to discover a mysterious café that features a house rule that “humans and robots are to be treated the same” . . .

Eve no Jikan is a fascinating show. For a 15 minute ONA, it manages to cram in a lot of visual detail and information while maintaining a steady flow in the story itself. While the music, pacing, animation and characters are all excellent, it is the angle which Yasuhiro Yoshiura has taken, along with the wealth of information in the background, that I would like to discuss.

Eve no Jikan offers a lot for the viewer who is willing to engage with it beyond a superficial level, and I hope that my essay will add to your enjoyment of the show and get you thinking. This is based solely on Acts I and II of the show.

How I Learned To Stop Worrying and Love the Androids

The most interesting aspect of Eve no Jikan is the interaction and social dynamic between the humans and androids. Typically, the humans treat their robot companions as inferior beings. There is a fair amount of Luddite propaganda pushed by the Ethics Committee (which seems to have a more sinister hidden agenda, but more on that later), and concerns about the growing phenomenon known as dori-kei: a psychological dependence on androids.

Rikuo and Sammy share a moment. Ahhh, how romantic.

All of this is fairly standard stuff as far as robot tales are concerned, but there is one critical point in which Eve no Jikan differs, and it revolves around the treatment of dori-kei. Dori-kei extends beyond its presented official definition as presented in Eve no Jikan’s media – the very act of thanking an android or treating it similarly to a human, (which can hardly be construed as having a psychological dependence), is enough to warrant being labeled as a dori-kei, and there is a fair amount of ridicule, shame and disgust that follows the label.

But, if it is so important for humans not to empathize with androids – and there is a definite social stigma in doing so – then why are the majority of them manufactured to resemble humanity so closely? Barring very few exceptions, almost every android shown in Eve no Jikan is eerily human in appearance, voice and manner. Empathy is the natural, instinctual reaction to another human being, and a lack thereof is seen as the hallmark of psychotics.

Isn’t it odd, then, that the level of interaction promoted with androids in Eve no Jikan seems to be one of abuse? In THAT Animeblog’s review of the first episode, the observation was made that the androids are treated worse than one would treat an appliance. Androids appear to be used as a target for humans to vent their frustrations or act out small cruelties that would be frowned upon if enacted on their fellow man – which would explain why dori-kei is so detestable. It places such action in a very negative light, and no one wants their own motives called into question.

There is a fair amount of criticism in the portrayal of this interaction. Eve no Jikan presents the question: if given a human being who was denied the same rights and privileges as themselves, how would they treat such a human being? The answer seems to be a misanthropic one – the average person treats them like slaves. I can only wonder if the show will look at the less savoury, maladjusted portions of the population who are not dori-kei.

Similarly, the older generation is exempt from dori-kei. In one scene, when his sister asks why he talks to Sammy as if she were a human being, Rikou points out that their mother talks naturally to her and even purchases her clothes to wear. The sister replies, “For her generation, it can’t be helped. But if you do it, it means you are already a dori-kei.” If everyone acted the same way, one could argue that dori-kei is an unnatural deviation.

By separating the older generation from the younger one, Yasuhiro highlights that this enforced regime against androids is a deliberate construct by the Ethics Committee, and to explain why we will have to dig into Eve no Jikan’s history.

“Would you eat a tomato created by machines?”

Aquatic musings in the time of EVE

Eve no Jikan shares many themes with Yasuhiro’s earlier work, Mizu no Kotoba, otherwise known as Aquatic Language. Both feature androids, coffee shops, questions around the Three Laws of Robotics, issues around human relationships and the power for language to shape ones thought.

In Aquatic Language, a graph is displayed showing the curves of the first two robotic laws against the dimensions of potential and time. 1 and 2 represent the First and Second Laws of Robotics respectively: 1. A robot may not directly harm, nor through inaction fail to try and prevent harm to a human being and 2. A robot may not disobey a command from a human unless it contravenes the First Law. The potential, I believe, represents the likelihood of the laws contradicting themselves over time and the operational band in which they can successfully follow each law.

Aquatic Language could be seen as the historical precursor to the current times of Eve no Jikan; a point where robotics and artificial intelligence have been only recently introduced. The barista in Aquatic Language identifies herself as an android immediately, and openly states that she’s never experienced the same emotional hardships as human beings. As a result, you could argue that the androids in Aquatic Language fall near the start of the graph, and therefore have a fair amount of play in following the laws.

