AD Police: DVD Review

Title: AD Police Files
Writer: Toshimichi Suzuki
Director(s): Takemasa Ikegami, Hidehito Ueda, Akira Nishimori
Year: 1990

I should like AD Police, but I don’t.  Not that I dislike it, it’s just… not quite right.  Looking, sounding, smelling, feeling right at home amongst other sci-fi anime of my youth, very dark, bleak and gratuitously sexual.

The DVD is a collection of 3 OVAs which, from what I gather, prequels to A.D. Police: Dead End City and Bubblegum Crisis.

The series takes place in Mega Tokyo, which is the same setting as Bubblegum Crisis.  I am not familiar with Bubblegum Crisis, but I gather that it has a narrative focusing on a group of all-female vigilantes, while AD Police is a series of one-off stories connected loosely by the fact they involve the AD Police.  The AD Police are the elite-force that deal with runaway Voomers (also called Boomers), which are essentially female robots which have gone mad for whatever reason.  This manifests itself in grade A crazy shit, generally killing people, causing mayhem, and being sexually provocative.  Mega Tokyo seems to be the classic sci-fi dystopian cyber-metropolis, filled with cyborgs, psychos, bastards and bitches.  The city is absolutely teeming with them, and so is the series.

Therein lies the problem.  There are no likable characters.  There is nothing to grab onto.  The very layout of the series is disconnected, and this just adds to the chaotic, frenetic pace of the stories.  The AD Police themselves are made up of dick-swinging yahoos (male and female), and even the new recruit who is introduced in the first episode quickly falls into step and starts swinging away.  Every woman in the series, excluding one wide-eyed and naïve officer in episode 2, is a bombshell and violent.

The first episode shows an AD Police group trying to take down a rogue voomer.  One officer fires a couple of shots at her, which clearly has no effect.  He declares:

“Bullets won’t stop her!”

And receives the reply:

“We’ll see, take this, bitch!” and then the officer, a beefcake, tries to strangle the robot.  By the end of the scene he is dead.  They are an elite force, you see.  Also, it has nothing to do with the point I was making, but the owner of this first voomer is a very racist representation of Chinese guy, which isn’t allowed.  Sorry, ishant arrawwed.

The first thing you see of the AD Police is their tank roaring down a packed street gratuitously wiping out civilian cars.  This wasn’t played for laughs, nor was it meant as a satire of police brutality, I’m fairly certain you’re meant to empathise and root for the AD Police.  It is quite difficult when their banter includes such witticisms as:

“You okay rookie, you’re not gonna shit yourself?” which could work in the mouth of a particularly gung-ho character, but in the mouth of a dick-swinging yahoo it is just a dick-swingingly yahooish thing to say.

While English-voice acting of anime and games has improved in recent years, the low-budgets of past dubbing has given rise to some poor work, and I would put AD Police into that bracket.  It isn’t so spectacularly bad to make it enjoyable, it is just misjudged.  For instance, by the end of the episode, the rogue voomer is begging for death, which she does by whining “kiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiill meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee” in a feeble guff of breath.

The episode also dabbles in grim koolwank, where Gina, the female officer we are meant to care about gets angry and literally rips one of the voomer’s tits off.  Literally, with her hand.  Just reaches on up there and rips it off.  As a wise man once said, sometimes the women are worse than the men.

The second episode opens with a 16 year old female prostitute being killed by a knife-wielding visor-wearing bitch.  This series is dark and grim, by the way, just in case you hadn’t caught on.

It follows a plot which examines what drove the knife-killer to do knife-killings, which is, spoiler, because she’s been slowly trading her guts for robotic guts, and now she doesn’t feel like a woman anymore.  So kill prostitutes, obviously.  It is an interesting premise, but the shortness of the episode means it is rushed, and cheapened.

A police (regular not AD) officer is introduced in this episode, a young, naïve female police officer with a short bob and severe fringe, a cute, bright, cheerful idealist.  I’m not saying the police force isn’t a safe haven for innocent, naïve idealists, I’m not well versed in law-enforcement.  I’m just saying it seems a misfit, especially in Mega Tokyo, where half the city is destroyed on a daily basis by reckless police and psychotic robots.

The naïve police officer trails the crazy knife lady down an underground corridor, splashing through sewage ankle deep, the wide eyed young police woman declares:

"I wonder where I'm going, where will this tunnel lead me?"

and then she gets grabbed and a knife put to her throat.  The last person who said “I wonder where I’m going” was no one, it didn’t happen.  Lies.

When the knife-killer runs away, the policewoman faints.  Because she is a girl.  Her presence in the series is misjudged.

By the end of the episode, the knife killer is begging for death.  See the pattern?

The third episode focuses on an ex-boxer turned AD Police turned dead, who is then turned into an experimental police cyborg with the sole purpose of killing the life out of crazy voomers.  What could possibly go wrong?

At one point in this episode, an officer shows his surprise by declaring “Fuck me!”, which, while unrelated to my review, I enjoyed and thought should be mentioned.

The cyborg experiment goes well initially, Billy, the cyborg’s name, is really good at killings voomers.  The problem is that he can no longer really experience anything.  His nerve endings have been dulled, his skin removed to make way for his exoskeleton.  He is left only with his tongue, which he bites in order to feel anything.  This leads to very striking imagery of a psychotic tongue-lolling cyborg ripping up voomers.  Powerful imagery, points scored.

Unfortunately they lose points by making the professor who developed Billy a Sexy-Ass Professor, which I believe is an important breakthrough area of science that was being developed in the 90s.

Billy becomes stricken with ennui, because he can’t feel, and starts getting drugged up by shooting drugs into his tongue.  The professor tries to engage with him using other methods.  To quote from my notes:

‘The gratuitously sexy-ass professor who made him tries to engage his senses by dressing in kinky lingerie and grinding all over his robot body, pressing her tits into his robot face.’

It ultimately doesn’t work, but I’m imagining that the scene gave a lot of teenagers some very confusing imagery to deal with.  She was wearing kinky stockings and the rest of it underneath her lab coat, which I believe was very prescient, and is now standard uniform in all labs.

Billy eventually loses his shit spectacularly, crushing the professor’s head as she is grinding up on him, which is very bad form indeed.  Gina, the AD Police officer who’s been recycled from episode 1, and apparently knew Billy when he was human, comes to investigate why he is acting so strange now he’s a robot.  Again, from my notes:

‘Gina rushes in to find the sexy professor sitting in Billy's cyborg chair, head crushed and mouth-open The Ring-style, and declares:

"it had to end like this”.’  Which, of course, it didn’t.

She hunts Billy down, and even though he has murdered everyone in sight, she manages to kill him, even though he is a man-shaped tank.  She succeeds because, here’s the pattern, he also wants to die, realising that being a tin-man is no way to live.  He declares:

“Yes Gina, kill me, shoot me in the brain”.

Which is an unintentionally hilarious thing to say.  Because of that third episode we are now all aware of the danger of building an indestructible drug-fueled killing machine.

Unfortunately, I started this review with the conclusion, which is quite bad form, so I will re-iterate as though that was my plan all along.  It is so hard to empathise with any of the characters, they are so heartless and unforgiving, as is the location and the scenarios, it is very difficult to engage with.

The first episode ends with a monologue from the rookie, who describes Mega Tokyo as a “savage, soulless city”, and when that is the case you end up with a largely savage, soulless story.

Koi Kaze: Manga Review

Just so's ya know, I'm posting this on behalf of Turbo Weeaboo.

