VOTOMS: Clarke’s God Is Dead

Armoured Trooper VOTOMS is a simple show. I should swiftly add that by ‘simple’ I don’t mean to imply ‘bad’ (it was good) or ‘stupid’ (it wasn’t stupid), simply ‘simple’, in its denotation but not any of its connotations. Armoured Troopers are simple mecha, tin cans with machine guns, the characters are simple people, the dialogue is frequently sparse (and better for it) and some of the show’s best images, such as Chirico carrying a sick Fyana across Sunsa’s airless desert with Zophie following behind him, are its simplest ones.

Theological Quandary for the Haruhiists

More confusing than a PIME TARADOX?

Suppose you’re a Haruhiist, and you desperately want to see this genderswapping gem animated (though it has already mutated into clipshow form).

So . . . is it acceptable to pray to God that She might change Her gender? And is She the same God when She’s a He? This is, of course, assuming that Haruhi can be God and gendered at the same time. I wonder if anyone’s actually given thought to an internally coherent theological system for Haruhiism yet?

[Incidentally, it was recently announced that Haruhi is getting a UK release. And not before time too, I might add.]

Tengen Toppa Gurren-Lagann: Rebellion Perfected?

[Apparently Geasstards such as myself aren’t being pretentious enough about Tengen Toppa Gurren-Lagann. Rather than produce a direct rebuttal, I thought I’d write 1700 words about TTGL, splashing a few of Dore’s illustrations for Paradise Lost around as I did so, making a sly joke about Haman Karn and icing the cake by linking a few other suitably pretentious articles.

I totally haven’t had this in my drafts for a month, waiting for an opportunity to use it. The Animanachronism is hardly that devious, nor is he able to see into the future.]

Anyhow . . .

The rebel is a seductive figure who crops up all over the place in popular (and unpopular) culture. Inasmuch as there is a coherent thread to Western thought, Milton is to blame for this. As someone steeped (too deeply) in the Western literary tradition, my instant response to Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann was to apply a rebellion stencil. Quite how well that works is another question, which will be considered below.

Spoilers ahead. Or rather, since this is Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann we’re talking about, GIGASPOILERS ahead.