Boro the Caterpillar: A Review From Japan

SoraNews24 has recently published a review of Hayao Miyazaki's newest movie, the Ghibli Museum short Boro the Caterpillar. The review is very favorable and runs through the overall story, which is about a young caterpillar making his way in the world. Judging from the photos from the official art book, this movie is visually spectacular.

There doesn't appear to be any CG animation in this movie. I wonder what happened to that idea? Perhaps it was considered at one point and then abandoned? Or perhaps it was another case of a mistranslation being heard around the world. That happens a lot where Miyazaki-san is concerned.

As always, Boro will be shown only at the Ghibli Museum in Mitaka, Japan. Don't expect this or any other of the Ghibli Museum short films to be screened outside of Japan, certainly not while Miyazaki is still alive. And I'm sure you don't wanna think about that subject right now.

These photos come from the article and show pages from the official art book, which can be purchased online. For Western Ghibli Freaks, this is the only way we can enjoy these great movies. It's like the days before VHS, when you had to read through giant picture books to relive your favorite movies. The Marx Brothers movie book, Why a Duck?, is sitting next to me on the shelf as I write this. We never see books like it anymore, now that we can watch nearly any movie on demand. But we still have to wait for the Ghibli Museum shorts, including Boro the Caterpillar.

Enjoy the screenshots.

Get My Ebooks and Paperbacks: Here Are the Direct Links

Do you enjoy Ghibli Blog? Then check out my awesome books: Zen Arcade, Pop Life and Greatest Hits. You can download my books at the following online retailers. Ebooks are free (we're working on Amazon right now) and paperbacks ($19.99):

Amazon
Barnes & Noble
Kobo
Apple

Greatest Hits: Join the DTM Newsletter and Receive a Free Ebook

The DTM Newsletter is a weekly newsletter that I publish every Wednesday. It features essays and news updates from yours truly, including the latest events on our book publishing empire. We continue to add new subscribers every week, and if you are among them, you have my thanks.

Everyone who subscribes to the newsletter receives a free ebook. Previously, that free gift has been the 42-page zine Bocanada. However, now that my KDP Select contract has ended, I can offer you one of my full-length books instead, Greatest Hits: An Anthology in Four Volumes.

Greatest Hits is an anthology of essays and stories taken from four other books, hence the title. Two of the books are now available, Pop Life and Zen Arcade: Classic Video Game Reviews. The two remaining book titles are still in production. It was an interesting experiment that I wanted to try out, and to be completely honest, it was my original intention to make this the "free book" for the mailing list. I just got greedy at the last minute and put all three titles up for sale.

Now Greatest Hits is back where it properly belongs, as a free anthology for all the new subscribers. As for the existing ebook titles on Amazon, I will soon be publishing on Apple, Barnes & Noble and Kobo as well, and I will run a "free" promotion for a while.

For Studio Ghibli fans, Greatest Hits includes 26 essays that belong to the "Conversations on Ghibli" book project. One longer essay about the 1984 Nemo movie project was written specifically for the project and has never been published on Ghibli Blog.

I always liked the Greatest Hits book. This is a great book. There's so many entertaining essays on movies, music, videogames and life. It's got the best cover design of my three titles, and looks great in paperback.

If you have not yet subscribed, please join today and I'll send you a copy of this terrific book. Here's the link:

Join the DTM Newsletter and Receive a Free Ebook

Riffs: Princess Mononoke (Movie and Book)

Here is one of the more interesting riffs in the Ghibli canon. In Princess Mononoke, we see a character named Kaya who serves as a romantic interest (of sorts) for Prince Ashitaka. The relationship is shown shown in brief moments, but she clearly loves the boy and is devoted to him. As he is cast out of the village and sent on his quest, she gives him a crystal dagger as a symbol of her memory.

