Rubenerd

Gainax accommodated my assignments and lack of time to review Gurren Lagann by largely creating a derivative episode from the previous one. Still, despite all the despair hope prevails! Right?

Plot: With Simon behind bars and entertaining the end of days with his old arch nemesis, Rossiu directs the remaining hope of humanity into the sky, leaving plenty of souls behind. Basically part two to the previous episode.

Context: We finally get a clear picture of what Earth in this universe looks like. Definitely not one we're inhabiting right now! Or is it Earth in the distant past, or at some point in the distant future?

Quotes: "Team Gurren has its own way of doing things". Damn straight.

Surreal: If someone who'd never Gurren Lagann before entered the room while I was watching thus, they would have seen a anthropomorphic chicken battling with Simon. I guess… that's no different to Foghorn Leghorn. I say, I say.

Drills: The power of the spiral knows no ends. Such forces even propel mighty space faring ships, and are strong enough to be detected by lunar evilness.

Priorities: Suddenly seem very different when you have a family, don't they?

Heart tugging: Seeing the ship leave orbit with all those left behind, I choked up a bit in the same way I choked up when I watched Titanic and saw the lifeboats leaving the rest of the passengers behind. That said, I did watch Titanic when I was 12 or something, and Leonardo DiCaprio was just dreamy.

Character development: After painting Rossiu as cold and a little vindictive in recent episodes, this time around he seemed more human. The artists drew him with panda eyes even darker than the ones I seem to always have, and we got plenty of shots of the beads of sweat on his face. Despite ultimately going forward with his plan, I could empathise more with the bind he found himself in, and how ultimately he felt he had little choice.

More character development: After struggling for so long, Simon seemed finally ready to accept his fate as he watched the ship take off, and leaving him behind. A temporary lapse, or a change in attitude completely?

Conclusion: Are the comments Anti-Spiral-Nia torments Simon with true? In trying to defend everyone, has Rossiu lost his humanity and ultimately achieved the Anti-Spiral goal? Will despair prevail?

Nah… Yoko is back! And this is why we love her now.

CityRail's yellow colour scheme in Sydney certainly made their older rolling stock look better, but I reckon their 1980s-designed Tangara trains looked classier before.

Photo taken by Trent "Raichase" Nicholson in 2007. They look like this now.

Speaking of trains, it seems Sydney is taking another shot at a contactless stored valued public transport card, and it finally has a name!

Photo by this rather dodgy fellow on Flickr.

EZLink cards make sounds like supermarket checkouts

I only just recently moved to Sydney, but was already well aware of ticketing problems here having studied the farce in high school commerce class. HSC commerce class taken abroad, ironically enough ;).

Promised in time for the Olympic games in 2000, public transport in Sydney was supposed to have an integrated contactless stored value card for trains, buses and ferries, along with a spiffy new logo they could have used an episode of The Simpsons to promote. Unfortunately, a series of legal squabbles over who should develop it, software problems, details of its operation, privacy concerns and usual state government ineptitude killed the project.

These smart cards aren't new. In the last decade Hong Kong, London and Singapore to name a few have implemented Octopus, Oyster and EZLing card systems respectfully, and most recently Canberra — a city with a fraction of the population and resources of Sydney — has adopted their own.

Take two!

As of 2011 we still use paper cards in Sydney, though apparently this is about to change:

The Opal card is the name of the contactless smartcard ticketing system that is planned to be introduced on public transport in Sydney by 2012. The smart card is expected to replace the existing Automated Fare Collection System on all CityRail, Sydney Buses, Western Sydney Buses, Sydney Ferries and Newcastle Buses & Ferries services along with incorporating all private-sector bus and ferry operators into the integrated ticketing system.

What's important now though is the card finally has a name as of yesterday: The Opal Card. When asking for names, I submitted "late". Oh well, can't win them all.

Yeah, so?

