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Dec 23, 2018
I watch Tokyo Godfathers every Christmas. It's a fantastic Christmas movie, but it's not just a Christmas movie. It's also a fantastic family movie and a fantastic auteur film. It's Satoshi Kon's greatest movie, out of the few films he was able to make in his lifetime.
The main characters are Gin, Hana and Miyuki. All of them are hobos and all have contrasting personalities. Gin is an alcoholic who doesn't want to face reality, so he makes up stories and lies a lot. He wants to shift the blame of his failures onto someone else instead of changing for the better. Hana is an okama,
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which is the Japanese version of a crossdresser, but is associated with homosexuality. Okamas are seen as weirdos in Japan and are not accepted by the mainstream. Miyuki is a bratty young girl who wants to be left alone, but also wants to be cared for. She is short-tempered and gets frustrated by Hana and Gin when they start arguing. The "colourful" personalities each bring something relevant to the story. Gin is practical but has no self awareness, Hana drives the trio forward but is very dramatic and Miyuki brings the other two back to reality when she's not being a pain in the ass. The characters are forced to work together in order to return the missing baby to its parents, which results in a lot of entertaining conflicts.
Family plays a big role in Tokyo Godfathers. Each of the three homeless protagonists has their own character arc revolving around their family, covering the issues faced by the family that lead to it breaking up, and resolving the family matters in a cathartic and believable way. The three protagonists also have a familial bond between each other, which is noticed more and more as they look after the baby. The story is fundamentally family-based because it revolves around finding the baby's mother and returning it to its home. In Christmas season, watching a family movie can put you in the right mindset for when you see all your family on Christmas Day, or over the New Year. Tokyo Godfathers doesn't just vaguely relate to Christmas using the holiday season as a front for Christmas; there are biblical roots to the story. After a church service, the homeless trio find a baby in a garbage-manger with no parents, representing the Virgin Birth, and embark on a journey to keep the child safe. Gin, Hana and Miyuki could represent the Three Wise Men, or perhaps Gin and Hana could be Joseph and Mary. The amusing implications of two men being Joseph and Mary aside, the biblical foundations of the story are clear.
A major theme in Tokyo Godfathers is coincidence. The movie begins with three homeless individuals finding a baby abandoned in the trash. Along their journey to try and find the baby's mother, the homeless trio coincidentally run in to just the right people at just the right locations, find members of their family just when they needed to see them most, and happen to save the day in the nick of time in an absurdly unlikely way. An example of a common coincidence is Hana narrowly avoiding being hit by a skidding motorbike. It's quite coincidental that so many characters happen to be named Kiyoko. All of these small coincidences show that coincidence is integral to the narrative. These coincidences don't work against the film's narrative and are never used as a convenient "out" in the circumstance of the script reaching a dead end. There were no dead ends, no mistakes requiring asspulls to fix and none of the coincidences undermined the family and Christmas messages of the film. The coincidences make for a far more interesting movie than if it was perfectly realistic. A realistic movie would result in the baby being given to the authorities immediately and the homeless people staying unhappy, filthy and poor. All good movies use some form of convenience and coincidence to make the story more interesting.
The reason it's possible to focus so much on the themes, roots and narrative of this film is that the presentation is excellent. It would require a great deal of effort to find any technical flaws. The animation is as good as you can find, the backgrounds and character design are detailed enough to look real, the voice acting is of a much higher caliber than your usual anime so it sounds like people, not mediocre voice actors, and the soundtrack is appropriate for the scenes, working well to set the right tone. Satoshi Kon was primarily a visual storyteller and he always excelled at making beautiful films. This is a must watch any time of the year, but especially during Christmas season. Have a Merry Christmas.
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
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Dec 14, 2018
Since ME!ME!ME!, Sex&VIOLENCE with MACHSPEED and Dragon Dentist have gotten enough exposure, I'll explain why you should watch some of the other shorts that you may not have heard of.
Yamadeloid:
A music video of Yamadera Kouichi with an infusion of traditional Japanese music with rock. There's a love story, Asian pirates, some badass fights and a stage concert with goofy dancing. The song of Yamadeloid is a lot catchier than ME!ME!ME! and is completely safe to watch in public. The visual style uses lots of thick lines and references to Japanese art. It's very over-the-top in a way similar to Jojo's Bizarre Adventure.