Later in the movie, Ashitaka meets San, the "Princess Mononoke", and falls in love with her. He gives her his crystal dagger as a sign of his devotion to her. Later, during the dramatic climax, San lashes out in anger by striking the same dagger into Ashitaka's chest. In the end, while the two share love for one another, they both realize that they cannot live together, and must stay in their separate worlds (don't kid yourself; when the girl you are dating says "I need my space," you're never seeing her again).

Now here's where things really get interesting. The village girl Kaya is actually a recreation of the heroine from Hayao Miyazaki's original 1980 version of Mononoke Hime, which was radically different from the eventual movie. It's far closer to a traditional fairy tale, Beauty and the Beast meets Feudal Japan. In that story, Mononoke is a large cat who takes on a human wife, the "Mononoke Princess."

Incorporating the storybook princess into the movie is a stroke of sly brilliance. The romantic heart of this movie involves a love triangle, where the heroic prince must choose between two women who carry the same name.

Most Miyazaki fans in the West had never heard of the 1980 version of Mononoke, created as a series of storyboards for a planned animation project which was scuttled, then published in the 1983 book Hayao Miyazaki Image Boards. A standalone storybook was published in Japan in 1997 to coincide with the movie, and was eventually published in North America by Viz Media in 2014.

Download My Ebooks For FREE on Amazon

Update: The free ebook promotion has ended, but the prices are now only 99 cents. Please pick up a copy. You can also purchase a paperback for $19.99, which is the ideal format for these great books.

Good news, everybody! My ebooks are FREE on Amazon from now until Sunday, December 10. Please download a copy of each and leave a reader review.

Zen Arcade: Classic Video Game Reviews features 140 classic video game reviews for NES, Super NES, Nintendo 64, Genesis, NEC Turbografx and Neo-Geo. Do you love retro games? Did you score that awesome Super NES Mini? Here's your guide. You've played the games, now read the book.

Pop Life features essays and stories on movies & television, music & audio, classic & modern video games, and politics & life. Oh, and there are a number of chapters on Hayao Miyazaki, Isao Takahata, Ghibli and anime. This book is awesome. It's funny and grouchy and feels like a classic rock double album.

Greatest Hits: An Anthology in Four Volumes is an anthology of stories, reviews and essays on pop culture and life. Read 26 chapters about Studio Ghibli. Read 20 chapters about the greatest video games ever made. Read about vinyl records and cool albums and great movies you shouldn't miss.

Remember, kids: the sooner you download my books, the sooner I'll get off your case and go back to posting Totoro pictures. I think that's a pretty fair bargain, don't you?

I Released Three Lousy Books

I'm trying not to go overboard like some desperate teenager in search of a prom date, so I'll keep this to a minimum. I wrote three books called Zen Arcade: Classic Video Game Reviews, Pop Life and Greatest Hits: An Anthology in Four Volumes. All three ebooks are now available on Amazon. The paperback editions are coming, as I'm only waiting for my proof copies to ensure quality.

Zen Arcade is a collection of 140 reviews for video games released on NES, Super NES, Nintendo 64, Sega Genesis, Turbografx-16 and Neo-Geo. It's a great read and an enlightening look at the history of classic games. There are a lot of personal stories in there, and more than a few grouchy wisecracks. It's also wickedly funny. At least I think so. But what do I know? There are no pictures, which ensures that no gamers will ever look at it.

Pop Life is a collection of essays and personal memoirs on popular culture and life. You'll read about movies, music, games and politics. You'll read my praises and rants on Studio Ghibli, Pixar, Metallica, DEVO, Miles Davis, Michael Jackson, the War on Terror, and the passings of many people who were dear to me. It's basically a mashup of The Beatles' White Album and The Shining. Again, no pictures. I have no idea what I'm doing.

Greatest Hits is a collection (surprise) of essays on movies, music, games and life. It's an anthology that includes chapters from the previous two books, plus two books that are still unfinished: "Videogame Classics" and "Conversations on Ghibli." Yes, this is the book with 26 Studio Ghibli chapters. Again, no pictures, just text. Who the heck signed off on this? What a rip. No wonder this book only sold five copies. This sucks. I'm going back to Pokemon Go.