As a public transport advocate and aficionado, I'm a completely impartial source when I claim contactless stored value cards are great because:

• travellers don’t have to purchase tickets on a regular basis
• the system calculates fares as they’re needed, rather than travellers having to calculate before buying each ticket
• they save us from masses of dead paper tickets strewn everywhere
• they allow speedier validation which helps get people off buses and through stations more quickly

Of course, the downside of such a system is the movement of people can be more easily tracked, though this can be somewhat mitigated through the purchase of the cards with cash, and by making some nonsensical trips every now and then to places you wouldn't normally frequent. It's a great excuse to explore :).

Anyway, with plans showing a rollout for 2012 for ferries and with other modes of public transport soon following, I predict we'll have our new ticketing system by around 2035, give or take a couple of years for elections and their effect on political priorities. Not that I'm cynical or anything!

Westfield Group, one of the largest shopping centre operators in the world, has launched a find-my-car iPhone app. The system uses a series of license plate reading cameras dotted throughout their multi-level car parks. Westfield said police could also use it to find stolen or unregistered vehicles. (Hello, slippery slope.)
~ skegg on Slashdot

I take public transport, so people track me with my purchased tickets. In Singapore with proximity stored value cards, this is even easier. As a kid I went all the way out to Jurong East and Pasir Ris just to muddy and confuse their "downtown expat" profile of me. I was a wild, out of control teen ;).

As to this Westfield story, it rubs me the wrong way but I suppose it was only inevitable.

Possibly the darkest episode of Gurren Lagann so far. In going after this enemy, are they losing their own humanity?

Plot: With the increasingly violent unrest of the populace now they're aware the moon is to be hurtled towards the Earth (always a concern), Rossiu finds his scapegoat, but not before using him to defend Kamina City once last time.

Relationships: I definitely don't condone Rossiu's actions, but I can understand from his perspective why he did them. At least, I think I can. He's a character who's getting harder and harder to read as the series progresses.

Comic relief: The chair, has a mind, of its own! Family guy reference of a Star Trek reference ;). Given the heavy nature of the episode, the antics in the design room while formulating a new theory for a class of weapon were sorely needed. I would love to have him as one of my university lecturers and tutors.

Design: The inventiveness of Gainax continues to amaze me. A veritable tree of ships?

Tactics: Instead of exploding these self-decaying devices, draw them out to the desert and destroy them there. Not only that, but deal the final blow with an energy weapon that draws it's strength from a… spiral! Just brilliant :).

Homages: The courtroom was almost identical to the courtroom on Qo'noS that the innocent Kirk and McCoy were tried in Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country. I'll stop observing these Star Trek references when Gainax stops making them!

Loopholes: Simon is to wait for the end in a prison cell, granting him ample time to formulate something. Or to have something formulated for him. Because he can't go… right?

Mindf*ck: After being thrown in prison, we see… Viral! I suppose it was to be expected, two episodes ago we saw him being apprehended.

Heart tugging: Simon seeing the engagement ring he bought for Nia on her hand since she transformed into a cold messenger for the Anti-spirals. Still, it suggests a small element of her past survived her transition. A possible source of hope?

Unanswered questions: Is Rossiu's pride going to be their downfall? Sure they have an amazing new ship that's been hidden from them all this time, and they have a new weapon, but surely they'll need Gurren Lagann again… right? I suppose without Simon it's useless. Surely they can't do what they plan to do to Simon, right?

Conclusion: Are the lives of people worth using as pawns for political motives? Will humanity, decency and compassion be regained before the government charged with protecting people ends up inflicting damage themselves? Something to think about.

For your consideration, my adventure with getting LibreOffice running optimally on the KDE spin of Fedora. Not too hard :).

While KOffice and the Calligra Suite perform better on KDE (for obvious reasons) and I prefer their use for my own ODF needs, I've found LibreOffice still handles Microsoft Office documents the best, even ones that are saved in those terrible Microsoft OOXML-based formats. I use the term "OOXML-based" given even Microsoft Office doesn't strictly conform to their own ratified standard.

Method one: downloading from LibreOffice.org

For those wanting the latest bleeding-edge release, downloading the RPMs directly from LibreOffice.org is the way to go, and the good news is the RedHat integration RPM even lets KDE pick up the newly installed applications.