Title: Koi Kaze
Author: Motoi Yoshida
Volumes: 5
Released: September 2001
Genre: Romance, Drama



The Plot

Koshiro Saeki’s girlfriend has just broken up with him; accusing him of being a cold man and his calm attitude towards the news makes it all the more apparent.
The next day Koshiro sees a girl on the train crying while looking at a button. As she leaves he notices the girl has dropped her wallet and runs after her to return it, finding her smiling at the falling cherry blossoms. Later that day when leaving work with a co-worker Koshiro yet again sees the same girl, and having two free tickets to a local amusement park he offers her both of them, but is surprised when she asks him to come along with her.

While riding the Ferris wheel the girl confesses that she was rejected after confessing to someone she had a crush on and Koshiro follows suit by talking about his own break up, shocked to discover himself crying while the girl comforts him.
As they leave the amusement park they both greet Koshiro’s father and are soon shocked to learn that they’re siblings; thanks to his habit of staying out all night Koshiro was unaware that his sister Nanoka would be coming to live with their father because it would be closer to her school, and thanks to their living apart they were both unaware of what the other looked like.

Although he now knows they are siblings Koshiro soon finds that the initial attraction he felt when he was unaware Nanoka was his sister continues to grow, despite his own horror and revulsion at these feelings and his attempts to repress them. Meanwhile Nanoka is developing feelings of her own.

What's Good

The idea of incest is one that usually sparks disgust in the majority of people and although the subject matter is a bit uncomfortable it is interesting to see how well the characters’ reactions are portrayed. Koshiro’s struggle to deny his feelings for his sister and his hatred for them are admirable and (at least to this reviewer) allows for a sympathetic feeling for his awkward situation. The way his attempts to act like a normal brother are conflicting with his hidden attraction result in some seemingly realistic responses, becoming flustered and angry at some times, amused and doting at others. Nanoka’s own conflicted feelings are also quite realistic and due to her young age her confusion over matters of romance are typical of a teenager.

What's bad

The obvious thing here is if you’re not willing to abide the subject of incest then this is definitely not a story for you since it is the central focus of the series, essentially portraying it in a more sympathetic light than modern society might consider proper.
The series also ends on somewhat of an unresolved note. In the sense of keeping with the story this is more realistic, since in real-life situations (especially those so controversial and awkward) are rarely resolved to such a complete degree as shown in fiction. However it can still be frustrating for someone who seeks ultimate closure recipe “a la ‘happily ever after’”.

Conclusion
While the subject matter can be viewed as taboo I would recommend this series if you feel you can handle the controversial nature and although incest is not normally seen in a positive light you can still feel somewhat sympathetic towards the two main characters, who have been thrust into a situation neither planned nor wanted in the beginning, but are now stuck dealing with the consequences the best way they can. In my humble opinion it is a sweet and touching story, although ultimately that is up to you to decide.

Psycho Staff: Manga Review

Title: Psycho Staff
Genre: Action, Comedy, Romance, Sci-Fi
Author: Satoshi Mizukami
Volumes: 1 (7 Chapters)



“To Hiiragi Kouichi, I’ll be waiting for you after school behind the gym. Sakuragi Umeko.” This is the first time Hiiragi Kouichi has ever gotten what seems like a love letter. He goes to the meeting place thinking something exciting and extraordinary is going to take place that will blow all reality out of proportion. Well it turns out he’s right for all the wrong reasons.
Sakuragi Umeko is an agent of the Space Esper Corps from the planet R’lyeh looking to recruit Kouichi, claiming he is a B-Class psychic.
Needless to say he immediately rejects her invitation, ignoring her rambling and saying he wants to go to University more than he wants to go to space.
The series spans seven chapters, allowing the reader a glimpse into a brief but interesting sequence of events.

I like dry, serious characters. I say that, I like it when they’re done well. A lot of the time characters that are supposed to be blunt, witty and clever are nothing beyond a shallow, insensitive husk that barely resembles a decent character. A character needs another element to his attitude that off-sets these harsh characteristics, maybe through using some kind of personal information to justify them, or softening their effects by adding a layer of sensitivity or content that makes the dryness seem less harsh.
This is why I like the main character of Psycho Staff. Kouichi avoids nonsense and always has a serious, cynical outlook on what he does, but over the seven chapters you get to find out what he’s like underneath it all, and that is something satisfying to read.
Umeko is another great character, although her conviction and motivation is something you see in a lot of characters just like her, so as a person she is quite predictable, but the scenarios within the series are interesting enough that while the character is predictable the situation she’s in is bizarre enough to warrant different courses of action.

Fans of “Lucifer and the Biscuit Hammer” (a.k.a Wakusei no Samidare) and “Sengoku Youko” will immediately recognise Satoshi Mizukami’s original art style. While the style is pretty simplistic, it has enough detail to make sure the panels aren’t bland but not so much that you can’t see what’s going on (one of the things I hate most in Manga is when you can’t distinguish one thing from another in a scene).

For all its merits it suffers the problem of being very short. While I was most certainly satisfied with it as a whole, the ending seemed a little rushed and a lot of pivotal moments are busted out in a short amount of time, leaving the reader to wonder whether the artist really did have bigger plans for the story. Rushed as it is the ending is satisfying, finishing the story while implying that more happens later.

While I am slightly disappointed by the short length of the Manga, it is still very much worth the read as long as you can let go of it by the seventh chapter.

Black Jack: Film Review

Title: Black Jack

Original Idea: Osamu Tezuka
Director: Osamu Dezaki
Year: 1996

Black Jack is a long-awaited revisit for me, as I caught the film years ago on glorious VHS, after forcing my father to tape it from Sci-Fi. The channel used to be a bastion of good anime, though I’m not sure whether it still airs anime late at night, or whether the airing of late night anime has withered with the passage of time.

The first time round I found that I had a rocky relationship with Black Jack, it contained things that fit awkwardly with my teenage desires, i.e. too much dialogue and a notable lack of nudity, but luckily now I am, at least attempting to look, dignified and cultured and these things are no longer held against it.

The film opens with clips of Olympic athletes breaking world records, specifically a 15 year old Polish girl breaking both male and female 100m sprint records, and a past-his-prime American breaking the pole vault record. We are treated to visuals that will delight ardent fans of thermal imaging, as thermal imaging is recreated to emphasize just how hard these athletes are working. A whole host of records being broken sparks suggestions that this is the next stage of human evolution, and the athletes are labelled superhumans, and though the Japanese phrase is "cho-jin", the ‘evolution’ is far from the sense used in Urotsukidoji. Thank Cruijff.

It transpires that these changes may not be quite the ‘evolution’ that the media had been promoting, as a number of the ‘superhumans’ begin suffering from strange systems.

Enter Black Jack. When newly-developing, mysterious illnesses are the game, then the two-tone-haired maverick-genius freelance doctor is the only player worth calling. Aided by his borderline-annoying child-assistant Pinoko, Black Jack is shanghaied into the case by suspicious femme fatale Jo Carol, whose motives are ambiguous.

Even since 1996 the anime has aged strangely, and though the ‘superhuman’ times they give for the world records haven’t been surpassed in reality, some of the technology is humorously outdated. *Warning: it is now necessary to turn your innuendo-aids off* At one point Black Jack is passed a floppy disc (though it is possible that it is a mini-disc), which he inserts into a computer and watches a video from I’m not certain whether the Japanese were using super-powered floppy discs in 1996, or whether SPFD is actually the name of a band I would listen to, but the floppies I remember were incapable of holding a picture, let alone a video file. Of course today the device would be a USB stick or a Blu-ray, and in another 13 years these would look equally as technologically redundant. In the future they will plug aerials into computers that link wirelessly to your brain and transmit .esp video files directly into your imagination. That is my prediction at least.

