Augury

Just reposting a couple of items I ran across today,

From the Sci-Fi channel…

The Japanese animation company Production I.G. has acquired the rights from publisher Kodansha to sell the animated SF film Ghost in the Shell for a live-action remake, Variety reported.

Kodansha published the Ghost in the Shell manga by Masamune Shirow in 1989. Production I.G. then made it into a cult hit animated feature in 1995.

The animation company also produced the Ghost in the Shell feature follow-up Innocence and the animated TV series Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, both of which have been widely distributed beyond Japan.

I’m kind of intrigued but I also think that this is a “major” mistake. Mostly I’m just curious to see what they’d do with Matoko in a live-action situation.

In World of Warcraft related news, The Burning Crusade finally came out about two weeks ago. I’m not a World of Warcraft player, or even fan, really, but I am pretty interested in the Warcraft storyline. I’ve been pretty interested in what’s supposed to happen in the Warcraft universe after Warcraft 3: The Frozen Throne.

Via Zen of Design I find this link to a cool machinima made using World of Warcraft

I guess I’m on a Warcraft theme, so some other Warcraft-related links:

Hobbs, a NSFW but hilarious audio recording found via MMODIG.
This college-newspaper article on Gold-Farming and Gold-Digging in World of Warcraft.

I also noticed that Steven has actually chosen to buy a manga in his latest order… And above that he links to Pixy’s pictures taken of the Crest/Banner of the Stars manga. One of the things that I really like about manga as opposed to anime is that, given that manga doesn’t require huge numbers of frames, the art can really be quite spectacular. The typical anime art-style — That is to say, bland but attractive characters who are typically only identifiable through hair coloration/styling and clothing — doesn’t necessarily apply in manga*. And that’s a very good thing.

*Love Hina and kindred not included.