Genocidal Organ (2017)

“I’m prepared to protect my world. A world where I can order a jalapeno pizza, and pay for it with my ID thumbprint! Where I can throw away half my Big Mac just because I’m full, and I want too!” – Williams from Genocidal Organ (I thought this line was hilarious both in, and out context. Best reflects this movie in a nutshell)

Politics, conspiracy theories, theology, psychology, and man’s morality are all tricky subject matter to tackle. Let alone all together into a single movie like Genocidal Organ attempts to do. Presenting itself as this intellectually deep film while providing some over the top blood & gore to attract casual viewers. It’s a animated film that requires all your attention to stay awake while watching. If the long talkative scenes that over explain things don’t bore you than the lack of engaging characters will.

Set in a time when Sarajevo was obliterated by a homemade nuclear device, Genocidal Organ story reflects a world inundated with genocide. An American by the name of John Paul seems to be responsible for all of this, and intelligence agent Clavis Shepherd treks across the wasteland of the world to find him and the eponymous “genocidal organ”. The setting of Genocidal Organ is nicely realize painting broad a picture of a semi-dystopia US. Creating the world by going into detail what led the country down the path it did. You’ll get a good grasp at the type of world this movie takes place in, and how exactly characters feel about living under a heavily surveillance country.

The future is nothing, but fire

Too bad the way it’s set up is through jargon dialogue going out of it way to over explain things for the audience. Some of this is reasonable like explaining why there’s a difference in surveillance security in different countries, and how the US adapted to combat terrorists attacks. When it tries to go into the more philosophical it drones on. Theology, politics, linguistics, and so much more will be the subject of a single conversation clunkily moving across these topics. These type of conversations consist throughout the movie making it unnatural sounding to listen too. Heck, the movie has a difficult time keeping mundane talk mundane when injecting these kind of subjects into them needlessly.

Amidst all these ideas are a cast of boring characters. The story dictates the characters we follow don’t feel emotion due to their military training. Our lead Clavis Shepherd slowly starts questioning that over time in the film. This plot point would work if the film presented itself better. There’s a sequence where Clavis, and his team storm into a building to killing a group of children guerrilla fighters. By removing his emotion what one should take away from this moment is difficult to pinpoint. Clavis is a blank slate just coming across as a mouthpiece for the writer to spout his belief making him uninteresting. Conflicting interests clashes with long diatribes against society with brief moments of hyper violence spread across it. Instead of leaving an impression it just fades into the background with seemingly nothing of value added to the story.

Want to know these pods are made out of? To bad, it tells you either way

Characters spend more time discussing ideals they forget to have personalities. Only Williams in the cast shows any personality cracking jokes every one in a while, and bringing up how much he loves his family. He feels human in a story that otherwise dehumanizes it characters down to just mere ideals. Sadly, Williams is not our main character so instead of seeing a amoral conflict developed in the story. We have instead the already amoral Clavis Shepherd becoming infatuated with a woman he barely met. If not for the blank slate that he was Clavis seeing his world in a different would have had a impact. There isn’t enough know about Clavis to make the transition easy to get behind either in his romantic fling, or his world views.

John Paul is sadly generic as one can get for a villain. Spouting the usual humanity is evil dialogue. What takes the cake with this character is his explanation that genocide has a grammar to it. The science behind it makes sense in the film’s context since there are silly sci-fi elements to accept it’s possible. This still doesn’t make for compelling dialogue though. However, he’s a slightly better written character because his motivation is explained, even if questionable how one thing lead to another.

What is not questionable is the fact the film uses John Paul stance against the government to prove a point that sacrificing freedom is a bad thing. If the film accepted the fact John Paul actions to prove his point is equally just as bad it would have been thought provoking. If there’s someone like John Paul capable of causing genocide through mere words would I want sacrifice my freedom to ensure he doesn’t cause harm to me? Instead of thinking about that I wonder why the movie thought justifying mass genocides was a thing it needed to do. There’s no grey area on this topic because all it does is make John Paul the embodiment of a hypocrite. Either change the tragic backstory, or make John Paul a straight up delusional villain to prevent an imbalance between the message of the story, and the film’s villain.

This brief moment is cool though

The Japanese voices take a lost on this one for their performances. All the dialogue is western based, and it simply feels like the Japanese did a literal translation of everything of Western phrases. So the Japanese cast has to awkwardly pause, or speed their delivery to match the lip flap. Instead of localizing certain phrases to sound natural in Japanese the literal translation creates an even more unnatural flow to the dialogue. Plus, the Japanese cast ain’t able to capture, or in some cases attempt to mimic the accent of their characters.

Josh Grelle plays Clavis Shepherd coming off monotone for the entire film. The point of Grelle character is be emotionless, but over time he’s meant to be cracking through the monotonous shell with emotion. Unless Grelle screams, it’s nearly indistinguishable to tell apart when his character changes. Overtime this lack of enunciating his emotions eventually just comes off as stoic.

Ian Sinclair is the most enjoyable actor in the English dub. He gets to show personality unlike the rest of the actors. Being allowed to be funny, serious, and anything in between. Providing the film levity, and dramatic weight it desperately needed where it’s regularly lacking.

Yep, animated gif. Hardly notice the animation.

The film’s was originally animated by Manglobe, and once Manglobe closed down it changed production to Geno Studio. It’s obvious to tell that the film had a rocky production history since details, animations, and background quality shift around. Hair details for example is inconsistent; sometimes the hair is detailed with different shading changing depending on the lighting, and other times it remains the same despite the lighting in a scene. There’s some usage of CG that sticks out, but are used sparingly. One of the highlight is animated sequence done in first person which looks pretty good. 

Animation is fluid when it moves, but noticeably drop in quality when characters still down, and stand still in a scene. Typically using a panning shots from far away to cut down on details on the characters. Environments are very detailed, and since takes place in countries all over the world the change in locale is appreciated. Character designs are hit and miss. Sometimes they look fine, and other times like during the action scenes their faces, or body structure just seem off. Lastly, the film does have a few over the top action sequence that bump up the blood, and gore, but they rarely happen in the movie. In line with the dialogue the music itself feels like an afterthought. There’s nothing remarkable about it. Just being loud, and noisy to fill the scene.

Genocidal Organ is the last film Manglobe had in production before it went into bankruptcy in 2015 before getting finished by Geno Studio. Instead of leaving the anime world on a good note this movie best summarizes Manglobe existence in a nutshell. You have a series of great ideas in Genocidal Organ, but with a less than stellar execution. Sharing its ideas before providing a good story to go along side with it. Manglobe name might be behind some fondly remembered animes, but Genocidal Organ ain’t going to be one of them.

Rating: 3/10

Upgrade (2018)

Science fiction is one of my favorite genre for storytelling. No matter how grand, or small the scope of the stories are I could name you around dozen science fiction work that completely engrossed me. An appeal of it for me is how versatile it’s visionaries can be. Expertly using the realm of sci-fi to provide commentary on humanity, takes us to places beyond imagination, and in the case of Upgrade be a schlocky low budget, hard sci-fi thriller done correctly.

Upgrade premise is the classic story of a ordinary man getting revenge. Grey Trace (Logan Marshall Green) witnesses his wife getting killed, mopes around for a bit with his thoughts, gets a computer chip called STEM implanted into him after being paralyzed, and getting pushed into taking vengeance on those who wronged him. In between all the cool action bits, and dark humor at the expense of its protagonist. Comes plenty of serious moments waving around in quality. It can be difficult to remain engaged in the story during the whodunnit segments, and collecting clues since the main story is predictable. Preventing this from becoming a growing issue is the film writer/director, Leigh Whannell, developing it lead character psychology. Showing Grey Trace mental, and physical destruction as the movie progress in a move that pays off in the long run.

Sup! I can take you all out without using my arms, and legs.

What Upgrade lacks in consistency in engaging material it makes up for it in its ending. It one of the few instances where it turned a good movie into a great one for me. Mostly because the ending gives some added depth to everything that came before. Making the dynamic between talking computer chip STEM, and Grey Trace that much better. It doesn’t excuse the feeling of it dragging at points, but it ends on a such a high note it’s easy to forget about.

One area the movie falter without much to redeem it is the failed attempt at commentary. Throughout the movie Grey Trace technophobia will be reestablished multiple times, and bits about technology improving humanity. There’s some dialogue establishing bits of the world where more jobs are being lost to machines. As well there being bits mentioning the living conditions of the rich, and the poor. These parts of the story feel like an afterthought when undermined by the man vs. machine, and revenge driven storyline.

This fight is pretty awesome

The standout moments in Upgrade are easily the four action sequences, and the small satisfying amount of blood, and gore. Tightly choreographed with kinetic cinematography swaying as it follow the action. Offers the film’s most visually inspired moments. Two of the fight sequences in the movie have offer brutal kills, and great practical gore effects that makes those moments easily memorable. It’s impossible not to get excited about an upcoming action sequence when they are edited masterfully, and are visually interesting. As for the climax it doesn’t offer up gore, but it will provide the best fight sequence in the film. Made impressive by the fact it’s not even a martial movie, nor does it have complex martial art moves.

Beyond the cool fight scenes is Upgrade’s one car chase is the least exciting action set piece in the movie. There’s not much to it other than everyone involve driving carefully, and there’s no hiding the cars aren’t going fast either through the many long shots. One car is ahead, and the other is trying to catch up to it without much happening in between. 

For a low budget science fiction movie the most advance pieces of technology are drones, and literal handguns (yes, people can fire bullets from their hands). Other than that the technology being kept grounded for that hard sci-fi aesthetics. Providing a gritty detail to its overall look. Offering nice contrast between the glossy high tech look of the rich, and the grimy outdated looking tech of the poor.

This film’s equivalent of comedy

Logan Marshall Green is the standout in the acting cast. Taking front, and center there’s hardly a single scene he isn’t part off. Doing a fantastic job to make the viewer sympathize with his character all the while being able to deliver some dark jokes. Providing his character great urgency in his journey. One difficult bit in his performance is performing an action scene where STEM takes over his body during a fight, and must act comedically horrified he’s beating a man to bloody pulp. Pulling off the difficult scene successfully to make it one of its most memorable moments. Plus, a nice touch in his performance is Green switching up how human, and how mechanically he moves in different portions of the movie.

Other standout in the movie is Simon Maiden who voices STEM. He’s portrays a emotionally detached computer voice with some enthusiasm. Coming across robotic, but not stoic. Rest of the cast pretty much plays it straight with their single minded characters. They do well in their roles ensuring there isn’t a weak link to the best of their abilities. Any actor who took part in the fight sequences also deserves some praise brilliantly performing them through robotic movements. The cinematography, and music score their job. Occasionally from both you’ll get inspired bits creating energy in a scene, but generally aren’t noteworthy most of the time.