The voice acting is particularly tasteful, where even the saccharine trilling of Pinoko is apt and adds to proceedings, rather than unduly detracting from the seriousness of situations. Pinoko is utilised well as she humanises Black Jack (do I call him Jack, Jackie, BJ?) who is often clinical and cold, and without her presence may come across as an overly heartless and compassionless fellow. Our main man, The Poppa BJ, is voiced magnificently, with one particular explosion of “kotowaru!” (I refuse!) being a genuinely impressive breath-catching boom.

There was one amusing mistranslation in the visuals of Black Jack, in a scene where a giant Olympic banner is being held by the crowd at the event. In reality, the 1996 Olympics were held in Atlanta, though according to the makers of Black Jack, it was held in Atlantis. This probably would have made for a more interesting Olympics, certainly more water-based at the very least. I would like to imagine that the mistranslation was purposeful, an example of the sneaky humour of one of the artists who worked on the film.

There is a sharp shock curve in Black Jack, which is for the large part encouraging the viewer to think and is driven by dialogue, but occasionally abrupt viciousness with explode into proceedings. One example of this from early on in the film is where a furtive discussion regarding patients is interrupted by a physically and mentally unstable sprinter literally sprinting headfirst into a wall, with a very bloody and final outcome.

The film revolves wholly around medical practises, specifically medial ethics, with Black Jack staunchly treating patients with utmost care and single-mindedly dedicating himself to saving them, where others have a far more distanced and dangerous relationship with the lives of their patients. Despite this, the topic isn’t explicitly discussed in any real depth, and the clear goodie/baddie divide that exists in parts of the film is repeatedly blurred, which ensures that the film doesn’t become preaching propaganda. The film is, in my opinion rightly, warning of the dangers of playing silly buggers with your patients, although it is able to portray the human and nuanced side of issues.

An amount of medical jargon exists in the film, though considering the main characters are all doctors this is to be expected. The jargon isn’t rampant, however, and I feel there is a healthy balance, where enough terminology is being bandied to create a credible medical atmosphere, without excluding any who are plebs in the way of medicine. A plebe such as I.

There are more moustaches than are usually present in anime. I was pleased.

On occasion there is a particularly unsettling sequence where Black Jack is involved in self-diagnosis, which takes the form of a monologue. The monologue is particularly cold and scientific, as he is working through his symptoms, which transforms it into a chilling and haunting soliloquy.

The film holds up much better now that I am not a presumptuous young oik looking for nudity and violence.

Kimi Ni Todoke: Manga Review

Title: Kimi Ni Todoke
Author: Karuho Shiina
Volumes: 9 (Ongoing)
Released: 25th May 2006
Genre: Romantic Comedy





















The Plot

The story of Kimi no Todoke centres around the socially awkward Kuronuma Sawako, a socially awkward girl whose resemblance to the horror character Sadako causes her classmates to fear her and believe she can perform various supernatural feats such as cursing people. Enter Shota Kazehaya a boy whose open and kind nature is the target of Sawako's admiration and she is even more shocked when he talks to her regularly, soon enough Kazehaya's kind nature and encouragement helps Sawako to gather her courage and start to open up to her classmates.


What's Good

Although Kazehaya encourages Sawako to try harder to make herself understood to her classmates he never asks her to be anything other than herself an interesting change to other romance stories where they seek to eliminate defect's but this fact is never over emphasised and its nice to see that it makes no difference either way when it comes to this manga. The fear caused by Sawako is often played for laughs and is sometimes genuinely funny when compared to some comedy in manga and anime which isn't quite as amusing as portrayed in some cases.

What's bad

The typical 'will they wont they' cliché between Sawako and Kazehaya can be seen as a bit tiresome for people who don't enjoy that sort of thing, especially since both characters quite obviously like each other but seem unaware of it. The manga's idealistic attitude may also be a point of scorn for some people, as most characters are nice enough in they're own way (apart from a few exceptions) meaning that this manga can be a bit idealistic.

Conclusion

Kimi ni Todoke is a sweet manga with an entertaining story and interesting characters, although it doesn't stand out compared to other series but it is certainly a good series in its own way and is well worth a look.

Mahou Sensei Negima: Manga Review

Title: Mahou Sensei Negima
Author: Ken Akamatsu
Volumes: 27 Volumes
Released: February 26, 2003
Genre: Harem, Action, Comedy, Magical girl
















The Plot

Magician in training Negi Springfield dreams of being a Magister Magi (Latin for 'Master Mage'), one of the highest classes of magicians who travel the globe helping normal people while keeping their magical ability a secret. Negi's main reason for wanting to be a Master Mage is so he can find his father, Nagi Springfield, a legendary magician known as the 'Thousand master' who has been missing since Negi was young and is believed to be dead.

At ten years old Negi Springfield has graduated from the Merdiana magic academy and as per tradition he is expected to take up a pre-assigned job and continue his training. He soon finds out that his duty is to become a teacher at Mahora academy, where he will be teaching a class of 31 middle school girls. Soon enough Negi is enveloped in his students' and school's chaotic lifestyle.


What's Good

Author Ken Akamatsu is famous for his harem Manga Love Hina and it's nice to see him try a new genre although the romantic style comedy elements are still present. Slowly (at first), as the series progresses, the shift to a more action oriented plot is soon established and it is amazing to see how well some of the fight scenes are pulled off. The ever present perverted moments played for laughs due to the main character's young age and a lot of alike moments are more like subversions of the original jokes. Although a few of the characters play up to the typical clichés such as the 'shy girl' Nodoka Miyazaki, the nervous bookworm with a crush on the main character, it doesn't mean that it's tiresome. Rather these walking archetypes are comfortable to see and as with any tried and tested archetype or model they can still surprise you every once in a while.

What's bad

A major problem I feel I must mention is the whole 'creepy' angle the series can give off, with a ten year old pre-pubescent boy running around giving 'proper' kisses to girls to make 'pactio cards' (magical cards that grant the magicians 'partner' special abilities). There is also a point where the main characters get a hold of candy that can give the illusion of the characters being older or younger when consumed, which while tame by itself it does get a bit weird when characters remain in 'loli' form far longer than they actually have to. In one case the girl has, for reasons known only to the author himself, taken the opportunity to dress in frankly downright revealing clothing while in 'loli' form. With all this paedo-bait it can be a bit uncomfortable for even the most desensitised reader. Frequent breaks from the main story to mess about with comedic elements means that the Manga can be slow moving sometimes, and the latest two arcs have been ticking along for such a long time now that it might be seen as annoying by some readers. A more personal gripe for me is the claim that Negi is Welsh; while I always enjoy seeing my country referenced in anything I do wonder if the author actually understands exactly how the whole England and Wales thing works, because at times it can seem like he knows precisely what he's talking about (especially when talking about magical myths and such) and at other times I truly wonder if he actually has a clue what he's talking about (Negi often refers to himself as an 'English gentleman', for example).

Conclusion

If you can get past the slightly creepy nature sometimes seen in some of the chapters then this series is about average. It is a refreshing change from other action Manga with its blend of fighting, more traditional slight romantic elements and comedy, but it's still very mediocre in some ways. Although I personally enjoy the story I wouldn't exactly call it amazing, and although they don't detract from the overall enjoyment of the series the typical archetypes spotted in some characters do nothing to actually add to the story. I would recommend this Manga only if you're in the mood for a blend of magic, fantasy and harem.

Paprika: Film Review

Title: Paprika

Directed by: Satoshi Kon

Written by: Yasutaka Tsutsui

Year: 2006

It may be difficult for me to give an account of the work of Satoshi Kon without lapsing into hyperbole and hero-worship, but it will be good exercise for my objective muscles so lets have a go.

