Latest news with #Lazarus'
New York Times
15-04-2025
- Entertainment
- New York Times
How an Anime Master Perfects the Cool Guy Action Hero
When it comes to creators who have defined contemporary anime, Shinichiro Watanabe is no less than a television auteur. His anime series, which include the renowned 'Cowboy Bebop' and 'Samurai Champloo,' are known for thrilling fight scenes, propulsive musical scores and fun, unpredictable characters. Watanabe's signature is his magnetic Joe Cool protagonist. He's a cowboy, bounty hunter, itinerant with some moral gray areas, but he's ultimately a good guy who's loyal to his crew. While loafing around at a bar he may give the vibe of an impassive layabout. But during a mission he is a suave, athletic fighter with a hybrid style of tussling that draws from various martial arts forms and alludes to several of the great movers and fighters from history. 'Lazarus' is Watanabe's latest series, about a scientist whose miracle drug may wipe out humanity and the ragtag team of miscreants who must track him down. Recruited to that team is Axel Gilberto, a fresh yet familiar take on Watanabe's typical hero. Here's how the latest version of Watanabe's always athletic, always stylish leading man fits into his history. The Original Watanabe's original cool-guy hero is Spike Spiegel, the centerpiece of his popular space Western 'Cowboy Bebop.' Spike's attitude and style are a mix between two well-worn cinematic tropes: the unflappable Old West gunslinger and the cynical down-on-his-luck film noir detective. His body language conveys a sense of nonchalance, even indifference. When he's relaxed, his gangly frame is often reclined, and when he's up and about he saunters around, hands in pockets, arms akimbo, with a smooth, uninterrupted gait. His fight style reflects this same fluidity; Spike is a master at evasive movement, great at narrowly dodging hits. Though he excels at both close range fighting and taking shots at a distance, his legs and footwork are really the stars of his combat style: Watanabe based Spike's fight technique on jeet kune do, the style developed by Bruce Lee. Spike's focus on minute, economical movement and his deft modulation of distance while dodging and striking an opponent is reminiscent of Lee. But his fleet footwork in this fight — the quick pivot and fanned out steps — actually recall the floating butterfly steps of Muhammad Ali (which is fitting, seeing as Lee was also inspired by Ali's footwork). The Outlaw 'Samurai Champloo' takes place in Edo Japan, where a waitress named Fuu employs two fighters to accompany her on a journey. Jin is the archetypal samurai character: a quiet, solitary ronin with expert, if traditional, swordsmanship skills. Mugen is a wild card: an outlaw used to working in his own self-interest who shares Spike's impulsiveness but is even more uncorked. Brash and hedonistic, Mugen is all id, and his fight style reflects this pugnaciousness. Mugen is an offensive fighter, always launching forward into attacks, but what makes him stand out is his mix of breakdancing-style spins and capoeira with his swordfighting. He's versatile, often using the environment around him, vaulting off objects to get himself airborne. Mugen's leg moves are vital in both his offense and defense. Near the end of this fight sequence with Jin, Mugen blocks a sword strike with the bottom of his sandal, which is reinforced with a metal plate: This small detail is also a characteristic of Watanabe's heroes, who all have interesting footwear. Spike fights in oversized, bulbous shoes. And Watanabe's next hero, Space Dandy, sports large steel-tipped and steel-bottomed boots. The Romantic 'Space Dandy' is perhaps the goofiest series in Watanabe's oeuvre. It features a shallow, harebrained, barely competent hero, but still offers a delightful parody of its creator's tropes. Dandy — that's what he is and it's also his name — is more of a lover than a fighter, and yet he often finds himself caught in inconvenient scenarios. Dandy is the foil to typical Watanabe cool-guy protagonists: He's another misfit who's always getting out of scrapes with his ragtag crew, but he can't fight, he's a bad shot and he's not as smooth as he thinks. In the above scene, Dandy shows off his speed and style with a series of Michael Jackson-esque dance moves in quick succession. Dandy's at his most agile when he's aiming to grab a woman's attention. Though Dandy's flirtations fall flat, his moves do come through for him in another vital way. When he's accosted by a gang of aliens wielding laser-zapping spears, his floundering movements save him from an untimely demise: Somehow even his clumsy physical gaffes seem to reflect some of the same dexterity and grace as Spike and Mugen's intentional dodges and deflections. The ultimate irony of this scene is that the woman whom Dandy was trying to impress is the one who gets the big action-hero fight: Scarlet flips and turns like an aerialist, then shows off some muay thai-style hand-to-hand combat, all while Dandy cowers on the floor. The Latest Model So much of the design and movement style of Axel Gilberto in 'Lazarus' feels reminiscent of the Watanabe heroes who preceded him. He's got much of Spike's fluid, evasive style of combat, and his devil-may-care attitude. He relies heavily on sweeps and parries like Mugen but torques and launches his body to more dramatic heights like he's a parkour master. He even has the wild mop of hair to mirror Spike's and Mugen's (Dandy's well-oiled pompadour, while also a dramatic 'do, is the exception). Axel is so confident in his abilities that he enjoys breaking out of prison as a kind of hobby; he wears a smug face as he does a massive aerial over the head of a prison visitor and lands backward against a railing: Even Dandy would have trouble matching Axel's flair, as this action sequence of him sweeping under, kicking at and catapulting over prison guards demonstrates the balletic quality of Axel's moves: There's no hesitation or breaks in his stride as he progresses down the walkway, and, like Spike and Mugen, he leads legs first. He barely touches the guards as he disarms and deflects them. Though this is our first introduction to this character, we can already get a sense of his particular charms and talents — he's another Watanabe favorite in the making.
