Signs o' the GNF: Hayao Miyazaki Retires, Futurama Airs Its Last Episode

Just saw on Japanese TV that Hayao Miyazaki held a press conference to announce his retirement.  At the end, the anime legend told reporters this would be his last public appearance.  Miyazaki's films have meant a lot to the Constructivist family and we're sad to see him go.  But when you leave behind Totoro, Spirited Away, Ponyo, Kiki's Delivery Service, Princess Mononoke, Howl's Moving Castle, Nausicaa, and Studio Ghibli, he'll never really be gone.

Which leads me to the end of Futurama.  I love the way the last episode tunnels back to the first episode and makes the entire series into a long time loop.  Pretty meta way to get at the way all fictional characters end up repeating the same words and actions--and a pretty romantic way to convince us that for Frye and Leela, at least, this would lead to happiness and love rather than despair or boredom.  If I weren't so busy, I'd watch every episode in order as a tribute!

Neal on Neil and Neal

I know it's Masters week, but what better time to let the world know that I'm going to be teaching a summer course on Neil Gaiman and Neal Stephenson from May 28 through June 28 at SUNY Fredonia?

Here's how I've been pitching it on campus.

Summer Session I

Bring on the "Ne(a/i)ls":

Bruce Neal Simon Will Be Teaching Neil Gaiman and Neal Stephenson

ENGL 427 Major Writers: Neil Gaiman and Neal Stephenson

During Summer Session I, we will examine a sample of works from the major fantasy fiction writer and the major science fiction writer of their generation: Neil Gaiman and Neal Stephenson. We will start by pairing some shorter works that made the writers' early reputations (for instance, Gaiman's Sandman: Season of Mists and Stephenson's "Mother Earth, Mother Board" from Some Remarks). We will then pair Gaiman's (and Terry Pratchett's) Good Omens with Stephenson's Snow Crash as hugely popular and influential experiments in narrative, humor, and apocalypse. Finally, we will pair Gaiman's American Gods with Stephenson's Anathem as mature and major novels. If we have the time (and are completely insane), we will also try to pack in their most recent novels, Gaiman's The Ocean at the End of the Lane and Stephenson's Reamde--you know, for fun (these novels will be optional purchases)!

We will consider such questions as what makes a writer "major"? how do these very different writers speak to each other, to their own times, and to us? what connections and contrasts can we find between their characters and settings, characteristic themes and figures, central beliefs and values, writing styles and narrative strategies, and literary and political projects?

This course fulfills the "major author course" requirement for undergraduates majoring in English or English Adolescence Education.

NEC Karuizawa 72 Ladies Setup: More Rebel Alliance/Empire Action

I had some fun with my title's Star Wars analogy in my post on the Jamie Farr Toledo Classic on the LPGA, so I was surprised to see the same Rebel Alliance/Empire shootout theme holding true at the NEC Karuizawa 72 Ladies on the JLPGA.  32-year-old journeywoman Tomoko Kusakabe (-8), who's never broken into the top 40 on the year-end money list in her 1st 8 years on tour, leads a rebel alliance of young guns looking to deny the tour's biggest names a victory tomorrow, including 23-year-old Eun-Bi Jang (-7), 21-year-old Miki Sakai (-6), 22-year-old Kaori Ohe (-6), 24-year-old Teresa Lu (-6), 24-year-old Erika Kikuchi (-6), 25-year-old Yumiko Yoshida (-6), 19-year-old Harukyo Nomura (-5), 26-year-old Esther Lee (-5), and 26-year-old Na-Ri Kim (-4).  It's a tall order, as the empire is lead by living legend Yuri Fudoh at -7, flanked by Sun-Ju Ahn and Mi-Jeong Jeon at -5, and Sakura Yokomine, Chie Arimura, and Bo-Mee Lee at -4.  But Kusakabe's best career finish was a T6 here in 2009, so maybe she'll be up to the challenge!

