Shibuya Goldfish 1 by Aoi Hiroumi

Giant goldfish terrorize Japan and a small group of survivors try to figure out what to do next.

Shibuya Goldfish is an impulse buy that I never heard anything about. The premise made me laugh and I had to see what it was about. Giant goldfish fly around, say inane phrases, and eat everything and everyone in sight. What's not to like? The entirety of society has halted. Anything that moves is eaten, including rescue helicopters. Only small patches of humanity exist now, struggling to survive. No one knows where they came from or how this happened, but it seems to be contained in Shibuya. Somehow, the city is contained within a giant fishbowl and it no longer has access to utilites.

As the story goes on, the abilites of the goldfish are slowly revealed. They are quite nearsighted, relying on smell and sound with the help of the lateral line organs to find food (ie people). The creatures travel in schools and sleep at night or in the shade. They also lay eggs everywhere, which adds a layer of terror when there are miniature versions of these creatures running around. Plus they can be laid inside living people who wouldn't be aware of it until they hatched. I love this body horror aspect that makes the survivors distrust other people as well as the obvious threat.

The survivors are a range of people, including high school students (Hajime Tsukiyada and his crush Fukakusa), a wannabe teen idol Alisa Usui, her middle school aged fan, and police officer Anko Yukino. Each person reacts to the crisis differently. Some try to charge out and get eaten. Others try to circumvent the goldfish by dousing themselves in perfume and moving silently. Some fall in love while some pretend to fall in love or make friendships. Still others simply sacrifice those around them to survive. I enjoyed seeing truly different types of people who range from incredibly selfish to self sacrificingly altruistic.

Shibuya Goldfish is a fun horror manga that takes the threat of giant man-eating goldfish seriously. This is what I wanted from Junji Ito's Gyo, which had more weird aspects that went way off the rails. Many of the situations are pretty typical for apocalypse situations and I hope the next book will expand outside of that. I am excited to see where else this story is going to go and the next one will follow different characters. The second book isn't out until October 30th. I will pre-order so I can read it the first day it comes out and mope around until the next one comes out.

My rating: 4.5/5 fishmuffins

Shark Movie Mini-Reviews: Deep Blue Sea (1999) and Jaws 2 (1978)

I am watching delightfully bad shark movies in preparation for the release of The Meg.

* Deep Blue Sea (1999)

Dr. Susan McAlester developed a way to harvest serum to cure Alzheimer's from shark brains. Unfortunately, she didn't tell anyone she had to genetically engineer the sharks to have bigger brains in order to harvest enough serum, making them much smarter.

Deep Blue Sea is a cheesy good time with killer sharks, people getting eaten, and an whole underwater science facility being flooded. There's a good mix of characters with a bunch of scientists, a cook, a corporate executive, and a shark wrangler. All of these characters are pretty stereotypical and don't hold too many surprises. The best characters are LL Cool J as the cheerful cook and Samuel L Jackson as executive Russell Franklin. The worst character is Susan who seems to think all this life lost is worth it. She's a parody of a scientist in this anti-science film.

These sharks are ridiculously fast, smart, and all produced with animatronics or CGI. There are only 3 sharks, a mated pair and their offspring, but they certainly eat a lot of people. For the time, the CGI was amazing, but it hasn't aged well. This isn't the only thing threatening the characters since there's a huge storm preventing helicopters and the facility is being flooded floor by floor. It makes for an exciting film even though many of the characters can be flat. Watch this if you want some good, mindless, cheesy fun.

My rating: 2/5 fishmuffins

* Jaws 2 (1978)

Years after the first film, Brody and his family still live and work on Amity Island. A shark seems to be killing people in the ocean again, but it's attributed to boat accidents and the like. Brody is let go from his job after scaring vacationers out of the water and wildly shooting at blue fish. Is there a shark or is Brody simply traumatized from his past?

Jaws 2 brings back almost the entire cast of the first film (except for Hooper and Quint), but is not nearly as successful. Brody is his usual everyman hero and fights to save people even when everyone thinks he's wrong. His wife has a job this time and seems less sympathetic than before because she's more on the side of the financial success of the island. Miraculously, the mayor kept his job and is back to his old tricks, discrediting Brody the minute he says shark. Brody's kid Mike is now a teenager (accompanied by a bunch of new and annoying friends plus a love interest to impress) and still disobeys his father and acts like it's the end of the world when he has to get a part time job.

