There’s a lot of bad TV out there, and it can be amazingly hard to find something worth watching. Something that has a point, decent character and plot development, perhaps something of a message. Of course the problem with all that is that we begin to care about the characters… which of course makes it amazingly difficult when something bad happens to them. We get hurt because some bastard writer is attempting to score an emotional response from us.

But what about the TV shows that, overall, become so harrowing by the end of their run that they make you want to curl up into a little ball and weep.

**SPOILER ALERT**

If you don’t know how Alf, Dinosaurs, Neon Genesis Evangelion, Daria, Buffy, M*A*S*H, Now Then Here & There or Saikano / She The Ultimate Weapon end, and would like that to remain a mystery until you’ve seen the shows, don’t read the rest of the article. (more…)

Yeah yeah, I know, I keep saying I’ll stop abandoning this blog, and then I do immediately again for a few months, well the reason for that is… Actually, there is no reason for that other than the standard gawthic ones. Laziness and depression!

Anyway, new content, so quit whining.

This morning I watched a movie so bad it actually explains exactly what happened to Gary Busey’s career.

Gingerdead Man (more…)

But only because Vince Colosimo can’t speak around fangs.

Something that a whole mess of people don’t realise is that sometime last financial year, a rather large swathe of our tax dollars got was released as a vampire movie. It was an Australian vampire movie, with most of the cast of Neighbours as terrible extras, and Sam Neill pushing something a bit more than just red meat. But for all the terrible acting, the cinematography and actual script, plot and concept of the movie are astoundingly good. Unlike the extraordinarily large precedent set before it by almost every Aussie film I can think of that had to get government backed financing, however, this movie didn’t actually suck. Only the characters in it… and *Vince Colosimo’s acting.

The idea behind the film is that in about a decade’s time, vampirism sweeps the land. Like zombieism to some degree, as everyone is now either vampire, or an industrially kept sack of fluids and vampire nutrients that are kept in large farming towers to have their vitals tapped somewhat reminsiscent of the way that we’re all currently powering The Matrix. Of course, the problem with this is that in reality, people confined to such conditions are most likely going to die due to muscles being kept immobile. Their muscles would atrophy, the body would become less and less healthy, and then simply cease to sustain its own life. This is precisely what’s happening to the human farms in the world Daybreakers, and the stock of free range humans that the vampire military can find is rapidly running out. This is highly problematic, as all the blood substitutes that the large vampire corporations are attempting to cook up simply don’t have the… desired effect.

Generally speaking, when you go and eat something, if it makes your head explode instead of nourishing you, that’s what the current pharmaceutical industry calls “undesirable side effects” (as opposed to Viagra, which was originally intended as a heart medication, having a side effect that was way better than what it was intended to be primarily used for).

As the blood becomes scarce, vampires begin to riot out of panic. Why? Because if they don’t get human blood, they devolve into bat like animals that attack anything, but look way cool thanks to WETA. Dog blood won’t do. Can’t have coffee. Must be people, but not Soylent Green! It’s a brilliant commentary on energy crisii type situations, and no doubt the future food shortages we’re likely to experience as the temperate zones move further towards the polar regions.

Eventually, a cure is found, which in turn causes complications. In yet anotherdig at modern day situations, a cure is no good because there’s no money to be had in a cure. The large corporation within the film is only interested in a human blood substitute, so that everyone must become a long term client. As pharmaceutical companies in real life are similarly disinterested in cures, but rather treatment regimes, as cures do not provide long term customers.

And for good measure, there’s also a couple of fascist dictatorship references. Fun!

The entire film is dark, set with a cool filter over every scene that takes place in the city to emphasise how cold and dark is the night. Sadly, the city isn’t terribly memorable or impressive… It’s Surfer’s Paradise after all (not exactly a place that screams “Vampires live here!”). To counter that, every scene shot in the country regions where not-blood-cow humans escape to is warm and sunny, made more so thanks to a rather obvious warm colour filter. A more critical person would say that the juxtaposition is also there to show how unnatural city living is and that it’s the death of us all as we devolve and feed on our fellow man but that’s the kind of wankery one picks up after having done a semester of film analysis at university… *cough*… Whilst this kind of videography is pretty standard for modern vampire films, it really hammers home the (intended to be) subtle messages of the film.

Willem Dafoe was actually rather week in this film, I felt. He plays “Elvis”, the vampire that somehow manages to cure himself (and in turn becomes a weak, pathetic human again). Dafoe normally has this seedy hyper activity about him, like Steve Buschemi on crack but with nice teeth. He seemed rathe flat and lifeless in this film, which, considering he’s actually alive again, should be the exact opposite of his characterisation I feel. To make matters worse, this isn’t even the first vampire role he’s been in. He was Max Schreck in Shadow of the Vampire, the archetype for what the vampires in Daybreakers basically turn into without blood, and yet he was off the walls in that film. A bit of a disappointment to my mind.