It’s a simple movie with simple goals that knows not to take itself too seriously. The takeaways from Ugrapde are easily the action sequences, the gore, and the ending. There’s still plenty in the movie to appreciate from Logan Marshall Green performance, the dark humor, and its lead character destruction for a majority of the run time. Upgrade offers entertainment of a schlocky B-movie with all the right touches to make it a cult classic over time.

Rating: 9/10

Cinema-Maniac: Incoming (2018)

Another day, another direct to video action movie, another Scott Adkin movie, and another dull experience. For me, one of the few things that can match watching a unfunny comedy movie is watching a dull action movie. Generally speaking action movies strive to deliver thrills to the viewers no matter how serious they can take themselves. A good action movie isn’t restricted by budget, and typically those behind the camera if capable can make something exciting out of very little. First time director Eric Zaragoza making his feature length directorial debut is not one of those individuals. Instead of coming up with ways to overcome his budgetary constraints he becomes a victim to them, although with everything negative surrounding the movie a good direction wouldn’t have been able to save it.

More than half of those screens in the background are useless.

Incoming script is nonsensical, and so poorly conceived I’m convince whoever wrote this probably never finished school. Basically the premise is there’s a space prison created by a joint effort between several countries, three people (a doctor, a CIA Agent, a pilot) go onto that space prison for an inspection, and things go wrong when the prisoners take over. During the movie it’s very evident through the bad dialogue it’s trying to explain away lap in logics due to its obvious budget constraints. Kingsley (Lukas Loughran) the main man in charge in this space prison explains to everyone the lack of personnel to the viewers, the lack of proper equipment in emergencies if prisoners break out, and in another scene specifically mentions the fact if the cameras weren’t analog the people inspecting it would have known to bring a part to fix the cameras. When you get the gold mine that is “The Geneva Convention doesn’t apply in space” line that’s the highest peak the writing reaches. Throwing expository dialogue after expository dialogue without much of a break. None of this would be an issue if the way characters spoke weren’t so artificial.

The movie obviously tries to infuse comedy failing because the actors are uncharmastic to make the comedic lines work. Not helping matters are recurring jokes that weren’t funny the first time being used multiple times with even more diminishing returns. If you remove the performances you’ll still get face with the issues of characters regurgitating the same bits dialogue several times. There’s no need to explain to the viewer where specifically someone graduated in piloting a spacecraft, why the spaceships are automatic, and definitely do not need repeating the terrorists are bad. Further adding to that last part, the terrorists aren’t threatening so building them up, and pretending they’re a threat contrary to what is actually shown makes it worse.

Then there’s dangerous the terrorists group known as the Wolf Pack. One of the least creative name for any terrorist group I’ve seen in any action movie made even worse by the fact you’re meant to take it seriously. The villain, simply referred to as Alpha, has his top men captured, and torture in space. The keyword being top men, so you naturally would assume the heroes would have to struggle, and outsmart their enemies. That doesn’t happen since nearly every encounter the heroes come out on top without consequences. If the movie didn’t establish the six captured prisoners are the best members in the Wolf Pack it would have been easier to believe our heroes beating them at every turn.

This hallway is in so much of the movie it deserves it’s own acting credit.

While I’m still on topic about the villains, the identity of Alpha is treated as a plot twist. Early in the movie it’s establish Kingsley has been trying to learn the identity of Alpha for five years. Half an hour later the identity of Alpha is revealed in a unintentionally funny manner. When CIA Agent Reiser (Scott Adkins) tells Kingsley people in high position knew one of the prisoners he was holding was Alpha for three, and a half years. The reason this information was withheld is because surveillance technology wasn’t developed enough to where politicians, and the government’s wanted it to be at. Further making you question if prison is supported by several countries you would think one of them would ensure something like an escape wouldn’t happen!

Having mentioned the fact this space prison is a creation by several nations I would imply it’s trying to make some kind of political statement. Although, saying that would be as inaccurate as claiming there’s an intelligent life form in Incoming. Anything related to politics within context has little ground to make a good statement. Simply bringing up The Geneva Convention, and not delving into it any further doesn’t equate to good commentary. So when head honcho Alpha eventually makes the “we’re dying for a great purpose” speech it feels out place. When you have a scene dedicated to how a character came up with the idea for deadly grenades made out of piss, but not touch on The Geneva Convention beyond torture is bad. Go back to your draft, make notes, and get your priorities straight.

Then we finally come to our heroes who are pretty stupid. There’s doctor Stone (Michelle Lehane) whom after hearing one sob story goes into a prisoner cell, and thus is reason the prisoners take over. Of course the prisoners wouldn’t have easily taken over the space prison if Kingsley, or anyone else that know about this prison bother hiring more personal. The dumbest thing in this movie is easily the fact you have a boardroom meeting scene of important people discussing how they should deal with the space prison having been taken over. This specifically is further exacerbated by the fact all the heroes involve signed a death clause that states the program (who really cares to be honest) will not take responsibility for their death, and implies they will take any measure to ensure the prisoners don’t escape. So why security doesn’t launch a missile as soon as they (whoever is in charge on Earth) learn it been taken over by prisoners makes no sense if it established some sort of death clause for its workers.

In case you’ve forgotten, the Geneva Convention doesn’t apply in space! Now em kill all!

There’s plenty of other stupid things like Kingsley into the control room knowing full well it’s taken over the prisoners, and he’s outnumber. Can’t forget the villains not trying to lock, or barricade any doors to ensure no one enters. Finally, there’s Reiser who is the worst written character in the movie. He’s just a amalgamation of nonsense. His turn to being evil comes during the climax has no context for it. I was scratching my head at this evil turn since nothing about it made any sense. Trying to made sense of it would require more work than the three credited writers Nigel Thomas, Rick Benattar, and Jorge Saralegui gave to the screenplay.

Mentioned in the beginning this is a direct to video action movie starring Scott Adkins. A very reliable man in this field who regardless of what movie he’s in is able to elevate it through his presence. Unfortunately this movie misuses Adkins. If you want to see him deliver a good performance that won’t happen since he’s stuck in tough guy mode for the whole movie. Saying every line with anger in it to get across he’s serious. Unlike the rest of the actors, his character is the easiest to believe, and physically fits the role well. When it comes to his action scene he has to fight on everyone else’s level so no one will see his martial arts skills.

That make up on McCusker (right) is pretty bad.

Oh right, the other actors who do surprisingly worse than Scott Adkins. Aaron McCusker in particular lacks the charisma to be a character worth cheering for, and his comedy relief is grating. He also lacks chemistry with Michelle Lehane who he shares many scenes with. Lehane can at least emote a little bit of emotion whereas McCusker cannot. The only other actor worth mentioning because I won’t bash him like everyone else is James MacCallum who just plays a desk worker. He’s charismatic in the very few scenes he’s in making me scratch my head he didn’t get more screen time. As for the villains they aren’t intimidating, nor do anything they say comes off as believable. I normally go into more details on the cast performances, but man, almost everyone did very poorly, and that best summarizes my thoughts of their acting in a nutshell.

In the entire film you’ll primarily see three sets; the control room, the hallway, and the prison cell room all of which are just a couple dozen feet away from each other. With the limited budget Incoming had is made very apparent the longer it goes on. Creating a fatigue in seeing the same sets being used for over an hour. There’s a evident absent of scale as everything gets reused. The poor set designs from a dark room with wobbly chairs and a bunch of TVs with CG LED monitors displaying sci-fi mumbo jumbo, to the cramp prison cells that all look a like, and a dirty hallway lack personality. Seeing these sets bring to mind that it’s a cheap movie instead of a hard sci-fi action flick.

You know, looking at these stills, there’s so much to criticize.

Now we come to the action sequences which is bad as everything else. Since the one cramped hallway is used for a majority of the movie the action sequences don’t allow room for movement. Limiting what the fight choreography could resulting in the shaky cam, bad editing, and bad cinematography during these scenes. Adkins suffers the most from this since he’s unable to do his usual high flying kicks he’s known for. You’ll get a series of attacks, and retreat for the action which gets repetitive very quickly. Add on to the fact that Adkins easily fights his way through everyone you not only get bad action, but boredom along with them.

Early on in the movie you get to see Big Ben (Great Bell clock in London) getting blown up with a badly composited explosion over it while in the stock footage people don’t react to it. This makes an immediate bad impression which instead of being a single bad spot in the movie is a indicator for the entire product. Incoming is a dull action movie even by direct to video action movies standards. If you’re a Scott Adkins competitionist go for it, though it won’t offer the goods in any area. Otherwise, I recommend passing up on this whatever chance you get.

Rating: 1/10

Cinema-Maniac: Annihilation (2018)

When it comes to science-fiction very few films can ever surpassed the sheer stupidity that was Ridley Scott’s Prometheus (2012) which I consider the dumbest science fiction film I’ve ever seen. I prefer sci-fi films that try to explore complex ideas about human nature over space epic. With this in mind I also understand science-fiction, like all genres, can be molded into what the storyteller so desire. So not every sci-fi is going to be smart, even though smart writing is what I typically look for in sci-fi. Annihilation ditches the advance technology in favor of being a hard sci-fi film with elements of psychological horror, and mystery thrown in. Resulting in a movie that has something to say, but doesn’t know to say it, nor combine all of its different elements into a single working piece.

Missing in this image, intelligent life forms.

Annihilation follows Lena (Natalie Portman), and her team exploring a mysterious zone called the Shimmer that is ever expanding in order to seek answers. As far as science fiction movies goes there’s little in the way of advance technology to be found here. The movie certainly could have used some of that advance technology because you’ll have very little in that regard in the film’s writing. For starter, let’s start off with the fact the film is incapable of creating psychological horror with shallow characters. With the exception of Lena, everyone else who explores the Shimmer are clunkily developed in one exchange of dialogue. Having little to go on for these characters prevents there from being any tension building up. Lena who is fleshed out must face the more self destructive side of her personality in the few attempts the Shimmer makes to create things, and remind her of things she regrets in her past. Why the Shimmer does is not answered beyond it can refract DNA, and maybe read people’s subconscious, or mind. That last part is never confirmed. Instead of being mysterious you’ll be confused by why the story takes the direction it does.

Lena character is the only one in the movie that gets fleshed out properly, and it still finds a way to ruin that. She has a destructive behavior ruining her perfect looking marriage, and exploring Lena’s guilty conscious is the only thing the movie has to make anything compelling out of. Sadly, it’s all written, and expressed in a emotionless way devaluing any emotionally resonate this storyline could of had. The writing wants you to sympathize with her as a tragic character, and sadly it doesn’t work when everything is portrayed in a cold, disinterested manner. Detaching the emotion from the idea so to speak.