This film isn't good. The dialogue is stilted and unnatural. The situations are completely ridiculous. For instance, the first shark encounter has a woman "accidentally" (it looked completely on purpose) pouring gasoline on herself and the boat and somehow causing an explosion, which should have also killed the shark. It clearly should have exploded as well, but somehow managed to escape with a bit of a facial burn. It wants revenge! Of course the lying teenagers get stranded with a shark circling them and Brody has to come in to save them. If you want a good shark movie, this isn't for you. However, the cheesiness and campiness are entertaining if you just want some shark craziness.

My rating: 2/5 fishmuffins

Friend Request by Laura Marshall

In 1989, Louise had the choice between a real friendship or a hollow friendship with acceptance to the cool crowd. She chose the cool crowd and succeeded in making Maria's life hell with cruel pranks. In 2016, Louise is a divorced single mother who works as an independent interior designer and dotes on her son. One day, she receives a friend request from Maria, who has been missing since prom night 1989 and is presumed dead. Threatening messages follow and Louise has to confront her uncomfortable past and the people from it to find out what actually happened to Maria.

Friend Request is a thriller novel about the past coming back to haunt wrongdoers. Louise is pretty insufferable and spends most of her time bemoaning her teenage mistakes and mooning over her ex-husband who replaced her with a younger woman. Right from the beginning, their relationship was creepy because she said they were everything to each other and didn't bother having any friends. The way she spoke, he seemed to tell her (maybe in not so many words) that no one would want her if they knew what she did. She keeps saying how she's changed, but then goes back to those old bad habits and clearly hasn't. Her penchant for lying to police over and over after someone died is really frustrating and does nothing at all to help her.

The novel is told in chapters from 2016 and from 1989, so we get to see first hand just how Louise was as a teenager. I fundamentally don't understand her as she oscillates for real friends and fake popular friends. It's abundantly clear that Sophie, queen bee, only wants Louise as a "friend" to do her dirty work, to make fun of, and to make herself feel better. Maria wanted to be her real friend and support each other, but then Louise would be the target of those same pranks. Maria also had rumors about her swirling around her about what happened at her old school and that she was promiscuous even though she was harassed by a stalker. Louise gets more and more entrenched in the popular crowd until she commits an unforgiveable act.

Friend Request is a frustrating book with a horrible main character. She never seemed to act in her own best interests. I kept reading to find out what the horrible act was in her past and see what other secrets would be revealed. The ending wasn't suprising. I'm surprised I read the whole book and Laura Marshall's next book has to be incredibly intriguing for me to pick it up after this one.

My rating: 1/5 fishmuffins

Jaws (1975)

It's Police Chief Brody's first summer on Amity Island when a young woman's remains wash up on the beach. The medical examiner identifies it as a shark attack and Brody is quick to mobilize his team to close the beach. The mayor puts a stop to it due to the city making the majority of its funds during the Fourth of July weekend, but Brody knows he's wrong and has no recourse to do anything until someone is attacked by the shark.

Jaws is the only good, serious shark movie. All of the other ones take the formula it created and riff of that with cheesy effects, campy tone, and bad acting. For Jaws, the acting, music, and writing all contribute to making it the classic it is and making it the first summer blockbuster. Roy Scheider as Brody is an everyman hero that many people can relate to. He's afraid of the water and new at his job. He's not particularly skilled or learned, but he wants to help people. The scene where the woman who lost her son to the shark yells at him and slaps him shows his true character. He knew he did his best and it wasn't his fault. However, he lets her say her piece and get her anger out because it's what she needed.

Hooper, on the other hand, is an abrasive marine biologist who doesn't care about the politics or social niceties when lives are in danger. Quint is really only in it for the money and the thrill of hunting the most dangerous shark he's ever faced. As rude and awful as he is, he's a lot of people's favorite because of his stories, his "doll's eyes" speech, and his insane furvor. The most deplorable character of all time is the mayor who time and time again keeps the beaches open because the local businesses would suffer. He represents everything wrong with the political right and only sees the error of his ways on the Fourth of July when people are attacked by the shark in front of the press.