Ethan Hawk manages to ensure that this isn’t the massive let down it could be though. He plays Edward Dalton, Hematologist man! It’s his job to find a cure for vampirism… or at least a substitute for blood. But he also happens to be a filthy human sympathiser! With clouded thoughts of “perhaps humans are people, too” this sick deviant not only saves a pack of the filthy things, he actively goes to live with them for a time to discover his cure! Degenerate filth!! And he’s believable in this sort of characterisation. You genuinely believe he feels sorry for the fact that people are no longer human, and that he actually thinks of them as an endangered species, rather than what he used to be. There’s a kind of sadness about him, until he basically fucks over Sam Neill.

Sam Neill is rather convincing in his role as Charles Bromley,  an evil bastard in charge of an evil pharmaceutical company. Perhaps this is based on his many many roles as a self absorbed narcissist that happens to be better off than those around him, or maybe it’s a side effect of all the meat he’s been trying to get kids to eat lately. I’ve got to say though, having seen this film, it really does all make sense now.

All up, I give this film three and a half swinging blue cocks.

*No, he really wasn’t so bad in this. It’s just that I hate Colosimo for some reason, and the bar has been set pretty low on Australian actors that aren’t Sam Neill. Name me one other local actor that’s pulled out their own eyes. That’s commitment to a bit!

Racist pun in the title! Wooo! Afterall, this post is a review of a Japanese anime series about vampires (of the bajillions that already exist).

Dance in the Vampire Bund is somewhere between a political intrigue thriller and high school romance, with a touch of excessive supra-martial arts action thrown in. Of course, as with all anime, there’s the standard lolicon / ephebophile content by having panty shots and cleavage galore from school girls in ludicrously (although not innacurately) short school dresses. DitVB takes this a step further by following along on the standard Poppy Z Brite mantra of it’s ok for them to actually be hyper sexed up twelve year olds… so long as they’ve been dead a few centuries before hand.

Essentially, the narrative sees vampires coming out into the open in a way rather similar to that of True Blood. Crappy TV news show appearances.

From there the male lead, Akira Kaburagi, quickly finds his idealic highschool life and somewhat fuzzy memory of childhood (because amnesia is so amazingly common in Japanese teenagers) as the Vampire Queen, Mina Tepes (picture above) waltzes into his life to remind he that he’s been promised to her… oh, and he totally forgot he was a werewolf!

(Don’t worry, these aren’t plot spoilers, it’s all in the first book / two episodes)

The plot is actually rather well done. Unlike numerous other vampire based anime with teenage appearanced vampires, such as Rosario + Vampire or Karin, Mina actually is into her third century and actually acts somewhat like it, with the exception of her crush on Akira… and let’s face it, we all know plenty of adults that do amazingly dumb things if they think they’re about to get it on with a teenager *cough*

Which is why the consistent “titillation” of the audience with a scantily clad twelve year old body just makes no sense. Cheap panty shots are generally the domain of an anime or manga series that stretching for time and appeal to cover up it’s near total lack of depth or character development.

Whilst DitVB characters are somewhat archetypal, the plot line of vampires basically becoming the corner stone of a reviving economy and demanding economic and political concessions to secede from a sovereign nation and form their own (hence the “bund” in the title) are not. The political sub-plots are handled with sincerity and aplomb, easily quite mature in their content and the way that they are handled (assassinations, kidnappings, turnings, etc.) without resorting to cheap gimmickery. Likewise, the relationship management with other clans of monsters.

Sadly, the cheap gimmicks seem to be there to stay for the highschool romance story line. i.e. the must have learning to cook in home-eco class, LOL the vampire queen fails because vampires don’t eat food… Not only could that be seen coming a mile off, it was entirely unneccesary to the development of other plot lines which were far more engaging.

It’s almost as if the author, Tamaki Nozomu, wanted to write a serious vampire story for an adult audience, and was instructed by the publishers to ensure that there was content for teenagers as well to ensure it was a commercial success… which is doubly odd because it was initially published in a monthly magazine aimed at mature adult males. Actually, that’s probably why there’s so many of the lack-of-tit-illating shots.

Either way, it’s actually an engaging series, so queue it up, get some pizza, and prepare for a marathon screening session because this is a damn site better than any of the crap Stephanie Meyer churns out… I hear her next series is going to involve Angels… that sparkle.

For those of you that don’t want to wait for someone to license this title, but feel guilty about downloading content from Pirate Bay, there episodes are currently available for free on Funimation’s Dance in the Vampire Bund YouTube Channel.

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