In contradiction to most other anime-fans (at least, that’s what I suspect), I’m not necessarily a Japanophile, and I don’t really regard the Japanese culture as the “best culture ever”; it’s just that these guys are so damn good at storytelling. That’s why I love it when an anime takes place in a country other than Japan. Because of this, I love the fact that for this movie, Hayao took up his roots of when he was still working for Nippon Animation, and combined this with his love for airplanes and his huge imagination.
The result is a beautiful depiction of southern Italy around the ages of World War One, and possibly the most unique out of all Ghibli-movies and it’s got a combination of drama and comedy that puts My Neighbour the Yamadas and Pom Poko to shame. While the amount of details that went into this movie isn’t as impressive as, say, My Neibour Totoro or Kiki’s Delivery-service, it makes up for this with some addictive storytelling and some awesome side-characters. You just can’t help but love the pirates and their antics.
Also, for once I’m glad that the main character doesn’t ruin the movie. Porco himself may not be the best character of the bunch, but yet he’s fresh and original, and a major leap away from the usual protagonists you see in anime, being a war veteran that turned into a pig and all. The real problem with Porco Rosso is that it’s got a few clichés here and there, though, that serve to keep the movie on track. A notable exception, however, is the ending.
With my reviews of the Ghibli-movies, I’ve often paid little to no attention to the production-values. Heck they’re awesome, what else did you expect? Still, I do want to mention that Porco Rosso has probably the best soundtrack of all Ghibli-movies. Like no other in Hisaishi Joe’s repertoire, it sets the mood for the Italian setting perfectly.
As I’ve now seen all of the major Ghibli-movies, I just don’t think I can really label one as the best of the bunch. My Neighbour Totoro was really nostalgic, Kiki’s Delivery-Service and Spirited Away were wonderful tales of growing up, and The Cat Returns and Porco Rosso combined great, intriguing and very different stories with a quirky nature and excellent characterizations. All I can say is that these five stood out for me as the most memorable, and they should be a definite recommendation to any anime-fan.]]>
My Neighbour Totoro Review – 89/100
Most of Ghibli’s works are for all ages, but there’s always one demographic that stands out for each movie, often related to the ages of the protagonists: Kiki’s Delivery-Service, for example, is for middle-schoolers, Princess Mononoke and Ocean Waves are for high-schoolers, while Only Yesterday is for the adults. My Neighbour Totoro completes this picture by being aimed at little children, and really, it’s one of Ghibli’s finest productions.
Even if you’re not a chid of ten years old, you’ll love the nostalgic feeling that this movie creates. A lot of screen-time is spent on the two main characters (two sisters of about four and ten years old), just playing with each other and having fun, just like all children are supposed to. A major theme also is children’s fantasies, and I’m sure that everyone would have loved to meet the strange creatures portrayed in this movie when they were young.
The reason why I like My Neighbour Totoro so much is that out of all the Ghibli-movies I’ve seen, this one’s the most perfectly paced so far. Princess Mononoke, Kiki’s delivery-service and Nausicaa, for example, were great in their own ways, but their climaxes were rushed; Takahata’s movies went on for too long and Spirited Away’s second half didn’t live up to the first one, but not with My Neighbour Totoro! The first half of the movie builds the characters and setting up perfectly, and once we got to know them, the second half kicks in and the fun begins as Totoro himself comes in action. The climax itself doesn’t feel forced at all, and yet I couldn’t help but shed a tear at what happened, and the movie ends at just the right time.
But yeah, My Neighbour Totoro shares the same flaw as Kiki’s Delivery-service: the pacing may feel perfect, but I feel that there’s so much more potential left in the concept. It’s a shame that only a movie of an hour and a half could be made out of it, and this movie could have easily been extended to a 13-episode television-series, there are so many characters that could have been fleshed out and delved into. But then again, one of the charms of this movie is how it’s so simple, yet effective.
Obviously, if you expected an action-movie like Mononoke or Laputa then you should stay away from this movie. My Neighbour Totoro feels much more like the non-Miyazaki-movies of Studio Ghibli, but with a perfect integration between the realistic and the fantasy-elements. As usual, the graphics and music are excellent, but you wouldn’t expect any different from a Hayao Miyazaki-movie. Anyway, with this, I’ve seen nearly all of the major Ghibli’s movies. There’s only one of them left, and I’ve got some high expectations of it.]]>
Suteki Tantei Labyrinth – 09
This series continues to baffle me like no other. There were some really good parts in this episode, and it’s basically one huge dialogue, portraying the bond between Mayuki and his music-teacher in an excellent way. You can see that the creators spent a lot of time to this dialogue, and it really works.
