Review of Dragon Ball Super Ep. 88

Gohan time! After last week’s questionable writing it’s time for Super to redeem itself. 

Gohan and Piccolo are sparring, and Piccolo’s not impressed. He tells Gohan that Goku already talked to him about the tournament and got him two senzu beans so he could retrain Gohan. 

After catching up with the other characters, including Vegeta changing a diaper and Kuririn getting beaten by his wife Seventeen in a training match we rejoin Gohan and Piccolo. Even in Super Sayian form Piccolo is beating Gohan. He tells Gohan that he is obsessed with winning, and can’t even invoke his original strength. 

Cut to Cabba in universe six. He is looking for that special someone who can help his team win the tournament.  He meets up with a guy named Renso who was apparently his teacher. Renso is impressed by his super sayian transformation, however when Cabba asks him to join Renso says he has a bad leg now and can’t fight, but says his sister Caulifla  can. Not only that but she is much stronger than him!

Back in universe Seven Piccolo calls the training thus far a warm up and says he is now getting serious. Gohan, already out of breath responds by going Super Sayian two. Piccolo says Gohan has a weakness that if he can’t overcome will knock him out of the tournament. In Super Sayian 2 Gohan appears stronger, but Piccolo beats him with superior techniques. He says Gohan is strong but doesn’t have a warriors heart, so he drops his guard in critical moments) Piccolo says he has to lose his arrogance and fight with everything. Gohan powers up again but Piccolo says super sayian isn’t his ultimate form, and to use the power he had when he fought Majin Buu. Gohan transforms into his “mystic” form and Piccolo begins attacking with everything he has. Gohan fends off his tricks and chops off Piccolo’s arm Gohan is mortified but Piccolo congratulates him, and then blasts him in the back with his disconnected arm. Piccolo tells him never to drop his guard and they start again. They train until nightfall and Gohan thanks Piccolo for the training but Piccolo says they have just begun. He doesn’t believe Gohan has reached the full extent of his power. Gohan agrees. 

After the disappointment of last week this episode appeared a breath of fresh air. Though it was somewhat predictable we got to see Gohan and Piccolo in top form. My only real complaint was the art was a little iffy in parts of the episode.  I was happy to see they addressed Gohan’s “mystic” form, which they seem to have forgotten about the last few years. I hope the tournament has a lot more Gohan and piccolo. 

On another note I think Caulifla from universe Six might become a fan favorite.  She seems to be the fem-Broly from the opening and previews who generated so much hype. The clip we saw appears to show her running a gang. I look forward to her and Cabba interacting. 

The next episode appears somewhat less serious, but perhaps more fun. Tenshinhan is running a dojo now and Goku is going to recruit him. Tenshinhan is a horribly underused character so I am happy we’ll get to see him in fighting form.

-Gedaemon

Review Dragon Ball Super Ep. 87

Space poachers! That’s the best they could come up with this week.

Desperate to lure Seventeen into the tournament, Goku mentions the super dragon balls. Seventeen seems interested but before he answers both of them sense incoming energy signatures. A UFO appears and starts stealing animals. Using instant transmission they board the ship.  

Once on the ship fighting ensues as Goku and Seventeen argue over who gets to take out the boss, whom they assume is the strongest. Seventeen runs ahead of Goku and confronts the boss who doesn’t seem strong, but he has two guards with laser swords. They are quickly taken out, as is the fat alien in charge. The alien boss tries to bribe Goku and Seventeen which of course doesn’t work, so he threatens to trigger the self-destruct mechanism implanted in him-- which seems rather absurd for someone who says he is only interested in money.

Seventeen tackles the alien, saying he he’s leaving the rest to Goku. He and the alien fly into space until Goku grabs them and brings both Seventeen and the bad guy to King Kai’s planet.  (That’s the joke.) King Kai is scared and pissed off about this. When deciding what to do with him Dende informs them that there is no self-destruct device, it was all a bluff.

So the ship returns the animals and all is right. Jaco also shows up to arrest the poachers. Finally Seventeen decides to join the team. 

How do writers get work if this is the best they can do? Even if its filler we deserve better than this over before it began scenario. The only funny part was King Kai.

Next episode is a Gohan/Piccolo training episode so I am once again optimistic. 

