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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   3309 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for February 10, 2023

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

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There's this somewhat 1990s famous anime series* "Legend of Galactic Heroes". It's based on a series of Japanese military SF novels. The novels are of the kind that deal more with command, strategy and tactics rather than the actual pew-pew/aargh of SF combat.

I learned about it when someone posted a meme dissing 'lore' of some other series and well, look for yourself:. Piqued my interest.

No spoilers at any of the links here.

Haven't gotten around to watching the series - it's rather long and quality of visuals is not up to modern standards, but I'm enjoying reading the first book.

Like with Three Body Problem, there's a distinctly alien quality to the book despite it being translated and populated mostly by people descended from Europeans. It's sort of a military space opera I guess, but with a more serious tone. The books and the series is complex but not too impenetrable like certain anime. I suspect a lot of the harder to understand anime series are that way because Japanese correctly understand if you make something that makes little sense, people will still try to make sense out of it and impute deepness to it.

The first book is not bad at all. The writer has a good turn of phrase and the characters / organisational dynamics are described realistically. It's not boring or too predictable.

A flaw in the first book is that the strategic issue with the first battle were a bit ridiculous- e.g. professional soldiers in long running war making the kind of error a schoolboy wouldn't make after five games of Stellaris! Specifically they allow themselves be defeated in detail, which is just .. ugh.

*no. 11 on that list, which is mostly new stuff.

I'm not sure. E.g. the world politics asides in Ghost in the Shell were not bad. Haven't seen enough to make an opinion.

Haven't really read the LOGH books, but the political parts seem the least weak. Sure, demagogues bad, but I'm expecting at some point a recognition of the need for myths and such.

After all, war is not something that humanity can simply transcend without killing itself. The lies necessary in waging a war may be distasteful, but so is killing, and while there are some who'd prefer to be a victim rather than a killer, our blood comes from those who chose otherwise, hence there's always going to be more of those who will do the needful.

Japanese in general seem more cynical and realistic about democracy - they've had democracy imposed on them at gunpoint, and have never really started to believe the bullshit.

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