November 26 2021
Literature Teachers 
It's hard to express yourself in anything if you've got no knowledge or resource for it.
I read manga mostly. To me Vietnamese literature is quite forgettable. Not that I don’t like the works (if not, I’m a big fan of these creators, whether it’s Nguyen Du, Quang Dung, or Nguyen Tuan), but because I mostly learn these out of an obligation to score in exams instead of curiosity.
It’s an irony. I love literature as much if not more than I do algorithms. I find the topics relatable in that each author is an introvert having something to say and give to his world, his audience. And generally I’m fascinated by the discussions that entail.
In my childhood Literature has never been seen this way by me. I hate formulating essays because I could never understand their workings, so I resorted to plagiarizing. Similarly, I can’t find a point in studying past authors whose ideals seem so distant. They were talking about beauty, love for your family, and of course patriotism (with communism, but that’s never the focal point). But as I grew up I managed to see through the futility before me. The first step is to take literature out of the educational context and to ponder the question: why was it written that way? Why purpose do these elements serve? It’s all LEGOs.
Of course I hated Vietnamese literature the way it had been because that was not how literature should be. Of course as I grew up I also realized how my dissatisfaction, against this subject and the education system as a whole, won’t matter so long as I remain a Vietnamese student. The status won’t change unless I’m a lawmaker or something. Or I’m just awkward and can’t bring myself to do basic tasks as intended.
In my years in LHP I was most impressed by the Literature teachers here (my experience holds with female teachers but not necessarily so for the male counterparts for I’ve never come across one) This includes both ones that head our syllabus and the substitutes. Each somehow sports a uniquely different teaching style, and “uniquely” is the keyword because they’re appealing in their own ways, not just distinct. Throughout the years they’ve influenced my lifestyle, specifically in the way I express myself.
The literature teacher who headed us in year 11 was the one who pushed my Photoshop skills to the limit. She was also the only one who gave serious thought on our writing style. Many teachers would assume that we’ve learned enough of essays. She, however, was the only one to recognize that, as English majors which are not the same as Literature majors, we need more training. Others would rate our works; excellent students will be acknowledged so, while others could only go so far as to recognize their weaknesses. She was the one who actively addressed those weaknesses.
Of course, the argument is that we should take charge of our learning process. If there’s a problem with our writing style, go ahead and request help from the instructor, don’t just sit there passively. The irony in my case is that as much as I would like to devote more time and care to this subject I just couldn’t. Starting out we CA-ers are generalists, but eventually we’ve to choose. Despite my respect for her and the subject, I couldn’t bring myself to study it when there are science projects in the way. She knew this. Other teachers would make us listen to their lectures: there’s no pressure during those sessions until the test when we had to cram. She made us study the hard way, forcing us to study and discuss in groups to improvise an essay, aka a mock exam as a daily exercise. It was no easy task, but by the end of it I’ve learned so much. We were trained how to teamwork, how to organize, present, and particularly how to debate, refute and defend our positions. These are essential soft skills that had been taught previously but she was the first to a. do it in Vietnamese and b. dissect our arguments.
In year 11 the pressure was on. First, I disappointed her, and it was hard to accept. Then one thing led to another, and by the end of the year after having laid more focus on Literature I’d attained a better score. But that last-ditch effort in proving my dignity didn’t outweigh the countless other times I performed in Literature poorly especially in front of the class, in group works. Even right now, I couldn’t bring myself to ask her for a letter of recommendation. I don’t want to press her on recommending a student of a mixed track record. Much as I’d learned, I wasn’t that golden boy who deserved all the praise.
Now it’s year 12, and once again I have to face that dilemma. Plucking up some courage to raise my hand and to take on analysis tasks from the teacher isn’t too hard, but knowing how to save my face is. There’d be topics where I’ve had little experience in. I may understand the points drawn out by the book I’m reading but once asked to relate this knowledge to previous works I’d freeze. It’s PTSD. I’ve gone through some bad times when I raised my hand without knowing the answer, and I ended up wasting time and being yelled at by the teacher which is why I’m so afraid of opening up.
If there’s one thing I’ve learned from that teacher in year 11, and as contradictory to her actions as it may seem, we must ask so as to learn. “Ngu thì phải hỏi,” or as translated, “If you’re stupid, you must ask”. It’s somewhat derogatory but she’s based after all, and as CA-ers we loved that. Everytime she’s mentioned, we immediately think of Ayn Rand, another based woman from the other side of the globe whom she most resembles.
And that was just one teacher.
July 28 2021
Telling Large-scale Stories 
A month or two back, I finished Monster, a renounced detective thriller from Naoki Urasawa. While there was a myriad of praise from the community, in me lingers some dissatisfaction with the story. Oh my, how wrong it must be to dislike such a classic.
Commentary post-script.
Don’t get me wrong, because I hold Naoki’s works in high regard. There’s little denial of how Monster is a cerebral ride, enough to click with me and to inspire another try with the author, this time the celebrated 20th Century Boys. But it is this exact nature of Naoki’s writing that spawned numerous plotholes in the story of Monster, ones that I learn to both undermine and be wary of. How could you manage a story on post-WW2 politics, on nihilism and hedonism while at the same on the more human, personal topics? As someone who has been writing novels for ages, I could get behind.
My dissatisfaction, from a rather subjective point of view, stems from how characters are introduced. Characters are consistently built in the way they interact with others or react to certain events. For example, as the story escalated in the late-mid chapters when Tenma was caught, for the first time Eva Heinemann met Dr. Reichwein. We are then skipped ahead of the nitty-gritty of how they got along, jumping straight to the next chapter where Dr. Reichwein concluded his understanding of the situation by repeating some knowledge about her (to the audience). It’s quick, fine, and dandy, and goes in its way to focus on what was important: how would she react to Tenma and how before a stranger, at the same time displaying changes in her personality (still a bitch around men).
