Happy New Year... Almost

Well I will say that my vacation has been running smoothly and my homework is slowly, but surely getting finished. I just really am so done with school after the hell produced by the month of December. Other than homework most of my days have been spent knitting and finally watching Sherlock.

Speaking of, here's what I got for Christmas:

1. A portable DVD player
2. A "fancy" Snuggie (that I can't walk in or else it looks awkward)
3. Three pairs of knitting needles
4. Six balls of yarn
5. A new camera with a tripod
6. Sketch books
7. And two whole anime series: Soul Eater and Haibane-Renmei (haven't seen)

That reminds me I haven't updated my anime review blog in forever... Probably need to give that some TLC.

So yeah, I've started knitting. I'm thinking if I make enough, I could sell some scarves and make a bit of money. I know I got a crap ton of yarn so I just gotta make free time to make more scarves lol

Well that's about it really. Nothing else really spectacular going on during the holidays. But hey, no place like home for the holidays, right? Right.

Crap...

God I never update this thing as much as I would like to. That's probably to blame due to the fact I'm just too lazy to write creatively and such, and my classes have become the spawn of Zuul by assigning me a crap ton of homework before finals week, which is next week.

Soooo I'll just give a brief summary of what's been going on since I got nothing better to do while Tumblr is temporarily shut down.

1. Spent week in Florida with Dad during Thanksgiving break
2. Went to Winter Formal
3. LOTS OF HOMEWORK

Yeah, isn't my life so eventful?

Oh wait I take that back, I did see Rise of the Guardians last night which is a fantastic movie. Probably the best I've seen out of Dreamworks since How To Train Your Dragon. I love everything about it; the creativity and imagination, the characters, the story, and of course the animation itself. If you haven't seen it yet, go see it.

And uhhh. Yeah. I've mainly just been consumed by school. It's been stressful but I know I can pull through once finals are over. At least the bright side of it is that I get to be Loki in my Drama final because we're acting out our own scenes we get from movies and stuff.

I don't wanna be the bad guy anymore

So I finally got around to seeing Wreck-It Ralph last week, and any positive words you have heard about it is 100% true.

With the set up of the story and the comedic voices of John C. Reilly, Sarah Silverman, Jane Lynch, and Jack McBrayer, it was really awesome to see it set inside the world of an arcade with video game characters from Street Fighter to Sonic. It created a great film for kids and an even greater film to the nostalgic adults who grew up with these arcade games.

The story is as basic as the title says. Ralph no longer wants to be the villain of his game due to the lack of appreciation while his colleague, Fix-It Felix Jr, is praised greatly. Frustrated and jealous, Ralph leaves his game in search of glory so he can be revered as a hero. Upon leaving his game, he encounters colorful characters like Sergeant Calhoun from a first-person shooter game, Hero's Duty, and a hyperactive glitchy girl name Vanellope Von Schweetz from the racing game, Sugar Rush. Unfortunately, one event leads to another and Ralph not only risks having his game unplugged due to his absence, but risks the whole arcade of disaster. But that's as much as I can reveal without spoilers.

The main characters:

• John C. Reilly is truly up there as one of the most comedic actors, and he doesn't disappoint as Ralph. I almost forgot that he can pull off as a serious character while still able to get out humor. That's what Ralph is. He's a nice guy, but knows when to be serious. Can be timid and a big goofball, but is easy to snap and make frustrated. He starts off as greedy and unacceptable of who he is, but forgets his greed to save those he truly cares about.
• When I saw Sarah Silverman as Vanellope, I thought she was going to portray an incredibly annoying kid. She starts off as kinda annoying but Vanellope proved to be a sweet and funny girl with a huge drive and passion to become a racer no matter what everyone else thinks of her.
• I remember seeing Jack McBrayer as the one awkward kid from Talladega Nights and I saw a lot of that geeky and awkward personality in Felix. He's not the strongest guy but he's still so determined to save his game no matter what it takes to bring back Ralph. He's just an overall goofy guy full of determination.
• Sergeant Calhoun is a bit more of a minor character, but Jane Lynch's name is shown on posters and stuff so might as well have her. Lynch is often type-casted as a very sarcastic character who really doesn't care what comes out of her mouth. Not that it's a bad thing because she's always hilarious in that weird way. Calhoun's a big no-nonsense soldier in that very humorous way, yet is programmed with a tragic past, so you do feel pretty bad for her.

The animation:

As animation goes for Disney, it follows the formula of bright and colorful with dark and scary. It takes advantage of taking place in the world of arcade games and not just including old games like Q*bert and Pac-man, but taking advantage of pure creativity with their original worlds of Fix-It Felix Jr., Hero's Duty, and Sugar Rush, though mostly Sugar Rush. I swear just looking at that part of the movie instantly gave me a cavity with an entire world made of candy. And it also takes advantages of maybe one too many puns but they're hilarious. There will be about a billion references not just to old video games but modern day stuff to, so if that's a pet peeve of yours, you may not enjoy this movie, but that doesn't destroy the film in any way. I also liked how some of the characters movements were very "8-bit". Very blocky and it suited very well for such a world.

The story/message:

While having a ton of comedic moments, the story does take time to be serious and really do make some tear-jerking moments. Yeah, I'm a bit of a baby. Again, it mixes bright and colorful to dark and near depressing. I really liked how it was about stereotyping and labeling, and this story went with a great route and told really nicely. It gave a nice blend of humor, drama, light, dark, and great animation. One of the best family films of the year.

