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CJAS Fall Marathon December 4

Join us on Saturday December 4th from noon to midnight in Goldwin Smith Lewis Auditorium. Enjoy 12 hours of various anime, and be sure to check out the game show at 3:50!

12:00 - The SoulTaker 1 Full Metal Panic? Fumoffu 1
12:25 – Someday's Dreamers 1
12:50 12:25 –  Xam'd: Lost Memories 1 and 2
1:15 - Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water 1
1:40 – BREAK
2:00 – Place Promised in Our Early Days
3:40 - Break
3:50 - GAME SHOW Soul Eater 4
4:15 – Soul Eater 4 and 5 GAME SHOW
4:55 - Soul Eater 5
5:20 – DINNER
6:20 - Rebuild of Evangelion 1.11: You Are (Not) Alone
7:50 - BREAK
8:00 - Sola 13
8:25 – Now and Then, Here and There 13
8:50 – The Skull Man 13
9:15 – Miyuki-chan in Wonderland Cromartie High School 1
9:45 - BREAK
9:55 - Super Dimension Fortress Macross 1 and 2
10:45 - Monster 1 and 2
11:35 - The SoulTaker 2 Monster 3
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Anime Reviews Manga Reviews Reviews

Review: Kuroshitsuji (“Black Butler”)

Welcome and good evening again, ladies and gentlemen!  Our series this time Kuroshitsuji (Black Butler), originally released as a manga in Square Enix’s Monthly G Fantasy in 2006 by Toboso Yana.  It has since proven popular enough to warrant a two-season anime adaptation, a spin-off video game, two well-scored stage musicals, and an impressive doujin community.  For this review, however, I’d prefer to focus on the manga and anime.

Sebastian Displaying his Contract
Clearly, this will not be a objectionable program.

Although the two differ in execution, the basic premise remains the same between them:  In manor house outside of London, the demon Sebastian Michaelis serves as Earl Ciel Phantomhive’s loyal butler.  The two have a contract: In exchange for Ciel’s soul, Sebastian serves as his retainer until the Young Master kills those who slew his parents and sold him on the black market.  The Earl, though only twelve when the series opens, is already a captain of industry and a favored subject of Queen Victoria.  He lives a double life: By day, he works as the head of the Funtom Toy Company; by night, he serves the Queen as her agent in the London underworld, assisted at all times by Sebastian, who performs his duties with impeccable skill.

What’s the overall result? Well, for me that’s a bit of a tricky question.  As of this writing, Black Butler is my “fanboy” series; it’s the kind of thing I like for far fewer reasons than I should because the series happens to hit enough of my favorite story and character elements (Ciel, for example) it its execution.  So, bear in mind that my view on things is likely more forgiving of Black Butler than I would normally be.  That said…

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Anime Reviews Other Articles Reviews

Mid-Semester Anime Roundup

It’s Fall Break now, which means that this semester’s Showing is already halfway over.  So I’ve put together this handy little article for those of you who might have missed the first half of Showing, who think they might forget what’s going on over Fall Break, or who want to waste a few minutes on the internet.  For each of the shows we’ve watched thus far, I’ve assembled a description of the series, a summary of the plot, and a quick review of what I’ve thought about it so far.  Plot summaries will almost certainly contain spoilers, so if you want to watch the series for yourself, you may want to skip these.

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Announcements CJAS

Fall 2010 Showing Schedule

When you think of August, what images appear? Well, here’s the one to really watch for, the unveiling of the CJAS 2010 Fall Semester Schedule.

A full listing of series summaries as well as promo pictures  is listed after the jump.

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Announcements CJAS

CJAS Marathon May 8

Join us on Saturday May 8th from noon to midnight in Goldwin Smith Lewis Auditorium. Enjoy 12 hours of various anime, and be sure to check out the game show at 3:30!