Large stories are not unheard of. Dragon Ball Z, or Naruto, … and they’ve been prevalent in every medium of story ever. They are the cornerstones of serial storytelling, told in long chapters with ambiguous premises to glue the audience a bit more to the pages until hours or months have passed. A story always includes a cast to supplement the protagonist. In these stories, however, either each story serves a purpose, and each character appears once, when need be, before their arc concludes, or they have as little interference to the overarching plot as possible and act only as plot devices, in which cases their personality and character building requires no more depth than a prominent quirk that helps them stand out. The same holds in Monster, and if anything, you can draw the line between the involved and noninvolved cast. Only thing is, the former is noticeably larger, especially a nonfrequent manga reader like me.
The problem that I don’t often see people bring up is recycling. When this “involved cast” expands but the spotlight stays ever still narrow, the line begins to blur between who should deserve it. Take Gillen for example. Gillen was introduced as not only a cynical, badass crime psychologist much similar to, if not, no better than Lunge, but most pertinently to the contemporary theme, an acquaintance of Tenma with a twist of being distrustful of him due to their uneventful academic history together. As the story progressed, Gillen was then tasked to challenge his own belief, the cusp being when his biased grievance is challenged by a commitment to the pursuit of truth - that the monster was real. Finally rebelling against authority and fighting for once an independent belief, Gillen concluded his arc by finally confessing his long-lived feud with Tenma, ending in his contender sympathizing with him.
Succinct, beautiful, and I even snapshot the last panel, but it wouldn’t be the last time that I see Gillen. Some chapters later, he got involved with the Richard Braun case, thus his counselor Dr. Reichwein, and you can guess that his story won’t officially end until his promise is fulfilled: to prove Tenma’s innocence. To me, it’s such a lame excuse to extend a character’s screentime. Don’t get me wrong, I do like this forensic doctor with a redemption arc. But unlike Lunge, Gillen did not receive, or rather, deserve another arc to supplement: again, his guilt is heard. Reusing Gillen and keeping him on the scene with the same phrase “I need to prove my friend’s innocence” is such a disservice to readers who are attached to him. They, or we, formed an emotional attachment to him, his life, and his drive, with it being solidified once his arc ended when he let Tenma escape in his mini-story. Perhaps the next time he appeared another lesson could be learned, but it could not simply repeat what once states. Perhaps it could be a subversion, doubting his decision, delving into his mindset, or finally applying what he learns about his mixed relationship with Tenma to solve a case. While he did display some desire to spread his lesson, like during his investigation with (enter Grimmer’s partner), they are but tributes to the last chapter, not a meaningful extension of any kind… I’d say that Gillen was pretty much underutilized despite the extra attention he received from Naoki. Instead, attention was diverted to the im-on-a-vacation Mr. Lunge from the BKA, another once cynical officer who received a subtler but more involved and comprehensive development and finally a satisfying, surprising, and climatic payoff at the end of Monster. Many pay it a second thought, most likely because Gillen now stands as a static character, and inherently there should be nothing wrong with it, as with Captain America the last static protagonist that I’ve come to love in recent time. But even that is a feeble excuse because right from the start it seems impolitic for a character to stay so in the world of Monster. When there are constant shifts in politics and public opinions; when there exist such absurd figures as a charlatan who pulled off murders against his adopters and desired world annihilation, inscribing on a water tank that a monster inside him is growing and exploding; when even the worst people in the world receive unheard-of treatment from the author and love from the fan instead of remaining a scapegoat for the sake of the story necessitating a villain; when the worldbuilding is so dynamic that good and evil is a flipping scale, a static personality serves to that world anything but. Gillen is not a static character, as isn’t anyone in Monster. It’s just pure mishandling.
The situation in Monster might just be ascribed to some story-writing flaws but can be overlooked by its contributions to the manga landscape - a breath of fresh air. But this still warrants a discussion because the issues hold to this day, when serial shows telling narratives of this scale have become all the more prevalent yet have still been stumbling.
Every serial show seems to struggle with how to delegate a sufficient amount of time to develop its cast of characters, and it becomes more troublesome when in the end every overarching story has to conclude. And with loose ends the climax can quickly devolve into a tangled mess, juggling between subplots and suspense around each corner as one story must close its door and open for another to progress, and this repeats until conclusions are drawn in an orderly fashion, First In First Out. To me, it’s a flaw, but some people just put up with him, not quite pleading with themselves to see their characters in a brighter light or sympathizing with the studio. Marvel has it wrong all the time, and it could be as glaring as the post-credit scene in 2021 Black Widow. In a series show, one story paves way for another. With such premises as a focus on characters, you would envisage clashing personalities in a small world and how they are all tied up together. I have not finished Monogatari, so I cannot tell whether such a show exists, but the majority seen in my lifetime has proven the opposite. Monster may have been forgiven as it was a novelty when it came out, but my concern has more roots in modern-day serialization. When an anime decides that it will cover a multi-chapter journey, you cannot expect good character development without being overly greedy. Even since 2012, the Avengers, then the multiverse model, just works as it clicks with viewers who seek instant gratification in seeing their favorite heroes teaming up before which most characters rather spend their time in isolated episodes, as is the golden rule of storytelling: to finish an arc. At some point, Marvel becomes the powerhouse of financially successful titles, and not only that, titles that could lean on others in case their take isn’t competent enough. This is the tentpole of modern-day mass entertainment. At least now someone has started to grow out of it. DC thought that it could jump on the bandwagon, and it almost did, with meager success before relying on the more standalone movies as an answer to dire fans who now only crave to see their idols be well executed on the big screen. But this is just a minority. CW is still running, and so is Phase 4 Marvel. In one way I feel sometimes disconcerted: this little obsession of mine keeps me from enjoying these shows that my friends do. If many have not voiced their concern, why should I? But it has become apparent that as the formula is here to stay, so am I become dissuaded and enticed to seek alternatives. In one, this harsh reality only incentivized escapism, and whether the latter one is recommendable I’ll leave you to decide.
