Tag: anime

Biblical Masculinity Hack: Don’t Play Video Games

Bernadine generally posts lots of pick me nonsense, because 90% of the time there’s nay a Scripture in sight backing a single thing she says rendering it nonsense.

By pick-me, I don’t mean women who want to be loved. Many of these SAHwifey influencers claim those criticizing pick-mes are criticizing women who want to generally be in a relationship, or get married, both of which no one is criticizing. Like 95% of humans wants to be in a relationship. A pick-me is a woman who vies for male attention/general praise by putting others (usually women) down in order to do achieve that. It’s not that these pick-mes want a relationship, but their means of gaining one involves being generally shady towards and criticizing women who don’t behave the way they do, or like the things they like.

Anyway apparently peak Biblical masculinity = not liking anime and video games. I suppose she prefers men partake in activities like watching football and posting constantly on social media about Harry Styles outfits? Ya know, all the extremely masculine activities Jesus and His twelve disciples participated in when they weren’t busy being stoned, whipped, and imprisoned.

Everything else aside, this post insinuates feminine, Christian women couldn’t possibly like video games or anime themselves which as a gamer who loves anime an cottage core that is actually what I find deeply offensive. Last year I played Spiderman, Horizon Forbidden West, and Jedi: Fallen Order. I re-watched HunterxHunter, and watched Chainsaw Man and Attack On Titan. I enjoy anime and video games, and most importantly I love Jesus. Many of my friends enjoy anime and/or video games and go to church every week, pray, read their Bibles, fast, and sing on their worship teams. And on Wednesdays we wear pink.

Now, I’m not saying Christians should go out and watch, or play, any old thing (I wouldn’t rec. Chainsaw Man tbh lol). However, there’s no difference between spending an hour playing video games each day vs. spending an hour on social media, or watching TV. Gaming is a hobby. Biblically, “everything is permissible but not everything is beneficial,” which is the attitude Christians should adopt when considering what activities to participate in, or not (barring anything that’s explicitly forbidden in the Bible).

I’ve come to accept social media is all about clickbait and whatnot to get people’s attention and Bernadine does go into a bit further detail on what she means and it’s like 10% deeper than this screenshot. That said, I don’t like seeing “Christians” post low-effort content that lacks any Scripture anywhere. Ya know, the part that makes it Christian and not just an opinion.

As Christians, our opinions should be formed by the Bible, not tradition, not cultural concepts of femininity and masculinity, but by the Word of God. Many of these influencers like Bernadine have large Christian followings of young people, so spouting off inane takes like these are only going to result in a bunch of young Christian girls thinking their partners aren’t masculine enough because they play Mario Cart, which is stupid.

The question isn’t whether or not anime and video games are inherently unmasculine, it’s whether or not those things are hindering one’s walk with God, or not. If you find yourself constantly skipping out on social events, time with family, or time with God to play video games, then yeah you gotta a problem.

However, playing video games as time permits isn’t unmasculine and Biblically this falls under the “work out your own salvation with fear and trembling” umbrella.

Also gaming isn’t gendered. #bye

Rating The Female Characters in Alice in Borderland

The Netflix Show so S1 only. Haven’t read the manga and haven’t blogged in a hot minute… anyways.

All characters start with 10 points that get deducted for reasons based 100% on my personal, garbage opinions.

My criteria:

  • Their removal would affect the plot
  • They undergo some change/character development, good or bad
  • We see different sides of their personality
  • They have a plot of their own that doesn’t revolve entirely around a male character. OR
  • They are well-developed within the confines of the role they are written to play
  • They don’t toss away every traditionally feminine trait in an attempt to be a strong, independent womyn

*Major Spoilers Ahead*

Momoka

  • she’s the one with the long hair, on the left, in the background
  • WITCH
  • bffs with Asahi
  • a dealer

Momoka’s suicide over (I guess) feeling guilty at having caused the deaths of countless others by helping set up the games (or maybe she knew she was the witch and just offed herself??), inadvertently causes like 5487543094 more deaths when she triggers the 10 Hearts Witch Hunt Game at the Beach.

What an absolute queen of chaotic evil.

Momoka Rating: 7.5/10

Asahi

  • she’s the one with the short hair in the front
  • smartly recorded evidence though it was lowkey all for naught
  • game master
  • *red laser of death*
  • bffs with Momoka
  • also a dealer

Asahi wisely recorded evidence of the dealers secret headquarters, which later got moved and all the dealers were killed so… Anyway, to date I’m not sure if she was faking not knowing who the witch was, or if she was in on it with Momoka, or what was up with that situation. Either way, she’s dead having sacrificed herself as a distraction so plot amour could keep Arisu alive for another episode.