The downside is that the GTK+ interface seemingly doesn't inherit any theme, even if you've specified one in your KDE settings. The result is an otherwise usable office suite that looks even more out of place in a Qt desktop than usual. There may be a way around this, but for now I just opted for method two.

Method two: Fedora repos

For those using the default Gnome install of Fedora, you can simply fire up a Terminal and issue this obfuscated command:

% su
# yum groupinstall "Office/Productivity"

I wish I could just as easily install office productivity into my brain, sometimes its hard to garner enthusiasm for writing reports and the like. But I digress.

The problem with this approach is it introduces a lot of Gnome dependencies I don't want or need on my beautiful KDE desktop, so I prefer installing each component separately. For example:

% su
# yum install libreoffice-calc
libreoffice-draw
libreoffice-impress
libreoffice-writer

Running this command didn't introduce many Gnome dependencies at all, leading me to think another LibreOffice application I don't use needs them. In any case, I fire up these applications and they look and perform as much like a Qt app as a GTK+ app with the correct theme can.

If you run LibreOffice (or even OOo) on KDE, I'd love to hear how you use it.

Star Trek meets Gurren Lagann in this second story arc. Kinda.

Plot: Having finally understood and come to terms with the imminent lunar based threat against their species, our humans in this saga demand restraint and discipline against the one person who has defended them.

Art: At the risk of repeating myself (repeating myself, repeating myself) from the previous episode, the cityscapes and art were even more breathtaking than before. The fact Gainax hasn't released Gurren Lagann in Blu-Ray or another form of 1080p media was once a major inconvenience, but now it borders on criminality. Just saying.

Light: Supreme ditto. Does that exist, "supreme" ditto? Sounds like a pizza. Wait, we're discussing Gurren Lagann, not Railgun, Angel Beats or Code Geass.

Explanations: Amongst the issues I've raised with this series in the past, one has been their incredibly speedy technological progress from subterranean dwellers to futuristic city dwellers. After reanimating the former Spiral King in a large, Futurama-esque jar, Rossiu learns of the spiral power that gives humans the power to progress so rapidly… and pose a threat.

Mindf*ck: I'd long anticipated the enemy's actions weren't as black and white as they seemed, but it does seem Our Heroes really had no idea who the real enemy was. That said, that Spiral King was still incredibly obtuse, and only by reanimating his corpse without emotions were they able to learn the whole truth (Nia aside).

Science fiction: Lots of Star Trek here. Their enemies fly ships that bear an uncanny similarity to the Enterprise-D, defended by energy fields we'd call shields. Finally, the idea of a civilisation wanting to neutralise a potential challenger before they can advance was the plot of Star Trek First Contact. The anti-spirals are The Borg!

Quotable quotes: "Shame he's not a mecha… THAT we could fix".

Relationships: In his (albeit understandable) capacity as scapegoat hunter, Rossiu further strains his relationship with Simon. I hope we see a resolution of this, they worked so well together in the past.

Homages: Was it just me, or did it look as though Evil Nia transformed into an Evangelion-eque character with one of their plugsuit things? I know very little about Evangelion, but lived with people intimately familiar with the series a few years ago!

Heart tugging Will Simon get his beloved Nia back, and ipso facto will we, the viewers, get her back? That reminds me, I still haven't found a[n affordable] Nia figure anywhere.

Absense: Yoko, and the fabled "Gainax bounce" which I was informed of today. Are they setting it up so she's instrumental in saving them in the future?

Meaning: Essentially, this series has taken the concept of Fibonacci numbers we see in nature but can't yet explain, and added meaning to them, and the plot for a story. The idea of everything from galaxies to the double helix being a spiral, and therefore the essense of who we are… I thought that was a really beautiful concept, and only makes me want to get a drill to wear around my neck even more!

Conclusion: Despite my two favourite characters being taken out of action for reasons that weren't their fault, I otherwise loved this episode. While I can understand some people may have reserveations about some of the fanservice (of which this episode was surprisingly absent of), I don't grok those claiming the series is shallow. I'm looking at you, Sydney Morning Herald writers!