Kanon:
Based
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on a Czech novel, this short is about a man named Adam who destroys everything in existence except himself, and it punished by God to become the creator of a new world. When he creates the world, and people to inhabit it, things don't pan out how he expected. It's a comedy on religion and atheism which doesn't take any unfair shots at the ideas it makes fun of. It's a good comedy because it's very honest, and nothing is funnier than the truth that we're not willing to say out loud.
Hammerhead:
A serial-killer turned regenerating superhero, Hammerhead, is dying after pursuing the strongest possible enemy. Hammerhead wanted to die at the hands of someone stronger than himself. Most of the short is recounting the deeds and motivations of Hammerhead, but after a new threat emerges, Hammerhead is not allowed to die and is resuscitated in order to protect the world once again.
Bubu & Bubulina:
A weird French-style story about a dancing ghost that possesses people using her shoes to find peace so she can move onto the next life. The art style is sketchy and doesn't use bright or glossy colours. It has a jazzy soundtrack and very creative design on the various lifeforms that show up during the short. The biggest thing going for this short is the aesthetic. The animation on the dancing is pleasing to look at, despite being quite weird and French.
Robot on the Road:
Directed by the man behind Jin Roh and A Letter to Momo, Hiroyuki Okiura, this short is about a hitchhiking robot that tries to get photos with and of the women that pick him up for his popular blog. The draw for this short is the character design and the animation. The animation is realistic and lifelike, and the design for the robot in particular is quite nice. It's amusing to see the robot make excuses when he gets caught, and the credit song is a silly robot-themed La Bamba.
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Dec 8, 2018
Liz and the Blue Bird is 30 minutes longer than it needs to be. Despite the smooth animation, crisp visual style and well written comfy soundtrack, this movie is a drag to watch.
The story is unfortunately basic. Two friends are playing important parts in a concert band piece and relate themselves to the story behind the piece. They have a very gay scene at the end where they hug and say what they love about each other. In the end, they become closer friends because they understand each other more. There is not enough content to stretch the movie out to 90 minutes with.
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The first scene is seven and a half minutes and literally nothing happens.
The movie takes place in two locations. The first is the school, which consists of a couple generic highschool rooms. The second is the world of the music piece, which uses a different art style to differentiate it from the real world. When the movie is in the real world, the style looks like that of A Silent Voice. When it's in the music piece, it looks somewhat like a picture book and uses the style of Baja's Studio.
The soundtrack is the most important part of the movie. The titular piece, Liz and the Blue Bird, was made specifically for the movie. We don't hear much of it, just the 3rd movement. The piece was made to reflect the contrasting personalities of the two main characters. The rest of the soundtrack is relaxing and subdued pieces that are intended to evoke a dreamlike feeling, and succeed in doing so.
The story was not one worth telling. While it's an improvement upon Hibike Euphonium Season 2's arc revolving around the two leads, spending 90 minutes watching two girls walk around some halls, talk to each other and play instruments is not engaging. The visuals of A Silent Voice were more consistent and more impressive due to the many different locations and plot events that allowed for lots of animation. The style of Baja's studio is too cutesy and childish, but it isn't used enough to be a large problem. The soundtrack is the major reason to watch the movie. It wouldn't have as much significance if you listened to it by itself since it needs the context of the movie. Even so, Liz and the Blue Bird is too boring to be worth your time.
Should you really watch Liz and the Blue Bird?
No. It's boring.
Reviewer’s Rating: 3
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Oct 16, 2018
I wanted to like Blame!, but Blame! wouldn't let me.
The first 2 volumes are unreadable. The paneling is so poor that it takes a lot of time to decipher what is supposed to be shown. There's no flow; no sense of position or direction, so it's hard to tell where Killy is in relation to his environment, or where the safeguards are in relation to him. The style would look nice if you were able to tell what you were looking at. This improves in volume 3, where you can mostly decipher what's on the page, but it still has the issue of being
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completely lost with position and direction. It remains like this through volume 8. Volume 9 is where it picks up significantly. Instead of being in the cluttered underbelly of the cyberpunk apocalypse, it's a lot more empty, which allows the architecture to be more visible, and is able to display the character and mechanical designs more effectively. In the last two volumes, where you can see the art properly, the character/mechanical designs are quite interesting and spooky. There's an organic, insectoid look to them. The page spreads every few chapters are usually nice, with good architecture and a view of the environment from a good angle, but this does not justify the first 2 volumes being unreadable and 3-8 being barely passable.