I’m willing to suspend my disbelief in movies, but the internal logic has to function properly either by the genre it’s most bound by, or the logic within the world it takes place in. Already having establish the world mostly resemble ours lets go over the major oversights. Starting with the obvious if its establish every team who explore the Shimmer has died with the only person to have return coughing up blood, and now quarantine. You would think with this ever expanding mysterious field taking the lives of several trained military personnel that the government would make sure nothing from the Shimmer makes its way into any public area! On top of that, the military evacuated the public from this area under the pretense of a chemical spill. Within three years no one in Maryland (where Blackwater National Park is located) suspected there was something fishy going on. Everyone just believes it’s a chemical spill.

They look like people? Nah, must imagining things.

The biggest oversight is something that shouldn’t have been overlooked in the first place. So when the only survivor from the Shimmer is placed in a quarantined area, and people wearing hazmat suit implies that survivor is contagious. Except when Lena (and possibly dozens of other) team goes to explore inside the Shimmer without any sort of protection. More questionable is the survivor made it into a public area so who knows how many people the survivor possibly infected. Maybe none since the movie is very selective on how science works. It’s almost as baffling as not having military trained personals besides Lena joining her team of scientists. With the stated gravity of this Shimmer expanding, and possibly destroying life the government sure are some serious cheapskates, or this military just have people who are complacent about all life possibly being killed by this ever expanding mysterious field!

Once the team actually gets inside the Shimmer it’s even slower moving than it was before. The opening sequence does the Shimmer investigation a disservice by revealing who survives, and briefly establishing the fate of the other team members. With that in mind you’ll just be waiting for them to slowly get killed off. There’s a scene at a military base at night time, and all the characters are taking turns guarding the team sleeping in the lookout tower. They decide to have someone on guard hundreds of feet away from the lookout tower they are sleeping in. With a stairway leading up to the sleeping team members being unprotected they intentionally placed themselves in even more danger for no reason. They have night vision goggles, and a lookout tower that’ll give them a broader view of the area if they guard the stairway. I would worry about them, but when they can’t see a giant mutated bear point blank in front them is about the point I gave up on them! Granted this happens at night time; however, the person who gets attacked is right next to the other members of the team when she gets attacked by a giant mutated bear. Oh yeah, can’t forget to mention everyone on Lena’s team we follow are some sort of scientists. I can’t buy into that when they’re hardly seen taking notes insider the shimmer.

Perfectly describes this move in a single sentence

Without spoiling any specifics the climax resolution is sure to make your IQ drop to double digits. This is because of how easily the Shimmer itself, and everything it created gets destroyed in the film. Making it laughable that the first teams who explored the Shimmer when it was just in inside the lighthouse didn’t bother using any sort of flammable weapons to destroy it. Then comes the ending which takes it sweet time getting too. The climax which takes place in the lighthouse where the Shimmer originated goes on for too long. All that happens is Lena gets some vague answers leading to a name drop, a grenade like weapon pin gets pulled, and conflict resolved. This all takes longer than it should play out. Padding the sequence by having Lena slowly move around the lighthouse. Once the final shot of the movie cut to black I stopped caring about the fate of humanity in this film. If it was that easy for them to eliminate the threat, and the fact these stupid characters are the ones that did it is quite the feat it pulled off in dumb writing.

Annihilation is written, and directed by Alex Garland. I already bashed his poor writing skills on the story front, but as a director he doesn’t know how to give his actors good direction. The only one who manages to pull of anything well is Natalie Portman. She takes a broken character, and subtly displays constant self doubt in her. When she sounds detach speaking about herself, or her husband it come off naturally for the character to be speaking that way. Her co-stars on the other hand have a leash around them preventing them from showing too much emotions. Jennifer Jason Leigh suffers the most from this looking bored in several scenes. Garland, for some reason, wrote her a character who doesn’t display much emotion in the first place. So when Jennifer Leight is suppose to start losing it she acts no differently from when she was sane. The muted colors don’t help either, but having everything be so detached from emotion when you’re attempting to be psychological is counter intuitive.

Only one thing could have done this. Man Bear Pig!

So without expressive actors the only other way Alex Garland tries to keep his audiences awake are through the brief moments of blood, and gore. One scene involving Oscar Isaac cutting through a soldier stomach with a knife has some convincing practical effects. It then gets ruined by fake looking CGI intestines. In general, the special effects are pretty good, especially the gore. There’s also another scene where a mutated bear attacks our tied up team in a house. The audio is so badly distorted that Garland to advise his actor to spell it out for the audience one of the team members mutated. Not only that, but this sequence involving the mutated team member in a house is pretty lame. When all it takes is a single clip from automatic gun to the head to kill a mutated bear how is there supposed to be tension. If the Shimmer distorts DNA, and this is the worse in terms of dangerous distorted lifeforms the team is going to be alright.

Annihilation is a hallow film detached from anything resembling human empathy. Attempting to have a broad psychological scope gets derails quickly through stupid writing, dumb characters, and a disinterested visionary. When you write a scene involving a team of scientists traveling by boat through a swamp after being attacked by a mutated alligator, you need to go back to the drawing board, and spend time tweaking around with simple logic before tackling anything complex. Alex Garland had good ideas, and a good cast to pull off something good, but it’s all goes to waste in this misfire effort.

Rating: 3/10

Anime-Breakdown: Patema Inverted (2013)

Patema Inverted follows Patema, a young girl from a civilization that resides in deep underground tunnels. While exploring one day, she gets herself trapped in Aiga, an inverted world, and teams up with a resident to escape and return home. Instantly having the appeal of its unique world set up in the opening minutes, Patema Inverted will make you curious to seek answers. Once the film ends, you’ll end up almost exactly where you started in your understanding of the world. The origins are explained, and some of the aftermath on the creation of opposite gravitational pulls, but other details like the changes that might occurred after the film events, and the new discovery from our main characters are left unanswered. The effect of a device that created a shift on Earth’s gravity is also vague implying it does whatever the story demands it, like shifting the weight of characters when traveling. Without proper world building it’s uncertain how the Orwellian dystopia of Aiga would change at all from the events in the film. Furthermore, it’s distracting with the lack of proper world building will make you wonder what exactly happened to the Earth itself since twice in the movies Patema, and her friend reach the highest point of their respective civilization, and there’s no stars to speak off. Adding onto this issue is the lack of explanation of what happened to the first people that fell into the sky given a specific revelation at the beginning of the third act. That revelation leads to more questions that aren’t answered, and some plot holes while the ending also does the same adding to the list of plot holes. 

And on your left, you’ll see more pointless buildings.

Aspects of Aiga civilization are very broad, and one dimensional in its portrayal. Being a civilization rule by a over the top evil leader Izamura. From the onset, having a villain who thinks he’s doing good in order to maintain order isn’t bad, but it becomes downgraded when the portrayal is over the top. The villain of the film has little motivation to act the way he does, and the religious like mindset to punish sinners isn’t delved into enough to make up his shortcomings. There’s also the unanswered question of how he obtain so much power despite him clearly not being in the right state of mind for it. Given how dead set Izamura is to keep order the only protection he has to prevent outsiders from entering is a fence. More leap in logic includes Aiga being surrounded by cameras, and later implied in the film to be under constant surveillance makes it baffling how the security in Aiga didn’t catch Patema crossing the boarder sooner. I could also bring up the fact the Aiga has students shown to be given points with the implication of worth, shown strict regulation on how people can act, and no parents to be found. However, the film chooses to gloss over these functions of its society, and simply speculating on them will do the film no favors.

At the center of it all is Patema, and Age both teenagers who bond is rushed in the film. Patema dreams of seeing more to the more, and Age likes looking at the stars. These two characters eventually meet each other only to have what should be the emotional anchor of the story to be left shallow. The most effective scenes the quiet moments where Patema, and Age simply talk about their lives. It’s doesn’t sound exciting, but it works in creating good drama. Unfortunately, the quiet moments are sparse throughout relying mostly on a comedic back, and forth between the two. Yet, because of how rushed their bond is there is little time they spent together before one of them gets captured, and has to be rescue. On top of that, because Patema, and Age got separated so early in the movie it renders their eventual reunion ineffective. There is also some kind romance building, though that’s hard to buy since it was rushed, and accepting both characters fell in love after spending like three days with each other mostly apart with everything else going on might be a little too much to accept.

As separate characters, Patema is the stronger of the two. She gets more development, and has more lively personality compare to Age who is simply nice guy. Patema backgrounds get delved into, and getting to see her absorb the beauty, and harshness of a new world she hasn’t seen. Her enthusiasm, and expressed wonder in seeing this new world for the first time helps in providing the film a sense of adventure. Age on the other hand just accepts whatever happens. This changes later on when he becomes more proactive, but lacks growth, and any sort of pay off for following him. Patema eventually gets a rewarding emotional scene when she discovers the fate of her father like figure, but Age is not given that same luxury. When alone Patema is a character that’s somewhat worthwhile to follow, and sadly Age isn’t lending to the uneven nature in the film.

I can assure you that I am not evil!

Supporting characters remain simplistic, and stay one dimensional. They don’t serve any greater narrative purpose other than what a certain scene requires them. Either be hesitating to shoot Age, have a side character provide comedy, or helping Age in breaking out Patema from a tower. They are functional since in Patema’s home there is an attempt to depict some kind of everyday life for the people, and some world building. Aiga, I already mentioned glosses over its world building. One side of the world you have some fleshed out characters, and a lead character who experiences a satisfactory growth on her journey. On the other side of it you have a major character, and a world who are glossed over during the film. It’s odd, one half of the movie knows what makes a good story, and the other half is that bad movie. Sadly, it’s the bad portions that eventually become victorious as the weaker aspects of the writing overwhelm the good parts the longer it goes.

When it comes to voice acting I would say neither the Japanese, and English track have a clear winner. The Japanese cast has two better lead actors in Yukiyo Fujii, and Nobuhiko Okamoto with a more heartfelt performance. Especially Nobuhiko Okamoto performance helps mask the shortcoming of Age bad writing through his more emotional delivery. In the English dub both Cassandra Lee Morris, and Michael Sinterniklaas are okay in their role. Only Cassandra Lee Morris of the two is able to make Patema captivating. On the other hand, the English dub has a better supporting cast keeping in line with the film overall tone. In Japanese, some of the supporting voice actors can be prone to overact their parts creating tonal whiplash in a scene that isn’t found in the English dub. Dialogue is underwhelming in both version either being fluff, or clunky in places. Regardless what you choose to go with, neither the Japanese, or English voice track will impress.

Animated sequences like this are the highlight of the movie.

