Columns – Geeking Out About.com

Trisha’s Take: Analysis of a rape allegation

Posted on 20 February 2015 by admin Leave a Comment

[Editor’s Note: Before I start, I’d like to preface this by saying that I was acquainted and friendly with both the accuser and the accused while I was first a guest relations, then publicity staffer at an East Coast anime convention from about 2004 to 2008. Until recently, I had not spoken or corresponded with either of them since I left New York City in 2012. Any and all opinions are my own unless otherwise stated, and all anonymous sources shall remain confidential.]

A question I never want to need to ask ever again. © Geeking Out About

If you’re into geek feminism and women’s issues, it’s been an interesting couple of years. Recently, we had the debacle at the TechCrunch awards ceremony, the Gamergate saga in the video game world, the first-person account of how to report sexual harassment at a science fiction convention, and the reveal that a prominent sci-fi/fantasy author participated in abusing her own child.

Each time I read another report, I thought to myself, “Well, that’s truly horrifying, but I don’t think things like that have happened in my anime fandom.”

That is, until now.

Two days ago, I woke up to see mentions of a Facebook post where someone whose name wasn’t immediately familiar to me accused someone else I knew of rape. The post from Amber Marie Frazier read in part:

I was raped last year at Anime Boston by Tom Wayland. I trusted him, as a friend, colleague, and a guest [whose] needs I was charged with taking care of. That is why you have not seen me around, and when you have I have been so different. That is why I am not doing anime shows or anything that involved crowds.

Frazier continued:

I wanted to tell all of you for two reasons. First, because you all know and love me, and you are not fools, and have noticed there is something wrong. I need your love and support if I am ever going to be anything like the woman you knew before. Secondly, so you can TELL EVERYONE. If you don’t tell everyone, he can do it again to someone else who trusts him. I have reason to believe that I am not the first, but I will be the last if I have anything to do about it.

According to Frazier, Anime Boston was made aware of her accusation and they’re not allowed to publicly comment. She also confirmed that they removed him from their list of invited guests. Interestingly, she also stated that she would share the information which she had told to Anime Boston and the police, but cautioned people against wanting to know that amount of detail. The last statement was the most interesting of all:

Don’t worry about slander or libel, I checked with my lawyer, and it is only that if it is not true.

My first reaction was, “Oh my God.”

My second reaction was, “Well… under certain circumstances, I think I can see how that could happen.”

Pages: 1 2 3

Trisha’s Take: How to get the most out of one day at a convention, part 2

Posted on 2 November 2010 by admin Leave a Comment

rsz_lxd — What does dance have to do with comic books? Plenty, says LXD creator Jon Chu

Picking up where I left off, I didn’t stay very long in the southern end of the Javitz Center because the one panel I’d RSVP’d for was in the northern end of the hall with the majority of the large publishers, game companies, and stores.

When I registered as a member of the Press, I had to supply my email address, presumably so that I could receive a confirmation that they received my information. What also happened is that as the convention grew new, my Inbox became flooded with press releases from those same publishers, game companies, stores, and individuals who wished to promote their panels and get members of the Press to write about their work.

I’m not sure if that’s how they operate over at Comic Con in San Diego, but I will say that it was a very smart thing for Reed to do because if it weren’t for that, I wouldn’t have known about the panel featuring Jon Chu from the LXD.

Yes, I’m talking about the dance group which blew everyone away with their exhibition dance during last year’s run of “So You Think You Can Dance,” were invited to do a TED talk/performance (after which Madd Chadd allegedly did the robot with Bill Gates), and brought interpretive dance back to the Academy Awards ceremony. I’d heard about their web series before but didn’t watch any of the episodes for one reason or another, so I thought that it would be great to see what it was all about. The panel didn’t disappoint, and I was even able to speak to creator Jon Chu about the comic book story elements in the web series and how they’d like to tell their story in other mediums.

Listen to the interview with Jon M. Chu (and I apologize for getting the seasons numbers wrong!)