I also should point out the animated short shown before Wreck-It Ralph because it's truly groundbreaking in animation. The short is called Paperman, and it's about a man in 40s NYC trying to get the attention of a girl he met in a chance encounter by paper airplanes. It's silent and black and white but it's a very sweet and cute romantic story, including some great music. But good god the animation! By far Disney's finest. You can find a couple videos online about it, but the animation is a combination of 3D animation overlapped by traditional 2D hand-drawn animation. I almost thought I was watching a 2D short. It is so creative and it looks like a piece of art. The short unfortunately isn't fully available online yet, but you can find featurettes about the short online until the short is available but just.. Agh! It's the best artwork I've seen out of Disney since Brave and its short, La Luna. Go see it!!

Happy (Belated) Halloween

That time of year has come and gone again and now the year is slowly making its way towards the Christmas season. Now those Christmas decorations in stores make sense to have out now.

As for Halloween, it was a splendid Halloween this year. Saw great costumes, went out trick or treating and have been recently suffering post-Halloween exhaustion and I didn't even eat a lot of candy XD
This year I went as Sweeney Todd, the demon barber of Fleet Street. I let my mom do my make up and hair and it was freaking awesome! I kinda scared some people a bit cause I looked pretty pale. By the way, this picture was taken by a student XD I look so terrifyingly model-ish with that pose.

Among the other costumes at school I saw the following:

Doctor Horrible

Flappers

Link

Mormons

Octomom

Harry Potter vs Mr. Miyagi

Billy Mays

Malcom Reynolds

Gandalf and Bilbo Baggins

Billy the Puppet (off the tricycle)

Tom Cruise from Risky Business

But the best one of all was...

Mitt Romney and his binder full of women

It was the most terrifyingly hilarious costume I've ever seen period.

After school and later on that night, I went with my friend Jamie to trick or treat around my neighborhood, and we got a lot for what we did in two hours. My neighborhood is mostly filled with little kids under the age of ten so a lot of people were bound to have candy. Hershey's, Snickers, Pixy Stix, you name it, they got it. Of course some houses had spooky decorations that almost made me stray away cause of my paranoia for stuff that surprises me due to my sensitivity to loud sounds. Though the best house we were at was this one house that just had a sign on the open window saying candy, and of course, it's pitch black inside. Likey-do, I didn't wanna go near it, despite Jamie egging me on, but I went over when a Reese's was thrown out the window. Then she ran away in terror when she saw a Death Eater mask at the window. That was actually pretty freaking hilarious.

As for my weekend, we're finally building the set for the play, The Butler Did It, which is less than a week before opening night. With all the people we had show up just today, we had a lot done and it was awesome. The best part is that they only really need like two people backstage, so this year I can watch the play from the audience, but I'll work in house for the rest of the weekend.

Now to go dilly-dally on Tumblr~

I need a vacation...

While my parents are in Japan, half on vacation half working, I'm still in Cali with some neighbors for a week. Not that it's bad but my weekend has been crazy busy.

Yesterday I had to take my PSAT... at eight in the morning... which meant I had to get up at 6 am so my parents could drop me off and still get to the airport on time.

My breakfast: One bowl of Lucky Charms, a banana, a cheese stick, and one tiny 90 calorie can of Coca-Cola.

Snack during test break: Nilla wafers (that I gave to my friend), goldfish crackers, a HoHo, and a Capri Sun.

I know I'm oh so very healthy. My mom suggested the Coca-Cola for caffeine but man did it backfire later in the afternoon..

Luckily the test was super super easy cause it was just basic geometry and sentence structure and grammar and vocabulary. And afterwards, I was offered Red Robin for lunch which sounded amazing. And the rest of my weekend has been composed of mostly finishing my crap load of homework while working with a tired body. I had such an extreme sugar crash I didn't feel like getting up the next morning...

I've also been reading a book for my independent project called How We Decide by Jonah Lehrer.

Okay I'm gonna go with true story of my week here; I right now hate this author because my group was originally supposed to read another book by him called Imagine. Problem though is that book was recalled by the publisher for plagiarism and fabricated quotes. I can't believe this moron would freaking do that when he's a freaking journalist. Actually change that, he got fired because he also plagiarized for another job. God, I think that's the number one rule in writing: Don't plagiarize.

This non-plagiarized work however is... Okay. I don't really read non-fiction that often... Okay I don't read non-fiction at all. I'm a fantasy/sci-fi reader. I only read non-fiction when I have to do projects or research.

I'm not too far in but I don't really like Lehrer's writing style. Maybe I'm just being nitpicky but it seems really disorganized and lacks focus. It's supposed to be about how the brain works and how we make decisions but it constantly goes back and forth to examples, scientific research, logic, emotions, oh my God, it's too much.

I dunno. Maybe I'll find some odd way to enjoy it eventually but it's whatever.

Here's some food porn before I say adieu

Here we have a chocolate cake with mint chocolate icing, covered in Hershey's chocolate bar shavings. Enjoy staring at its beauty while your mouth drools.

Disney Villains (Part 2)

If you followed my previous post, you saw that I listed off half of the Disney villains I think to be great  funny villains but also the "meh" villains. Now we're slowly transitioning to the biggest baddies of all. I hope your favs get up here and remember: No Pixar villains (that will be a separate post eventually) and this is based off the of the 2-D animated films I have seen.

