Project A-Ko: The First Anime Parody

For over 40 years, the first recognized anime parody has been Project A-ko from 1986. Prior to this, there were fan creations like fandubbed episodes of Yamato and of course the infamous original animated Daicon openings. Chances are, most American otaku are familiar with the title, especially since it became the name for one of country’s longest running fan conventions. The initial theatrical release led to a trio of OVA sequels, plus a spinoff OVA titled Project A-Ko Vs. Battle which is the first anime to tread into “parallel universe” territory when it came to doing a remake. For many, Project A-Ko was one of the first anime titles that they were introduced to outside of TV titles like Speed Racer or Voltron as it was frequently shown at sci-fi cons and displayed on Blockbuster Video, despite the fact that the movie was labeled as an adult title without being a porno.

Speaking of which, Project A-Ko first began as the concept for the hentai anthology Cream Lemon. The film was directed by Katsuhiko Nishijima who went on to do lots of other ecchi titles like Agent Aika. Nishijima also wrote the screenplay with Tomoko Kawasaki who wrote for Southern Cross, along with Yuji Moriyama who eventually directed the equally crazy Nuku Nuku. They all managed to work in enough fan service in a production intended to be a satire of anime during a time when there weren’t many comedy anime films in the mid-80s, although the rapid-fire humor is similar to Urusei Yatsura which most of the production crew had worked on.

The title was borrowed from one of Jackie Chan’s earlier hits, Project A, and this translated well as there is a ton of action shoved in with all the pop culture references. Among some of the anime titles being parodied were from the late 70s on up like Lupin III, Space Battleship Yamato, and Macross, along with a bizarre replacement of the android from Harmagedon with Colonel Sanders. There’s also some poking fun at American comic books, but we’ll get into that later. Even the names of the main characters are joke nicknames the studios used before deciding on their actual names. The animation was meticulously crafted on the same level as a space opera and treated fairly seriously, so if you were just watching this for the first time you might not recognize Project A-Ko as being a comedy.

The story is a love triangle between the super-strong teenage redhead A-Ko, her very annoying childhood friend C-Ko, and the spoiled rich girl B-Ko who is the queen bee at the new school they just transferred to. The relationship between A-Ko and C-Ko seems like they are just good friends, but B-Ko wants to take it a step further and make C-Ko her lover, although there isn’t much yuri baiting throughout the story. Lesbian fangirls had best not get their hopes up too much expecting this to be a romantic drama. B-Ko uses her scientific genius to create various mechas to put A-Ko out of the way, but A-Ko’s strength always triumphs, so B-Ko uses her secret weapon, a power armor bikini capable of mass destruction which begins the second half of the film as being one giant showdown between the enraged schoolgirls.

The schoolyard brawl is not the only focus of the plot as it takes place in the futuristic Graviton City which was built on the remains of a crashed spaceship from 16 years prior that left a huge crater behind. A stranger in sunglasses named D is an agent for an alien empire who is looking for their lost princess who happens to be C-Ko, even though the movie starts out making you believe that their original target was A-Ko which would explain her superhuman abilities. D reports to the alien space captain who is a joke version of Captain Harlock and Char from Gundam constantly thirsty for alcohol. The huge alien battleship makes it way to Graviton City to reclaim their princess while plowing through all of Earth’s defenses, and the strange part is that it’s all done largely straight like another sci-fi invasion epic. This was due to Japan having not the stranglehold they had on copyrights that they have now, like how Who Framed Roger Rabbit could only have come out in the 80s when all the characters were available to shuffle between different license holders.

The two plots finally converge with D abducting C-Ko, forcing A-Ko and B-Ko to put their duel to the death on hold and make their way up through the spaceship where it’s revealed that all the aliens who look like men are really women. This idea alone is what separates Project A-Ko from your average parody by revealing that an entire invading force were all really warrior women with a huge laundry cargo hold filled with smelly undies. The ship crashes on top of Graviton City where its left dangling precariously on top of the highest building in town. The next day, most of all the damage to the city has been repaired overnight just like at the end of any Power Rangers episode, and we finally discover where A-Ko gets her fantastic strength from. It’s briefly revealed that A-Ko’s parents are none other than Superman and Wonder Woman who got married and moved to Japan, although they’re both apparently permanently retired since they didn’t do zilch during the alien attack from the day before.

Aside from poking fun at DC superheroes, Project A-Ko was a smorgasbord of pop culture references. There are spaceships that are just the Valkyries from Macross, although with no cool robot mode. Transformers gets tagged too when B-Ko builds a convertible robot to stop A-Ko which is completely incapable of piloting once its robot form. The most estranged bit in this comes from Fist Of The North Star where one of B-Ko’s flunkies is a huge muscular schoolgirl version of Kenshiro who has a masculine voice when she’s flexing up but a normal girl’s voice when she’s talking.