Anyway, you can find the links to my books on the right-hand column on the screen. Simply click on the covers and you'll be sent to Amazon. You'll also see other projects that I've worked on over the years, including the Lupin the 3rd box set, Horus, Prince of the Sun, and the Mi Vecino Miyazaki books from Spain. I loved working on all of these. I never made a dime from any of 'em. Whatever. Nobody cares.

(Snark.)

Seriously, though, check out my books. I worked hard on these projects. If I'm lucky, I'll make enough money to afford a Happy Meal. It's good to have goals in life.

My New Books Are Now Available on Amazon Kindle

Good news, everybody! I am happy to report that my new books are now available for pre-order on Amazon. Launch Day is this coming Tuesday, November 21. All three titles will be available in ebook and paperback. Simply click on the cover images to go directly to the Amazon pages, where you can pre-order the titles for your Kindle apps and ebook readers.

During our "launch period" all three ebooks will be available for only 99 cents. This is a sale that will last for a limited time, after which they will return to their normal prices. I will announce when that time comes.

The paperback editions will be available on November 21 for $19.99. Each book is 6" x 9" and ranges from 350-450 pages. These are big books.

Enjoy the new books, and happy pre-ordering!

Mi Vecino Miyazaki Book Reaches 5th Edition

Mi Vecino Miyazaki, the excellent Spanish book dedicated to the films of Studio Ghibli, has now reached its fifth edition. This latest edition has been updated to include all the Ghibli movies released to this date, including The Tale of the Princess Kaguya and When Marnie Was There, The Red Turtle and Studio Ponoc.

In addition, the cover has been redesigned, keeping much closer to the follow-up book, Antes De Mi Vecino Miyazaki, as well as other animation books published by Diablo. I really like this design, it's very colorful and showcases all these wonderful movies in bold color and detail. The layouts have likewise been given a makeover, remaining as bold and inviting as ever, with generous use of screenshots and production artwork.

One unfortunate change, unfortunately, has been made to this book. In order to squeeze in the new chapters and updated content, authors Alvaro Lopez Martin and Marta Garcia Villar have removed the collaborators' contributions. These included short snippets from selected writers, including me. I sent them micro-reviews on several Studio Ghibli movies, and they published the piece on My Neighbors the Yamadas. That piece, and all the others, will no longer be available in the newest edition.

Combine these changes and additions to the new cover design, and it looks like the previous editions of Mi Vecino Miyazaki will become collectors' items. I hope you've already bought your copy so that you can show off to your friends in a few years.

If you haven't yet purchased this book, the latest edition of Mi Vecino Miyazaki is a must-have for all Studio Ghibli and animation fans. Highly, highly recommended.

DT Media: Check Out Our New Website

At long last, the DT Media website is now live! Please bookmark and visit.

DT Media is the name of my indie publishing label that specializes in the creative arts, including art, photography, books and zines. Our website features a pop culture blog, an Instagram gallery, and an ever-growing library of published books and zines.

This month, we will release three new books: Zen Arcade: Classic Video Game Reviews, Pop Life and Greatest Hits: An Anthology in Four Volumes. Please click these links to visit each title's page, which features cover art, book description, and selected chapters for browsing. These pages will continue to evolve in the coming days and weeks, as we will include review clips from readers and critics.

I've spent the last 18 months writing, editing and assembling these books. The covers are fantastic, the content is fantastic. Once the Amazon pages are up, I will write a formal post announcing all the details. Expect that to happen this week (cough, Thanksgiving).

As I've stated, DT Media also features a blog which will be filled with regular content. For now, I am publishing reviews and articles that also appear in the books, such as the Ponyo review as seen in the screenshot above. There will also be new content, so please check for regular updates.

Ghibli Blog will continue as always. As you can see, I've been working overtime since September to provide essential content for this site that you cannot find anywhere else: news, reviews, essays, fan art, and more.