But seriously… WHY the tea?! Why does tea form the solution to every single mystery that Mayuki runs across?! Also, where did the virtual reality come from? More importantly, these glasses look quite heavy. Don’t people realize that they’re wearing the glasses in the first place? This series really has the potential, but these utterly ridiculous plot-twists really hold it down so much.
For the past few episodes, I’ve also been screaming for some development from Mayuki, and this episode finally listened to these requests, but not really in the way I expected. Mayuki was either incredibly serious or incredibly silly. While it felt a bit out of place, I do have to say that this was the first episode where he didn’t get on my nerves, so the guy is getting better.
And then we have the ending of the episode… where I really have no idea what to say. Mayuki’s teacher has had enough development, and while I couldn’t understand most of the dialogue, I could see why she killed the teacher, and it was interesting to see how her friendship with Mayuki was actually genuine, instead of an act. When her plan is revealed by Mayuki, she clearly is in despair and reflects upon her actions…
… only for Byakko, who suddenly appeared from out of nowhere to brainwash the woman with a violin and her red-glowing eyes so she goes berserk. Seiran then comes and his two assistants kill the teacher. Yes, kill her. This begs the question as to what exactly happened to her and why Seiran doesn’t get arrested… a murder is a murder, right? And really, where is this series trying to go? Right now, we’ve got some psychic kid and a homicidal bodyguard who have to stay out of the clutches of those who want to either abuse or eliminate the powers of said kid. While it is among the more original premises of the season, it still remains hard to swallow…
Ah well, this series does win the award of “most eccentric series of the season” easily.]]>
Gundam 00 – 08
I admit: the political roots of this series have been quite interesting, and they’re a good reason to watch this series, but the creators do need to put more effort into the characters. As usual, my main problem is with Setsuna again: he yet again surpassed his stupidity with this episode, when he runs into the queen of Azadistan and basically tells her that he’s the Meister of the Gundam Exia and working for the Celestial Beings, and only to confirm it, we see him hold a small demonstration of his piloting-skills right above the plane that said princess is boarding.
Why…. for god’s sake, why?!
One thing that would also make this series a bit better is if we were actually showed the intention behind the terrorists, like Bokura no and Simoun did. Right now, I’m not feeling any sympathy for the random victims that get killed by the Celestial beings. They just don’t feel like humans. One thing I’m glad for is that the terrorists actually tried out some tactics that show signs of complexity. If the creators can keep increasing this complexity, things can get quite interesting in the future.
One thing I did appreciate was the bit of development for Lockon. Apparently, his family was killed in terrorist attacks, leaving him as the sole survivor among tens of dead bodies. He was really meaner than usual this time. One thing I like about this series is how everyone reacts differently to the actions of the celestial beings. Some countries decide to use them, others hate them, and others have to deal with the victim of this hate.]]>
Les Miserables – Shoujo Cosette – 47
Well, ignoring the fact that the animation basically went south (such a shame that the animation-budget ran out, right before the ending of this series), this was a really solid aftermath, that basically did everything it needed to do to provide enough closure to the youngsters of this series. Jean and Shushu reunite Gavroche with his two younger brothers, and the three of them come to live along with Jean and Cosette. Later in the episode, they’re also admitted to a school, so that they can study properly.
Marius meanwhile wakes up, and has to face the hard truth: out of all of Les Amis, he’s the only one left. I loved how mature Cosette was in this episode, taking care of both the injured Gavroche and providing the right support to Marius. The two of them really are a couple, and I love the realistic way in which they’re portrayed.
The thing is, though: there are five episodes left with this, and this episode alone would already have been enough to provide closure for this series. There’s still something that’s about to happen, but what? I can imagine how Thenardier is going to return for a final time, and it would be awesome if Javert, Thenardiére and Azelma got some more screen-time as well. I seriously have no idea what the creators have left in store for the final part of this series, but let’s hope that the animators will get themselves back together and finish this series off with a bang.]]>
Dennou Coil – 25
Haha! That was some major plot-twist at the end of the episode! I’m not going to say what it is, though. I’ll leave that up to the next and final episode of this series. There’s just so much potential for it!
