This is an article that I wrote for my school's newspaper, and thought it would be fun to share on my blog as some additional Horror Month content. I added some pictures to make it more visual. Enjoy!
There are two types of people that do different activities on Halloween night: the first type goes out into the dark, wearing their costumes, braving the bitter cold. The second type decides to stay at home, holing up in their warm basements, watching horror movies or Halloween specials, eating their popcorn, eagerly anticipating the next scare. For those of the second type, I decided to compile a guide of what movies to watch and who should watch them. Enjoy, my fellow movie lovers!
Psycho (1960): This movie pretty much invented the psychological horror genre. The film has a perfect sense of pacing, interesting characters, and a lack of gore so that the squeamish can watch. However, if you don’t want Norman Bates’ creepy smile etched into your brain, stay away, but otherwise, watch this classic masterpiece as soon as you can.
Paranormal Activity: This recommendation can also be said for The Blair Witch Project, but these movies are really the ones who solidified the “found footage” genre of horror. Some may find this style boring (and some have), but you can’t deny that these movies can at the very least be unsettling. Watch the first, and then decide on watching the rest.
Scream, Friday The 13th,A Nightmare on Elm Street, ect.: Not for the faint of heart, these slasher films are worth watching if you like gore and suspense. If you’re more a fan of psychological or supernatural horror, don’t give these a try.
Hotel Transylvania: This Adam Sandler movie is more aimed at comedy lovers and younger children, but it’s still a great watch for the entire family. Witty dialogue, lovable characters, great humor, fantastic animation, and a throwback to classic monster movies make this a must-see.
Shaun of the Dead: A clever satire that somehow completely parodies the zombie genre while at the same time still works as a zombie flick. Not for the faint of heart, but give it a watch if you like zombie movies.
Silence of The Labs: It’s Hannibal Lector, one of the most famous cannibals of all time. Need I say more?
The Shining: No, I’m not talking about the miniseries, I’m talking about the classic Stanley Kubrick adaptation of the Steven King novel. Known for how messed-up and terrifying this film is, The Shining definitely shouldn’t be missed this Halloween, especially for Jack Nicholson fans.
Misery: The movie that won Kathy Bates an Oscar for playing the psychotic fan Annie Wilkes, this picture proves just how dangerous it is to be famous. Maybe being that superstar isn’t the best course of action…
Coraline: This stop-motion animation film is generally aimed at children, but some of its images are truly frightening, enough to scare the average adult. It’s a great movie for the family if the children are above the age of ten, because I saw it around that age and am still scared of its imagery.
Those should tide you over this season. Until next time!
Welcome to the final (planned) review of Horror Month 2014! I hope you liked this project, and let me know if you’d like for me to continue it every October! Anyway, let’s move onto the review.
Something that I’ve picked up during my experience of watching anime is that the medium can be dark, and that I am all for dark anime. I believe that utilizing more serious topics in shows can make them more realistic, intense, terrifying, and overall satisfying. For example, Kara no Kyoukai, a series that delves into the darkness of humanity and questions just how moral our species is. Another example is Parasyte, a show that’s not afraid of showing gore and contains aliens that only think about their survival and lack empathy. Heck, Fullmetal Alchemist 2003 is incredibly dark when it wants to be, and showcases some pretty pessimistic and agnostic themes such as hopelessness, the ability to wipe out an entire village based solely on racism, and the consequences of actions that may have had good intentions. I could go on for days about how much I love anime that take themselves seriously in this regard, but that’s not what I will be talking about in this review. Today, we’re going to be talking about an anime that tries so hard to be dark and serious, but results in a disgusting and pretentious show that never finds its own true identity. Sit back, relax, and read on as I review The Future Diary.
