The Fifth Annual MadGSC Awards

Movie of the Year: Pirates of the Caribbean 2: Dead Man's Chest
Another less than stellar year at the movie theatre, okay who am I kidding I didn't go to the theatre all year, its been 18 months since I went to a movie theatre. In any case the movie of the year is of course Pirates which I saw thanks to Netflix. Funny, full of piratey goodness, and actually lives up to the amount of fun the ride was unlike other Disney based ride movies.

Horror Movie of the Year: Dead and Breakfast
Zombies, or possessed undead are coming to kill you but with a toe taping catchy soundtrack. On the surface it doesn't sound like a really amazing horror movie but put all together it really is one of the best horror movies made in this country in probably a decade.

Kung-Fu Movie of the Year: Mr Vampire
Their vampires and they hop, it is the combination of my two favorite genres around, horror movies and kung-fu what can get better than that?

Actress of the Year: Edwige Fenech
The goddess of European Cinema, and one of the most beautiful women in the world in my very humble opinion, this year she wins best actress after not just 1 but 2 70s sex comedies staring Edwige got me to laugh hysterically and thus won actress of the year. In addition look next April for Eli Roth's sequel Hostel 2 that is going to feature the still lovely Edwige as the Professor, hopefully in an un-eviscerated role.

Undiscovered Genre of the Year: Shaw Brothers Black Magic The Shaw Brothers are best known for their kung-fu films but they also made a whole raft of other films from period costume dramas to the Black Magic films. The Black Magic films are completely insane, they involve bug eating, corpse milking, mystical battles of Oriental magic, naked chicks, curses, hexes, and bug eating, I think I already said that but there is a lot of bug eating. But what is more amazing is that they are good, in a truly wild and utterly original kind of way.

Anime of the Year: Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex 2nd Gig
A staple of my yearly awards Ghost in the Shell again continued to thrill and impress me time after time. Alas until 3rd Gig comes out this will be the last time Ghost in the Shell gets to be anime of the year.

Action Anime of the Year: Bleach
Bleach is another Shounen Jump series, but unlike Naruto, shudder, but unlike Naruto this actually moves the plot along without taking thirty episodes to do it. Plus it has an insane amount of in-jokes peppered through out. Some of you may have seen Orihime twirling her leek to the tune of Finnish polka probably, Orihime does that when she describes her unnatural cooking, I mean it is awful sounding stuff. But my favorite joke is when Ruika is explaining the world of Soul Reaping to Ichigo and shows him these brightly coloured drawings that look like they came out of a kindergarten class. It is a funny and exciting show, definitely worth the watch.

Comedy Anime of the Year: Miami Guns
In the vein of Excel Saga Miami Guns manages to spoof just about everything from Initial D to Friday the 13th and all places in-between. I only wish it had been more than 13 episodes it was so good and so damn funny. My favorite episode of course was the Friday the 13th spoof, but my second favorite was the second episode that was a re-cap of all these episodes they never showed. Now that is my kind of funny screwing with people's heads.

Fan Sub Anime of the Year: Keroro Gunso
Originally this was the comedy anime of the year and then I remember I had seen Miami Guns earlier this year and realized that Miami Guns really deserves the title of comedy anime but don't think that Keroro Gunso isn't any less deserving, it is just that I haven't seen a Friday the 13th parody on Keroro just yet. From the first episode I knew I'd love this series, it has a mom who likes to cook the stray pets the kids bring home, a ghost living in the basement, and the most adorable world conquering alien around.

Horror Anime of the Year: Higurashi no Naku Koro ni/Jigoku Shoujo
Been a good year for horror anime, not one but two series that deserve praise for their horror, and rather stark violence, especially Higurashi which has some rather shocking violence, but it good, the blood and guts aren't just for cheap thrills and look for gratuitous Colonel Sanders cameos. Both I doubt will ever get licensed too creepy, too Japanese, but still are fabulous. Just goes to show that the Japanese can make good horror anime just as much as they make good horror movies.

Manga of the Year: Kindaichi Case Files
It may take six months for each volume to come out and it is appearing less and less likely that they will ever actually put out the New Kindaichi Case Files but it is still my favorite manga series but next year it will up against some incredibly stiff competition when Gunsmith Cats: Burst and Gunsmith Cats: Omnibus come out.

Horror Manga of the Year: Reiko the Zombie Shop
Reiko isn't a place to by zombies, she is a person with a funny name. But there is nothing funny about the world Reiko is involved in, lots of child murders, stuff that you never see happen in comics or TV but happens all the time in the real world. Reiko can also call up her very own personal zombie like some form of really twisted Pokemon. It zombies, it is blood and gore, it is lots of fun. The zombie shop would be a funny used car dealership wouldn't it.

Action Manga of the Year: One Piece
This is the best pirate manga around, probably one of the best pirate stories in the world. It is a little more fantastic than your average swashbuckling tale, Luffy, Zolo, and especially Nami, it really is the character, the wide array of crazy and imaginative characters in this that really make it truly great.

Comedy Manga of the Year: Ninja Nonsense
Ninjas in the modern world, and of course they are complete and utter clods. But what really made me love this involves the flying yellow ball of a character Onsokuman who when he gets into a fight decides to climb inside the mouth of an alligator to use the alligator as battle armour and then he gets accidentally swallowed.

Best Retro Manga of the Year: Lupin III: World's Most Wanted
Although suffering the same fate as Kindaichi being trapped in the slowest possible release schedule it is still a truly kick ass manga filled with sex, gags, girls and guns, what isn't to love if you are a fan of retro stuff like I am.