The music represents the main characters and is responsible for all of the tension in the film. It's very apparent when the music is played live along with the film and I highly recommend the experience. The cheerful adventure theme represents the hodgepodge team of men trying to take down this shark with only one experienced man and blundering through it. The most famous theme (which is really only two notes over and over) is the shark. It's one of my favorites of all time. When it's heard, I frantically guess where the shark will appear. The music shows its drive to kill and get revenge. This along with the scarce views of the entire shark make this film incredibly suspenseful. If you haven't seen Jaws, you're in for a treat.

My rating: 5/5 fishmuffins

The Dark Descent of Elizabeth Frankenstein by Kiersten White

Elizabeth Lavenza started out as a penniless orphan with little access to food and affection. Her guardian leaves her arms covered in bruises, leading Elizabeth to seek solace outdoors at night and hiding in the forest. One day, her guardian takes her to the Frankenstein home essentially to sell the young girl. Elizabeth meets Victor, a dour and odd boy. Elizabeth makes herself indispensible to him to ensure that she can stay in the household with its access to education, food, and clothing. Once they are older, Victor goes off to school and cuts contact with her. Her place in the household is tenuous as ever after the passing of Victor's mother and the Frankenstein's financial problems. When the patriarch goes on a trip, Elizabeth takes her best friend Justine to track down Victor and secure her future at any cost.

The Dark Descent of Elizabeth Frankenstein is a retelling of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein from the perspective of Elizabeth. In the original novel, Elizabeth doesn't have much of a presence beyond being beautiful, dressing in white, and being threatened by the monster. The story is very different in this one. Elizabeth has manufactured a perfect facade to be exactly the woman Victor wants and never lets him see the real. She can never be smarter than him and constantly flatters him. The white dress was chosen to make her look as frail, harmless, and unassuming as possible. She made herself indispensable by smoothing over his mistakes, teaching him how to better navigate social niceties, telling him stories, and fawning over him in exchange for education, a roof over her head, food, and material goods. Unfortunately, the education provided doesn't translate to anything practical, so she has to keep her position in the Frankenstein household. The real Elizabeth is wild and doesn't care what others think. She's not afraid to travel with Justine and find Victor to both save him and herself. You might think her behavior is selfish and manipulative, but this is the situation she was given and she is determined to survive.

Victor, on the other hand, is both fragile and callous at once. He's prone to deep depressions, explosive rage, and social ineptitude. He is used to everyone doing anything he wants and having everything essentially handed to him. Elizabeth taught him how to be basically acceptable to society, but he shows his true self to her. His future was determined from birth. Despite his privilege, Victor is callous and seems to not understand basic human emotions. He doesn't have to learn as a noble and with so many people scrambling to clean up each of his messes. As Elizabeth travels through Ingolstadt trying to find him, it's apparent that his arrogance, detachment, and brilliance leave an impression on each person they meet on his trail. I love this portrayal of Victor because he's awful in the original novel: whiny, not willing to face the consequences of his actions, and all around horrible. There is also an explanation for the original novel and its inaccuracies because it's Victor's journal.

The Dark Descent of Elizabeth Frankenstein is amazing. I love the more realistic re-imagining of these characters the plots. There are critiques of the male dominated society, the flawed justice system, and the abuse of the mental health field. Elizabeth eventually has to find out who she is without being an actor for Victor and it's a relatable experience. I wish the monster would have been in it more with a more established relationship to other characters. A lot of people complained about how scary and gory it was, but, as a diehard horror fan, I wasn't impressed with that aspect. However, the spin on the story and tweaks to events and characters are amazing. Highly recommended.

My rating: 4.5/5 fishmuffins

Unfriended: Dark Web (2018)

Matias O'Brien claims he bought a used laptop on Craigslist and prepares for a game night with his friends. He tries to talk to his girlfiend and programs crash left and right. When he signs in as the remembered user, half a dozen women start messaging him about getting them plane tickets. Snooping further into the computer and showing it to his friends on Skype, the memory appears full with no files until her uncovers hidden videos of people doing everyday things. Then he gets to the bottom of the list and finds much more horrific videos of women held captive and abducted from their beds. The computer's owner gets into contact with Matias and threatens all of his friends and his girlfriend if he doesn't get the computer back.