In any case, Mayumi turned out to be a small character in the end, whose purpose was to show Yasako where she had to go to find the other side. Mayumi just still hates Yasako, because Yasako basically did nothing to stop rumours about her and Michiko-san from spreading, while she had enough chances to do so. It’s like Mayumi said, Yasako tries to be nice to everyone, but when it really matters, she won’t do anything. That’s why Mayumi felt betrayed, and their fight began.
The reason Haraken was on the move in the previous episode was not because he still longed for Kanna. Instead, he somehow found out that Yasako was trying to get to the other side, and wanted to stop her. Tamako catches him easily enough, though they both end up collaborating in trying to get Yasako back. They’re too late, though, and end up sending a Sacchi to the other side. This Sacchi has a few modifications, though: it can fly!
(Thank god for wao’s summaries) And we finally know why Nekome does what he does: his case is quite similar to that of Takano’s in Higurashi: his father was a researcher as well, and when he finally discovered something major (I think he was the one who originally developed the Imago-function), this was taken away from him by Megamas. So he teamed up with Michiko-san to cause some kind of major scandal for Megamass, by making Michiko cause every kid with Imago to faint… so I guess that that means that the real reason why he allowed Isako to try and get her body back was for Michiko to take over Isako’s body. But still, did he have to go for such a complex way? Couldn’t he just have lured people inside the keyholes and make the v2.0s destroy them? That would have caused a scandal for Megamass as well, wouldn’t it?
I also wonder… where did Michiko originally come from? Did she just appear out of nowhere, or is she like the humanoid illegals, who in the end turned out to be products of Yasako’s grandfather that went out of control? Was she originally created by Yasako’s grandfather, but did something entirely different from what he had in mind? In this episode, she looked awfully human-like, apart from her eyes, perhaps.]]>
Shion no Ou – 07
Alongside series such as Higurashi no Naku Koro ni, Saiunkoku Monogatari and Kaiji, which all have plenty of time to build up, Shion no Ou forms an excellent addition, simply because the time it has to work with is quite limited, so it has to keep up quite a fast pacing to finish in time. Unlike the series above, you just know that every episode will be interesting and push the storyline a considerable amount further. This effect becomes even more apparent when the characters are just so addictive as in this series. I could care less about the Shougi at this point, the characters themselves make this series worthwhile enough to keep watching.
This episode probably forms the end of the small intermezzo, where Satoru gets fleshed out even more, and where we see two matches: one between Saori and Shion, and one between Ayumi and Satoru. All of them were interesting, and quite important for the storyline. After the first one, Saori finally starts to consider Shion as a worthy opponent, instead of a cute girl who happens to be good at shougi, after Shion makes quite a few smart moves in a quick match. Satoru on the other hand, loses to Ayumi on purpose, in order to test the guy/girl out. His motivations are still quite fuzzy at the moment, but I think that we’ll find these out quite soon.
I’m also quite surprised at how often the reporter-guy passes by. The guy gets featured in the OP, but is he something more than just a bystander, or will he too play some kind of more important role in the future? In the later part of the episode, we also see Shion and Ayumi, going to a local fast-food-restaurant, and the two of them were SO cute at the time. I’m really surprised at how the usually stoic Ayumi talked in such a gentle way to Shion.
One thing that I’ve been wondering: how come the police couldn’t find anything through fingerprint analysis? The murderer basically placed the king of shougi on the board after he killed Shion’s parents. He wasn’t wearing gloves, as Shion recognized how the fingers of the guy were pretty… so why hasn’t fingerprint analysis pointed out the victim? Or could this be because the murderer has never been in contact with the police before?]]>
Higurashi no Naku Koro ni – 46
Aaaand the building-up continues yet again. My patience is getting tested quite a bit for this series, and it really looks like the final arc of this series will be around nine episodes of building up, with the climax taking up only two of them. I’m still not sure whether this was a right decision to make. I mean, the climax has to be really good in order to make up for the episodes that it kept us hungry for any actual development. Can the creators really pull it off, without going through the obvious routes in which Takano dies and the others live happily ever after?
In this episode, Rika teams up with both the major children and adult-characters, and they come up with the plan to fake Rika’s death to cause confusion to Takano. Tomitake goes into hiding, and meanwhile investigates on Takano, discovering what we knew already, Akasaka remains in Rika’s house to make people believe that the house is still being inhabited by people, while Rika, Satoko and Hanyuu hide, Irie continues to keep an eye out, and basically forms Akasaka’s link to the outside world, since his phone will probably be tapped and Oishi is going to be the one to spread Rika’s faked death.
