rachelmanija | Comic Con, etc

1. I've been given a membership to Comic Con, and will be there probably Friday and Saturday. Who wants to meet up?

2. Some people I know are signing up for a Japanese class. My Japanese could certainly use all the help it can get. However, the class is on Sunday afternoon, which is a good time for me to either write or relax, and which prevents me from taking a two-day weekend in Santa Barbara. I'd really like to get back into the Japanese groove, and that's a lot less inconvenient than another City College class. Hmmm.

3. I am taking time off from karate and have begun lifting weights three times per week in an attempt to not have my back hurt all the time. About two weeks in, I feel pretty good, my back is definitely improved, and I find lifting pleasantly meditative. Does anyone here lift weights seriously? How much improvement in strength can I reasonably expect if I persist?

I also walked three miles yesterday. Go me.

4. Today I finished and sent in revisions for Secret Project GW that I'm doing with Sherwood Smith. Go us. This makes me feel better about not having accomplished anything else this week.

5. DO NOT SPOIL ANYONE IN COMMENTS IF YOU CAN FOLLOW THIS but having recently hooked

oyceter on Naruto and knowing that she was a fair way into the chuunin exams arc, I e-mailed her, "Have you gotten to [so-and-so]'s past yet?" She replied, "I think so, so-and-so mentioned such-and-such, which was interesting." I wrote, "Never mind, you're not there yet."

I knew exactly when she got there when I received an e-mail with the subject line: [so-and-so's spoiler-protected name]!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The flashback which completely changes your view of a character is an old and very frequently well-done device in manga, and one which Kishimoto uses to good effect in several places in the series, but [!!!!!!!!!] is the best take on it I've come across yet.

Order the series from Amazon: Naruto, Volume 1

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[so-and-so's spoiler-protected name]!!!!!!!!!!!!!

HA HA

riddering SENT ME ONE OF THOSE when she first read it too!!

The flashback which completely changes your view of a character is an old and very frequently well-done device in manga, and one which Kishimoto uses to good effect in several places in the series, but [!!!!!!!!!] is the best take on it I've come across yet.

It is my utter favorite manga device, and Naruto kicks ass it; every Naruto character who I hated passionately before their spoilery flashbacks, especially [Main Spoilery Character In Question], afterward became among my favorite characters of the series. (I have the LJ equivalent of [!!!!!!!!!] with old posts tracking my Naruto reading from [Spoiler] needs to DIE to OH MY GOD [SPOILER NAME] OH MY HEART.)

[Spoiler] gets the best [!!!!!!!!!] EVER IN HISTORY.

Also, I am going to do a massive Naruto fanart-recs post soon-ish; any requests? (Massive but by no means comprehensive, as the fandom attempts to make up for its lack of decent fanfic by having oceans of really kickass art.)

Comic Con eee! Go poke your head in on Matsuri Hino for me! Maybe someday there will be a decent manga track at Dragon Con for me.

Yes, she went straight from "...I love Rock Lee, and Hinata is so sweet, and [some other person] still bores me, and [so-and-so] is still freaky," to "!!!!!!!!!!!"

Really, there are oceans of kick-ass art? Great, I'm looking forward to your post. The only ones I can think of offhand to recommend are the realistic angsty Gaara that you pointed me to, I think, and to browse through

telophase's gallery. Oh, and

oyceter especially likes Rock Lee, so if you find some good ones of him, I'm sure she'd appreciate it. Personally, I'd love to see some good (spoiler-marked) post-timeskip art.

the_z has some really good Naruto art in her DA gallery (http://the-z.deviantart.com).

Making list here, partially for your benefit and partially for

rachelmanija's, since you probably know most of them. Spoiler warnings primarily for

oyceter. These are pretty much all the ones I've got faved over on DA. In most cases I'm linking to one pic, because that's the one I faved, but their gallries probably have much more.

Naruto Memorial Project (http://www.ninja-monkey.com/NMP.htm) index - This was organized by

the_z in response to the big ginormous disastrous things dealing with Mr. Emopants that winds up with I AM MORE SPECIAL THAN YOU (to remain vaguely unspoilery). It grew so that every character that we knew of who had died, and every character that we thought might have died had at least one picture done of them - so there are characters listed in this project that didn't actually die: their status was uncertain at the time the art was made.

Kung-Foo's NMP entry (http://www.deviantart.com/view/10385455/), done at a time when we didn't know if this character would survive or not.