10. John Clayton (Tarzan)

Still a bit of a "meh" villain cause his motive is very weak. It's money and power, and not to mention he resembles too closely to Ratcliffe. What makes him different though, is how ruthless and violent he is and the great extremes he goes to just to get what he wants. If you really hate animal abusers, you'll hate this guy. 

I gotta say I was almost tempted to not have him on this list but what really makes him unique that still makes me cringe to this day: his death. Clayton's the only character I've seen to actually be hanged and it's pretty scary. Took me years to see the shadow of his body after it happens..

Well anyway. Next guy!

9. Shan Yu (Mulan)

Out of all the villains I've listed, Shan Yu is definitely one of the more merciless ones. He's just having fun being such a bad guy with an immense amount of power. And when you put him with that intense music, it makes him and the Hun army very intimidating.

Motive? "By building his wall he challenged my strength. Well, I'm here to play his game." Yeah.. that just about says it. Shan Yu hates being overpowered and wants to prove that he's the strongest out there and is ready to challenge anyone who steps above him. Even a woman disguised as a dude who has a body count in the hundreds via avalanche.

Ruthless and crazed with strength, Shan Yu's the guy who will never underestimate his enemies and fight to come on top... Until he gets blown up with fireworks.

8. Mother Gothel (Tangled)

Much like the Evil Queen and the Wicked Stepmother, there isn't much to Gothel other than a really vain woman. Unlike those two women however, she doesn't seek to bring a miserable life or even death upon the female lead. Gothel kidnaps and locks Rapunzel away to use her hair to stay young forever.

I put Gothel pretty high because of how manipulative she is, and she does it for 18 years. She gets away for so long telling Rapunzel that the outside world is a dangerous place when the real danger is right in front of Rapunzel. Gothel is a great actress in showing how much she "cares" for Rapunzel and treating her like a loving mother. Yet once Rapunzel starts growing her independence, her true colors show for how big of a liar and how cruel of a woman she really is.

Gothel also gets points for being the first Disney villain to die of old age. Once Rapunzel's hair is cut, she turns into her real age and just eventually turns into ash. By far one of the most unique of villain deaths out there.

7. Scar (The Lion King)

I'm coming at the point where I don't feel like I gotta say much about these villains. They're so well known I don't even have to specify their qualities that make them so evil. But I'll do it anyway.

Scar follows the classic Disney path of a vain and power-hungry dictator. Willing to kill anyone to get the title of king, including his own brother, creating one of the most iconic Disney deaths. He's scheming and ruthless, but once he gets into power, he becomes a Prima Donna. You think he'd take advantage of his power, but just likes sitting around doing nothing and then complaining or snapping when no one does their job or criticizes him.

But of course he entirely doesn't lose interest when Simba returns to the Pride Lands, and they're forced to face one another. When you look at him then, he can be cowardly when he's against intimidation, yet still maintains his brutality until the end when his ignorance betrays him, and he betrays his minions who eat him alive.

6. Cruella De Vil (101 Dalmations)

Another animal abuser on the list, Cruella is the most iconic and memorable of the Disney villains. She's fashion-obsessed and egotistical but also impulsive, sadistic, greedy, and extremely bipolar. She can be calm and collected one moment, but the next she's a psychopath chasing you off a cliff with her car. Nothing like a crazy woman behind the wheel trying to kill you.. Don't know if that's a sexist joke or not..

Like I mentioned before with Yzma, Cruella is just hideously glamorous. She's a very skeletal woman covered in a massive fur coat. Like I gotta say her motivation; gathering enough Dalmatian puppies to create fur coats like a fashion monster. And the longer it took for her to get her way, the more reckless and psychotic she got.

Cruella: Giving an entirely new name to fashionably insane.

5. Ursula (The Little Mermaid)

TOO SIMILAR!!!

Trivia: Ursula's design was actually based off of a drag queen named Divine. Unfortunately, Divine died of an enlarged heart before the movie was finished. I'm sure if she saw it, she thought Disney made a twin.

While the original sea witch from Hans Christen Anderson's story was neutral, Ursual turned out to be a dark and sinister octopus woman with a massive craving for power. She has the power to manipulate and easily fill the merpeople's heads with deceptions of granting them. She's also very easy to piss off as shown by how the movie got to its climax: Her "poopsies" Flotsam and Jetsam were killed. So she does have a heart for whatever she considers her "children" and goes on a rage when it's taken away from her. And she was pretty scary and had a bit of a graphic death for a Disney film.

Always a crazily, enjoyable villainess, and then she gets stabbed with a ship.

4. Jafar (Aladdin)

Now we're getting closer and closer to the most popular villains of all of Disney, with Jafar regarded as the #2 Greatest Disney Villain, though not on this list.

Motivation: Power. A familiar motivation for many Disney villains. He's sadistic, narcissistic, dark but also cunning and having a dark sense of humor and class like Ratigan. I always seem to quote any of his funny moments because he's so enjoyable. His design is also amazing because he's just drawn to look so dark and sinister. It's funny because just on his appearance alone, he's the very obvious bad guy, yet he's so deceptive and manipulative, especially over the puppy-eyed Sultan. But he can also be very short-tempered and impulsive, which led to his unfortunate ending of being trapped in "itty bitty living space".

3. Gaston LeGume (Beauty and the Beast)

LeGume = "Peabrained"

Gaston is the most unique villain because if you didn't know who he was and what movie he's from, your first impression would be that he's the hero. In fact, that's how the town sees him; a hero and eye candy for every female.

