Features 764
Books: One Month in Tohoku
By Jonathan Clements. Caroline Pover did not spend one month in Tohoku. Well, she did, but then she went back again, and again and again. Over the last decade, pandemic lockdowns excepted, she has returned to her “adopted” village of Oshika for a month or so most years, at first as a delivery woman for […]
Japanese Box Office Round-up 2020
By Jasper Sharp. So, what happened at the Japanese box office in 2020? The critics lists and industry stats from the Motion Picture Producers Association of Japan, or Eiren, are all now in, so it’s time once more for my annual mull over the figures, trends and top titles of another year in Japanese cinema. 2020 […]
Books: The Impact of Akira
By Andrew Osmond. If you were asked which singer comes to mind in connection with Akira, most readers would think of Kanye West cosplaying Tetsuo in his pants in the “Stronger” video. A few of you might remember Michael and Janet Jackson’s video for “Scream,” which samples Akira in its last moments. But in his […]
Human Lost
By Jonathan Clements. Tokyo, 2036. A revolution in medical treatments has conquered death. Thanks to the SHELL system, which controls a benign plague of nanomachines, human beings no longer suffer from diseases or death. A 120-year lifespan is entirely possible, but this glimpse of quasi-immortality has also warped modern Japan. Drunk on their own extended […]
Kill la Kill
By Jeannette Ng. Kill la Kill rests on a panoply of ridiculous puns, the central pair of which work just as well in English due to them being loanwords: “fascist” and “fashion” do sound very similar. The title itself plays on another set of puns that only really works in Japanese: “to kill” (キル kiru), […]