Th3P-Law

Pain, Pleasure, Pointless. Any activity that i do in the SAF can be associated with at least one of these 3 Ps. Duty on a Saturday? Painful. Day off? A pleasure. Digging up my No.4, SBO and forced to go on a midnight route march? Painfully pointless. Usually i get some satisfaction out of completing a march, but asking me to go on one without carrying anything while everyone else has a MOP or field pack on just hurts my pride. To see Joseph and Jordan carry a field pack full of water bottles hurt me more than the post-march blisters on my heels.

Had a nice nap when i got home in the afternoon and watched finished H2. Maybe Ee Wei is right in saying i'm a sucker for 'friendship' drama because i really like this series. Especially when the (girl)friends look so hot. And i'll say it again: i really like the ending sequence and song by "Over" by K. Gonna start on Kurosagi tonight, another Ichikawa Yui drama.

Care to guess who Hiro ends up with in the end?

I'm very happy to discover that there's at least one more game i'm looking forward to on PS2: Sengoku Basara 2: Heroes, which is my favourite hack n slash title on any console. The HnS is so good that i don't mind not understanding a single word of the story (it's only in Japanese). Capcom is probably the publisher that i trust the most when it comes to quality game releases. Big news to me is that Kojuurou (Toshiyuki Morikawa, VA for Sephiroth, Kazuya Mishima) and Oichi (Noto Mamiko, VA for Yakumo (SR), Enma Ai) will be playable! PS2 is not dead yet!

This is how a special move should look like..Dynasty Warriors, eat your heart out!

3 games announced for PS3 looks really interesting to me, Brave Arms, Chain Limit and Second Season 01. Nice to see some original games and hope the reviews are good so i can justify getting a PS3. I will always be a Sony fan at heart but of course now my brain(and wallet) is on the X360 side.

Heard of Low Ji Wen? He's the Singapore National Cyclist who's going to France soon to begin professional training. (appeared in Strait Times a about a week ago). Well anyway after reading the article Brandon couldn't believe that anyone his age could be as strong as him in cycling (not exactly what he said but i just summarised what he actually intends to say) so somehow he got his email address and invited him to go for a ride with him this evening. I can tell from his expression when he came back that it was 'no kick' (summary). Me and my brother (and father) are pretty prideful when it comes to things we feel we are good at. And cycling is pretty much in my family's blood. (my elder brother happens to be a former national cyclist as well). I think Brandon intends to go overseas (France) to train as well. Well good luck to him.

A case of 'Glassy' Elbow

Started watching H2 last night at about 2am and couldn't stop till episode 4 (about 4+am already then). A interesting drama has to have either 1) good story, so-so cast or 2) so-so story, good cast. H2 falls under the latter description. Story revolves around baseball but it's mainly about friendship, love and rivalries, pretty average story, nothing to get emo about. But i really like the cast: they've got Takayuki Yamada who can pretty much carry any drama on his own(Taiyou no Uta, Sekai no Chuushin de, Ai wo Sakebu), Ichikawa Yui (Forbidden Siren, Nana 2) and the adorable Ishihara Satomi (Nurse Aoi).

Satomi plays Haruka, the klutzy manager of Senkawa baseball club who loves baseball and falls in love with ace pitcher Hiro (Yamada), who's in love with childhood friend Hikari (Yui), who's the girlfriend of Hideo (Tanaka Koutaro) who just happens to be Hiro's best friend and baseball rival. Yup, it's a typical love quadrangle. Bottom line of the show is...Ishihara Satomi is extremely cute in her role, the same type of cute innocence as Hachi (Miyazaki Aoi) in Nana and steals the main female role from Yui without much effort. As for Yui, well... i regard her as the actress with a 1001 faces, cause she looks different from every camera angle. But one thing's for certain, she's got really pointy elvish ears ! (see 3rd pic below) Thought she could cover them with her hair but they just poke right through it.

If you're wondering why this baseball show is called H2, i'm guessing it has something to with how all the main character's name all start with 'H', Hiro, Haruka, Hikari and Hideo. Ending theme song ("Over" by K) and video is very nicely shot as well.

"Cheese!" Haruka (Satomi) and Hiro (Yamada)

That guilt-ridden face says it all.

I'm flattered by your compliment!

The most interesting news i found today was that Erika Toda will star in the manga to drama adaptation of 'Liar Game', which i personally haven't read but i've heard some comparisons of it to Death Note (battle of wits). I always like to enjoy manga to anime/drama adaptations (because i like to compare differences) but having Erika Toda play the lead character is a super bonus! To be aired in Japan starting April 14th! Now the only problem is should i read the manga before or after catching the drama..

And speaking of Erika Toda, found another short 1 episode drama starring her, Tsubasa no Oreta Tenshitachi. I have the entire 8-episode series (it's a series of 1 ep short story about girls in the city) and so far i've only watched the Aya Ueto episode. Not bad. There's Ishihara Satomi (H2) and Horikita Maki (Nobuta) in 2 of the other episodes as well. Anyway i just scanned through the episode and Erika looks fantastic with glasses!

Actually she would look good with anything on. (Erika from Season 2 ep 2)

Somehow i don't think she's receiving good news. (Satomi from Season 2 ep 1)

Slacking on the job. (Aya from Season 1 ep 1)

STUPID SINGNET!