The Setup:
This is probably the best aspect of Future Diary. The show follows a fourteen-year-old boy named Yukiteru Amano, or Yuki for short. He’s a social introvert who thinks of himself as an observer, recording everything that happens on his cell phone. An incredibly outdated cell phone, I may add, but I guess it can be excused because the manga came out in 2006, the year before Apple came out with the iPhone. But, then, why does one character have an iPhone in later episodes…you know what, I’m just going to ignore this incredibly minor complaint because I’ve got way too many to cover later. Then again, the creators could’ve modernized the phones…I’m spending too much time on this! Anyway, Yuki also has some imaginary friends in the forms of Deus ex Machina (who, despite popular belief, does live up to his name) and his assistant Murmur. Deus then tells Yuki that he’s going to give Yuki a “Future Diary” that can, well, tell the future. He then uses this to cheat on a test and avoid some bullies that wanted to beat him up…for some reason…but then things take a turn for the worse when a serial killer begins to come after him. To save him, the famous pink-haired yandere mascot Yuno Gasai tells him that her diary is all about Yuki and his actions, and they work together to kill the serial killer. As it turns out, the three of them (and nine others) are part of a battle royal where the prize is to become the God of Time and Space. The reason? Deus is apparently real, and he’s dying. How will people accomplish this? By trying to kill everyone using his or her future diary, of course! What a nice way to choose the new god of the world; let’s have the winner be a raving psychopath! Actually, here’s a new nitpick that I haven’t seen: why the heck is Yuki the only normal person participating in this game? Everyone else is certifiably insane, why was Yuki dragged into this? Okay, logic gaps aside, this is a pretty good setup. Who wouldn’t want to watch a battle royal where the prize is to be god? Apparently a lot of people wouldn’t, though, especially after viewing this anime.
The story focuses on 12 people given the power to see the future and kill the other contestants
The Characters:
Contrary to popular belief, the characters aren’t terrible. There were quite a few that I did like and were memorable, but those are side characters. The main characters are some of the worst that I’ve ever seen. Firstly, there’s Yuki, the quiet and reserved character that becomes stronger by the end…except he doesn’t develop at all. I normally really like weaker protagonists, a la Kaneki from Tokyo Ghoul and Shu from Guilty Crown (they were the best parts of their respective shows), but Yuki takes having no backbone to unbelievable levels. You know it’s bad when you have a villain character yell at Yuki to assist Yuno during a fight scene, and that I was agreeing with the villain character. I would be fine with this, except for the fact that he uses Yuno to do everything for him. His inner monologues about Yuno are normally along the lines of him thinking of her as a tool due to her undying devotion for him to survive. What an a-hole! And this is never addressed as wrong, as he thinks this is the best course of action. Not to mention the fact that he practically controls her, telling her that they’re a couple to prevent the death of someone who betrayed them, and saying “I love you” whenever it’s convenient.How manipulative can someone be?! Also, whenever the show realizes that Yuki should probably change, he’s somehow made even more unlikable. To avoid spoilers, I’m just going to say this: Yuki, you will never be Lelouch or Light no matter how hard you try. Moving on, there’s Yuno, the insane stalker character who loves our main character for unexplained reasons, and the reasons given are incredibly weak. Outside of being in love with Yuki and being willing to do anything to protect him, she has no character. Actually, no, that’s not it. Watch this, it’s a good summary of her character.
She’s annoying! Whenever she’s not insane, I wanted to punch her in the face half the time. I also hate the fact that everything she does is for the sake of someone who, in all honesty, doesn’t care about her whatsoever. However, whenever Yuno switches to her insane side, she can be very entertaining to watch. As for the other characters, as stated before, they aren’t terrible. My favorites were Ninth, Sixth, Akise Aru, and Seventh (in that order). Due to spoilers, I can’t really discuss them, but if those characters were the mains, this anime would be so much better. However, despite all this, Future Diary’s biggest problem character-wise is just how many of them there are. Future Diary is 26 episodes, so it’s okay for it to have a lot of characters, but this show is so overstuffed with so many unnecessary characters that it makes the anime adaptation of Tokyo Ghoul look like it doesn’t have enough characters. The thing about Battle Royal stories is that you should: 1) only focus on a few of the characters involved, like in The Hunger Games; 2) not include too many characters in said Battle Royal, like in Btoom!; or 3) put some time aside to decrease the action and focus more on character, like in Fate/Zero. Future Diary goes on the Hunger Games path, but focuses on all the characters within the fight, and adds on other characters that aren’t even part of the death game. This bloated cast does nothing to improve the plot.
