Fade to Lack

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The Weekly Stuff with Jonathan Lack & Sean Chapman is a weekly audio podcast, and if you subscribe on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts, episodes will be delivered automatically and for free as soon as they are released. Visit www.weeklystuffpodcast.com for a complete archive of streaming and downloadable episodes.

Tuesday, August 9, 2022

Japanimation Station #02 – FULLMETAL ALCHEMIST (2003) Review & Discussion

Welcome to Japanimation Station, an anime podcast brought to you by the folks at The Weekly Stuff Podcast. We are here to dive into the wide and wacky world of anime, and you can subscribe on all platforms at JapanimationStation.Com.

For our first anime subject, we’re diving into the world of Hiromu Arakawa’s Fullmetal Alchemist, starting with the 2003 anime that partially adapted the then-young manga before branching off into an increasingly divergent anime-original story. While it was a huge and acclaimed hit, in Japan and abroad, at the time of release, the show has a more controversial reputation now, years after Arakawa’s manga was completed and faithfully re-adapted as Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood. Sean and Jonathan are coming at the 2003 series from wildly different directions – Jonathan a lifelong fan who started with this anime as a kid, and Sean only recently having read the manga without ever seeing either anime – so our perspectives inherently diverge. But if there’s one thing we clearly agree on, it’s that this is a fascinating show very much worth talking about. Whether one loves it or hates it, it’s clearly more than an outdated curio, and we think you, like us, will come away from this conversation with a greater appreciation for all versions of Fullmetal Alchemist.

Enjoy, and come back next week as our journey through Amestris continues with our review of the Fullmetal Alchemist movie sequel, Conqueror of Shamballa!

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The Weekly Stuff Podcast #439 – The FULLMETAL ALCHEMIST Episode(s) Part 1: The 2003 Anime

This week’s show starts off with the baffling news about the newly-merged Warner Bros. Discovery shelving a completed Batgirl film for a tax write-down, and then continues into the first big topic from our new anime podcast, Japanimation Station, where we’re diving into the world of Hiromu Arakawa’s Fullmetal Alchemist, starting today with the 2003 anime that partially adapted the then-young manga before branching off into an increasingly divergent anime-original story. While it was a huge and acclaimed hit, in Japan and abroad, at the time of release, the show has a more controversial reputation now, years after Arakawa’s manga was completed and faithfully re-adapted as Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood. Sean and Jonathan are coming at the 2003 series from wildly different directions – Jonathan a lifelong fan who started with this anime as a kid, and Sean only recently having read the manga without ever seeing either anime – so our perspectives inherently diverge. But if there’s one thing we clearly agree on, it’s that this is a fascinating show very much worth talking about. Whether one loves it or hates it, it’s clearly more than an outdated curio, and we think you, like us, will come away from this conversation with a greater appreciation for all versions of Fullmetal Alchemist.

Enjoy!

Time Chart:

Intro & News: 0:00:00 – 0:24:34

Fullmetal Alchemist: 0:24:34 – 3:41:16

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Monday, August 1, 2022

Japanimation Station #01 – Welcome to Japanimation Station! Our Anime History & 5 Desert Island Favorites!

For the debut episode of Japanimation Station, Sean Chapman and Jonathan Lack introduce themselves and host a spirited discussion about how they got into anime, how their fandoms and interests have evolved over the years, what makes animation special in the first place, and why anime in particular is the thing we find so interesting we had to make a whole podcast about it. You’ll learn about our backgrounds, our philosophies, our anime likes and dislikes, and much more as we introduce you to the foundational ideas of our show! And at the end, we share which 5 anime we would each take to a desert island if such a strange fate were to befall us.

Enjoy, and come back next week for our first anime review with Fullmetal Alchemist, the original 2003 anime based on Hiromu Arakawa’s classic manga! Subscribe at JapanimationStation.Com to make sure you don’t miss a single episode!

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Tuesday, July 26, 2022

The Weekly Stuff Podcast #438 – The RESIDENT EVIL 4 Episode

Today’s episode is a real treat, as we finally take the time to talk about one of the greatest video games of all time, Resident Evil 4. With the remake of Capcom’s action classic coming next Spring, and Sean and Jonathan both having fallen hard down the Resident Evil rabbit hole at different times over the past few years, we thought now was the perfect time to break down why Resident Evil 4 is so entirely singular, why it’s so ridiculously fun and engaging, and why it still stands tall and timeless as such a perfect masterclass of game design 17 years later. We also break down the news out of the Marvel panel from this week’s Comic-Con, where producer Kevin Feige laid out the next few years of MCU movies and shows in a plan that has us both feeling exhausting and baffled. But hey, the Black Panther trailer was great!

Enjoy, and come back next week for the launch of our brand new anime podcast, Japanimation Station!

Time Chart:

Intro: 0:00:00 – 0:05:29

Marvel News: 0:05:29 – 0:51:09

Resident Evil 4: 0:51:09 – 2:47:31

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Tuesday, July 19, 2022

Weekly Suit Gundam #58 – Mobile Suit Gundam: Cucuruz Doan’s Island Movie Review & Discussion

It’s time for Weekly Suit Gundam, a show exploring the world of Mobile Suit Gundam from The Weekly Stuff Podcast with Jonathan Lack & Sean Chapman. You can subscribe for free in iTunes by following this link.

Both Gundam as a franchise and Weekly Suit Gundam as a podcast come full circle this week by returning to the world of First Gundam, with the brand-new movie set in the timeline of the original show, Mobile Suit Gundam: Cucuruz Doan’s Island! A remake of the infamous 15^th episode of Mobile Suit Gundam – an episode with such a troubled production that creator Yoshiyuki Tomino has never allowed it to be distributed outside Japan – original Gundam character designer and animation supervisor Yoshikazu Yasuhiko returns as director to redeem this story of a Zeon deserter protecting war orphans on a deserted island. It’s an absolutely wonderful movie, as beautifully animated as one would expect from the great Yasuhiko, but also incredibly smart and soulful in its themes and storytelling, finding a particularly compelling story for original Gundam protagonist Amuro Ray, played again here – possibly for the last time – by a never-better Tōru Furuya. This is a great movie, and an absolute pleasure to discuss for our final Weekly Suit Gundam before the launch of Japanimation Station.

Enjoy, and we’ll see you on the other side with the premiere of Japanimation Station on August 1^st. Be sure to subscribe at http://japanimationstation.com

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