Scanalation Manga of the Year: Osen
This year I really got into scanalation manga, it is like fan subbing but they really aren't subtitles. I have really gotten into it, currently there is... 9.66 gig, yes that is gig, on Ami-Chan, plus another 3 gig or so on my desktop. But of all of them my current favorite is Osen, which is one of the more unusual mangas I have seen. It is about a restaurant, it is primarily a cooking manga.

Scanalation Comedy Manga of the Year: Pugyuru
Random and hilarious tales about a little creature, not sure what exactly to call her, alien or what, Cheko-chan is a maid who is like silly putty or something. It is absolutely hysterical just little four panel tales of Yakuza with squirt guns, squid arch-enemies, and all around general cuteness that is almost over powering.

MadGSC
The Internet's Heavily Armed Raving Lunatic

Scanalation Action Manga of the Year: Gantz
Violent to an extreme, twisted to an extreme, boobs to an extreme, there is really nothing Gantz does half way. Also look for Fujiko from Lupin as the pin-up girl at the beginning of one of the chapters. The Gantz Manga-ka loves big boobs and you can't argue with a man that has the same interests as you.

Manga Company: Dark Horse
Yes strange but true, in years previous their erratic release schedule and often high priced manga had raised my ire but this year they proved to be the best manga company. They have Reiko the Zombie Shop, Berserk, Hellsing (okay they haven't released a new Hellsing in almost 2 years but hey they have it), and they have started to release Ghost in the Shell 1.5, the stories inbetween the two GITS mangas and when I e-mailed them asking if they were going to put it out in a manga volume not only did they answer, something which other manga companies, TOKYOPOP!!!, often won't do, they answered the same day something almost no one does. But more importantly Dark Horse is also going to be the manga company of the year for 2007 for three words Gunsmith Cats Burst or Gunsmith Cats Onmibus, or just Gunsmith Cats in general. So three cheers for Dark Horse, truly living up to its name.

Game of the Year: Okami
Definitely one of the most all around unique games ever made. People ask me why I don't like the X-Box or American games in general now I have a one word answer, Okami. From the cell shading to the inventive gameplay to the epic story Okami does everything perfectly.

Action Game of the Year: Lego Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy
I don't know exactly why I liked this game so much, possibly my nostalgia for Legos or my nostalgia for days back when Star Wars was still an unmolested trilogy of films. But there was something rather fun about playing these games, at times they could be frustrating but much less frustrating than other games (ahem, Bully, ahem) and the very un-American amount of hidden extras and special features made replay something very enjoyable.

Survival Horror of the Year: Resident Evil: Dead Aim
Coming in at the very last moment we have a new survival horror game this fear, leading up to this I was debating whether or not to give Fatal Frame III the award two years in a row but for Christmas I got Resident Evil: Dead Aim, a lightgun entry into the Resident Evil Franchise that was absolutely a hoot. You get to shoot all kinds of zombies. The game is a wee bit short and I would have liked to be able to damage the environment just a little more but it was a thrilling game that really put you in the shoes of the person and pull the trigger. Another great feature is limiting how much ammo you can carry to 6 clips which makes a hell of a lot more sense than being able to carry and entire arsenal, plus enough ammo t destroy a small African Republic.

RPG of the Year: Disgaea 2
I loved the first Disgaea, and when I heard that they were making a second game I was thrilled and when I heard it was just like the first one I was even more thrilled games like Disgaea you really can't improve on the gameplay you can only enjoy it a second time. Disgaea 2 lets you play the unique Disgaea RPG system a second time with an equally funny story line and the same great gameplay, what isn't to love?

DS Game of the Year: Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin
I loved the previous DS Castlevania game and Portrait of Ruin was even better. It takes the truly perfected Symphony of the Night style of 2nd platform game and shine it up real nice. It takes the unused but brilliant idea from Castlevania III of letting you switch between characters to maximize your ass kicking power, in this one you have standard Belmont style whipper and then a Sylphia style mage who can blast stuff with big powerful spells.

Retro Game of the Year: New Super Mario Brothers
It is Mario with a few new features, it is everything you loved about the original game with a few new spiffy new features that give the game new life plus excellent boss battles. Mario is back doing what he does best, stomping walking mushrooms and turtles as he collects coins.

Music of the Year: Tiger Army/Southern Culture on the Skids
This has been a good year for me and music because I have discovered a lot of good music. Again nobody actually tells me about these great new bands I have to stumble on them on my own. Tiger Army is the greatest psychobilly band around, they have absolutely great tunes. Southern Culture on the Skids is the greatest Swamp Rock band around. These are two bands that have been around for awhile yet I never had the chance to hear them and now that I have I am rather upset that I didn't hear of them sooner, they both really kick ass. If you dig music, not the third rate crap spewed out by MTV I mean real music played by real musicians.

Book of the Year: Coffin: Vampire Hunter D Art Book
While it is mainly an art book, it does have a short story in the beginning so therefore it still counts as a book. Not only is it absurdly huge, I mean the thing is four legs shy of being a coffee table rather than a coffee table book. The pictures are beautiful in their haunting way. It is something I don't think either of the movies really captured was the spooky beauty of D that Anno's work manages to magically capture.

TV Show of the Year: Venture Brothers Season 2
As good as the first season with a couple of truly great episodes, my favorite was Viva Los Muertos which involves bringing a guy back from the dead, some truly hilarious lines in that one. Now with a season 3 silently creeping up on us I hope and pray that I don't have to wait two years to see it like I had to wait for this season.

Technology of the Year: Nintendo DS
I got the DS for my birthday, I had my eye on one for some time, it really has the best game line up around. I have to admit I love my DS on the same level as I love my PS2 and I've had the thing for only two months.