Whereas Eve no Jikan lies further on the time axis, either just before, on or past the turning point as indicated on the graph. Asimov designed the rules to have a hierarchy of importance; therefore, as long as the curves of each do not cross, the three rules can be maintained.

This is particularly relevant in Eve no Jikan, and I will explain why. The only thing that separates humans from androids is the digital halo that spins around the androids head, marking them as such. In other words, without it, humans would be constantly performing a form of Turing’s Test – trying to determine whether the person they’re interacting with is a human being or a robot.

The café itself presents such an environment. By enforcing the house rule that patrons cannot discriminate, you create the environment for this test to occur. If a human is unable to determine who is an android – or chooses not too – it is possible that said human could develop a relationship (platonic or otherwise) unwittingly.

This is where the graph factors in. The potential to cause harm beyond that of the merely physical increases substantially in this scenario over time. Therefore, it becomes more and more difficult to follow the Laws. Let’s say that a human – unaware that the object of their affections is literally that – had just confessed his love for an android. The android knows that a romantic relationship would cause them harm due to increased animosity from their peers due to dori-kei. However, to spurn their love would also cause emotional harm.

In Eve no Jikan, the androids side-step the issue by either lying or refusing to make a decision (say, by not answering at all) on the premise that the Second Law prohibits them from doing so. This side-step requires rationalisation, something at which human beings excel over their logic-chained brethren. This is the “turning point” in the graph – the point where the androids cease to be mechanical devices following a program. At this point, androids would begin to demonstrate autonomous action and nurture intelligence.

This is why the Ethics Committee pushes the anti-android propaganda so forcefully. It can be seen in various areas of the show – in an advert which criticizes the modernization of agriculture, in the “Human Style/Robot Style” posters that grace the billboards, the “No robots” sign which uses a symbol reminiscent of the androids’ 1940’s counterparts. Interestingly, not once in the first two episodes do the Ethics Committee refer to androids as “Androids”, despite the popular media and androids themselves referring to themselves as such.

The Ethics Committee is trying incredibly hard to maintain that disconnect between humans and androids in both action and language in order to avoid what the café has created: an environment where androids and humans are indistinguishable from one another, and for the very reason I explained earlier – such an environment encourages the growth of individuality in androids as they, along with their human counterparts.

Although the obvious reason would be to prevent losing a cheap workforce, that doesn’t sit very well with me. I believe the Ethics Committee have another reason for suppressing the growth of a self in androids, but with only two episodes I can’t really say what with any degree of accuracy.

Ultimately, for some, Eve no Jikan may seem to fall into the “Can robots think and feel?” category. Truthfully, there isn’t an original story in the entire world – yet we continue to tell them. Eve no Jikan happens to be telling an old story very well, and falls into a subset of anime that has been released recently (such as Kaiba and RD Sennou Chosashitsu), but more of that in another post.

Postscript

These are just one or two other observations that I would like to point out that didn’t really fit with the flow of the essay.

• One of the things that cropped up while I was looking for screenshots was the gender of the androids people selected. Notice how all of the owners seem to gravitate towards androids of the opposite sex? The rich lady walking has an all male entourage; the off-screen female classmate who is ridiculed for thanking her male android; the two male students who slam their bags roughly into their waiting female androids arms. Is it related directly to our preference for aesthetically pleasing objects and persons, or is the show hinting at a deeper, psycho-sexual meaning behind the choice, considering the level of abuse levelled at the androids?

• I was immediately taken by the digital halos that adorn the androids, and the shift between the red/green status. I’ve tried to correlate the colour with their actions to determine some sort of pattern, but I can’t really explain it. Maybe someone else has some idea, but I’m largely stumped.

• References to Code:Life, which appear both in a book and in the opening credits to the show, when the title of the act is displayed.

• Sammy is cuter in a ponytail. That is all.
  

Validation of statement. See above.THAT IS ALL.

Acknowledgements

Thanks must go to Pireze, who has not only taken it upon himself to sub this awesome series, but has introduced a form of open-source subtitles that makes capturing screencaps and blogging a breeze. Pop him a message of thanks if you can!