The 12 diary users
Akise Aru
The Story:
Where the heck do I even begin with this mess of a story? How about the romance? If you couldn’t guess, Yuki and Yuno have no chemistry whatsoever. Yuki has no reason to love Yuno, and Yuno’s reasoning is just about as ridiculous as you can get. I didn’t believe it for a second, which just made Yuno all the more annoying. Speaking of not believing, Future Diary does a terrible job when it comes to covering its tracks in terms of logic and plot holes. Why would Deus want a psychopath to become the new god of time and space? Why would Ninth only blow up part of the school in episode 2? How would a five-year old have the brain capacity to obtain poisonous gas and be able to kill people with it? Why do popular girls think rape is a good punishment for a girl who shows interest in a popular guy that she’s known for years? Why does Yuki think he can go back in time and change everything? This is all I can say due to spoilers, but have you noticed a trend with a good percentage of these logic gaps? Most involve something dark, but that dark element is used in a completely illogical and over-the-top scenario. This is what makes Future Diary fall from a bad but enjoyable show to something that is completely repulsive. The anime uses real-life problems that actually scar real people to emotionally manipulate the audience in completely unrealistic ways into feeling sympathy for these fictional characters, and that is the only reason why these characters are memorable. That is so insensitive, so vile, and so detestable that this makes Future Diary one of my least favorite shows of all time, up there with Code-Breaker (which, by the way, I hate for similar reasons). It also doesn’t help that the show tries to make you take this seriously, like this is how real life works. I’ve got news for you, Future Diary; that’s not how life works, and that’s not how you should portray real life under any circumstances. You can either be realistic, or you can be escapist; that’s how entertainment works. Future Diary tries to combine the two in the laziest way possible, by having a completely illogical story but simultaneously including some really heavy stuff like child abuse, murder, rape, and terrorists, without really realizing how demented it really is. Some say that ignorance is bliss, but in this case, ignorance should not have been the anime’s course of action.
The story sacrifices decency and taste to come across as dark and serious
The Animation/Sound:
There’s nothing really special in this category. The animation is okay, nothing too bad or incredible. Sometimes the movements look really clunky, though. The character designs are nice; though sometimes they look a bit disproportionate or straight up weird. Who the heck thought that Eighth’s design was a good idea? For some reason, though, I really like the characters’ eyes. I’m not entirely sure why, but I thought they were pretty cool. I thought that the color pallet was pretty terrible, though. I get that it’s supposed to be a contrast to the harsh violence, but in my opinion it just made the show’s ignorance shine through even more. The CGI is awful, just like it is most of the time when it's used in anime, so it's something I can't truly complain about. The music was actually pretty good. It’s not the best, and this may just be my optimistic mind scrambling to find something worthwhile about this show, but I did like the songs and found some to be pretty memorable. I thought that the effect that some had to sound like clocks or time was pretty well-integrated, and gave a nice atmosphere in terms of the fact that the show involves time travel. The first opening is fantastic, with wonderful visuals and a fast-paced song, but other than the second opening (which is sung in terrible engrish), nothing else stands out in that department. Finally, sub or dub? Sub. The English dub for Future Diary is abysmal. I normally love Funimation dubs, but this is one of the worst I’ve heard from them. It sounds like no effort was put into making this dub good, with lackluster voice acting and a script that sounds like it was written by that five-year old with the poison gas. The Japanese dub, on the other hand, features some pretty strong performances, with Yuno’s seiyuu being the standout.
First Opening:
Animation and sound are average, but the dub is terrible
The Scare Factor:
Future Diary, despite its best efforts, just isn’t scary, the main reason being the fact that it’s predictable. I know that this line sounds clichéd as all heck, but it’s an idea that I think is pretty relevant when it comes to horror: “People fear what they don’t understand.” Due to its run time and 12 diary users, you can tell using simple math after the first two diary users or so when a diary user is going to show up and when they’re going to die. So, there are ten diary users other than Yuki and Yuno. Therefore, around twenty episodes will be dedicated to killing off the other diary users, and whenever a cycle ends, the new character(s) that is introduced will be the new diary owner. The other six will either be filler or the final battle. In other words, you get into a comfort zone, because “no one panics if everything goes according to plan, even if the plan is horrifying. What we need is a little more chaos!” – The Joker, The Dark Knight. Now, people are probably going to ask, “Well what about Yuno? She’s scary right?” Objection, she’s also predictable! Whenever someone or something threatens Yuki, she goes insane! That’s it! Granted, I will admit that there were some moments where I was scared of her and the lengths that she’d go to protect Yuki, but that’s it. You can easily tell when Yuno’s going to snap, and the fact that her character is so one-note just makes her feel unrealistic! If you want a scary psychopath, how about the original psycho, Norman Bates? His actions, while not the most unpredictable, were scary because he didn’t seem aware of the crimes he was committing, and that lack of morality makes him frightening! Yuno both seems aware and only commits crimes whenever she thinks Yuki is jeopardized! That’s it! It’s just not scary to me.