As always, if you want to follow the latest news and developments at DT Media and Ghibli Blog, please subscribe to our newsletter. When you join, you will also receive a free zine that is totally awesome and will make you the most popular kid on your block.

Much thanks, as always, and thanks for your support.

Bocanada: A Journal of Pop Culture and the Arts - The New E-Zine From Ghibli Blog

Have you downloaded your free e-zine yet?

Many years ago (longer than I care to admit), I created zines to nourish my love of writing and popular culture. I wrote about Star Trek and science-fiction, video games, music, art, and the ups and downs of daily life. They were created on simple desktop publishing software, word processors, and an assortment of clip art and marker pens. It was very low-tech, but highly enjoyable. I even managed to score some freelance writing work at GamePro, which was tremendous fun

Ever since then, I wanted to return to zines. I even had recurring dreams about finding an old computer with long-forgotten websites that were still active, and communicating with old friends. 21 years later, while working on my multiple book projects, I thought it would be fun to finally take the plunge again and create a zine that I could share with my readers and fans. And so Bocanada Issue 1 was born.

Bocanada: A Journal of Pop Culture and the Arts. That long-winded title means, simply, that I get to write about whatever the heck I want, but mostly aimed in the same direction as my writings on Ghibli Blog and the new books: Zen Arcade, Pop Life and Greatest Hits.

For Ghibli Freaks, this issue includes essays on Kiki's Delivery Service, Princess Mononoke and My Neighbors the Yamada. For classic and retro video game fans, there are reviews of Altered Beast (Genesis), Sonic the Hedgehog (Genesis), Bonk's Adventure (TG-16), Mega Man (NES), and Street Fighter 2 Turbo (Super NES). For music lovers, we have articles on Miles Davis' 1974 jazz-fusion album Get Up With It and Sony's PS-X75 Biotracer Turntable. Finally, we have an art gallery of zine-worthy graffiti works created by me back in 2002.

The cover image is another one of my artworks, a 2005 digital painting created entirely on computer. The title is an homage to Gustavo Cerati's 1999 album, a glorious mashup of trip-hop (remember that?), Radiohead's Kid-A and The Beatles. The pages are "half-size," meaning that they are standard 8.5" x 11" pages folded in half. The zine is 48 pages in total, which matches the output of my old zines perfectly (they were 245 pages at standard size).

Bocanada was created for both physical and digital formats. I find the half-size format works perfectly for tablets and even smartphones. The pages are very readable and neatly designed without becoming too cluttered or dense. I created everything on Scribus, a freeware tool, which I suppose would disqualify me in the eyes of many zine publishers -- it's not a "real zine" unless everything is created on a typewriter, scissors and markers. Whatever.

Bocanada is available as a "perma-free" download, meaning the digital version will always be free. All you have to do is join my mailing list. In addition to receiving the zine, you will also receive regular email newsletters that feature the latest news and developments from DT Media (my indie publishing label) and Ghibli Blog, including the new books!

When is Bocanada Issue 2 coming? Soon. I'm still very busy with releasing the books, assembling the new DT Media website, and doing the usual promotional work (translation: hassling everyone with review copies and appearance requests). If we can assemble and publish the second issue in time for Thanksgiving, I'd be thrilled.

As always, thank you very much for your continued support of Ghibli Blog.

P.S. I keep mentioning the new books: Zen Arcade, Pop Life and Greatest Hits. Well, the books are finished and ready to roll out! As for release date, availability and price...join my mailing list and I'll share all the answers in my next newsletter.

Update (10/4 8:23pm): Bocanada now has a new cover design! I like it a lot, and hope you will, too.

Here Are My New Book Covers: Zen Arcade, Pop Life, Greatest Hits

Ladies and Gentlemen, here are the book covers to my upcoming books. The brilliant designers from 99 Designs created these great works, and I am forever in their debt. These just look amazing. I now turn to the skilled formatting designers to put everything together. Meanwhile, I will be working on setting up the new DT Media website, setting up the Amazon sales and author pages, and sending out review copies to pretty much everywhere.