Jamie Farr Toledo Classic Thursday and Friday: Rebel Alliance/Empire Shootout in Process

Scoring has always been low at Highland Meadows in the Jamie Farr Toledo Classic, which may as well be called the Se Ri Pak Shootout, what with her 5 wins at this event.  Paula Creamer hung on in 2008 after opening with a 60.  Eunjung Yi shocked the field with a moving-day 61 in 2009 and beat Morgan Pressel in a playoff.  In fact, the last player to win without breaking 65 was Mi Hyun Kim in 2006.

Given that history, everyone playing this week knew they'd have to go low or go home.  With the cut line at E, big names like Ya Ni Tseng, Ai Miyazato, Azahara Munoz, Anna Nordqvist, Michelle Wie, and Pressel have had to settle for the latter option, not to mention players of the caliber of Eun-Hee Ji, Mina Harigae, Jennifer Song, Mariajo Uribe, Lizette Salas, Nicole Castrale, Vicky Hurst, and Ryann O'Toole.  But plenty of other golfers have gone the former route, including many names we haven't seen in a long time near the top of the leaderboard. 

On Thursday, Pernilla Lindberg fired an 8-birdie, 7-under-par 64 to take a 2-shot lead on fellow members of the rebel alliance Meredith Duncan, Numa Gulyanamitta, Chella Choi, and Karine Icher (not to mention Mika Miyazato and Angela Stanford).  Joining them in the 60s were the likes of Ayaka Kaneko, Gerina Piller, Ilhee Lee, and Jenny Shin (and, oh yeah, Amy Yang and So Yeon Ryu) at -4, Jane Park, Jee Young Lee, Lizette Salas, Danielle Kang, Dewi Claire Schreefel, Danah Bordner, Jane Rah, Jacqui Concolino, Brooke Pancake, and Rachel Rohanna (whoops, also, Laura Davies, Stacy Lewis, Paula Creamer, Hee-Kyung Seo, Hee-Won Han, Jeong Jang, and Janice Moodie) at -3, and a huge group at -2 that included P.K. Kongkrapham, Valentine Derrey, Cindy LaCrosse, Mo Martin, Kathleen Ekey, Sydnee Michaels, Christine Song, Samantha Richdale, Jennie Lee, Nicole Hage, and Moira Dunn (oops, forgot Ji-Yai Shin, In-Kyung Kim, Inbee Park, Brittany Lincicome, Sandra Gal, Momoko Ueda, Natalie Gulbis, Katherine Hull, Lindsey Wright, and Candie Kung).

On Friday, the empire struck back to some extent, with Mika Miyazato, Inbee Park, and Hee Kyung Seo only 1 shot behind new rebel alliance leader Chella Choi, followed by So Yeon Ryu, Hee-Won Han, Karine Icher, and Pernilla Lindberg at -7, Ji-Yai Shin, In-Kyung Kim, Angela Stanford, Beatriz Recari, and Jacqui Concolino at -6, and Stacy Lewis, Mi Jung Hur, Lindsey Wright, Dewi Claire Schreefel, Sydnee Michaels, and Kathleen Ekey at -5. 

So as moving day beckons, will we see another Eunjung Yi-like performance by a rebel alliance leader, or will a big name bring a Se Ri Pak-like Death Star blast to the hopes of the rest of the field?  I'd say "stay tuned," but between the London Olympics and Tiger in contention at the PGA Championship, the decision by the tournament organizerts to save money and not pay for Golf Channel coverage is looking pretty smart (although maddening to LPGA junkies like me!).  I'm hoping for big moves by Momoko Ueda (E), 2010 champion Na Yeon Choi (-1), Amy Yang (-2), Tiffany Joh (-2), Ayaka Kaneko (-2), Paula Creamer (-3), and Jane Park (-3), rooting for Mika Miyazato to break through for her 1st LPGA win, and expecting at least a couple of golfers to go lower than Lindberg's opening 64 on the weekend.  How about you?

Sime Darby LPGA Malaysia Sunday: Jimin Kang Fires 65 to Deny Juli Inkster

Jimin Kang was only 3 shots off the lead heading into the final round of the Sime Darby LPGA Malaysia event, but I never considered for a second that she would be the one to prevail in the end--and in so doing take her 2nd career LPGA title. Sure, I had just promoted her to 6th-most-likely-to-win among the golfers with 1 LPGA victory to their names, but with Jee Young Lee (#2 on the same list) leading, Natalie Gulbis (#7) in the hunt, Song-Hee Kim poised to get her 1st win, and none other than the Final Round Queen, Ji-Yai Shin, only 3 back, as well, I figured almost anyone but Kang would win.