The animation is handled by Purple Cow Studios Japan (yes, that’s the studio name), and it’s nice looking at times. Character designs are uninspired, but make up for it by having them be very expressive. Background are also simple, but during night sequences the background will be given more details to display its beauty. The underground city where Patema live is brittle with detail as well. Anything outside, or inside during broad light though is unimpressive. There’s a few time where the cinematography would have scenes animated upside down. Making for a few unique looking sequences. In rare usage, the camera will also turn sideways, or upside down to show the perspective of the other character. It’s obvious the animation studio abilities are limited since these type of usage of the camera are in short supply. The music is composed by Michiru Oshima making some wondrous tunes. His music elevate certain sequences giving them a sense wonder where the writing lacks in creating. My favorite pieces of his music are for creating a foreboding mood providing a sense of danger, or mystery that severely lacking.

Patema Inverted is fascinating conceptually while the actual movie ends up being less than it could have been. The world is more fascinating to me than the rushed character bonding it’s more focus on showing. If it wasn’t rushed in developing it central relationship than I would have engaged despite the half baked world building in place. All around interesting, and all around somewhat disappointing. It had high goals that it couldn’t grasp fully.

Rating: 4/10

Cinema-Maniac: Ready Player One (2018) Review

Ready Player One is set in a future where a virtual reality world called the OASIS is the biggest thing on Earth. One of its deceased creator challenges its users to find all his Easter Egg to give the winner his fortune. An unlikely young hero named Wade Watts (Tye Sheridan) decides to join the contest, he is hurled into a breakneck, reality-bending treasure hunt against evil corporation IOI. Very sloppily written, the best time Ready Player One shines is when it doesn’t try to encompass everything out of reach, and simply focuses on being a piece of entertainment. It’s breakneck speed ensures there isn’t a dull moment to linger on in its nearly two, and a half hour runtime. Something else that’s somewhat of a positive are the pop culture references, for the most part, are simply there. Not drawing too much attention to them despite the large number of iconic characters to be seen on screen. There also isn’t a reliance on pop culture knowledge to understand the story itself. Granted, even knowing just a little bit helps add to the appeal of Ready Player One. For me, it was the The Holy Hand Grenade reference from (possibly the greatest fantasy film ever made) Monty Python, and the Holy Grail that was a nice surprise.

Not even a DeLorean capable of time traveling can outrun the almighty King Kong.

When it comes everything else this film does plenty of things that works against itself. Mostly how it feels disingenuous in delivery its “experience the real world” message. For starter, the lack of proper world building in the real world. Sure, the OASIS is a fantastical place where a majority of people go to avoid the harsh reality of their life, but those harsh realities are simply ignored in the film. Most you’ll get about the hardship of this future is the main character Wade lost his parents, and his current living conditions. There are also other aspects of the real world that are explained, but just like Wade parents, they come across more as decoration since it rarely shows the real world effects on its people. I sound like I’m being oblivious that this was the intended effect, but when Wade himself doesn’t show any concern for a family member dying within the film why should I care. Wade obviously doesn’t since all he does is simply acknowledge his caregiver has died, and moves on from it. Nothing about that plot point was handle properly making it seems like constant addiction to escapism is great.

Another issue is not enough time is spend in the real world itself for its message to be meaningful. Wade, and the other characters are rarely seen in the real world absorbing its actual beauty like it proclaims it has. You can claim something all you want, but when you don’t actually show it the results is disingenuous. Where’s the connection Wade makes with the real world, and its people. Absent within the film. Bringing up another point that if it wasn’t for Wade constantly ignoring the real world he would have never made the connection with his online friends in the OASIS. Reiterating, “experience the world” in this movie is forced. Why would people prefer to live in the real world if they live in slums over living in the OASIS where they can obtain anything they want. There’s a case to be made for living in the harsh real world, though you won’t find it here.

Speaking of disingenuous, all the pop culture references in the film just feel like they exist. While I’m sure Spielberg, and his crew has some connection to some of the things he references, all of it becomes homogenize. There’s no connection to a majority of it. If you notice something you love on screen chances are high it’ll disappear as just quickly. This issue applies with the pacing disregarding characterization. The most fleshed out characters are the creators of the OASIS; Ogden Morrow (Simon Pegg), and James Halliday (Mark Rylance) whom are given more characterization than the main cast themselves. Morrow, and Halliday also have a more fully realize conflict that gets explored as the film progresses unlike the main storyline that refuses to evolve. A big contributing factor to this is Halliday, and Morrow storyline deals with a trouble friendship whereas the other main storyline becomes save the world ordeal from the onset.

Even the main character more engaged in this subplot than their own.

When the movie begins, the OASIS users are competing against each other, and evil corporation IOI desires to win the grand prize. By the time the movie gets to it climax, this storyline has hardly evolve into anything beyond its introduction. Contributing more to a lackluster storyline is the writing makes the villains idiotic, and a plot point later on in the movie removes the whole underdog trait of its hero. It’s simple for IOI to find Wade Watts address, but it’s nearly impossible for the same group whom seemingly have dozen of drones ready to blow up anything be able to find Wade later on in the climax. This includes the fact there surveillance cameras seemingly all over the world which is a bigger leap in logic that IOI can’t find them. Like I wrote earlier, when Ready Player One is simply a film focusing on being a piece of entertainment it succeeds, but when it wants to capture the emotional investment it fails. If you removed the whole “experience the real world” message from the writing than issues regarding the lack of world building is gone. Instead, it prefers escapism over reality, and during the portion of the story it actually accepts that part of itself is when it’s a good film.

Tye Sheridan plays Wade Watts, and while his performance here didn’t impress me as much as he did in Mud (2012), he’s fine overall. While his enthusiasm for the OASIS is an aspect of his character he sells to the viewer successfully, everything else about his character ain’t as easy to sell. Some of this can be blame on the screenplay, like the scene where Sheridan is supposed to mourn the loss of a family member for less than a minute before it moves onto something else. When this happens, it’s reasonable he wouldn’t be able to emotionally capture what his character is feeling, and portray that in a way where the viewer can become further invested. Other times it’s purely his fault, like typically falling back to wide eyes facial expression to constantly show how he’s in awe of everything he sees. Showing some more enthusiasm would help him, though he also lacks the ability to get across the urgency when the film needs it.

Tye Sheridan co-stars are a bit better in balancing the area Sheridan lacks. Olivia Cooke for example is able to properly get across the urgency of a scene. There’s a moment in the second half of the film where she discovers where she’s being held captive, and her reaction is something appropriately out of a horror movie. She’s more rounded as an actor in this movie because she’s able to do a lot with little. There’s Ben Mendelsohn, T.J. Miller, and Hannah John-Kamen whom play the evil adults. As expected, they play the evil adults as you would expect. Mendelsohn especially comes off the most slimy, though the direction is a bit confused if he should be over the top evil, or humanized evil. Making it impossible for Mendelsohn to be memorable as a villain. T.J. Miller, and Hannah John-Kamen are the opposite simply being over the top in their portrayal. Being more than comfortable to make their characters come off as cartoons, and it works surprisingly well in the movie because of the already silly nature of the movie. There’s also the remaining co-stars of Win Morisaki, Lena Waithe, and Philip Zhao that make up the rest of the heroes. These three actors material are the most limited making them go into autopilot acting when the second half hits, but they do their best. Not on one point did I feel these three actors were phoning in their performance in spite of the thankless material.

This has to be the strangest assortment of characters I’ve seen in movies recently.

The two best actors in the movie without question are Simon Pegg, and Mark Rylance. Simon Pegg took a while for me to notice as it’s simply something I didn’t expect from him. Relying more on his dramatic side as a actor Pegg eases his way through scene after scene. Being effectively dramatic in everything without ever over acting, or stepping out of bound in his role. However, Mark Rylance is even more impressive in his performance. Without question he is the complete package as an actor in the movie; sincere, funny, believable, and captivating all at once no matter what scene he is. Rylance, and Pegg scenes together are easily the best in the movie, but Mark Rylance presence alone is something that hugely benefited Ready Player One. Without MarK Rylance in the movie, what would be missing is the only actor who is able to capture something heartfelt within a script that feels artificial with it dramatic scenes.

Steven Spielberg visuals aren’t convincing, but within the context of the movie they are more than fine. Since everything takes place in a virtual reality world accepting the plastic looking visuals is easy. What’s not easy is the blurriness that comes whenever the camera moves quickly. Whenever there’s too much going on screen it’s difficult for the camera to stay focus, especially in the climax of the movie where the blurriness makes it difficult to spot the many pop culture figures. However, during the action sequences the freedom of placing the camera wherever Spielberg wants leads to some visually stunning setpieces. In particular, the racing sequence in the beginning in the movie is a sight to behold, especially the amount of effects on screen all at once. My favorite set piece involved obviously involved Mecha-Godzilla (because I grew up with the franchise) fighting against two other iconic robots which I won’t spoil as it best to experience that fight blind. When it comes to music the original pieces of music was during the climax, and a orchestrated piece played that sounded similar to the classic Godzilla theme music. Aside from the obvious insert classic songs from The Bee Gees, Blondie, Prince, and a few other from the era. Music in the movie is nothing that stands out.

Ready Player One is a decent blockbuster made by Spielberg, but misses the magic that made blockbusters like Indiana Jones: Raiders of the Lost Ark, E.T. The Extra Terrestrial, and Jurassic Park special. Missing is the heart, and the connection the filmmakers had with these creations, and recreating the joy it brought to them to a whole new audience. Gone is the wonder, missing is the heart, and absent is the emotion the story attempts to capture, but gave up on at some point. Whenever Ready Player One isn’t pretending it’s something it is not the film is enjoyable experience, and thankfully it’s like that for a majority of the run time. Disappointing yes, but also very entertaining.

Rating: 7/10

 

SPOILERS BELOW ON SOMETHING THAT BUGGED ME

I didn’t know where to put in this my actual review since it’s not detrimental enough to cripple the movie quality, but it did bug the Hell out of me. When the climax draws to a close, and Wade Watts bids farewell to James Halliday. Wade asks Halliday what he is, and Halliday simply leaves without answering. If Wade encounter with Halliday was simply explained away with it being programmed for whoever won the challenge than I would have been okay, but Halliday says it not. So, either James Halliday became a sentient being that somehow managed to live in a video game, or Halliday actually alive somewhere in the world, and is a big dick for making his best friend, and everyone he cares about that he’s dead. Either way, that minor detail bugs me to end.

Nitpicking A Joke (Contains Spoilers)

When the heroes are off visiting the world of Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining, there’s a moment where Aech, whom is presume to be male at this moment, making out with a corpse he temporarily sees as a beautiful woman. Once it reveals that Aech is a woman, the scene immediately didn’t make sense. I mean, there wasn’t anything in the movie to indicate she’s bi-sexual, or a lesbian. It was something that left me scratching my head. Sure I laughed when I saw it, but when thinking on back on it. This moment just feels like it got overlooked during the writing process.

