How Anime Influenced My Adventures Of Superman

Josie Campbell began working on DC Comics characters in the Teen Titans Go and Justice League Action animated series. She went on to revitalize She-Ra for Netflix in a new anime-themed series which features a diverse cast concentrating on unconventional relationships. Campbell got brought back to DC a few years later working on a new take of Mary Marvel(the original magical girl!)in The New Champion Of Shazam comic, plus writing the story for some current DC animated movies like Legion Of Super-Heroes which reintroduces the angst of teenage hormones in a sci-fi setting. She then became a head writer for the My Adventures With Superman series which is an all-new take on the Man of Tomorrow’s origin. The animated TV series was first pitched as an action comedy intended for Cartoon Network’s daytime schedule, but it was decided to add a romantic element by focusing on Clark and Lois’ relationship, so it was reformatted to be shown on Adult Swim, even though the first season was merely given a 10-episode run. Josie and her team have seemingly taken a major page out of the anime genre with their approach to presenting the original superhero to the next generation.

The first season played out like a Makoto Shinkai film where they compress an idea which could have filled out the better part of a season with just the initial aspect of the story. A young Clark Kent and his roommate Jimmy Olsen begin working as interns at the Daily Planet along with a fresh Lois Lane. Clark is just learning about his newfound powers and alien heritage while trying to keep it a secret, so he ditches his glasses and wears an outfit he got in his spacecraft. Lois dubs this superpowered vigilante Superman, but soon figures out that it is really Clark which is something that took decades to happen in the comics. This creates a big shortcut in their relationship, along with the two young people admitting their budding feelings for each other. While at the same time, a military division called Task Force X is aware of Superman’s nature after an event labeled Zero Day where an alien army nearly invaded Earth leaving only Lois’s father Sam and Amanda Waller to spend the next two decades preparing for a second invasion. Sam Lane is now a general and doing nearly anything to neutralize Superman, while Waller is secretly doing anything and more to make sure Zero Day doesn’t happen again, that includes using civilians as possible targets to accomplish her goals as well as criminals to flush out Superman. Another large beeline that was made to the plot was introducing the concept of a multiverse where different versions of Lois have taken formed their own secret society to stop any Supermans gone bad, which also prematurely brought Kryptonite into the equation. Yet another plot bypass was gathering an entire crew of DC Comics villains into Task Force X, most of which were never even part of the Superman rogues’ gallery. The best example is taking Justice League enemy Dr. Ivo who created the Amazo robot and have the scientist becoming Parasite with incredible kaiju capabilities. The storytelling is streamlined down for a tight broadcast run that numerous anime adaptations have been subjected to.

The more diverse cast works in the show’s favor. Jimmy Olsen and Perry White are now black while Lois is of Korean descent, plus the Newsboy Legion is the Newskid Legion made of different genders and ethnicities. Some villains from the comics here are misunderstood like The Brain and Monsieur Mallah who are a disembodied brain and an intelligent talking gorilla that are now a gay cross-species romantic couple. Even Mr. Mxyzptlk is remade into a mostly different character with blue skin and pointy ears who in this show is more of a multiversal agent of chaos that fights against the orderly efforts of the Lois League. Lex Luthor is also reimagined as beginning as Ivo’s assistant who would become a major thorn in Superman’s side as a secondary bad guy that rises through the ranks to become an archenemy.

Clark and Lois’ relationship is given a new coat of paint in the manner of a background romance in a standard action anime that is brought to the front as the driving force of the story, making this series both a shojo and shonen-inspired American cartoon. In most past situations, Lois’s efforts were either to boost her reporting career or get her even further into Superman’s arms, but here she is a little more conscious of the world around her and the part she plays in it. Lois also exhibits the generic hypocrisy her character is infamous for when she gets steamed at Clark for lying about his secret identity just a few episodes after Lois herself admitted to lying to Perry White while trying to cover a story of killer robots. The blossoming love of Clark and Lois echos your average high school romance that makes up numerous anime titles while ditching the obligatory additional harem love intertests.