There's no story to Blame!, which isn't that big of a problem. I was looking forward to reading about some guy walking through a cyberpunk apocalypse without any particular motivation. Killy is looking for the "Net Terminal Gene", whatever that is, and for whatever reason. That's all that's need to justify a manga primarily about the atmosphere and aesthetic. But when the visuals are dreadful, it's hard to be immersed in the simplicity of the journey. There's some lore every now and then, but none of it is relevant and it only serves to feed the fans who like this. That's a good thing. If you're interested in Blame! you deserve some sort of reward.
Just like there's no story, there's also no characterisation. Killy the spandex wanderer is looking for the "Net Terminal Gene" and that's all we ever know through to the last chapter. He has companions along the way who are often called Cibo, and one time there was another spandex wanderer who stayed around for a few volumes. Just like with the story, I was looking forward to reading something simple, without any characterisation. And again, when the main selling point isn't good, there's no reason to care.
Blame! is not worth reading. If you like architecture, type "Hagia Sophia" into your search engine. If you like cyberpunk, find something that doesn't look terrible. If Blame! didn't fail horribly with its art and paneling it could have been a great manga. Unfortunately, it's awful.
Reviewer’s Rating: 2
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Aug 15, 2018
Sin the Movie is the best worst movie you've never seen.
It adapts an unsuccessful first person shooter game called Sin that tried to compete with the original Half Life. Video game adaptations are known to be terrible and Sin is no exception. Nothing makes sense. Nothing is explained. And this is what makes Sin the Movie the best of the worst movies.
It begins with John Blade, JC and some rando going into a sewer because reasons. JC is then killed by a sewer alligator, I think. Because reasons. John Blade yells "JC" and the scene cuts to a funeral. Some old guy mumbles pretentious dialogue
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to John Blade and nobody cares what he says. JC's sister, whose name can be abbreviated to JC, requests to see John Blade, but since she is probably unimportant we can skip ahead a couple scenes.
Tim, who is a normal man and the self-insert of this movie, ends up being killed by a monster similar to the sewer alligator that killed JC. The plot thickens, but not really because it doesn't make any sense. This little girl that John Blade rescued from somewhere has some connection to a monster, I think, it's pretty unclear.
Several scenes later, some evil corporate overlord woman called Sinclair is doing evil corporate things with this evil corporate man named Vincenzo Manchini. John Blade and his crew invade the tower because they kidnapped the little girl and John Blade makes sure to bring his cancer bullets to shoot the sewer alligator monsters. John Blade kills Vincenzo Manchini and the evil corporate woman Sinclair, rescues the little girl, then they escape out of the tower on an aircraft. The end.
The movie looks terrible because the art director must have been going through an edgy phase and put in too many dark colours. Most of the movie takes place at night and the animation team didn't give a rat's ass about making anything look smooth. There's one single scene where a sewer alligator mutant soldier runs very quickly at a lot of tanks that looks hilarious and that's the only good bit. It's visually hard to follow what's going on and the subtitles don't make it any easier. The plot is impossible to understand because not even the writer knew what he was doing. It's a hackjob of an adaptation and you'd have to hunt down a copy of the game to try and understand where this fits in. The voice acting is spectacularly stupid and done by people who have gone on to be quite successful.
Nothing could be as hilariously poorly done as Sin the Movie. MD Geist comes close but that doesn't try to have a plot. Sin does. It takes itself seriously even though whoever worked on it clearly didn't care.
Should you really watch Sin the Movie?
Yes. Watch it several times. With friends. Watch it a lot.
Reviewer’s Rating: 1
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Apr 1, 2018
If you want to watch Monster Hunter, go to YouTube and search for some Let's Plays. The CG will be better in the game by far and the games aren't targeted primarily at children.
The major problem with this show, other than having some of the worst presentation I've seen, is that it has an additional 27 episodes after the initially planned 48.
For the 48 episodes, which shall now be known as "Part 1", that were planned out and made with some sort of nuance, there is a good amount of content for the kids. At the end of the first quarter in Part 1,
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one of the main characters suffers a very significant loss and has serious problems dealing with this internally. A different main character also has to deal with a loss of their monster after fighting with a blighted Nargacuga. Both of these events have lasting impacts and are executed in such a way that is appropriate for children. Part 1 goes through the monster of the week motions, develops a rivalry with some characters, explores backstories and tries to have an epic structure to build to a conclusion. This is mostly acceptable, but unimpressive.