Anime-Breakdown: Rakuen Tsuihou: Expelled From Paradise (2014) Movie Review

Gen Urobuchi is a writer I like, but even with that thrown out there he’s very repetitive in his writing. At times, he creates fascinating worlds, and characters, but then make them speak by info dumping, and reiterating the same topics as if viewers missed them the first time. They speak like plot devices instead of like people. So Gen Urobuchi opted to create a world that was formerly filled with humans, and now are just data. Here is story written in that kind of world. A world without consistency, nor intelligent life forms. Just a strings of badly written events.

The opening sequence of the film is confusing. We’re shown a beach, our main character in a swimsuit relaxing, someone hacks the beach, our protagonist throws her drink, and stops this hacking by being naked. Don’t worry, the event turns out to be pointless. I eventually found out by the end of the film that it lead up to nothing. Absolutely nothing. A conflictless story that forces in conflict in its final act just because. No logical reasons behind it besides the fact it wasted more than half of its duration on nothing related to the main story, and might as well try to end things with some action no matter how nonsensical it seems.

Minutes after failing to stop the hack it is established that Deva, this spaceship where 98% of humans resides, has been hacked by this same hacker, Frontier Setter, 184 times. So Deva has push aside the notion of improving their security, but it took them approximately 184 times of being hacked to finally decide to send one of their own agent to Earth to capture the hacker. So we got an advance system/civilization run entirely by super advance computers whom all take the appearances of Gods contradicting the notion this is an advance, smart, intelligence system when it reacts this slow. At this point (seven minutes in), you begin to question if the system got hacked that many times by a single entity how come a large amount of people are still living in Deva?

Not only that, but instead of assigning one of Deva best agents on the assignment Deva assigns 3rd class agent Angela Balzsac. There’s obviously much better agents that can accomplish the task. They (the computers Gods of Deva) established Deva already has an S ranking Deva agent on Earth. It would speed up the process by giving this assignment to Zarik Kajiwara, the S rank agent on Earth, who’s familiar with Earth, and despite being told he has a bad reputation is clearly reliable due to the fact he is an S rank Deva agent. Why Deva uses numbers, and letters to determine an agent ranking is beyond me. Seriously, is the number 1 or 0 much higher in ranking than S rank agents?

Our main characters is named Angela Balzac, which is the most respectable thing about her. She’s a stupid character who for some inexplicable reason knows to hack which would require understanding of simple terms like Script Kiddies, Black Hats, and words like Daemon for simple function. Yet, this same character does not understand people don’t eat sand which is the first thing she does when landing on Earth. These two things don’t belong to the same character. Ballsack (as I am referring to her out of the lack respect I, and writer Gen Urobuchi do not share for her) is introduce in a beach scene in a bikini saying it’s because of work? Wouldn’t it make more sense to be in a place that can overlook CPU, servers, hotspots, you know any area that’ll actively help you better spot when there’s a hacker in the system. I would wouldn’t be questioning this if the film itself provided decent world building. With that absent, there’s no understanding on the status quo of this world at all.

Ballsack goes from one scene to another completely inept in her abilities. Her human partner, Zarik Kajiwara, has to explain to her how using her mecha from Deva would expose her spot to Frontier Setter. Why Ballsack didn’t think of this is inconsistent with the claim she’s a 3rd class rank agent close to being promoted to a high ranking position. If that’s a high position in this world it further question her abilities to do this job, and Deva security too. She needed to be told by S rank agent Zarik Kajiwara to do this instead of her doing it on her own. After being told using this Mecha would reveal her position to this intelligent hacker the next logical step would be for Ballsack to put on some different pieces of clothing to blend into Earth crowd, and not stick out. However, she wears a leotard, garter, elbow-length gloves, and knee boots for the entire film. Everyone else on Earth else wear normal pieces of clothing, but this doesn’t matter in the long run either since this does not catch the attention of Frontier Setter at any point.

I’m meant to believe Frontier Setter singlehandedly hacked into this super advance ship called Deva, which apparently has high security, yet the fact Frontier Setter is unable to detect Ballsack who is looking for him in this city without changing her appearance goes against what’s established. Frontier Setter has other robots he could control, and taking into account he hacked into Deva 184 times this is also inconsistent with said intelligent of the character. As far as characterization goes he received nothing substantial besides questioning if human traits can be found in machines. This often used plot point in sci-fi would have been fine if the film actually explored it.

Another annoying trait of Ballsack character is her bragging how life is better on Deva, and how life on Earth pales in comparison. Ballsack mentions that old rock music wasn’t considered worth keeping by Deva. Meaning Deva intentionally didn’t keep information on simple stuff like sand does not taste good, but kept the information that made Ballsack be naked when stopping a hacker in cyberspace? The same information that does not tell her human body can get tired, and sick. If Deva was a such a great place to live at than it should have preserve as much information as possible not just be selective about it. Say, if somebody on Deva like rock, and Deva didn’t have it that person is out of like. However, on Earth you can find rock music if you like. If not, simply ignore it not discard it like Deva does. As I mentioned earlier, due to poor world building Anglea claims of Deva being better than Earth don’t add much to the film when the bare minimal about the world is not established.

Zarik Kajiwara is the most likable character, but even he has inconsistency in his character. He says himself in the movie he’s  afraid of heights, yet there is a scene where he’s on top of an abandon building stringing his guitar. Unlike tsundere Ballsack, Kajiwara is competent at his job to the point he should have been the protagonist of the film. For starter, he blends into the crowd unlike Ballsack who sticks out. Another thing is he knows the area, can collect information on Frontier Setter location, all while being off Frontier Setter radar. This guy, is basically babysitting this deadweight agent named Ballsack to make sure she doesn’t kill herself. This allows me to sympathize with Kajiwara because not only does he have to do most of Ballsack job for her, but also make sure Ballsack doesn’t end up killing herself. Sadly, there’s not much to his character either besides he likes rock music, and living on Earth. This about as close as the film gets to producing anything resembling good quality.

Our final character is Frontier Setter himself. The film sets him up as this intelligent hacker which does make you wonder why is he attacking Deva. Unfortunately the answer essentially amounts to “you want to go on this road trip bro?” for his motivation. It’s a letdown when this is reveal because the hour building up to this were spent on characters talking about nothing related to the plot. It was either debating where it’s better to live rendered into a pointless argument because of terrible world building, or being all philosophical with subjects on eating till you’re full, liking a specific brand of rock music, and being sick like a human. Frontier Setter is falsely presented as the antagonist in this story, and when there’s no ill attention from it then there should have been something the characters learned from their journey. Ballsack does eventually learn the value of being human, and having a human body just because. There’s not a single good experience she had on her journey before finally finding Frontier Setter. She has her mecha destroyed, and sold for parts, was nearly raped, got sick while on Earth, became very tired, hungry, and talked to Zarik Kajiwara discussing the current affair of their job. Somehow all of this made Ballsack change over a new perception of human living.

It’s explained later on in the film that human consciousness was transferred into data. How exactly that happened, when it happened, and how long it’s been going on for is up to anyone imagination. They (Deva) could have used “Bipolar Magnetic Reversal Theory” to accomplish that as far as anyone is concerned. These simple questions needed to understand the setting are never answered. After the opening credits, Angela Ballsack crashes on Earth, and fights giant Centipede like aliens with a giant robot. These bugs appear in this one, and only scene throughout the film. Are these bugs a common issue on Earth? Is there any other species on Earth that make people fearful to live on Earth? If so, then the idea of 98% of Earth population living in a computer would make sense. Except, there is no world building on Earth either!

While seeing the film I assumed it was created by A1-Pictures because of various ass shots, but nope I was wrong. This film was brought to us by Toei Animation, and Nitroplus who really wanted to outdo them with ass shots. All the budget for the film clearly didn’t go into the animation. Whenever character speak it’s only up, and down motion which looks unnatural. I’m guessing the budget likely went into developing bouncing boob technology for Ballsack character before abandoning the idea when realizing Toei, nor Nitroplus had the technology to make it happen. So they opted for ass shots just incase the audience forgets Ballsack has an ass. When the characters are still the models don’t look bad, but the low-framerate in motion makes everything look disjointed, and delayed. Possibly making you wonder if whatever device you’re watching it on is laggy. The only time the animation looks natural is when the framerate is bumped up in the action scenes. In these action scenes the motion is fast, and whatever moving looks somewhat natural. These moments don’t last long, nor are they very flashy in their presentation. Most of the film best moments of competent animation is in the climax, but given how pointless the climax is it undermines what happening on-screen, and ultimately would have been pointless if the writing wasn’t so awful. The only thing about the animation I wouldn’t complain about are the backgrounds are decent looking since they don’t move. That would be it as far praises go.

Voice acting in both Japanese, and English languages are competent while virtually sharing the same traits. For starter, both Rie Kugimiya in Japanese, and Wendee Lee in the English voiced Angela Balzac are equally annoying. Wendee Lee is higher pitched in her portrayal which makes her more grating when listening to her brag about how better life is on Deva. She doesn’t change her tone regardless what her character is meant to feel in any scene either. Rie Kugimiya doesn’t fare any better in the leading role. Instead of being grating her portrayal ends up being bland. At least Wendee Lee portrayal made me feel something about the character. Sure it is mostly hatred, but it’s certainly better than Rie Kugimiya who leaves no impression when having played other tsunderes. Nothing about Rie Kugimiya performance stands out besides she sounds no different from a bland tsundere character.

Zarik Kajiwara is played by Shinichiro Miki in Japanese, and Steve Blum in the English dub. On both audio tracks these two actors are easily best actors. Steve Blum especially operating on autopilot with his cool, laid back voice. Blum voice goes hand in hand with Zarik Kajiwara personality for an easy cool portrayal. Miki also does the same so not of a much difference in performances. Frontier Setter is voice by Hiroshi Kamiya in Japanese, and Johnny Yong Bosch in the English dub. None of them end up being better than the other voice actor. Johnny Yong Bosch is simply wasted in the role that demand nothing of him. The character has no complex emotions, or personality so it’s more disappointing seeing Johnny Yong Bosch in the role than it is a bad performance. He doesn’t sound robotic at all in the role. Whereas Hiroshi Kamiya does sound robotic in his portrayal. Fitting the role, but nothing demanding about.

The script is different in both languages. I wouldn’t advise seeing the film in any language given how bad it is. Reading the subs draws more issues to its writing while the English dub has some bad audio mixture. In English, some wording are changed to make the story appears less idiotic than it already is, but also end changing the meaning in the film in general. Hearing 98% of humans have “cyber personality” doesn’t seem like a big deal compare in Japanese where it says 98% of humans are “artificial intelligence”. Creating different problems for itself. At best, it’s most tolerable to mute the film, and read subtitles. Not the even soundtrack composed by Narasaki is noticeable in the film. It’s heavy on electronics, techno, and rock, but all equally forgettable.

