“Japan Sinks – People of Hope” – Japan Gets That Sinking Feeling… yet again.

I have previously written a post about the two movie versions of Nihon Chinbotsu (日本沈没) known as ‘Japan Sinks‘ in English. I had studied the two versions discussed in that post for my article about disaster movies. After that I came across an animated version of the story on Netflix (see “Japan Sinks 2020” –…

Monkey: A Journey To The West

A few months ago I posted about the Netflix series The New Legends of Monkey. As I mentioned in that post, I really enjoyed the series and hope that it will continue (still waiting for news on Series 3). I also wrote in that post that it had encouraged me to get out my copy…

The New Legends of Monkey

While searching Netflix for something to watch, I came across The New Legends of Monkey. Having grown up with the cult TV series Monkey as a child (the programme was popular with many at my school and thanks to a scar on my forehead helped lead me to having the nickname ‘Buddha’ for a while……

Kamon – The Symbolism of Family Crests in Japan

Thanks to my interest in symbols and symbolism, I have been doing some research about kamon (家紋), ‘family crests’, in Japan. At the moment the research is at a relatively early stage and my knowledge is based primarily on a couple of books that I bought during a trip to Japan in 2020 and some…

Giri/Haji – Not Your Average Japan-related Drama

While Giri/Haji (‘Duty/Shame’) was first released on BBC, it is also available via Netflix. Although I had heard some good things about it, I resisted watching it. I’m not sure why exactly – probably as I feared that it could be yet another series that would play up on exoticising Japan in some way (and…

“Age of Samurai: Battle for Japan” – Excellent Docu-Drama

I have previously posted about one of my favourite places in Japan being Sekigahara – some of which owes to its place in Japanese history. Although I wouldn’t say that the Sengoku Period is my favourite part of Japanese history, there is something compelling about what happened towards the end of the period and how…

“Japan Sinks 2020” – Japan Gets That Sinking Feeling… again.

I have previously written a post about the movies Nihon Chinbotsu (日本沈没) known as ‘Japan Sinks‘ in English. As I wrote in that post, I had studied the two versions of that title for my article about disaster movies, but as I wrote the post I discovered that there was a new version of the…

“Outbreak” – A Disaster Movie for 2020

In the next of my posts about movies which I studied for my article “Disaster Narratives by Design: Is Japan Different?“, I am writing about Outbreak (Wolfgang Peterson, 1995). During the COVID-19 pandemic, this movie has apparently been a popular watch due to its content. A summary on IMDb is as follows. Colonel Dr. Sam…