He knows he's strong and handsome which leads to a great deal of pride and ego, though the people of the town are too oblivious to see that. His goal is to make Belle fall in love with him and marry him, no matter who or what gets in his way. Problem though is that he's the biggest sexist pig that Disney has to offer and Belle's -1000% impressed by the way he degrades women. He easily gets frustrated when he doesn't get his way and won't take no for an answer and goes to the extremes of putting Belle's father in an insane asylum just to get her hand in marriage.

And because everyone in the town loves and trusts him (and not to mention are very gullible), Gaston manipulates them into paranoia about Beast and gathers a freaking mob to go to the castle. Yet his arrogance and extreme desire for Belle makes him the monster while Beast becomes more human (literally and metaphorically).

2. Maleficent (Sleeping Beauty)


Can't have a Disney villains list without the Mistress of all Evil now can we?

Maleficent is by far the most memorable and most popular of all the Disney villains. Next to Chernabog from Fantasia, she's a big representation of all that is evil, though her motivation is pretty weak. Remember that she originally wanted to kill Aurora just because she wasn't invited to a baby shower. Yet she goes to such vengeful extremes, it makes her scary and sadistic.

Her sorcery allows her to be strong and powerful and makes the heroes wonder what her next move will be. Who can forget when she turned into a giant freaking dragon? How can anyone top that?

Despite how evil she is, she just has this elegance and class that makes her enjoyable and easy to take seriously. Hell, she's so popular she's the main Disney villain in the Kingdom Hearts series. Though if you wanna look at her based on the video games, she's a nuisance.

Yeah, in Kingdom Hearts 1, she was a big threat until you killed her and learned about Ansem. Her comeback in Kingdom Hearts 2 was completely pointless seeing as how half way through the game, she stops contributing anything in achieving whatever pointless master plan she has seeing as how the other Disney villains have lost interest and I'm just waiting for Master Xehanort to turn his back and stab her in the chest. It's not exactly appealing either when she has Pete with her. God, he's even more annoying and such an eye sore. Bottom line, Maleficent just needs to find other plans (or at least a new sidekick..) and was a thousand times more of a bad ass in the movie.

Now I bet you're wondering how can I top Maleficent, the most well known and popular out of all the Disney villains? I've seemed to have named all the popular ones and the ones I've grown up with as a child.

Well the scariest and most evil of all Disney villains is...

1. Judge Claude Frollo (The Hunchback of Notre Dame)

By God, like I even need to say it. From a movie that took a lot of risks as just an overall family film, it created the darkest Disney villain period. Frollo does all the twisted, bastardly, villainous acts, and takes them to the nth degree.

Driven by a strong prejudice against gypsies, he kills a mother, almost kills her baby, locks said baby in Notre Dame for 20 years and lies to him about the outside world, lusts over a woman, goes on a near genocidal rampage, all while claiming to be doing it by the word of God Almighty. What a great Catholic man.

That's what really makes Frollo a great villain. He does all these nefarious acts but he's complex by claiming to do them for pious reasons and backing it up with the word of God but he fears damnation as much as the next guy. Hell, he even freaking lusts over Esmeralda and hates it as he's slowly slipping into temptation and pure madness. Much like how the original Victor Hugo novel challenged the corruption of church, it challenged the corruption of faith and power and how having so much power makes you into such a big monster.


And just everything he does and every way he looks just makes him more intimidating. The voice, the black robes, the near permanent frown on his face, how he sings, the extremes he goes to, even up to that freaking choir. He's just a walking nightmare.

I always thought his death was scary because he freaking sees a gargoyle come to life and give him a devilish grin as he slips into absolute insanity. Then Frollo takes his plunge into (a symbolic) hell. God it was pretty terrifying.

So that concludes my Disney Villains list. Hope you enjoyed seeing your favorites on here.

Disney Villains (Part 1)

So ever since my list of Disney Princesses, I've been coming up with lists of other types of Disney characters. I tried going for male leads but I'm not sure where to go with yet. So in the mean time, I'll just do Disney villains.

Before I start, I will point out that this is a long list (hence why this post is part 1) and it was very hard for me to do. There are just so many great villains that I remember from my childhood that I remember so well. So instead of 10, I made it a list of 20 villains. Now I made this list that goes from the funniest villains to the meh villains to the biggest bastards of Disney. And this doesn't have any Pixar villains cause I'll do something separate for those, and this is only based off the Disney films I have seen.

Welcome to...

~Liz's Top Disney Villains~

20. Yzma (Emperor's New Groove)

Hands down, Yzma is the best funny villain period. She's evil, greedy, power-hungry but also eccentric and hard to take seriously 100% of the time. I like how she tries to act like a bad ass but always looks over minor details and screws up. Leads to funny reactions and moments with her. And when she's with Kronk, priceless! Those were the best parts of the film was just the two of them because it's such an odd duo, especially when Kronk has the mind of a newborn baby and the innocence of a puppy.

Rewatching Emperor's New Groove, I noticed Yzma's design was pretty similar to Curella de Vil. She just has this hideous glamour about her; trying to hide how old/frail she is in nice clothes. Lots and lots of purple.

On the whole, Yzma is just the best part of the film. I enjoy seeing her over and over again with how hard she tries to be evil, yet always leads to comedy.