Now, I’d had an expensive hot dog and a medium-sized lemonade before the panel started, which meant by the time the panel was over, I had to use the bathroom. One of the things I remember from my days as a Sequential Tart was often joking about the way one could tell that women had successfully infiltrated the “boys-only” club of comics conventions is that the line for the women’s room was longer than the men’s. Over the years, this “joke” has become a reality, and while I feel great about that in terms of achieving parity, my bladder was not feeling the same way when I encountered the line outside of Hall A.

Despite an amendment to the building code requiring more women’s stalls than men’s in New York City public buildings (PDF), I still feel that if I have to go, I have to go, especially since I’ve had kidney problems ever since I was born. Thus, it was with a little bit of bravado and a whole lot of chutzpah that I turned right around and walked over to the other side of the hall to get in line for the men’s room. Another female attendee had the same idea I did, and as we waited for the one stall, we talked about what we were there at the convention to see, while encouraging the poor confused men who entered and saw us in line to go ahead and use the urinals.

The funniest part of all was catching a glimpse of Brooklyn-based comics artist Dean Haspiel out of the corner of my eye, and saying hello to him… after he washed his hands, of course. He was naturally very surprised to see me, and when I found out that he was on his way to the Vertigo panel, I decided to make that my next stop as well. I got there in time to hear Haspiel speak about his most recent work called Cuba: My Revolution, a collaboration with writer/painter Inverna Lockpez. I attempted to catch Haspiel after the panel for a brief interview, but he said that he had to do a signing at a booth with writer/collaborator Jonathan Ames (The Alcoholic, HBO’s “Bored to Death”) and to try to catch him there.

That was just perfect for me, because by that time, I had started receiving text messages and Speed McNeil and let me know that she was in row F of the Artist’s Alley, which I had completely skipped over during my initial pass. Armed with this information and knowing that I had about an hour or so to kill before Haspiel was free, I wandered back through the Hall A throng and was surprised to find Evil Inc. creator Brad Guigar sitting with Scott Kurtz at the Webcomics.com booth.

I have a special place in my heart for Guigar because he was the first creator whom I’d interviewed the weekend after I left Anime Insider and I’ve followed almost all of his projects with great interest since then. I figured that now was as good a time as any to talk to him about Webcomics.com, and exactly why any and all webcomics creators should join up.

Listen to Brad Guigar’s Webcomics.com pitch, which was successful enough to convince me that our own Kara Dennison needed a 1-year membership

…to be concluded next week

Keeping Tabs: Avatar sequel unlikely to win animation Oscars, and other stories

Posted on 11 July 2010 by admin Leave a Comment

Ever since Spirited Away was the second movie to win the Best Animated Feature award and the first anime (and non-English language) movie to win, anime and animation geeks have been keeping a close eye on this Academy Awards category. The newest change in the rules of the category, amongst other rules changes, were announced, including this death blow for films like Avatar which featured extensive use of new technology: “”Motion capture by itself is not an animation technique.” (Source: ANN)

In the “We Can Do It!” department, Josh Tolentino gave a brief update and provided screenshots from studio Ordet’s Black Rock Shooter, a 50-minute OVA whose source material comes from a one-year old illustration, a song recorded using the Vocaloid software, and an ensuing music video. The OVA will be released in Japan on July 24 as “special pack-in DVD with the newest print editions of Animedia, Hobby Magazine, and Megami. Two questions: 1) If James Cameron combined Vocaloid usage with his mo-cap technology for his next movie, how much money would that make? and 2) Is that really a string bikini top that the underaged-looking protagonist is wearing in the image above? (Source: Japanator.com)
And finally, if you’re a gadget geek and/or a comics geek but wanted to know which of the iPhone or Android apps to download in order to get the most comics for your bucks, Johanna Draper Carlson and Glen Weldon have got you covered with Draper Carlson providing a very succinct update on the status of the currently existing ventures and Weldon providing a very nuanced editorial on the current Digital Age of Comics.Is this enough to put a nail into the coffin of the “local comic book store” or increase comics readership? Let me put it this way: if I had an iPhone or ‘Droid (or an iPad) and knew that I could pay $5 or less for comics, you betcha I’d be reading some of them more often (Source: Comics Worth Reading, NPR’s Monkey See blog)

Trisha’s Take: Micmacs à tire-larigot review

Posted on 14 May 2010 by admin 1 Comment

Micmacs à tire-larigot (aka Non-stop madness)

Directed by Jean-Pierre Jeunet
Starring Dany Boon, André Dussollier, Nicolas Marié, Julie Ferrier, and more
Rated R for some sexuality and brief violence

When I was in the eighth grade, I was given the chance to either take a first year of Spanish at my school or to take a first year in French at the high school across the street from where I lived and where I’d eventually attend.