Rakuen Tsuihou: Expelled From Paradise will leave you with many philosophical questions. The most important one being “What did I just watch?”. Don’t let Gen Urobuchi, and Seiji Mizushima (director of the original Fullmetal Alchemist anime) names trick you into seeing this film. If this is the standard Japan wants to set for every 3D animated film that come out of their country they’re in serious trouble. The general low-framerate in animation, lack of any thought into the writing, and nothing substantial to remember is inexcusable in an era where the likes of Pixar, and Dreamworks Animation have made better 3D animated movies. If the animation isn’t flashy enough to make it entertaining to watch than it should at least contain good writing to keep viewers engaged. When you got neither, this film here stands as an example of that.

2/10

Cinema-Maniac: Time Lapse (2014) Review

Time traveling movies have the largest amount of room for error in their writings. Creating paradox, plot holes, and inconsistency. This all applies to all forms of stories, but the ones where time traveling is involved are at greater risk coming across these issues than any other type of stories. However, the less amount of errors you have in a time traveling story the better the overall result can be. Time Lapse is one of those instances where a simple approach to a complex concept makes a good film.

Time Lapse follows three friends discovering a mysterious machine that takes pictures 24 hours into the future and conspire to use it for personal gain, until disturbing and dangerous images begin to develop. One aspect about Time Lapse that most films about time manipulation do incorrectly is over complicate the mechanics behind time travel. In this film, upon the main character’s discovery of this camera the rules are laid out, and are easy to understand. Our characters attempt to understand how this camera, and test it out to confirm it functions.

Characters in the present are given a picture of themselves 24 hours into future doing various things, and the characters in the present timeline have to match the photo in 24 hours so their past self can receive the same photo. The characters never travel between timelines meaning there’s less chances to create a paradox. If something goes wrong the characters, at no point, can they travel back in time, and undo an event. At most, they can simply warn their present self in a photo from the future. Another nice bonus to the camera is how it’s used to foreshadow events in the future visually. With this simple element the writers are allowed to focus more on the characters than spending several scenes discussing the mechanics of the camera. This also gives the writers opportunities to set up seemingly unimportant elements of the film, and bring them up later to be used later on.

Characters are few in number, and written in a way they can carry the film on their own. Throughout the run time the film never loses focus on the main characters. Finn (Matt O’Leary) is an aspiring painter who can’t seem to get the final product from his mind onto a canvas. Jasper (George Finn) is a slacker who attempts to make money through illegal gambling like betting on races. Finally, Callie (Danielle Panabaker) the supportive girlfriend of Finn. These three characters are always together creating an intimate tone within the story. Not only that, but their interactions with each others conveys these are long time friends. Instead of telling us about these characters relationship with each other it shows it to the viewers. Through the course of the movie greed will take over each of the character taking a toll on them in different form. These three characters are dynamic making the events that prevent the story from heading into a linear path.

These character gradual changes add twists to the story while never over complicating the overall storyline. Character relationship are explored in the film. From Finn and Callie relationship that seems rocky to Finn and Jasper that argue over how this camera should be used. It’s all driven by the characters. Best aspect about the small cast is how clear everything is about them. They aren’t complex characters, but their simplicity work extremely well in the confined in the story presented. The film does sprinkle discussions about the consequences of playing against time, but the concept isn’t fully explored compare to the character relationship that becomes rocky over time.

As much as I am praising the film there’s evidence of the low-budget indicating how events fold out in the film. Despite giving the film my highest rating possible these issues prevent Time Lapse from feeling like a great experience. For starter, one of the film’s central conflict revolves around illegal gambling, and a bookie who doesn’t like the idea Jasper (one of our three main characters) is winning so much money. This conflict could have easily been remedied if Jasper simply went into legal gambling like buying lottery tickets. This huge over sight is done to provide conflict to the story in the form of Ivan giving a life threatening presence, and actual consequences of their usage of this camera besides their friendship. A more organic conflict arising from Jasper large winnings was possible, but wasn’t taken for the sake of the story.

Another is the lack of location within the film. Everything basically takes small in one small area. In order to compensate for the lack of location the filmmakers opted for a more personal story involving its characters. Unfortunately, the camera never leaves the gates of this one area so visually you’ll be seeing the same rooms, and the same set without it ever changing. It’s all shot well thanks to cinematographer Jonathan Wenstrup polish, tightly confined, and clear look for the film. One aspect that wasn’t a hindrance, but could use an explanation is one moment in the film. Jasper takes a picture from his phone of the photograph from the camera which manages to show the same thing. What this says is basically a photo taken by any other devices other than this huge, futuristic camera can also capture a photo that show events that will transpire 24 hours into the future. The film never goes into the creation of this camera, but even if it did it likely would have sounded preposterous given the huge size of the actual camera.

The one aspect that makes this whole film come together is the acting. Matt O’Leary takes charge as Finn. He’s charismatic, and a capable leading man. His acting shops proves his immense likability being funny, dramatic, and struggling internally sometime all within one scene. Matt O’Leary has a good grip of his character that he becomes Finn without questioning it. George Finn plays Jasper with a good portrayal of his slacker turned into psycho. What best about this performance is George Finn doesn’t go over the top when showing the darker aspect of his character. He simply hints at it throughout with simple gesture making for a calm psycho. Danielle Panabaker plays Callie making her likable. Unlike George Finn character, Panabaker isn’t given enough scenes to gradually show her transform into a different character. However, Danielle Panabaker is able to hide her character ulterior motive without viewers catching on. Together all three actor keep viewers engaged during a slow build of the story. Their chemistry with each other is natural in every scene they take part in. Selling quickly the idea these are long time friends.

The supporting casts are a nice addition from Jason Spisak as the bookie, and David Figlioli as his bodyguard. None of them look intimidating, but are their performances work. The remaining cast member to mentioned have brief appearances in the film. They won’t make much of an impression since their screen time is very brief. Time Lapse soundtrack doesn’t contain much music making the noteworthy track, “Spider” by the band The Autumn Owls easy to spot. All the music will go unnoticed since it’s not a strong presence in the film. The music isn’t huge on a tracklist, but it’s effective nonetheless.

If you’re still pondering over the rating (even you read the previous paragraphs) here’s a bit more insight. The choices made by the filmmakers are equal to those done by veteran filmmakers. You have a great premise, and plenty of ideas with it to tell engaging story. However, there’s a giant plot hole that should prevent the story from being told the way it is. Do you compromise an original vision, or rework to way in a new way? In this film, nothing feels like it was compromised because it was engaging to forgive it giant plot hole, and become immersed in the story. Every choice from the casting, the look, and even the execution was expertly handled by director Bradley King in his first feature-length film. Not only that, but also compliments to both Bradley King, and BP Cooper for their written film. They do not have experience on under their belt, and do display potential talent in crafting a film. Whether or not these two will continue to make films remains unanswered, but they with their showcase with film is any indication they might be capable of creating a classic film.

Time Lapse is an enjoyable, simple film that’s better written than you might expect. The choices made are similar to veteran filmmakers in crafting a good film. It won’t have the wow factor of any time travel classic due to some sacrifices in the writing, nor the technical prowess to stand out, but it’s nice a little gem in the low-budget sci-fi department.   

10/10

Cinema-Maniac: Chappie (2015) Review

Neill Blomkamp debut film, District 9, I would vouch for being a sci-fi classic. While there was nothing subtle about it central theme it had a refreshing approach to storytelling. District 9 brought, and put Neill Blomkamp on my radar eagerly anticipating his next film. Elysium was a bad film aside from being unsubtle again, it was heavy handed in its message delivery, had weak writing, advance technology used in illogical ways, and badly edited action scenes. It was a disappointment regardless, in particular the writing as Blomkamp simply rewrote District 9 storyline into Elysium with minor changes. This same formula didn’t work the second time around. Now comes in Chappie, a film I anticipated since I see potential in Neill Blomkamp to make many great movies, and tell more engaging stories. When reading a synopsis for the film Chappie I had no interest in it, but with Neill Blomkamp named attached to it I was sold. What I didn’t expect after finishing viewing Chappie for it to have become one of the worst films I’ve ever seen.

Chappie is set in the near future, crime is patrolled by a mechanized police force. When one police droid, Chappie, is stolen and given new programming, he becomes the first robot with the ability to think and feel for himself. If you think the premise sounds high concept enough to carry an entire movie you are absolutely correct, but this is Chappie. Where words like sense, reason, or depth are absent from the writing before the first act even finishes. Nope, all it took for me to predict most of the story was the second time Hugh Jackman character, Vincent Moore (the villain), appears on screen in a such unsubtle way about its own execution was then made into a dreadful experience. Here’s the main problem, regardless of how many films, and formulas you’ve been exposed too Chappie is all over the place with its own ideas wanting to be shared. That it does not even obtain enough working pieces to be a bad functional story. An immediate issue with the film are its characters.

First, we have Deon Wilson (Dev Patel) who we’re told on the news is a genius for creating police robots, and within the first twenty minutes of the movie creates a brand new A.I. that thinks like a human. Yet, this same genius can phantom the simple idea of calling the police when a group of gangsters kidnap him, and steal a defunct robot he helped bring back to functioning order with his newly created A.I.. It would be understandable if Deon didn’t contact the authority if any of the following were used in the film.

A.) Didn’t make Deon such a highly profile figure that the company he works for puts a picture of him on their website when listing the police robots inventor. Therefore, Deon world suddenly turning upside down wouldn’t be telegraphed to viewers.

B.) Human police officers opposing full robotic police forces if it put them out of jobs creating a disdain for Deon. This isn’t the case as humans police officers still work in this dangerous line of work. Also, there’s no mention of human police officers opposing these robots so there’s clearly no hatred for Deon from officers.

C.) If the gang that captured Deon consisted of more than three people. Not only is that a small number, but take into account none of the gang members that captures Deon are presented as smart individuals. If one of the gang member was a computer expert who can keep Deon in line by a number of means like blocking his signal if he attempts to call the police, threaten to bankrupt Deon and his entire family, or even incriminate Deon.

D.) If Vincent Moore (the villain) hired the gangsters, and pretended in aiding Deon in securing Deon life. Deon is given no reason to distrust Vincent Moore before his kidnapping so this would have given Vincent Moore an opportunity to incriminate Deon by taking pictures of him interacting with the gangsters, and a stolen police robot. Fabricating a lie to his boss that Deon deliberately stole a police robot, and is now working with them in unknown criminal acts under their noses. Therefore getting his project funded, and it becoming fully operational.