Unfortunately, the show didn't end here and continued until episode 75. What shall henceforth be known as "Part 2" is garbage. It was unplanned, it has no themes, and meanders along. The character arcs from Part 1 may have been fine at the time, but since the end of that, no characters progress whatsoever. They don't face any serious threat and the big bad is very un-scary. Unlike Part 1, there are no themes. Nothing about the loss of the characters. Nothing about rivalry, or ideals about owning monsters. Complete trash.
If you are under the age of 10 and like the Monster Hunter franchise, Part 1 (1-48) are perhaps worth a watch if terrible CG is tolerable. Skip the rest. There is more fun to be had watching mediocre YouTubers that can barely break 80k subscribers.
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
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Jan 19, 2018
Mary and the Witch's Flower was produced by Studio Ponoc, formed by former members of Studio Ghibli and directed by Academy Award-nominated Hiromasa Yonebayashi. It is based off of The Little Broomstick by the Scottish Mary Stewart, which is why it has a very Nothern atmosphere. Though originally released mid 2017 in Japan, Mary and the Witch's Flower only reached Australia on the 18th of January with dubs and subs both available.
Quality
As to be expected from former Ghibli staff, the production quality is excellent. The character designs are well done and modern, the artwork and animation is very impressive and the soundtrack, by Takatsugu Muramatsu
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who also did the music for When Marnie Was There and Yuasa's Lu Over the Wall, is appropriate and grand. The soundtrack and visuals contribute greatly to the atmosphere and the impression we have of magic. The mark of a well directed movie is if it's easy to follow what is going on. An example of this concept done poorly is The Last Jedi, which was difficult to follow and was not exciting when exciting things were happening on screen. Mary and the Witch's Flower doesn't have any of those problems; the movie flows well and everything is clear.
The character of Mary is the polar opposite of Anna from When Marnie Was There (the Academy Award-nominated Yonebayashi film). Very energetic, tries to do everything, doesn't give up even when she's being a burden, etc. This works well to tell the story, especially since Mary is thrown into a place that she doesn't understand whatsoever. Willingness to try new things and having no earthly idea what is going on is a smart writing technique to introduce the world and important characters since it doesn't have to be preachy or on-the-nose with exposition. However, there is an exposition scene towards the end which didn't need to happen and opened up holes in the plot in the build up to that exposition. Unfortunately, although Mary works well as the lead, none of the other characters seem to have much to them. There are the generic antagonists who want more power but are technically not evil, the boy who will inevitably become important and befriend Mary, a plot convenience talking fox thing that shows up at suspiciously optimal times and solves too many problems for what little character he has, and Mary's grandmother who has two scenes and does nothing useful. Peter, who is an important plot point but a relatively uninspired character who didn't get enough screentime early on, has too much emotional payoff around him for how little he has to his character. This makes the climax slightly awkward.
The writing is on and off. Most of the plot is decent enough, but magic is poorly explained. This shouldn't normally be a problem, because magic isn't supposed to make sense, but the magic academy has some form of magic-infused science which has clear rules. Poorly explained magic in a world where there are rules and scientific principles is not excusable. Inconsistent uses of magic happen a fair amount in the latter half of the film and can detract from the immersion because of how noticeable it is. The motivations of the antagonists is directly related to the theme of the movie, which was that progress at all costs is a bad thing. The film deals with the antagonists in a goofy and whimsical way. There is quite a lot about the film that is whimsical, including character interactions between Peter and Mary, a joke which takes 45 minutes to finally get the punchline, any time Mary uses a broomstick or when there is an escape sequence. It's never a big issue but it wasn't balanced too well with the substantial parts of the movie, which were lacking.
Entertainment Factor
This movie is primarily aimed at children and young girls. For that audience, Mary and the Witch's Flower will be a blast. The magic, thanks to the visuals and sound, is impressive and wondrous. The opening scene of the movie is exciting and the lighting is well done. It starts of the movie well, though it's a big tonal shift going from exciting magic to watching an ordinary 12 year old girl do ordinary things. There's enough going on in the plot that you probably won't get bored.