12:00 - Someday's Dreamers 1 DANCE PARTY
12:25 – Black Jack 4
1:15 – Planetes 1
1:40 – BREAK
1:50 – Sword of the Stranger
3:30 – GAMESHOW
4:10 4:35 – Casshern Sins 1 and 2
5:00 – Blame!
5:35 – DINNER
6:25 – The Sky Crawlers
8:30 – BREAK
8:40 – Infinite RYVIUS 1
9:05 – Mobile Fighter G Gundam 02
9:30 – Outlaw Star 26
9:55 – Break
10:00 – Mazinkaiser 7
10:50 – Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha A's 13
11:15 – Paranoia Agent 13
11:40 – The Big O 13
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CJAS

Plamo: Tobe! Gundam.

Want to learn how to recreate you favorite scene from the Gundam Universe? Want to have Char in his Gelgoog fighting Kabuto Kouji in Mazinger Z, or Shuu Shirakawa in the Granzon? Want to learn how to make

this bad ass?

Well, stop by our fascinating “Gunpla Tutorial/Building Session” on April 16, from 7:00 – 11:00 pm in Willard Straight Hall’s International Lounge. We will have several models ready for you to make if you don’t have one, or if you have one, bring it over, and model with others.

For more details about the event, and the models on site, please see our Plamo page.

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Announcements CJAS

Cornell Con 2010

CornellCon Schedule:

  • 8:00p.m.- Doors open, game play begins in all rooms
    • Manga booth (loans out manga for the event)
    • Game show qualifier tests are available in the info booths
    • Magic the Gathering is open for registration and pretournament games
    • Super Smash Bros./Tatsunoko vs. Capcom tournament registration begins
  • 8:45p.m.- Magic the Gathering Draft tournament begins
  • 9:00p.m.- Super Smash Bros. Tournament begins
  • 10:00p.m.- Karaoke begins (goes till 1:00AM)
  • 10:20p.m.- Last call for Game show Qualifier Tests
  • 10:30p.m.- Begin grading Qualifier tests
  • 10:45p.m.-Prepare for Tatsunoko vs. Capcom tournament
  • 11:00p.m.- Anime starts showing in the auditorium
    • Ring of Steel sets up in the Multi-purpose room followed by a performance
    • Tatsunoko vs. Capcom tournament begins
  • 11:50p.m.- Cosplay Contest in the Multi-purpose room, following Ring of Steel’s performance
  • 12:20a.m.- Game Show begins in the auditorium. After Game Show ends anime continues showing in the auditorium
  • 2:00a.m.- Doors close; Clean-up begins
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Fixing the Size on a Finished Cosplay

Hello, all.

I don’t know about the rest of you, but on occasion, I screw up my cosplays. Sew a sleeve on backwards, pin the wrong sides together instead of the right, and so on. Usually, I’m paying enough attention to catch and fix these problems before they get too far. And most of the time, the problem is small enough that people don’t notice. Sometimes, however…sometimes it’s only after I’ve finished the garment or the entire outfit or gone to a con before I realize that the shoulders of my coat are too small to be comfortable, or that the sleeves are too narrow or that the robe isn’t wide enough.

For all of you who have run into similar problems, here is my guide for how to adjust the size on a finished piece of cosplay without having to remake the entire piece of clothing. Now, keep in mind, this is a quick patch. For the best quality cosplay, you’ll probably have to remake the garment, or at least the part that’s giving you problems. If you don’t want to deal with that, keep reading.

This shows the added material to make the outfit wider
Sanzo's robe

The first time I realized that I had made an outfit too small was with my Sanzo costume (by the way, I only seem to make clothing too small. I imagine making a large piece smaller is much easier). The robe he wears is supposed to wrap around him entirely, but whether because spaciness on my part or the pattern I was using, the robe didn’t wrap enough; it showed the jeans I was wearing underneath. I managed to ignore it for a while, but eventually I decided it needed to be fixed. The high quality and labor intensive solution (not to mention cloth intensive) would be to remove the collar and sleeves, and sew a new body for the robe that matched the correct dimensions. I used the quick and patch solution. I undid the stitching on the edging/collar to about the waist, unstitched each end of the hem on the bottom of the robe for a few inches, and added in extra material. The additional width of the robe was entirely at the bottom, so I added very narrow triangles to both sides of the robe, making it wider. Then, I reattached the edging/collar to the new material, and finished up the new hem. It’s not the greatest looking fix in the world, but it beats making a whole new robe.