E.) If one of the gangster made a bluff that they have someone surveilling Deon every minute of the day. Deon is clearly in no position to hold his own against the gangsters, and him knowing his invention puts an end to their criminal acts would make him more likely to believe the bluff.

F.) The police was corrupt. Any level of mention alluding to corrupt police forces would have solved the issue as to why Deon does not call the police.

To add insult to Deon “genius” mind is the fact the gangsters don’t even hold him hostage nor is one gangster place on him to keep an eye out for his activity. He manages to escape successfully with his life, and instead of calling the authority, or telling anyone his busted police robot got stolen, and he was forced to install his new A.I. in said robot. Deon instead gets items in order to teach Chappie. This whole negligence of Deon refusing to call the police ruins the film, and leads to stating the obvious. If Deon contacted the police after escaping his kidnappers than the film story would have never happened. Who knows how many thousands of lives, and possibly millions dollars of damage would have been prevented if Deon simply, called the police. In case you’re wondering about the shortage of human police officer it is revealed at the end of the movie there were exactly 150,000 reserved human forces!

Secondly, Vincent Moore is nullified as a character. He brings up a valid point of giving robots the ability to think for themselves. In a much better film Vincent Moore character would have been challenged intellectually on his issues instead of being painted as a villain. Unlike Neill Blomkamp previous films there’s no politics involved in Chappie which is the first red flag of the film. Moving along though, with no politics Vincent Moore is written to do devious things in order to make the audience hate him, except he still has a point. His solution to create a giant killing machine, and control it himself is rejected by several other in the film, but never once is Deon questioned for his creation. What this does is undermined a reasonable concerned by turning it into a game of good vs evil instead. Can’t forget, Vincent Moore unfortunately suffers from the “Obviously Evil Bad Guy” syndrome. These kind of villains are good, but when place in a serious a film they all fail the same way. Immediately upon being introduced they have “Obviously Evil Bad Guy” written on them wanting you to take them seriously even though they belong better in a B movie due to how they act, and talk.

Third, the gangsters characters are all terrible people. We have Ninja from Die Antwoord played by Watkin Tudor Jones, but better known as Ninja. So Ninja in the film takes Chappie to a meeting at a sketchy place with a group of gangsters, and leaves Chappie alone with some gangsters that actually hurt a police robot. Once Chappie comes home from his lovely time with those gangsters, and a detour Ninja sees Chappie beaten with a missing arm and Ninja says “I didn’t know this would happen”. REALLY! LEAVING A POLICE ROBOT WITH THE A.I. OF A CHILD IN THE STREETS WITH A GROUP OF GANGSTERS, AND YOU DID NOT, AT ANY POINT, EXPECT THIS TO HAPPEN! YOU’RE IN THIS PROFESSION!

Ninja is sadly the leader of the gang that this film focuses on. The other members are Yo-Landi (played by Yolandi Visser), and Yankie (played by Jose Pablo Cantillo). That’s the entire gang consisting of three people don’t exactly spell intimidation especially when none of them specializes in anything. Seriously, one could have been the hacker, one could have been a veteran, one could have been a loose canon, one could have been righteous, and so many other traits. In this film it lumps all three gangsters together. They are also unlikable. Ninja for instance, wants to use Chappie for his heist so he lies to Chappie to steal cars, and teaches him the thug life. Best part, the film expects you to care feel for Ninja despite all he has done to Chappie.

Then there’s Yo-Landi who is meant to be a mother figure who just does nothing. She’s written to be motherly, but not act like it. Despite her insistence Chappie not be put in danger she doesn’t stand up to Ninja when she disagrees with him. Even after Chappie experiences the loss of an arm showing concern for him even though he’s a robot. This does not make Yo-Landi a good person as she later goes on to take part in a heist, and shooting without a concern for human life. She doesn’t change in any way as she is still willing to take part of a crime, and doesn’t look on her criminal lifestyle any differently. Then, there’s Yankie who is just in the movie. He’s not developed like the entire cast. His main purpose is to be the middle guy. Someone who sees both sides, but the film does nothing with this characters simply going through the motion of events. He doesn’t take an initiative in voicing his thoughts be content sitting in the background.

Finally, Chappie is an unsympathetic character. Virtually every single person he comes across in the film that isn’t Deon mistreats him. For some reason, the film decided to give him the mind of a child, yet this is not enough to counteract the fact he helps steal cars, and willfully hurts people in the film. Instead of seeing Chappie act as like this was some sort of game, Chappie views his ordeals in a inconsistent mindset. For starter, when told his battery is unable to get change instead of throwing a child tantrum Chappie insteads react violently as an adult choking Ninja. Another miscalculation in the script. There’s a scene where Chappie clearly understands killing, but through a lesson from Ninja thinks he’s making people fall asleep instead of killing. So this robot understands the meaning of pain, yet that does not influence him in his decision to take part of a heist. Nor it is use this as a plot point to at least see Chappie think out about actions.

Tips and Steps to write a Neill Blomkamp Film:

1.) Make the film villain a white, psychopathic mercenary from South Africa.

2.) Set it in South Africa. More favorably if it is in the slums.

3.) Make sure you’re leading character changes into something different by the end of the film.

4.) Former Regime Personnel are inhumane and nigh-unstoppable major foes.

5.) Write in someone getting blown up at some point, and highlight it

6.) Cast Sharlto Copley

7.) Cinemtraphopher must be Trent Opaloch

One last thing, the film has incredible leap of logic regarding supercomputers. Now this is set in the future, so how come Sony Computer Entertainment game console Playstation 4 is used to make a super computer. It’s a video game console specifically created to play video games. I should know I played every single Sony video game console at some point, and even owned the home consoles. So, I can’t make fun of this aspect of the film. I kid you not, I hate looking at specs of any hardware because it reads like Binary coding to me, but yes, several Playstation 4 hooked up together to make a supercomputer is actually possible. The Playstation 4 processing power is delivered in a System-on-Chip design with eight AMD CPU cores and 18 AMD Radeon Graphics Core Next (GCN) compute units, typically used to process all the software, games, videos, and motion sensor capabilities that enable players to interact with others through online services. Even more impressive, the same compute architectures found in the PlayStation 4 really are powering some of today’s supercomputer clusters. (This paragraph not brought to you by Sony™.)

However, it is still blatant product placement, and without an explanation to explain this is not a work fiction. Viewers will simply laugh at this aspect in the film, even though it is technically possible. It was possible with exactly 1,760 less powerful Playstation 3 to make a supercomputer which actually happened. Then, there’s the capturing of human consciousness into data. Chappie didn’t bother explaining how it’s actually possible to make Playstation 4 into supercomputers so why would it bother explaining how one can capture human consciousness, and fit it all on a flashdrive.

Dev Patel plays Deon, our “smart intelligent genius” protagonist of the film. Dev Patel doesn’t have a meaty role in Chappie. Lacking genuine concern in his vocal delivery thinking shouting is the same as emoting. He shouts frequently in the film in nearly every scene, but a bigger issue is his lack of chemistry towards the entire cast. None of it feels believable. Mostly in part due to the fact his interaction with the human cast lacking the range compare to when Dev Patel interacts with a CG/Practical effect suit weary Sharlto Copley. Patel is unable to make any scene feel genuine of any emotion.

Unlike Patel, Sharlto Copely was able to make some scenes work despite his limitation not just with the material, but a serious lack of any facial feature. Copely body movements is never robotic in the film moving like a human. However, scenes when Copely has to display a beaten up or scare Chappie work because of his body movements. Sadly, whenever Copely isn’t allowed to express the more vulnerable side of his characters the restraint are shown. It seems phoned in as most of his line delivery as done in the same manner of a child. Instead of feeling bad for Chappie when he’s lie too you end up wanting to punch Chappie full aware of the damage to your own hands to make him shut up.

Two of the most talented actors in the cast, Hugh Jackman, and Sigourney Weaver are given thankless roles. Sigourney Weaver has little screen time, and no bearing on the plot that her role could have been filled by any other actor, and not have turned out differently. Whenever Sigourney Weaver is onscreen she spout concern or greedy CEO dialogue that leaves little to the imagination. It’s a disappointing performance to see given the talent involved. Next, Hugh Jackman whose only meant to fit his antagonistic role aesthetically. Hugh Jackman simply looks evil in the film compare to the rest of the film cast. He’s bulky, foreign, and has an accent which has the making of lazy writers. Jackman doesn’t have much to do either besides appearing suspicious, and angry in his scenes. If Hugh Jackman went over the top it would have been fun seeing his simple character on screen, but with a realistic direction he is not allowed to make the character his own. The script undermines the performances of both Hugh Jackman, and Sigourney Weaver can bring to a film.

The remainder of the film cast is less encouraging. Instead finding great talent in the likes of Watkin Tudor Jones, Yolandi Visser, and Jose Pablo Cantillo it gives three perfectly good reasons why Hugh Jackman, and Sigourney Weaver deserved bigger roles. Jose Pablo Cantillo is the least harmful from the three since his character isn’t meant to be sympathetic. So when Jose plays his character he does not have any complexity to display. His co-stars do have too, which makes them their lack of acting experience that much more noticeable. Watkin Tudor sticks to acting gangsta, with only knowledge of the rough side to be filmed. Tudor lacks range to make his character likable. Whenever Tudor says anything remotely mean, and mean spirited he sells it like a person you want to punch. However, his character is meant to be sympathetic so his lack of charisma hurts his character. Whenever appearing nice it simply hurts the intention of his character. Yolandi Visser doesn’t fare any better suffering from similar issues. Opting for a bubbly portrayal of her character. She has neither the psyche (like the previous two actors) to be intimidating, or even sell the idea she’s living the gang life.

Finally, the music by Hans Zimmer is awful. Just awful. Every single time dubstep was misused, and sounds like a collection of noise than actual music. It was annoying throughout the film. Special effects we’re well done, but went to waste under a bad script. Fueling realistic special effects to a very, dislikable lead. The action scenes in the beginning of the film is well done, and nicely shot. Sadly, the film lacks action afterwards for over an hour until it reaches the climax which by then has failed to provide engaging characters, or rising action. There’s nothing to care for on screen despite a seeing a robot shooting dozen of gangsters in a single area, and blowing up parts of it.

Chappie is the first film where I had to pause the film halfway through, and take pain reliever. That has never happened before in any film I’ve seen. This, is the first time, I ever had to take any sort of medicine because of how bad a movie was. It was so bad, it caused a migraine. Everything I saw on screen was so unpleasant to my body it physically hurt it. Thankfully, the worst it got for me while viewing Chappie was a severe headache.

Chappie is a total mess of filmmaking. Nothing about the film works, has a clear point, or a purpose. It’s confused in every single aspect of the word film. It’s the only film I have review, as of now, that has given me a migraine. It’s the first film I needed to take medicine for in order to complete. It does not entertain. It does provoke a thoughtful discussion. It does not offer anything unique. It does take away allot from the viewer, and rewards them with nothing. Except in my case it gave me a severe headache.