New York Times
03-04-2025
- Entertainment
- New York Times
‘Lazarus' Is a Dark and Kinetic Adventure
Image A scene from 'Lazarus.' Credit... Adult Swim Right on the heels of 'Common Side Effects' comes another animated pharmacological thriller, this time the Japanese anime series 'Lazarus,' which premieres, dubbed, on Saturday at midnight, on Adult Swim. The show is set in 2055, and a miracle pain killer that claims to free people from all suffering has become ubiquitous. Years after the mysterious Dr. Skinner released this drug, Hapna, he re-emerges with a second bombshell: After three years in your system, Hapna will kill you. Humanity has 30 days before everyone who has taken it — which is just about everybody — succumbs. Unless, of course, someone can find Dr. Skinner and the antidote only he can share. This calls for a ragtag team! Of course it does; 'Lazarus' was created and directed by Shinichiro Watanabe, best known for his work directing 'Cowboy Bebop,' which is also a dark, funny, futuristic ensemble adventure. The show's other big draw is its fight choreography by the 'John Wick' director Chad Stahelski. The action sequences are the highlight of the five (of 13) episodes made available for review: a big jailbreak in the pilot, lots of urban scrambling, a zippy comeuppance for a sex-pest sleaze. Our snappy hero and newest member of the crew is Axel Gilberto, an escape artist and underbelly-dweller who is serving 888 years in prison — your sentence is doubled every time you escape. He is recruited out of his cell and into a shadowy group that is determined to find Dr. Skinner and has the requisite position players to do so, including a hacker, a researcher and an icy boss. Each episode of 'Lazarus' begins with the same visual montage, but each opening narration and narrator is different. The episodes end with a countdown of how many days are left until the Hapna apocalypse. This repetitive yet iterative framing feels like a ritual, and the show is filled with religious imagery and musings about the nature of divinity. If Dr. Skinner can both cure and kill everyone, does that make him a god? Or just the world's most powerful drug peddler? If pain is a part of life, and there is no more pain, maybe we're already dead, and there's nothing left to pray for. If you thought the end was coming, would you change course or just surrender?
Washington Post
30-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Washington Post
A painting of a miracle that's nothing less than a miracle
Great Works, In Focus • #189 A painting of a miracle that's nothing less than a miracle In its raw artistic power, Duccio's 'The Raising of Lazarus' connects to Aretha Franklin's own storytelling masterpiece six centuries later. Expand the image Click to zoom in Column by Sebastian Smee March 27, 2025 4 min Duccio di Buoninsegna was the radical, poetic artist who guided a group of other artists working in Siena, Italy, in the 14th century. As the recent Siena exhibition in New York so beautifully demonstrated, these artists helped redefine Western painting for centuries to come. None of these Sienese artists survived the Black Death. But Duccio had meanwhile breathed new life into painting. He 'opened up a door through which others could pass,' as Hisham Matar wrote in 'A Month in Siena.' 'The Raising of Lazarus,' one of the great treasures at the Kimbell Art Museum in Fort Worth, was painted — patiently, and with unmatched delicacy and fluidity — in egg tempera and gold in 1310-1311. Originally, it formed part of a giant altarpiece known as the Maestà for the high altar of Siena Cathedral. This small panel was positioned near the base, or predella, the last in a sequence of images showing scenes from the Passion before Christ's entry into Jerusalem. Story continues below advertisement Advertisement A born storyteller, Duccio was acutely alert to nuances of emotion. He wanted to depict biblical history as though it were a contemporary event. That may be why, when I see 'The Raising of Lazarus,' I can't help but think of another artist who told this story — not in paint but in song. In 1972, Aretha Franklin performed 'Mary, Don't You Weep' with a gospel choir at the New Temple Missionary Baptist Church in Los Angeles. 'We're going to review the story of two sisters called Mary and Martha,' she sang, her matter-of-factness oddly reminiscent of Duccio's. 