The problems come with the inconsistencies with magic and the plot holes accompanying them. They can ruin the immersion, take you out of the scene and annoy you. The exposition scene towards the end is another mistake because it involved telling us things we already knew. The exposition is likely necessary for children to understand how scenes connect, but the exposition didn't tell us anything we didn't know or anything we needed to know. As far as exposition goes, it was poor. The most fun parts of the movie are where magic is being used to do all sorts of cool things. Luckily, this is the entire second half of the movie.
Overall Message
The core messages were along the lines of "progress at all costs is not worth it" and "you shouldn't change yourself for the sake of change". The messages were clear and shown visually in the latter half. They are well executed because they aren't preachy about it and don't monologue about what the message is and what they learned. For the intended audience, the messages are appropriate and could apply directly to them.
There are some smaller messages, like that you shouldn't abandon what you care about, not to ab use power and that you should take responsibility for the things you cause, but they aren't emphasised at all and are off cuts of the main meal. Of course, there is that one scene where a cow-person is carving up some meat to serve as food, which is quite morally reprehensible. Mary and the Witch's Flower is simple and you shouldn't expect anything else. It does enough to be engaging and somewhat impressive, but not enough to be fantastic and has too many flaws to become a classic or cult-classic.
Should you really watch Mary and the Witch's Flower?
Yes. Yes you should.
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Jan 6, 2018
Devilman: Crybaby is the first show to be completely released this year, due primarily to Netflix's all-at-once method. It aired in the Winter season of 2018 and has 10 episodes. It's a complete adaptation (read: adaptation, not 1:1) of Go Nagai's 1972 Devilman manga. The premise is about a man who becomes possessed by a devil while keeping control of himself in order to fight the growing demon menace that is threatening mankind. Devilman first became popular because it was the first manga at the time to be so violent and graphic, with lots of sexual content. The anime adaptation changes a lot from the
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manga to the point that only the core plot points are similar. The director, Masaaki Yuasa, has been known for his unique directing style and made great use of it once again in this show.
Quality
It would not be possible to talk about Crybaby without mentioning how it changed so much from the manga. There is a lot of modernisation, like the use of cameras, smartphones, social media, etc. This was similar to how Parasyte, set in the 80s, was transformed into a mid 10s setting. The best part of the modernisation is that the bland tough guys from the manga become a rap gang who are quite impressive at their art. The most noticeable changes, other than the character designs, are that the show has a lot of track racing. This acted as a way to characterise Akira and Miki, of whom received little characterisation in the original manga. We are shown a bit more of Akira before he becomes Devilman, which was a significant improvement because the manga began with an infodump between Ryo and Akira. All of the relevant characters in Crybaby have some personality to be distinct, but their personalities can be described in one or two sentences.
The plot takes mostly the same turns as the original, but with the added track racing there is another level to develop the story. Most scenes regarding Miki are new, including the photoshoot related scenes, and they act to display degeneracy, of which comes tumbling down at the end. Considering how bland Miki was in the source material, all of these changes are welcome, but Miki is still not compelling. The manga liked to throw everything at you at once, but the anime takes a slower approach. A complaint people had about the adaptation was that it minimised the roles of some of the demon enemies, however, one of the characters they complain about was hardly relevant in the manga, and the other had changed scenes to increase the emotional impact. I have no complaints about any of the changes because they are logical and make the story and show better as a result. This is not to say the plot has no issues, because it has many significant ones. Crybaby seems to move at a very fast pace towards the end and doesn't take the necessary time to justify a lot of what happens. Many plot points were created for the sake of shocking the audience, which diminishes its value. Compared to the manga, however, this is still an improvement because it was also very rushed at the end and didn't take any time to justify what happened. The manga was bad schlock, the anime is alright schlock. Schlockfests like this are uncommon, and what we usually get is poorly produced.
Since Crybaby is a Masaaki Yuasa work, it would be an insult to not praise his directing. The art style might seem weird and the running animation is positively goofy, yet this is all part of Yuasa's charm. Yuasa is clear with what he is conveying because he is a visual director. He gives information off with the slightly drugged up visuals rather than via infodumps ala the manga. His directorial changes led to a far greater payoff for certain scenes, and one particular scene with Miki's Christian father later on in the show that he made was one of the best moments of the show. Yuasa improves upon the original with this adaptation. The theme exploration is shakily done and this adaptation muddies the waters a bit more than the "War is evil", "Nukes will destroy the world", "Humans were evil all along". There are also a lot of Christian themes, most of which are well presented and none of which stoop to the level of Evangelion, which used religious imagery and symbolism because it looked cool instead of being substantial. The iconic ending has a neat concept behind it, but is very poorly executed due to the rushed plot.