0/10

Anime-Breakdown: Trigun (1998) Series Review

Introduction:
I don’t know how to bring up a discussion on violence which is the main theme of “Trigun”. An anime series that goes into depth on the topic of violence and telling a compelling story with a great leading character. Despite the serious theme Trigun is also enjoyable dashing out humor through the course of 24 episodes. It’s as much of an enjoyable show as it is dramatically powerfully. If you’re a fan of Westerns, Madhouse Studio, or like a great leading character Trigun is the show for you.

Basic Information:

Episodes: 26

Available English Dub: Yes

Animation Studio: Madhouse

Good: Vash The Stampede

Trigun is only as it good as it protagonist and you couldn’t have asked for a better leading character than Vash the Stampede. He is deliberately introduced as this badass gunmen in the series intro that shows him dodging dozen of bullets from gunmen and wind constantly blowing his way in the lonesome desert getting across an uncanny, seemingly violent figure. Once the first episode starts you only get to know about Vash from secondary accounts that make him out to be this dangerous man. However, when actually seeing Vash for the first time you’ll find it difficult to imagine such a goofball would be worth so much money.

That’s one of the main reasons Trigun works. Vash has many characteristics allowing the series to go in different directions once establishing Vash and none is more evident than in his sense of humor. It doesn’t matter how dire the current situation or standoff might be. Vash can come out of it with his goofball side intact. Always seeking to find the best solution in a very limited amount of time when placed on the spot. Vash is a misunderstood hero you probably wouldn’t give a second thought towards. When advancing further in the series details slowly revealing Vash background are given. Suddenly there is new meaning behind Vash good nature in the desolate and violent world he lives in becoming more sophisticated. Analyzing the depth of Vash can be an engaging experience all on its own right.

Define by his ideology and the constant challenge to stick to it in difficult situations, there is never a moment Vash is not challenged. Because of his pacifist nature, it leads him into trouble in the west from dangerous gunmen. By no means is Vash an incompetent shooter as proven in several episodes he has obtain pitch perfect accuracy. Understandably that would ordinarily make for a boring lead, but because of Vash ethics to not kill anyone it makes every approach to conflict unique. With his beliefs preventing him from simply killing those after him results in creative solutions. Whenever simply shooting a gun off your gunman just doesn’t work, it branches out how the setup will play out. Since Vash ideology prevents him from killing in confrontations will have you wondering what the breaking point will be. Living in a world and people that influence him to think like common folks over achieving peace. What Vash does isn’t simply for survival, but spreading an ideal that he must represent by any means.

Good: A Riveting World

Trigun takes place on a desert like planet named “Gunsmoke” that is cover by sand, decaying cities and towns, and steampunk technology. The world of Trigun is common to overlook in a film, but in the form of a TV series you get a better opportunity to understand and see it developed. It’s not an ideal world to live in. As made evident with the extensive world building that is put into crafting this world. We benefit from seeing Vash travel to different destinations and experience a bit of chaos in that city or town. Each visit gives you insight on how differently people lives are affected by the world they live in. In episode 5, an entire city is attempting to capture or kill Vash in order to save the city from bankruptcy. Immediately you understand that the city is in desperate need of money in order to survive. Hinting that even in a world that’s barren like “Gunsmoke” money still present power over instinctively helping the common man. Within the same episode you get to hear voices lashing directly at Vash to give up his life while Vash on other hand opposes their opposition with reasoning. Needless to say, good nature people doesn’t equal positive decision making. Neither does it mean that a doomsday aftermath will eliminate the rules we currently live by.

Trigun takes place on a desert like planet named “Gunsmoke” that is cover by sand, decaying cities and towns, and steampunk technology. The world of Trigun is common to overlook in a film, but in the form of a TV series you get a better opportunity to understand and see it developed. It’s not an ideal world to live in. As made evident with the extensive world building that is put into crafting this world. We benefit from seeing Vash travel to different destinations and experience a bit of chaos in that city or town. Each visit gives you insight on how differently peoples’ lives are affected by the world they live in. In episode 5, an entire city is attempting to capture or kill Vash in order to save the city from bankruptcy. Immediately you understand that the city is in desperate need of money in order to survive. Hinting that even in a world that’s barren like “Gunsmoke” money still present power over instinctively helping the common man. Within the same episode you get to hear voices lashing directly at Vash to give up his life while Vash on the other hand opposes their opposition with reasoning. Needless to say, good nature people doesn’t equal positive decision making. Neither does it mean that a doomsday aftermath will eliminate the rules we currently live by.

Good: Exploration On Violence

The element of violence I keep mentioning is what the series tackles thoroughly. Our protagonist is a pacifist, and those he encounters generally are not in the same mindset. Simply holding all life sacred isn’t as simple as withholding one self from pulling a gun trigger. It’s a perspective that is elaborated upon, even if the answer you received might not be entirely acceptable. Characters in the world will question them with the hero or villain quick to refute their criticism with their own reasons. The philosophy is obvious, but understanding why anyone would stick to their beliefs is difficult to fully grasp or get behind. Sometime it can be as simple as a person who inspired a character or in another case a life that influences choices.

As a blunt contrast to Vash we’re given the traveling priest and smooth operator Nicholas D. Wolfwood. Despite being a follower of the holy lord, Wolfwood is far more pragmatic in his treatment of human life, and the arguments between him and Vash, as well as Wolfwood’s eventual confrontations with redemption, make him a particularly interesting character. He a highlight of the examination of Christians principles. Sure many religions value love of life, forgiveness, and redemption, but clearly Nicholas D. is geared toward the Christian side given Wolfwood background. Am I reading too much into the character? Maybe, although Yasuhiro Nightow (the creator of Trigun) is a known Christian. Much like Vash, we wonder what Wolfwood breaking point would be when it comes to his religion. Can a man who follows the word of the lord really be able to abide by them? The answer to that it provides might come across as clear cut, but much like Vash, there is various shades to each answer given.

Another contrast to Vash are Meryl Stryfe and Milly Thompson, who are agents of the Bernardelli Insurance Society sent to evaluate claims regarding Vash the Stampede. In the series they serve the purpose of comedic reliefs as well as being the bridge to natural characterization. The insurance girls are a good pair on the entertainment and story. For me, the relationship between Meryl and Milly evolves from the two simply doing their job to doing what they feel is right. As I see it, this is an evolution to being realistic and adds a subtle take on a working person in the world of “Gunsmoke”. Finding the meaning behind what you do beyond a simple paycheck. What drives a person to keep their job, no matter how dangerous and why. It’s never truly brought to the forefront in the series, which makes it a small nice touch in the background. Passing no judgement on whatever your motivation as it demonstrates sometime the reason can go beyond your judgement as demonstrated with Meryl and Milly following Vash despite the harm they are put into.

Good: All Shades of Villainy

The series advances with a villain of the week formula. In nearly every episode has Vash and sometime his company defending themselves from a new super power villain or ordinary thugs. In the very first episode Vash goes up against a large cyborg named Descartes. He possesses a giant cybernetic arm with an attached boomerang. Despite appearances Descartes doesn’t last more than a single episode as Vash easily gets rid of him.

Villains personalities are varied offering some that are sympathetic with reasonable motivation while others are solely evil. It’s refreshing to see a series that doesn’t attempt to make every villain come across as a tragic story. Because of this we’re able to see the lowest depths thugs in this desolate planet can sink too. The most memorable confrontations are those that expose a different side of Vash psyche. These intellectual battles require Vash to be a quick thinker to find a peaceful resolution, even though simply shooting the villain is an easy way to survive. Sometime Vash doesn’t even need to use his gun to win making preventing standoffs from becoming stale.

One noteworthy villain is Legato Bluesummers. Legato best fits the part of a villain with long blue hair covering one eye and wearing an open trench coat showing off his imposing figure. Smiling when torturing others with his sadistic personality. Ultimately going as far as choosing his purpose in life is to help his master wipe out all of humanity and making Vash as long as possible. When it comes to villains not many within the series can surpass Legato in dedication to his single cruel purpose.

Good: A Distinctive Vision

The animation is spectacular while the art and the background art isn’t wildly creative with the barren, dusty world nearly eliminating scenery variety. On the plus side character designs are classic-yet-memorable, and the quality of the production is always high to carry the story. Vash’s spiked blond hair, signature sunglasses, and long, red trench coat, give him a distinctive look as the hero of a Western. Nicholas D. Wolfwood looks suitably cool with his massive, cross-shaped gun makes him among coolest priests in animation. There are impressive over-the-top fights displaying various degrees of bullets piercing and the dynamic gun choreography is always fun to see with superpowers gunmen requiring characters to change tactics. In particular the final standoff, which easily ranks among one of the best choreographed finale to have ever graced animation.

Trigun soundtrack is noteworthy from aggressive electric guitar to a few very mellow Western-themed tunes and a pretty song that factors into the story. Supporting a scene instead of telling the audience how they should feel in a particular scene. Like Legato’s chaotic industrial-sounding theme that fittingly goes along with Legato even more chaotic nature in mentally torturing Vash.

The Japanese and English voice acting is another of Trigun’s strong points. Vash goofball side and antics mesh well with the dramatic parts of his persona. Never is one aspect of Vash personality ever become overshadowed by the other. Wolfwood is also smooth, fun, and generally likable sharing many similarities to Vash. Hiromi Tsuru does a great, lively Meryl, although there’s not much depth to the role. She’s balanced by Milly an equally likable and generally believable when she gets serious. The English dub has none other than Johnny Yong Bosch in the lead role who does an excellent job. Playing up Vash comedic chops during the comedy scenes while always sounding human whenever discussing the value of life. All the actors in the English dub sound natural balancing the vastly different tone that it starts out with to what it eventually becomes. Much of the same praise that can be given to the Japanese cast can also apply to the English voice cast. Either way you can’t go wrong with reading subtitles or watching the English dub.

Final Thoughts:
Trigun has high brow writing and thoroughly explore themes on violence without shy away from dishing out a sense humor along the way. Coming across as a prime example of how to do gritty story and delivering a meaningful message without having to be serious all the time.

Protagonist: 2/2

Story: 2/2

Themes: 2/2

Villains: 2/2

Production: 2/2

Possible Complaints (no points value):
Vash numerous pacifism speeches
Sand, Sand, and more Sand
Depending on your taste the soundtrack isn’t as memorable without the series

Rating: 10/10 – Trigun is the best kind of anime that takes the establish western genre and reinvents it with a unique world which has yet to be match in the industry. A must see for any fan of great anime, for those looking for intellectual departure, or anyone who likes western.