Shurayukihime Versus Kill Bill

Shurayukihime, literally Scene of Carnage/Fighting Snow Princess, otherwise known as Lady Snowblood, a 1973 movie based upon the popular four part manga by Kazuo Koike of Lone Wolf and Cub fame. This movie starred Meiko Kaji in the title role and was popular enough to garner a sequel in 1974- Lady Snowblood 2: Love Song of Vengeance. (The first movie is also titled Lady Snowblood: Blizzard from the Netherworld).

I am currently watching for the second time and I have just purchased the 2001 sci-fi remake Princess Blade, which stars Yumiko Shaku in the title role. Princess Blade is a loose remake but what I have seen of it is entertaining.

Shurayukihime found new fame with the release of Kill Bill, which it heavily inspired. The tale of a woman wronged by a group of people and seeking revenge is just one of the similarities. Even some of the scenes share a parallel, the one where we have the Deadly Viper Squad looking down at The Bride, the same scene is found in Shurayukihime where the treacherous four look down upon a grieving Yuki's mother.

There is also a scene, which invokes memories of O-Ren Ishii, whose character is heavily inspired by Yuki. Yuki tells the second of the four, Banzô Takemura to look at her face and tells him the sordid tale of her mother's rape and her mother's husband's murder. Equally O-Ren confronts Boss Matsumoto and has him look to her to see if he is reminded of somebody he murdered.

The fight between Black Mamba and Cottonmouth is the snow is very reminiscent of Lady Snowblood weaving her deadly sword through the snow. They even share white kimonos and cause many ridiculous blood spurts with their blades.





Both are great films in their own way, bloody, violent and exciting. Shurayukihime proves to be darker with less character development but it is definitely worth watching it and without it Kill Bill would not exist or certainly not be as wonderful as it was.



Of course at least The Bride got her revenge, Yuki was deprived of hers as Kitahama Okono hung herself stealing away Yuki's chance to murder her. The cycle of revenge is explored a little more deeply as Kobue, daughter of the murdered Takemura Banzō attempts to kill Yuki at the end of the first movie and gain her own revenge. The idea of a cycle of revenge is hinted at in Kill Bill Volume 1 when Beatrix kills Vernita Green/ Jeannie Bell in front of her daughter Nikki and tells Nikki to come find her. Yuki equally told Kobue where to look for her before she killed her father.

The return of Cadbury's Caramel!

I'm sure many of you wonderful British folk remember the good old days when Cadbury's products were not purple and all forms of Dairy Milk, the days of Wispa, Wispa Gold and Cadbury's Caramel. Well, following the success of Wispa, Cadbury's are now re-releasing Cadbury's Caramel back in its wonderful yellow with purple letters packaging.



We may even see a return of the wrongly sexy Cadbury's bunny voiced by Miriam Gargoyles. Funny how companies always change products, give them new names just to revert to the old version after a time- Coco Pops to Choco Krispies then back to Coco Pops, Wispa to Dairy Milk Bubbly and now we have both.

Now all I need is the return of Wispa Gold and Vice Versas, which did come back for a short time.


Also, saw Watchmen last night and completely not what I expected. My boyfriend and I figured because it was a superhero movie it wouldn't be long or gory and we were wrong on both accounts. It was three hours long with quite a lot of in-depth dialogue and a number of surprisingly gory scenes. Seemed to be over-complicated to me but it was good.



Not sure how it differs from the comic, having never read it but there was a definite comic book feel to the movie unlike the Batman movies, definitely more in vein with Sin City. Have to admit, only really liked Rorschach though his endless dialogue got a bit tedious and was very reminiscent of the males in Sin City.

Matthew Goode was fantastic as Adrian Veidt / Ozymandias but the best performance definitely went to Jeffrey Dean Morgan. I'm so used to him as a kind father (Supernatural, Weeds) that his performance really was quite a shocking turnaround. In Watchmen he plays The Comedian, a retired brute of a hero who was often very anti-hero, killing innocents and attempting rape. His performance really did blow me away and I look forward to seeing him in more.



Comic group pic for comparison.

The Sandman Versus Wee Willie Winkie and the Mystery of the Jaffa Cake

Wee Willie Winkie just seems like the ultimate pervert to be honest, I mean he runs about the streets at night peering through windows to see if children are asleep yet. However, he is also like the Sandman in that he checks to see if children are asleep yet.

The Sandman whose most awesome carnation is Der Sandmann who takes children who won't sleep's eyes and then takes said eyes to his children in their iron nest on the moon. My friend used to be scared on the Sandman as a child, fearing a man who carried a sack of sand, maybe this story is why. I have to say Neil Gaiman's Sandman is definitely the best fictional incarnation.

So who do you prefer Wee Willie Winkie the potential pervert or the Sandman, potential eye thief?

Cushions

Why do I have cushions? Why does anyone have cushions? They are fat little shits that take up too much of the bed, don’t fit their covers and somehow make the room into a mess when they hit the floor. I mean they aren’t for hugging, that’s why I have teddies, so why cushions?

This has been one of those nights where just when I think I’m settled for the night I realise the computer plug is out. Too lazy to get up off my bed, I painfully lean over my screen, sinking my stomach into its painful edge, and I successful grab the wire.

The wire is alas tangled with my lamp, which has marked out a corner of the floor for its territory for many moons now, and the lamp topples over defiantly. Thus I have to get up off the bed anyway to correct this tangle. Really could have saved myself some pain.