Mecha anime equally holds sway here too. The Parasite suit is clearly a remodeled body armor version of Unit-01 from Evangelion. Brainiac robots are designed to look like something out of Metroid. Even some background robots were obviously borrowed from Gurren Lagan’s torso-themed mecha.

Magical girl shows had an effect on Superman here as they are one of the few consistent genres in anime where a character manages to keep their alter-ego hidden even from those going to extreme ends to uncover them, despite the fact Jimmy Olsen knew about Clark’s secret identity from the beginning. Clark’s first fitting into his blue tights was also reminiscent of a magical girl transformation scene, even if it's only for the one time. All of his powers eventually appear as Superman levels up from each battle also demonstrates a character’s evolution into their role as a guardian similar to your average pretty soldier.

The action on display in this series ascends from prior superhero anime shows like One Punch Man and My Hero Academia that were in turn shaped by American comic books. Superman isn’t on the god level he normally is at in this adaptation, so supervillains with high tech weapons do sometimes end up getting the better of him, even if super-speed comes in handy to not draw out a battle like Goku and Frieza. Superman fights for what he believes in and tries to keep the citywide damage to a minimum, making him mindful of how his powers can attract and repel gawking onlookers.

Superman’s iconography corresponds in this show as well. It is a deconstruction of the superhero, but not in a dark or bloody way featured on recent titles like Invincible or The Boys. Superman stands out here as someone feared by those in power but heralded by those whose lives he saves, which is usually conventional in the realms of sentai hero titles. Your average Metropolis citizen is aware of what lengths Superman will go to save the day, even with the entire population uniting their efforts to help stop a rampaging gigantic Parasite from consuming all the energy in the city.

Even the opening credits look like something out of an early 2010s anime TV series. It reflects some of the last few Gainax productions or slice-of-life titles with the occasional giant robot somewhere in shot.

My Adventures With Superman is the culmination of over eight decades worth of legacy and how that left its mark on anime in general, as well as how it comes back to the source with this Man of Steel being given a bigger emphasis as a bishonen with superpowers. What the second season has in store for the never-ending battle is yet to be seen, but don’t be surprised if you see a couple more Dragonball homages as it goes along.

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ANI-MOVIES, *Jiang Ziya

Being the second chapter in what has been labeled the "Fengshen Cinematic Universe", Jiang Ziya is a follow up to Ne Zha, both of which are based on the Fengshen Yanyi book of Chinese folklore from the 16th Century by Xu Zhonglin. The prior movie of Ne Zha became the highest grossing animated movie made in China with Jiang Ziya earning its spot as the second biggest seller. Originally titled Legend Of Deification in China, Well Go USA released under the name of the main character. Whereas Ne Zha was more of a comedic fantasy, Jiang Ziya is a high fantasy steeped in mythology and Taoisim. There was a live-action movie about Jiang Ziya that came out just the year before, but it suffered from bad special effects while the fully animated adaptation is a stunning depiction of Chinese legends.

A fox spirit possesses the body of the consort of the Shang dynasty's emperor and causes the three main realms to unite to defeat the wicked demon's plans. The main hero of the war, Jiang Ziya, is given the task of executing the fox spirit in front of the council of gods, but he notices the consort's innocent soul inside and refuses to kill her as the demon escapes. The gods banish Jiang for the next decade to a desolate wasteland along with his thunder-punching assistant Shen Gongbao and a junior deer/dragon pet called Si Bu Xiang. Jiang comes across Xiao Jiu, a young orphan girl with fox ears that everyone else thinks is connected to the fox demons. Jiang and Xiao head pass the borders of the outcasted lands to find answers to the pointy-eared girl's origins. They run across the Shang dynasty emperor now remade as a deity who recognizing that Xiao is original soul of his former concubine that the fox spirit consumed. After taking a trip to the heavens and getting information from the Master spirit, Jiang learns he must take Xiao taken to the Gate of Resurrection where she can be reborn free of the fox demon's spirit. After Xiao enters the Gate, the fox demon breaks it open and frees all the other fox spirits that were killed during the war which was all a plan thought up by the Master god to unify all the nations against a singular enemy. The Master tries to cover this all up by sending a giant guillotine to smash the swirling mass of fox spirits which Jiang and Xiao are caught up in. Jiang severs the stairway to heaven to leave humans to decide their own destiny free of the gods, and years later all the main characters get reincarnated. In a post-credit scene, Jiang in the heavenly realm has dinner with Ne Zha from the prior movie establishing the thin connenction between both films.