The basic outline of Paprika may seem deceptively simple; a medical institute have developed a machine, the DC mini, which allows dreams to be seen on a monitor and recorded, and also enables people to interface with the dream, literally placing themselves into the patient’s dreamscape. The inventor of the device, Kohsaku Tokita, imagines the wonders of being able to share in a friend’s dream, and also understands the medical and therapeutic breakthroughs the new technology could enable. Anyone familiar with Kon’s often dark plots will be able to pre-empt that all will not go as planned.

At the very beginning of the film several copies of the DC mini have gone missing, and very soon all psychedelia breaks loose. Madness is infecting the members of the institute where the DC mini was created, as the missing technology is being used to broadcast the dream of a mentally unstable patient into the minds of others, which is visualised using the, now iconic, parade; a noisy and frenetic convoy of insanity thinly disguised as jubilation.

The titular Paprika, then, is the dream-exploring alter ego of Atsuko Chiba, a psychologist working in the aforementioned institute, who attempts to provide therapy more effectively by experiencing the patient’s dreams alongside them. Needless to say, when the chaotic dream begins to leak out, it is Paprika who is best placed to combat the situation.

The film was marketed in the Western world with the tagline: “This is your brain on anime”, a parody of the 1987/88 anti-drugs campaign, likely due to the, for some, confusing nature of the film (I refrain from the phrase head-fuck), and the heavy use of frenetic psychedelic imagery. This is perhaps a strange choice, as the ‘drugs’ of the original campaign are depicted as damaging, thus you would expect the ‘anime’, placed in the same category, to also be damaging, although to be fair they were likely playing on the retro feel of the reference, hoping to gain publicity from that alone. This criticism of the tagline may seem slightly unnecessary, and of little consequence to the actual film, which is a fair point, however if I am to portray a positive and a negative side to the film, that is how far I have to grope for aspects I am dissatisfied with.

The film plays heavily on the line between dreams and the real world, for want of better terminology, constantly blurring the distinction between the two, and falling back on the old pull back and reveal technique. Overuse of the pull back and reveal would usually suggest a lack of innovation, and at times Paprika skates frighteningly close to being a parody of the “and then I woke up” story that you are forbidden to write as a child. However, Paprika manages to utilise this technique sparingly, and to great effect, perhaps aided by the slick visuals, with the change from dream to reality playing out in one scene as a layer of scenery is sucked into a vacuum, revealing the real world behind.

The film is wonderfully crafted with almost infinite examples of a deft artistic touch and, strangely for a writer and director that has such a long history of serious and dark subject matter, exquisite comedic timing. It is perhaps unsurprising that Paprika has some genuinely humorous moments, although actually laughing aloud may simply be evidence of my increasingly twisted humour, as a film which is so heavily invested in psychosis has its fair share of genuinely insane dialogue. In the examples where manic senseless dialogue occurs, the film wavers between the instant humour that can be derived from absolutely nonsense utterances, and the inevitable horror to follow, as these verbal explosions are precursors to complete mental breakdown. The example I have chosen to illustrate this is from the very first instance where it occurs, where a Doctor involved with the DC mini’s use exclaims:

“This whole festival was put together by thirty third-graders with lots of chutzpah and panda!”

before proceeding to jump of out of the nth floor window.

The characters are all fantastically designed, where the somewhat surprising difference of style between certain characters should jar, but in fact it stands up well, and effectively emphasizes the difference between them. It is likely that this occurs due to the film relying heavily on a suspension of disbelief, where if you are willing to accept that a dream can be entered and manipulated through the use of technology, accepting that a certain character is ludicrously overweight is less of an obstacle. But oh! How overweight. It wouldn’t be presumptuous to suggest that Mr Kon was really trying to make a point when designing Tokita, a man not only obscenely obese, but also strangely out of proportion with the rest of the characters, in the same way as toys often are (Spiderman and Mr Sinister were never meant to battle, and were a constant source of annoyance to me as a child).

The foul design of Tokita, whose bloated neck floats out further than his jaw, is counterbalanced by the slick power-dressing of Atsuko, and further by the casual indie-chic of Paprika. It is, however, in the backgrounds where the meticulous detail can be discovered. In particular, the parade scene is so detailed and busy that there a million and one pop culture references that may be being made, where brief bursts of recognition (there’s the Statue of Liberty!) are counterbalanced by the interminable frenzied march. There can be no doubt that these references are being made however, as Paprika briefly appears as Son Goku astride a cloud, from whichever incarnation of Journey to the West you would recognise that character from, and later appearing as Tinkerbell, although it is just as likely she is merely a archetypal fairy-character. More direct references to Kon’s other works are made, for the sort of fanboys who would enjoy that sort of thing (i.e. ME), where a cinema complex at the end features posters of Millenium Actress, Perfect Blue and Tokyo Godfathers. Similarly I had to wonder whether Paprika skipping ephemerally through the cityscape over the opening credits was an homage to the sort of skipping done in the climactic scenes of Perfect Blue, where if it isn’t it hints to a skipping-based obsession held by Satoshi Kon.

Alongside the psychedelic imagery that the film is most-likely known for, there are examples, with one butterfly scene in particular in mind, of deeply disturbing shudder-inducing visceral horror. The film really should feel busier than it does, as a piece including horror, psycho-thriller, psychedelia and occasional comedy shouldn’t be able to fuse comfortably, but Paprika seems to have achieved this fusion.

I was able to follow the story fairly comfortably on this viewing, though I have seen the film before. As this was a second (or perhaps third) viewing, I decided to view the film with the English dub, for as any pretentious anime purist/elitist knows, first viewings are in Japanese with subtitles if this option is available. Now I have no abiding memory of the Japanese voice acting, which would suggest that it was good, and by viewing the cast list, Hayashibara Megumi in the lead role, I can’t imagine that it was anything less than a stellar performance (this is criticism at its cutting edge). The English dub, however, is another matter completely.

It would seem unfair and reductive to criticise the voice acting by declaring that Paprika’s voice was annoying, but it was. Looking back on my notes I have actually written that her voice “makes me angry”. Apologies to Cindy Robinson, who will never work again now that she has suffered the death knoll of Animated Opinions' criticism. On the other hand, she also voiced Atsuko, and the voice she assumed for this role caused no irritation. It is simply possible that the ultra-cutesy style with which Paprika speaks works comfortably in Japanese, where there is a heavily trodden tradition of the cute, but English-language archetypal cutesy voiced characters merely cause irritation, and seem false and vacuous. On a, very tenuously, related note, one American-accented extra pronounces paella “pie-ay-ah”, which is a new one on me, and simply will not do. Unless of course my understood pronunciation of “pie-ell-ah” is incorrect, in which case: sorry America.

My final gripe, then, is the occasional example of blatantly expository dialogue. It would be interesting to see whether this is present in the original Japanese, but having too much information explicitly stated somewhat dulls the film, and patronises the audience, especially when the audience is as clever as I am. One example has Atsuko suggest that an elderly injured Doctor stay in hospital, as the meeting to cancel the project involving the DC mini needs to involve every member to be passed, with the Doctor himself then stating something along the lines of: “If I stay here, the meeting can’t go ahead!” which I greeted with a slow shake of my head and mild chagrin.

It is necessary to have it known that I have perhaps overcompensated with the negatives on this film, as I was afeard that I would drown the production under the flood of my enjoyment. The film is a thought-provoking, gripping and dark story, animated and depicted ingeniously, and backed with the experimental electronica of Hirasawa Susumu. Paprika is a continuation of the collaboration between Kon and Hirasawa that has been so successful in the past, and there are a number of standout tracks in the Paprika soundtrack, in particular ‘The Girl in Byakkoya’ and ‘Parade’, though to be fair the entire film is wonderfully scored.

Boiled down, what can be expected of Paprika is what can be expected from any other Satoshi Kon piece, enjoyment for your ears, popping of your eyes and an initial boggling of your mind, followed by its expansion.