Meanwhile, the woman we saw with Takano turns out to be someone who’d like to see Takano’s antagonists fall too, which explains the support she gives to her. The next episode will probably consist out of everyone getting ready for the major plan. Episode 48 will then probably deal with the start of the plan, while the real climax will take place in episodes 49 and 50. Let’s hope the creators know what they’re doing.]]>
Gambling Apocalypse Kaiji – 08
Holy flipping heck! I know I’ve been complaining about Kaiji for the past few episodes… but seriously… this episode was just plain crazy, and I mean that in a good way! If there was anything this series needed, it was betrayal, and this episode features lots of it. I love episodes like these, where everything comes together like that.
So in the end, there was no Mr. X. I should have guessed this: the guy who flushed his cards down the toilet threw away three scissors. He probably ended up with a wrong hand and fell in despair. The matter is, though, that these cards weren’t counted off the scoreboard. Because of assuming this, Funai ended up being the final person with a card, along with Kaiji and the others. Because of that, he just had to throw away five of his nine stars just to survive. The thing is that because he’s a repeater, he needed to have four stars to survive. Because of this, he still has a debt of 4 million yen after this, because he was stupid enough to borrow the maximum limit and he can’t sell any of his stars.
The second half of the episode is dedicated to another problem: because said three cards have been flushed, there is no way for Kaiji and the others to cancel out each other’s cards. Kaiji then sacrifices himself to the other room, where the final pieces of the puzzle come together. The old man indeed has been tricked by a repeater, and now he’s been abandoned while said repeater is celebrating happily in the winner’s room. Then there’s another character (Okabayashi) who gets introduced, and I really like this guy for his realistic view on life. Both the old man and Okabayashi have been working for their partners. Which makes me wonder, where did Okabayashi’s partner go? I recall that Furuhata and Andou were the only ones with more than two stars left.
Which brings me to the next point: Andou is about to betray Kaiji! It is logical if you look at it one way. There’s a huge trust between Kaiji and Furuhata: they knew each other before going on the ship, Furuhata feels extremely guilty for what he did to Kaiji and Kaiji has been way too moralistic to doubt him. Andou is a different case, however. He was basically saved by Kaiji because he happened to have two stars. Kaiji made a temporarily impression on him, though apart from that, he doesn’t know anything about the guy. There are people who trust easily and there are people who are always afraid to make friends and always keep an emotional distance from people. Apparently, Andou belongs to the later part.
Again on a side-note: if the screenshots don’t show up: let me know]]>
Saiunkoku Monogatari – 67
Ah, so finally Juusanhime appears. Really, she turned out totally different from what I imagined of her. I expected a mature young girl, probably along the lines of a younger Kochou, but instead she turned out to be Shuuei’s younger sister, quite energetic and quite talented at fighting. So this is the woman who will eventually be married to Ruuki, and I wonder what she’s going to add to the overall storyline.
In the meantime, Shuurei relieves her anger upon a very unlucky lump of dough, and she gets her first major mission from Kouki: safely escort Juusanhime to the palace. Shusui also returns, and nearly commits suicide! Ran also has some worries now that he’s not with Ryuuki anymore, and the two of them meet each other in this episode. There was a lot talking involved, so I couldn’t understand exactly, but apparently Ran had someone he loved, taken away from him by his triplet-brothers. Shushui puts up a strong face in front of him, though she herself is also troubled by hearing a very strange and annoying sound. Could this date back from when she was still working under Souka? All signs point to yes, since she freaked out when she saw small Riou.
Most part of the episode is spent on Shuurei, though. It’s great to see her out of her old outfit that she wore in the past few episodes. I’m again not sure if I understood everything correctly, but it seems that Kouki favours Seiga at the moment, and he lets him in on quite a few things that he doesn’t let Shuurei know. Which makes me wonder… aren’t there any other people working on their department besides the three of them? Or was Kouki really in such a huge need of more people?
On a side-note, I’ve been getting increasingly more annoyed with how the speeds of my images, hosted on putfile have gone down, so I’m experimenting a bit with different image- and filehosts. Can someone tell me whether the images above actually show up? And please notify me if they don’t. ]]>