In one way or another, I must find a way to look through this predicament in the entertainment industry. I mean, no novel or manga ever contains so few characters only whose number is on my fingertips, or at least there aren’t plentiful enough to make a genre out of.
In my break away from these formulas, and funnily before Monster, I’ve come across one manga title that seems to be the defining exception to this storytelling trend, but for good or ill it is also one that I haven’t managed to bring onto the table. This is the same title that, to its credit, deserves some form of recognition on my website, yet despite much effort I still summon up the energy to do so. This is the title that brought me to the world of manga, a diverse art medium whose niche corners enjoy enough media coverage and internet discussion to not be immediately disregarded. An average layman can grasp the general idea that manga covers a wide range of topics, unlike its Western counterpart where Batman has been rewritten for about a century. In mangas, I found the best of both worlds, a cerebral reading experience found in novels and the love for art styles that I wish to retain, as should in any form of art. It is the exact reason that I’ve refrained from discussing this title. Imagine a kid fussing over the benefits of LEGO to his parents or a former gamer writing a video essay on the ingenuity of Half-life 2: the lack of exposure, combined with untamed nostalgia, means that talking in subjective terms is borderline impossible. This is further amplified by the period of personality growth during which I was exposed to this manga, the resulting emotional investment was such, and still is, that the act of reviewing this indiscriminately feels like blaspheming what attachment I developed. The similar sentiments I share with reading any of Tatsuki Fujimoto’s works, from Chainsaw Man to Nayuta of the Prophecy to Fire punch then Look Back. Art is something precious to me in the way that you could not look into it solely from an emotional standpoint, because then it’ll be cheapened, somehow magically relatable to some but not to others, and there’ll be no universal standards in valuing it. But having gone this far to read more than enough other titles that I could count on my fingertips, so that enough context is given about the current state of the manga industry, I can finally begin to give a more objective dissertation at ease.
In Oyasumi Punpun, the readers are narrated to the early life of Punpun, an ordinary Japanese citizen with the twist of being de-anthropomorphized into a bird-like creature. If Monster is massive in terms of space, covering events that span across Dusseldorf, Munich in Germany then Czechoslovakia, Punpun can be described with a similar attribute, in this case in terms of time as we follow our bird-like protagonist from his 12th to 20th year in life, a span of around a decade but already riven with incidences. Even with such a setting, no tropes are ever overused like in Monster. The convention has been to set a specific length for each arc, but with Punpun, author Asano devised a different approach that, in my view, managed to capture the “it’s a small world” feel from Monster while avoiding its flaws. The result is nothing too distinctive to warrant an award but refreshing enough so that the beats of the story could flow smoothly without being nitpicked by me.
If anything, the “small-world” tropes prove to be the core message of the story, a cynical but lowkey serious take on life monotony, a critique of an imperfect society where people fail to deliver promises. Punpun’s best buddy, Harumi started as a figure intrinsically representative of his childhood, given how our protagonist only met him in the primary school days. In a later episode, Harumi is now talking with Punpun’s mom, unknowingly of course, and this time he was struggling to come to terms with his grief over failing his significant other in a bike accident, an unrelated subplot but fit well in the ongoing topic of faith and conditions in love. Finally, during the last few panels when Punpun’s tragedies began to wrap up even temporarily, Harumi steals the show once more (??), this time reuniting with the childhood gang - that is, with Seki, Komatsu, some side characters, and lastly Punpun. Harumi is not in the position of knowing the length Punpun went through, but only serves a specific role of commentating on the current state of Punpun’s life, his ex waking him from the dead while carrying her child with another person, and concluding the story by attesting to the depression truth that the cycle of Punpun’s life soon track into his nephew and the next generation. And countless other members of the cast have sweeping encounters with others but beyond which their relationships do not flourish.
There’s no use in revisiting a character if there’s no story to tell. Steins;Gate 0 resurrected the cast from the dead by having them appear in groups each time, as fan-services, but beyond which their interactions contribute little to the stories, sometimes just to confirm past or future events like the inevitable marriage of Daru and Amane, and sometimes to ruin a well-defined moment if not a season’s worth of character development, specifically when Mayuri being written off as another member of Okabe’s harem.
Deku’s struggle to enter UA and subsequently thrive in it is a relatable one to the lives of millions of Asians, not just Japanese, who seek prospects in a new environment, but the story suffers when the decision is made to expand the narrative scope onto the entire A1 class. There are too many story arcs to count, but not every one of them has the same appeal as Deku’s. There have been two movies, one more about to release, but rarely does the message expand beyond the question of “what it takes to be a hero”. Feeling the raw emotions and thrill of heroism in an anime is not common, a commendable endeavor at crafting a unique story, but I miss my first blush with MHA and what drove me to watch it in the first place. Underdog stories are plenty in writing, but one specifically caters to the POV of a student is not. Instead, the decision is now to capitalize on the cast of all-appealing teenagers and simplify the take-home message so that more movies could be made. I do feel that the manga is taking on a more serious tone, but not the anime and especially not the movie renditions.
Every time Harumi returns to the screen, his story coincides with the theme in question. This is nothing new in writing and Monster has been an expert on this, but also important is to expand upon a character’s motivation beyond what was stated.