But after erasing a 1st-hole birdie with a 2nd-hole bogey, Kang was flawless, making 6 birdies and no bogeys the rest of the way. A closing flurry of birdies--3 in her last 4 holes, including a walkoff birdie on the 54th hole--put the pressure on Inkster, who had birdied 4 of her 5 previous holes heading into 18. But as Bill Jempty notes, Inkster pushed her approach into a right-side bunker and failed to save par. And just like that, as Golf Babes notes, Kang had her 1st win since 2005.

It was another good week for Mika Miyazato, but a weak finish on moving day and an inability to match Inkster's and Kang's closing charges today relegated her into a tie for 3rd with Maria Hjorth, who kept offsetting every birdie she made today with a follow-up bogey, capped off by her last on 18. Cristie Kerr made a charge to leap to solo 8th, but she would have tied Shin for 6th if she, too, hadn't bogeyed the final hole. With Ai Miyazato unable to go low after a terrible 1st round and tied for 28th, it'll be interesting to see if she gets passed by Kerr and Shin, or just 1 of them, and whether Shin will leapfrog Kerr in the Rolex Rankings.

More on this when we return to Dunkirk. We had a great time in Rochester, haging with my parents at the Strong Museum and talking science fiction and comics with Alter Ego (who let me read Warren Ellis's Planetary--awesome!). But now it's time to hit the road to get back in time for onechan and imoto's skating lessons! Speaking of which, congratulations to Daisuke Takahashi for winning the NHK Cup today in Japan. With Sakura Yokomine winning in Japan, Bo Mee Lee in Korea, and Lee-Anne Pace in China, it's been an eventful weekend in golf! More soon....

[Update 1 (9:14 am): In the meantime, here's Hound Dog's play-by-play!]

[Update 2 (8:09 pm): We travelled all across western NY looking for a Violet (from The Incredibles) costume for onechan, to no avail. So here's Hound Dog's epilogue while we go online to find it--and then to bed!]

RIP Satoshi Kon

Just heard the news of Satoshi Kon's passing. After Hayao Miyazaki, he was probably my favorite anime director. From his contribution to the animated sf anthology Memories (1995) to his first feature film Perfect Blue (1997), to his 2 best movies, Millennium Actress (2001) and Tokyo Godfathers (2003), to the tv series Paranoia Agent (2004) and his last film Paprika (2006), he was nearly always pitch-perfect, mystifying, engrossing. He will be missed.

'Twas the Afternoon Before Honika... Uh, Two Weeks Ago

OK, so I'm a little late with this, but I finally finished grading and it's time to celebrate! Actually, T-Joh is to blame for this departure from my usual anime Hanukah thing:



That's the real Lady Gaga in there, right?

For background on Smooth-E, check out this youtube timeline of Hanukah-themed parody songs:





Merry QSMS, everyone!

[Update 1 (12:24 pm): OMG, I'm such a bad Jew I even got the title and timing of this post wrong! Should have posted it at sundown so I could have called it "'Twas the Sundown Before Honika... Uh, Two Weeks Ago"! Yeesh.]

sf@SF Is Back!

Just a little public service announcement for those who come to Mostly Harmless looking for stuff on sf, anime, and other aspects of American and transnational popular culture: I've got students in both my undergraduate classes this semester signing up as co-authors on the sf@SF blog, which is now on "science fiction--and more--at SUNY Fredonia." I've just posted a brief observation on the odd choice of commercials that run during Onegai My Melody on veoh.com and Ouran High School Host Club on youtube.com. We should have several posts per week up from a variety of writers this semester. Check it out when you get a chance!

So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish

Yes, I just compared ex-LPGA Commissioner Carolyn Bivens to the dolphins in the 4th novel of Douglas Adams's classic Hitchhiker's Guide trilogy.