Yuno can be scary at times, but mostly the story is devoid of scares
Final Judgment:
I know that a lot of people may not like this review due to its negativity and how I barely found any positives in this anime. I’m not going to lie; there were moments within the show that I did like. Whenever the show doesn’t take itself all that seriously and just had fun with its over-the-top story, I enjoyed myself a lot. However, this edgy ignorance makes this show detestable in my eyes, and its unlikable main characters do nothing to help that. This makes my overall enjoyment incredibly low, as whenever I look back at this show I feel dirty. I give Future Diary a 1 out of 5 stars, and a recommendation to never check it out. However, if you like the show, I have nothing against you. Continue to love it, like it, hate it, or feel however you want to feel about it. Like always, it is up to you to decide your own opinions. ScoreCard:
Further Recommendations:
Death Note
This is a supernatural thriller anime that shares some similarities to Future Diary, but is overall a lot more conscious of reality and has much better characters.
Higurashi
Higurashi is an anime that I haven’t seen yet, but it’s an iconic horror anime and a show that you should probably check out. Also, like Future Diary, it’s apparently really gory.
Well, that’s the end of Horror Month, and…oh, wow…I’ve been blogging for almost a year now! That calls for a special review! See you next time!
I’m pretty sure that vampires have the worst modern reputation out of all the supernatural creatures incorporated into entertainment, and considering Twilight, who can blame them? Pre-Twilight, vampires were cold, monstrous, and depraved beings who lured humans in with their charm and charisma only to violently drink their blood. They could turn into bats, they burned in the sunlight, they slept in coffins, and were genuinely terrifying. Post-Twilight, the stereotype is that of the edgy vampire who sparkles in the sunlight and chases after supposedly depressed teenaged girls. The difference is, well, stark. Ever since Twilight, the general population has decried the new stereotype and demanded for the old to be brought back. So, people have been making attempts to do this in literature, but unfortunately the Twilight curse still lurks in the darkness, poisoning every vampire book, movie, and anime until society learns that Twilight should be forgotten and never remembered again. A book that manages to separate itself from the Twilightstereotype and renew the old stereotype is The Coldest Girl in Coldtown. Does it succeed in its endeavor? Sit back, relax, and read on as I review The Coldest Girl in Coldtown by Holly Black.
The Setup:
The book takes place in an alternate version of reality where vampires exist, and vampirism is basically a disease. If a vampire bites you, you become infected, and if you drink human blood before 88 days pass (it takes 88 days for the infection to fade, for some reason), you become a vampire. One day, a vampire named Casper thought it was a good idea to go around biting people without killing them, causing the infection to spread and new vampires to appear left and right. This results in the constructions of Coldtowns, places where vampires and the infected are quarantined and can no longer hurt anyone outside of the coldtown. Meet protagonist Tana Bach (yes, that is her name, and no, I have no idea whether she’s actually related to the musical composter Bach. It would be pretty awesome if she were), a teenager who wakes up at a party to find out that all of her friends are dead, killed by vampires. The only other people who are alive are Aidan, her now-infected ex-boyfriend, and a chained-up vampire. That is where I will leave you. Even though it does raise quite a few questions, like what are the vampire’s origins, why does it take 88 days to sweat out the infection, and why haven’t people tried to work on a vaccine, this is a great setup. The book’s world is so interesting and very well established going off of the first few chapters. The characters, on the other hand, need some work.
The Characters:
The main problem with the characters, and the story for that matter, is the fact that nothing in either of these two categories is clearly established. The characters don’t really have definite personalities because the book focuses more on its story, and when the story basically just focuses on the setting…well, that’s a problem. Tana is a pretty standard protagonist. She’s tough, is able to make decisions on her own, and independent. There’s nothing about her that truly stood out, except for one thing that I really liked. So, when she was dating Aidan, Aidan always seemed to cheat on her because…well…more on that later. However, instead of just sitting around and moping about it, she joined in on the act, spending time with other guys and just straight-up refraining from telling Aidan that his actions are wrong. When they do break up, they stay that way, and Tana takes every chance she can to keep their relationship from forming again. I am so happy that Holly Black incorporated this into the book rather than succumbing to the regular cliché of guy cheats on girl, girl breaks up with him and cries herself to sleep every night, and then they get back together because I never said that this cliché wasn’t idiotic. That’s the only memorable thing about Tana, though; everything else is kind of generic. Okay, maybe “generic” isn’t the right word, but more like “clouded”, due to the book’s lack of truly establishing who she was. Next, there’s Aidan, who’s even less established than Tana. He has no clear personality as far as I can tell, and whatever’s clear completely contradicts other aspects of his personality. He says that he loves Tana, but then goes off to spend time with other girls at parties. He wants to remain human, but becomes a vampire anyway. He’s shown to be kind-hearted, but what kind person would openly cheat on his girlfriend? And…that’s pretty much it. Finally, there’s Gavriel, the chained vampire in the room and the only above average character in the entire book…except that if I explain why, I’d spoil everything about him. Let’s just say that his backstory is fantastic, and that he’s an intriguing character. The side characters do their jobs, I suppose, but none are truly memorable.