Granted, thought-out executions like in Punpun are not unheard of, but in retrospect, it hinges largely on the type of story the author tries to tell. A year ago I reviewed A Silent Voice on my old website 925weblog, but back then I had not picked on how well it handles intertwining story arcs. As with any other story, large-scale story management is an unspoken standard and a given these days. Looking back, you could see how both Punpun and A silent voice both fit the bill as relevant everyday life coming-of-age narratives. With this genre comes its strength that for any life story at a particular point in time you could expect changes that entail struggles as you would expect from meeting a childhood friend or a distant relative. Life, especially the teenage years, gives a perfect formula because it is an easy source of stock reference: you could always recapture your experience and it will always be unique. There’s no need for method, rhyme or reason to it because life finds a way. There’s no extra step of defining a congruous theme to fit a plot because every message revolving around living in the modern days either highlights your personal development already or eventually converges to one core issue of society: mass adoption, directionlessness, isolation, the cost of globalization and individualization. Sometimes it feels like cheating. Compare this to Monster where the subject matter is more grandiose in its execution. Not that it’s proving a lofty point, because hedonism and love surely aren’t ones, but Naoki perseveres in sticking the story to its root message without straying anywhere, stiff but consistent. Through life, you could tell a story, but more of a lengthy unabridged one, one that does not fit a fictitious thriller plot of a murder mystery. Between Punpun and Monster, between the ordinary life and the extraordinary life, with each story, a different goal is being achieved, yet once reading them I relate less with the latter but more with the former. And that’s why I’ve been repeating how this comparison is subjective because Monster is put at an inherent disadvantage. Clearly, it’s a harder story to write. Actors in Monster have less leeway in what to express, they must stick to their mantras as part of the author’s intent.
One recurring argument that I make for Monster is that the story relies much on conveniences and that the perspective of which differ between readers. Initially, you would take it for granted that Punpun being portrayed as an alien creature is but an artistic touch, a decision, claimed by Asano in his interview, to increase relatability by bolstering anonymity. In fact, Punpun having a non-constant shape, from a bird to geometrical cubes to a slightly more humanoid figure growing bull horns on his head, seems so inventive an expression device. But if you’ve read Punpun to the last panels, you would understand that even such a feature given is tied together. Out of the blue, it is revealed, in breaking the 4th wall fashion, that Sachi was the one who thought up the figure. Sachi’s role as a knot-tie-er had been hinted at earlier in the story. She had a brief cameo as early as in the factory arc of the story, but another during Punpun’s first high-school date. But it wouldn’t be until a year thereafter that she returned, this time black-haired and as a sister figure of some sort to Punpun, or in the parlance of this manga, an objectively better Aiko. In the world of Oyasumi Punpun, Sachi debuted a manga that was, as shown through glimpses of its panels, literally Asano’s previous work Solani in real life. With this everything suddenly ties together: as Sachi acts as a stand-in for the author himself, so is the ending of Oyasumi becoming its own inception, as Sachi records 10-year’s worth of Punpun’s lifetime, forever imprinting his miseries into the minds of millions. For me it’s just one ironic but lovely send-off, one that is straightforward but ingenious enough to not spawn an Asano verse of some kind, showing Asano’s such care and attention. Monster, in this case, stands in deep contrast, where storylines converge for the sake of having to. Eva happens to know Richner because somehow out of a thousand psychiatrists, Richner was the one she chose. In later chapters, this knowledge has evolved, or rather devolved, to such a meme that, in that one brief confrontation between Tenma and Lunge, it is implied that Tenma just presumed that Lunge has changed without further asking. The “small-world” situation has become such a staple in the Monster universe that meeting long-time acquaintances is no longer a luxury to ponder. In some way, it feels meta. Punpun being a bird somehow serves a deeper meaning to the story and not just for artistic reasons. Him being portrayed as so was a direct contribution from an in-fiction character, so it helps ground their stories further in their own universe, allowing the audience to fully immerse. In Monster, each time a convenience occurs, we have no choice but to shake it off as “meta”.
All manga creators, sensitive and thoughtful of their works they all are, like to give a nod to the past. Having read enough titles to attest to it, I could easily spot a character design being recycled to pay homage to the author’s past works, all of which are after all his/her brainchildren. In a similar vein, future works of Asano do share, but I appreciate how he never entertains the idea of a cinematic universe, and so do many other authors. Not that it’s objectively wrong, but as I have repeated myself, the entertainment market is now saturated with those. From an artistic standpoint, little about it is inventive anymore.
Each story requires effort, but it is my belief that stories similar to the likes of Punpun demand more because taking stock of real life has never been easy. With fine ideologies, an eminent philosopher could be referred to, but with sources as erratic as the life you have no choice but to go out and experience. Part of what constitutes the success of Punpun was how Asano could make comments and draw comparisons between his past and current experiences. Much of his notions in life have been altered since the writing of Solanin, and many contemporary events, such as the 2012 Earthquake, made up part of his critique of social misbehaviors as voiced indirectly through Oyasumi Punpun. In fact, Asano was so expressive and vocal in his critiques and viewpoints, the most he had ever been even compared to his previous work Solanin that it seems that his story just works on the grounds of authenticity. The same way he approaches his backgrounds and for which reason I find his interview, the only one I’ve read in recent memory, so eye-opening, never knowing what other mangaka might do instead (the deepest I’ve ever reached in manga making was through my exposure to Eizouken). But has not it been this way, as in how arts operate, on the principle of self-expression, self-declaration, no matter how cringey it gets? There could be some restraints or censorships, as always regarding the contradicting cultures between East and West, but it should be at your discretion to consider them or not.