Jiang Ziya is a breathtaking saga with outstanding animation. The dub is fine with anime voice actor Chris Sabat as the title character, even though the translation doesn't make it totally coherent with where the plot is supposed to be going. There are some heartfelt deaths in this but considering that reincarnation plays a big part in this, the demise of each character is void of any real consequences. The dub is available on free streaming channels like Tubi, so it's no real sacrifice checking out one of the best Asian fantasy animated movies of all time.

ANI-MOVIES, *Wish

To celebrate their centennial anniversary, Disney thought that doing one big session of circle jerking was long overdue. Wish is a bloated display of egotistical entropy that was just a revarnished clip show with a plot that normally would make for a feature that would barely cover 25 minutes. Planning for this wreck had been going on for over five years prior to its release, but even given that amount of time with a majority of Disney's "talent" working on it and the company's vast finances to back it, Wish was not worth it. The animation quality is not that much better than what was done for Tangled over a decade before it, so you would be better off just watching that on Freeform instead of wasting your time and money on overpriced theater tickets for. This self-gratuitous exposition of Disney's legacy of course also had to be a musical as well, and the songs are about as memorable as a case of terminal amnesia. Wish's more diverse cast helps keep the company's trend of trying to appeal to a wider audience other than just middle-class Americans, even though it also works against it as you're not really given any context if this is supposed to happen in the real world, or at least a fantasy version of it. The movie tries to begin like a standard Golden Age Disney movie with a storybook opening up, but it's all downhill from this point on.

Ages ago in the Mediterranean lies the island kingdom of Rosas ruled by the supposedly benevolent sorcerer Magnifico who accepts the wishes of his people with the promise of granting someone's wish once a month. A young lady called Asha is on his staff and is interviewing to be Magnifico's new assistant, but instead uncovers the secret he's been hiding from the citizens for years to gain their unconditional trust that he covets their sealed off wishes. Asha goes to wish upon a star which actually comes down from the skies as a living little smartphone icon that starts to work its own kind of magic by giving animals the ability to speak. The star referred to as Star helps Asha realize that she should try to free the wishes from Magnifico's grasp. The corrupt leader knows about the fallen star and plots to take if for himself to gain even more power. The rest of the film is a series of bad musical numbers and rotating characters as Asha tries to liberate the kingdom's wishes. The movie gives no real effort to understanding if Magnifico's original intentions slowly turned him bad from using dark magic, or if he was always a power mad despot.

Wish is an incomplete chain of events that was strung together with an impulsive need for Disney to show off their hugely animated catalog spanning nearly a century. The supporting cast are just copy/pastes of previous Disney characters, not to mention the entire royal staff is just a reincarnation of the Seven Dwarves. Asha is a boring Disney princess-type without really being a princess, and her whole story is nothing more than an origin story for a fairy godmother. The villain's motivations seem to change at the drop of a hat, constantly being in flux as to whether he wants his people's loyalty or if he just keeps getting crazier from dabbling in dark magic. Very young children might be slightly charmed by it at first, but would forget it once they get old enough to realize that movie is just one big mess. I've seen jumbled mockbuster rip offs that were more coherent than Wish. The movie is a wild goose chase totally void of anything endearing and not worth the effort on either the creators or its intended viewers.

