Invincible - Season 1 (2021)

Invincible is an eight episode animated superhero show that premiered on Amazon Prime Video. It is based on a comic series of the same name. While it’s an animated show, don’t be fooled into thinking it’s just a kid’s show. While the first episode reinforces that fact, just wait until the end and that’s when it shows its true self. You’ll be left reeling at what just happened, wondering about the sudden turn of events and whether the reveal will be satisfactory or if it is just a cheap plot device.

The show is set in a world where aliens exist, as well as people with superpowers. Where there are superheroes, there are also supervillains. These people are on a completely different levels, since normal everyday folk, whether it’s the police or the army or any other conventional taskforce, their weaponry is no match. These superpowered people just shrug off bullets like mosquito bites. The world is currently protected by a band known as Guardians of the Globe. The Guardians work brilliantly as a team, and the first episode showcases that.

There is a particular focus on Omni-Man, this is because we’re soon introduced to Mark Grayson, his son. Mark, who is soon to be in college, hasn’t awakened to his powers yet but is waiting (and losing hope). Nevertheless, he eventually gains the same powers as his father: superstrength, flying and invulnerability, hence his superhero name, Invincible. He dives into the world that his father works in, and it’s tough. Mark learns from his father that no one pulls their punches, and you have to be ready for anything and everything.

It seems the world is populated with superheroes and there are no shortages of superhero teams. It’s like an everyday occurrence but at the same time, it feels as if the population of this world can easily die as collateral during a supervillain strike or an alien invasion. While the powers of several superheroes are nothing new (like super speed, or strength or fire), there are some concepts that’s very interesting, such as the alien aspect or difference dimensions.

The animation is on par with what you’d expect. There are some fluid action scenes which looks great and choregraphed nicely. While there are also certain scenes where the character models are slightly out of proportion and looks weird. Nevertheless, the show is bright and colorful, in contrast to its subject matter at times. It’s not afraid to show blood and internal body parts, in fact, it seems to show them even when it wasn’t completely necessary.

The show loves to put stingers at the end of each episode, so you come to expect it. Even with that expectation, usually it shocks or surprises you, changing how you perceive the plot at that point in time. While most of the show focuses on Mark and how he makes his way in the superhero business, we see it revolve around his father Omni-Man a lot as well, and perhaps he is actually more important and having the more interesting plot arc. Unfortunately, despite the overarching plot arcs, the show can still feel very episodic. You might think that lingering scene or reveal at the end of the episode will have future repercussions, but it then proceeds to never mention it again.

The pacing of the show can be a bit rough. You’ll trudge through a slow boring stretch where the writing is about on par with kids’ cartoons. Then it throws in this crazy twist or revelation that really elevates the mood and shows great potential. The uneven pacing keeps you alternating between thinking it’s a fantastic show and one where it’s flat. The most interesting parts are where the story developments teases concepts such as aliens, other dimensions and supernatural events.

Mark has to contend with juggling around and putting priorities over his superhero life and his personal life. He learns the hard way the struggles behind the glamor of superheroes. Since he’s still so young in age, and new to this superhero business, he can be naïve. It isn’t helped that his father is not the greatest teacher, and gives him tough love, preferring to watch Mark make mistakes rather than intervene. This ends up with Mark sustaining severe life-threatening injuries and other types of trauma as a result.

After chugging through the slower moments, the final two episodes of the season really ramps it up. This was the point where it finally gives us meaningful reveals to the actions of several characters, and things start clicking into place. The penultimate episode’s pacing was so good that you’d wish that the six episodes before it was the same. It had a great balance of story and action.

The revelation of the lingering question from the very first episode was revealed in full in the last episode. After all the teasing and build up, it was a tad bit disappointing at first. However, the way that the show handled the topic, and the effect it had on the characters, how they dealt with it, and the final showdown, turned that around. It had one of the more bloody scenes in the season, and it did that deliberately to show the horribleness that collateral damage from these superheroes could cause. It also made sense to show that while Mark is powerful, he is still young and inexperienced. The ending definitely left plenty more story for future seasons.

Overall, the first season of Invincible is strong. It starts off kind of lowering your guard before it throws something with huge impact. Then for most of the season, it yoyos between slow paced everyday life matters and the crazy stuff that you watch it for. This can lead to a very uneven show, although it culminates into an explosive final two episodes which wraps everything back together in an ultimately satisfying finale. You’ll be left with a strong eagerness for the next season.