The Story:
As I stated earlier, the story suffers from the same lack of focus that the characters do. This is a prime example of a book where I’m pretty sure the author began writing with no ending in mind or not visualizing how to get to the imagined ending. The entire first half of the book just feels like it’s meandering around, looking for a story to hold everything together. The second half is better, and it does tie together everything that happened in the first half, but that still doesn’t change the fact that during the first half I was sitting there waiting for an actual story to take place. The pacing is pretty slow, and I feel like it could’ve been around 50 pages shorter than what it is (which is around 440 pages, including previews for other books). Then there’s the quasi-romance, and I use the term “romance” incredibly lightly. I’m not going to say that Gavriel and Tana had no chemistry, because they kind of did, but the romance is kinda sorta not there and the feelings the two parties had for each other were kinda sorta apparent…yeah, the main two words to describe this romance are “kinda” and “sorta”. You never really find out if the two actually have romantic feelings for each other, or at least in Tana’s case. Gavriel’s reasoning does make sense, but it stems from my least favorite stereotype of all time: the person in distress. The only reason Gavriel loves Tana is because she was the only person to save him in his entire life (or death…both work). That’s pretty weak. Tana has absolutely no reason to fall in love with Gavriel except for the fact that he’s dangerous, yet beautiful. That’s just sad. Even with this weak reasoning, though, you could still create a good romance if you have the characters interact and get to know each other, right? Well, The Coldest Girl in Coldtowndoesn’t take the time to really flesh out their relationship because it spends so much time searching for its plot. When the plot is found, however, the book actually becomes really good. The pacing picks itself up, pretty much all loose ends are tied up, and the ending is pretty satisfying.
The Writing Style/Grammatical Errors:
I don’t like third person narratives, mainly because I feel a lot more separated from the characters due to how it’s not written from anyone’s point of view. The Coldest Girl in Coldtown isn’t really an exception to this. The descriptions of everything are overlong and boring to read, and I get the feeling that the reason the character personalities weren’t established is also because of this. When the book wants to describe violence to you, though…it reallydescribes violence. During the intense scenes, the writing tenses up, and it’s hard to stop reading it when these occur. The second half is almost all of this wonderful writing, so props for that. There were some grammatical errors, but it was mostly misusage of tense, so it wasn’t too distracting.
Scare Factor:
As I stated before, the intense scenes of violence can create scary and suspenseful scenes. However, it is the book's typical detachment from the characters and story that prevents it from being terrifying. I lost no nights of sleep after reading this, and I feel relatively confident that vampires will continue to not exist. However, I didn't really expect it to be scary; the book felt too tame, and not good enough to create the creepy atmosphere that sinks into my nightmares. Final Judgment:
Overall, despite my criticisms, The Coldest Girl in Coldtown was a pretty good book, at least entertainment-wise. The setting is very interesting, and is hands-down the best part of the book and receives the most focus. Its story and characters have some major flaws, as the book was slow to or didn’t establish some key details. However, once the book got good, it became really good, with some very well written and tense scenes. So, it all comes together to be slightly above average. I give The Coldest Girl in Coldtown a 2.75 out of 5, and a recommendation to read it if you’re interested. But, like always, it is up to you to decide your own opinions.
ScoreCard:
Further Recommendations:
Anna Dressed in Blood
This is another horror book with well-written action scenes and violence along with some pretty good characters and a better story. Just don’t read the sequel/
The Lux Series
This is a wonderful paranormal romance series whose final book I am reading right now. If you haven’t read it yet, you’re missing out.
The next review will be on…oh, wow, it’s the final review of Horror Month! It will be on the anime The Future Diary. See you then!