Asahi Rating: 7/10

Live Door

  • looks harmless but actually can lead to death
  • responsible for the first on-screen demise
  • general queen behavior

Live Door Rating: 10/10

Mira

  • Queen of Hearts
  • absolutely unhinged speech
  • black outfit is on point
  • actually the game master
  • great hair
  • one of the HBICs of the beach

It was obvious something was up with Mira because during the witch hunt all the other top executives were seen at the start except her.

As of S1, her reasoning for torturing people via games in a bizarre, alternative Tokyo is still unclear but my guess is she’s either actually unhinged, straight-up evil, or doing some weird analysis of human behavior, which I can respect. Real queens don’t care about death, especially when it’s not your own and it’s for science.

Long live the queen.

Mira Rating: 9.1/10

Dealer With the Collar

  • tag, you’re it
  • horse head
  • dies via neck explosion

Horse Head Lady aka Dealer with the Collar haunts Arisu long after she’s dead, and she also illuminates the fact that players are made to participate in the games in more ways than one.

Dealer With the Collar Rating: 10/10

Girl Who Dies In The Water

  • she’s the one in the flower shirt
  • DUMB

Girl Who’s Electrocuted To Death’s Rating: -01/10

Ann

  • sunglasses indoors
  • sunglasses indoors during a water game
  • one of the HBICs of the Beach
  • white queen
  • seemingly the only person actually trying to solve the witch hunt game
  • outfit on point
  • lipstick on point
  • extremely smart and level-headed
  • being a genius herself, she could obviously sense Arisu’s genius as well, hence testing him in the water game (while wearing sunglasses)

Ann was like the only person who seemed to actually be trying to figure out who the witch was and, thanks to her smarts and Arisu’s guessing skills, they were able to confirm it was indeed Momoka who killed herself, making her the witch.

Ann’s Rating: 9.5/10

Saori

  • great hair
  • hair, make-up, outfit, etc. is really on point for having been playing death games for like a week
  • she’s wearing heels!
  • slept her way to the top in the real world, only to end up in the back rooms borderlands
  • really wants to survive
  • wisely tries to pit Chota against his homeboys but fails

Let’s be honest, we all would’ve done what she did during the wolf game. Girly was ROBBED at her chance at life because of Arisu’s bozo friends. Her writing (which apparently differs from the manga) wasn’t that great either, especially that squicky scene with her and disabled, ill, virgin Chota who can barely walk. Like flip the genders and that wouldn’t have even made it to TV in woke Hollywood.

I would normally hate her for running away once she became the wolf, because it’s possible Arisu would’ve thought of a way to save them all, but we all know the plot wouldn’t have let that happen as it was obvious they were all gonna all die as soon as Chota got injured.

Saori’s Rating: 6.5/10

Kuina

  • beat up cringe sword master dude without a weapon and in a bikini whilst mercenaries are running around and the building is on fire
  • amazing hair
  • tragic backstory
  • was taking care of her sick mother before being phased into the borderlands
  • trash father
  • always with what’s-his-face-blonde-hair
  • represents the caterpillar
  • helps steal the playing cards from the safe

The writers really had me thinking that backstory with the martial arts was cringe sword dude. It was actually Kuina, who is a straight thug and learned how to deal a final blow from her garbage dad. Not sure why she’s hanging out with skeevy blonde dude who’s name I can’t remember but I’m gonna be mad if she’s dies in Season 2.

Kuina Rating: 9.5/10

Usagi

  • really good at climbing
  • only reason Arisu is alive x2
  • represents the white rabbit
  • excellent survival skills (can hunt, start a fire, set up a camp)
  • in incredible shape
  • tragic backstory: father committed suicide after being accused of lying about a hike

Usagi was the daughter of a famous mountain climber who often took her along, hence where she got her awesome, climbing abilities from.

Anyway, I will always love the fact that she not only bit Niragi’s tongue, but also ignored Arisu the first time she saw him wallowing on the ground and left him there to die until pity-saving him later. While I lowkey ship her with Arisu, I’m glad she wasn’t just sidelined as his love interest as soon as she was introduced.