And yes, the analogy doesn't precisely hold, for as the 2nd-most-intelligent species on Earth, the dolphins in Adams's novel saved the planet after it had been unexpectedly demolished to make way for a new hyperspace bypass, or rather saved the 3rd-most intelligent species (us) by pulling a parallel Earth to replace the demolished one (it's all there in Chapter 32), so if you take the Earth as a metaphor for the LPGA, this seems to me to better fit the new-Commissioner-to-be-named-later than Bivens herself, whose grasp of English and social interactions was never quite as Vogon-reciting-poetry-bad as critics like Geoff Shackelford made out but who really did take a huge gamble with the tour's future and has paid the price for it, although her consolation prize--a buyout of the remaining years on her contract--will pay for a lot of fish, so maybe the metaphor does work, after all. Speaking of fish, Adams has lots of passages that can help a blog named Mostly Harmless commemorate the end of the Bivens era.

Take last year's language controversy. All the LPGA needs is the Babel fish, right? Hmmm...what does the Hitchhiker's Guide say to that?

the poor Babel fish, by effectively removing all barriers to communication between different races and cultures, has caused more and bloodier wars than anything else in the history of creation.

Of course that one's from page 42 of The More Than Complete Hitchhiker's Guide. Here's one for the golfy media, courtesy of Wonko the Sane:

I'm not trying to prove anything, by the way. I'm a scientist and I know what constitutes proof. But the reason I call myself by my childhood name is to remind myself that a scientist must also be absolutely like a child. If he sees a thing, he must say that he sees it, whether it was what he thought he was going to see or not. See first, think later, then test. Otherwise you will only see what you were expecting.

Anyway, to return to my nautical theme, Marsha Evans, a retired Rear Admiral in the U.S. Navy and former President/CEO of the American Red Cross, will be the tour's interim commissioner, and Annika Sorenstam will be helping the Board of Directors find its bearings and chart a new course. Apparently the idea was that having been ousted in a ARC board mutiny back in 2005 and participating in the LPGA Board's own in 2009, Evans will have learned from her own and her predecessor's mistakes. In which case, let's hope she wasn't in charge of the announcement process.

Sometimes life imitates Adams. And sometimes bloggers do, too.

[Update 1 (4:11 pm): Here's Ryan Ballengee with the news and background on Evans, Stephanie Wei on Bivens's legacy and Sorenstam's role, Jay Busbee on what next, and The Golf Chick with some answers.]

[Update 2 (4:14 pm): And here's Brent Kelley's thoughtful analysis.]

[Update 3 (4:21 pm): And here are the LPGA's press releases announcing Bivens's replacement with Evans and explaining Sorenstam's role.]

[Update 4 (11:11 pm): Bill Jempty, one of Bivens's longest-standing and harshest critics in blogaramaville, weighs in with his thoughts on Bivens's ouster and replacement.]

[Update 5 (11:18 pm): Here's Randall Mell.]

[Update 6 (11:24 pm): Here's the Golf Channel video of the announcement.]

[Update 7 (11:49 pm): Here's Hound Dog's reaction to the news and the press conference.]

[Update 8 (7/14/09, 9:54 am): Here's Daniel Wexler's reaction and Stephanie Wei's overview at the Huffington Post.]

[Update 9 (10:00 am): Geoff Shackelford links to and comments on various journalists' reactions.]

[Update 10 (10:09 am): Here's Dave Seanor's reaction.]

[Update 11 (11:18 am): Here's Christina Kim on why she's optimistic about the LPGA's future.]

[Update 12 (11:33 am): Here's Gene Yasuda's piece for Golfweek.]

[Update 13 (11:44 am): And here's one of the guys from Nice Ballz.]

[Update 14 (4:21 pm): William Rhoden of the NYT got Bivens to talk in a phone interview, so his piece is definitely worth reading.]

[Update 15 (7/15/09, 10:54 pm): John Strege shares the views of a former tournament organizer of Bivens's 1st ex-tournament, the Shoprite.]

[Update 16 (7/16/09, 12:37 am): Brent Kelley has done some reading--and linking--of his own.]