I''s: Manga Review

Title: I''s
Author: Masazaku Katsura
Genre: Romance, Drama
Volumes: 15
Released: 1997 – 1999 (Western release March '05)



Seto Ichitaka is your average 16-year-old high-school student. As you might have guessed, just like in any other romance Manga, he is in love with the beautiful Yoshizuki Iori and is too shy to express his feelings when he's around her. In fact, when he is around her his attitude changes completely, and he comes across as cold and uncaring towards her. As you can guess, this hardly helps him spark up the most basic of interactions, let alone a relationship as girlfriend and boyfriend.
I''s follows Ichitaka's struggle to get together with Iori somehow, regardless of all the obstacles blocking his progress (including a childhood friend who's just returned from America), and his confessions never really seem to go as planned.

Okay so you have all seen the age-old method of getting a donkey to move by dangling a carrot in front of it with a stick, or using a similar method to get a hamster to run in a wheel. It's in constant use in many cartoons and I had no problem laughing at the situation when I was twelve. Hah! Stupid donkey, silly little hamster.
Yeah well right now I feel like an ass and my wheel is turning faster than the “bangin' alloys” on some boy racer's shitty little yellow Saxo at two in the morning.

Seriously, this series is chock full of situations that will pull you back, forth, left, right and straight into that lamp post you didn't see because you were too busy reading it. Yes, yes it's got most of the clichés you would expect to find in a romance Manga: the childhood friend, the lecherous classmate, an innocent and perfectly kind love interest, and a pretty decent but annoyingly shy main character who would get drunk after Rum Truffle (and then proceed to make an idiot out of himself in front of the girl he loves). Karaoke, hot springs and class trips also make an entrance in this series so don't be surprised when you see the same situation pop up here as you did in the other tens of romance Manga you might have read.
Don't expect the characters themselves to be different from the norm, either. They're your standard romance characters, with their standard features, personalities and reactions, although the lecherous classmate, Teratani Yasumasa, can say some enlightening things every now and again.
To be honest, there's a lot to I''s that would leave it with no individuality if that was all it had, but for all the cliché scenes like hot springs and class trips that creep in it presents new and fantastically different situations within these scenes that makes the cliché itself look more tried-and-tested than overused, and while the characters fulfil your usual run-of-the-mill romance/drama Manga roles, watching them adapt to these new situations is just as fun as it all being completely original, and there's less danger of screwing up something that's common as muck than trying something completely new.

Now where drama/romance is concerned, in my personal experience the most important thing the writer needs to develop in the reader is hope. If the reader doesn't care about the outcome of the romance then what's the point of reading? Hoping the character doesn't screw up on his first date, hoping she can accept his quirks. Hoping he isn't a complete fuckwit who speaks before he thinks. All of this rides on hope and without it the relationship is dull and uninteresting. There are, of course, points where a lack of hope can be made up using curiosity; while the reader may not care about him getting with one character over another, he may still be curious as to finding out the end result. Trying to invoke curiosity in a romance Manga is hard, though, as many series suffer due to the reader immediately being able to tell that the main character will indeed end up with his main love interest regardless of the badly done “Oh gosh, she fell on him and they accidentally kissed and she walked in. O...M...G!” scenarios that are launched at you from some horrible cannon made of mediocrity.
This series inspires both hope and curiosity, which to be honest is a first for me where romance Manga is concerned, as it's always either been one or the other, and having both in its arsenal makes this series more than worthy of attention than most, if not all other series of the same genre. This series has become one of my favourite where romance Manga is concerned, and believe me when I say I've read my fair share of those.

Mirai Nikki: Manga Review

Title: Mirai Nikki
Author: Sakae Esuno
Volumes: 8 Volumes (ongoing)
Released: January 26, 2006




















The Plot

Amano Yukiteru is an antisocial boy whose only two interests seem to be writing in his diary on his cell phone and visiting his imaginary friend Deus Ex Machina, the lord of time and space. One day Yukiteru goes home and visits his imaginary friend only to be told that his cell phone has been gifted with the ability to tell the future. Yukiteru soon learns to enjoy his new toy and everything is going smoothly until the diary's latest entry foretells his own death.

After narrowly dodging his own death Yukiteru is soon stunned to find out that there are other people with future telling cellphone diaries and he has unwittingly become a player in the Battle Royale to decide who is going to be Deus' sucessor.

What's Good

For starters the characters in Mirai Nikki are nothing if not entertaining and watching how different characters take to their new powers is certainly something interesting to see. The way the different diaries work is a nice touch, especially with some of the more unusual ones such as the audio diary for the blind player and the 'escape' diary which allows its owner to find any possible way out of a situation. The story moves at a nice pace without dragged its feet much, and the build-up towards parts of the series is as intense as you would expect from a thriller. The characters' back stories are also exciting, especially those that are even now shrouded in mystery.

What's bad

Some of the scenes are a bit unrealistic; such as feats of strength and accuracy that aren't exactly believable at times. Some parts are a bit idealistic in the way that things seem to go smoothly at just the right moment, though this can also be reversed in respect of that things also go phenomenally bad at just the wrong moment, a minor flaw that has been pointed out is that the characters are able to foretell up to 90 days into the future and yet most characters don't seem to bother doing much more than checking their diary right after or just before a momentous event, though it has also been pointed out that the future changes so often that it becomes pointless to bother. This brings up the flaw of how quickly things can change in the Manga, which could be seen as confusing sometimes.

Conclusion

While it has its good points and bad points I feel that Mirai Nikki is definitely a must see . While it may not be for everyone I have thoroughly enjoyed the plot (thus far) and the characters, and while some of it may be unbelievable and convenient in places I personally loved every second of it. After all, even if it is sometimes unbelievable it doesn't suffer from it. In fact in places the unbelievable feats may leave you cheering for more. If you're looking for a good psychological thriller then look no further, if not then I definitely recommend you give it a try regardless. Who knows, you just might like it.

Rec: Manga Review

Title: Rec
Author: Hanamizawa Q-Tarou
Volumes: 9
Released: Q4 2002 – Ongoing



Matsumaru Fumihiko is your everyday salary man who dreams of a position in the marketing department of his company. After being stood up by his beautiful co-worker he goes to throw away his cinema tickets when Onda Aka interrupts his tantrum, saying it would be a waste to throw away the tickets and that she would like to watch the film with him. During the film Matsumaru can't help but notice Aka is mouthing along to the film, and is told upon questioning that she is a voice actress, and dreams to one day be the voice over for Audrey Hepburn. At the end of the day, they walk home and go their separate ways.
While getting ready for bed, Matsumaru notices smoke and sirens. Noticing that there is a fire nearby he rushes out to watch, because apparently everyone loves an emergency and watching people die horribly in fires is a great source of entertainment. Lo and behold, Aka is there sitting outside with the few items she was able to save from the inferno that is currently burning in, surprise!, her apartment.
With nowhere to sleep, Matsumaru recommends that she stays at his own apartment, at least until she's sorted everything out. They then proceed to go to his place, get undressed, and have sex. After waking up, Matsumaru realises Aka is missing and finds a note from her saying “I have to go, goodbye.”
After getting to work, it turns out that a proposal Matsumaru made to the company for a commercial (while he was drunk, no less) has been accepted, and he's the one to sort everything out. When introduced to the voice actress chosen for the commercial, he's in for a big surprise (I say surprise...), as Aka is the one who was chosen!
The Manga follows three main points, those being her progression in Voice Acting, his progression in Marketing (I say progression, he just seems to stay in the same place but does lots of things) and the relationship between Matsumaru and Aka.