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Blood & Truth (PS4 / PSVR)

Blood & Truth is a VR game that is exclusively for PSVR on the PS4. It is one of those rare AAA VR titles and is an expansion of the London Heist level from PlayStation VR Worlds, one of the highlights of the game. It’s a new standalone story though that can be enjoyed by anyone. The game is deliberately filled with over the top gangster moments and this is what makes it so fun.

The game at its core is a first person shooter with on-rail elements. There is no free travel as it utilizes predetermined points that you can move towards. Look at the target, press a button and you character will walk or crawl or jump there. If even this causes you nausea and discomfort, then there are several settings to make it better. The game has a dedicated Comfort setting that will try and minimize motion sickness. As a result, when moving, it will darken the edges. This won’t fully mitigate it, unfortunately there’s no teleport travel either so you will just have to put up with the walking (or close your eyes).

If you are using the Move controllers, then the control scheme is really simple. Each controller represents each hand. This means you can hold the gun and shoot from either hand, while the remaining hand is used to pull the ammo from the pouch on your chest and into the gun to reload it. The gun can be placed in a holster at your waist or if it is one of the larger guns, on your back. This is intuitive and works well, although the reloading is finnicky during the more intense moments.

The aiming is intuitive and works well. The story features three difficulty settings. Normal and Hard are self-explanatory, while Cinematics will give you infinite health and unlimited ammo, significantly making the game easier. This mode is perfect for players who are not too good with first-person shooters or aren’t perfectly accustomed to VR. The aiming with the Move controllers is intuitive and works really well. Playing in Cinematics mode will provide a laser sight so you can easily see where you are aiming at, while the harder difficulties will have the laser sight as a late unlockable.

There are plenty of on-rail sections where the character will automatically move and you need to shoot. These are short enough that if you are prone to motion sickness, you can stomach through and then rest afterwards. These are also some of the best sections of the game since that’s where a lot of the action takes place, including when you’re inside a vehicle. It’s quite a rush when you’re running through a building, desperately shooting down the bad guys that just keeps on coming. The normal shooting sections where you physically duck behind cover is fun as well, although you’re fixed in place a lot of the times even with the options to strafe and jump to another cover from time to time. When things get too difficult, there an ability you can use to slow down time so you can easily pick off the enemies.

The level designs aren’t anything to write home about. The good thing is that the game provides enough variety through its story in where it takes place so the environments don’t get boring. As expected though, each level progresses in a linear way. There may be alternate paths but the destination will always be the same. That’s not a bad thing as you can enjoy the game for what it is as a result.

There are a variety of weapons to use and it even includes dual-wielding weapons which is awesome. However, when dual-wielding, reloading isn’t as easy since it feels more awkward. The control scheme further simulates reality such as holding a weapon with both hands to steady your aim. The other thing the game does well are the interaction gimmicks. You will climb by moving your hands to grab the next bar and physically pull your self up. This makes those usually bland sequences feel novel and engaging. Although as per usual, this can induce nausea if you’re not good with VR movement.

The story ultimately feels flat. It is initially told in a flashback where we learn the character, Ryan Marks, was in the army who returns to London due to his father passing away. However, his family is pretty big in the underworld and another gang is hoping to “merge” with his and effectively take over. There are surprisingly a lot of cutscenes but since it is VR, they are done with you as a part of it so it’s not very cinematic when you’re just sitting there listening to dialogue.

The story is like an action movie with many set-pieces and tropes of the genre. You’ll have car chases, massive shoot-outs, reconnaissance, sneaking around and interrogation scenes. Yet for all those sections, there are surprisingly a lot of moments where there’s not much happening. You’ll spend a lot of time standing around or moving around looking at stuff, which makes the pacing slow down to a crawl. Once the novelty of VR wears off, these sections are extremely bland and boring.

The game has a strong ending sequence where the levels are an enjoyable rush to the finish. They are some of the very best and most action packed in the game. This builds up your excitement until you’ve finally reached the person whom you had been chasing all this time… only for it to be a bit of an underwhelming confrontation. There was also a character that was introduced who seemed important but ended up being more of a sequel hook instead as they did not appear in the game too often.