Entertainment Factor
The main reason you should watch Devilman: Crybaby is for the entertainment. There's a lot of violence, a lot of R-rated sexual content, a great soundtrack, and fluid animation. The original Devilman became popular because it was the first manga to push the boundaries so much and become edgy. Crybaby acknowledges this and delivers even more sex and gore. Very schlock. Quite haram at points. Not recommended as a romantic show to watch with your wife because she'll probably hate it or start crying at all the gore and horror elements, but if you have some mates you want to spend a 4 hour night with, grab a six pack and enjoy the night.
Some people might take issues with Yuasa's art style or dopey animation, but I see that as part of the fun and a great reason to watch Devilman. I first became interested in this show because I saw Yuasa's name attached, and a lot of people became interested because it was part of the Devilman franchise. The plot is quite basic and the themes are messy, but for people who like Transformers, Fast and Furious and Evil Dead, this is a good pick.
Overall Message
The original Devilman slapped on a "War is bad, humans are bad" message onto an insubstantial story, but Crybaby attempts to weave the themes into the story a bit more than this. There's a moral dilemma late in the show with Miki's Christian father, but that is ultimately insignificant, although well done, in a sea of gratuitousness, violence and degeneracy. "Humans can be terrible" is a very juvenile outlook on humanity, one shared by edgy teenagers. Not to be taken seriously. "War is bad" is a more mainstream message but it's slapped on just like in the manga. Some collateral damage is shown, but the "humans are bad" idea gets in the way of the anti-war message by implicating humanity in crimes, degeneracy and slaughters. The ending tries to suggest that God will punish the evil in this world, but the show rushes through the ending sequence so much that it's hard to take any message seriously. Devilman Crybaby should be considered devoid of any meaningful message, despite the Christian undertones of some sort of Revelation/Noah's Ark.
Should you really watch Devilman: Crybaby?
No. No you should not.
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
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Sep 9, 2016
Makoto Shinkai's latest work goes even further to support the theory that he's fantastic at directing a visually brilliant movie, but lacks the writing ability to tell a good story.
Plot:
An absolute mess. Without spoiling it, this movie fails to get into the main plot until roughly halfway through. Before that point, it views like a teenage slice of life; nothing to be disappointed by. After the halfway mark, the plot becomes incredibly contrived with no logic, reason, or thought put into its creation. There were at least 4 separate climaxes (which is inexcusable for any movie which is not Return of the King) and
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an overly drawn out epilogue sequence. The main climax happens off screen, which negates the entire build up to it, because Shinkai wanted to have a reveal with little weight. There are an unacceptable amount of plotholes, mostly due to the concept of Musubi. There's little coherence, and amateur directing/writing displayed frequently throughout. To differentiate this from his other movies, Shinkai infused supernatural elements with romance, which fails horribly at enhancing the movie and instead detracts very significantly. Even amongst the people who love this movie, there is a large percentage that find the plot messy.
Art/Animation:
It's Makoto Shinkai. If movies were judged by aesthetics alone, this would be one of the best ones. There are no issues with the art. Scene composition is mostly great, the animation was very high quality, and the art style was beautiful. While there are not as many wallpaper opportunities as in 5cm/s, the quality of them is significantly higher. Watch this in the highest possible quality you can find. Worth watching for the art alone. The animation is what you'd expect from a high budget movie, but it's not anything revolutionary. There are several scenes that move beautifully and feel like magic to look at. The animation quality isn't quite up to Ghibli standards but it is nothing to scoff at.
Sound:
Voice actors were quite good and played different roles effectively. The change in voice aesthetic was notable during the first half when they were body swapping. The soundtrack was unmemorable, but set the scene adequately, and it may help to broaden your horizons and expose you to new music. Sound FX and general background noise was well produced and sounded natural. The opening sequence song in particular stood out and is worth a listen, but I can't say that for most of the soundtrack.
Character:
The mains were adolescents, which meant there was a lot of adolescent stuff going on in the first half. The characters were interesting initially, though none stood out as incredibly well written and became less and less captivating as the movie went on. The main positive about the characters was that they mostly felt natural, save for when they were clearly not meant to. Side characters were certainly more natural than the mains, and contributed well to the atmosphere of the movie. They develop plot stupidity and have no depth or drive other than the forced romance, and plot amnesia is introduced for added gratuitous drama. There is no reason for the characters to become stupid, or amnesiacs, and it detracts from the believability of the characters and the plot.