Project A-Ko was given a wide release in the 80s through Central Park Media which used the original Manga Entertainment dub from England. After the first movie, CPM dubbed all the other OVAs through Ocean Group in Canada, so if you were a regular watcher of Ranma and Dragonball during the 90s then you’ll recognize a lot of voice actors in it. The film was reaching for an international audience through Shochiko in Japan as the soundtrack had songs done entirely in English composed by American musicians Joey Carbone and Richie Zito, one of these was actually sung by Samantha Newark who was also doing the speaking voice of Jem around the same time. The movie would regularly be featured on the old Sci-Fi channel during their anime showcase marathons. You might have seen this film labeled Supernova in various other regions where it’s rewritten that A-Ko is really bionic instead of a superhuman. Most of these editions were censored leaving out some of the blatant nudity that was rampant in the 80s, although the film doesn’t have an obligatory shower scene.

This film is one of the first anime that highlights women as the main characters. For one thing, the main romance plot is between three females with no central Archie archetype for any of them to fawn over, although most of the feelings between the leads are platonic, however B-Ko seriously has some less than innocent plans involving C-Ko. Project A-Ko helped established females as assertive strong figures which that eventually go onto influence other anime like Alita, even though A-Ko and B-Ko’s focus is about bickering teenagers instead of standing up to some opposing evil force.

Project A-Ko has been released several times over the last few decades into English and has been picked up by numerous US distributors. It was first released by Central Park Media throughout the 90s and most of the early 2000s. Afterwards, the rights went to Eastern Star which is an imprint of Discotek Media, and has subsequently become available on different streaming formats, most of which are for free. Perspectives on the movie differ over time with some of the older otaku loving it when it first came out mostly for the cheesy humor but then looking back on it later as just being a big piece of schlock. Modern day anime fans have come to appreciate the high-grade animation, even though a good portion of the film’s fan service might turn off possible viewers and seen as being degrading to women even though the entire story is about strong women fighting each other and not for the love of some dull guy. There is gratuitous nudity in most uncensored editions of the film.

The current Perfect Edition of the film has a horde of features including clips from the unreleased Project A-Ko CD-ROM game and numerous commentaries. Project A-Ko made a big enough impact among American fandom to not only get its own English tabletop game, plus a comic book adaptation drawn by Ben Dunn from Ninja High School which is another title worth looking up if you liked this. Depending on how much you appreciate the animators’ attention to detail, you’ll probably have fun with this over multiple viewings, but it’s not unreasonable to see today's youth finding it dated and just loaded with panty shots.

ANI-MOVIES, *Ghost Cat Anzu

What if My Neighbor Totoro was changed to have the father be a deadbeat and the mother was already dead? That's what you get when you watch Ghost Cat Anzu. Based on a one-shot manga by Takashi Imashiro, this was directed by Yoko Kuno with Nobuhiro Yamashita who has already adapted other manga into live-action films such as Confession and Let's Go Kareoke. The majority of animation done for it was provided by Shin-Ei Animation which had already done similar productions in Doraemon, and they went back to the well of early animators by first shooting the movie in live-action and rotoscoped it. Similar to several anime films of the Reiwa era in Japan, this borrows quite a few elements from Studio Ghibli where modern day spirits are seen an ordinary part of life, and going to the Land of the Dead is like to something out of Beetlejuice, so the movie starts out like Totoro and then eventually makes a sharp turn into Spirited Away for the final act. This is a self-contained story that has a lot of world-building and is a deep dive into Japanese folklore.

Young Karin is taken to a country temple by her father Tetsuya who leaves her there with his father who runs the temple while he goes to pay off a huge debt to the yakuza. Karin is stunned to find there is a giant talking anthropomorphic cat named Anzu who is a ghost cat that's been helping her grandfather at the temple for decades. Anzu tries to make Karin feel welcome, but she blows him off wanting to make it back Tokyo to visit her mother's grave. Anzu eventually takes her to Tokyo, but they can't enter because Tetsuya didn't keep up his payments, so Anzu gets help from the God of Poverty who takes them to the afterlife to see Karin's mother who is stuck working in maintenance for the oni running the place. Karin makes a break with her mother and Anzu back to the world of the living where none other than Enma himself who runs the underworld on a merry chase on scooters, limos, and sports cars. Karin's mother decides to go back the afterlife and leaves her under Anzu's protection. Tetsuya shows up at the end having paid off his debt but agrees to let Karin stay at the temple with Anzu and her grandfather while he goes on to be insolvent.