19. The Queen of Hearts (Alice in Wonderland)

Like I gotta say much about her. The Queen is just a pure psychopath and mad just like all the other characters in Wonderland. What makes her enjoyable is seeing what Alice is thinking of the right thing to say or do around her because her huge mood swings and sensitivity could get her beheaded. It makes the ending pretty suspenseful and makes her funny.

When you get down to it, she has no motivation other than just getting rid of whatever pisses her off. She just a giant child in an adult's body creating a "fat, pompous, bad tempered old tyrant". I did find it interesting when Alice became huge and the Queen felt extremely intimidated by how huge Alice was. So she does have a weakness of being suddenly overpowered and anything larger than her. It makes her more child-like in a sense.

I will say though I also did like the Queen in Tim Burton's version of Alice in Wonderland. It's Helena Bonham Carter so it's obvious she'll bring out the pure madness of the Queen but to the nth degree and makes her a big threat by making her a serious villain.

Old or new, the Queen of Hearts truly is a mad woman.

18. Captain Hook (Peter Pan)

He tries being such a big bad pirate but the moment you put him near the crocodile, forget that. He turns into the biggest coward ever as that crocodile craves for his flesh.

Hook's motivation is really just revenge on Peter Pan for cutting off his hand. He's menacing, manipulative, and even murderous (kills two of his own crew men in the film) and despite how clever he is in finding loopholes, deep down inside, Hook is still best known for how cowardly and hilarious he is. But he's also just down right sadistic, especially towards kids. He doesn't care who gets in the way as long as he gets his revenge against a ten-year-old.

While his evil ways are overlooked, Captain Hook is most memorable as one of the best funny villains ever.

17. Prince John (Robin Hood)

Yet again, a big child in an adult tyrant's body. Though I think this is taken to the nth degree seeing as how the villain in this film has more focus than the Queen does in Alice in Wonderland.

Like a majority of Disney villains, Prince John is power and money hungry. What sets him apart though is that he's just immature and childish. He's just purely jealous of how big of a favorite his brother, King Richard, was over him. And it especially shows whenever his mother is mentioned. He can still be threatening but again, he's just a big child. Something I've recently noticed is that whenever he and his sidekick Hiss get into arguments, it makes them sound like an odd married couple. Thinking about it now, it's pretty funny and it adds on to making him an enjoyable character.

16. Dr. Facilier AKA The Shadow Man (The Princess and the Frog)

This was a new take for Disney to do a voodoo witch doctor as a villain. It adds on for a ton of creativity. I actually saw the one of the inspirations for his design was Cab Calloway, and it does show. I can definitely see it remembering this villain in The Princess and the Frog. Plus he's just designed so well. As chief animator Bruce Smith described, "a love child of Captain Hook and Cruella De Vil"....... Um... Ew..

Anyway..

Dr. Facilier's motive is to become filthy rich and take over New Orleans while giving all the souls there to his "friends on the other side" to repay his debt, which is never actually specified, but I'm assuming it's his ability to use black magic or whatever. He's actually scared of not paying back his "friends" and if he screws up, which he does, he gets dragged into the underworld. So in an interesting story device, they're not minions of the Shadow Man, but he's actually affiliated with them and just asks for help when needed. In a lot of ways I kinda compared him to Rasputin from Anastasia. Selling his soul to the underworld, having a magical item he can't break, and even similar deaths.

Like some Disney villains, Dr. Facilier is manipulative by promising to change their futures and/or lifestyles, but he's a smooth-talker and charismatic while also being the scheming bokor (voodoo magician that practices both black and white magic) that he is. But I also think he's a lot of fun. He just enjoys what he does by manipulating people to give them happiness but turning his back and making them regret what they wished for.

15. Hades (Hercules)

A lot of people would consider Hades as the best funny villains, and I think so too, especially when you have the voice of James Woods as the villain. Unlike the passive deity presented in mythology, James Woods turns Hades into a fast talking evil god of death making his mannerisms seem similar to that of a car salesman or a lawyer.

Hades's motive is to surpass Zeus, who for some reason isn't referenced as his little brother, and take over the Cosmos and Mount Olympus. Sadly he's very sloppy in, oh I don't know, not keeping track if Hercules was actually killed as an infant. He's one of the more laid-back villains who only poses as a great threat with his over-the-top mood swings or is getting stuff done. When things don't go his way, he just loses it and explodes. Literally. It makes him even more enjoyable.

14. Ratigan (The Great Mouse Detective)

Looking back, this is a completely underrated Disney animated film. Which sucks that I got rid of the tape years ago cause it's a great movie. And this is a great character who is voice by the great Vincent Price who later said that Ratigan was his favorite role.

Ratigan is based off of Professor James Moriarty from the original stories of Sherlock Holmes. The motive is just to gain a heavy amount of power and wealth, but Ratigan is very malicious and sadistic and just enjoys every second of it. He has a formal and rather dark sense of humor, but he's also charismatic, intelligent and not to mention highly egotistical.

A lot of what makes the character is him trying to stay so calm and sophisticated, but slips back and forth between being calm and going into a violent rage. By the film's climax, Ratigan is just so full of insanity that it's plain terrifying. But it keeps you on the edge of your seat until it's all over and makes him so great to watch.

13. Governor John Ratcliffe (Pocahontas)

Yeah... We're at the "meh" villains. And that's really what I feel about this character is just "meh". Mostly cause this has been such an overdone villain archetype: the greedy bastard who refuses to listen to reason. Just a racist snob who wants gold but is too stubborn to believe he'll never find any.