Finally got around to hard-subbing Gal Circle. Did it once previously but i didn't like the Divx quality of the re-encode (used VirtualDub with filters). So after testing many different codecs i decided upon Xvid because of its video file size-to-image quality ratio. Think i'll rewatch Gal Circle again cause it's in English this time round.



No prizes for guessing why i'm watching it again.

Saw 3 movies the past few days, first would be 'Letters From Iwo Jima', or as Sau Kit calls it, 'Letters from 1WO Jima'. When i told Peng Xiang that we were going to watch '1WO Jima' i thought he would know that i was mocking Sau Kit but turns out he is another bodoh. He went to the ticket counter at EW West Mall and asked for tickets to 'that 1WO show'. I had to step in quickly and correct him. That auntie behind the counter tried to act smart by telling me it is pronounced EYE-woh instead of EE-woh but i'm 100% sure my pronouciation is correct. Movie was slow paced but i liked it (i'm sure MW will hate it). It's a complimentary film (from the Japanese perspective) to 'Flags of our Fathers' which i haven't seen, both films were directed by Clint Eastwood. Rating: 9/10

Ken Watanabe (Right w/binoculars) as General Kuribayashi

2nd show i watched was 'About Love' which is basically 3 short stories about love (duh!) short by 3 different directors in 3 different locations (Tokyo, Taipei and Shanghai) that has to do with breaking cultural and langauge differences. All 3 pairings are played by a Japanese and a Chinese actor/actress. And suprise suprise! Ichikawa Yui pops up as a minor character in the first story! Didn't expect to see her in this movie. Besides her the only other people i recognise were Misaki Ito (Densha Otoko, YUA, Ju-On etc) and Takashi Tsukamoto (Battle Royale, Midnight Sun). But i thought that Chen Bolin was pretty good-looking, and he rides a bicycle as well! Gonna get a jacket/long pants combo like him to cycle around Japan. Movie was light-hearted, nothing mushy or to cry about but i enjoyed it. Rating: 7/10

Story 1: Tokyo

Story 2: Taipei (suckiest of the 3)

Story 3: Shanghai

Last movie was "Midnight Sun" which is basically the movie version of Taiyou no Uta (see post below). Even the characters names are exactly the same in both versions. The story however has quite a few changes (Koji can't play the guitar, for example) but all in all i was pretty disappointed with this version. I preferred Erika Sawajiri over Yui as Kaoru Amane. Erika's insert songs ('Stay With Me' and 'Taiyou no Uta') i found to be more catchy then Yui's ('It's Happy Line', 'Good-bye Days' and 'Skyline'). It uses less Engrish as well. The story is far too simplistic as well and even though it's a 2 hour movie alot of the screen time is wasted on awkward silences and unneccesary camera panning. It fails to have the same impact on me as the drama. Would i be feeling the same if i had watched the movie and then the series? I honestly don't know. I loved 'Be With You' the movie but i'm a bit apprehensive about picking up the same drama series with different actors. It doesn't help that Takeuchi Yuko is one of my favourite actresses as well. Anyway i would highly recommend the drama for Taiyou no Uta over the movie but if you do want to catch both, then watch the movie first so you won't be so disappointed. Rating: 6/10

And i want to add that this is probably the most annoying post i have ever had to write because i kept getting D/C while i was searching for URLs and uploading pics. Singnet is fast when everything's normal but more often than not there's alot of problems with the connection. I want to say that the grass is greener on the other side (Starhub) but i bet many cable users have their own complains as well.

Crying in The Rain

Watched finished "Be With You" yesterday morning at 3AM. Very beautiful heartwarming show. I cried alot during the last few scenes till my nose got blocked again (still not 100% recovery from the flu). The pacing of the movie (1HR58MINS long) is steadily slow but i think it's appropriate for a drama. But if it were that similiar pace for an Action movie then i would just fall asleep. The ending song is "Hana" by Orange Range(whose only other song i know is "Asterisk" from "Bleach"). Maybe it was the momentum of the movie but i also shed a few tears when i read the lyrics (translated of course) of the song during the ending credits. It really captures the feelings of the movie's main characters. I went to find the song immediately after the show ended and it's been been repeating on my PSP ever since.


Hana Single Cover - Orange Range. Nice orange peels petal.

Also went to learn more Jay Chou songs by finding 2 of his albums Still Fantasy and November's Chopin. I dislike all his R&B songs in which he raps, he has a lazy way of slurring his words that just irritates me. His ballads however are very catchy and the lyrics are pretty good as well, but i'm probably a poor judge cause i hear only a little Mandarin songs.

I was looking for this movie "Sky High (2003)" but this morning when i checked my download it was actually this "Sky High (2005)". I'm trying to find "Sky High (2003)" because i like the director Ryuhei Kitamura. He directed "Azumi" (not "Azumi 2" which sucked) starring Aya Ueto and also "Versus" which i am trying to find so i can bring to office to screen during VA. He was also involved in directing the cutscenes of the remake "Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes" for the Gamecube. To me his trademark is making low budget action flicks look good and gory. Too bad i don't see many of his DVDs for sale in Singapore. I wouldn't mind collecting his shows. For the time being i don't know what to do with "Sky High (2005)" that's on my HDD. Should i take a risk and waste one and half hour of my life to watch an American High School Comedy or just delete it? Hmm...