Yet again I have begun reading a Manga series after watching its animated comrade, in this case, however, I can't say I'd recommend watching or reading one before the other to prevent disappointment or amplify excitement. The Anime consists of nine episodes, each one around ten or twelve minutes long.
Now normally with such a short amount of time to each episode I had expected the series to be a big confusing mish-mash of stuff that would make the series seem rushed and half-arsed, but it turns out that was completely the wrong assumption. Rather than cramming as much as they could into a small container, small, important bits from the Manga were selected and moulded together to make a finely crafted piece of art. It even had a good ending that left the door ajar, so it was final enough to satisfy the viewer, yet if another series was to be made there would be nothing stopping them. Had I read the Manga before watching the Anime, I have no doubt that my satisfaction in the latter would be just as fulfilling.

As you would expect, the Manga goes far deeper into the story than the Anime, but without confusing the reader with horrible intricacies and plot twists. At the same time it goes against any romance cliché, without there being the stereotypical characters you'd expect in romance stories. Aka is not tsundere, shy, lively, sporty, cool or mysterious. There isn't really any category you can place her in other than 'human'. The same goes for Matsumaru, he's just your average salary man; kind-natured, hard working and slightly lecherous.
That's one thing I like about slice-of-life series: characters are realistic, and while they portray the average human being, they have personalities, skills and traits that make them individuals without having to rely on the characters in other genres than seem to have been generated using some kind of Character Creation Wizard.
The story itself isn't so far-fetched either. Okay, so there are unlikely conveniences here and there to help the story progress, but a deus ex machina here and there never hurt anybody. What I like is how real the story is. There are no epic backgrounds filled with death that cause a shitty little “oh hey the main character is depressed because a repressed memory was brought to the surface now watch her struggle for a bit before her friends help her get over the ditch” story arcs. The most adventure you get is when they go to an island in the south to shoot a commercial, and there aren't really any surreal scenarios with a level of depth and confusion that rivals The Mask's pocket.
Now while I am harping on about the realism of the series, it isn't without its quirks. One character, a prestigious Anime director and director of an Anime Aka stars in, is one of the quirkiest characters I've seen in slice-of-life productions, and the mascot for the actual commercials itself is a weird fusion between a cat, a tree, and sweets.

At the moment, Rec is a fantastic read, and I doubt it could disappoint a single human being. If it does, then I will need to be presented with proof that the person is actually capable of sentient thought.

Hello from the new guy

Hi, I'm Turbo Weeaboo and I am the newest reviewer to this blog. I will mainly be reviewing Anime and Manga along with Gilder and Casinha, and will also review other things from time to time. My reviews will be posted on Saturdays

I love watching Anime and reading Manga, but I am able to see why series are considered 'bad' and will faithfully try to make sure these points are reported. I will also try my best to list good points and things that I myself enjoyed about a series, as well as the points I didn't like. This way I will try to find an unbiased opinion and express my own judgement of a series.

Love & Collage: Manga Review

Title: Love & Collage (Ai Kora)
Author: Kazurou Inoue
Volumes: 12
Released: 2003-2008 (however, it has been republished and continuing since July 2008)



When preparing your “Love & Collage” recipe be sure to keep knives and other sharp objects away from children, thank you. First thing you do is you find a copy of Love Hina and a blender. Put Love Hina in said blender and leave it on medium speed for about 30 seconds. Take the now finely blended Love Hina mix and apply glue to the setting of the Manga you would like to create. Now carefully sprinkle the Love Hina and spread evenly around the surface of the setting. Congratulations, you now have the setting for Love & Collage.
While my little recipe for Love & Collage did go on for longer than necessary, I'd say it's pretty damn accurate. Now don't get me wrong, it certainly has the same setting. One lone young boy living with the usual people, a tsundere who punches him 100 feet into the air, a timid girl who “secretly” falls in love with him and a martial arts (in L&C she's a ninja) straight and serious girl, in an all-girls dorm. There are “oh hey I'm going to the bathroom oh look there's the tsundere undressing and LOL Naru punch!” moments and the main character is also quite the loser who defied his parents and went to Tokyo, sure he's a high school student rather than someone applying for University but he was just as defiant, nonetheless. However while the setting is nigh-on identical, the Manga itself is completely different and sets itself apart from the Love Hina stereotype quite well.

The main character, Maeda Hachibei, is a pursuer of “girl's parts”. He has the picture of a perfect girl painted in his head; straight legs, a husky voice, cat-shaped and clear blue eyes, and bullet-train breasts (bullet train being a reference to the shape of the front carriage of a bullet train in Japan). He has more wants and if you're interested they can be found on Wikipedia, but will be revealed eventually in the Manga anyway. With this beautiful girl's image strong in his mind he sets off to a high school in Tokyo, hoping to meet with said girl.
In all fairness, he does indeed find his perfect parts, but at the same time they're on four different women. Ameyagi Tsubame is the landlord of the dorm and a teacher at Hachibei's school with perfectly straight legs the same size from hips to feet. Tenmaku Sakurako is the man-hating tsundere with his perfect clear-blue, cat-like eyes. Tsukino Yukari is the timid middle-school student with the perfect breasts. And Ootori Kirino is the stoic Ninja descendent with the perfect strong bass voice.
Hachibei's dorm was burnt down by a vengeful arsonist and, having nowhere to sleep, is invited to stay in the shed next to the girl's dormitory. The next few chapters are the typical relationship-building chapters which have him realising and sorting out the problems of his neighbours (while I have yet to read one where he helps out the teacher, it wouldn't surprise me if there was one). While Hachibei turns into a killing machine whenever one of these parts are threatened in some way, most of the time he is your average shameless fetishist. If the part isn't to his liking then he pays no attention, and so you don't get the usual spurting of blood when he sees someone in their underwear, simply because he has no desire for what he is looking at.

Some of you may know the name Kazurou Inoue from his popular series “Midori Days,” and you can certainly see it in the style of drawing. He tends to stick to the usual style for this genre of Manga, but certain details can be seen here and there that give it an original feel (like Ootori's eyes, for example).

Love & Collage is basically a Manga depicting the growing strength and value of the relationships the various characters have with each other. As it goes on and on, more and more characters are introduced, and will no doubt end with everyone being one big happy family, and I like that.

Yotsubato: Manga Review

Title: Yotsubato
Author: Kiyohiko Azuma
Volumes: 8 (60 Chapters)
Released: Q1 2003 – Ongoing



If there is a cuter entity way out there in the universe somewhere you would have to show it to me before I could possibly show a hint of believing you and then proceed to melt with said cuteness. Yotsubato is a Manga about a five-year-old girl (called Koiwai Yotsuba) who moves to a new town with her father and proceeds to have various small adventures with her father, the god-knows-feet tall Jumbo and her next door neighbours, the Ayase family. The Manga consists of Yotsuba wandering around on these adventures infecting everything with various deadly levels of cuteness, her childish naivete and misunderstandings fuelling an even higher level of the word “cute”. To be honest I do think I will be using the word “cute” more than a schoolgirl in a soft toy shop, so you'll have to forgive its abundance in this particular review, otherwise you either haven't read Yotsubato or you don't have a soul. Kiyohiko Azuma's art style really shows in this series, which has a likening to her other series, Azumanga Daioh, and is thus tailored to be cute beyond what the average human being can handle.

