Recent Impressions

The Girl and I saw Howl's Moving Castle last night. The chance to see a Miyazaki film on the big screen is something dear to me and makes me quite happy to live in a big city. Here Studio Ghibli gets a bit away from the more serious tone of Spirited Away or the much more serious tone of Mononoke and gives a simpler, less mature story. In many ways, actually, it's Spirited Away Lite. The main character get stuck into an world they didn't want nor do they understand, and there's a deep underbelly of learning about one's true self and you know, true love and stuff. Howl won't rank as my favorite from Ghibli, but it hits all their trademark goodness with some gusto.

It was funny to hear a father explain deus ex machina to his kids on the way out. Partially because he was trying to get a five year old to understand the inner mechanics of Greek tragedies and partially because Howl's Moving Castle doesn't really use any.

On the completely other side of the entertainment field, I finally started that God of War all the kids have been talking about. I think it's funny how GTA is the posterboy of all things wrong with gaming, and here I've ripped people in half, popped off heads and banged two women into a red glowy ball ... and I've only played the game for about two hours. I heard from someone that this game is the kind of game Sony won't let anyone make ... unless it's Sony itself. I do get the game's ... charm? Charm seems wrong for a game with this kind of unambigously mature content, but the combo-orientated fighting and minigame style boss fights does make it fun in a way that I think Dragon's Lair always wanted.