'They had a brother named Lazarus.' Franklin sings of how Lazarus, a follower of Jesus, had died while Jesus was away. Drowning in grief, Mary ran to Jesus, saying: ''Master. My sweet Lord.'' In the song, Franklin repeats the word 'my' 10 times, oscillating back and forth between two gasping notes. ''If you had've been here,'' she sings, ''my brother wouldn't have died.'' Sobered up by this terrible accusation, the song briefly reverts to a quieter mode: 'Jesus said: 'Come on and show me. Show me where you buried him. Show me where you laid him down.'' But the high drama returns when Jesus is brought before the tomb of Lazarus. (This is the part of the story Duccio painted.) Ventriloquizing Jesus, Franklin sings 'Lazarus' three times. Before the second, she launches into a high-pitched hum: ''Mm-mm, Lazarus!'' For the third, she hits an astonishing high note, almost a scream — 'LA-ZARUS!' What follows is one of the most powerful musical moments I know. The choir pursues this third 'Lazarus' with two undulating, sirenlike notes that echo Mary's earlier anguish ('My my, my my …') and that instantly conjure the moment's spookiness, the sheer unlikely power of what Jesus has just done. You may consider it a stretch, but what Franklin and her church choir did in 1972 is exactly what Duccio was doing 660 years earlier. Notice the man removing the lid of the upright sarcophagus. (Underpainting suggests Duccio originally painted it horizontal.) Then look at the man in the yellow cloak, covering his nose and mouth. Is it a simple gesture of shock? Or is he protecting himself from the foul smell of Lazarus, who has been dead four days? Unlike the rest of the gathered crowd, Mary and Martha are focused not on Lazarus but on Jesus. This unites them with their brother, who has just opened his uncomprehending eyes. The moment is too fraught and uncanny for anything so saccharine as happiness. Lazarus's body is still tightly wrapped in its shroud. A moment ago — gah! — he was dead. Story continues below advertisement Advertisement Like Franklin, Duccio used color, gesture, composition, character and a crowded chorus of concerned onlookers to bring the story, and Lazarus, to life. I use that phrase deliberately, because I suspect its implications go to the heart of why we have art. We are mortal. Vulnerable in our mortality, we love. For the same reason, we are always losing what we love. Helplessly, we accuse the world — as Mary accused Jesus — of being complicit in our mounting losses. Art is there to do, in a sense, what Jesus did to Lazarus, and what Duccio and Franklin did to their art forms: to open up a door, to recoup the losses, with stories, song and images. To bring what we love back to life.
Associated Press
11-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Associated Press
Anonna Reign's Captivating Love Triangle 'Lazarus' Graces the New York Times Square
The romance novel lighted up New York's iconic billboard on March 7, 2025. COOKSTOWN, NJ, UNITED STATES, March 11, 2025 / / -- Right above the Pelé store at Times Square, the love story in ' Lazarus,' debut novel of author Anonna Reign, lighted up the corner of 1560 Broadway, New York on March 7, 2025. 'Lazarus' tells the compelling story of Ava, a woman torn between two men — Julius, a wealthy and influential man with everything in his grasp, and Lazarus, a humble yet captivating man who sweeps Ava off her feet. As the love triangle turns deadly, the novel explores the complexities of love, power, and fate, capturing the hearts of readers. Fiction author Anonna Reign captures the literary world with her deeply moving stories that combine romance with spiritual depth. With her ability to blend faith with fiction, Anonna's writing invites readers to explore profound connections with both their faith and their hearts. Her debut novel, 'Lazarus,' inspires readers to share their personal stories of love, faith, and perseverance. With a background in psychology and a passion for advocating for autism awareness, Anonna continues to inspire through her work. When she's not writing, she enjoys spending time with her family, gardening, and serving her local church. Available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and other major online bookstore retailers, follow Annona Reign's intriguing love story in 'Lazarus.' About Writers' Branding Writers' Branding is a full-service self-publishing company that provides aspiring authors exclusive access to publicity and a pool of book evaluators and marketing creatives and bridges them to literary agencies and traditional publishing houses. Please visit for more information. Lyn Goot Writer' Branding YouTube Legal Disclaimer:
