My anime reviews

[Hicks]

RIN ~Daughters of Mnemosyne~

(6 episode series)

I really don't know how to describe this series, other than as gore porn or as fetish fuel. While it had plenty of fan service, the disturbing part is that the sex and nudity tended to go hand in hand with things like bondage and sadism. Oh, and it was filled to the brim with sadistic lesbians, so while there was plenty of girl-on-girl action for those who like that kind of thing, it tended to have a somewhat disturbing edge to it. For instance there was the psycho lesbian doctor who got off on sexually torturing her female victims with piercings before bashing their skulls in, or the one who demanded sex from her female clients in exchange for information, or the one who got off on trying to kill the protagonist even though she knew that she couldn't actually be killed, so it was just all about causing pain and suffering.

Oh, yeah, I suppose that I should get around to actually describing the series. It's essentially a detective story that follows Rin Asogi and Mimi, two immortal women trying to lead somewhat normal lives as they run a consulting agency and end up acting as private investigators. We're kind of clued in to the fact that Rin is immortal early on, as she's coldly gunned down by a female assassin in the teaser of the first episode, and then wakes up the next morning in her apartment. If that wasn't enough, it doesn't take that long for us to actually see the process of her healing and reviving after suffering a rather brutal death. This is no Highlander stuff, though, as apparently the only part that needs to survive is the little "time spore" or "fruit of time" that has entered their bodies and caused them to become immortal to begin with. The only way to kill them is to remove this little orb and crack it open like an egg, the cum-like fluid within the antagonist Apos apparently likes to eat, because it contains tasty memories, or so we're told.

Most of the episodes are fairly episodic, focusing on what seem to be random cases, like in the first episode where Rin rescues a clone and investigates his origins. Each episode is 45 minutes long, too, so what would have taken most episodes a two-parter, this series is able to do all in one episode. There is an overall plot to the series, though, and I have to admit to feeling a bit let down about it. About the mid-point of the series, the story was actually getting kind of interesting. Things were starting to be connected, and elements of the show that had always been there in the background, like the huge tree that was releasing those time spores, were becoming important to the story. Unfortunately, everything came down to this:

A giant red egg filled with man-hating lesbians with a giant vagina used to unbirth some unfortunate sacrifice for some purpose that wasn't explained all that well. It has something to do with who gets to be the next "guardian", who apparently has something to do with the giant tree and the time spores it releases. Again, that aspect wasn't explained all that well, just that Rin got knocked up and gave birth to a baby that would grow up to be the next guardian after her.

I will admit that despite all the fan service and the more disturbing parts, this show did have some merit to it that made it better than say something like High School of the Dead or Sekirei, mainly due to the story and the characters. When this series wasn't busy showing people screwing (usually right before they were brutally murdered) or torture porn, it actually was a somewhat interesting detective story that took place over the course of decades. Rin and Mimi were fairly likeable characters, as was the clone they ended up rescuing. There was also a detective on the police force who would help them out, and he was a somewhat interesting character, though we didn't get to see too much of him. It actually was kind of sad when bad things happened to these characters. I can't really say the same about any of the antagonists, though, as non of them really have any layers to them. The closest any of them get to that is the "shocking" revelation that Apos, the main bad guy, technically isn't fully a guy or a gal. So basically s/he's a trap. As for the good story elements, well, that kind of got to a convoluted part, because there ended up being a lot of connections that took things to the point of stupid.

One thing I won't give this series a pass for, though, is all the fetish fuel. Bondage, torture, psycho lesbians – that's just scratching the surface. Actually, as I watched this series, I couldn't help but get the feeling that the reason Rin was made immortal was specifically so she could be repeatedly killed in ways that gore fans could fap off to. At different points the series tried to sell her as an action girl who could sick up for herself, but most of the time her she was just killed and/or captured so she could be tortured in some sadistic and usually sexual way. Then there's the part where we find out that only women get to be immortals, so when Rin ends up fighting fellow immortals, who are naturally psycho lesbians, it came off to me as a kind of twisted version of some kind of a magical girl show. As for men who absorb time spores, well they turn into monsters called angels, entirely due to the fact that they have wings and can fly. They also have superhuman strength but are doomed to short existences. When in proximity to one another, the female immortals are compelled to have sex with angels, and angels are compelled to have sex with and eat the female immortals. There's also just plenty of sadism to go around, usually from Apos. And for all the perv out there who like jailbait, we have Mimi, who seems like she's only immortal just so some nerds out there who object to being called pervs can try to defend themselves by pointing out that Mimi was really hundreds of years old. That being said, she still looked about 14.

Of course, even the regular sex comes off as the writer simply sharing their own fantasies, especially the lesbian parts, which played out like something you'd see in a porno made for guys. While the subject matter and the overall series was definitely more mature than something like Sekirei, it still wasn't all that terribly mature itself, and I couldn't just help but feel like I was watching porn with plot.

Needless to say, this series is not for everyone. That being said, I know that there are definitely people out there who will love this series. But for those who don't enjoy sexual sadism, you'll probably want to avoid this series. I honestly tried to see past all that, though the series didn't exactly make it easy, to see if the story buried underneath was any good, but it really wasn't worth it. I don’t regret watching this series, but it's not an experience I'd care to repeat, except maybe to show parts of it to friends for shock value, which puts it right up there with Gantz as far as I'm concerned. 4/10.

[lemmingllama]

Awesome reviews as always. Just a question, do you do requests? On MAL, there is a one episode OVA that is ranked the worst on MAL. Just might be funny to see your review. Anyways, keep up the good work, I look forward to reading more.

http://myanimelist.net/anime/413/Mars_of_Destruction

[Hicks]

I don't really do requests - between possibly insulting whoever made the request and just having a 1 TB HD full of stuff to watch with grad school taking up most of my time I just generally don't. If you actually want me to pick on a bad anime, I could suggest this one to the Maximum Weeaboo panel for a video review.

[Hicks]

Gunbuster

(6 episode OVA)

An early offering from Studio Gainax, as you might imagine, this series involved a lot of giant robots and bouncing breasts. Actually, according to Wikipedia, this series is where the exaggerated breast motion Gainax would come to be famous for got its start. I have to admit, though, that while it does have some things going for it, for the most part I found myself somewhat disappointed with this series, but that has more to do with the kind of anime it is than anything that was specifically bad about it.

The plot, in a nutshell, is that humanity is at war with a seemingly unending army of giant bugs that humanity found inhabits the galaxy. The way that this ties into the story is that the main character, Noriko Takaya, is the daughter of a famous admiral who was lost along with his entire fleet soon after coming into contact with the giant bugs of doom, and she has sworn that she will become a great space pilot to be like her father. To do so, she attends an all-female high school academy that trains its students to pilot giant robots. Later she goes on to become the great pilot she always wanted to be, overcoming the doubts of others along with her own to pilot the giant mecha that gives this series its name.

To be fair, there was obviously some thought put into this series, and I don't mean just in how the machines all work. While most sci-fi tends to ignore the complications that would actually be involved with space travel and combat in space, namely the way relativity will make space travelers out of sync with the rest of humanity. As one approaches the speed of like, time is slower for the traveler relative to the outside observer, so while only minutes may be passing for them, months are passing on Earth. This isn't something that's just barely mentioned either; it's actually a major point that is at least attempted to be used to generate some drama.

I'm going to be honest here and admit right up front that I'm just not into giant robot stuff for the most part. If I ever am, it's only because it's being treated as a joke or otherwise over-the-top in order to generate humor, basically like Gurren Lagann did. This series, though, plays everything completely straight, and includes the giant robots as a part of what is largely a stereotypical military drama, one which focuses very heavily on the clichéd training aspect of the military. And since this is Giainax, I'm asked to take a bunch of jailbait teenaged girls dressed in skin-tight one-piece bathing suits while they pilot giant robots and fight giant bugs seriously. Now, as ridiculous as that sounds, something like that actually could be pulled off to an extent, though I'm not sure I could ever take giant robots seriously in any context, especially if it involves combat in space. However, this isn't the only problem I have with the series.

The other big turn-off this series had for me was the way the characters were presented, which is to say that all of them were completely clichéd and stereotypical. All the male characters were the ultra-hardcore badass warriors while the female characters were treated like wilting violets when they weren't being vindictive bitches who were only after personal glory. Then there's the main character, Noriko, who is only just better than Shinji Ikari when it comes to whining and self-doubt. Really the only thing that makes her better is that she actually has some character growth and overcomes these issues, albeit not all that well in terms of the writing. Then, of course, there was the rather shoe-horned romance between the woman Noriko looked up to and the man who was coaching them.

As a brief aside, the whole "coach" aspect almost made this seem more like a sports anime than a military one.

Anyway, there was competition between two women over the coach, both of whom were subordinates of him he was training. Coming from a military background, that kind of thing tends to rub me the wrong way, but the thing I actually found a little insulting was the way the woman who had been Noriko's role model for most of the series completely feel apart during an attack that all of humanity depended on succeeding, because she realized the coach was in all probability going to be dead from cancer by the time she got back to Earth. Really, though, this was just a prime example of how none of the drama in this series really seemed to flow all that naturally for me – it all seemed rather forced and trite to me.

That being said, there are probably plenty of people out there who would enjoy this series, if only because it's a space opera with giant robots, and because it's an example of Gainax's work prior to Neon Genesis Evanglion, which has in many ways overshadowed everything else they've done both before and since. It's somewhat interesting to see aspects from other franchises which seemed to have inspired this work, Starship Troopers being among them, as well as seeing aspects of this series which probably went on to inspire later works. For instance, I would not be surprised in the least if Shinji's character was inspired by Noriko's. There's also a heavy focus on the idea of "hard work and guts" being able to overcome anything in the same way "spiral power" in Gurren Lagann seems to be, though decidedly more tongue in cheek than Gunbuster.

As for the technical aspect of this series, it actually isn't bad considering that it was made in the late '80s. This is probably owing to the fact that it was an OVA, and as an aside, it's somewhat interesting to see similarities in the animation style and design between this series and the shorts made back in the early '80s for Daicon III and IV. However, there is no dub available for this series.

Just to sum everything up, if you are into giant robot space operas, you might find this series worth a watch. As for me, that kind of thing isn't really my cup of tea, and other aspects of the series just made it an even less enjoyable experience for me. 6/10.

[Hicks]

Redline

(2009 movie)

Wow. This movie. This movie is like Speed Racer meets Gurren Lagann meets Dead Leaves meets Dragon Ball Z. It is one of the most over-the-top action movies that actually mostly made sense that I have ever watched, and I enjoyed every minute of it.

When I first saw ads for this movie, I have to admit that I was initially put off by it, mostly because racing really isn't an area of interest for me, and it seemed like that's what this movie was about. Upon seeing some newer trailers and reviews that highlighted the animation and visual design, I actually started to come around a bit. I normally wouldn't go by visuals alone, but seeing scenes from it reminded me a lot of '80s anime and even somewhat of the old MTV Æon Flux cartoon. It looked beautiful – hand drawn – and from what I was starting to see I was willing enough to give it a chance since it was just a movie and not a 26 episode series.

So let me tell you right up front here – this movie is about racing like Gurren Lagann is about giant robots. This is to say that they definitely play a large part, but that it's more focused on having as much fun as possible than on anything else. We're given a wonderful cast of outlandish characters, whom we are introduced to in the Yellowline race that opens the movie. The only ones that are really important are J.P. and Sonoshee, both of whom are humans amongst a wide variety of aliens. The other characters are pretty much just there as part of the humor, usually to poke fun at various genres of anime.

Which is no doubt why a giant robot managed to show up and do a little fighting, with some magical girls at the controls just for added fun.

The story isn't really all that complicated, but in the long run, that's okay. J.P. is the male protagonist. He started racing after being inspired by Sonoshee as a teenager, mostly by how determined and driven she was. And also because she's hot. Naturally as an adult, she's now the movie's designated hot chick – no worries, they throw in a gratuitous nude scene while they introduce all the other characters participating in the race that gives the movie its title.

I'm sure J.P.'s hair isn't symbolic at all...

As you might guess, J.P. is as interested in winning Sonoshee's heart as he is in winning the race. Naturally, things are complicated, because not only is Sonoshee his opponent in the race, but his mechanic, Frisbee, is in with the yakuza, which is determined to fix Redline just like they did to Yellowline at the beginning of the movie. The deal was, J.P. was supposed to come from behind and look like he was going to win, only to lose at the end of the race. And when J.P. went against the script, Frisbee detonated the bomb he'd hidden on J.P.'s car and nearly killed him. It was only a matter of luck that J.P. qualified for Redline, and while Frisbee fixed up his car for the race, he also made sure to include another bomb just in case J.P. tried to win. And if that wasn't enough, Redline itself takes place on Roboworld, home to an authoritarian nation of cyborgs, and they want nothing to do with this race. So basically they threaten to kill all the racers, and then try their best to do it as the race begins. The movie just gets more and more obnoxious with every minute, really.

I know that Madhouse has some good projects under its belt already, but I have to admit that I wasn't expecting a lot from this movie. After all, lately Madhouse has been doing that same moé blob crap that everyone else has been doing lately. Case in point – Summer Wars. I can only hope that they've been doing that simply because they know all the pathetic otaku eat that shit up, and they can go on to fund really awesome stuff like this. It might be selling out, but after delivering a movie like this, I'm willing to forgive them for it.

I'd also be remiss if I didn't mention the excellent English dub that came with this movie. This is also an area that has been lacking lately in a lot of anime, but there is a lot of good talent on board this project, and the direction fits the tone of the movie perfectly. Between this, the awesome visuals, and the outstanding soundtrack, I'm really glad that I decided to give this movie a chance, and I can't recommend it enough. If you liked Gurren Lagann, FLCL, and/or Dead Leaves, there's a pretty good chance you'll like this movie, too. 9/10.

[Hicks]

Elfen Lied (The Review 2: Electric Boogaloo)

(14 episode series)

Okay, so I already reviewed this series a long time ago, but having recently finished re-watching it, I felt the need to revisit it, mainly because my views on it have significantly changed. This could be because the whole moé thing was still relatively new to me at the time I first watched this and thus it didn't grate on me as much, or it could be I was just more willing to put up with the negative aspects of this series. Either way, I actually feel strongly enough about this series in the opposite way I initially did to take it off of my favorites list. Just to make something clear here, too, this change of heart has nothing to do with the level of graphic nudity and violence ... well, not that much, but rather with how the story was executed. You'll find that I'm going to harp on basically the same things I did in my original review, but that I'm not as forgiving of them.

The series follows protagonist Kohta and his kissing cousin Yuka, though we only catch up to them shortly before they come across the mysterious naked woman from the memorable opening of the series. They name her "Nyu" since that's the only word she can seem to say. Naturally, they take this naked woman with obvious head trauma home with them instead of the hospital. So while I might be somewhat willing to overlook that if it had been written a little more believably, unfortunately this is just one of many brain farts the series makes as its story progresses. But then this is a harem series, so I guess we can't expect that much out of it. To be fair, it isn't as bad as some other harem series I've seen, and it at least has potential for a better story hidden in there with all the obnoxiously high voices and cute moé character designs.

When the series first starts with what is arguable the best scene of the series, the audience might be mislead into believing that Lucy, aka Nyu, might be the main character. But since this show is aimed at the young male demographic, it's apparently assumed that the audience could only relate to Kohta. Of course there's also the mystery aspect of Lucy's past and how it relates to Kohta, because the mother of all coincidences happens when he and his cousin come across her on the beach. To be fair, this series did have plenty of good potential in it, and I think that's what I was focusing on when I first watched this series and reviewed it afterwards. That and it is amusing to see cutesy little anime characters tear each other to pieces with invisible arms, but then I can actually find the humor in that.

The main positive of the series is its basic underlying theme – nature or nurture. Lucy belongs to a mutant species referred to as Diclonius, of which more and more are being born for some reason. All of them have horns, though the men turn out bald for some reason while the women get obnoxious pink hair. Apparently this is all the better for them to kill humans by, because the female Diclonius seem to just love the hell out of killing people, though for some reason they won't harm animals. And while they are sterile in the biological sense, they are still somehow able to reproduce through a virus that is somehow connected to the use of their invisible arms, which are referred to in the series as vectors. We meet Lucy as she escapes from a secret research facility that is located on an island somewhere close to Kamakura, Japan. There's a good dynamic between her character and Kurama, the director of the team tasked with isolating the Diclonius virus and finding a cure for it (or so his team thinks), though this could have been better. The reason for this is explained later in the OVA I count as just another of the episodes, since it takes place between episodes 10 and 11 anyway. What I'm getting at, though, is that after Lucy takes a heavy blow to the head and develops the child-like Nyu personality, she isn't the bloodthirsty killer anymore, and given the horrors Lucy went through all of her life, it could be argued that the bloodthirsty killer aspect is brought on by nurture more than nature. This is also the case with Nana, who remembers every bit of torture she's been put through, but seems to have formed a bond with Kurama and developed a much more balanced personality. The series does argue this point back and forth, but while it could have been executed in a much better fashion, it's still the draw of the series for me.

The thing is, while I do see some good in the series, there is so much going against it. This series had the makings for something much better with everything it had already set up: a secret research facility that has military connections conducting inhuman studies on girls and young women – that's Alien stuff right there. But a lot of the motivations of the many different characters, protagonist and antagonist alike, just don’t make all that much sense. There's also way too much focus on the moé and harem aspects of the series, which frankly gives it some really bad mood swings. After all, it’s also filled to the brim with plenty of horrible things that either happened to the characters at some point in the past, or is happening to them during the course of the series, so it doesn't really jive with the whole moé thing. That's actually the same problem Higurashi has, really, which is that had the mood been kept consistent, that would have mad the series better almost by default. In Elfen Lied's case, it makes it way to difficult for the series to be taken seriously, which isn't helped by the poor animation and the bad dub given to it. But really, the number one thing that this series should not have done, was to make Nyu so damn special.

Back of the short bus special.

When Nyu is first introduced, she has the mind of a child, and really she doesn't get much better over the course of the series. Now if by chance you don't know what the whole moé thing is about, aside from setting the current generic anime look of impossibly huge eyes and a squeaky little voice, it was originally supposed to be all about engaging the "big brother" feelings in the male audience members (the assumed average viewer). Unfortunately for way too many people, this also engaged their boners, which says something pretty nasty about them. On the other hand, it handily explains why there are just as many nude scenes with prepubescent girls as there are with the more mature Lucy/Nyu and Nana, as well as why there's a love triangle between Kohta, Lucy, and his cousin Yuka. And if you think that was bad, it seems to be suggested during flashbacks that Kohta's sister also had a thing for him and that both she and Yuka were jealous of each other over his affections.

As many messed up aspects to this series there are, though, I can't help but feel that a lot would have been improved had they simply given Lucy the standard clichéd amnesia. It would have made a lot more of an impact against the nature vs. nurture them a lot better, especially given Nana, who was the complete opposite of most of the other Diclonius. Anything would have been better than making Lucy completely retarded. Losing the moé crap and those other things I mentioned would have also made the series much better overall, but whoever made this seemed to be more interested in making a moé harem anime than in making a compelling story, so there you have it.

But at least it has a catchy theme song.

Anyway, if gore and nudity isn't your thing, you definitely want to avoid this series. It is very much a horror, with lots of blood and gore to go with its nudity and overdone moé. And as I mentioned, this is hardly the only offensive thing about the series, but if you think you can put up with that, or if you just don't mind it for whatever reason, it might be worth seeing this series just to see what I was talking about. It's better than Gantz, but only just barely. 5/10.

[Hicks]

Diebuster

(6 episode OVA)

Sequel to Gunbuster, which was made in 1988, this series aired more than 16 years later. I honestly have mixed feelings about this OVA series, though to be frank none of them are particularly strong. Still, I always try to be fair, and I'll to my best to put what I hope is useful information to anyone who might be interested in watching this series. First thing I'll put out there is that while I read that it was recommended to watch Gunbuster prior to watching this series, I honestly think the only thing you might miss out on is the last few minutes of the last episode if you haven't. Well, that and the repeated meme of "hard work and guts" along with a few other references to the original series here and there.

That being said, this series actually felt quite a bit different than Gunbuster, primarily in tone. Whereas Gunbuster was a fairly typical anime space opera from the 1980s that took itself fairly seriously, Diebuster is almost the complete opposite. In fact, I'd compare it a lot more to Gurren Lagann, which was made not all that long after this series was. Actually, there are a lot of direct comparisons that can be made between this series and Gurren Lagann, but I'll get into that more later. As far as comparing Diebuster to Gunbuster, though, probably the most similarity between them was that a female character who seemed incapable of doing so really wanted to be a space pilot and idolized another female pilot who seemed to be the most proficient of all of her piers. Other than that, this series is pretty much what you would expect from a modern anime, right down to the moé character design.

I just can't seem to get away from it...

About the only good thing to say about that aspect of it is that it's at least kept to levels I could generally tolerate. I have to say, though, that I don't find the idea of a woman being stupid and naïve to be cute, especially when she's one of the main characters.

The series actually throws us for a bit of a loop, at first, as to who exactly the main character is, but I think I'd say that Lal'C, the first Buster pilot the moé character happens to meet while on her quest to become a pilot herself. The moé character is named Nono, and apparently she's a robot some old guy found in the middle of a comet. At first, though, she's sold as a simple (and I do mean simple) country girl who's running off to the big city to try to make it big, so basically the main character. And either I missed something, or the fact she's even a robot isn't revealed until she ends up being dragged into space by a "space monster", which is also when it's revealed that the planet they were all on up until then was Mars, not Earth. But then this series likes to throw twists M. Night Shyamalan would be proud of almost every episode.

As far as the story goes, it's about what you would expect, with Nono eventually proving herself and Lal'C finally accepting her. The fun part there was that apparently Lal'C actually liked her all along and just wanted a friend instead of a worshiper, but then she was a complete bitch to Nono at almost every possibility, so I'm sorry, I just didn't buy the reveal. Of course, the series isn't terribly serious or mature, so they could have been poking fun for all I know. I mean, this from a show that calls its elite young pilots "topless", and yes, they totally take that pun to its obvious outcome. Gainax does love boobs, after all. Of course they also made some ships look and move like sperm, too, so whatever.

I think what it comes down to, though, is that I just wasn't into show very much. I wasn't bored, exactly, but as with the first series, I just wasn't into the whole children piloting giant robots thing. It wasn't taking itself seriously the way certain other shows Gainax has done, but while there were plenty of outlandish things in the series, like giant robots that can appear out of hammer space, ships shaped like sperm, and naked robot girls, but it just wasn't quite the kind of over-the-top that makes me enjoy other Gainax works like Gurren Lagann and FLCL. I can't put my finger on what was missing or anything, I just know that this series didn't quite do it for me. So between that and the things that annoyed me, mostly having to do with moé, I was just generally underwhelmed. It wasn't bad either, and it didn't feel like a chore watching it after the first couple of episodes, so it has that going for it.

I have to say, though, that having watched Gunbuster prior to this series, I wasn't really seeing how the two were really connected. There were references here and there, but other than that, I wasn't really seeing it. Some aspects that changed were that humanity had apparently given up on FTL travel, and that it had actually developed a sophisticated automated defense system to protect them from the giant space monsters that were the focus of the first series, and then completely forgot about them, and in quite a few other things. So maybe it wasn't so much that it wasn't connecting to the first series well enough, it was just that it was stretching credulity that humanity, being advanced enough to not only move planets but to turn Jupiter into a freakin' black hole bomb, and has colonized basically every single terrestrial body in the solar system, actually lost track of all of its past technology.

Something this series is good for, though, is in seeing things that made their way into Gurren Lagann. For instance, the giant robots were actually alive, and after being built, they basically chose a pilot and only woke up when that pilot really truly believed in what they were doing. The robots would also stop working if their pilots stopped believing, or if the robots thought that an action was wrong. You could almost say that they ran on spiral power, though in this series it was "hard work and guts". There was also the way the conflicts escalated to a ridiculous scale as the series progressed, to the point that the space monsters were literally bigger than planets, and that planets were literally being used as weapons, though to be fair, Gunbuster did that, too, just without as much flair. I think the main similarity has to be with Nono, though, in that she was basically the same character as Nia from Gurren Lagann, in both visual design and in character. None of this stuff is really important to the story, but it is kind of fun to note it.

Anyway, while I didn't enjoy this series all that much, that has a lot to do with my own biases and tastes than in the quality of the series itself. From a technical standpoint, the series is well done – it obviously had a decent budget and a lot of love and fun were put into making it. So if giant robot shows are your thing, and you like moé and the typical sex humor that seems to go along with that, you'll probably enjoy this series more than I did. For my part, I enjoyed it slightly more than Gunbuster, mostly because it wasn't as boring or as serious. Between that and the technical aspect I mentioned, I think I'd rate this series a 7/10.

[Hicks]

Trigun

(26 episode series)

I first saw bits and pieces of this show on Adult Swim some years back, but at the time it didn't really appeal to me. Since then, I've heard a lot of complaints, or maybe just warnings, about how the show was initially a comedy but then got serious as the series progressed. Still, based on what I'd read about the series, I thought I'd give it a try, and I have to admit that I really liked this show.

This series has quite a few characters that it follows. Initially, it follows Meryl Stryfe and Milly Thompson, two agents of the Bernardelli Insurance Company, as they attempt to make contact with the real protagonist, Vash the Stampede. Vash has been named as being responsible for a large amount of property damage, so Bernardelli apparently wants to see if they can keep him from damaging more property due to the large number of claims that have already been filed due to damage blamed on him. It's not readily apparent how exactly Bernardelli was hoping to go about this, because while Vash has a sizable bounty on his head and both Meryl and Milly are proficient in the use of firearms, the first thing they do is try to give him donuts, and from that point on they pretty much just follow him around. Of course this is the comedy intro to the series, and part of the joke is that they aren't even sure if the scrawny blonde guy they're following around is even Vash because initially the description they had was for someone else, and it was apparent that the kind-natured buffoon didn't seem anything like his reputation.

Later on, as the series starts to follow Vash more, it isn't even entirely clear if he is in fact guilty of any of the things he's accused of, such as destroying an entire city, or if the massive amount of damage attributed to him was simply caused by the many people trying to kill him for the bounty on his head. But then, there's a lot that isn't really made all that clear about Vash or his surroundings until later on in the series. For instance, Vash seems to not be human due to his ability to dodge bullets, his implausible amount of luck, and his seeming ability to heal very rapidly. He even gets accused of as much, but then since this is a cartoon and at this point the series isn't taking itself all that seriously. As for Vash's surroundings, while the setting seems to be a generic desert punk spaghetti western (including shout out to Clint Eastwood), there are many anachronistic elements as far as technology goes that makes it apparent that this isn't supposed to be the old west. There's also the fact that there are two suns in the sky and several moons which make it apparent that despite humanity not looking all that advanced technologically, that the series is not taking place on Earth. The only clue we're given is the presence of deteriorating "plants" next to every settlement that look like giant light bulbs and are referred to as "lost technology".

The series does indeed take a turn for the more serious as answers to my many questions were starting to be revealed, and it actually turns out that a lot of them were already revealed early in the series, but were played off as ridiculous jokes. To be fair, though, it isn't until about episode 16 or 17 that the series becomes really serious, and even then there tends to be comedy relief here and there. One example that comes to mind is the appearance of a black cat in every episode, often more than once.

Mreorw.... I'm everywhere and no where at the same time. Mreorw...

What I take from the series, though, is that most people seem to take the first few episodes for granted and thought that the entire thing should have been a comedy. After all, when the series first starts, it mainly consists of Meryl and Milly following Vash around as he seemingly wanders at random from settlement to settlement, solving problems as he goes in a non-lethal and humorous way. However, I'd argue that those episodes are mainly there so that the audience develops and attachment to the characters, because comedy really is disarming that way. We get to see these characters in light situations, so it makes it that much more dramatic when things go badly for them later on. Really, this series is about Vash and the tragedies he's suffered and continues to suffer. Hell, we have a character introduced, Nicholas D. Wolfwood, who only seems to be there to point out the fact that Vash's comedic personality is basically just all on the surface. Well, that and to provide a much more pragmatic voice of reason to Vash's idealism, which was a viewpoint I could agree with a lot more than Vash's "no one has the right to take the like of another" philosophy.

As an aside, when you think about it, Vash is really a lot like the Nolen-verse Batman. A tragic past forged him, and he's sworn himself to protect others. Yet despite his efforts to protect humanity, he is hated by everyone no matter where he goes, often even after proving himself to not be the monster they accuse him of being. Yet despite all the hate heaped on him by the people he's sworn himself to protect, he refuses to kill, and uses his skills to find non-lethal ways of dealing with his opponents. All because he's not the hero humanity deserves, but the one it needs. Well, actually the one they deserve, too, considering that about 90% of humanity seems to be made up of asshats. He also eventually has to face a "no-win" scenario in which his idealistic philosophy is challenged to the breaking point.

In any case, Vash's "no one has the right to take the life of another" is really what's at the heart of the series. It and Vash are both offset, because as it turns out Vash has an evil twin brother named Knives, and Knives wants to wipe out all of humanity.

Wow, real subtle....

Knives's philosophy, if you want to call it that, is meant to echo Wolfwood's somewhat. Wolfwood rather pragmatically argued that if you or someone you want to save is threatened with death by another, you are not only justified in killing that person or persons, but you should do it as quickly as possible so they don't get a chance to do any damage. This was echoed by Knives's statement that if you want to save the butterfly from the spider, you just kill the spider, because even if you tried to just save the butterfly, the spider is still going to die because it is going to starve to death. This sentiment is actually shown to be the case on a larger scale, because as it turned out, Vash actually did destroy an entire city, and while no one died at that moment, they eventually died due to the devastation of that city. Of course, Knives's is evil, so his viewpoint is made out to be the wrong one because frankly Knives is a sociopath, whereas Vash's viewpoint is upheld as being the right one, though I do give the people behind this some credit for challenging it more than once.

The thing is, this isn't the first show I've seen that makes this kind of an argument, and which shows it as being possible to shoot someone without doing any real harm. But I already had a short "guns are not toys" rant in my review of Black Cat, so I'll spare you all from another one.

Ultimately, I found this series to be someone disappointing. While I was pretty into it for most of it, I had to wonder how exactly the situation with Knives was going to be resolved, because it was obvious that Knives was a threat as long as he was alive, just as all of his followers were. Hell, one of them could telepathically manipulate people into killing themselves or each other, and that's not something that can simply be "disabled" long enough to lock the guy away. And Knives made it clear that he would continue to work toward humanity's destruction for as long as he lived. So I felt that the ending was something of a cheat, and not really a real ending at all, because the threat Knives represents has not been eliminated and humanity is still at risk. So while an attempt was made to have a happy ending for all the tragedy the audience has seen, I found it to be unsatisfying due to the implications.

On the technical side, this series is from the late '90s, and you can tell. I still think that it looks fairly good, though, and I don't really hold its animation against it. The dub is also okay for the most part, though the weak link there, in my opinion, is a song some of the characters sing which just doesn't sound natural to me. Overall the dub isn't bad, though. I think that Trigun's greatest strength on the technical side has to be its soundtrack. It's this wonderful mix of rock, jazz, and old-style country that I could listen to all by itself.

Overall, I definitely enjoyed this series, but not as much as I've enjoyed some others, mostly due to the ending and the preachiness of the "no one has a right to take the life of another" message. I'll probably add it to my list of favorites, but probably more towards the bottom of it. That being said, this series is definitely worth a watch. Just make sure you know going into it that this is more of a comedy-drama, not a straight-up comedy. 8/10.

[Hicks]

Avalon

(2001 live action movie)

I actually initially only watched this movie because I read that the movie Assault Girls was a sequel to it, and I kind of like to watch things in order if I can to try to gain a greater sense of context. I'd actually completely forgotten that Mamoru Oshii directed this movie, though I had a really obvious hint in that most of the movie has a rather heavy orange tint to it, like someone slapped an orange tint over everything. But the appearance of a basset hound made me look this movie's Wiki page up again and sure enough, Oshii's name was one it.

If you're not familiar with his work, he also directed the first two Ghost in the Shell movies, which hopefully most people reading this are familiar with. The thing about his work is that they tend to have a common color theme to them to help set the tone, which a lot of recent games have done themselves as a cheap way of doing that themselves. In Oshii's case, it also tends to coincide with what his favorite color is at the time he makes the movie (compare the original 1995 Ghost in the Shell movie to the more recent 2.0 release and you'll see what I mean). Pretty much every movie he's ever done also features a basset hound, primarily because Oshii owns one and it's apparently a favorite of his. Of course the other thing about Oshii's work is that he really tends to favor a slow pace as part of setting the tone of the movie, and will often do long, drawn out scenes or shots to evoke a particular kind of emotion from the audience. I tend to only just tolerate this, because in my opinion he tends to drag things on for too long, probably because I'm just not that interested in what he wants me to focus on. In one scene in particular in this movie, he focuses on a man's lips as he sloppily eating eggs and bacon with his hands. I get that he was trying to make the audience disgusted, but I honestly could only take so much of it and had to fast forward. Oshii also tends to focus a lot on the preparation of food, and while I get that in this case he was going for a mundane feeling for the main character's "real" life compared to the game the movie is named after, I felt that this scene was drawn out for far too long. I know that not everyone agrees with me on that, though, and that some people look at Oshii the way that others look at Kubrick, which is to say that he has a very devoted fan base that sees him as a genius. As a disclaimer, I'll say that I don't disagree with that, only that my tastes only allow me to get a limited amount of enjoyment out of Oshii's films, and also that I've noticed many of his films share the same existentialist theme and many of the same story elements, which is part of why I knew who directed this movie almost right off the bat.

Speaking of similar themes, though, I have to note that this movie seems to borrow a lot from The Matrix through its use of an older style of computer graphics, and how this is used in "rendering" the game environment.

Follow the basset hound.

I suppose that's only fair, though, seeing as The Matrix borrowed a lot from Ghost in the Shell, so it's like coming full circle, really. Still, I had to chuckle when the main character opened a set of windows at one point only to find a brick wall.

Okay, I suppose I should get around to talking about the actual movie at some point, so I guess this is as good a point as any to mention that it was actually a co-production with a Polish film company which was filmed in Poland and stars Polish actors. That being said, the country the movie takes place in is never identified beyond looking stereotypically Eastern European in order to play up the cyberpunk feel of the setting. All that's really said is that young people have been seeking escape in a virtual reality game called Avalon, which is supposedly illegal, and is also a means of making money for some people. The story follows a young woman named Ash, who is an experienced player of the game and apparently an ace at it. While I never got the feeling from the movie that the game was actually illegal, it was apparently supposed to be because there was a danger of players ending up brain dead from using it, apparently if they tried to seek a secret final level of the game.

The movie really plays up the importance of the game, at least to its players, because in the game Ash is really well known and thought of, but in real life she's just a single woman living in a small apartment with her basset hound. Of course the movie also tried to mess with your head a little by suggesting at more than one point that Ash has never left the game.

Anyway, not long into the movie, another player has been showing Ash up in the game, and this bothers her. This brings up her past, back when she was part of a well known team that was unbeatable until one of them panicked and called for a reset, which is the only way out of the game without winning or getting killed (in the game). The split the team up, but ever since she's wondered about the team leader, Murphy. I'm sure most people could have told her to look in Detroit, but she's convinced that he's still in the game somehow, in spite of seeing his brain dead body at a hospital. So she sets out to find this secret final level of the game, despite many attempts to dissuade her. She does finally find what she's looking for, including a Murphy who hasn't been turned into Robocop, but naturally it isn't what she hoped it would be.

Of course, it's only at this part of the movie that several running themes finally get a more obvious answer for them, such as the orange color scheme, which disappears in the "Class Real", and how basically every statue up until this part of the movie has been headless or at least faceless. It's left open to interpretation, naturally, as is Ash's final fate. The last part of the movie actually made me think of a few different other works, The Thirteenth Floor among them, as I attempted to figure out just what the hell was going on. The most mysterious portion of this movie as far as figuring that out was the sudden disappearance of Ash's basset hound, which later appears on a poster for a concert named Avalon, and as a passenger in a car that just happens to be driving by in Class Real. I was convinced for a while that some conspirators had somehow moved Ash's body in an attempt to fool her into murdering someone in real life, but when she stepped outside and the orange filter went away, I was then convinced she was a computer program who had somehow found her way into the real world. Murphy actually made that argument, and he seemed convinced that his body wouldn't disappear like usual when Ash shot him, only it did, and the last few minutes of the movie kind of got weirder from there.

I'd be lying if I said I didn't get some enjoyment from watching this movie, otherwise I wouldn't have bothered watching all of it, but I'll tell you right up front that it isn't for everyone, mostly owing to the pacing. I couldn't help but feel like the movie was being padded out, and while I'm sure that statement just upset some Oshii fans, I've never been afraid to call things the way I see it. Something else I saw was bit of a shot against gamers who take themselves way too seriously and spend way too much time gaming. I'm sure some people will disagree with me on that, but since another movie he made, The Sky Crawlers also seemed to be a bit of a shot at the typical otaku that tends to watch all the same kind of shows, I can see him taking the same kind of a shot at gamers, especially since in his case it takes one to know one.

I think this was an okay movie, though as you can tell it didn't exactly blow my socks off or anything. I'd say that it's more for film nerds who enjoy interpreting what different details within a movie might mean, or who like to find hidden themes and messages within a film. Oshii, like Kubrick, definitely puts a lot of that into his movies, so you can be rest assured that you might have fun trying to interpret this movie. If you're not into that kind of thing, you might not find this movie all that enjoyable, because while it's about a combat game, there actually isn't all that much action. Kind of like Ghost in the Shell (the movie, not the series). 7/10.

[Hicks]

Assault Girls

(2010 live action movie)

Whelp, considering that this is supposed to be a sequel to Avalon, and that it was also written and directed by the famous Mamoru Oshii, it honestly couldn't be any more different from Avalon if it tried. Whereas Avalon felt a lot like Ghost in the Shell and the Matrix in terms of complexity, depth, and tone, this movie feels more like a run of the mill action fluff anime, except it's introduced using a long drawn out narration explaining the set-up (and how it's connected to the first movie) and interrupted by long drawn out shots of the location this movie was shot at and few different examples of wildlife. Those two things are the only hints Oshii has anything to do with this movie, as there is no overlying color theme and while a dog does appear at one point, it's not a basset hound. I can't help but feel that Oshii is trying to distance himself from some of his older work that I'm more familiar with, which typically was cyberpunk and tended to focus on gritty realness with some kind of underlying philosophical angle, which was usually some variant of existentialism. While it's nice to see him throw a little more variety into the mix, did he really have to go for pointless fluff?

I'm going to be mean here and just come right out and say that there is no substance to this movie. I honestly don't get why there's even an attempt to connect this back to Avalon, because it's completely unrelated otherwise. Large chunks of time are wasted on introducing the background for the movie, which is essentially a more detailed version of the paragraph we got at the beginning of Avalon. The only thing is, it does exactly squat for the actual story, which consists of four different characters wandering a volcanic island-I mean barren wasteland, in search of giant worms to kill.

The spice must flow...

The four of them have four different ways of fighting, with one of them being all tacticool in her fighter jet (which she gets out of to snipe), one using an assault rifle and a giant mecha, one using the power of magical girls to transform into a crow that can shoot lighting and orbs of energy, and one that uses a giant sniper rifle.

Hey, give Yoko her gun back.

The one with the giant sniper rifle is a dude, though, but I guess they couldn't think of a catchy way to work him into the title. He's also shown to be very gross, and while the girls all have ways of getting around the wasteland faster, he's stuck on foot because he put all of his earnings into the giant gun.

The story, in a nutshell, is that there's a boss worm, and none of them can take it down on their own, so they have to team up to fight it, even though they all seem to hate each other. That's it. The movie's only an hour long, and a good chunk of that is wasted on an intro with screensaver footage that doesn't add anything of importance, and on seeing how each of the characters react to a snail that once of them put on the head of a statue (rifle guy ate it). The movie doesn't really take itself seriously for the entire rest of itself, though, so those segments seem really out of place. I have to admit that I did get a little bit of a chuckle out of one scene that kind of simulates a fighting game like Street Fighter a little, but other than that the only real entertainment I derived was from the Engrish the actors were forced to use for most of the movie, and how great the three women looked in their fan service outfits.

As an aside, I think I liked how crow girl looked the best, but she doesn't even have any dialog, and she spends most of her screen time dancing and acting silly. She does look great in skintight black leather, though.

Anyway, the whole point of the fight between rifle guy and tacticool girl (I'm refusing to use their names in case you're wondering) was about how the points from killing the boss would be distributed. The fight itself was good for a chuckle, but the movie ends with the three girls all flying back to base, with the exposition given that only the first player back to base gets the points. Which makes no sense at all, either in the context of it being a game, or in the context of the movie where rifle guy got his ass handed to him in order to ensure that each of them would get an equal share of the points. So rifle guy shoots all of them down, and they all start shooting at each other, and the movie just ends.

Why do people like this movie?

Okay, so it isn't horrible like some of the different anime I've seen, but it certainly isn't good, either. 6/10.

[Hicks]

Berserk

(25 episode series)

Set in a Western Medieval fantasy world, I have to admit that Berserk didn't really appeal to me all that much at first. Actually, most of the series didn't have the appeal to me that it probably has to most of its fans, simply because the hack-n-slash battles just don't appeal to me all that much, and the way everyone who wasn't a main or supporting character tended to be cut down like grass didn't help any. From what I'd read about this series ahead of time, though, I was convinced that this series would come through for me, and it did, despite many handicaps.

This series follows Guts, a large muscular man who wields an impossibly large sword. The series starts in media res, with Guts seeking revenge against the demonic members of the Godhand and the abusive, oppressive people who surround them. He is specifically seeking revenge against one named Griffith, and a few relevant flashbacks are shown before the series dives into the past to show us how Guts came to be the way we first see him. I'd already been spoiled about the ending of this series, as frankly I actually like to read about this kind of information ahead of time anyway. For those who haven't been spoiled, though, the first episode of the series would probably act as sufficient warning not to take Griffith for face value as the stereotypical enigmatic leader he appears to be for most of the series. Of course, if you haven't been spoiled about this series, you soon will be by reading this review.

As I mentioned, for the most part, this series is a fairly typical hack-n-clash Medieval warfare story, with impossible characters doing impossible things. A number of clichés were present that made it impossible for me to enjoy that aspect of the series too much, such as armor only actually doing its job for important characters, while for everyone else it was basically just tissue paper. It is just a show, though, and I'm sure for some people the idea of a show that mostly consists of people hacking each other apart with swords are shooting crossbows at each other has an appeal of its own. For me, though, the appeal came mainly from the themes of the show, such as camaraderie and how people, especially leaders, can feel isolated despite that. Aspects of human nature are also explored, mostly addressed by having characters that actually had some depth to them. Guts, for example, is basically the stereotypical barbarian who really just likes to kill people, and yet he makes a competent military leader and not only cares for the lives of those under his command, but of people in general, even if he doesn't always involve himself. In a way, he's kind of like a spaghetti western Clint Eastwood character. Griffith, on the other hand, seems very much like a good leader, who cares about those who follow him, but later reveals that all he really cares about is his dream of having his own kingdom. Hints of this are shown before his final betrayal of the band of mercenaries he leads, the Band of the Hawk, though even as he betrays them, it's still made clear that this wasn't originally his intention, and he even initially attempts to prevent their destruction.

The majority of the series takes place during a "100 Year War" between the kingdoms of Midland and Chudar. Guts started out as a wandering mercenary who made something of a reputation for himself through his disproportionate fighting ability. As fate would have it, he comes across the Band of the Hawk after the battle and a few of them decide to rob him. Griffith, seeing Guts single-handedly fight off these attackers, challenges him to a duel which will decide whether Guts can go free or not. In the end, Guts loses and is essentially forced to join the Band of the Hawk.

As an aside, I'll note that Berserk seems to have a large number of yaoi fans (dude on dude love to you non-anime nerds reading this), and for once it actually wasn't all in their heads, because frankly the series wasn't helping anything.

The one on the right is Griffith, and yes, he's a dude.

What with all the "you belong to me Guts" and the way Griffith practically fawns over him, it's kind of hard not to notice that aspect of it even if yaoi and yaoi fans make you roll your eyes like it does for me. Still, it's pretty obvious that Guts doesn't think of Griffith that way, and Griffith pretty much seems to frak whoever will advance him toward his goal. Anyway...

As the war goes on, both Guts and the Band of the Hawk make a name for themselves, with Guts being promoted to captain of a unit of raiders within the Hawks, and the Hawks themselves eventually coming to be recognized by the king of Midland, and becoming an official part of Midland's army. Through it all, Griffith has to constantly fight off assassination attempts, though he always manages to stay a step ahead, or to just turn out to be extremely lucky. Griffith credits his luck and his success to the ugly red "Egg of the King" he wears around his neck, which looks like something Picasso might've carved, and which also acts as a constant reminder of the kind of character Griffith really is. Griffith and the Hawks' do so well that they are eventually raised to the level of white knights and recognized as the best unit within the Midland army, with Griffith holding the rank of general. Just to sweeten the deal, Griffith seems to be lining himself up to romance the princess. One can only guess at what Griffith's original plan was, but apparently Guts deciding to strike out on his own again and actually winning in a second duel with Griffith made him lose his edge. So, in spite of winning a century long war and doing so much for Midland, sleeping with his daughter was a berserker button for the king, and not only was Griffith arrested and tortured for a year, but the king ordered the destruction of the Band of the Hawk, even though they not only had nothing to do with Griffith's little nighttime escapades, but had no idea anything had happened. So, yeah, winning the war and doing nothing but good for the kingdom means nothing when your commanding officer fraks the king's daughter, apparently.

Guts returns from a year of wandering to help save the Hawks, hopefully by saving Griffith. Unfortunately, they are way beyond too late, because Griffith is skin and bones, and has had the tendons cut in his wrists and his ankles cut, meaning he can never stand or grasp anything again even if he managed to recover his weight and health otherwise. Oh, and his tongue has been cut out, so he can't even so much as give rousing speeches anymore. All for dipping his wick in the royal well. Hope she was worth it, Griffith.

Apparently, this was all part of the red egg's plan, because following a suicide attempt by Griffith, some of his blood gets on it and causes it to rearrange itself into a norm-looking face, except for the tears of blood streaming out of it. It's also apparent at this point that Griffith really did think the thing was only a trinket, and that only then did he understand the implications of what was happening. He tries to warn Guts, but unfortunately he doesn't have a tongue anymore, and both Guts and the entirety of the Band of the Hawk are transported to a nightmarish landscape, followed shortly afterwards by the majority of them being eaten alive by demons. Oh, spoilers.

So I'm sure some of you are wondering why I haven't mentioned Guts's very own tsundere, Casca. For those of you not in the know, basically tsundere means that Casca acts like a bitch to Guts, but deep down it's really because she likes him and totally wants to jump his bones. I didn't mention her before because she deserves her own section to address why she is both a positive and a negative for the series. She's a positive in that she's shown to be a competent commander, strong, and respected by those who follow her. That would be a good thing, and she'd be one of the few strong female characters I've seen in anime. Unfortunately, she really isn't, because it's all undone by her constant moodiness, and the way she is completely unreasonable and tends to get angry at pretty much anything. Then there's the way she tends to need to be rescued by Guts, all while she's apparently pining after Griffith and constantly blaming Guts for anything bad that happens to Griffith. I might have given this aspect of the series more of a pass if it had flowed a little more naturally, but I just couldn't see past what I saw as an obvious tsundere for Guts to win over, and how stereotypically moody and unreasonable her character was made to be. It all just seemed rather forced to me.

From a technical standpoint, all I can really say is that it's really too bad that this series's budget didn't match the ambition of the story. People who have only seen newer anime will probably be turned off by how primitive this series looks compared to pretty much anything that's come out in the last decade. It's the kind of stuff that the stereotypical anime nerd of the past would gush about as far as the supposedly brilliant ways animators would cut corners so they could actually afford to finish the series on the laughable budget they were given. So there are a lot of static drawings, many of which are moved around a lot to simulate something like shakey-cam, and some of which are panned multiple times to signify a powerful strike of some kind. Not sure why they always did it three times, but whatever. This kind of stuff normally wouldn't bother me that much, but it's just used so much in this series that it really wears on me. It makes me wonder what this series might've been if it'd actually had a decent budget. The soundtrack is the one saving grace, but it too has its drawback in that there just aren't that many tracks in it. So while the music is used fairly effectively, you hear the same tracks over an over in this series. I'm going to go out on a limb and guess budget had a lot to do with that, too. In any case, this series may be disappointing on the technical side to some viewers, though story and character-wise it has plenty of positives.

Honestly I'm looking forward to the new movies that are coming out, which are supposed to follow the manga the series was based on more closely. To be fair, though, from what I've read, the main reason the series didn't follow the manga as closely, aside from time constraints, had mostly to do with the fact that the manga wasn't, and in fact still isn't finished. It started in 1990, by the way. I can only hope then that a few areas will be cleared up for me that were left somewhat unaddressed in the series, such as how Guts survived the betrayal of the Hawks to become the "Black Swordsman" seen at the very beginning and very end of the series. Casca's final fate is also left unaddressed, as if Griffith's for that matter, though to be fair these plot points remaining unknown or ambiguous didn't really spoil my enjoyment of the series. That was mainly done by the fighting and romance clichés.

I'd still recommend this series, though I wouldn't exactly call it a favorite. The main thing is just to know what you're getting into, because it's one hell of a doozy of an ending, and being an older anime there are just some things about it that fans of newer anime might have a hard time getting past. 7/10.

[Hicks]

An older anime about a pair of women who chase down bounties and run a gun shop for a living, we at Maximum Weeaboo Magazine are pulling double duty by giving this older series some exposure while reviewing something we actually think is good. After all, anyone can tear an obviously bad show a structurally superfluous new behind, but it takes a little more effort to explain why one thinks a show is actually good. Whether we actually manage to accomplish that or not remains to be seen, so let us know either way what your worthless opinion of our worthless opinions is.

MaximumWeeaboo presents

a Table Heavy Industries production

audio-visual critique and commentary on

Gun Smith Cats

based on the manga by Kenichi Sonoda

Produced by OLM, Licenced by ADV*

[Hicks]

Thermae Romae

(6 episode series)

This was a short, simple, and effective series. Being short, unfortunately there really isn't a lot to say about it, but it was a pretty enjoyable series to watch.

Set mostly in ancient Rome, it follows the time-traveling adventures of Lucius, a Roman architect who specializes in baths. He is initially down on his luck, as the style of architecture he prefers to use in his designs is currently out of style. He initially tries to relax in a bath as he explains what's upsetting him about current trends in bath architecture with one of his friends, only to wind up in a modern Japanese bath house. With what he experiences during these mysterious journeys, which he takes to be a strange country Rome has conquered full of "flat-faced slaves", he copies everything about it that fascinates him as per Roman tradition and thus becomes famous as a bath architect. Each episode sees him coming up against a new challenge, which he then solves after a humorous journey to modern Japan, bridging the gap between two bath cultures that are millennium apart.

As someone who considers themselves a Roman history buff, I have to say that I was actually pretty thoroughly impressed with the amount of historical accuracy put into this show. For instance, the complaints about the noise and loss of the formerly relaxing nature of the baths in Rome was a real complaint written about by a Roman historian, though I can't think of which one as I write this. There was also the many different aspects of Roman life and the technology they had available to them, and just some tidbits here and there that I thought added some authenticity to it. They even had the voice actor struggle through some Latin at appropriately humorous times.

That being said, the people who made this had a lot of fun, and that really comes through. In fact, if I were to sum this series up, it would be just to call it that – fun. It has a lot of humor in it, mostly based around the "fish out of water" aspect of an ancient Roman finding himself in modern Japan, but not entirely around it. It uses a flash animation style that reminds me a bit of some of the shows aired on Adult Swim, and in some ways that actually works for this series as far as making it funny.

I would definitely recommend this series; it's short, relaxing fun. 8/10.

[Hicks]

Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind

(1984 movie, 2005 dub)

This is the first of three Miyazaki films I’m reviewing, all of which I watched over the course of a weekend. Just as a warning, I’m going to point out that, yes, I know Miyazaki is basically a hippy, being very pro-environment and anti-military. Actually I find it somewhat amusing that he’s a pacifist considering how much violence there tends to be in many of his movies. In any case, this is your fair warning that if you’re looking for a positive review that might reinforce your view of this movie, or really any that Miyazaki has made, you aren’t going to find it here. That’s not to say that I’m going to be all negative, either, just that I definitely do not agree with most of what Miyazaki has to say with his movies. I will say, though, that I think his movies tend to be very pretty, and they do have some interesting plots, characters, and good action, even if I really don’t care for his heavy-handed environmentalism and pacifism.

With that out of the way, I’ll start my actual review of this particular movie. This is a post-apocalyptic move in which the earth has been devastated by warfare, which has burned most of the surface and killed most of the life on the planet. As if that wasn’t bad enough, giant fungus has started to grow and spread, along with giant bugs that would give the Mobile Infantry a run for its money. The bugs are really easy to piss off and the giant “ohm” bugs in particular, which are the size of a large house, will stampede and destroy everything in their path if anything disturbs what has come to be known as the toxic jungle, mostly because all the spores in the air are deadly to breathe. This is actually part of how the toxic jungle spreads, as the ohm literally go until they drop dead, and then fungus starts to grow out of them on the newly devastated landscape they’ve created. Of course, the spores that the fungus creates spread pretty easily on their own, so it’s safe to say that humanity is basically fighting a losing battle, as the opening of the movie makes obvious. There are only a few small areas still habitable to humans, and these are becoming overrun by fungus, or by the military actions of other “nations” that still exist.

Unfortunately, there’s no Johnny Rico to help save the day. Instead, we follow the peace-loving protagonist Nausicaä, princess of the Valley of the Wind, as she figures out a way to save everything without using any weapons, apparently having figured out how to communicate with the giant bugs. We first see her as she explores the wonders of Pandora –I mean the toxic jungle. I will say that it’s nice to see a strong female protagonist who isn’t bloody useless, but the downside is that she’s basically the mouthpiece of Miyazaki. As a result, she tends to spout off a lot of crap science, and I have to admit that this irritated me almost as much as the “humans are evil and a threat to the planet” message, but then I have a background in engineering and science, so I actually know that ceramic, while extremely hard and heat resistant, is also very brittle, and that the soil from very deep underground tends to be sandy and/or made up of clay depending on where you are in the world, and is not suited to grown anything.

She also seems to be making a statement against wearing underwear.

Okay, okay, it’s probably just an issue with the coloring and she’s actually wearing pants, but still…

Anyway, the main plot of the series revolves around the militaristic Kingdom of Tolmekia and what big assholes they are. We get our first introduction to them as one of their impossibly huge airplanes crashes in the peaceful, monarchy ruled Valley of the Wind. It seems they stole the embryo of a “Giant Warrior”, which is a genetically engineered weapon that’s responsible for the destruction of the world. The Pejite are the ones who actually found and dug it up the thing, but the Tolmekians wanted it for themselves, and kidnapped the Pejite princess as a hostage after stealing it. Both kingdoms wanted to use the Giant Warrior to burn up the toxic rainforest, but naturally the story is stacked completely against this idea, mostly in the form of a stampede of giant bugs, but also in the whining of Nausicaä as she tries to explain the convoluted “evolution” of the toxic jungle and its creatures.

Apparently, the giant, deadly fungus functions to filter the soil, which makes zero sense since it’s, you know, fungus. And the giant bugs? Why to protect the giant fungus, of course. And we’re just supposed to accept that humans are going to die as a result, because humans are seen as a threat by the planet. And this is why I tend to not like Miyazaki films.

If that wasn’t absurd enough, though, apparently the world was destroyed by a bunch of fire-breathing giants. This is where the movie delves into the pacifist message, which itself is frankly completely illogical, even with the story stacked in its favor. Mostly this is because it preaches a peaceful solution in the face of an aggressive force bent on genocide and destruction, and chides the natural, sane response of wanting to fight for survival. This applies to both the Tolmekians and the toxic jungle, by the way. Of course the movie finds a way to actually resolve the immediate situation of a giant herd of ohm bearing down on the Valley of the Wind, and the occupying Tolmekian force by having Nausicaa sacrifice herself to them, which somehow shocks them into stopping. Since, as a young girl, Nausicaa fought to preserve on of their kind, and did it again even as they stampeded toward her home bent on destruction, the ohm are then nice enough to bring her back to life, making it not really a sacrifice at all. And they all lived happily ever after. Except that the toxic jungle is still slowly devouring the rest of the planet and killing more and more villages as it does, but hey, the giant bugs are alright and the Tolmekians decided to go home, so I guess we’re supposed to forget about that part.

As you can tell, I wasn’t really a big fan of this movie. It had very heavy-handed environmental and pacifist messages, and frankly the protagonist could get on my nerves at times, not only because of the stuff she’d say, but also because of how she was basically perfect, practically a Mary Stu, really. Personally, I actually liked Master Yupa, a Gandalf-like wanderer who was pragmatic and skilled in both diplomacy and combat – the perfect character to be voiced by Captain Picard himself. And as an added bonus, he didn’t talk down to the audience or spout any bullshit.

As for what I liked about this movie, well, occasionally post-apocalyptic stories can be interesting. The show how people deal with the end of the world as we know it, and as long as they aren’t completely stupid, it can be interesting to see that. This movie, and really a few of Miyazaki’s works, also tend to have a rather fanciful tone to them when they aren’t busy being preachy, with some good comedy relief moments, and character development, even if they can be a bit slow-paced at times. I’ll also admit to just liking how things look, too, as Miyazaki movies tend to be very beautifully animated, and I also kind of like the different examples of steampunk in them. Yeah, most of the giant flying machines and the like are impossible, but they are still cool to look at.

I’m sure some of you might be surprised to read after all of this that I think this is actually one of the better Miyazaki movies I’ve seen so far. Unfortunately, the heavy-handed messages really dragged it down for me. However, if you happen to agree with that stuff yourself, especially if you like the movie Avatar, which seems to think this movie wasn’t heavy-handed enough, you’ll probably like this movie. If you aren’t into those kinds of messages, it’s still somewhat watchable, but be warned that this movie is pretty preachy. 7/10.

Edited August 1, 2012 by Hicks

[Hicks]

Princess Mononoke

(1997 movie)

Yet another offering my Miyazaki, this movie takes place in a mythical ancient Japan, which is not long into the iron age, and which still has to deal with actual spirits which exist in the vast forests which cover most of the land. Like every Miyazaki film, there are heavy-handed environmental and pacifist messages, but fortunately these are balanced out by an intriguing story filled with characters that have some actual depth to them, including the people who are theoretically supposed to be the bad guys.

While there is a strong female character in this movie, named San, the protagonist is actually Ashitaka, a young member of an isolated, traditionalist village that sits on the edge of the forest, which we're informed is supposed to be off limits to humans. Ashitaka is sent on a journey into this forest following an attack on his village by a forest spirit in the form of a giant boar that's been covered by black worms. While Ashitaka is successful in defeating this possessed boar and protecting his village, he is wounded by the black worms, which leave a mark on his arm that will spread to cover more and more of his body throughout the movie. He's informed that this will kill him unless he successfully finds the Forest Spirit and is able to talk it into lifting this curse from him. In the interim, though, the evil black mark gives him superpowers that enable him to literally shoot the heads and limbs off of some douche-bag samurai types, lift a door that normally takes ten men to lift, and survive getting shot through the center of mass by a musket ball the size of a fist long enough to rescue the girl and get healed by the Forest Spirit he's looking for.

San is "the girl" I'm referring to here, who Ashitaka takes a liking to the moment he lays eyes on her, in spite of the fact she and her giant wolf buddies have just finished slaughtering a bunch of humans who are only trying to get through the forest to bring food and supplies to their families in Iron Town, and in spite of the way she and her wolf buddies constantly threaten to kill him and even make a go of carrying out those threads. She is kind of a looker, though, so, hey, crazy in the head, crazy in bed, right?

The main plot of this film is about the conflict between the industrializing humans and nature, actually somewhat paralleling the kind of conflict J. R. R. Tolkien set up in his stories. Actually it wouldn't surprise me that much if this movie was somewhat inspired by Lord of the Rings (as in the books, obviously), but really that's just an interesting thought and not something I'm actually holding this film up against.

Anyway, the industrializing humans are represented by two different groups – the douche-bag samurai I referred to earlier, and the inhabitants of the island-based Iron Town. The samurai represent a militaristic group of humans who basically want everything they lay eyes on, and they'll kill anyone and everyone who happens to be there. Given that this is a Miyazaki film, this representation of a military force really shouldn't be all that surprising. Not that the samurai weren't douch-bags. Iron Town, on the other hand, exists to create iron and the primitive firearms it uses to defend itself against douche-bag samurais and forest spirits alike. Of course in doing so, they've cleared a significant portion of the forest, and have mined for iron ore, so you can kind of guess where the conflict comes in here.

Iron Town and its leader, a woman named Eboshi, are actually what help to balance this movie out quite a bit, and show that in spite of the fact Miyazaki can be very preachy when it comes to the environment and fighting, he can still keep his films from being completely one-sided, and I respect that. See, Eboshi has basically taken in all of the social misfits that wouldn't be able to find good work anywhere else, like prostitutes and even lepers, so they can make iron. It's hard work and these people are portrayed as more or less good people who are simply trying to make a living, and who owe a lot to their leader because she's taken them in and given them this refuge in exchange for their labor. Ebashi also genuinely seems to care for these people, and will put her own life on the line to defend them. As this brings them into conflict with the forest spirits, San and her wolf family are very hateful toward Ebashi and the residents of Iron Town, and since San and her wolf family are constantly killing their friends and family members, they're naturally very hateful toward San and the forest spirits. This kind of puts Ashitaka in an awkward position, because while he doesn't agree with the industrialization and the stripping of the forest, he still recognizes these as good people and can't bring himself to condemn them, in spite of the revelation that they are essentially the cause of his present misfortune. Then, of course, is the fact that he really wants to slip San the ol' sausage, so he ends up finding himself fighting both groups while trying to befriend both groups. Complexity and depth, I like it.

So as I mentioned earlier, Ashitaka ends up getting shot by a huge musket ball of doom, which is made of iron instead of lead for some reason, and is also responsible for the various forest spirit animals who get shot going crazy and turning into worm-covered demons that want to kill everyone in their sight. Kind of like the samurai-types. Huh, wonder if there's a parallel there or something. Anyway, since San is impressed by what Ashitaka is willing to sacrifice in order to preserve her life and by his respect for the forest and its spirits, she decides to take him to the Forest Spirit to be healed. As it turns out, he'd actually spotted the Forest Spirit earlier in its day time form, which looks kind of like an elk with a flat, human-like face.

The forest's savior.

Due to its ability to magically heal the sick and wounded, and to literally walk on water, I'm going to refer to the Forest Spirit as Elk Jesus from now on. In any case, this first instance of the audience being shown that Elk Jesus has these abilities also establishes that in order to give life, by healing or otherwise, life must be sacrificed to do so, which is why San grabbed a tree branch and planted it close to Ashitaka when she took him to Elk Jesus's home.

And thus Ashitaka find himself no better off than he was at the start of his quest, healed of his gunshot wound, but still bearing the curse that has spread even further through his body. And despite San coming around to him, somewhat, she still refuses to accept any kind of a peaceful compromise with humans, or that she even is human herself, having been raised by a she-wolf like Romulus and Remus. He's also told to leave the forest by both the wolves and the leader of a huge pack of giant boars, because the next time they see him they'll kill him. Of course, the samurai douche-bags attack Iron Town while Ebashi and most of the men from Iron Town are away on a hunt for the emperor, so he ends up resuming his quest to find a peaceful solution for Ebashi and her group and the forest spirits, and to save San while he's at it.

Ebashi, for all the good that she's done the residents of Iron Town, apparently only had the resources to do so because of the emperor, and now owes the old bastard a favor. As it turns out, the favor consists of hunting down Elk Jesus and cutting off its head, which is said to grant immortality upon its owner, or something like that. To ensure she lives up to her end of things, the emperor even goes as far as to send an elite group of hunter-monks, who are portrayed not all that differently from the samurai.

As it turns out, Elk Jesus turns into this giant, ethereal humanoid at night and wanders the forest. Apparently, during the transformation phase between elk-thing and giant ghost-thing, it's actually vulnerable to getting shot, although it apparently losing its head just makes it grope around wildly, killing everything it touches while it looks for its head. This is where the movie basically sells itself as being a kind of lost history to the real world, because this incident marks the end of forest spirits as a tangible thing, and of the forest animals being sentient beings. But hey, Ashitaka gets the crazy wolf-girl in the end, and in spite of Iron Town being destroyed and overrun by plants, there's nothing left now to keep humanity from progressing into an industrialized society, so happy ending for all ... except the forest spirits and Elk Jesus, who died for humanities sins (only being slightly sarcastic here).

This movie is mainly interesting to me due to its themes: religious, change from nature to industry, life from death, etc. And while I don't really agree with what all this movie has to say, it is interesting to note these themes and to make comparisons to other works that have similar themes. I also like that the majority of the characters in this movie have some actual depth to them, and that the causes and solutions to the conflict and drama in the story are not really all that clear-cut. The resolution wasn't perfect for everyone either, because even though Ashitaka was cured of his curse and got a hot new girlfriend out of the deal, he was not able to save the forest spirits and only barely managed to save the residents of Iron Town. And while the residents of Iron Town survived, everything they worked for and fought to protect was destroyed.

The main weakness of this movie, like pretty much every Miyazaki film, is that at times the pacing can be somewhat slow and the movie can drag in parts. I also have to admit to a personal bias here in that the setting and subject matter just aren't all that terribly interesting to me. However, due to the interesting theme and the balanced storytelling, I'm going to rate this movie somewhat higher than I might have otherwise.

If you’re interested in myth, fantasy, and really like trees and stuff, you'll probably like this movie a lot more than I did, because really it's custom made for people who have those interests. But even if you aren't someone like that, it's still a somewhat engaging and interesting story that can entertain. 8/10.

[Hicks]

Howl's Moving Castle

(2004 movie)

My third and final (for the moment) Miyazaki film review, this is everything I've come to expect from the man. Well, mostly. In this case it's more about being anti-military and pacifist than environmentalism, which takes a back seat to calling everyone in the military murderers. The Wikipedia article about this movie mentions that Miyazaki was upset about the 2003 Iraq invasion, like pretty much everyone else in the world, so naturally he uses this movie as a soapbox to that end.

Okay, maybe I'm being a bit harsh here, because to be fair, most of the movie is about the protagonist, a young woman named Sophie, and the love she develops for the eccentric wizard named Howl. As you might guess from the title, much of the movie takes place in Howl's magical moving castle, though the setting itself is in a fantasy country I never quite caught the name of and remembered, which seems like a mix of pre-WWI France, Britain, and Germany. Actually the setting is one of the most impressive things about the movie as far as I'm concerned, mostly because it reminds me a lot of the fantastic visions of the future from the late 19th and early 20th centuries, from the architecture to all the different vehicles seen buzzing about on the ground and in the air. Of course another major theme is that magic is taken as a normal, everyday thing, with wizards and witches actually being educated to be such.

Sophie is a hatter, working for a small family shop, and she's very down on what she sees as her lot in life. Basically she starts out with a very negative outlook on herself and her life because she feels it is her responsibility and her fate to waste her life making hats. This becomes an important theme for the movie, because not long after the movie starts she has an unfortunate encounter with The Witch of Waste, who apparently is after Howl for some reason. In any case, she's put under a spell that artificially ages her to the point that she looks like she's one foot in the grave. The thing of note here is that she only looks like this when she is feeling down on herself or has an otherwise negative outlook on life, because when she's distracted with what's going on around her, and when she lets her feelings for Howl come to the forefront, she begins to appear younger – in one outburst defending Howl she briefly even appears her true age. For most of the movie, though, you could almost miss the change in her appearance simply because of everything that's going on, as the movie doesn't slow down all that much once it starts introducing the characters.

The plot of the movie mainly focuses on Howl's involvement with a war that has recently broken out with another country. The details are never discussed, though, because the movie is too busy bashing the military and war in general. Actually this is part of where the movie shows some major weakness, primarily because there's a plot hole that makes things not make a lot of sense. Because the thing is, Howl is drafted to fight, and he makes it obvious that he doesn't want to fight, but he still does. The thing is, at one point he has Sophie pose as his mother to try to talk the reining monarch/witch into letting him off the hook, and a big deal is made about this monarch, Madame Suliman, ordering him to be hunted down when it becomes obvious to her that he's just draft-dodging. Yet later on, he's seen fighting in the war, and the focus shifts to Sophie trying to get him to stop fighting, because apparently there's some risk of him being stuck in the crow-like form he fights in. So why is Suliman still hunting him if he's fighting?

I don't get it.

There are some scenes that manage to hit home, especially when Sophie's home is attacked, but for the most part I find all the anti-military crap to be sanctimonious and frankly insulting. It's true, I have some bias here because I was in Air Force ROTC for a while, but while I have respect for members of the armed forces, my limited experience has given me perspective enough to not be unquestioning and basically the kind of stupid that would be on the other side of the same coin here. So while I don't unconditionally call everyone in the military a hero, I also don't unilaterally call them murderers, either, which at one point Howl just flat our states. And while war is tragic and at times pointless, there are times it's necessary, illustrated wonderfully by WWII with the Hitler and Japan taking over the world thing. I'm not going to get into it too much, because frankly that's its own discussion. Safe to say that the movie rather irritated me with this subject matter.

For the most part, though, the movie tries to generate laughs more than anything, mostly with jokes having to do with getting old – something Miyazaki undoubtedly has experience with. There are a number of secondary characters, which mostly serve comedic roles as well, including the Witch of Waste, who is reduced to a "cute" old woman who only really serves as a minor annoyance later on. There isn't a lot that really stands out, though, either story-wise or character-wise. The movie ends pretty much the way you would expect, which is to say not completely happy, but with Sophie and Howl hooking up and even adopting the child wizard who's been Howl's apprentice/assistant, along with the dog who's actually supposed to be a spy for Suliman but apparently just decides to become the family dog instead.

Before I wrap things up, though, I think I should mention another theme I've noticed with Miyazaki. I can't help but notice that all the female characters he wants to portray as being strong tend to have short hair. I also noticed that in the case of two female leads, Sophie being one of them, they start out with long hair and are somewhat weak and unassertive, but their hair is cut or otherwise ends up short as their character develops and they become stronger and more assertive. It's not really important, just something I noticed and thought I'd mention. I'm partial to short hair on women, too, so I guess that's one form of common ground between myself and Miyazaki. I still think he's a hippie, though.

Anyway, this is an interesting and marginally entertaining movie, but I find it to be mostly fluff surrounding an anti-military message. If you like other examples of Miyazaki's work, you'll probably like this, too. Even if you aren't, but you just don't mind being preached at for a few minutes out of two hours, you still might find this movie entertaining. But when it comes to me, I don't much like the sermon, which earns it a -1 modifier in my book, resulting in a score of 6/10.

[Hicks]

Black Lagoon

Season 3 – Roberta’s Blood Trail

(5 episode OVA)

This sequel is basically more of the same as far as plot and characters go. Oh, and since it’s an OVA, we finally get to see some uncensored side-boob from both the titular maid and everyone’s favorite fanservice action girl, Revy.

This sequel picks up right where the series proper left off, continuing the storyline of Roberta, the terminator-like maid, and her master, Garcia Lovelace. The thing about Black Lagoon is that it revels in its own grittiness, so while a story might have an otherwise happy ending, it usually still ends badly for someone or is at least bittersweet. So while Roberta successfully rescued her young master and the two of them went home, as it turns out, Garcia’s father got blown up in a clandestine anti-drug operation conducted by the US Army. Entirely innocent of anything, he was in the wrong place at the wrong time, and now Garcia is the head of the small Lovelace family. This not only hits Roberta’s berserker switch, but it breaks it off in the “on” position, because she grabs an antique musket that symbolizes the Lovelace family and disappears, vowing to avenge this attack on the Lovelace family.

Fortunately for Garcia, he’s not left completely alone, as the Lovelace family apparently saw the need for a second assassin-trained maid, only this time she’s a moé-ish loli, just to make sure all the fetish bases are covered. Since Garcia basically is in love with Roberta, he enlists the aid of his second maid, Fabiola, to go look for Roberta so they can hopefully bring her back home before she gets herself killed by trying to take on the US Army. This leads them back to Roanapur and the Lagoon Company, naturally at the oft’ destroyed bar where they first met Roberta. It goes about the same way, too.

Everyone is brought into this little adventure thanks to the implications being presented to the various mobs operating in Roanapur and elsewhere in the world, because they are interested in maintaining the status quo in Roanapur, even if some of them, like Hotel Moscow, would love to have an excuse to kill some American servicemen themselves thanks to the Cold War dying hard with them. In the end they actually end up helping the American black ops unit responsible for Lovelace’s death, but they are sure to let the Americans know that while there is some professional respect there, they’d just as soon kill them as anything else the next time they see them.

One of the most interesting things about Black Lagoon is its characters, and that continues with this OVA. For this story, we’re introduced to an Army officer who is duty-bound but also has a strong moral compass. The first we see of him, he’s actually defending some young Vietnamese kid from the troops in his unit, risking getting fragged himself to do so. But he holds strong, and even guns down one of his bloodthirsty subordinates to make his point. Fast forward to the present, and upon learning that he’s killed an innocent man and wounded Garcia, and he does everything he can to defend Garcia even while he flees from Roberta, who’s so out of it that she nearly kills her own young master. There isn’t a whole lot of depth to the character, and basically he’s an ideal more than a real person, but that’s pretty par for the course in Black Lagoon – what’s important is that he’s interesting.

As always, Black Lagoon is a valentine to action movie fans, and the action is just as over the top and awesome in this OVA as it was in the series proper. Sure, it’s unrealistic as hell, but if you recognize where things are coming from and just accept it for the action schlock that it is, it’s pretty damn fun to watch, and if you’re anything like me you’ll find yourself laughing at the ridiculousness of it all. This is actually why I tend to give shows like Black Lagoon more of pass for that kind of thing, because they know exactly what they are and don’t try to apologize for it in any way, unlike something like say, Avatar (as in the one James Cameron made while fapping to furry porn).

The one downside to all of this is that it tends to be fairly predictable. A lot of drama is made of Rock’s struggle to make some kind of a master plan that will enable him to save everyone this time around, since pretty much every other time he’s tried this he hasn’t really succeeded. On the plus side, this is character development, as is Revy’s continuing interest in him (I really wish they’d just jump each other’s bones and get it over with). On the other hand, it’s kind of robbed Rock of the underlying kindness that’s been an aspect of his character from the start, and turned more into this odd competition with Mr. Chang, boss of the local Triad mob.

No what was I talking about again? Oh yeah, predictability. And I don’t just mean in that you could see action scenes coming from a mile away. What I mean by that is that this story ends about the way you might guess that it would end, which is to say that it’s a mostly happy ending, except that Roberta ends up not quite being the fine specimen she was when we first met her. This is basically foreshadowed earlier in the story when she starts taking depression medication and starts seeing dead people. Essentially she becomes a Captain Ahab, in more ways than one.

And they lived happily ever after...

Overall, it’s pretty easy to say that I liked this OVA, though in a lot of ways I kind of wished we’d gotten a fully-fledged season. All the same, it was nice to get something, and it was one hell of an action romp to boot, every bit in the same vein as the first two seasons. The only downsides are a lack of time for other characters to get more than a cameo, and the kind of predictability that just comes as standard fare for action schlock.

If you liked the first two seasons, you’ll probably like what the third season has to offer, just be aware that there’s as yet no dub available, at least not as of the time I wrote this review. I’m really hoping that a dub does get made, but I’m not going to hold my breath either.

If you haven’t seen the first two seasons, you should be able to jump right into Roberta’s Blood Trail without much trouble. They do quickly run through introductions again, so you shouldn’t be completely lost if you skipped the first two seasons. If you’re trying to decide to watch this, if you liked The Expendables, RED, or the Crank movies, Black Lagoon should be right up your ally. 9/10 (in my extremely biased opinion).

Edited August 1, 2012 by Hicks

[Hicks]

Armored Trooper VOTOMS

(52 episode series)

You know, I muddled my way through this beast of a series, hoping that in spite of the constant padding and drawing out, that it would pay off in the end. After all Blood+ turned into something worth watching in spite of a slow start, and it was likewise a long series. However, Armored Trooper VOTOMS ultimately proved to be a disappointment for me, because as the series neared its end, it became really clear to me that the writers had been pulling everything out of their fourth point of contact all along.

A product of the '80s, this series really showed its age as far as the animation – it actually resembles the animated Star Trek series from the '70s in part. That being said, at first that was my only real concern with the series. We're given a bit of exposition in the beginning that explains that a war has been going on between two interstellar nations, the Gilgamesh Confederation and the Balarant Union, and from that point on the series closely follows protagonist Chirico Cuvie as he is sent on a secret mission with a clandestine group that has unknown objectives. He thinks he's on a training mission of some kind only to find himself fighting his own forces as the group he's with looks for something. He stumbles upon a mysterious bald (and buck-ass nekkid) woman in a glowing stasis chamber, and from that point on his life goes completely to hell as basically everyone he comes across tries to kill him. So basically what I'm saying is that, initially anyway, the story seemed to interesting enough to put up with the dated animation and lack of a dub (however horrible it might have been). After all, it was obvious that this secret society didn't want Chirico with them on this mission to steal what turned out to be some kind of a genetically engineered super-soldier, yet he was an elite soldier from a group known as the Red Shoulders. What was he doing there? What was the secret society up to and how extensive was its membership? Who was the mysterious bald woman?

So it was fairly easy to root for Chirico and the friends he made along the way, even if every single one of them basically met a cliché of some kind. Chirico, for instance, was basically the ideal bad-ass soldier. Actually, it got rather amusing at times, because the secret society was apparently after the "Perfect Soldier", or PS for short, and given how Chirico was basically perfect in is Gary Stu-like ability to overcome literally any odds, I thought it was pretty obvious that Chirico was the real perfect soldier. Apparently the writers noticed this too and just made him one. But then, the PS thing was pushed into the background, even as Chirico met up with the mysterious woman and the two of them decided they were in love with each other.

I suppose it could be somehow argued that everything was planned out at least well enough, but especially getting toward the end of the series, it was obvious that the writers were just clamoring to tie up any loose ends they might have left (more on that later). I guess I can give them credit for at least caring enough to do so, anyway – that's more than Rick Berman and Brannon Braga can be given credit for anyway.

I was also initially concerned that since this was a giant mech series that I'd end up not liking it because of that. To be honest, giant mechs are mostly amusing to me, and for the most part in a series that's trying to be serious I usually find that it just isn't me thing (see my Evangelion reviews). I was somewhat impressed that some thought was actually put into these particular giant mechs, but for the most part I just kind of bared with it.

I think the characterization is where I was mainly let down for the majority of the series. To be frank, Chirico's character would change depending on whatever plot twist the writers decided to pull out of their asses, and so would pretty much everyone else's. For instance, there were three comedy relief characters who always managed to end up following Chirico no matter where he ended up, and they would constantly yo-yo between thinking Chirico was a prick and deciding he wasn't that bad after all and do everything they could help him. To be fair, though, there were plenty of times Chirico actually was a prick, and he'd usually end up screwing these people over in some way. Then there was Fyanna, the mysterious bald woman Chirico saw in the first episode (she does grow hair, though). Initially, she was an impressive combat soldier, but as Chirico drew closer to her in his search for answers, she started to grow weaker, and when the two of them fell in love she basically fell into the clichéd role a lot of women in anime and just in media in general tend to fall into. Sure, occasionally she'd show some fighting ability, but for the most part she was there to be emotional about Chirico so the writers could try to fool the audience into thinking there was actually some drama.

The series goes on a very long, convoluted journey, which seems to change depending on what mood the writers were in, and it has a little bit of everything. Chirico goes from the kind of urban cyberpunk dystopia that was pretty common for '80s sci-fi, to a Vietnam-like planet where he fights in someone else's civil war, to a post-apocalyptic desert planet that has a poisonous atmosphere, to the desert home planet of a species that decided to abandon technology, with an ancient technological mystery buried beneath them the entire time. Likewise, Chirico goes from being almost an everyman, to an asshole, to being sympathetic, to being regretful in his past affiliation with the Red Shoulders due to atrocities they committed, to refusing to let a woman die even though she's vowed revenge on him and constantly tries to kill him, to being a prick with aspirations of galactic domination, to being the big damn hero at the last minute. I especially wasn't impressed with those last two things.

So what was the solution to all the mysteries? God did it. Well, a technological god who is basically a genetically superior superman, but, still. And as it turns out, Chirico is actually one of these "overmen", too. And the part that really irritated the hell out of me is that once this was finally revealed, Chirico basically turned evil and left his would-be lover and the friends who have been with him for all this way to die. Then, not long after, he seems to actively try to kill them as they try to stop him from taking over the galaxy.

Then, at the last minute, Chirico suddenly shoots the ancient computer god and sets about destroying it, having done all the douchebag things he'd done up to that point to fool the computer god. Of course, the big deal about the computer god was that it was telepathic, so... yeah.

Daisy... Daisy... Give me your answer, do... I'm half cra-zy, all for the love of you...

The ass-pull comes in how basically every lingering mystery – the strange ship Chirico and Fyanna found themselves on following planet Vietnam, why Chirico was on the mission in the first episode, etc. – was resolved by having the computer god exposit that it was totally behind everything, and even though Chirico came close to dying more than once, the computer god was somehow protecting him the entire time. Talk about an eye-roller.

The series then somewhat abruptly ends as the war Chirico apparently was trying to prevent with by destroying the computer god (along with the planet it was on and all of its inhabitants) breaks out between the Gilgamesh and the Balarant all over again. Chirico and Fyanna, now newly made up with the other friends Chirico had tried to kill previously, decide to be shot out into space in a cryo-tube, leaving the story open for a sequel, which there apparently were plenty of. Jury is still out on whether I'll actually give them a chance – I might check them out just out of morbid curiosity.

I think, for me, the most interesting aspect of the series was seeing the influences this series took from other sources, and how it influenced at least one other show at least in name. There was definitely a lot of influence from the movies Alien and 2001: A Space Odyssey, both in visual design and in the use of certain sound effects. As for how it influenced another, much younger show – apparently someone from Gainax saw this show and especially liked the name of a certain character, named Gurren.

That being said, while there are some interesting aspects to this series and it is somewhat noteworthy in the basics of its story and approach to telling that story, I'm not sure I'd really recommend it to anyone. Hardcore sci-fi and mech fans might be interested somewhat, but it's a rather dated show and it tends to drag at times. 4/10.

I can't believe I watched the whole thing...

[Hicks]

Baccano! – A Re-Review

(13 + 3 episode series)

Having recently re-watched this series, I thought it deserved a re-review – not that my views have changed much on it, but because I have a clearer understanding of it. That, and the original review I wrote up on it was one of the first ones I did, and I think it deserves to be reworked using my current, more detailed style.

Baccano! is a pretty unique series, and it’s obvious that a lot of effort went into bringing it into being. Like the Gunsmith Cats team, the Baccano! team went to the locations they wanted to portray in New York City, and since a good chunk of the story takes place on a train, the team also visited the Steamtown National Historic Site, so the locations the story takes place in could be more accurately depicted. This attention to detail was carried on into the English dub by the casting director and script writer, who watched old movies from the era so they could get a feel for how people talked at the time, and this produced one of the best dubs in anime. About the only downside is that since most of these movies were about Chicago mobsters, a bunch of New York mobsters had Chicago accents, but in this case it’s the thought that counts. For me, the attention to detail is pretty impressive nonetheless. And as if that wasn’t enough, the outstanding soundtrack also makes a point of bringing the sound of Prohibition era America to life for a show that primarily takes place during this time frame.

Of course, this attention to detail isn’t really what I’m referring to when I call this a unique series. What makes this show unique is its method of storytelling, which is to say that it’s like the editor had attention deficit disorder. There are several different storylines that take place at several different time frames that all manage to intersect on a train called the Flying Pussyfoot, which is referring to being qick and light on the feet, you sick bastards. Anyway, if that wasn’t bad enough, the story actually starts out after everything has already gone down, and then proceeds to feed the audience relevant information in a well-paced manner that kept me interested in the story. To the credit of the people who made this, they actually kept things pretty straight, which is more than most other shows told in a more traditional manner can say sometimes. This works both for and against this show, as it does generate interest and tells a story in a different way, but it can also be very frustrating and confusing at times.

The story itself revolves around a group of immortals and an elixir of immortality given to them by a demon one of them managed to summon. This isn’t a case of Highlander immortality either, as one of these immortals can be shredded into little pieces and their flesh will magically reconstitute together and bring the person (or animal) back to life. The original group was apparently a bunch of alchemists, though the series didn’t really make that point all that clear to me, as I was under the impression that it was a group of immigrants on the way across the Atlantic. Although now it makes a lot more sense to me why they all had different fake European accents. Anyway, the demon gives the knowledge for how to make the immortality elixir to the alchemist who summoned him, but he and most of the others decided that they would keep this to themselves, as the consequences of this becoming common knowledge and creating a world full of immortals was rather distressing. However, one of them, and old man named Szilard Quates, disagrees and wants this knowledge for himself. Incidentally, the demon left the group of immortals an out in case they ever decided they wanted to die by making it possible for them to be absorbed by one of their fellow immortals if their devourer placed their hand on their forehead and thought, ‘I wish to eat’, or something along those lines. As an added bonus the devourer also absorbed all of that person’s knowledge and experience on top of basically being a cannibal, so you might guess where this was leading.

Fast forward to the 1930s, and ol’ mad Doctor Quates was closing in on the correct formula for the elixir, and unfortunately for him, got tangled up with a bunch of mobsters in the process. Really, though, the best thing he ever produced was Ennis, an incredibly attractive homunculus he created from his own cells using magic, apparently.

*sigh* So kawaii… Have I mentioned I have a thing for women in suits, women with short hair, and women who can kick ass?

As for how all this leads up to a slaughter on the Flying Pussyfoot *snicker*, I can’t really say for sure, other than that a lot of the characters we’re introduced to end up on that train, and one of them was one of these original immortals (man, imagine being stuck in the body of a 10 year old boy for 200 years) and the homunculus of another immortal happened to be on the train while some kind of underhanded political crap was going on. It’s really kind of a Charlie Foxtrot, because while there’s a group of black-suited terrorists basically looking to take a US Senator’s wife and daughter hostage, there’s also a group of white-suited thugs led by the completely insane mobster Ladd Russo that’s basically looking to kill everyone on board. And if that wasn’t enough, there’s an expert assassin/gymnast on board who was actually one of the train’s conductors, but thanks to a scary story being told at the right time he effectively becomes a monster known as the “rail tracer” who busily goes about slaughtering all the black-suits and white-suits on the train. It’s entertaining as hell to watch, but it can also be confusing at times.

That all being said, this series is completely over the top and ridiculous. That actually helps me to let the giant cluster fuck that is the storytelling method and the sheer amount of story and characters that there is. Which, speaking of the characters, there are so many of them that it's often hard to keep track of them all. The opening credits fortunately helps a little, as it introduces basically everyone important to the story while the awesome theme song plays. It also helps to convey the scatter-shot method of storytelling, I guess. Really, there are only two characters that manage to weave it all together – Isaac and Miria, two eccentric (as in insane) characters who are in every single storyline except for the "how it all got started" storyline that took place in the 1700s. There's also the vice president of the Daily Days, which is both a newspaper and an information broker, and his young apprentice, Carol. Those two mainly serve the function of introducing the different storylines and the odd method of storytelling to the audience, as well as the all important role of being the writers' mouthpiece. This may be somewhat unkind of me to say, but they just made it so darned obvious by only having these characters be in the first few episodes, literally introducing all the various storylines, and then not having them show up again until the very end of the special 3 episodes that were added after the original ending of the series, mainly to take pot shots at critics like myself, as well as making a statement to all the fans who were undoubtedly the reason these 3 episodes were made, which is to say that they tied up a few loose threads and then told everyone off about any others they might have left dangling.

It's certainly a valid argument that the audience should be able to use its imagination in lieu of showing how each and every plot point got resolved, which is to say that there is an appeal to that. Mainly, I just took a little issue with the attitude, although I can understand anime fans being at the root of that. I'll also say that their unique method of storytelling was also valid, but I still think the show would have been better in chronological order and without the story-framing writer mouthpieces, but that's just my opinion.

On that same note, I also have to say that I didn't particularly attach to any characters or find any of them sympathetic, mainly because they were all criminals, but that's okay because this isn't really a serious series anyway. In this case, what matters is interesting characters who are interesting to watch, and Baccano! has plenty of those. One of my favorites has to be Ladd Russo.

How can you not like this guy? So what if he's a psychopathic murderer who's saving his girlfriend to kill last; he's just so damn entertaining to watch.

So, in case you were wondering if I'd changed my mind on the rating I gave this show on my nebulous and arbitrary scale of "good", no, I haven't. I still rate this a 9/10 for being the entertaining, well done, and well thought out ruckus that it is. I would definitely recommend it, and I'm going to finally get around to adding it to my favorites list. Actually, I bought this show a while back when it was on sale, and the only thing I regret is that Funimation saw fit to put unskipable ads on every single disk.

Edited August 1, 2012 by Hicks

[Hicks]

Neo Tokyo

(1987 movie)

I've actually been putting this review off for close to two weeks now, because honestly, I'm not entirely sure what all I can say about this movie. Of course part of that is because strictly speaking it isn't so much a movie as a collection of three short stories, only one of which is told in a linear, mostly logical fashion. The others are a bit more ... abstract. But then, that isn't to say that I disliked this movie so much as I wished I understood what exactly it was I was watching.

Okay, just to start things off, I'm going to put it out there that this is a beautifully drawn and animated piece of work. The visual style of the two less abstract shorts in particular typify one of the appeals older anime has with me. Older sci-fi anime in particular just tends to look really awesome to me, and I actually kind of like it when things are kind of weird or otherworldly in the story that's being told. Actually, one of the things I liked about the much more recent movie Redline was that it's visual style and even the type of story that was being told reminded me a lot of '80s anime that I've grown to like, in spite of never having watched any of it until more recently. I'd say Redline actually mostly resembled the "Running Man" short with the hardness of the lines in the drawing style and just overall in the visual design, at least in my opinion. Incidentally Madhouse animated both of these movies.

As for things like plot and story, well, that's a bit more complicated. As I mentioned before, this isn't a movie, it's a collection of three shorts, one of which serves as a framing device for the others, at least in how it was edited for the movie. Called "Labyrinth labyrinthos", it seems to involve a little girl in '50s era Japan playing with her large pet cat, named Cicerone. The Wiki article indicates that the abstract visuals the audience is subjected to is an "exploration into the mind of a little girl," which I guess I can buy, it's just that I felt kind of like I was watching an animated episode of The Twilight Zone. Unfortunately, there isn't a whole lot of commentary I can offer on this short, as it's really much too abstract for me to do so – really this is a case of things possibly representing some other concept that I just don't grasp, or it could be complete nonsense. About all I can offer is that her cat's name is an old European term for a guide, such as for a museum or an art gallery. The word itself is derived from Marcus Tullius Cicero's name. He was a Roman philosopher and politician during the late Roman Republic. During Caesar's dictatorship, he advocated for a return to the more traditional style of republican government which later led him to becoming an enemy of Marc Antony and getting killed. In any case, the use of his name as the title for a guide probably has a lot more to do with his writings on philosophy, mostly of the Greek variety, through which he introduced Greek philosophy to the Roman Republic. These writings were rediscovered in early modern times and are often credited for helping to start the Renaissance by reintroducing classical philosophy to the writers of the day. As for how this applies to a little girl traveling into a warped dimension and seeing some Salvador Dalí artwork on the way to a monster circus, I have no idea, beyond the obvious of the cat accompanying her in spite of not actually being a guide of any kind.

The second short, called "Running Man" is about a futuristic, ultra-violent race of some kind that is (in)famous for all the deaths it tends to cause. It focuses on a driver named Zach Hugh, but is told out of linear order and is narrated by a magazine reporter after Zach's unusual and mysterious death. Apparently Zach had a telekinetic ability which he used to destroy the hover-car racer of anyone who managed to pass him, and this apparently had driven him insane. The short covers Zach's last race as the ghosts of his past catch up to him and he apparently destroys his own body and car. I guess the thing is, while the narration explained all of this, the way the story is edited together made it somewhat confusing for me to watch until after I'd watched it a second time. It was kind of bland as a story, but pretty neat to watch even if I didn't entirely understand just what I was watching.

What did I just watch?

"The Order to Stop Construction" tells its story in a much more traditional fashion, keeping things nice and linear even if the setting is still strange as hell. Basically, a stereotypical salary man from a generic Japanese construction company has to travel to a fictitious South American country to shut down an expensive project being built there. Called Facility 444, this would be a bit more obvious to American audiences if it was called Facility 666 – 4 is the Japanese number for death. Anyway, the facility is being built deep in the jungle and has to deal with both an abundance of rain and flora, and because of the conditions there it's being built entirely by robots with only one man supervising the project. As you might guess, this is the pretty standard "warning against depending too much on technology" story, though I personally also see it as a bit of a jab at the business attitudes of the average Japanese company. Since a coup has taken place, the contract for the facility has been cancelled, and the order has gone out to stop construction and recoup as much as possible from the site. Unfortunately the human supervisor has not responded to this order and construction at the site is continuing. So, it's a bit clichéd, but not in a way that made it unenjoyable for me to watch.

So while this movie may not be what I would normally call "good", I think it was still pretty fun to watch. It actually reminded me of a show that was on Tech TV back in the early 2000s that featured animation (mostly CG) from amateurs, some of which had no point beyond being cool-looking, and some of which actually were short stories. I'd say I enjoyed Neo Tokyo on that basis, and I think it's important to keep that in mind if you're thinking about watching this movie. I actually would recommend it, though more in terms of seeing an example of some cool sci-fi anime from the '80s than in some other sense. That being said, I'm not entirely sure how to rate this, even on my nebulous scale of "good", so I'll just tentatively call it a 7/10 – not something that'll rock your socks off, but still fun to watch.