Wredewrat has a few things, including her entry (http://www.deviantart.com/view/11532160/) for the NMP, for the same character I did.

oyceter, you can't look yet until the chuunin exam arc is over. :D

Croaky (http://www.deviantart.com/view/8192898/) has a metric assload of Naruto stuff including lots of Jiraiya, and several OCs including a female version of Kyuubi called Bitch!Kyuubi.

chibitensai (http://www.deviantart.com/view/6758700/) - that one was done with ball-point pen.

Elledupomme (http://www.deviantart.com/view/6233532/) - great Gaara picture. :D

Ralein (http://www.deviantart.com/view/6311441/)

Paintpixel (http://www.deviantart.com/view/6173463/), who most people know for being one of the poeple colorizing covers of scanlations.

Frostius (http://www.deviantart.com/view/6002743/)

Prodigy Bombay (http://www.deviantart.com/view/6072264/)

JenZee (http://www.deviantart.com/view/4574597/)

Yamiza (http://www.deviantart.com/view/3952005/)

Technoelfie (http://www.deviantart.com/view/6020024/) has some cool stuff, including OCs, and, say, HALF-NAKED NINJAS (http://www.deviantart.com/view/5176783/).

Chelsee has wonderful Naruto art, including this one (http://www.deviantart.com/view/8104045/)

Many things by daruma123 (http://daruma123.deviantart.com/)

Ninja Skillz (http://www.deviantart.com/view/10427354/). Funnier if you've seen the canonical image of Itachi crouching on a light pole silhouetted by the moon and have read that bit of Sasuke's past.

Operation: Revival Uchiha, by duneboo (spoilers for post-chuunin exam)
Part I: http://www.deviantart.com/view/7671657/
Part II: http://www.deviantart.com/view/7833863/
Part III: http://www.deviantart.com/view/8677984/

omg u stol my recs u h0r h8 u

*bookmarks shinyshiny new things*

omg dun h8 me bcuz im gud!

:D Lots of Naruto art recs, I can do. XD And actually any search on "naruto" on DA will produce a lot of gold among the ~~massive amounts of~~ dross. A search for "nartuo" will bring up a lot of dross, unsurprisingly. XD What's surprising is that "naurto" has no results at all.

I dunno if the search is still restricted to paid members or not.

Yay! Art!

By the way, is the sexy picture of Naruto grown up in these? (I feel dirty liking it now, but I saw it before I really read the manga!)

Hmmmm..... I don't think so. You might want to poke through Croaky's and Technoelfie's galleries, but I don't think they do Naruto himself. They both play in AUs so I think you're OK with 'em because you won't be able to tell what's canon and what's their worlds. :D

[Spoiler] so gets the best [!!!!!!!!] ever! EVER!

EEEEEEEE!!!!

Am still not over it yet!

Ohhhhhh if you are still doing fanart recs, Rock Lee! Or Master Guy! I love them so much! The eyebrows! The stick lashes! The round eyes!

Also, anything of Sakura and Ino. Or actually, anything with the women.

nightambre really likes Ino, so she's got a lot of her in her DA gallery - http://nightambre.deviantart.com

Paintpixel, above, has a few of the chicks. :D

the_z did a Kunoichi Slumber Party (http://www.deviantart.com/view/10519000/). She used to ahve a Rock Lee up, but must have taken him down because I can't find him.

I just did a search for him on DA, and these are the best ones that popped up. In some cases. I will not be held responsible for any brain breakage that might occur in the other cases. XD

http://www.deviantart.com/view/6647034/
http://www.deviantart.com/view/1760688/
http://www.deviantart.com/view/6142832/
http://www.deviantart.com/view/2514828/
http://www.deviantart.com/view/10040819/
http://www.deviantart.com/view/7314256/
http://www.deviantart.com/view/3334335/
http://www.deviantart.com/view/5600960/
http://www.deviantart.com/view/15762601/
http://www.deviantart.com/view/3756635/

And a bonus Master Gai/Guy! BRAIN BREAKAGE IMMINENT
http://www.deviantart.com/view/2492190/

My brain! Ow ow ow ow!

I only clicked on the last one too!

Muahahahaha! You don't know which ones are good and which will break your brain! I am EVIL!!

oyceter just wrote up [!!!!!!!!!!!!] in her own LJ, by the way.

What happened to your fanart recs? Did I miss them?

Comic Con, etc

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You want Rock Lee? I GOT YER ROCK LEE RIGHT HERE!

Re: You want Rock Lee? I GOT YER ROCK LEE RIGHT HERE!

Re: You want Rock Lee? I GOT YER ROCK LEE RIGHT HERE!

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