One thing that is always apparent is her innocence. She could annoy the shit out of you and you would still forgive her thanks to those watering puppy-dog eyes and quivering lip. She doesn't know that what she's doing would be considered bothersome, and simply follows the advice of whoever is around. The fact that she is easily distracted doesn't really help her situation, either. There was a particular point where she is sent on an errand to get pot noodles for her and her father. She isn't fond of spicy things, but her father is, and so she gets the shiny red spicy pot for him, and a less spicy one for herself. Not really know what to get next, she comes to the conclusion that the next item on the list is candy, and gets a few small snacks. Unfortunately the money her father gave her doesn't cover it all, and so she is told she needs to put an item back. While she is confused about what to put back, the shop assistant offers the solution of “Put back what you like the least.” Completely forgetting the original reason the went to the shop, she proceeds to put back the spicy pot noodle, and the chapter ends with her arriving home happy as a daisy. While the chapter ends there, it's not hard to imagine her father sighing, giving her a bonk on the head and going to the shop to get the pot noodle himself.
Each character adds his or her own element to the series. Jumbo is the guy who everyone finds amazingly huge and stares at like a zoo exhibit. Her father is probably one of the best fathers in the Manga world, teaching her lessons by making her go through the ordeal, always watching her to make sure it doesn't get out of hand. The Ayase family is also filled with some pretty interesting characters. Ena is the friend closer to Yotuba's age who goes to school, does her homework, and enjoys the company of her stuffed bears. Fuuka is the procrastinating high school student, forever putting off her studying for something else, like exercise balls. Asagi is the older of the thee sisters, but this doesn't show in her attitude. She is constantly playing around with Yotsuba, tricking her into some funny situation, making her, oddly enough, the most childish of all three sisters. Between these characters various friends and acquaintances are slotted in and the all make a bunch of happy peas in a happy pod.

One of the nicer things in this Manga is how happy everyone and everything is. Even the torrential rain is made into a cheerful event with Yotsuba running out and yelling “Wheeeee! Raaaaaain!” Typhoons are turned from horrid weather into mesmerising events, and every time Yotsuba trips, falls or screws something up, you can't help but look into her eyes and go “gyaaaaaawwww.” There isn't a single unhappy moment in the entire series (not yet, anyway), and I want it to stay that way. Plenty of Manga and Anime will get a smile out of me, but there are few that actually make me feel happy while reading them, and Yotsuba is one of those few.

Wicked City: Film Review

Title: Wicked City (aka 妖獣都市 - Yōjū Toshi)

Director: Yoshiaki Kawajiri

Year: 1987

Based on the novel by Hideyuki Kikuchi.

When I first heard of this film, someone claimed that the only reason it wasn’t classified as hentai is because it is too disgusting for anyone to get kicks out of. For the uninitiated, ‘hentai’ is the term for animated pornography. For me, this echoes a Mary Whitehouse-style sentiment first brought to my attention by someone ignorantly describing all anime as 'demon porn'. That is like saying that because the Nazi party existed in Germany, all Germans are Nazis. So, clearly, if you denounce anime as demon porn, clearly you are a racist, clearly. Being an adventurous and valiant anti-prissy type, I plunged headfirst into the viewing of this ‘horror neo-noir’ film.

The story centres around Renzaburo Taki, by day: a salesman for an electronics company, by night: an agent for the Black Guard, an organisation seeking to preserve the peace between the human and the demon worlds. Every few centuries the truce must be renewed, which requires special emissaries to seal the deal. The human world’s representative this time around is grey freak and ancient runt Giuseppi Mayart, who is entrusted to the care of Taki. Mayart is of vital importance, as he is necessary to sign the contract.

Taki is therefore allotted a compulsory sexy partner, named Makie, who, despite her sexiness, and her membership of the Black Guard, is a demon. Taki is then warned: “we are giving you a new sexy female partner, don’t get any funny ideas”, in a sequence that could be replaced by a sign saying “He is going to get funny ideas”.

On his way to the airport to 1) meet his sexy partner and 2) pick up Mayart, we are treated to artistic shots of Taki, decked out in his businessman’s suit, in which he looks like a cross between James Bond and Bruce Lee. Renzaburo Taki wouldn’t be out of place in a smithy, probably being put to use as an anvil, or perhaps outside, serving as a brick shithouse. Cue the first demon ambush, which begins a trend that runs throughout the film. A terrorist demon group wishes to stop the re-signing of the treaty, and wish to kill as many of the main characters as possible.

Fights in anime can often be tedious affairs, like the repetitive arm-flailing and screaming of Dragonball Z, but the fight sequences in Wicked City are slick and incisive, never overstaying their welcome. Early in the film the battles are realistically brutal, with the fighting including scrapping and strangling, and one particularly cruel struggle ends with Makie being kneed in the spine. As the film progresses, the battles become more supernatural, though it doesn’t fall into the trap of merely declaring characters more powerful and then running through the same techniques, instead opting to introduce new and unique twists and abilities.

The horror aspect of the film comes through most powerfully in the characterisation of the demon terrorists, who often have insidious and sinister powers. This sort of creeping horror is where, for me, Japanese horror wins out over the Western 'jumping out and shouting “rargh”' strategy. This is where I take issue with the individual who posted that the film should be hentai. There is a difference between a sex film and a film with sex in it. Sex certainly features heavily in this story, but it is used as a stylistic technique in order to propagate the horror. The sex scenes are hugely romanticised and overly sensual; they lure the viewer into a false sense of security which makes the horror all the more, well, horrifying as it creeps its way into the scenes.

The design of the demons is shudder-inducingly grotesque, including a disembodied head with tentacles whose eyes pop out on stalks and then open up into a small fanged mouth, as well as a man with ribs that burst out of his chest to bear-hug people (to death, obviously). And they are merely the grunts, with more important antagonists including a woman whose arms and legs stretch out into double-jointed spiders legs, who is able to spin webbing from her befanged vagina. I was shocked as well. Not content with only one demonic undercarriage, another demon-lady’s power is to have her torso open up into a huge hypnotising love-canal, which mesmerises people and lures them inside (to their deaths, obviously). The demon-lady claims that “No man can resist this”, which I protest against vehemently, as does the main character, although he protests with the business end of his oversized pistol (not a euphemism).

Despite this, the fighting is annoyingly inconsistent, often with characters flipping from useless weaklings into all-powerful fonts of apocalypse in an instant. There’s no point introducing a character as a kickass if they are going to spend half the film captive and meekly awaiting rescue. Also, it rings slightly hollow when the main character is called a weakling and then walks into a room, shoots everything that moves and then punches the only survivor in the face so hard that his eyes literally fall out, in a scene that wouldn’t be out of place in Barefoot Gen. The difference between the respective eye-popping sequences in the two films is that in Wicked City someone is being punched in the face, and in Barefoot Gen an atomic bomb is being dropped.

Another problem with the film is its eagerness to use seizure inducing background flashing. It is an old film, and therefore it likely came out before the animation world at large decided to be more epileptic-friendly, but even for non-sufferers, it is very difficult to watch those sequences. Even if they are merely highlighting that someone has been punched so hard their eyes fall out.

It is enjoyable to see characters decked out in fashions which haven’t stood the test of time, and were likely gaudily out of style even in the late 80s. At one juncture a demon leaps out of the floor kitted out in a white rolled-sleeved vest and heavy black sunglasses, looking like a steroid-infused re-animated Michael Jackson. The big baddie of the piece also makes his first appearance clad in a red pinstripe monstrosity of a suit, topped off with a dashing white tie.

For me, the icing on the filthy cake is the soundtrack. Bad music can hamstring any story, but coming straight out of '87 we have a track that is as retro as dancing sunflowers, yo. There’s nothing quite like it. Cheesy synth and drum machines as they were meant to be used, before suffering the abuses that they now do in the pop charts. Tracks conjured by one man, his tortoiseshell glasses, a keyboard, a computer and a sense of occasion. Real effort went into the soundtrack, even creating an English language pop ballad tearjerker, as only the 80s could deliver.

