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REVIEW: Perfect Blue: Awaken from a Dream




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Arale Kurashiki



Joined: 24 Aug 2015
Posts: 766
PostPosted: Fri May 04, 2018 10:38 pm Reply with quote
I've been reading the first book for a bit now and have found it incredibly boring in many ways, so I won't be reading this. But what he says in the afterword, how an element of stalking is built into the concept itself - this is very true, and the most important part of the themes he's working with.

The idol industry, and the system around it, encourages the existence of obsessive, even dangerous fans. It's a natural product of a system designed to engineer it.

In fact, part of what makes the first book so boring for me is that it doesn't go hard enough on this. From what I've read, not enough attention is placed on the system itself and the way it operates, which makes the stalker feel like more of a "crazy over-the-top serial killer" guy than a natural product.

The movie, of course, is incredible.
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katscradle



Joined: 05 Jan 2013
Posts: 469
PostPosted: Sat May 05, 2018 12:18 am Reply with quote
I also don't have plans to pick up Awaken From A Dream. I got my fill of idols and deranged stalkers and gore and sex stuff with Complete Metamorphosis. Though, I did like the first book. Made me muse about some stuff while it wasn't killing some of the tension, stretching reality or not giving full resolution to all the plot points. I’m sort of surprised Seven Seas licensed the second novel in conjunction with the first. (Who knows maybe it was a package deal.) The title has big name recognition but, the novels are the novels. Repetitiveness does not sound like a good trait.
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Mew Berry



Joined: 02 Apr 2016
Posts: 187
PostPosted: Sat May 05, 2018 12:29 pm Reply with quote
I'll probably pick this up eventually, but I'm not in a huge hurry to do it or anything. My main problem with the first book was the serious suspension of disbelief towards the end (you all know what I'm talking about), so having most of these stories be explicitly supernatural might actually work better for the author.
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Arale Kurashiki



Joined: 24 Aug 2015
Posts: 766
PostPosted: Sat May 05, 2018 8:45 pm Reply with quote
Mew Berry wrote:
My main problem with the first book was the serious suspension of disbelief towards the end (you all know what I'm talking about)

This actually makes me more interested to find out what happens in the rest, since it means at least something will happen, at all, as opposed to the characters sitting around talking about the unchanging circumstances of the premise for 100 pages.
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Mew Berry



Joined: 02 Apr 2016
Posts: 187
PostPosted: Sun May 06, 2018 9:33 am Reply with quote
Arale Kurashiki wrote:
Mew Berry wrote:
My main problem with the first book was the serious suspension of disbelief towards the end (you all know what I'm talking about)

This actually makes me more interested to find out what happens in the rest, since it means at least something will happen, at all, as opposed to the characters sitting around talking about the unchanging circumstances of the premise for 100 pages.


That is a completely fair point as well. Just don't expect realism.
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