Next in my continuing educational series about Things That Want to Eat You (see my earlier post about Komodo dragons), I present: tigers.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7487583.stm

An incredibly lucky and dogged Indian (Does that count as Asia? What the hell, they’re connected) man has survived not only an attack by a man-eating tiger, but also the 10-hour journey to Calcutta to have his tiger-wounds treated at a hospital.

On the bright side, he is now the coolest man in all of India.

As Mr Halder fought the tiger he remembered that his father, Gour, had been killed in a similar attack.

He remembered? Uh, like he would ever forget THAT. Seriously.

It’s been a bad year for geekdom, and for Dragoncon guests in particular. First Robert Asprin (author of the hilarious Myth series of novels) passed away. Then Michael Turner (comic artist of Fathom) died after a long battle with cancer. Now Don S. Davis, beloved of many Stargate: SG1 fans has also passed away.

http://gateworld.net/news/2008/06/don_s._davis_1942-2008.shtml

Both Asprin and Davis were scheduled to be guests at this year’s Dragoncon. It’s a little disturbing to see their names on the ‘Cancellations’ list.  Canceled…by FATE!

Anyway, read some Myth novels, meditate before your Fathom poster, watch some Stargate, pour out a 40, whatever you feel is appropriate. The world has lost some formidable talent this year.

If you live anywhere near me, in Southwestern, Ohio, chances are you’ll be sitting indoors watching it rain, shaking your fist indignantly skyward in an impotent display of rage, and damning the sky-gods for ruining your holiday weekend.

So - when you’re done doing that (and assuming the sky gods haven’t roasted you with a well-placed thunderbolt for your mortal impertinence), here are a few things to do with your three-day weekend.

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Variety Asia reports that Japanese Star Wars fans attending the Star Wars Celebration Japan will be treated to a glimpse of the upcoming ‘Star Wars: The Clone Wars‘ CGI film, as well as the ‘Clone Wars‘ TV series, set to debut later this year. I have to admit my interest in all things Lucas has dwindled to a singularity, but I’m actually kinda, sorta, looking forward to ‘Clone Wars‘.

Japanese fans will be the first in the world to see clips from the new CG toon. produced by Lucasfilm Animation. Also, director Dave Filoni will fill in fans on the pic’s production process in a talk with Japanese animator Atsushi Takeuchi, whose credits include “Ghost in the Shell” and “The Sky Crawlers.”

The excellent martial arts site ‘Kung Fu Cinema‘ recently posted a rundown of the Wachowski Brothers’ Speed Racer followup, Ninja Assassin, which lays out in excruciating detail the slew of problems plaguing the production. Check it out:

Leaks include production pics (originally posted and then removed from Slash Film), a German newsprint photo of a Volkswagen’s hood decimated by shuriken and a complete spoilerific breakdown of the film’s first scene. There is also word from Comic Book Resources in an interview with screenwriter J. Michael Straczynski that the film’s entire shooting script was rewritten from scratch in three days and only six weeks before production began.

KFC also questions the casting of 80’s Ninja-flick superstar Sho Kosugi, but I have to side with the fans on that one - the mere prospect of seeing Mr. Kosugi on the big-screen again has me totally salivating, even if his role is a five-second cameo.

Hey, Geneon…how you doing? Haven’t heard from you in a while. You know, ever since you shut down Stateside distribution of all your product. Sorry that didn’t work out. I’ve been wondering if someone else would pick up that ball and run with it, and it looks like someone finally did…I hear Funimation’s pretty cool. Anyway, L8r - I gotta skate. Oh - you’ve got a press release for me to post? Well, I’ll post the juicy bits - nobody reads all that extraneous crap anyway.

Under the terms of the agreement, FUNimation Entertainment obtains the exclusive rights in North America to the manufacturing, marketing, sales and distribution of established Geneon titles, including Ergo Proxy, Hellsing Ultimate and Black Lagoon.

“Geneon is a strong producer, known for excellent production and quality of its anime series,” said Gen Fukunaga, president and CEO of FUNimation Entertainment. “We are pleased to partner with them and we are committed to the successful release of these series.”

“FUNimation’s momentum as the leading anime distributor continues to build,” said Yushin Soga, president and CEO of Geneon. “We are sure this partnership will only grow the prominence of our portfolio.”

A blind photographer? It sounds ludicrous - but stop to consider that Beethoven was deaf as a stone when he composed his greatest work, the mighty 9th Symphony. From that perspective, blind photography doesn’t seem that big a stretch.

Yutaka Meijo holds his breath to make sure his camera stays steady, carefully brings the object into focus and waits just a moment before clicking the shutter — relying only on his ears and a hunch.

“I take pictures relying on sound,” said the 18-year-old, who lost his sight when he was seven.

“But there’s just a feeling to it,” Yutaka said, as he took shots of his visually impaired friends playing table tennis, hitting a ping pong ball with a bell inside.

“I press the shutter button and don’t hesitate when I think the moment’s right. The moment can’t be brought back. That’s my secret for taking pictures,” he says.

Yutaka is among 23 youth photographers at a school for the blind in Yokohama, south of Tokyo, whose pictures are gradually drawing public attention.

“I can measure an object’s distance by ear,” blind 12-year-old Yuta Ueno said at a Tokyo exhibition of the children’s works where captions were written in both braille and traditional script.

Hats off to Kotaku’s Brian Ashcraft, who recently was approved for permanent residency in Japan. Bash (as he’s affectionately known over yonder) penned a handful of reviews for us back in tha’ day, which I’ll get around to re-posting in his honor.

Anyway, congrats Brian!

I’m not sure what to make of this one. 75-year-old Tran Trong Duyet, who held Republican Presidential nominee John McCain prisoner for five years in Hanoi, Vietnam, says he would cast his vote for McCain in the upcoming election and refers to him as an ‘old buddy’.

Mmm-kay…

“If I were an American voter, I would vote for Mr. John McCain,” Tran Trong Duyet said Friday, sitting in his living room in the northern city of Haiphong, surrounded by black-and-white photos of a much younger version of himself and former Vietnam War prisoners.

At the same time, he denies prisoners of war were tortured. Despite detailed POW accounts and physical wounds, Duyet claims the presumed Republican presidential nominee made up beatings and solitary confinement in an attempt to win votes.

Rating:  

Well friends, this may very well be the last edition of Yaoi Menace. I think I found the book that will put me off the genre forever.

Yaoi: Anthology of Boys’ Love Volume 1 from Yaoi Press is a collection of three short stories brought to life by international teams of writers and artists. Also, it sucks. Hard. No, that’s not a good thing.

The first story, The Price of Freedom, is written by Misa Izanaki and drawn by Yishan Studios. It begins when a family of what appear to be less-than-Yeti but more-then-human creatures rescues a young woman and her baby, who are lost in the forest. The child, Aren, is a half-incubus (wings, tail, horns etc.) and grows up with the Yeti family’s son, Kumari. Then one day Aren’s mother announces that they are going back to her family.

We meet Aren again years later, when he is the star attraction of a circus sideshow, where he plays demon to an ‘angel’ (a man who inexplicably has feathered wings, as opposed to Aren’s bat wings). The ‘angel’ happens to be the lover of the sideshow’s owner, and after work they get their kicks raping and humiliating Aren.

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