ex machina
Gather up your wallets, everyone. It’s time for a moralistic defense of capitalism.
A few weeks ago, I posted another review for the New York-Tokyo crew, because they hooked me up with an advance screener of Ex Machina, the latest Appleseed anime adaptation, and I was (mostly) appreciative. Check out the review if you want to know my thoughts on it, but it probably won’t matter to you if you don’t give a shit about Appleseed. Here, though, I have some stories to tell you about how I try to do my part to maintain the output that fuels this little site, and my life in general.
Despite having just seen the movie for free and finding it unlikely that I’d be in a hurry to repeat the experience, I bought the DVD upon its release. Now, I didn’t do this because I have some desperate and endless need to purchase goods that I think will fill my time, not to mention the bottomless void in my life where love and compassion once flourished. Seriously. Nor did I do it to satisfy some compulsive and inexplicable urge to build an insurmountable fortress-like wall of media in my apartment to prove as a warning and a heralding of my oft-questioned idiosyncrasies. Nope. I bought the DVD because I wanted to give something back to a perceived system, in an effort to keep it functional. I had gotten a several hours of entertainment from the collective forces that created the work, and I wanted to acknowledge that appreciation. That, and I thought the special edition steelbook case was super pretty.
I’m not going to get into too many details here, but the anime industry has been in some trouble lately. Basically, this is because people are generally impatient, cheap and entitled. But also because people love anime. As such, free subtitled versions of Japanese TV anime can be distributed across the vast expanses of the internet within days of the initial broadcast in Japan. Of the musings on Japanese TV you’ll see here, many viewings have been made possible by this process, born of boredom, greed and stinginess, but also of people’s desire to share that which they love. Unfortunately, nobody having anything to do with the production of these works sees any money as a result, and new shows lack funds for development. Sure, arcane business machinations get in the way so that buying your favorite band’s t-shirt at their concert often gives them more support than buying their CD at Best Buy. Still, I’m compelled to emphasize and require in myself an appreciation and process of recompense when life has been improved in one way or another. As such, even though I’m probably not going to sit through over a hundred and sixty episodes (and counting) of Bleach ever again in my life, I’ll still buy the DVDs as soon as they’re licensed and released here. Because my world would be particularly shitty if suddenly, art and entertainment stopped being in it.
Now, I should note that, while I’ve been trying to be all ethical and shit up in here, I was disappointed in my disappointment with the flick, which also rippled forth with monetary effect. I had really wanted to love the movie. Yes, because I’ve loved Appleseed since junior high and everything, but more than that, because I really wanted to buy amazing toys that had been released for the film. But, while I could easily stomach dropping a couple bills on the DVD, in the end I couldn’t justify a few hundred bucks for the toys. Have you ever had a moment like that? Where you had your heart set on buying something, maybe a pair of shoes, maybe a contract on someone’s life, but for one reason or another, you were prevented from making that purchase? When it happens to me, I get an odd, joyous feeling like I’ve found money. So, of course, I went off and spent it at the wonderful Nucleus Gallery store on an armload of prints and books.
I don’t rent video games or movies anymore, nor do I buy them used. Mainly because I want the people who inspire or entertain me, and not some jackass who started a video conglomerate or regretted a drunken internet purchase, to receive some reward for their toiling. Sometimes, it means that I’m forced to exercise caution and judgment, and end up buying one DVD when I could have bought four. On other occasions, I’m found facing down personal responsibility, my arch nemesis, and kicking myself that much harder when I realize I’ve paid nearly full-price for something like Alien vs. Predator: Requiem. But I do understand that mine is a privileged position, from which I make some attempt not to be cripplingly judgmental. Instead, I’m thankful that I can afford this practice, as I have friends who lend me movies on their recommendation, and because I have a job which, in addition to basic sustenance, serves the express purpose of funding such habits, the way I imagine Boba Fett gives a lot of his bounty money to saving intergalactic whales and stuff.