Unfortunately as inventive as this method of storytelling is, hardly is it cost-efficient. You are not often given a week, but less, but release one chapter before the next deadline arrives, so it relies much on the author’s wealth of experience which is not endemic in every manga writer. Even the one-week model itself has proven to be a burnout generator for artists. In our modern-day society where a new episode of Mushuko Tensei comes out every weekend, it’s rare for artists to have even breathing ground, let alone adequate space for expression, and this just contradicts everything we come to learn and love about arts. When you think of subversion, and works that risk going against the drain, rarely one comes up to mind that exceeds financially. In that case, one option lays open: be a YOLOist and put all future prospects in jeopardy for the sake of creativity.
Drawing comics is hard and animating is harder, even for modern mangaka or animators who just dream of an earning. And it is this exact reason that remains a barrier against artistic freedom, or artistic discussion. The fiascos of recent years are mangaka overworking for the next anime season of Jujutsu Kaisen, or how a feud against Kyoto animation led to a man burning down their entire HQ. The situation of Mappa is most disheartening because it paints a wrong vision of the animation industry should be; not that I am apathetic to their reality, but we can agree that there was a time when high-level animations were carried out through pure skill and talent (Fate), an outburst of emotion (Evangelion) or idea (Serial Lain) or just love and dedication. In modern times, the last issues concerning the animation industry that make the headlines are budget and cramming. The stagnation of our animation industries only adds insult to injury.
I’ve been somewhat dissatisfied with Naoki’s approach to connecting stories together. My word choice is quite precise, because I hold no grievance or distaste against what he tried to tell. I love the personalities in Monster, both the heroes and villains, and respect their stances whether right or wrong, just because they show such determination and adherence to a set of defined moral codes or because their enlightenment and succeeding redemption are executed such that readers can relate. Naoki has definitely blundered in other departments, It might be wrong for me to seek perfection and judge Naoki’s work on that criterion, but perhaps perfectionism is a standard for objectivism also, to differentiate between good and bad art. Perhaps to prove its worth, Monster has no choice but to be exposed to its own shortcomings, the titular reason behind this post. But I hate it when others recycle the same excuse every time a mistake is made, that a masterpiece should be judged for the sake of being a masterpiece alone. That excuse is further backed by the struggle in the arts industries today which is only so opportune and unfortunate. When things are bad in a certain way, it is not wrong to admit it, something I have not seen in critiquing Monster. Monster is great, but with only one-sided praises for its brilliance, its values also diminish at least in my eyes. On the other hand, it seems that we fail to credit innovators enough. Punpun was a thrilling experience, one that (in)famously instills one week’s worth of depression in every reader in the aftermath, according to Youtube comments. I hear more of their emotional investment in Punpun, but not often what it did right artistically. In the grand scheme of things, Punpun has been one underdog, an experimental series printed in a seinen magazine.
And for these excuses to be founded, there are also emotional factors at play. People just fear that by aiming for the impossible criteria, there will be nothing left of a masterpiece and that in itself is, they know, because few come near to the definition of a masterpiece. We just wish that our favorite work is one, that we all share a favorite manga and that manga proves to be the best, so our position and bond are consolidated. I know this because in proving my own point about objectivism I have fallen into the same pit, just in the opposite manner. I learn to be critical of Monster and to appreciate Punpun, but to a point where now Satchan is my religion, when merely discussing it takes some effort to first beat some senses out of me. Our love is rarely rational, and so is the debate on whether we should live to love or reason. In modern times, that fact alone blurs the line between objective and subjective masterpieces.
These days we the consumers of entertainment are such to be susceptible to underhanded tactics that play with our emotions. But that is just another massive topic when I am already struggling to contain this ongoing subject matter, and I’d recommend this video essay from SolarSand who dissected the contention better than I ever could. Just as we could forgo or defend a cause that is our religion, we could attack its offenders even when the soundest reasons are provided.
This might stray from the topic, but it has become apparent how our modern culture emphasizes “the massive”, “the ambitious”, whether in depth or breadth, in the medium of film, animation, or video games,… This is easily perceived as, particularly in Western, the open societies, a response to the mundane, the crowd’s favorite, the mass adoption, … Of course it goes not as far as to being niche or idiosyncratic, and much cynicism hasn’t escaped our mind, but for entrepreneurs or those dreaming of a quick buck of instant hit, going big is the way to go, daring as it may be. In our modern society when success is our first thought, there’s always every incentive to do so. Managing hype levels and expectation becomes an art form in marketing, and every now and then they’ll resort to nostalgia to keep a product running. In contrast, as we progress through the century, cases like Punpun borne out of pure artistic and expressive intentions may become ever rarer.
There is a game called “Fallout 76”, the discussion of which here I wish not to dig my heels into, but the long and short of it is that it was advertised to be 4x times larger and 16x times the details of its predecessor, literally the culmination of the best things about the game’s franchise until then. A year later, it now sits as the lowest entry with broken promises, spawning numerous fiascos and legal allegations, and is regarded as a dirt smudge to the Fallout game history. On the hand, there was this title called “Fallout New Vegas”, a title that had been excessively bullied by even its creators. It was given one year to develop by a little-known studio Obsidian, and was marked to deliver with Metacritic scores above 8.5 or else no bonuses. It got an 8.4. Its launch was equally broken, if not worse. But it has been a decade since that faithful day, and now fans regard it as a classic of modern Fallout, a masterpiece. The studio that made it is famed for storytelling, and their following creation, The Outerworld, is now nicknamed “the Fallout killer”. The game is broken to this day, but fans have been so dire that some are willing to install 50+ mods, having paid for the game beforehand, just to keep the game running. Bethesda, being Bethesda, never admitted the game’s success, considering it a lucky spinoff and not officially part of the mainline franchise. But the company has come to such a dire point that, to make a quick buck, they had no choice but to include a 76 DLC that referenced New Vegas. Thanks to that, Fallout 76 is now passable with a mixed rating. But what did the adopted child New Vegas do that its adoptive cousins failed short of? By telling a relevant story. I’d love to dig into this title riven with references to real-life political dilemmas, but as no political scientist, I’ve yet managed to summon the confidence to (so refer to this video instead). Without getting too deep, New Vegas managed to minimally retain the Fallout spirit while expanding on that with a layer of commentaries, commentaries that were sensitive politically and showed no fear of censorship. Like Punpun, New Vegas pulled off a risky but awarding venture that takes time or in this case is impossibly rare except for a talented writer. Its brothers could go so far with the former with a dose of recurring names, themes, and factions, but never the latter. That is why, despite broken gameplay and outdated graphics, and an unsustainable physics engine, the game still garnered a cult following that grew. By keeping to itself and establishing its own identity, New Vegas was no simple post-apocalyptic survival simulator, but a unique story, one that struck a chord with almost every modern human being who lives in a capitalist world, something that not every modern game could do. Most importantly, every player of New Vegas could tell that it is no perfect game, particularly by modern standards. Even an avid low-end PC gamer like me could not manage through all the crashes and corrupted saves without shouting like an oppressed member of society. At least, the New Vegas community is among the more skeptical. Granted that some are exposed to an unhealthy amount of nostalgia, or as a Fallout fan would call it, “Old World’s Blues”, it is good to know that its flaws are not completely forgiven, and many are vexed enough to voice their displeasure. Still, there are pitfalls. Right now, a more recent name came on the scene, “Cyberpunk 2077”, rough and unfinished but artistic and vocal in its message. Some have drawn comparison with New Vegas, and in fact, many, such as Tyler McVicker, are now willing to mod a triple-A title just to taste it. It is now being forgiven by the upholders of faith on the basis of being “just another New Vegas”, of being an undermined masterpiece. Well, it could be too early to tell whether people will soon turn a blind eye to what a horrible launch it was.
In the face of these ironies, I am hopeful that the majority of us are born in an age when criticisms matter and receive the transnational reach they rightfully deserve. From the comfort of my home, I could listen to an opinion written half a planet’s away and much of its message is retained. In books and articles, they have been since time immemorial, but most spectacular is the advent of video essays, allowing content creators to smoothly integrate entertainment with knowledge-sharing. As with any form of literature, or in this case, an analogy to arts, writing an essay is not everyone’s capability. Not that bias is extinguished, but thanks to this forming a complete critique on a work of art or any subject has never been easier, and so is communication between like-minded viewers and readers specifically those who hold similarly subversive views. Talk about a democratic society.
This medium suffers similarly to lenient criticism. I’m tired of holding the individualistic view on these creations, of reaching an understanding that everyone’s viewpoint is worth considering: there exists a threshold beyond which these video essays are no longer valid. Jacob Geller’s videos are at best a break from the essay formats we come to be accustomed to. I can feel his effort channeled into crafting a cohesive analysis, that each take is a unique one on wildly different subjects. But I also must face it that his execution could use more work. His essays boast a unique style, and discuss obscure subjects, but they’re just as unique as they are cringe-worthy on many occasions, or just blatantly monotonous in cases. He has much to learn to develop his own style, and I cannot recommend his works to everyone. But it’s good to have people like him on the platform.
In discussing the issue of artistic standards in storytelling I’ve been obligated to face it that the same view I hold for an exemplary work of art may not be identical to that of others, if ever at all. Through a rigorous process of juggling my analysis from animes and mangas to video games then essays I endeavor to reach a conclusion, but every time, one more argument arises after another, and there seems little to no progress to the bottom of the well.
Monster is revered for its tight-knitted narrative, Oyasumi Punpun for its ability (probably through a tell-tale plot) to transcend readers and motivate us to work and self-improve. The mangas receive these highlights for a reason. My dissatisfaction sources more from points unheard, from unpraised potentials and overlooked flaws, because overlooking them might be just another sign of ignorance, which is why this post exists. The ability to tell large-scale stories is just one indicator and so it warrants this discussion. Now that my point has been stated, perhaps we should try to review arts in a different light every now and then?
This was written circa August 2021. Could have posted this under that date, but I’d like some commentary.
Things have changed. I’ve read more mangas, and really good ones at that. Seeing flaws in good literature works is now a common sight. I’m seeing Breaking Bad too, a TV serial show that actually ends neatly, and thus delivers it. The point that this essay expresses is not unfound in the viewer and reader community. I could have provided more related examples like the fiasco that is the ending of Game of Thrones (although I don’t watch it). Dune is a masterful craft spanning a decade worth of novels, and yet it doesn’t overstay its welcome…
Still, I thought writing this was fun (was practicing writing so this was an outlet), and I don’t think there’s a sequel to this due to other hobbies. I hope that you’ve enjoyed it. Cheers :-)
June 18 2021
Nuclear (Pr)inter 
Written a shell-script to better handle your printer, because nobody has.
Check it out!
It’s just one horrible idea to interface with printers from Linux in general. EPSON, the company whose eponymous printer (as seen above) is currently used in my household, made an up-front statement in its manual page: Epson does not provide support for Linux drivers. The closest to their support is EPSON’s driver, and epson-printer-utility - a barebone app made in QT4.
Yet, this still pales in comparison to its Windows or Mac counterparts in terms of execution. On Unix, we must refer to CUPS (Common UNIX Printing System), a collection of utilities open-sourced by Apple (surprise!) that in theory should aid me and those in need. If only it was so easy.
After CUPS, I figured out how to manage print jobs through shell (a.k.a. through commands), albeit was devastated (and lobotomized) by a lack of out-of-the-box features. It wouldn’t be until a few more days, having recoursed to Foxit and relived the nuisance of switching to Windows due to urgent demands, that I was persuaded to write my own shell script.
