Shameful Otaku Secret!

UR DOING IT … well, sort of right actually.

My plan is not really to talk about the premiere episode of one of April’s big new shows with a mouthful title, The Tower of Druaga - The Aegis of Uruk, from Gonzo. The show was entertaining — fast-paced, surprisingly funny, and well animated, especially for the notoriously inconsistent studio.

What interests me most about it is that Gonzo and Bost TV have partnered up to offer the series (along with another series called Blassreiter) in supposedly high quality, translated and subbed, as it comes out.

Hold on there

No one promised you a rose garden. The first episode is being offered for free, it’s even on YouTube, but thereafter Bost TV will be charging money for it. Druaga is a half-season show, and from the looks of it that will run you $20 USD. That means a full-season show like Blassreiter will be… $40. Sounds crazy, right? If you planned on watching, say, 5 anime shows this season (I think I watched 6 this past one), 200 bones would be a lot of cash to shell out for television, wouldn’t it?

That said, I can see the reasoning: Bandai Visual wants us honky suckers to pony up that much just to watch 13 episodes of True Tears on DVD 2 months after the fact, so there has to be someone out there thinking what Gonzo’s thinking: it’s a lot less bread, so why not?

Change the model

Remember how home taping was killing the music industry? Maybe you don’t, but this shit has always been happening, in spite of how much our RIAA wants you to believe it started with Napster. Hollywood thought the television would destroy movies forever, then VCRs, then downloads. Many more of these mini-media-revolutions are going on right now, and the Americans are finally starting to get it right. Have you seen Hulu? It’s not bad at all. You can only watch the most current shows, but it’s decent and the turnaround is very quick. It’s also controlled by the networks, so it’s not a cluttered-up mess like YouTube and everything there is official and of reasonably consistent quality. More importantly? It’s ad-supported.

People want to watch their TV for free. And maybe it’s unfortunate, but people on the internet want pretty much everything to be free. You don’t necessarily have to be better than the fansubbers, offering mkv’s at 720p resolutions (although why not? bittorrent is a legitimate distribution method that could be used to keep bandwidth costs down and leave middlemen like Bost out of the picture) — you just have to be as fast, reliable, and easy as them. Frankly, I’ll watch in a browser window on my lunch break. But I won’t pay cash money to watch in a browser window on my lunch break. I’ll look at ads in order to do it. I’ll even watch pre-rolls.

But seriously. This is the internet, and the same business models and pricing schemes that DVD companies use do not translate. Nice first step, but don’t stop just because you came up with something.

Wolf and Swirling Conspiracy

[Spicy Info here as always]

After a bit of a delay in translation for episode 9, #10 came out soon on its heels, complete with my own delay in viewing. And as I suspected, things really started moving this week. Mind you, not in a good direction for our heroes, but good for story.

Recap of Doom

Turns out Rubinhagen’s yearly romp to the north to kill heathens has been cancelled this year (hence the mercenaries running rampant on the roads), and the value of armor has plummeted. Uh oh. Last week’s ingenious discovery of the Polson merchant’s attempt to screw Lawrence netted him twice the value of armor than he normally would have gotten — and that means he’s now at twice the debt since no one wants to buy.

The merchant guild can’t help him, so he goes to all his connections, who turn him away without a second thought. Now he’s starting to get worried, and we end with him shoving Horo away in frustration, and she goes back to their inn without him.

Now he has no business connections to help him, he’s on shaky ground with his traveling partner, and he has two days to come up with repayment before they shave him, pull out his teeth, and send him to his death in some horrific mines somewhere.

What We’ve Learned

Lawrence is obviously not flawless in his skills, and everyone who lambasted him for not diversifying last week is vindicated. He put all his eggs in the armor basket and now he’s double-screwed. Seems the crooked Polson merchant most likely knew about the armor crash, and ended up jacking Lawrence in the end anyway.

On the Lawrence and Horo front, we swapped out the clever teasing for some sincere cuteness this week, and I found it really fun. Of course, that was before everything went to shit.

Thoughts

The title of next week’s episode implies a crazy scheme — probably Horo’s — that will work if all goes well, but Lawrence is going to have to apologize bigtime. That means more potential for character development and the furthering of their relationship. So far the interaction between them hasn’t gone the cliché route, so hopefully they’ll continue to stay away from that.

Either way, Episode 10 is usually when things start getting hopelessly dark for protagonists, so that’s about right and I’m eagerly awaiting how they’re going to get out of this.

Wolf and Shepherd’s Lambs

[Catch up with your wolf spirits at the Spice and Wolf Info Page]

Spice and Wolf continues slowly developing its current storyline, but by the end of the episode I think the pace is sufficiently picking up. I’m not sold on this whole Nora thing, but she’s mysterious and she ramps up the still-clever interaction between Horo and Lawrence.

Recap

The shepherd, called Nora, wants Lawrence to hire her as an escort (a guide, that is — mind outta the gutter) to get him through the wolf-infested road he’s traveling. Of course, he’s not worried about wolves but it wouldn’t be prudent for him to tell a stranger why he’s not worried. On top of that, he seems interested in having some cute human company. She’s interested in making some extra cash because shepherding is laborious work — especially when you’re in the employ of the Church. Plus, she talks to sheep all day and wouldn’t mind company either.

Travel seems to go without a hitch, with the exception of Horo constantly giving Lawrence shit. Is it… jealousy? She would never admit to that, and berates him for even thinking it, but she certainly likes having control of him.

Nora’s church connections get them into the city without much hassle. But the customs officer gives a little snorting laugh at Lawrence’s suits of armor. We also get to see Nora entering the city to the tune of slamming doors and citizens shuffling their children out of her way. According to the bits of light novel trivia we’re given by certain benevolent fansubbers, the Church is mistrustful of a female shepherd as skilled as Nora (i.e., they too think she’s a magician), so her employment situation exists as much to keep an eye on her as anything else.

After some drinking and eating (sadly for Horo, no honey-pickled peaches), Lawrence goes to the merchant guild’s headquarters. He makes Horo wait outside, with obvious reason — the guild master likes to loudly tell embarrassing stories.

But Lawrence and Nora aren’t the only people entering the city: a mysterious stranger is about, and he’s looking for Lawrence…

Thoughts

Lawrence and Horo’s conversation in the cart after Nora goes to sleep is a fine example of one of my favorite things about this show. Lawrence tries to counter Horo with some smooth talk (with a hilariously timed shooting star to aid him), but it just makes her cackle with laughter at his pimp-attempt.

Their back-and-forth makes even the slowest episodes cleverly entertaining. We’re past the halfway mark now and it’s about time the next portion of the story got rolling. There really hasn’t been much happening since the Silver Coin Scandal. But like I said, I enjoy Spice and Wolf even when not much is going on, so I’ll wait somewhat eagerly for next week.