-Gedaemon

Review of Dragon Ball Super Ep. 86

The search for Seventeen continues as Dende moves the look out to the island Seventeen is staying at. Dende says he has a family now and is nothing like he used to be. He also says Seventeen is much stronger than he used to be. Dende also brings up the reincarnation of Majin Bu, who is apparently a young prodigy. Dende asks Goku to train him when he is old enough.

Arriving at the island, Goku encounters Seventeen fighting a large group of armed men. Apparently poachers in Dragon ball are armed to the teeth. After Seventeen effortlessly beats them Goku introduces himself. After helping Seventeen take out several more poachers and more talking Goku challenges Seventeen to a match to test his strength. In the ensuing fight Goku is forced to go Super Sayian Blue. Seventeen even blocks a Kamehameha 

Seventeen calls a stop to the fight to protect the island.  But both are suitably impressed by each other. After a long talk, Goku finally gets to the point. But after hearing about the tournament, and Goku’s fib about the ten million Zeni, Seventeen still refuses to join. He is the only one protecting the island from poachers. Goku finally spills the beans, but even this doesn’t sway Seventeen. Suddenly, aliens show up to raid the island. 

Ok I can only see this alien stuff as someone writing themselves into a corner. Just let Seventeen join up. Everyone with a wife and three kids cares if they get erased.

 This episode was ok. The fight was interesting but suffered from some bad animation in places. Seventeen is an interesting character, though his decision not to join Goku at the end makes no sense given what he said the rest of the episode. 

Unfortunately the next episode looks like pure filler. I wish they would just focus on getting ready for the tournament. 

-Gedaemon

Zelda Oracle: Two High Points

The Zelda Oracle series are two titles most of us remember playing, but many of us have not touched them since childhood. They have been almost universally praised,  and deservedly so. I have to say they are way, way better than I remember.

I have an old GameCube with a Nintendo Advanced attachment, so I plugged in these games and played them that way so I wouldn’t have to strain my eyes looking at a small screen. Even though they were blown up way bigger than they were ever meant to be on a modern screen the games still looked pretty good. While the graphics lacked the “pop” of the sixteen bit Zelda games they were still relatively pleasant to look at. The boss designs were interesting, as were some of the NPC sprites.  The environments were also very well done, and I personally find them more impressive than a lot of what was in the original Zelda and Link to the Past—to which these two games owe quite a bit in terms of concepts and design. 

The design of these games was really well done, with interrelated stories and characters and solid game play. The Nintendo color was only an 8-bit system, but Nintendo managed to draw on some of the best developments of earlier Zelda games. Compared to LTTP there was an actual narrative and a story worth following, and the side characters were somewhat interesting. The most interesting feature of the games however was the password system that let you move data from one game to another; continuing the story and unlocking special items and secrets. While the password system as not aged well, it makes the overall gameplay far more interesting. I especially enjoyed the 2-D Mario like environments inserted into parts of the game. The one design element worth complaining about is the controls. In many Zelda game the sword is permanently assigned to one button and you can assign a weapon of choice to another button. The shield is not assigned to any button. It is an accessory which just deflects things coming at you from a certain angle. In these games both of the two buttons can be assigned a weapon. The problem with this is there is no way to quickly cycle through the weapons other than pausing, and while putting the shield on a button makes it more usable, you usually need the button for something else.  It took me quite a while to adjust to this control scheme and I never liked interrupting gameplay to quickly switch weapons, something that I found necessary against the final bosses. 

The story linking the two games is a bit simplistic. The Triforce drops you into a land you and have to save the local holy maiden from some evil force. In the end its revealed that the evil forces are part of a plot to revive Ganon. I’ve heard they meant to make a third game but had to settle for two. As a result there seems to be a slight plot hole at the end covered up by some sloppy writing. However I find the story elements make the games much more interesting on the whole. It’s clear that in the near decade between the Oracle series and LTTP Nintendo learned a good deal about story telling. While the story is not nearly as polished as in latter handhelds like Link Between Worlds or even Spirit Tracks, It is a marked improvement over many early entries in the franchise. 

Comparing the two games, I always felt that Oracle of Ages was a better game than Seasons as a kid.  I still feel that the story of Ages is better, but overall I think Seasons as a slight edge.  The bosses and dungeons are more difficult. But Ages has a slightly more enjoyable map, whereas the map in Seasons gets very annoying with the four different seasons giving only slight changes totally necessary to navigate from place to place. The secrets that could be accessed in the play through of the second game make it far easier but also add an element of fun. I especially enjoyed Biggoron’s sword which made several of the boss fights much easier.