All in all, the story takes around six to eight hours to complete. Of course, this depends on whether you like to play around, slowly taking in the sights. While it may have been called short, it’s actually a pretty good length for a VR game and it is just the right sort of length as it doesn’t outstay its welcome and isn’t so short that it feels like a tech demo. There are a few things to extend the game such as collectibles that will unlock customization options for your weapons.

A series of patches also introduced several minigames and different modes. These include expected stuff like shooting levels within a time limit to gain a high score. However, there are some inventive modes like a rhythm game (which is more difficult than it would initially seem) and puzzles.

In terms of graphics, they’re okay. It’s hard to make a VR game with amazing graphics given the low res of the PSVR but it is pretty good for what it is. As per usual, close up models look great while the backgrounds are blurry. In the slowly scenes, you will notice how flat the backgrounds are, while in the faster paced ones, since you’re focused more on the shooting, it’s not a bad. Although it is funny sometimes to have enemies that are a bit further away with just a head with no facial features.

Overall, Blood & Truth is a stellar VR game. The emphasis on that is the VR as you cannot ignore that it is only because it is a fully fledged VR game that you can overlook that its mechanics are very standard and generic. The story is decent and although it’s not the best writing out there, it is enough for you to grin at several moments, being the star of your own action movie. This is one of the best PSVR games available on the system and one that highlights and showcases the potential of VR.

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Monthly Girls’ Nozaki-kun (2014)

Monthly Girls’ Nozaki-kun is a twelve episode anime based upon the four-panel comedy manga. It is set in high school, following Sakura Chiyo, who had (supposedly) mustered up the courage to reveal her feelings to her crush, Nozaki Umetarou. However, Nozaki is an extremely stoic and clueless guy, so he misinterprets her confession. Yet this is how Sakura learns that Nozaki is actually a successful manga author, the one behind the currently popular shojo romance manga. Sakura is then unwittingly recruited by Nozaki to be his assistant, helping out with the monthly manga chapters.

Sakura is constantly surprised at how Nozaki gets his inspirations for his manga developments. He trusts her enough to run through several ideas and they will be things that make you wonder how he managed to be so spot on with his manga when he is so dense and oblivious himself. His manga is lauded at being exactly what a teenage girl in romance would like and act, yet he has no romantic experience himself. As a result, Sakura will constantly have a deadbeat look, and it’s also where a lot of the humor comes from.

The first half of the season introduces a new character in nearly every episode. Each of them has an over-the-top exaggerated personality, but only for the purposes of humor. We get a flamboyant guy who’s actually very shy, or a handsome girl that’s popular with the ladies. While they themselves may not be top tier comedy, it’s Sakura’s reactions to the situation that seals the deal and makes it so enjoyable and funny.

It’s no secret that Sakura has a crush on Nozaki but Nozaki is too thick to realize that. This leads to Sakura to over-think a lot of what Nozaki says, leading to several worst case scenarios only to find out that he meant something different. She tends to lean towards that Nozaki may be displaying the first signs of affections for her when he is basically just musing about future plot arcs for his manga, or other mundane things about his life. It’s cute in a way, especially considering that there is something ironic with Sakura fawning over Nozaki, who is supposed to know a girl’s heart given his success as a shojo manga author.

Despite it not being an anime focused on the manga creation aspect, there are some episodes where we learn the mechanics behind it. We see the tools of the trade, such as how the shading and patterns are done, what the assistants help with such as the erasing, and of course, the tight deadlines. It’s an insight, especially for those who had not really thought about it before and it makes sense that not everything is hand drawn from scratch.

It can be a bit meta on how the anime parodies on manga creation and tropes. It likes to put the characters into typical situations you’ll find in romance manga, before having the characters muse on how reality is so much different to what would typically happen in a manga. It’s like it tries to deconstruct… without really deconstructing it. This is not bad, since it leads to some funny scenes, it’s just an interesting take that feels unique as it manages to just shy away from being too serious about it.

Despite the main character being Sakura, the plot has a lot of focus on Nozaki, and then on the supporting characters too. Each supporting character has their own romantic interest, even though the characters themselves may not consider it to be the case. It’s quite funny to see how they interact when it is obvious to an outsider, who can see things as a whole, that they are a pairing while they themselves don’t realize it. Plenty of scenes also rely on others misunderstanding the current situation since they’re viewing it out of context.