Impractical youngster that I was in Southern California, I chose French and for five years I was one of the more fluent speakers in my class, going as far as to win the silver medal my senior year of high school at French camp. Those classes were where I first saw or heard of classic French films like Jean de Florette, Le retour de Martin Guerre, and Au revoir les enfants (which apparently was an inspiration for Reservoir Dogs), and I thoroughly enjoyed them. Yes, even Les compères.

Alas, my ear for the language has diminished, but that still doesn’t mean that I’m not about to turn down the chance to see a movie by perhaps one of France’s great directors of the modern era.

Even before it made its debut at the 2009 Toronto Film Festival, Micmacs à tire-larigot was picked up by Sony Pictures Classics for a U.S. release, and it’s no small wonder why.

Just as in director Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s first major hit Le fabuleux destin d’Amélie Poulain, whimsy abounds in Micmacs in the form of a motley crew of homeless misfits who are tasked by the main character Bazil (played by Dany Boon) to help him seek his justice upon the arms dealers who were responsible for the death of his father and who supplied the bullet which lodged in his brain during a drive-by gone wrong where he was at the wrong place at the wrong time.

That there’s a lot of grim scenes depicting the actual shooting or the fact that the first five minutes of the movie start with watching Bazil’s father accidentally trigger a landmine he was tasked to clear could be perhaps a continuation of the themes in A Very Long Engagement.

And yet, I couldn’t stop thinking about “Leverage” while watching this movie because what unfolds after we meet the happy band of misfits (including such heavy-weight French and French-speaking actors as Jean-Pierre Marielle, Yolande Moreau, and long-time Jeunet-collaborator Dominique Pinon) is a series of heists featuring cobbled-together tools and a female contortionist.

Of course, each misfit has a quirky note about them that gives them their “speciality” and makes them integral to the smooth workings of the plans. Of course something goes wrong, and the crew has to work together to get Boon back once he’s been captured by the bad guys (who are played with such scene-eating relish by André Dussollier and Nicolas Marié that I feared there wouldn’t be a set left by the end of the movie).

If you’re looking for deep insights into why war exists, you’re not going to find them here. In fact, the movie could almost be a rejection of war, war-mongering, and the industries that help perpetuate the cycles of violence–but that’s just me trying to reach for a deeper meaning in a movie that really doesn’t need one.

I enjoyed every performance greatly, especially lead actor Boon’s. He portrayed well Bazil’s pride upon learning that he’s lost his job and apartment after being in the hospital for so long after the shooting, and I loved watching the bits where he had to do any bit of pantomime. I’ll admit that just like Bazil, I was flummoxed when Julie Ferrier’s tirade came out of the blue, but I don’t think that’s a function of her being a poor actor but perhaps a function of there not being enough room in the script to show her character’s changing feelings towards him.

In short, if you’re looking for a good, satisfying, and fun heist/revenge movie, you should definitely find Micmacs at your local theater.

Micmacs is going into limited release in the U.S. on May 28, but if you’re really that anxious, you could import the R2 DVD and contribute to the French GDP at the same time!

Trisha’s Quote of the Day: Democracy, with a twist of British

Posted on 10 May 2010 by admin Leave a Comment

One of the most puzzling features of the current unstoppable wave of political punditry that is flooding all channels and outlets at the moment (including this one of course) is the peculiar propensity of commentators to feel qualified to extrapolate from the election results the Manifest Will of Britain. “The people have voted for change”, “The people have told Gordon Brown that he has got to go” , “The people are saying that they don’t really trust any one party”, “The people have said that they want Parliament reformed, the tea room in the House of Commons redecorated, new carpeting in the women’s lavatory of the House of Lords and a vegetarian option in the canteen.”

