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Influence Map: thatguy999 — Description
Over the past couple of weeks I've noticed alot of these influence maps popping up during my searches so I decided what the heck, I'd make one to. By the way if you're interested here is the template: [link]

In the top left is an old anime series I watched back in the early days of Adult Swim called "Yu Yu Hakusho". This was one of the first animes I ever watched and even to this day it has in my view some of the best characters ever written and it manages to convey the theme of "Friendship conquers all" but it does it in a way that's bad ass and not overly dramatic. That combined with some brilliant lines and the fact that it has a great English dub unlike newer series is one I can recommend to anyone despite its age.

In the top right is my favorite out of the current manga series out right now called "Fairy Tail" I dare say this series is actually better than both Naruto and Bleach the reason being is that it knows how to be inspired by other series without being a crappy rip off unlike Naruto and each chapter of the manga actually moves the story forward in meaningful manner unlike Bleach; I'm still pissed about getting jerked around all summer Tite Kubo!!! That aside it is a great series with a hilarious yet dramatic cast of characters, Erza Scarlet is quite possibly the best female character ever. In addition so far after 202 chapters there has only been one major BS development

On the bottom left we have Gundam Wing, another old anime that I started watching on Toonami when I was 10; this particular show is what drew me into anime in the first place. Like Yu Yu Hakusho this series has an excellent English Dub and features a great cast of character with very interesting back grounds and inner conflicts; one of the major character for my upcoming original story is actually partially inspired by this series' main protagonist Heero Yuy. I consider myself fortunate to have grown up in the 90's to early 00's, if I had grown up in the 80's I would have been flooded with shows like Transformers, GI-Joe, He-man, and other series with real black and white, good and evil story lines and that's just not compelling or realistic. And if I had grown up in the mid 00's to the present I wouldn't really get any sort of shows to watch that a real plot compelling or otherwise since Cartoon Network canceled Toonami and only offers a bunch of toddler friendly crap in its place. Again this is a series I highly recommend despite its age

In the bottom right you have Fable. I really enjoy games like the Fable and the Mass Effect series where you're forced to make choices and those choices have effects not just on you but the world around you. In particular I felt morally torn at the final choice of Mass Effect 2 (I ultimately chose to create a fireworks display out of a certain base). What I find compelling about games like these 2 series is the idea that "we are who we choose to be" and our choices effect not just us but those around us; depending on our choices we as individuals can become beacons of hope in troubled times such as today or we can choose to look out only for ourselves at the costs of the less fortunate.

Just above the left corner of the Fable picture I have a simple picture of a cross, the star of David, and the crescent star meant to represent Religion. Throughout history and my own personal experiance religion has inspired hope in many, however it has also caused countless people to sink into the depth of Depravity and has caused thousands of years of persecution and blood shed. According to my mother her father used to say "more people have been killed in the name of God than anything else" and sadly history shows us he was correct. Even in today's world it still prevalent, to see proof of this one needs to look no further than the controversy surrounding a planned Islamic center NEAR (not on) Ground Zero in Manhattan and some of the hateful rhetoric that has been spewed by SOME of its opponents. The fact of the matter is it's wrong to discriminate against an entire religion because of a few fanatics who've taken it too far and to do so would make you no better than the murdering bastards who killed approximately 3,000 innocent people on that fateful Tuesday morning nine years ago. One of the themes I'm hoping to convey with my up-incoming story Children of Vanity is what happens when people take Religious Faith too far.

And lastly the American Flag. The United States has only existed for 236 years, there are pubs and furniture in Britain older than our country for crying out loud; yet despite that what history we do have has been lively to say the least. At times we've shown the best humanity has to offer when we toppled Hitler's empire and rebuilt Europe, I also see it in the out-pour of aid to foreign countries in the wake of natural disasters such as the Earthquake in Haiti. On the other hand we have a history of incredible cruelty as well as evidenced by our enslavement and subsequent segregation of millions of black people and the essential genocide of the Native American population during our Western Expansion. Today we find ourselves faced with numerous challenges; our economy still has yet to recover, our education system is in the toilet, and many other issues plague us. These challenges have created an air of fear in this country which has been spurred on by the lowest scum our nation has offer; self serving sociopaths such as Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, and Sarah Palin play upon the fears of millions in order to fan the flames of mistrust to fracture and divide us as a people, and all for the sake of stroking their own egos. I implore anyone who reads this especially if you're an American, to remember that fear is a disease which can rob you of your reason and can only lead violence and misery. As Franklin Roosevelt once courageously said after taking the oath of office in the midst of a depression more than twice as grave as the current recession we face "...let me state my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself- nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance."

And that's my influence map for you, hope I wan't boring. If you have time I'd love to here your thoughts on my upcoming Children of Vanity project [link]

Yu Yu Hakusho (c) Yoshihiro Togashi
Fairy Tail (c) Hiro Mashima
Gundam Wing (c) Sunrise
Fable Series (c) Lionhead Studios