Doggie Goes to the Moon

Thanks to teh wondars of the intertubes, we got to read another story from Grandpa Bob before the girls went to bed.

***

Doggie Goes to the Moon

By

Grandpa Bob

One day, doggie decided to go for a walk. He was looking for fun. Soon he came to some stores. One had a TV in the window. The TV showed a space ship landing on the moon. A man in a space suit got out. He had a golf club and ball. He hit a golf shot on the moon!

Doggie said, "That looks like fun! I want to play golf on the moon, too."

Doggie ran as fast as he could to the Spaceport. The Spaceport was where rocket ships left earth to go to the moon. But the man at the Spaceport wouldn't let Doggie in. "Dogs can't fit in the seats and we have no dog food for you to eat on the rocket ship," he said.

Doggie was sad. He really wanted to play golf on the moon. He slowly walked home and didn't even wag his tail.

On the way home, he passed onechan's and imoto's house. They saw him and asked him to come in for ice cream. They asked Doggie why he was so sad and he told them. But onechan and imoto knew how to make him happy again!

Onechan had a picture of the moon. Imoto had a toy rocket ship. They pretended Doggie was a passenger on the rocket ship. They gave him ice cream to eat while he "pretend flew" to the moon. Then they put him on the picture of the moon. They put a golf club in his mouth and put a ball on the picture. Doggie hit the ball. It rolled far!

Now Doggie was happy! He had played golf on the moon--thanks to onechan and imoto!

THE END

***

Onechan told me what happened after the ending!

Onechan: Imoto used magic and Doggie went into the picture of the moon.

Me: What happened next?

Onechan: That's it! Now can we do that Sparkychan falling all the way to us one?

What can I say? It was right before bed time, after all!

オバマmania II

A little tribute to today's historic inauguration for MH fans: American Jedi painter Chaz Guest visited Obama City, Japan, recently. James at Japan Probe has the details, as usual. Here's the background in English:



And the Japanese TV report (which is where his Jedi roots become apparent):

Make It Hikaru Utada in 2009!

Hat tip to Bill Benzon for sending me to the Japan Times for this piece by Daniel Robson on the coming J-pop assault on America's top 40 charts. Here's hoping the 1st artist he features, Hikaru Utada, does as well in the English-speaking world in 2009 as Jero did in the Japanese-speaking world in 2008.

Here's the video for one of her older songs, "Travelling," which gets a lot of play on our Saturday rides to onechan's yochien:



Here's "Can U Keep a Secret," which stars not one but two robots:



Here's her debut single, "Automatic," which was released in late 1998, just before she turned 16:



By that point, she had been performing for 5 years already, mostly with her mom, Keiko Fuji, an enka singer in the '70s. Here's Utada covering the Carpenters, back when she started her solo career in Cubic U (a reference to her being a 3rd-generation female performer--her grandmother was a blind shamisen player):



Happy birthday, Hikki, and good luck! (Going by her first single, she won't need it....)

Japanese Star Wars v. Japanese Spider-Man

I would be remiss in my ongoing attempt to unite animation, sf, music, and golf otaku of all genders, ages, and nationalities were I not to pass along these gems from the 1970s:





Which is better at blowing your mind? Note how both the giant robot and Kamen Rider traditions are invoked in the latter. But the former's lyrics must not be underestimated.

Can you top these?

[Update 1 (9:57 am): I vote for the latter, on the grounds that its opening probably influenced The Tick's theme song:



But I'm willing to be persuaded.]

The Day the Earth Stood in the Balance

Liked the title of my critique of the 2008 version of The Day the Earth Stood Still that I recently posted over at sf@SF so much I thought I'd link to it here. As you can see from the tags, it may be of interest to those who come to Mostly Harmless for something--anything!--besides women's golf.

The Politics of Astro Boy

Just a quick link to Bill Benzon's reading of Osamu Tezuka's Mighty Atom (a.k.a. Astro Boy) as an indirect response to and working through of ambivalence about the U.S. occupation of Japan. Given my own research interests and past blogging on anime politics, I ought to have a good response for Bill, but unfortunately I grew up in a place that was never in range of any TV stations that were actually airing Astro Boy and have not had the opportunity to reduce my cultural illiteracy since leaving there. Sorry, Bill!