Unfriended: Dark Web takes the form of the first film and replaces the supernatural enemey with dark web denizens. As with the first movie, the entire film is a computer screen so we watch as Matias Skypes with his friends, Facebook messages, searches on Youtube and Google, and snoops around his stolen computer. I like that the programs and websites are ones people actually use instead of weird made up ones that end up feeling cheesy. The Dark Web of course figures largely with its reputation for urban legend level stories, specifically paying people to be kidnapped, tortured, and killed for the buyers' amusement. This particular syndicate is populated by mysterious, faceless people with the ability to hack into computers and cameras. They also seem to know what each character will do before they do it, which was the only real flaw of the film for me. The world goes outside of their homes so video chat on phones and surveillance footage of main characters trying to escape, fighting, and of course dying.

Besides abandoning the supernatural angle, the characters are so much better than the first movie. This group of friends are all at least college age and easy friends. They play Cards Against Humanity over Skype while they catch up on major events in their lives. Matias is the worst character because he basically refuses to learn sign language to better communicate with his deaf girlfriend Amaya, who rightfully thinks he's being immature and selfish. My favorite characters are Nari and Serena, a newly engaged couple going through a troubling time. Not only are they adorable together, but they also had the most sensible reaction to the whole situation and tried to do something to stop it. Their other friends are Damon (an English computer tech) and AJ (a conspiracy theorist and Youtuber). Their conversations and decision making were pretty well founded and logical. The friends were the worst thing about the first Unfriended and the best thing about this new one.

Unfriended: Dark Web has only one real flaw and it's a pretty well constructed horror film. The ending was more intense than I expected. It also has two endings in theaters and I loved the ending I saw. I'll probably see the second one when it comes out on DVD. I honestly didn't have high expectations coming in, but Dark Web had a lot of tension, surprising death scenes, and decent characters to actually care about. I would highly recommend it to people who liked The Den.

My rating: 4/5 fishmuffins

The Cheerleaders by Kara Thomas

Five years ago, five cheerleaders died: two in a car accident, two in a random murder, and one by suicide. The city of Sunnybrook was devastated and the cheerleading team was disbanded permanently. In the present, Monica becomes obsessed with her sister's suicide nearing the anniversary. She finds her sister's cell phone in her stepdad's desk. By itself, it isn't too suspicious, but he was also the first officer on the car accident scene and the officer who killed the supposed murderer. Is there more to these deaths than just random coincidence? Can Monica find out who killed all these girls?

The Cheerleaders is a teen thriller of a teenage girl going through a lot all at once. Monica had an abortion right before the beginning of the book and she's still cramping and bleeding afterwards. She pushes through it to try out for the dance team and is in agony. No one seems to know but her mom whose only response is that she wants Monica to learn something from it. Abortion isn't said in so many words (even though I wish it were), but it's heavily implied. I wish Thomas would have just said it if she is going to tackle the subject matter. On top of this, it's coming up to the 5th anniversary of her sister's death. Monica decides to delve into the deaths because some things just don't add up.

Monica delves into her sister Jen's life and finds out things she never knew while gathering a list of suspects. Jen's life wasn't as perfect as it seemed and she was going through a bit of a crisis. Her friends are changing, sniping at each other, and finding other interests (some of them illegal). Chapters from Jen's perspective are placed intermittently through the novel, showing what happened from her perspective. Mirroring her sister, Monica makes a new friend scorned by the school and all but abandons her own friends. As she gets more and more entrenched in this investigation, Monica gets into more and more trouble, sneaking around, lying, and hurting those around her. She can see the damage she's doing, but is still compelled to go forward. I felt for her and understood her motivation even if I disagreed with her actions.

The Cheerleaders is the best of all the thrillers I've been reading lately. The only flaw was how everything is tied up in the end. The last scene shows something that was never revealed during the rest of the book. It was an interesting reveal that told more about a character, but it was hamfistedly tacked on to the end. It's fine to have some loose ends. Real life has cold cases and unsolved mysteries all the time. Or integrate it into the story more organically. Other than that, I enjoyed the mystery and the twists and turns of the story.

My rating: 4/5 fishmuffins