Ah let’s see now, what do you folks have here? Hmm, a Krusty Burger… that doesn’t sound too appetising…

Sometimes I find it fun to trawl through the Rubenerd archives and see what I thought was interesting years ago! In this case, this was what I discussed five years ago:

• First Blu-ray Disc Drive Won’t Play Blu-ray Movies
• Songs Names with Song in Them on Wikipedia

Interesting how far we've come. BD movies still aren't supported by too many computers, and that Wikipedia article is long gone. Good thing I quoted it :).

A lot happened in the Gurren Lagann universe in seven years.

Plot: In the intervening years since the previous episodes, Kamina City (sniffles) was built up around the ruins of Teppelin, the former royal capital. Of course, we join them just as something big is about to go down.

Transition: As a science fiction fan, such stories often want to jump further into the future to display the ramifications or effects of certain events. Some seem stilted and tacked on, but Gainax did a great job with Gurren Lagann. Kiyoh's pregnancy and Simon's proposal tied the timelines together, and they didn't seem too bound by the rules of their previous story arc. If any of that makes sense, I'm not a media student!

Art: As close to City pr0n as you could want. Hugely detailed skylines and streams of lights along streets at night. Their landscapes in previous episodes had been pretty amazing, but I revel in art such as this. It was one of the reasons why I enjoyed Bakemonogatari and Railgun so much.

Light: Related to art (or is art related to light?). The optimism of this new world they've created was reflected in the abundant light, and was quickly replaced with darkness when replaced with fear. Hey, maybe I should be a media student.

Character development: It was great seeing them all again. Yoko and the world's greatest fabulous engineer seemingly haven't aged a day! Simon and Rossiu are older now, and still contrast each other's personalities. In previous episodes this worked to their advantage, but in this arc it seems their relationship is pretty strained. Something to keep an eye on.

The enemy: A million apes. We'd heard the former Spiral King mention a potential lunar threat. We finally got a glimpse of what he meant, something which no doubt will form the plot for the upcoming episodes.

Gainax references: Was it just me, or has Darry turned into the spitting image of Nono from Diebuster, right down to the eye colour and hair?! Though she does seem a little more serious ;).

Nostalgia: They called it "Kamina City", and erected a gigantic statue for their fallen hero. This series is so full of win. sniffles

Social commentary: People who grow up in comfort and excess end up being lazy, and the cost of progress in technology and living standards is… roads choked with traffic. Is that progress? And who would have thought Gainax would make us think.

Divergence: Simon had bureaucracy thrust upon him, but Yoko was able to avoid it by heading off on her trippy hovering bike, more reasonable clothing and awesome new set of schades. Sorry, "shades" (its a reflex for someone with my last name). Something tells me we'll be seeing her again though, and that this coalition of strong willed people might not last.

Suspension of disbelief: Surely a civilisation that progressed from underground caverns to a state of the art city with gigantic computer screens and futuristic lighting in seven years would have more efficient and technologically advanced methods of conducting a population count that a simple census. Why not orbiting sensor grids, ala Star Trek? They can send ships to the moon, so it would be possible!

Originality: The Gurren Lagann universe was so different and had contraptions powered by human spirit. The Gurren Lagann Universe 2.0 has… a city with cars and tall buildings. I have to be honest, while it did look terribly futuristic, it was all rather… predictable. Felt like Gainax missed an opportunity to create something truly unconventional.

Breaking the fourth wall: I suppose this isn't really an example of this given the characters themselves do come from the series, but that standing cutout of Simon and Kamina in the restaurant made me smile, if only for the fact I've seen this exact prop in shops ;).

Surprises: You expect Nia to respond to Simon in the affirmative, but of course she doesn't… until later. And then it's intentionally left vague. Geez, these folks sure know how to build suspense! Oh yeah and Nia… I hope she's okay, she's my favourite character.

Conclusions: A solid start to the next story arc, with and plenty of unanswered questions and cliffhangers. Was also great to see them all again in this amazing new setting.