When will these books finally be released? I'm still hoping for late October; Halloween would be nice. These titles will be available exclusively at Amazon, but later will be expanded to Barnes & Noble, Apple and Kobo at a later date. For now, I just want to concentrate attention on one single storefront before expanding.

I have not yet firmly decided on prices; I am currently thinking of $14.99 for the paperback and $4.99 for the ebook, but nothing is yet set in stone. There may also be some surprises for everyone on the mailing list, so if you're thinking of joining up, now's the time.

Finally, if you are a review critic for any media outlet, please contact me and I will send you copies of all three books as soon as they're available.

Zen Arcade: Classic Video Game Reviews

"Do you love retro video games? Are you a veteran collector, or a young player wondering where to begin? Zen Arcade collects 140 reviews of video games across six classic platforms: Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), Super NES, Nintendo 64, NEC Turbografx-16, Sega Genesis and SNK Neo-Geo. Author Daniel Thomas MacInnes, a video game writer for over 20 years, guides you through this living history with intelligence, humor and wit. Zen Arcade is a celebration of the vitality and power of classic video games to inspire and entertain."

Pop Life

"Pop Life is a collection of essays across four broad themes: film & television, music & hi-fi audio, video games, and the political & personal. Author Daniel Thomas MacInnes tackles every aspect of 'the pop life' with biting wit, humor and keen insight, bringing readers on an illuminating journey across the cultural landscape. This book follows in the tradition of Roger Ebert, Pauline Kael, Chuck Klosterman and Hunter S. Thompson, and will prove insightful, illuminating and entertaining for all readers."

Greatest Hits: An Anthology in Four Volumes

"Greatest Hits: An Anthology in Four Volumes is a compilation volume of selections from two current books (Zen Arcade, Pop Life), and two upcoming books (Videogame Classics, Conversations on Ghibli). Author Daniel Thomas MacInnes examines and dissects the pop culture universe: film and television, animation and live-action, music and audio, video and computer games, politics and current events with sharp wit, humor and insight."

DT Media: Book Cover Design Contests Underway

News on the upcoming books: I have begun cover design contests for my three titles at 99 Designs. I have supplied detailed notes on the books and what I'm looking for, which range from "exactly like this" to "I have no idea what I'm doing." Artists and illustrators will compete and the winners will create covers for the paperback and ebook editions.

Zen Arcade: Classic Video Game Reviews is a collection of 140 videogame reviews for NES, Super NES, Nintendo 64, Turbografx-16, Genesis and Neo-Geo. All the titles have been released on Nintendo's Virtual Console and similar digital platforms. Two more books in the series are planned if this one is successful.

The cover design recreates the style of Nintendo Wii game packaging, complete with the swirl on top with the DTM logo on top-right. There are a tangle of game controllers, some rainbow colors, and a bunch of empty space. I hope the designers really make this one shine.

Greatest Hits: An Anthology in Four Volumes is an anthology of essays from four books, including two that I'm still working on, "Videogame Classics" and "Conversations on Ghibli." Yes, this will be my first published writings on the never-ending Studio Ghibli book project.

The cover design is aiming for a tabloid style. I wanted to use Totoro instead of an LP/CD, but I can't get the copyrights from Ghibli. This may become a problem with my efforts to publish the Ghibli book down the line. Maybe the designers will surprise me with something amazing.

Pop Life is a collection of pop culture essays on film & television, music & audio, video games, and politics & current events. This is the most "Chuck Klosterman" of my three books, and also the largest of the three. I really love this one.

The cover design will be a recreation of Gustavo Cerati's 1999 Bocanada album, but with me on the cover. I'm strongly tempted to leave no text on the cover, which would look cool, but might prove confusing to the public. We'll see how it goes.

The 99 Designs contest runs for a full week, but the first round runs four days. As soon as the covers are finished, I'll hand things over to the formatting team, then we'll be ready for launch. Is there still time to launch before Halloween? Cross yer fingers, kids.