I guess you could say he's charismatic and manipulative but there's also not really much else to him. It's a villain that's been done before and overall, it's just boring, especially when nothing new is done to is. Hell, it's been done recently in James Cameron's Avatar.

So yeah, not a fan of Ratcliffe. There are so many better villains out there.

12. Queen Grimhilde AKA The Evil Queen (Snow White and the Seven Dwarves)

Anyone wondering where the real name is from, it's from old publicity stuff. Anyway.

When you really look at her, the Queen isn't really that interesting for a Disney villain. Just a really vain woman going to extremes to be the "fairest of them all". But her design is just purely amazing. Ever notice how she never smiles? And when she turns into an old hag, it's pretty freaky. Used to make me jump a little. Other than that... Yeah there's really not much to her until she become old. That's when she actually becomes really threatening and pretty scary. She. Just. Loses. It. You can almost see the insanity in her eyes until the very end.

11. Lady Tremaine AKA Wicked Stepmother (Cinderella)

Now we're transitioning into the biggest baddies of all Disney, starting with Lady Tremaine.

She doesn't possess any magical powers or physical strength, but she's just pure evil all because she has control of one person's life. Why? She's not gonna gain anything out of it. She just does it because she knows Cinderella is a thousand times prettier than her and her daughters and just because she could. She just does anything in her power to make Cinderella's life miserable while Cinderella fights back with patience and hope.

She's just cruel in the way she's trying to crush any hopes and dreams Cinderella has. To make it worse, her daughters are just as evil. I think the most intense part was when they just started mercilessly ripping up Cinderella's dress that she made from their old clothes. Anastasia and Drizella are the biggest spoiled brats to ever hit the silver screen thanks to their cruel mother.

Now that's just half of the Disney villains. And don't worry, we have a ton of baddies to go.

My First Con

This last weekend I finally went to my first anime/comic convention ever: Sac-Con. It's nothing big like Comic-Con or Fanime or anything. Hell it only lasts a day compared to a whole weekend. But it was still as awesome and I even was able to buy something as a memory of my first con: an England plushie.

I went as Lady Bruce Banner and I went with my sister, who dressed up as Lady Loki, and her friends who were Thor and Lady Deadpool. Sarah, the girl dressed up as Deadpool, had a lot of people ask to take photos of her, even professional photographers. Give her credit she did have an awesome costume. Got to see a lot of other great cosplayers including Storm Troopers, Hetalia and quite a few Adventure Time cosplays which actually fit because the lady who voices Princess Bubblegum was there that day. Unfortunately, it was very crowded and very hot, and Sacramento's two hours from home, so we had to leave early. But it was great seeing all the great cosplays and all the stuff the vendors were selling, including some fantastic artwork.

I have to say out of all the cosplays I've seen, I'm not really fond of Homestuck cosplay... It's just really overrated and lazy. When you really look at it, it's mostly just wigs and T-shirts and some accessories. It doesn't look like much effort is put into it. It's just really boring when a lot of people do the same cosplays. It just looks so dull. I'm also not a Homestuck fan either. I tried getting into it but there's WAY too much going on for me to understand. I appreciate that it does have fans, but it's just so overrated and I don't like seeing a crap ton of fan art and cosplays from it. Especially when there are other great cosplays out there that are beautiful and complex.

Anyway!

They gave us fliers of another Sac-Con that's gonna be in December on a Sunday which is actually gonna have Steve Blum as one of the guests. That, I wanna get into. Plus it's only six dollars to get in so it's cheap. But there's also the big SacAnime convention in January that lasts the whole weekend and includes more celebrities like Liam O'Brien and the one and only Todd Haberkorn. THAT I want to go to. It's a lot more expensive because there are more events but I hope I get enough leftover Christmas money to go. And it's the last weekend before I go back to school from Christmas break so I can have a bit of fun before going back to school. Hopefully I can get more decent cosplay before then.

I never really have enough time to plan out for stuff like go to anime conventions which sucks because there is one just thirty minutes away in San Jose every Memorial Day weekend, and I still haven't gone to it. My Lady Bruce Banner cosplay just consists of jeans and a purple button up shirt. I tried getting an Italy cosplay a couple summers ago but it's pretty cheap and I only wore it once. On top of which my mom won't let me buy stuff online so I either gotta buy stuff from the closest GoodWill or sew it myself. Again, I don't have enough time because school just stresses me enough, and I'm too busy thinking of wanting to do other things but always forget to bring them up. Like, oh I don't know, getting a job or getting my license. Ugh..

I'm still somewhat stuck in post-con exhaustion except now I'm getting a cold. Actually that's just from school. It seems like it's that time of year where most everyone at school is starting to get sick at the same time. Always fun, huh? Having your nose stuffed up with goo and feeling like a pile of dog crap is probably the best feeling in the world. I took a Nyquil a short while ago so I may just pass out and sleep like a boulder. Ah well. Enjoy the pics of the con.

Why do fireflies have to die?

I just watched the most beautifully, sad anime film I have ever seen in my life. I watched Isao Takahata's Grave of the Fireflies.

With other great films from Studio Ghibli, especially from the great Hayao Miyazaki, Grave of the Fireflies is very underrated compared to the other works produced by Studio Ghibli. Which sucks because it really is a classic and one of the best anime films next to Spirited Away.