Buy this on bluray because it looks stunning. Don't expect good characters, or a remotely good plot, but do expect to salivate at another of Shinkai's wallpaper opportunity movies. Worth the watch for the visuals. It's an awful movie that looks good.
Reviewer’s Rating: 3
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Aug 2, 2016
Shinsekai Yori had a case of not knowing what precisely it wanted to be. It was an action show aimed at teenage boys, a political thriller for the older crowd and a philosophical drama for those who want to think. Except it failed to deliver on all of these promises. A significant amount of this is due to the poor characters, though the plot was decent for the most part.
Characters:
Saki, being the main character, severely disappoints with her constant passivity. She is rarely proactive which means that other characters always have to drive forward the plot. This includes Satoru, Shun, Kiroumaru and Squealer.
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She has very few defining character traits other than being very self-preserving and resilient. The only sequence where Saki drives the plot forward is when they are searching for someone, of which they do twice, and the sequences accomplish nothing other than provide us with nice scenery to look at. Her decision in episode 24 to burn the Psycho Buster in order to save Satoru from a chemical death is downright idiotic and illogical on every level. Not only does this keep the 'ogre' alive so it could potentially kill more people, but does nothing to save Satoru from her. Very fortunately for her, this pays off, but to make such a huge idiotic decision and not have the show comment on it one bit, aside from words of reassurance for Saki, which also makes no sense, detracts from her character immensely. If she were both self-preserving and logical she could have created a wall in front of Satoru whilst the 'ogre' suffered a chemical death, which would have ended the conflict immediately and saved Satoru's life. It is worth noting that Saki's character, although the story spanned almost 15 years of time, never changed or developed as a character. She stayed the same until the very end, where she was ruined. She also talks to the deceased Shun 10 years after he died to figure out plot details which would otherwise have been very difficult to know.
Squealer and Kiroumaru stand out as characters in the wrong show because they are charismatic, intelligent, and honourable. Squealer progresses from a slimy servant to a glorious military leader rivalling Kiroumaru. Kiroumaru is the embodiment of honour, but it is revealed late in the series that he plotted a rebellion against the humans because they could have been destroyed by them at any moment. Squealer's motivations are very justifiable; fighting for the liberation of monster rats and equality of rats and humans. His experiences in the first arc of the series shape his strategy and actions in the 3rd arc where he declares war on the humans. Kiroumaru and Squealer stay true to their principles to the very end, and they do not waver in the face of death. Kiroumaru fights with the humans out of loyalty to them, even though his loyalty is not unconditional. Squealer fights for all rats in order to provide them with better lives. They are admirable characters, unlike everyone else in the show, who is either a redshirt or suffers from supreme stagnation. It is not difficult to see why these are characters are the best part of the show.
Everyone else was mostly insignificant. We barely got any screentime of Shun, and so his purpose was to trigger an epiphany in Saki, however the memory wipe the episode after delays this for a very significant time, thus negating the consequences of his death for a few episodes. Mamoru and Maria were uninvolved with the plot to the point where their daughter, who has 0 lines that aren't screaming, is more relevant, more important, and drives the plot forward. Even she is not a character, though, she is a character-less enemy. Redshirts include Inui, Rijin, Kaburagi, the crazy monk dude, and countless other citizens. Tomiko is an interesting one because she does such evil things, like killing children and controlling every aspect of human life, out of fear that an apple with go bad and ruin everything. Her interests are in preservation of humans at the cost of freedom, progress, and humanity. This is contrasted well against Squealer, who is progressive and constantly advances his tribe even if it is highly dangerous for them all. Satoru is barely worth mentioning. When you see him in episode 5, that is his character and it never changes throughout the series. He makes rash decisions, and is still naive, especially during the hospital sequence where he doesn't want to realise what threat they are up against.
Plot:
The plot was the best thing about this show, though it wasn't anything better than 'good'. The first arc contains eough events, however, they are all placed at the end, leaving the first 4 episodes almost eventless. The first few episodes are used entirely to set the scene and infodump, rather than to develop the story. The introduction of the rat conflict and rat politics was a benefit, but having to watch humans play a large role in this detracted, especially since Satoru just killed everything. First arc has a decent conclusion, though in classic A1 fashion, there is unnecessary explanation to establish this conclusion. There are a lot of dropped plot elements, such as the characters who go missing who are given 1 sentence of information 10-15 episodes later.
