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There is a deluge of cinema yet a dearth of quality, and we humans emulate that which we observe. Cinema Aficiona seeks to separate the wheat from the chaff and analyze what speaks to the human soul, fires the imagination, and appreciate what makes a truly good story.
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October 01, 2022
Kalei Analysis: Takahashi's 18th Dynasty Fanfiction

A lot of people take knowledge for granted. They seem to think that history is just automatically recorded and distributed and will always be there, created reliably and accurately from thin air. The longer I witness the ebb and flow of the internet and the nature of people, the more I realize that if you have the means to create something, it's your duty to do so, because information is only distributed when people choose to distribute it. Midst the endless deluge of those who do so ironically and maliciously, truthful and sincere information is always scarce, but will be found by those who need it.

Now preserved here for posterity, please enjoy one of the only analyses of Kazuki Takahashi's original YGO story, brought to you by the only two people on the internet likely capable of writing such a thing: An analyst who is a gigantic nerd who happened to make friends with one of the greatest Egyptologists in the UK who is also a gigantic nerd.

All links will be referenced at the end of the post:


Okay time to tackle this ask…

TLDR: Takahashi actually spent time in Egypt doing his homework, somehow got an accurate translation of the Book of the Dead in the 1990’s which is unheard of, tried to write a historical fanfiction about the fall of the 18th Dynasty and was curb stomped into making children’s card games by JUMP, Shueisha, and Konami.

Here’s the shitpost mentioned. [Link 1]

Since I could go on for DAYS about the background information needed to fully grasp what happened with Takahashi and his original plans for YGO, I’m just going to address what was asked here directly. Keep an eye out for that YGO video I teased forever ago [Link 2] for the more in-depth explanations and accounts. Here’s a quick and dirty primer…

…But before I go into this, please keep in mind I am: #1. Regurgitating all of this from an actual Historian who studied the Book of the Dead and a solid year of Egyptology at King’s College of London (thank you @monpian) and #2. I am MASSIVELY simplifying the definitions and explanations of Egyptian beliefs and book of the dead lore for time’s sake here.

This is a religion that predates any and all current religions by THOUSANDS OF YEARS, so throw away all preconceptions about “souls” and “bodies” and “spirits” and “heaven” and “hell” etc. because this stuff is much more complex and straight up WEIRD than what we’re used to with today’s religions.

Okay here goes:

Egyptians believed the living person was comprised of 5 parts. Ka, Ba, Sheut, Jb, and Ren.

Ka was something of a life force, your double, unseen but always present, kept you alive and encouraged you to be strong and do well; think Jiminy Cricket. The Ba was your personality, the part of you that interacted with the world and other people. The Sheut or shadow, empowered you to pass judgement on others, and was a servant of Anubis. Jb or Heart, was your brain, functionally. Where memories were stored, every event you’ve experienced, and these memories were considered a tangible place in time and space. Finally, Ren. Your name, an essential element the Ka and Ba needed to have access to in order to recognize each other. It was also tied to the Jb and ones’ memories.

When you died, it was also known as “Meeting your Ka”. The Ba is now free to travel between the worlds of the living and the dead, often depicted after death as a bird with the face of the deceased. However, it’s sort of stuck in the body, so rituals needed to be performed to get it out of there and let it fly around and do its thing. It’s job was to look over the family of the deceased, protect em and such. As long as there is a tomb, a mummy, and the Ren is present somewhere within those items, the Ba can find its way back to the Ka after its daily joyrides, join up with the Ka to get “reenergized”, and do the whole thing over again the following day.

The Ka, which is life itself, just gets up and walks out of the body upon death. It’s depicted as a smaller version of the deceased and is dumb af, unable to cross over to the land of the dead since it is life, needs to be set up with a sweet bed (mummy) and sustenance (pictures of food/drink on the walls of the tomb) for it to survive this first death. It also needs to be able to recognize itself to continue existing, hence you have a detailed death mask on the mummy, the Ren written all over the damn place, and the Ba depicted as a normal bird with a big ol detailed human head depicting the deceased’s appearance. Thank you, proper priest spells.

Where’s the Sheut in all this? Well it can choose to hang with either the Ba or the Ka, but was usually with the Ba since Ba would be flying around protecting the deceased’s family and friends and would need the Sheut to dole out some judgement (Shadow games, anyone?)

So the Ka and Ba are pretty happy to have this day to day existence with a sweet tomb and mummy, this is just as well since tons of spells needed to be performed by a priest to enable all this, which would usually take between 3-6 months (which hey hey look at that, is the generally accepted grieving period for the deceased). But eventually Ba and Ka gotta hit up the Duat, and to get there, they gotta be judged by Mr. Creepy touch himself; Anubis.

However, you can’t be judged unless you are a whole person, so how does this happen? Remember those Egyptian priests that were casting spells and performing rituals on the deceased? Yep.

So the Ba, Ka, Sheut, and Jb are all back together thanks to the presence of the Ren and all the right magic words, and are now considered Akh, or “effective one.” They take on the trials and tribs of travelling to the Duat. Anubis says “what up” to the Sheut that’s been accompanying you throughout your life, gives your Jb a few squeezes, and tosses it on the scale to be weighed against the feather of Ma’at.

If you’ve lived honestly and well, you’re good to Pass Go, collect $200, and enjoy eternal poon while eating milk and honey and partying with the Gods in the duat! But, if you’ve got horrible guilt in your heart/memories, then Ammut gets a free meal, kiss your Jb goodbye, and you’re doomed to never hang with the cool kids. The disappearance of your Jb also means no more Akh, and you’re doomed to the dreaded SECOND DEATH.

Basically your Ba and Ka are no longer “Wonder Twin Powers Activated”, and with no Sheut or Jb, the Ka has now forgotten the Ba and will “disappear” from existence within some greatly unspecified amount of time. The Ba is stuck wandering between the land of the dead and living for eternity, or until a priest can perform the proper rituals to send it to the Duat when the Ka comes along again in 3000 years Hey there former Priest Seto Kaiba and his obsession with murdering Yugi in the early chapters of the manga. Also the line in YGO: DSOD in original Japanese explicitly stating this was the exact nightmare Kaiba was having. English version botched their translation, who’d’ve thought?

The second death could occur in a maddening variety of ways and was feared by the Egyptians even more so than straight up death. No mummy/body of the deceased? 2nd Death. No tomb with wall goodies? 2nd Death. Name erased from history? 2nd Death! Improper rituals/lack of priestly handling? You guessed it! 2nd Death.

But all hope is not lost, because there were mentions around the Greek times in the Egyptian empire of Ka lost to the 2nd Death able to be reincarnated after 3000 years.

Now that we’ve got all THAT out of the way…

From chapter 1 to chapter 13 of the YGO manga, the plot was as follows: Young Japanese child perpetually lonely, attempting to solve ancient Egyptian puzzle pilfered from the Valley of the Kings by his grandfather, suddenly able to solve it after 8 years. What’s up with that? Well remember the whole “Ba can’t recognize Ka unless they look the same” issue? Wonder why Atem looks so much like Yugi? Well it’s the other way around, Yoogs grew up to look just like Atem and BAM, Ba recognizes its Ka and “Hey there buddy, let me help you with this puzzle.”

Completing the puzzle releases Atem’s Ba and Sheut, both of which had been trapped in there due to Thief King Bakura plot events. Remember how that Millennium Ring could seal pieces of “soul” into objects? Well that was about the best translation you could get at the time in the late 90’s/early 2000′s, but p much it was sealing people’s Ba into objects. Hence you were left with a body in a coma, and the person’s personality inhabiting the D&D figures.

So we now have Yoogs’ Ka, Ba, and Sheut together again! But wait! There’s no Ren! And the Jb was lost as well! So that means no memories, and no way for the Ka and Ba to truly “recognize” each other. That’s right! All those early chapters showing Yoogs unable to remember what happened whenever Atem showed up and used their Sheut to pass judgement on people now fully explained. And as the two go on living together, with the Millennium Puzzle acting as the Ba’s own personal tomb and Yugi as his freakin Mummy Alive!, the bond between Ka and Ba slowly starts to strengthen.

“But wait!” You may be thinking. “Atem and that shadow were straight up MURDERING people and had no morals! Atem and Yugi couldn’t be the same person!”

Keep in mind the Ba was your personality and what interacted with the world, the Ka was your lifeforce, and relatively close to the modern day idea of a conscience. Taking a quick step back here, Atem in YuGiOh is based off of Tutankhamun (formerly known as Tutankhaten whose namesake came from the cult of Aten at the end of the 18th Dynasty.) Atem’s Ba is literally a Pharaoh who, by historical record, likely enjoyed seeing prisoners tortured and brutalized, and was bff’s with The Biggest Asshole in Egypt™, Pharaoh Horemheb aka: Seto.

Yes I know there was a Pharaoh named Set soon after the 18th Dynastic period who loved blue and gold, but trust me, the namesake is all Takahashi pulled from Pharaoh Set, his personality and historical timeline events fictionalized in YGO are all direct reference to Horemheb and the fall of the 18th Dynasty. I’ll eventually do an explanation on all the direct ties with the 18th Dynasty crew/events but this TLDR post is ALREADY HITTING FOUR PAGES and I just don’t have the time right now to go into it.

So it’s easy to see why the ancient Ba is just murdering peasants without a second thought, and the modern reincarnated Ka is not too happy about the Ba pulling all this horror and murder, but hey, they eventually come to terms to the point where they can exist at the same time, each learning from the other and acting as the Ka and Ba are meant to be; one and the same person.

I really want to get into what happens from Ch. 13-20 BUT THIS IS A HELL OF A LONG POST ALREADY.

SO THAT’S THE INITIAL SPILL ON WHAT’S UP WITH KA, BA, AND 3000 YEARS IN YUGIOH.

Man this is really frustrating because there’s  A LOT MORE TO COVER and I HATE leaving things unexplained, but as I said before, I just don’t have time right now.

Hope this little tidbit is enough to sate you guys for now! I WILL be doing more in the future!

[Link 1] <a href="https://returntheba.tumblr.com/post/169627013685/kaleidraws-sothe-ka-was-believed-to-be-able-to" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank" class="link">https://returntheba.tumblr.com/post/169627013685/kaleidraws-sothe-ka-was-believed-to-be-able-to</a>
[Link 2] <a href="https://www.bitchute.com/video/8rPLrdSmr0wH/" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank" class="link">https://www.bitchute.com/video/8rPLrdSmr0wH/</a> 
[Original Post] Original Post: <a href="https://kaleidraws.tumblr.com/post/172163064760/so-ive-been-putting-off-this-ygo-ask" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank" class="link">https://kaleidraws.tumblr.com/post/172163064760/so-ive-been-putting-off-this-ygo-ask</a>
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September 19, 2022
Video: Primal Retort

Just a meme borne of enjoying watching Genndy Tartakovsky's Primal.

...Birds?

00:00:42
April 02, 2022
Cinema Aficiona: The Trailer

Fantastic video from @BigBlueVA for our weekly Cinema Aficiona meetings! I love this, absolutely wholesome.mp4. Thank you, Andrew!!

00:01:12
November 06, 2021
Cinema Aficiona: Giant Robo (Part 2)

A new month, a new opportunity to upload this monster file of a Cinema Aficiona episode!
Please enjoy the conclusion of our foray into the fantastic 7 episode series "Giant Robo: The Day The Earth Stood Still" by Yasuhiro Imagawa!

Part 1 can be viewed here: https://kalei.locals.com/post/1147675/cinema-aficiona-giant-robo-part-1

01:05:48
April 09, 2022
Cinema Aficiona: The Lion King (1994)

Good Morning Cinema Aficiona !

This morning we're presenting the 1994 animated feature "The Lion King" directed by Rob Minkoff and Roger Allers. For the directors, this was a bit of a flash in the pan, as I haven't found anything else in their repertoire worth pointing out, and based off of stories of how this movie shifted and evolved during the production phase, I'd say it's very fair to call this a "lightning in a bottle" scenario, and the last worthwhile animated feature that would be created by the studio.

With a fantastic soundtrack by the incomparable Hans Zimmer, and story supervision at the hands of Ms. Brenda Chapman (fresh off her work on The Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast), this weekend's event is sure to knock your nostalgic socks off. And for those who have never seen it, prepare to witness the greatest achievement in featured animation history.

We will be watching an unedited, unrestored, laserdisc version of the movie, as most every modern copy has ...

Cinema Aficiona: The Lion King (1994)
February 12, 2022
Cinema Aficiona: The Iron Giant (1999)

Today we'll be returning back to the animation roots of my analytical posts with The Iron Giant (1999) directed by Brad Bird.
Bird made a name for himself as an animator for The Simpsons and King of the Hill, and working on things like Animalympics, The Black Cauldron, The Fox and The Hound, and Sesame Street, finally gaining enough clout to pitch his first movie: The Iron Giant.
This little known gem has become more popular over the years since it's initial lack-luster release, as all good stories do. It's a fantastic example of how good a story can be when corporate stays out of the way and the creative team is solid.
This movie sports fantastic voice acting from Harry Connick Jr., Vin Diesel, and Christopher McDonald, Brad Bird made sure of it.
I hope you enjoy this discussion about a fantastic sci-fi adventure with some of the best comedy ever rendered in two-dimensions! The editing once again done by the incredibly skilled @Hailo , thank you!

Cinema Aficiona: The Iron Giant (1999)
February 05, 2022
Cinema Aficiona: The Shining (1980)

Today we'll be watching Stanley Kubrick's "The Shining" from 1980. This movie is based on the horror novel by Stephen King, but Kubrick clearly makes it his own with a number of liberties in the story and characters. It's a fantastic and horrifying dive into the capabilities of the human psyche when driven to the extreme, and the dangers of ignoring resentment and unresolved conflict between people. This supernatural horror is fantastic for the very fact that if you remove the supernatural elements, the story remains unscathed. I hope you enjoy this discussion around a classic horror that set the standard for decades after.

Big thanks to @Hailo for editing!

Cinema Aficiona: The Shining (1980)
May 05, 2023
Heads Up Locals Crew!

The time has finally come to consolidate my future rants, site updates, blurbs, and general shitposting into one independent location. I have been convinced to move onto Substack which has been integrated into KaleiWorks.net by the fine crew at Patch Digital.
I will be making all future updates, posts, videos, etc. through my mailing list to try to pull all the different branches of my creative works into my personal website's reach rather than splitting my time between Tumbl, Twit, Locals, and the like. I've got a couple dried out husks of Mammoth, Gab, Parler and Truth accounts floating around as well, it's almost like a seasonal migration at this point.
For those of you who wish to keep up with the show, please sign up for my mailing list: https://kaleiworks.substack.com/subscribe
And for those who have been here supporting me through the years, a hearty Thank You for your time and attention, it's been a fantastic ride!

April 21, 2023
Cinema Aficiona LIVE Panel

Good Afternoon Locals crew! Here is the promised video of the MEGACON panel that happened late March, expertly edited and filmed by @KeyBlack https://odysee.com/@KaleiWorks:b/CA-MEGACON2023
A warm welcome to the new Locals crew as well!

March 22, 2023
Cinema Aficiona LIVE at MEGACON 2023 in Orlando, FL!!

Cinema Aficiona is an official panelist at this year's MEGACON in Orlando, FL! Sorry for being AWOL for the last few months, been working hard on things behind the scenes and some of that work has paid off!

https://fanexpohq.com/megaconorlando/

If you are attending MEGACON this year, join me Thursday, 30 March at 6:30PM in S320G on the third floor of the North-South concourse for a live Cinema Aficiona! Since we don't have a full 2 hours to watch a film and discuss it, I will be analyzing a few clips from some past CA classics like A Fistful of Dollars, The Shining, Pirates of the Caribbean, and A Flight of Dragons, as well as discussing the big-picture for why Cinema Aficiona was started in the first place.

Tickets are still available for Thurs! I hope to see you guys there!

December 21, 2022
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A Study in Gaslighting and Disingenuous Academia
“How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Accept Atlantis”

First, an apology to all those who followed my Locals thinking it would be artwork and memes; you are about to get some good ol’ analysis. And for those of you who have known me for a LONG time; Huzzah! It’s finally time once again for some good ol’ analysis.

I have just finished Graham Hancock’s outstanding new series “Ancient Apocalypse” which presents very clearly and thoroughly a number of anthropological and historical theories and assertations that have always been at the forefront of the collective consciousness of mankind. These subjects are discussed side-by-side with uncensored and phenomenal site evidence, new archaeological discoveries, and impressive all-source analysis that makes these propositions, in my estimation, self-evident. In simpler terms: Graham said Plato was right about Atlantis and the “academics” are angry about it.

Ancient Apocalypse is the first audio-visual presentation to take concepts such as The Lost Civilization of Atlantis and Catastrophic Destruction of a Human Civilization outside of the realm of myth, and plant them firmly in historical fact. Plenty of people, hinged and otherwise, have made similar assertations in the past, but due to their mocking, censorship, deplatforming, or the exploitation of personal shortcomings by critics, very few public voices have dared to consider these events as something to be taken seriously until now.

I will say now, for those of you reading this who have not yet seen Graham Hancock’s Ancient Apocalypse, please take the time do to so in the manner most convenient to you, which hopefully supports Graham’s financial welfare and future endeavors.

Now that the stage is set, getting to the subject that made me sit down and write my first analytical post in years, I will cop out and simply copy pasta the off-the-cuff ranting I did in a private group chat on this subject as I watched the Joe Rogan Experience Podcast #961 - Graham Hancock, Randall Carlson & Michael Shermer:

You wanna see a master gaslighter? Check Michael Shermer using weasel words and totally irrelevant subjects to sound smart.

This guy is trying to claim because there were no metal tools found at Göbekli Tepe, it can't be an "advanced civilization-made location" when it is self-evident from the dating on the site putting it at 12,000 years ago and the fact that it's BEAUTIFULLY CARVED STONE PILLARS AND ALIGNMENTS TO SIGNIFICANT ASTRONOMICAL MARKERS. He’s acting like that's not from a civilization more advanced than hunter-gatherers that allegedly couldn’t even sustain an agrarian presence, could only build huts and use tents, and couldn't construct large stone buildings. This guy continually moves goalposts and brings up things that have nothing to do with the subject matter to derail or make false equivalences.