I first lobbied for a proper personal printer in early 2019 during my time prepping for the high school entrance exam. Before this, half of my time would be delegated to cycling 15 minutes to a printer’s, back and forth. Not to mention how my bad memory would aggravate the situation once in a while: I’d leave my USB behind at the photocopy shops, or that the files would get printed incorrectly. As the print load increased over time, it was high time that I deserved an upgrade.
Even thereafter, hardly was printing efficient. Having perused the machine for months, it is still common of me to get it wrong: incorrect format, incorrect layout, ink getting “stuck” mid-printing so the whole job must be restarted,… Soon enough came piles of leftover sheets, half-inked from failed attempts. For a while, I entertained the pitch of a paper recycler. Took it quite seriously, even downloading, and attempting to digest, a research paper on various methods of de-inking, but which I never finished. Three years have passed, and everything has settled with Foxitreader on Windows 10 functioning as intended. Today, my saga with the printer continues, on Ubuntu.
Not all printers support duplex (double-sided printing) by hardware, especially the budget ones. For mine, the EPSON L3110 (which was bought in 2019 but whose origin dates back to the years of Windows XP), the workaround exists in the software. The machine would start the first pass by printing on one side of each sheet - all of which could be from odd-numbered pages for example. The user would then manually flip and reinsert the half-printed sheets so that the other side could be filled with even-numbered pages. This method is not available in CUPS, at least by default.
CUPS is more of a management utility accessed through localhost, a terminal for viewing the queue, plus some admin controls, and whatever settings your printer’s company has to offer. Printing requires control beyond such as you set up your targeted document or image. At that end, you’re still at the mercy of the corporates whether your Linux distro is supported, otherwise not much about your printer appears on CUPS.
On Windows, there need no CUPS where good applications (Acrobat, Foxitreader,…) is a given, or else companies would have lost their only demographic. Just for contrast, beside is the same Epson utility program on Windows. On the opposite end of the spectrum, that is Linux, you have Foxitreader crashing every 10 seconds I entered. Evince barely cares about your need, and neither does Okular. Unless your printer supports full duplex, the default offer is impractical in most situations.
I was first inspired by a project on Sourceforge; unfortunately, it was of little assistance. So far I’ve written the basic functionalities for basic two-sided printing, like defining a range or an option to examine the output by queuing a test job of some initial pages. These are simple enough, but I’d like to go beyond that, at least beyond the confines of shell. Not that it isn’t capable of basic math, but working in shell script is just tedious: not impossible, but involved: deprecated syntax reminiscent of the age of Pascal, stream-editing, documentation here and there but you can’t go on splitting hairs with the syntax forever - but which I’ve been obligated to. The more I dig into shell, the further I walk back to the history of computing. Our lives should get easier, not harder.
Since I’ve taken the matter into my own hand, perhaps there’s more light at the end of the tunnel than what I anticipated, as in the process I’ve developed more programming skills, specifically in furnishing my code. Still, it remains to be seen whether any of my effort will pay off. For now, I dread having to fiddle with shell script ever again.
P/S: Discovered a bug on my site during the uploading process, so I must set the date no further than August. I’ll look into it after having recovered from the days working in shell.
June 18 2021
The Linux Experience, Tập 1. 
During my time developing a Unity prototype, I concluded that Linux should be my next operating system. While few could deny the hardship and countless hours on Stack Overflow that entail, eventually I settled on the idea, for one and one sole reason only: change.
Windows 10 has been here to stay for over 5 years, and under no circumstances can me abandoning it be satisfactorily justifiable. Where logic fails, my heart tells me that sooner or later the switch will happen, so there would be no point in delaying it anyway. Also, it is now summer. Even taking into account the pandemic rampaging in my area, and both my prepping and scholarship-hunting process (that is going nowhere), I remain confident that this will be a fantastic time when school is no issue.
The loss is to be felt, and procrastination stemming from perusing this novel system is inevitable and will be full-blown, putting more strain onto an already tight prepping schedule. Yet, even after that one time canceling the installation at the last moment, the following day my instinct took hold of me, and along the ride, I came.
Of course, not everything about Linux, or in this case its distro Ubuntu (just because), is doubtful. Its fair share of benefits is quite worth the recognition. One time I opened up System Monitor (the Ubuntu equivalent of Task Manager) to realize that my RAM usage was 26%! Somewhere between that, and it was when I closed all windows. In comparison, the lowest I could obtain on Windows was 31%, accounting for the decimals. I may be wrong here (which means that more research must be put into it) but it might go to show just how much more optimized and decluttered Linux systems are.
It will take hours on end to reiterate my journey because it went way back in late February / early March when I first installed Ubuntu. To make it brief, it was me in the middle of a tardy video-editing project that broke the computer: the Windows 10 bootloader was broken for unapparent reasons (I probably overheated the machine, but that remains no sound cause). With a multi-purpose Pixel 3 and a USB stick thankfully equipped with an OTG USB (as in On-the-go, this one serves as a USB-3.0-to-Type-C converter), I thought of reinstalling Windows but then realized the (un)timely opportunity to try out a Linux distro instead. And so I did.
Eventually, I was obliged to switch to Windows because it was the very After Effects that I needed, then I finished the project on time, receiving good reviews from friends and family and disheartening ones from myself, then losing the video competition to a deskmate, end of story. Three months later, I decided to pick up Ubuntu again, and here we are.
You could see the video here. It has got 2 likes or something.
Not sure what I feared most when it comes to using Linux. The terror from sleepless nights not figuring out how to install the most minute features? The sudden nostalgia of video games and how they are now ancient relics of the past? The fear of not prepping hard enough for the IELTS test because I’m multitasking in the meantime between it and perusing a newly installed OS?