added a back panel. hardly noticable!
Touka's tunic

The second major fix I had to do was to the back of a tunic for my Touka cosplay. This one I actually caught before I finished the outfit or even the tunic. Unfortunately, I didn’t have enough fabric to remake the needed piece, and so I had to make do with a make-shift repair. The problem was with the width of the shoulders; I had originally made them too small, and since the material has almost no give, these is a real problem. My solution was to cut the back of the tunic – where my spine would be – from the bottom to the top. I then added a very narrow trapezoid piece of fabric in the middle, just a few inches, to make the top wide enough for my shoulders, and kept the bottom almost the same width. I then sewed up the back again, with the added piece simply as an additional panel. Fortunately, for this cosplay, there’s a coat on top of the tunic, and I likely wouldn’t have fixed it except for the difficultly it gave me moving.

The final sizing problem I’ve had is with the sleeves of my Edward Elric coat. Unfortunately, it was one of my earlier cosplay, and I misjudged the width I’d need for the sleeves, especially with a long sleeve shirt underneath. While the sleeves don’t immediately look wrong, they make it slightly hard to move and cause the coat to be even warmer than it is. The problem was, to fix this I’d have to make two completely new sleeves, and I don’t think I even still had the fabric. My solution? Deal with it; it’s a problem that I’m the only one likely to really notice, and it doesn’t cause me too much trouble. Sometimes discretion? Is the better part.

Sleeves are way too small, but not small to make it worth remaking them
Edward Elric's coat
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How to “Man-Up” Valentine’s Day

If there is one stereotype that most anime fans fall into, it is being without a SO on Valentine’s Day. When people are spreading the message of love and other related topics, a majority of anime fans are stuck wallowing in solitude. Well, fuck it. Instead of wallowing and crying about being alone, just forget about it. Instead of spending the day spreading the message of love, the plan should be to “Hotblood Out.” Here are some suggestions to do this.

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Anime Reviews CJAS Reviews

Fall 2009: In Review

Good evening, ladies and gentlemen.  Good to see you all again! Although I can’t really speak much from experience, I must stay that I was thoroughly impressed by the lineup this past semester.  Showing was a real event this time around, and I’d like to take a few moments to take a quick look back on it.

Series Reviews:

Genshiken

Our starter for this semester was one I had not seen since I was in high school.  At the time, I was rather amused with it, but after re-watching the first season, I found that the series hasn’t held up as well as I had thought.  Let me be clear:  It’s not a bad series; I don’t think so, anyway.  But whenever Genshiken’s not poking a good-natured elbow in the ribs of hardcore anime fans, the overall result is disappointing.  The humor tends to be awkwardly spaced; whole episodes can go by with scarcely a slice of wit to hold interest, relying instead on the (mostly bland) antics of local basket-case Madarame to keep the whole thing from grinding to a halt.  Add to that rather generic BGM and character design, and what’s left is a series So Okay, It’s Average.  You could do worse than this dull little piece of work, but you could do much better as well.

Wolf’s Rain

Aint he pretty?
Ain't he pretty?

I must admit, I was pretty skeptical about this series.  Just looking at the character designs made me shudder; I like bishounen as much as the next fan, but I didn’t walk in expecting much in the way of, well, anything else.  Thankfully, Wolf’s Rain does not disappoint.  It has its issues, mind you; the plot moves at the pace of cheap pancake syrup and the dialogue can sometimes suffer as a result.  But thus far, it’s been nothing short of a treat to watch.  The backgrounds and character animation are, as expected, fantastic, with real eye for detail and cohesion.  And the music! Man, Kanno-sensei should really go make an album or something.  If she does stuff like this for a show… Ah, I digress.  Anyway, if this series can overcome its pacing problems and deliver its already unique story already, then it’s well on its way to becoming a favorite of mine.