Grave of the Fireflies is an anti-war tragedy that follows two orphaned siblings, 14-year-old Seita and 4-year-old Setsuko, as they try to survive after the bombings of Kobe in the last months of World War II. They never experience the massive bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki but what they have to go through and the constant raids they're faced from American planes just really tears your heart up into tiny shreds.

The title of this post pretty much sums up the movie without giving away too many spoilers. Why do fireflies live such a short time before dying? Why do innocent people have to be killed? They did nothing but get in the way of bombers in a war. It really does reflect on the horrors and pain the Japanese were forced to endure while we Americans just dropped bombs on them because we couldn't just let Japan take us over that easily.

I like how this movie has a lot of moments where it's no dialogue or even music and it's just pure silence. It gives you time to just think that this is what was happening while we were trying to win a war. And we did win but at the cost of many innocent lives. We had no choice but to go to war, but it didn't change that many lives, even the lives of children, were lost.

The movie also takes those slow moments to build the bond between Seita and Setsuko. They're all they have after their mother died in the bombings and have to stay strong. Mostly Seita to keep up hope that his father will return home from the war and to keep his little sister alive. Yet he's still just a kid. He's a bit self-centered and impulsive, but he's still caring for Setsuko and will do anything to keep her healthy and happy. And this is a big shock for both of them because they lost their homes and are constantly raided on, yet somehow in this cruel world they're still able to find some amount of happiness. The dark and terrifying imagery on such a dark subject is contradicted with beautiful images of nature and memories of Seita and Setsuko full of bright colors.

This is truly a brilliant masterpiece by Studio Ghibli that I recommend highly. I've heard that the English isn't really that spectacular so definitely watch in its original Japanese format. Can't find a DVD, then it's available on YouTube.

“Life is difficult. Sometimes more for some than for others. But even when life is at it’s roughest, you must keep pushing forward for those you love. It will all be worth it in the end.”

- Grave of the Fireflies, Hayao Miyazaki

STOP

God I pay more attention to my Tumblr than I do to this blog XD

So let's seem um.. God two weeks.. XD This is a bit awkward.

Well in the past couple of weeks it's mostly just been school work. My teachers are kinda evil and like to just load it on us. Not that any of it's hard but it's just extremely time consuming and by the end of the day my brain just feels like a mush of unsolidified Jell-O. So I just spend the night jacking around on Tumblr which is purely addicting as hell. Not to mention the heavy amount of Hetalia that floods it on a daily basis. As of now, 21 followers with over 300 posts XD Good God.

Anyway, I have become the president of the Anime/Manga Club and it's feels awesome. (Reminds me I haven't updated my anime blog in a while either...) I actually feel honored to have that responsibility to make this the best year the club has ever had, especially since the creators are seniors now. I want their last year at the club to end not with a bang but a giant nuclear explosion (Figuratively speaking of course).

And today was also Club Day where people sign up for clubs they want to join and we got about twenty people signed up. It really feels awesome to have the club expanded to such a great size. I know it's gonna be a fun year and I feel confident that I can make that possible.

I just needed time to slow down especially for today since my brain is just at too many places at once. Club day, independent art project, quizzes, English project, tests, oh my Jesus it's too much.. I know I don't want to fall behind but God it's just so much freaking work.. I still haven't written in such a long time. I need to get on that this weekend..

In fact I should decrease my workload a bit this weekend especially. My stepdad is finally coming home after being away at Japan for about a month. He's been working with satellites and stuff since the guy originally working and living there had to leave cause his pregnant wife got a nervous breakdown. Ever since he got there, my stepdad has had some odd events happen to him. The biggest highlights though were him getting stupidly expensive food bills, having to cover his tattoo in the pool cause of the Yakuza and having to take off his watch in the pool in fear of hurting someone else. (Trivia: My stepdad's tattoo is on his shin and is of a bald eagle with the american flag in the background) So my stepdad is on the plane right now and will be here in the morning. In fact he'll be time traveling since they're sixteen hours ahead and it's already Friday over there.

So yeah, that was my little break from school. For now anyway. I need to do this more often.

3 days of doing absolutely nothing... Cept for homework

Yeah my AP classes are evil. Not really. They're really easy assignments anyway and one of them isn't due until Wednesday. While I'm into my second week of school, the rest of my friends including my sister are just starting school. Guess it's cause my school year is freaking loaded with vacations at least once a month even if it's a three day weekend. Labor Day weekend is one of them.

Not really doing much of anything other than blogging, messing around on Tumblr, watching YouTube videos, y'know, lazy stuff. And of course the obvious getting homework done. I probably should update my anime blog with the rest of those anime openings cause I've been too occupied and too lazy to do that.

So thank god I was able to switch out of that God awful peer counseling class and get into drama with the new drama teacher, Mr. DeMelo. He's a great guy, very fun and I think we're gonna have fun with him this year. We've been doing quite a bit of improv games which have been hilarious but also so dramatic. I had no idea that you could make improv so heart wrenching. It's pretty amazing. And of course we got to play World's Worst which is always the best improv game ever.

I'm so freaking happy that I've gotten some time to let my creative juices in my brain relax for once and I can actually do all my free writing which makes me so happy. I really hope I get some time during the year to show some of my teachers some of the poetry and stories I've been working on.

Hmm. Kinda feel like watching Disney films right now for not particular reason.