On an unrelated note, my endeavor to make ibus-bamboo functional has come into semi-fruition. To recap, for a while now, I’ve been struggling to work out typing in Vietnamese. There used to be a Windows program called Unikey that allows this (later on I realized that Windows supports Vietnamese keyboard anyway). On Ubuntu at least, there are multiple input modules to choose from. I chose iBus. And when it comes to that, there are ibus-unikey, ibus-bamboo, ibus-teni, and some others. There’s also the standalone Unikey program, but that performed poorly, or at least I was out of depth with CMake. I refused further testing anyway.
I did come across similar issues claimed on Github, and there are varying solutions to this. Heck, I came to learn that our problems were not identical.
One solution pertains to env. On Windows, we are already familiar with the concept of environment variables, one of which is PATH. They too exist in Ubuntu, documented here. The gist is that in shells there are these shell variables that can be created, called, and serve a multitude of purposes, one of which is to be made system-wide available, or global, thus environment variables. These variables are written in a range of files scattered throughout the system, even in the user’s folder, and are called upon start-up and once the user logged in.
export is one command to both set and globalize a variable. Thus, when I used GTK_IM_MODULE=XIM, it worked (to make it permanent I even pasted it in ~/.profile where its likes are called). As a twist, however, the effect only kicked in when certain apps are opened from the terminal (that is, not from the .desktop). This means that, currently, for me to type Vietnamese on Opera, the app must be started from bash which will be left open and printing until the app is closed. Not efficient.
Specifically, I heard that apps downloaded from, or handled by, Snap are experiencing these kinds of issues: or as some Vietnameses put it, they are not supported. In reality, after some testing, I found that this may not necessarily hold. Granted that Opera and VSCode, formerly snap-based, are compatible with the ibus input module after being reinstalled from .deb instead, there remain others who are the exceptions by not being functional with ibus despite not being sourced from Snap, and even such groups make no sense. For example, the search bar in the overview can be typed Vietnamese in, but not the bar in Settings, both of which are system, GNOME apps.
Paying attention to the im-config message, I noticed that there is a list of compatible GUI frameworks. QTK is only one among a list of such likes, like QT4, QT, QT Clutter, QLFW, the last few of which are not built-in. In all honesty, if they were of any importance then their installation should be the default. Perhaps it is but a raw string as a message, a general warning. Perhaps certain libraries will be installed as required by their apps.
QT4, GTK, Electron, … are widget toolkits, frameworks that enable GUI development. They are about widgets and canvas manipulation.
OpenGL is a programming language for low-level 3d rendering. In reality, it could aid 2d rendering as well by providing GPU acceleration for rendering-intensive tasks like anti-aliasing (correct me if I am wrong). Plus, some frameworks include GL-based libraries, middle-men that handle the integration of both parties. GLFW and Clutter are such likes.
I’ve fiddled with QT4 in the past, not directly, however, but during my time learning ML when I had to MacGyver an annotation program with OpenCV which was equipped with QT4. Indeed it was so seamlessly integrated with another library that I did not realize it until I had to google the problems when the topical QT4 issues were the first to hit. Compare this to Windows API, which was such a rigid and wordy language for making GUIs that I have never had the gut to touch it again.
Before I dropped off, there I came across an article, which I’ve already seen, reminding people that exporting the above variable works (as in setting the system env, so far as I see it, though it’s called export for unapparent reasons; I tried ‘set’ but nothing happened). That’s been how I live by.
Anyway, my experience with Vietnamese typing on Linux, albeit it’s Ubuntu technically and much as I am grateful that it is possible in the first place, has been unpleasant. To say that it is a disaster is impolitic, a disheartening disregard, but to claim otherwise, as in it being somewhat functional, is me being tolerant towards the system’s, or perhaps my own inefficiency, or to be blunt, incompetence. The chance of getting it to work is 50/50. To rate my tolerance, it’s 80% of the time since I’ve found methods to manage through, albeit that does not improve its reputation. Typing on Messenger is fine enough, until some random points when it lags like hell. There are no working, recommendable text editors that are local, except for VSCode, which is a code editor funnily enough, but on which I made a draft for a serious work-related post anyway. It pains me to even complain about it.
After some digging, I finally made a switch to the fcitx input module, which is designed more for KDE desktop environments but works on GNOME through some modifications. I will not discuss the process which has been better explained by Nguyễn Tứ.
To be able to type at all has been a wish come true, but it still takes time to familiarize myself with some slight input changes.
Long story short (particularly read from here and here), there are various methods that programs adopt to provide a seamless typing experience. Take Vietnamese, specifically using the TELEX typing convention. Keying in two consecutive a will return â, but the original a must also be deleted, or backspaced. Unfortunately, the many layers in the system that governs the program and its input render such action difficult to perform. Methods are devised not only to crop out artifacts but also to ensure clarity and focus in UX.
The method above was backspacing, where character changes are purposefully shown where the inputs are. fcitx-unikey uses pre-editing. A small box will pop up showing my input (converted to Vietnamese), and that conversion will not be officially keyed in until I’ve finished the word. It has probably been like that for other languages in East Asia, such as in the neighboring China, Korea, and Japan (I can confirm this with the mobile Japanese keyboards).
As a long-time Unikey follower, this is my version of Deku arriving at the UA, or Steve Rogers running off to Times Square, and hopefully a step in the right direction. In retrospect, I have rarely described myself as a staunch. In the past, I’ve abandoned Unikey for the default Windows 10 input method anyway. This should be no big deal, and I am glad to reach a conclusion of some sort, even at 3:00 AM.
End of part 1.
