280 - Prose Picks 1 - Last and First Idol

Morgana and Darfox are out this week so Seamus leads the charge into the uncharted territory of light novels this week! We’ll be reviewing Gengen Kusano’s award winning Last and First Idol to see how dakazu handles reading a book without pictures!!!

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Timestamps:

• 00:00:00 - Intro Song: “Massara” by KANA-BOON from Sarazanmai, Opening, Introductions
• 00:01:00 - Revealing our fantastic new host avatars by Chess Albaneze
• 00:02:47 - Whatchu Been Reading: Transition Song: Dragon Ball Z OST “Prologue”, *SPOILERS* dakazu finished the epic sci-fi war series Juuza no Ulna
• 00:10:44 - dakazu is excited for Boys Run the Riot with its trans-man narrative
• 00:15:38 - News: Editor-in-Chief of Jump+ tweets about the increase in readership for Manga PLUS after major scanlation groups stopped working on Weekly Shonen Jump manga
• 00:23:20 - Netflix officially announces the live-action One Piece series with Eiichiro Oda overseeing production
• 00:27:05 - Next Episode Preview and Rundown:  One Shot on Ghost in the Shell: Global Neural Network, we will review this anthology of stories by Western comic creators that take place in the world of Ghost in the Shell 
• 00:28:04 - Main Segment Prose Picks: Last and First Idol, Transition Song: “Fiction” by sumiko from Wotakoi: Love is Hard for Otaku, we read and review the award winning hard sci-fi tales by newcomer Gengen Kusano
• 00:29:07 - Seamus explains the connection between this book and the British science fiction novel Last and First Man
• 00:30:44 - dakazu explain why he doesn’t like light novels in general
• 00:33:32 - We breakdown the plot of the first story Last and First Idol
• 00:36:56 - Seamus thought this story was trying to take the piss out of Last and First Man
• 00:40:26 - We discuss how the creative and transcendental ideas fall flat from the lack of interesting plot or characters to connect them
• 00:42:52 - We breakdown the plot of the second story Evolution Girls and compare it to Spore
• 00:47:59 - We breakdown the plot of the third story Dark Seiyuu and how its main concept of aether has been scientifically debunked
• 00:51:24 - dakazu notes the inclusion of casual cannibalism that adds to the edgelord factor of these stories
• 00:54:48 - Seamus explains what Jainism is until dakazu recognizes it from Osamu Tezuka’s Buddha
• 00:55:48 - We discuss the prose filled with casual swearing that gives the book a juvenile tone
• 00:58:50 - dakazu doesn’t understand why certain words weren’t translated for a better explanations
• 01:03:58 - We share our final thoughts on the book
• 01:11:00 - Next Week’s Topic: Ghost in the Shell: Global Neural Network, Social Media Rundown, Sign Off Song: “wish men” by sunbrain from Beet the Vandel Buster