The second arc is bad. Almost nothing happens. They go looking for people for at least 4 episodes. Episode 10 contained Shun's death and some infodumping, and provided conclusion to his part of the story, which wasn't much, albeit good, transitioning the show into the next segment. The infodumps during Shun's death episode provided enough information for his issue, but didn't particularly affect the main plot in any significant way. Then the plot convolutes and starts to introduce plot holes, such as memory wipes. Use of such memory wipes in addition to sealing of power would allow the Ethics Committee to solve basically every problem that arises with children, thus rendering cats unnecessary unless they become really bad. There's a once-off character whose role was to replace Shun but he had no relevance to anything and was forgotten immediately after. The Mamoru search showed some snowy scenery, but ultimately meant little. The Maria search showed the same scenery, and also added little apart from setting up the next arc and leaving Satoru and Saki on their own.
The third arc is better, but spends far too much time focusing on the humans who have not changed since the beginning, and nowhere near enough time on rat conflict and rat politics. There are a decent few episodes where Squealer is effectively likened to the Tywin Lannister of the show, and his battle strategy against the humans appears to be quite effective, but the actual damages are never shown or mentioned at all. The lack of shown consequences makes the attacks on human settlement feel insignificant when they shouldn't. The 'ogre' was a good introduction, but instead of utilising existing characters, a new one was created specifically for the role, and for the zero lines they say, they have more of an impact on the story than Shun, Mamoru and Maria combined. A seemingly unbeatable threat upped the stakes, which was good for tension, and it remained this way until they introduced the cop-out that is the Psycho Buster: a magic solution that will solve all of their problems. This undermines the abilities of the humans and instead of letting them fight and win on their own merits, acts as a way for the plot to grant an out the the losing faction. The Tokyo exploration episodes could have had good scenery, but it was just desert and caves, which was a missed opportunity. Yet again, Shinsekai Yori becomes a searching simulator as they look for the Psycho Plot Convenience. This isn't as bad as the previous searches, though, because it is their goal they are pursuing, not insignificant side characters that don't do anything useful. The intentional sabotage of the Psycho Buster by Saki when they could have won may have ruined Saki's character, but it served the plot by allowing the humans to come up with a solution of their own merits. The actual solution is given to Saki by Shun, who died 14 episodes prior, and even though is a figment of Saki's madness, reveals important details to Saki that she either should have known herself (thus strengthening her character) or should have figured out. Being told how to beat the 'ogre' reflected poorly on her character and the plot. Kiroumaru's sacrifice was well executed (pun intended) and served as a consequence for Saki's actions.
The final episode concluded on a low note. The bad guys won, oppression and tyranny would continue, freedom was crushed. But instead of being solemn, the show maintains a neutral stance. This neutrality does serve to let the viewers decide who they feel was righteous, but it was so obviously the rats, that this could almost be considered a negative point (it isn't, though). The decision of the human council to punish Squealer made sense, and his eventual release from torment was a good conclusion to his story, however, the show mostly ended off as it began; with an oppressive and tyrannical society that controls every aspect of human life. There is indication that the humans have undergone some cultural change regarding freedom of thought, but the rats are still considered subhuman and were all exterminated, save Kiroumaru's colony.
Sound and art/animation:
Voice acting was of standard quality, with standout performance by Squealer's VA. The OST was mostly forgettable, though not bad, with only one track being good. It set the scene on most occasions, but sometimes ruined the atmosphere, like during the confrontation with an imprisoned Squealer. Really not notable. It suffered from a lack of diversity in tracks and used the same ones over and over even if they didn't fit the mood of the scene.
The art style was a weird shoujo style, the scenery of some of the towns that were visited was nice, but the directing was inconsistent, especially camera angles that often focused on Saki's rear when it was inappropriate for the scene. Episodes 4 and 10 were directed very poorly, but the floating bars of soap in Shun's area were quite amusing to look at. Animation quality was inconsistent. Rarely it was high quality, usually was mediocre, often bad. Lighting was good most of the time.
Overall:
This is a very messy show which has the misfortune of being created around intriguing ideas. That makes it more disappointing that this is bad.
Reviewer’s Rating: 3
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