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ANI-MOVIES, *Luca

Before Turning Red, Pixar created a totally different tale of maturity with fantasy elements to it in 2021. Luca was the first full-length picture directed by animator Enrico Casarosa who previously worked on Pixar productions like Up, Onward, and Coco. The whole concept is somewhat of a successor to Casarosa's short that he did for Pixar in 2011, La Luna which was about a fisher family off the coast of Italy, except this time a supernatural twist has been added. Dreamworks would take the concept of Luca along with Turning Red into their own "original" idea for Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken, even though it took on its own unique style. Luca was not a regular Pixar story delving into social commentary or emotional inner peace, but merely a tale of growth in an otherworldly setting.

The movie is set in 1959 at the fictional Italian fishing town of Portorosso where a family of sea monsters live nearby underwater. Their only son Luca shepherds dim fish for some reason, while his parents warn him to stay away from boats, even though he gets interested in the things humans drop from their boats. He meets another young sea monster named Alberto who lives alone on a small island in a desolate lighthouse, and he shows Luca that when sea monsters go on dry land they turn into humans. This gets Luca in trouble with his parents who want him to go the depths to with his see-through uncle, so he'll be safe from humans. Luca runs away from home and teams up with Alfredo with the goal of getting their own vespa scooter which they believe will help them see the world on their own. They meet local girl Giulia who tells them about an upcoming multisport race where they can win the prize money to get their own vespa. The boys spend the next week living with Giulia and her one-armed fisher father training for the race while trying to keep their sea monster identities secret, all while avoiding Luca's parents who have come up to the surface to look for their son. There is of course the standard cartoon villain involved whose sole motivation was to win the race along with his two henchboys just to flaunt his ego. Not to give away the ending, but it doesn't have what you normally expect to see in a Pixar flick.

Luca is an endearing movie which is more of a slice-of-life story than a modern-day fairy tale. The animation style has an obvious influence on the works of Hayao Miyazaki, especially Ponyo. There is a strong sense of innocence and fairness to each of the character's motivations, except of course for the villain. Even though it is a Pixar production, Luca is a little lacking in visual dynamics, at least outside of Luca's dream sequences which is most of the film. The moderate tone of this film works at least as a change of pace from all the Cars movies Pixar keeps turning out. It's more of a pleasant inoffensive feature for the whole family, even though it could stand be more decisive about whether they want to stick with either spoken English or Italian.

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ANI-MOVIES, *Blue Thermal

Kana Ozawa created the five-volume manga series of Blue Thermal in 2015 that was popular enough to not only get a prequel manga, but a full-length anime movie in 2022. The studio behind it was Telecom Animation Film who has a long lists of credits in several American productions like Real Ghostbusters, Inspector Gadget, and Mighty Orbots. It's a slice-of-life story with some melodrama added to pad out the film's 103-minute run time. There is resplendent designs and flying sequences, although some of the characters are obvious generic anime stock.

Tamaki Tsuru is a freshman on her own in her new college and accidently causes the aviation club's glider to be damaged. The team captain Kuramochi talks her into paying the debt off by joining their club, and later discovers that she has a natural talent for operating a glider and all the aeronautics involved with it. The majority of the middle of the story has Tamaki contending with rival gliders and her big sister from the competing school who has been holding a grudge against her since they were young, so the plot is lengthened with customary anime cliches. The film wraps with Tamaki working out her feelings for Kuramochi who has gone missing in Germany while the aviation club is going through its finals. There's never any confirmed romance, although greatly hinted at between the male and female leads.

As a movie, Blue Thermal better here than it might have as a TV series which it was first conceived as, even though it can seem lackluster at points. Eleven Arts decided to save even further money in their English release of this by not providing a dub or even bothering with a U.S. theatrical run. You can find this on Blu-ray through Shout Factory but could save some cash just catching it for free on numerous streaming channels.