Usagi Rating: 9.5/10

Girl Who Died During Doors Game

  • chose the obviously wrong door
  • dies just to show the main characters and audience that these games are dead serious. Literally

GWDDDG Rating: Karube, Chota & Saori’s Collars Exploding/10

Manga Analysis: Juujika no Rokonin is Trash

All opinions are mine and my opinions are trash, just like the plot of Juujuka no Rokonin.

Juujika No Rokonin is something I regret reading not for the usual moral reasons, but because it’s giving out-of-control train about to crash energy. Alas, like a dog returns to its vomit, so one idiot (aka me) continues reading the equivalent of vomit they’ve already become too invested in.

*Spoilers*

Summary: Trash

Juujika follows my homeboy Uruma on his quest to get vengeance against the bullies that made his life terrible and killed his parents. The plot is essentially Uruma violently murdering all the bullies until he gets to the final boss, Kyou Shigoku. It’s like Saw or Hostel except those being offed deserve what’s coming for them (I guess?) and it had a semi-interesting albeit typical premise. Anyway, the massive amounts of violence and unnecessary edginess is obviously why I was drawn to it (no cap, saw a random panel from the manga on Instagram and immediately started reading it), plus who doesn’t like a good revenge tale?

Anyway, child Uruma is tortured by Kyou and his goons. Since bullying someone to suicide isn’t enough, anti-Christ jr. one day Kyou decides to kamikaze one of his goons by tossing him in front of a car, causing Uruma’s parents and younger brother to get into a car accident and die. Except no, they don’t die. So Kyou lights the car on fire, which seals the deal and consequently torches the younger brother, Kakeru, putting him in an indefinite coma. Mind you, no one is arrested for this, nothing appears to be investigated, nothing happens in regards to what is incredibly extreme bullying either. But let’s be honest, no one is reading this because it’s super realistic and reflective of real life.

Flash forward, Uruma has gone Super Saiyan and is with the only well-written character in this manga, Gramps, who is a straight thug. The two of them decide to get revenge on the bullies and Uruma begins Act I: systematically kidnapping and killing all of his childhood bullies and erasing all the evidence of his crimes. We get a brief “they had me in the first half, ngl” moment with the first “victim” Madoka, who seems apologetic for his past treatment of Uruma only to be faking it. From there on, Uruma snatched Kyou’s goons and slowly tortures them to RIP with the help of Gramps. There are random side characters, but they’re mostly annoying and could be removed from the story without changing anything.

Garbage Plot, Garbage Characters

The plot was always lowkey trash, with poorly written (female) characters, but the first two villains (Madoka and Ushiro) briefly displayed some tepid shades of complexity, which made me think perhaps the next few bullies would be better fleshed out. At this point, I’m beating a dead horse because again I didn’t start reading it for the plot or for character development, but because I wanted to see Uruma kill the bullies. That said, it’s entirely possible to create edgelord trash that pushes boundaries and have well-written characters (like The Boys).

Alas! The remaining villains are variations of Ushiro with somehow less depth than him. The kicker though is once they all die, the plot repeats itself with older, adult goons who are part of the Cult of Kyou and are all willing to die for a child.

The introduction of these adult, cult goons preceded the deterioration of the plot into something boring, repetitive, and somehow even more poorly written than the earlier chapters. The manga should’ve ended long ago with Uruma taking down the last bully, and then Kyou. But even if the author didn’t want to do something so cliché, there are a myriad of ways they could’ve ended the story on a semi-fulfilling note. Instead, the reader is tossed several years into the future, after both Gramps and Kakeru were killed at the hands of Kyou, and Uruma seems to not even remember who he is.

On that note, the villains are all horribly written, but especially Kyou – why are all these people following him? That’s never elaborated upon or even shown beyond a few, sparse scenes here and there. Nothing about him is particularly charismatic or attractive, and Kyou even admits he’s evil for the sake of being evilz. Again it’s perfectly possible to write chaotic evil characters decently (see: the Joker, Ramsey, Johan Leibert, Mado, probably Misa), so it really seems like the author put forth no effort in developing any of the characters.

Juujika No Ronukin is ongoing and normally I’d wait until a manga ends to review it, but I stopped reading not long after that one manager creep was introduced as I can tell the story is going to devolve into a series of introducing random characters and killing them off until Uruma reboots or whatever, and remembers his true goal.

Juujuka No Ronukin Rating: Gramps Cutting His Own Leg Off/10