I don’t know why I start these things; I usually get bored of them. I guess it’s because I don’t like getting too personal in case someone I know comes across this and trouble ensues.

This is all being typed on Word right now because my internet has been dead for three days now. I really would like to scream down to the company but I know how they are when it comes to problems like these- useless.

No point dwelling on it, obviously if you’re reading this the problem was solved and I got the internet back. So back to the cushions, bought purely because my new bed set came with cushion covers and I did not want them to go to waste. MISTAKE. Ladies in particular, when you’re thinking of buying a cushion just don’t. The weird pros we women come up with to justify such kooky purchases are not worth the cons in this case. If you already have a cat or a dog you really don’t need them because all they do is take up space only they don’t give you the kisses and love of a dog or threatening Satanic glares of a moggy. *I hate cats, you love cats, I don’t care, deal with my hatred.*

Cushions are like that fat twenty-something son who won’t move out, they just lie there, growing and growing and growing and never giving you anything back. Oh sure, they look pretty at first, give something to the room but then the squish out of shape, somehow escape these covers that were a perfect fit and for reasons unknown, they move about and add only chaos to the room.

Back to uni

So it's the final semester of the final year which is sad in a way but to be honest, as much as I love university I don't think I could cope with another year, the workload really is intense. It's great to be back though, finally some structure to my days and Starbucks! This semester it's two Modern History modules and one Ancient History module.

Just finished the third Battle Royale manga and am about to start the fourth, I quite like it despite the extreme sex scenes. It's different from the book and the movie so it's great for any fan and the artwork is fantastic.



Mitsuko Souma was my favourite character, you definitely feel for her more in the book though than you do in the film or manga. Kou Shibasaki did a fantastic job portraying her and I would like to see more of her work.

I also love Kazuo Kiryama, he's so cold and ruthless and all without the feeling and emotions that everyone else, including Mitsuko is weak to. I love all adaptations of him and to think...it all could have been so different if the coin had landed a different way.

Battling hard on Final Fantasy X, got to go play some more of it and finish some artwork and improve my Japanese. Unfortunately, I get sucked into my laptop way too easily for hours on end :-S

One more exam to go and then first semester finals are officially over! Just started volume 4 of Kimagure Orange Road, it's a great manga though I still utterly loathe Kyosuke he is so nosy, selfish, shallow and hypocritical. Madoka and Hikaru could do so much better. Poor Hikaru really gets such a bad rap by a lot of people. I quite like her, she's young, self-conscious and naive, traits which people hold against her quite harshly. She can't help it though, she just wants to be loved and instead of being honest with her, Kyosuke cruelly leads her on, which can only make her self-conscious nature worse.

Also, trying to get hold of both the manga and the anime Harukanaru Toki no Naka de - Hachiyou Shou, otherwise known as Haruka: Beyond the Stream Of Time: A Tale of the Eight Guardians, it's only recently been released on dvd in the West and yet is nearly impossible to find. I've checked ebay, Amazon and Google for volume 1 and whilst Amazon has it, the price is ridiculous. So I've resorted to CD Universe, and I'm going to buy it if a preview on youtube proves promising. I find it a little absurd that there's only 2 episodes per volume.



The plot does sound very similar to Fushigi Yuugi but Fushigi Yuugi is based on Chinese mythology so I wouldn't call it a rip-off. Both feature a miko, chosen male warriors and the four gods.

The manga is much easier to find, and I'm getting the first volume of ebay. Hopefully I will love it as much as Fushigi Yuugi which is my favourite anime by far.

Anyway, I'm thinking of rewatching Fushigi Yuugi after I finish series 1 of Gilmore Girls, just one more disc to go. Still got to watch the rest of Gossip Girl, especially now that season 2 has arrived. Also, got to play some more of Final Fantasy X. Got two more agents to post my work to as well, waiting until February before I do that.

Exams and writing woo

Finally completed FFIX, for the first time ever I might add, and boy was the ending long. For a moment I feared that it wasn't over but it was it's just a really long mix of cut scenes and ordinary old style graphic scenes with text speeches 0_0. Mesmerised by the Eidolon cut scenes I drew this one of Bahamut Versus Alexander.



It took forever to draw and even longer to colour but I think it was worth it. Coloured it using Copic and Touch markers. I love doing artwork in my spare time even though it's not great and I'm highly critical lol. It's fun illustrating my own fictional characters, might come in useful if I get published.

I have also, just now, completed half of my 4,000 word essay of slaves' Christian faith in America, quite pleased with that though not looking forward to finishing it tomorrow. Once it's finished, revision for my Ancient Jewish exam begins :-(.

Still reading Kimagure Orange Road and Pokemon Special manga, though not much since I have no spare time. Also will soon be receiving the last two volumes of Angel Sanctuary in the post, at least I hope so, my postman is dodgy, he and my dog have a bitter rivalry going on at the moment. I was on my postman's side until two packages were lost in the same month, now I am on my dog's side. I have read reviews claiming that the last volume of AS will clear everything up, I find that doubtful but remain hopeful nonetheless. Was quite disappointed that the powerful Zodiac angels had such a small appearance but oh well.

Almost finished Season One of the Gilmore Girls as well, getting quite into it so will have to borrow Season Two when I get the chance, although I still have to finish watching Season One of Gossip Girl.

Going to send off a letter to another agent soon but for a different book, which shall be completed soon. So wish me luck! Editing sucks :-(