Ghost Cat Anzu might on the surface seem like an all-ages film, although it delves into murkier territory. Karin is a fleshed-out character for being the young protagonist, while Anzu is more like someone's happy-go-lucky uncle that usually helps them out. The behind the scenes of this movie are fascinating as its one of the most polished rotoscope anime films ever made. This style can be rough at times with strange looking humans who are sometimes hard to differentiate from the other yokai shown in the movie, but Anzu himself blends in well to the picture with all the regular and supernatural characters believably blend together. It's a charming family comedy that isn't afraid to get a little dark.

Cheers to our friend, C. Martin Croker, 10 years later.

 

ANI-MOVIES, *Lonely Castle In The Mirror

Lonely Castle In The Mirror started out as a novel by Mizuki Tsujimura which was later adapted into a manga, and then into an anime movie in 2022 from A-1 Pictures directed by Keiichi Hara who also did Miss Hokusai and The Wonderland. Even at 116 minutes, the movie cuts a few things from the original source material, so a decent deal of pacing, sub-plots, world-building, and character conflicts are trimmed to fit the run time. The book is a modern-day fantasy set in Japan and centers around the victims of bullying and how their lives are shaken up from the experience. This isn't a fairy tale as it does bring up some mature situations involving sexual assault and home invasion, so don't think of the title of the film trying to be another Ghibli-wannabe.

A group of seven middle schoolers each appear in a magic castle on top of a mountain in the middle of a sea set in an otherworldly realm. Four boys and three girls are introduced to the master of the castle, a small girl called the Wolf Queen who wears a wolf mask who tells them they have nearly a year to come to the castle from 9-5 PM any day through their own mirrors where they live, but if they don't leave the castle before 5 they will each be eaten by a giant wolf. Every one of them don't regularly go to school as they are all traumatized by bullies, so they spend their time hanging out getting to know each other and what they have in common. The Wolf Queen informs the kids that there is a key hidden in the castle which opens a secret door and whoever gets it first will be granted a single wish. The main character is Kokoro who has been mistreated by girls at her school who even tried to break into her house to terrorize her, but she is the one who comes closest to figuring out the secret of the castle and what ties them all together.

Lonely Castle In The Mirror is full of surprise plot twists and revelations, so to keep the mystery of the story, it's best to say that that is a faithful adaptation to the book and has a satisfying conclusion. There's a divide between the movie's initial reviews and how others looked at it when it was put on streaming and Blu-Ray, so it's best to ignore the Rotten Tomatoes score. The film does get dark but not to the point of being morbid, although it's got a fair enough rating at PG-13, although it does show how anxiety from bullying can plague a young person's life and how it affects them in the future. The story is a slow boil, but the animation is in a league of its own with great blending of 2D production with CGI. This is a noteworthy anime movie with a dub that outsells the original Japanese language edition.

ANI-MOVIES, *Mind Game

If your movie was so creative that it went on to influence the spastic Everything Everywhere All At Once, then you know it's about as spastic as it gets. Mind Game was a 2004 anime film based on a manga by Robin Nishi that was the directing debut by Masaaki Yuasa who started out as an animator on Crayon Shin-chan before going on to direct other hits such as Devilman Crybaby and Riding Your Wave. This film is an experimental production that switches from multiple forms of animation including some live-action and the best possible outside source to compare it to is Run Lola Run, even though there's only a single shown case of a change in the timeline. Many confuse Mind Game for being an anthology film like Robot Carnival, but instead it shows a singular story told from multiple perspectives similar to the classic Rashomon samurai flick. Yauasa used his eclectic approach to create an anime that was specifically unpolished which worked in his favor as the movie blends genres in a spectacular melting pot.

Nishi is a clueless college student who wants to be a manga creator who runs into his old girlfriend Myon and follows her back to her father's restaurant which her younger sister Yan works at the grill. A pair of yakuza come looking for Myon's father who cheated on the younger one's girlfriend causing him to eventually shoot Nishi right up his shaft and he dies. Nishi ends up in an afterlife of sorts and challenges the ever-changing god there to let him go back, so he gets sent back just before he was shot and turns the tables and plugs his original shooter. Nishi then runs off into the night with Myon and Yan who steal the yakuza's car, so now there's an entire fleet of gangsters chasing after them. Once they go off a bridge, the three escapees are immediately swallowed by a gigantic whale where they spend the remainder of the film along with an old castaway who has been trapped in the whale for decades. After a great deal of trippy dream sequences and self-reflecting, Nishi and the others manage to eventually get out of the whale. The story then goes back in time to where Nishi first runs into Myon and we see different flash forwards of what the characters' lives might be like in this new timeline.

Mind Game is a particular pastiche of an anime movie which you need to put your expectation on hold to watch because its unconventional storytelling will completely baffle most non-otaku or fans of auteur cinema. Its offbeat plot is one of most intriguing of all time for an animated film, especially since its title is so pretentious. It is a schizophrenic experience that bombed on its original release but has gone to get 100% on Rotten Tomatoes, but Masaaki Yuasa managed craft a nonsensical story that makes crazy anime like Dead Leaves seem tame by comparison.