—Stephen Fry, attempting to explain who won in the most recent general election in the United Kingdom.

Trailer Watch: Inception first official trailer

Posted on 9 May 2010 by admin 1 Comment

Well, I think I can officially say that director Christopher Nolan is off his rocker. Just take a look at the below and see if you don’t agree with me.

Here’s a more detailed synopsis of what you just saw:

Acclaimed filmmaker Christopher Nolan directs an international cast in an original sci-fi actioner that travels around the globe and into the intimate and infinite world of dreams. Dom Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) is a skilled thief, the absolute best in the dangerous art of extraction, stealing valuable secrets from deep within the subconscious during the dream state, when the mind is at its most vulnerable. Cobb’s rare ability has made him a coveted player in this treacherous new world of corporate espionage, but it has also made him an international fugitive and cost him everything he has ever loved. Now Cobb is being offered a chance at redemption. One last job could give him his life back but only if he can accomplish the impossible—inception. Instead of the perfect heist, Cobb and his team of specialists have to pull off the reverse: their task is not to steal an idea but to plant one. If they succeed, it could be the perfect crime. But no amount of careful planning or expertise can prepare the team for the dangerous enemy that seems to predict their every move. An enemy that only Cobb could have seen coming. This summer, your mind is the scene of the crime.

I have to say that now that we know a little more about Inception, I really wish that we didn’t. I groaned the instant I heard Leonardo DiCaprio’s character say that he was doing “one last job,” and I also may have gagged a little when it flashed to a scene of him being emotional while cradling Marion Cotillard, presumably an ex-wife or a former lover.

At the same time, though, the visuals look amazing and I think I’m in love with the idea of being able to use your dreams against you. We’ve already seen in Minority Report how the future can be manipulated, now your subconscious? Really chilling.

Starring DiCaprio, Cotillard, Ellen Page, and Cillian Murphy, Inception will be in theaters in the U.S. on July 16.

Quick Cuts: 20th Century Fox to make prequel about “damn dirty” Apes, and other stories

Posted on 7 May 2010 by admin Leave a Comment

Just in case you weren’t convinced that New Zealand’s WETA Digital was the go-to SFX house these days, 20th Century Fox will be using them to produce all of the genetically altered-primates in CGI for their film Rise of the Apes, a prequel to the classic sci-fi movie series which was begun by 1968’s Planet of the Apes. The movie will be directed by Rupert Wyatt (The Escapist) from a script by Rick Jaffa and Amanda Silver (The Relic), and will be released in the U.S. on June 24, 2011. (Source: The Hollywood Reporter)
Dashing my hopes for a female-powered view on Captain America, British actor Toby Jones has entered the final round of negotiations to become the movie’s second villain, Arnim Zola. He’ll join Hugo Weaving’s Red Skull as Chris Evans’ antagonists, and I think I’m starting to see how the storyline’s shaping up and will end with Cap on ice and Zola in a robot suit. (Source: The Hollywood Reporter‘s Heat Vision blog)
Finally, if you’ve ever wanted to see all of Metropolis, the sci-fi silent film by Fritz Lang that inspired Blade Runner amongst others, head on over to the Film Forum in New York City today where they will be showing the film in its original complete version for the first time to audiences since its premiere at the Berlin Film Festival in 1927. Hidden away in a private film archive in Buenos Aires, we have Argentine film archivists Fernando Peña and Paula Félix-Didier to thank for rescuing the movie from the bureaucratic red tape. The most interesting quote from the story?

“It’s no longer a science-fiction film,” said Martin Koerber, a German film archivist and historian who supervised the latest restoration and the earlier one in 2001. “The balance of the story has been given back. It’s now a film that encompasses many genres, an epic about conflicts that are ages old. The science-fiction disguise is now very, very thin.”

Additional screenings in other cities and a DVD will follow later this year. (Source: The New York Times)

Trailer Watch: “Illegal” Machete first trailer

Posted on 6 May 2010 by admin 4 Comments

Boosted from the fine folks at Ain’t It Cool News.com comes what Machete director Robert Rodriguez is calling his “illegal” trailer, and is the first official look at the plot to the film.

I love, love, love the casting of this movie because in addition to Danny Trejo being just badass in general, Michelle Rodriguez gets to kick ass with dual pistols, Jessica Alba gets to be Hispanic, Cheech Marin dual wields shotguns in a priest’s frock, and then you’ve got the “evil” white guys played by none other than Robert DeNiro, Jeff Fahey, and Lindsay Lohan…

God, if loving “Mexsploitation” is bad, then tie me up and call me a piñata!

Trisha’s Take: How do you make a Miyazaki film more profitable?

Posted on 15 March 2009 by admin Leave a Comment

ponyocliffsea There really isn’t much meat to this old story Variety posted about the U.S. production team of Ponyo on the Cliff by the Sea, but there’s an interesting tidbit in there that I’ll get to in a bit.

Joining previously announced producers Frank Marshall (the fourth Indy movie, the upcoming The Last Airbender) and Kathleen Kennedy (Persepolis, Tintin) is Pixar president John Lasseter, and was it honestly a surprise that he’d be involved?

In November 2008, the English voice cast was announced with such names as Cate Blanchett, Liam Neeson, and Noah Lindsey Cyrus—the eight-year old sister to Miley Cyrus and my pick for the lead character of Ponyo (since IMDB doesn’t have that info yet).

What is interesting is the second paragraph of the Variety article, which contains this line from writer Mark Schilling:

The goal is to boost both the number of screens and the box office take beyond [Studio] Ghibli’s record for a U.S. release set by Spirited Away, the [Hayao] Miyazaki toon that earned a little more than $10 million on 714 screens in 2002 and 2003.

However, as much of a Miyazaki fan as I am, I think that goal is doomed to failure.

I’ve been an anime and animation fan for quite some time, and I have always thought that one of the common problems of the medium is that while fans can appreciate the art and artistry of a film like Persepolis or Steamboy, the general public has traditionally thought that any movie that was animated was going to be a movie for children—and the box office numbers have reflected this.

Back when I was writing for Anime Insider, I remember we did an article on the comparative box office grosses for the top 10 anime films that have been released in the U.S. Unfortunately, I can’t find that article right now—and besides, it would be five years old—but I did find something similar online that was written for the Associated Content website (a sort of clearing house for freelance writers to get noticed).

North Carolina screenwriting graduate student Will Wright took a look at the 15 highest grossing anime films of all time, and he discovered that out of the top five anime films, the first four slots were taken up by kiddie franchises Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh! and Spirited Away has the fifth slot.

When you click through to the Box Office Mojo page, though, you notice that figure of “a little over $10 million” represents only 3.7% of the total gross that Spirited Away achieved. In contrast, Pokemon: The First Movie (which I did see, and yes, I did enjoy it at the time) has a domestic gross of over $85 million which represents 52.4% of its total gross.

Kinda makes that $10 million dollar figure for an Academy Award winning movie look kinda paltry, doesn’t it?

Here where I live in the U.S., we have made some great strides towards creating cel or cel-like animation that audiences other than children can enjoy, but those strides have been almost entirely in the sitcom form, lead by “The Simpsons” and continued by “King of the Hill,” “Family Guy” and even “Drawn Together.”

The only animated show I can think of in the last 20 years that is sophisticated enough to be more than just a sitcom was “The Boondocks,” but that’s not very surprising considering its source material was the left-leaning, politically-minded comic strip by Aaron McGruder. Other people will probably chime in and say that “Avatar: The Last Airbender” is a show that adults can (and do) enjoy, but I’m actually not counting it in my list because it’s a show aimed squarely at the kid audience.

The bottom line is, the mainstream U.S. audience still isn’t there enough to get behind a cel-animated film that isn’t by Disney, which is something that even Disney knows because the last time they made a full-length one was 2004’s Home on the Range which grossed only $50 million on a estimated budget of $110 million. And to get that Disney-like audience might require a whole bunch of changes that would piss off the already existing fanbase.

In any case, I’m definitely waiting to see what Lasseter has up his sleeve and praying that it will be enough to help justify the idea of re-introducing 2D animation back into our film lexicon.

Category: Columns