Honorable Mentions

So I recently made a post about my top ten Disney princesses. And I know I missed a few who many people technically count as princesses and who people like. So I'm making an Honorable Mention list in remembrance to the Disney princesses who are often thrown under the rug. This isn't in any specific order. I'm just naming off ones I think deserve a mention.

1. Melody
This was the only exception I had with mention of Disney sequels in my top ten list. Why? Because even to this day it's so weird to me! Why is it Ariel is the only one that has a child? It just makes her stand out and it's just... Agh!

But anyway, Melody is.... The same as her mother from the original film.. In fact, all of The Little Mermaid II is the exact same plot as the original with slightly different plot elements and less memorable characters. Melody is a whiny little brat who wants to be a mermaid after being sheltered from the sea for all her life cause the sister of Ursula threatens her life to persuade Triton to hand over his power to her, yet no one freaking tells her a damn thing. Do I even need to say anything else? It's the same damn thing. Haaaaaaate. I guess you could argue that compared to Ariel in the original, Melody does take part in the film's climax and tries to set things right where Ariel does pretty much little to nothing in the climax of The Little Mermaid.. But again, it's the same character. Haaaaaate.

2. Eilonwy
Let's start off with the fact that I've never ever seen The Black Cauldron. This was one of the few Disney films that as a child and even now as a teen, I've never seen. It doesn't really help that The Black Cauldron is known as one of Disney's greatest failures in animation history. Even if years later it's gotten a cult following, the negativity about this film still doesn't appeal to me. On it's opening weekend, it lost to The Care Bears movie. Pathetic, isn't it?

From seeing Nostalgia Critic's Disneycember of The Black Cauldron, from what I can gather is that not much about her is "princess-y". Hell, she's not even part of the Disney princess franchise just because she never sang. That's kinda sad. From what else I can gather, she just really has the title because her kingdom's not seen or anything else, and there was kinda no point in making her a princess in the first place. Again, this is what I can gather from other sources, but it's not truly fair for me to judge her if I've never seen the film.

3. Kida
Atlantis: The Lost Empire is a movie I have little to almost no memory of. The most I remember are the visuals. And that's what I remember of Kida: How she looks. Out of all Disney female leads, she has the most unique design. Her design looks a bit like Storm from X-Men and it really does show with her white hair and tan skin, but she's still unique with her blue tattoos from the culture presented. Other than that, everything else about her is a blank slate. I guess she has some connection with spirits or something which I thought was a bit like Pocahontas and is also like a warrior too, but again, I don't have much memory of this movie.

4. Mulan

Technically, Mulan is part of the Disney princess franchise. But I made my princess list based off of actual royalty (married [actually married or implied] or born into it). Sorry Mulan, hugging the Emperor doesn't count.

But she's still a really great character and became part of the Disney girls who were strong, adventurous, independent, and courageous. Yet Mulan is also clumsy and awkward trying to fit in with a group of men. Plus she's not scared to be opinionated and outspoken and stand out among all the other women of her time. She's still unique, and I really enjoy seeing her again and again.

5. Giselle
She's pretty much a satire princess to the first three Disney princesses (Snow White, Cinderella and Aurora) and shows the trend how they have gone from nice and sweet to spunky and courageous with characters like Ariel and Jasmine.

Giselle is overly naive and sweet as sugar. She's stuck in a fantasy world where she has never experienced emotions other than pure happiness. As she comes to New York City, while still remaining optimistic and naive, she becomes more mature as reality hits her that not everyone in the world is nice and things like divorce happen. She even experiences sadness and frustration. She learns that she can fight for herself and work for a happy ending. And that's the trend the Disney princesses had from earlier in the 1900s to the 1990s.

I gotta say though, Amy Adams is freaking amazing as this character. She's beautiful and just adorable. She just plays Giselle so perfectly with how stupidly nice she is but still dynamic as she matures in the "real world".

6. Kairi
She's a Princess of Heart. In my world, it counts. Don't judge me.

Well if you have seen my All About Me post you will know that I'm not really a particular fan of Kairi. She's down there with Naminé as one of my least favorite female characters of the whole Kingdom Hearts series. Yeah, she gets kidnapped and is asleep for most of KH1, but KH2? No excuse. How did she not get any self defense lessons in the off chance that she was, oh I don't know, kidnapped again?? Why couldn't she summon a keyblade before? Questions like that are never really explained and leave holes in her character. She could have turned into a total bad ass. All that I'm getting from Kairi is some damsel in distress who is all kind and sweet and stuff. Looking back, it's kinda boring compared to characters like Xion and Aqua. I know she's important to the series and I'm hoping KH3 will provide more room for her to develop and become an interesting character.




7. Charlotte La Bouff
First off I freaking love this GIF. I found it on Tumblr and was like "I'm using this". She's just hilarious.

No, I'm not counting Charlotte on this list cause she's technically princess of Mardi Gras or whatever. I put her on this list just because of her strong desire to be a princess. It just reminds me of every fantasy a little girl has. Growing up and marrying your Prince Charming to become a princess. She pretty much portrays the dreams we had when we were little girls down to her overly pink wardrobe. I was kinda the same as her when I was little. Everything had to be pink. It was my favorite color ever.

Charlotte's very ditzy and spoiled as a southern belle, but she still sassy, energetic, generous, and freaking hilarious! She's one of the best parts of the whole film and I love seeing her every time.

So there are my honorable mentions of Disney "princesses". Hope you enjoyed it! :)