While I based this review on original copies of these games for the Game Boy Color I have heard they are available for the 3DS via virtual console. I am happy to hear this because these games are certainly worth playing and among the best of the 2D Zelda games.  

9.2 out of 10

-Gedaemon

Review of Dragon Ball Super Ep.85

The Gods are plotting, or at least they are trying to but they can’t agree on anything.  Meanwhile Buu and Mr. Satan have been training. Buu has trained so much he looks like thin Buu from the Buu saga! And Goku just has to stop what he is doing to spar with him. Its not like he has anything important to right? Buu wins too, knocking Goku back down to the ground, thus out of bounds. 

After Buu’s fight we go to universe eleven where Toppo is eating at a high class restaurant and thinking about his fight with Goku. A friend tells he that his face is too scary for a hero. It seems the fate of his universe is weighing heavily on him. 

The Gods of Destruction also meet. They also have a grudge against Goku but Vados suggests that if Goku didn’t suggest the tournament Zen-oh would have destroyed them all anyway. They don’t like hearing this and they don’t like Goku’s friendship with Zen-oh. 

Going back to the Pride Troopers of Universe 11, they are fighting a giant monster. WE meet Dyspo, who looks like Beerus with long ears, and a cyborg named Kahseral. After the fight they discuss the tournament of power.

Going back to Earth, Picolo declares he will retrain Gohan, and Dende points Goku to Seventeen’s location. 

If all that sounds like a lot of nothing and teasers that’s how I felt too. At least half this episode felt irrelevant to me. Yeah its good to get a quick peak at the other universes, especially the Pride Patrol, but there was a lot of unnecessary exposition when we could have focused on fan favorites like Piccolo, Gohan and now Seventeen.  

Next episode looks fun though. I’ll be waiting for it. 

-Gedaemon

Rick is Back Baby!: Rick and Morty Season 3 Premiere Review

Rick is back baby! And its as absurd as ever. After two highly praised seasons Rick and Morty have been on hiatus for over a year. The last episode of season two left us with a cliffhanger. Rick was in jail and Earth had joined the byzantine Galactic Federation.

 As the Galactic Federation tries to hack Rick’s brain the federation has turned Earth into a giant nanny state which pays people in pills.  Desperate to escape this parody of government gone amuck, Summer exhumes the Grave of this dimensions Rick and gets a copy of his teleportation gun.

Morty and Summer wide up in the dimension he and Morty abandoned, where their family destroys the portal gun and starts after Summer who “Smells of Rick” She is saved however by Rick’s from the council of Rick’s who can’t allow Rick technology to fall into the wrong hands. 

Meanwhile we see the origins of Rick’s portal gun, but of course it’s a trap and Rick uploads into the body of the agent trying to break him. At this moment Seal Team Rick breaks in to assassinate him. Rick steals one of their bodies and kills them. Back at the Council Rick steals the body of another, higher ranking Rick to rescue his grand kids, who are currently on trial. Rick teleports the entire Citadel or Rick back into the prison and huge fight breaks out.  Rick kills the council of Rick’s. 

Rick, Morty and Summer proceed to the center of the prison.  Rick uses the alien computers to undermine their fiat currency which sends the government into anarchy.  Rick and the kids return to Earth where Jerry gives Beth an ultimatum, him or Rick. She divorces him.  

This episode was brilliant on so many levels. From the absurdity of Rick to the over the top parody of bureaucracy that is the Galactic Federation. The episode managed to tie up most of the loose ends from the last season. It was an absurd roller-coaster ride, which ended with Rick giving a crazy hard to follow rant; a call back to the first episode. 

The Social commentary was subtle and ripe. The Galactic federation could be seen as the authoritarian conclusion of several trends in today’s western democracies towards centralization and “protecting” citizens from themselves. That the leaders of the federation are giant insects plays into this. The nanny state metaphor is hammered home by The families new robot butler who forces them to take their pills and watches them for the state. It’s fitting that the only character who seems happy in this system is Jerry, whose many, many faults are treated as virtues by the new system. He takes pride performing a job with no real meaning as long as he is rewarded and exulted for it.  I hope that Jerry still makes appearances after the divorce because he is one of my favorite characters.

Rick and Morty teaches us that existence is huge and our lives are insignificant, so life is all about what you make of it, and that life is made better with more Rick and Morty. 

-Gedaemon