My main gripe centres around the sometimes hairy justifications for the progression of the story, the biggest being the line: “the laboratory concluded that in order to conceive the couple had to have a spiritual bond of love”. Laboratories, places of science, should not be factoring in elements such as ‘spirituality’ and ‘love’, but in a story centred around demons, maybe I am being slightly too pedantic.

The design in Wicked City is cited by Todd McFarlane as having been an inspiration, and fans of his work will certainly find Wicked City a worthwhile watch. As someone who first became acquainted with anime through late night recordings of the films they used to show on Sci-Fi, Wicked City struck a nostalgic chord with me, though I am glad I didn’t experience it as a child.

Wicked City is warped, eerie and grotesque, and is definitely worth a viewing if you are a fan of horror which doesn’t make you jump, but will ensure you have trouble getting to sleep.

Similar Oldies

Sex and Demons: Urotsukidoji

Sex and Violence: Violence Jack

Sex and Suit-Wearing Agent of Death: Golgo 13.

Yonen Buzz: Manga Review

Title: Yonen Buzz

Author: Christina Plaka

Label: Tokyopop

Volumes: Ongoing

I’m a sucker for a story based around a rock band, both NANA and Beck place highly in my favourite anime/manga estimations. Yonen Buzz, for me, attempts to inhabit the same space as these titans, and does a fantastic job of it.

The main premise will be familiar to all; it follows the fortunes of a struggling musical foursome attempting to make a living from their music. I am not a proponent of the “If it’s not broken, don’t fix it” school of storytelling, favouring more the approach of “If it’s not broken, great! Now go and make something new”. However, Yonen Buzz does not merely follow in the footprints of its megastar predecessors, dancing a merry jig and presenting you with nothing new, instead, it manages to carve out its own niche, in so doing telling a gripping tale.

The story is still very much in its infancy, and so far we have only hints as to the underlying back-story of the characters, for example; while we know that guitarist and frontman Imai Jun lost his parents as a child, we know none of the details, which promises to be an important reveal later in the story. An interesting, and for me, welcome, change from formulaic romance plotlines is that the story begins with the two main characters already in a relationship. This means that there is an absence of the moribund long, drawn out ‘Will they? / Won’t they?’ plot line where both characters nervously judder into their pillows, plucking up the courage to say ‘it’. This is a huge breath of fresh air in manga-storytelling, due to that particular storyline having been done to an ugly death. Constantly. Repeatedly. Over and over again.

The characters are lively and likeable, without resorting to gimmicky repeating jokes, again a novelty in the ‘teen drama’ genre. Importantly, the characters all feel genuinely rounded, which is no small feat in what is, necessarily, a fast moving story which has to assume that you haven’t read the prequel. There is little explained in the prequel (now re-released as Yonen Buzz: Plastic Chew) that isn’t skilfully and succinctly recapped in the actual series, although if you enjoy the series it would certainly be worth going back to the very beginning. The members of the band are straight-up earnest, without being sickeningly twee, again, a fine line deftly navigated by the author. My personal favourite is reliable nice guy and bassist Kato Atsushi. What is perhaps hugely enjoyable about the series is that the characters, the members of the band at least, are able to create a sense of honest friendship, which isn’t interrupted by the usual shallow misunderstandings that lead to ‘hilarious consequences’ that are a formulaic blight on all mangakind. Having said that, the characters are put into testing circumstances, after all it is a drama, however the solidarity of the friendship shines through in an honest and real way (as opposed to the Grandia 2 way). While the mandatory fallings out and grumpings of the band are rectified, there is a degree of brooding and angst-filled sequences, however it is a story following the antics of a 90s influenced grunge band, so to complain that it is angsty would be a little ridiculous. As though I’d read a story about swimming and complained that there was too much water in it.

The art is also a departure from bog-standard manga design, with a noticeable lack of V-chinned, inter-changeable, androgynous characters, plumping instead for still-stylised, but perhaps more honest representations of human beings. The differences are particularly noticeable in the jaw-lines of the male characters, which are more squared off than is usual in manga, and also indulging in a splash of stubble here and there. The design of hairstyles is also a far-cry from the ‘fight with a glue gun’ variety of DBZ-fame, and while I have no qualms with ludicrous, gravity defying styles (the very opposite in fact) the realistic styles are far more appropriate.

The clothes in the series will be enjoyed by lovers of rock, especially if you are feeling nostalgic for the 90s, now that we are almost an entire decade away from then. As the story has progressed, Jun has transformed more and more into a lookalike of Kurt Cobain, but since the manga itself references this fact, it seems almost a redundant observation.

The feel of the entire series is of a story that the author is completely immersed in. It is a joy to bear witness to a tale that the author is dedicated to telling, not merely eking it out as anther half-baked idea. Every chapter is accompanied by messages from the author, sometimes providing commentary or insights to the story, sometimes with lyrics for the songs of the band, also providing short biographies of bands which influence the separate characters in the story. It is this kind of immense backlog which helps round out a character, meaning that they are not merely 2D cut-outs running through a story. It is also clear that the author feels as strongly as her characters about music, with the bands original name of Prussian Blue being changed in the re-release to Plastic Chew, due to the appearance of a real-life Prussian Blue, described by Wikipedia as a white nationalist teen-pop duo, and by me as a pair of racist cunts. So a good call on the part of Christina Plaka to distance her work from them.

Now one reason why NANA and Beck have the advantage over Yonen Buzz is due to their anime incarnations, which enabled them to record actual songs for their respective bands, adding an extra layer to the story. Now though Yonen Buzz does include the lyrics for the band’s songs, I was all set to say that it couldn’t quite live up to the other offerings. Before writing this review, however, I did some research (if typing ‘Yonen Buzz’ into a reputable search engine counts as research)(re: it does) and discovered that there were recordings of Yonen Buzz songs on YouTube. I assumed these were songs created by fans of the series that had taken the lyrics from the books and composed some noise around them. But no, the truth is better than that again. There are a series of recordings of the songs, composed and performed by the author, on YouTube. What makes this particularly fantastic, in my opinion, is that they are not professionally filmed; they are merely a short clip of a woman with an acoustic guitar, singing her own songs into a digital camera. For all the professional quality and big names involved in the recording of the songs for NANA and Beck (which, don’t get me wrong, is hugely impressive) the indie, home-grown nature of these songs is far more amazing, and importantly, very much in line with the nature of the story. Firstly, they are clearly a labour of love, and performing them herself is surely a brave step, and moreover, beyond the call of duty. You wouldn’t expect your favourite musicians to start writing stories, and I certainly didn’t expect an author to also write music. But I am incredibly glad she does.

There are a few slight niggles I have with the series, the biggest of which is that it takes forever for a new volume to appear. Having said that, however, it does make the series slightly special, with never-ending serials sometimes feeling pointless and throwaway, I am more than happy to wait for a new volume that is well thought out and structured, rather than getting a new volume every week and discovering that it is tripe. The translation from German to English is mostly above criticism, however one particular scene (in Vol. 3) indicates that one translator was perhaps not on the same wavelength as everyone else. It says on the back that the book is suitable for 13+, however in a sequence of dialogue where a drummer thinks he is going to be replaced, he angrily drops the c-bomb. Now it seems somewhat coy of me to have censored it there, since I used it earlier in the piece to describe a neo-nazi pop act, however I am writing this in the understanding that children will not be reading it. In a story marked 13+, where terms such as ‘dorkface’, ‘turd’ and ‘buddy boy’ feature, the word ‘cunt’ seems hugely out of place. I, personally, enjoyed the sudden plunge into no-holds-barred language, but I can imagine that the parents of children reading it might not.

All in all, the story isn’t an epoch-altering breakthrough, but it is an engaging story well told, and well drawn. I am awaiting the next volume with infantile, unrestrained glee.