The anime was released in physical format in six volumes and each volume had a three to four minute short. They’re designed to be watched straight after another as they cover the same topic and stitched together, they’re at around twenty minutes long. It’s a fun “episode”, giving us more of things that worked. Plus, we get to see more of Nozaki converting his everyday experiences (natural or manufactured) into material for his shojo manga.

Overall, Monthly girls’ Nozaki-kun is a carefree anime that has a penchant for hitting you hard with good humor when you don’t expect it. It has a fun cast of characters, although it leans a bit heavy on tropes for the genre. Nevertheless, the surprising focus on the manga aspect and supporting characters is a highlight, with the anime ending on a fairly sweet note, even though the main pairing doesn’t get to move forward as much as they would want.

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Toy Review: Transformers Vintage Beast Wars Cheetor (Deluxe)

Review:  #714

Name:  Cheetor

Brand:  Transformers

Allegiance:  Maximal

Line:  Vintage Beast Wars

Year of Release:  2021

Size Class:  Deluxe

Mold Status:  repaint / reissue of original Beast Wars Cheetor

PACKAGING:

As part of the Vintage line (celebrating the 25th anniversary of Beast Wars), the packaging aims to replicate the original packaging of the Beast Wars toys when they were first released.

As a result, Cheetor comes in a fairly big blister bubble.  Also harking back to simpler times, the instructions are on the back of the packaging and is only eight steps.

BEAST MODE:

Cheetor, as the name suggests, transforms into an organic cheetah.

This is a pretty decent beast mode all around, except from the back where the blue from robot mode is visible.  This is the only robotic kibble that you can see in beast mode though.

Despite a Cheetah being sleek and powerful, Cheetor is kind of the opposite, taking on a stockier stature.

Above is a comparison against TLK Bumblebee for a size comparison, as well as Kingdom Cheetor, just to see how much toy technology has evolved and improved over 25 years.

Despite the beast mode being a statue as there is no meaningful poseability whatsoever, this is still a fairly good looking beast mode.

TRANSFORMATION:

Getting Cheetor to robot mode is quite simple.  The rear legs straighten to form the robot legs, you just need to flip out the feet.  Rotate the waist around, and then fold the front legs up.  The robot arms can then fold out from inside the body.  To finish it off, fold the cheetah head down.

ROBOT MODE:

At first glance, and in all stock photos, Cheetor looks pretty good in robot mode.  He has a blocky aesthetic to him, reminiscent of G1.

He carries some kibble on his back, mainly the front legs of the cheetah.  They're quite big but they're hollow so it isn't too bad in the end.

The cheetah head as his head is the biggest flaw.  There's a huge gap between the head and the cheetah head, and it looks horrible.  There's no way to reduce that gap at all, which is really disappointing.

The head sculpt is good, it's different from the show as it is less beastly and more like a robot.

The first wave of Beast Wars toys all had a "mutant head" gimmick, an alternate head so to speak.  For Cheetor, you just need to flip the head 180 degrees to get the other one.

A quick size comparison shows he is roughly the height of a normal Deluxe, but he does feel bulkier and sturdier, as he has less reliance on hollow parts for cost-cutting purposes.

And now a comparison with his Kingdom version, once again showing how far toy design has improved.

Articulation is pretty good, he has joints for his head, shoulders, elbows, waist, hips and knees.

With the cheetah feet acting as heel spurs, Cheetor is extremely well balanced and easy to pose.

He comes with two weapons, both are guns.  One is made from his tail and backside, while the other was stored underneath the beast mode (his "guts").

He can hold both in either hand, although the guns are a tad bit oversized and awkward for him to wield.

It would have been cool if the guns could have a missile launcher built in, but unfortunately that is not the case.

The other gun, the one formed from his "guts", have a gimmick where if you press down on it, it will blow the air out.

Apart from the half formed chest, this is a good robot mode.

OVERALL:

For a toy designed over 25 years ago, Cheetor holds up surprisingly well.  Yes, there are some flaws, ignoring the blocky aesthetics, the main one is his chest, which is just terrible design even in 1996, and could have been easily fixed.  Is he worth it nowadays with better updates?  Unless you are curious about older toys, or have nostalgia, then it is better to grab the Kingdom version.

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