Graham: We have, according to the current “accepted” human society timeline, the world's first perfectly north-south aligned building, and astronomical referencing carved in stone.
Shermer: Maybe.
Graham: Maybe?? I'm citing the measurements of the site from the guy who discovered it!

This guy can't even look Graham in the eyes while he speaks. "Because ONE journal finally published ONE article about a fringe theory that disproves any mass attempt to keep alternative theories down." - This Guy

LORD GIVE ME PATIENCE. I jumped ahead to where Graham and Randall were talking, the midwit chimes in again, and says something so absolutely batshit insane that Joe Rogan breaks his usually neutral stance and calls him ridiculous.

Shermer literally compared someone painting on a wall to creating the largest megalithic astronomically aligned stonework site in the world. He claims the level of skill is comparable, and both are impressive. Granted, yes, painting with three-dimensional perspective is impressive. However, it’s nowhere near the cognitive and societal accomplishment of building something like Göbekli Tepe, and even inferring that is asinine at best and nefarious at worst.

The They’s of the world really don’t want the idea that “civilizations just as advanced as our current one were wiped out in a cataclysmic event” to take root. If we are at the pinnacle now, everything is justifiable. All fears of "going too far" and "shouldn't we be more careful?" go away. They get to say "We're the smartest, we know better, we’ve never had these opportunities before, we’ve never had better technology," and conduct whatever evil they want under the guise of progress. Additionally, ANYTHING that points to the Bible being true scares the shit outta these people. Gotta keep it "Haha silly retards think there's a magic man in the sky".

Shills: Plato was a great Historian, we base a lot of ancient history off of his completely provable claims.
Graham: What about him giving explicit and detailed historical account of what happened to Atlantis and its advanced civilization that he got from the Egyptians?
Shills: No no, Plato was clearly a lunatic about that one thing.

Shermer then weasels "There's Graham, he seems so reasonable-" home boy is literally insulting Graham Hancock to his face. Shermer then goes "Graham, I'm sorry, I didn't mean it to sound like that" after Graham calls his insult out. Shermer then gives a non-apology in an absolutely sociopathic manner.

Every time Randall Carlson gets his turn to talk he just nukes Shermer’s arguments from orbit.

Ohhhh perfect example of more gaslighting. Joe calls a colleague of Shermer’s, guy named Marc Defant who has misrepresented Graham’s positions in the past to discredit him. They want to set the record straight and they get him on the video call line. Marc starts off with "Well I'm sorry if I disturbed and upset you," when Graham was neither disturbed nor upset, but that statement now tries to reshape the entire interview into "Graham is weak and his feelings are easily hurt". And then when Graham calls him out, he immediately gaslights again and infers that Graham refuting him was "wasting time", to which Joe chimes in immediately going "No no, we have plenty of time."

This is GOLD analysis on gaslighting!

Then when Joe refutes him, he tries to change the subject using weasel words like "Would you allow me to just address *change of subject*?" Then when Joe refutes THAT attempt, he shuts down and throws up his arms going "Well what was the question then?"

After doubling down on misrepresenting Graham’s arguments, it gets so bad that Shermer chimes in going “Marc, we actually did misrepresent him,” because even Shermer realizes how terrible this looks for the both of them.

At this point I stopped watching the interview, it was just too tedious to hear the continual “nuh-uh” level rebuttals to Graham and Randall’s rock-solid info. And for anyone wondering why I consistently malign, dismiss, and mock “academia”, this interview is the perfect demonstration.

While many people will defend the parties involved in this discussion because of the “rational and polite” way in which it was conducted, I say that’s BULL. When you have one party insulting and belittling the other consistently, to which one side has to continually defend not only their argument, but themselves, that’s not a rational or polite debate. It’s exhausting, tedious, and serves to give the illusion of “both sides having merit” to the passive listener.

Graham and Randall’s analyses speak for themselves, so the only argument that people like Shermer can heave at them is one that brings attention to other subjects and other people. They must tie one person’s reputation to another and discredit them both, because the analysis is solid.

Academia has rewarded this faux debate technique along with groupthink and consensus for so long that it has destroyed the very concept of critical thought. Consensus is the opposite of discovery and the antithesis of invention.

“The finest candlemakers would have never thought of the lightbulb. The advances can never be peer reviewed; they come from the fringe.” – Allan Savory, Ecologist

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