Hopkinson@SF

[cross-posted from sf@SF]

It's official! Award-winning science fiction and fantasy writer Nalo Hopkinson will be giving a reading/lecture at SUNY Fredonia on Monday, April 21st. And she'll be making a special appearance in our Science Fiction class the following day, which we're moving to a new room to accommodate Saundra Liggins's African American literature class and any other Fredonians who want to attend.

Many thanks to the Dean of Arts and Humanities John Kijinski, the Pride Alliance, the Science Fiction Fantasy Gamers Guild, and the Mary Louise White Fund--not to mention the amazing Ms. Hopkinson herself--for making this visit possible. And to Jeffrey McMinn, Textbook Manager at SUNY Fredonia, who will have about 25 copies of her newest novel, The New Moon's Arms (which, by the way, was recently shortlisted for the Nebula and Aurora awards) and her first novel, Brown Girl in the Ring (which won the Warner Aspect First Novel Contest in 1997 and recently was one of the 5 finalists among the books selected for the Canada Reads program).

Here are the details:

Monday, April 21, 4:30 pm, Thompson W101: Reading/Lecture on race in science fiction; free and open to the public

Tuesday, April 22, 2 pm, McEwen G26: Class Visit; free and open to SUNY Fredonia students, faculty, and staff

And a bit of a bio:

Born in Jamaica, and raised in Jamaica, Trinidad, Guyana, and the U.S., Nalo Hopkinson has lived in Canada since her family moved there in 1977 when she was 16 years old. The author of four novels and two short story collections, she has branched out into essays, editing, and art in recent years.

Spread the word!

Don't talk back to Darth Vader; he'll getcha

A young girl tells the Star Wars tale:

Announcing sf@SF: Science Fiction at SUNY Fredonia

My science fiction course begins in less than an hour, so I'm officially launching the course web site and course blog right...about...now!

On Fantasy and Science Fiction

So the Full Metal Archivist and I have been catching up--very slowly--on the movies we missed while in Japan. And the nights she sleeps over in Buffalo (it's an evening class, morning internship, avoiding the Thruway in winter thing), I'm renting movies she has no interest in seeing. Last week we saw House of Flying Daggers and I saw A Scanner Darkly, and you know what? It would make a great study of what difference genre makes to a basically similar scenario to like, look at them together, closely. (Plus you could throw in Infernal Affairs and bring action movies into the mix and stretch the criteria for inclusion just to bring the wacky and unexpectedly deep Running on Karma along for the ride.)

Suffice to say this post shall not do this, not least because I'm still trying to figure out how to structure my science fiction course for the spring semester (on which more later). But I do wonder why there have been so many movies already this millennium that riff on the classic "what going undercover does to your identity/thin line between cops and criminals" themes?

The Collected Adventures of Sparkychan & Gojochan (Thus Far)

Well, here it is, the first book of The Collected Adventures of Sparkychan and Gojochan (Thus Far), by Uncle Bill Benzon.

July 9: For onechan [in response to this and that]
July 10: The discussion continues
July 11: Onechan's Adventure [in response to this]
July 12: Where's Onechan? and Calling Onechan! Calling Onechan!
July 14: Help is on the way and There They Are! Yippieeee! [in response to this]
July 17: Onechan's Choice
July 19: Calling all kidz! Calling all kidz! [in response to this]
July 23: Sigh
July 28: Catch you later alligator
August 1: Where's the bunny rabbit?
August 3: Onechan Tells a Story
August 11: The Little Worm from Kansas
August 14: Twas brillig
August 16: Sparkychan & Gojochan Adventure Time Mystery Theatre
November 20: i had a dream

Without giving away too much, our intrepid pair end up in Dunkirk! Literally. The girls are still celebrating. Sparkychan is getting rides on the girls' toy baby stroller while onechan cradles Gojochan in one arm until imoto says "itai" enough to prompt me to intervene and force onechan to give Gojochan back to imoto. For more updates, see the comments on the last post in Book I. A big "arigato gozaimasu" to Uncle Bill from onechan and imoto!