ANI-MOVIES, *Children Who Chase Lost Voices

For Makoto Shinkai's third full-length anime movie, the future director of Your Name wrote an original story for it, although you will notice a great deal is borrowed from the works of Studio Ghibli. Children Who Chase Lost Voices is technically Shinkai's only isekai motion picture, and a large portion of it reflects Ghibli movies like Castle In The Sky, Princess Mononoke, and particularly Goro Miyazaki's Tales From Earthsea which is strange as most hardcore otaku were turned off by it. This was Shinkai's first fantasy movie as most of the prior ones had sci-fi elements, and his production company of Comix Wave Films brought its A-game with the jaw-dropping landscapes and striking sky backdrops. Unlike most of Shinkai's other movies, there is superb detail given to some of the film's action sequences which makes you with the director would eventually head up a shonen project. The major theme of the story is learning to let go of those who have passed on and how this compulsive need can drive people to cross entire worlds to make the pain stop.

Asuna is a responsible girl who learned to take care of herself since her father died and her mother is a full-time nurse. Whenever she's not at school, Asuna has her own little sanctuary in the mountains, but one day she encounters a mysterious beast on a bridge, although she is saved by a young boy named Shun who claims to be from the country of Agartha. Asuna later learns Shun's corpse was found in the woods, while at the same time a substitute teacher Morisaki takes over her class and starts mentions the fictional land of Agartha which is supposed to by underneath the surface that is connected to the Hollow Earth belief. Asuna then runs into a lad named Shin who is Shun's younger brother who came to collect a crystal Shun left behind. The two of them are attacked by a military organization labeled Arch Angel which Morisaki is an agent of and is bent on finding Agartha. Shun and Asuna make it to the hidden door to Agartha where Morisaki follows them leaving the other Arch Angel soldiers behind as he came to this magical realm to find a way to resurrect his deceased wife. Shun parts ways from them as he returns the crystal, but it turns out Aauna had a similar crystal of her own left behind by her father, so know he has to track them down while avoiding other hunters sent to capture the topsiders. Asuna and Morisaki now journey to a place called the Gate of Life and Death where wishes can be granted, and Asuna wants to find a way to be reunited with Shin, despite the endless army of shadow monsters that pursue them.

Children Who Chase Lost Voices shows why Makoto Shinkai has often been called the "next Miyazaki", even though for this film its more Goro Miyazaki than his father Hayao. The film lacks slightly from pacing issues and not having a definitive direction as you don't always know where the plot is going with a new story element is added every few minutes. The inner world of Agartha is something out of an RPG daydream which could have used a few more random encounters or the occasional boss battle to liven things up a little. Asuna is an interesting protagonist who in the end isn't as determined as she thinks she is in her quest, although her mentor figure of Morisaki is seriously in this for himself but with some moments of care for Asuna. This was the longest of Shinkai's films to date when it's clear it could have been trimmed by at least ten minutes. If you've seen any fantasy anime, then you'll find something familiar here, but its major draw is Shinkai's unparalleled cinematic perspective.

ANI-MOVIES, *Fortune Favors Lady Nikuko

Based on Kanako Nishi's novel, Fortune Favors Lady Nikuko was directed by Witch Hat Atelier's Ayumu Watanabe with animation crafted by Studio 4C whose resume goes all the way back to Katsuhiro Otomo's classic Memories. This was a comedic slice-of-life story between a girl and her mostly clueless mother and how her bad life decisions led to the dire straits they're currently in. It's not so much of a full-length story but comedic segments strung out with a several flashbacks to fit a singular plot, similar to like that in My Neighbors The Yamadas.

Kikuko lives in a houseboat in a harbor town with her overweight mother Nikuko who has a long history of continuously getting hornswoggled out of her money by bloodsucking bachelors. Nikuko now works as a waitress at a bar and grill, but Kikuko is more the more responsible one even though she's still in elementary school. She makes friends with a boy student who makes funny faces when he thinks nobody is looking, who is one of the few sensible people she knows with her classmates arguing about who plays on whose team in basketball. Nikuko has recently been gaining more weight, and her carefree behavior causes Kikuko to feel embarrassed even though most of the locals find her eccentricities charming. We learn that Nikuko is not Kikuko biological mother but her former best friend's who couldn't accept the responsibility of being a parent, even though she later marries a rich man and has two children with him. Despite hearing this painful truth, Kikuko still considers Nikuko her real mother and lovers her with all her faults.

The film spends an inordinate amount of time focusing on Nikuko's weird perspective, like constantly making bad puns from Japanese kanji, which is one of the reasons that this movie wasn't given an English dub. This lackadaisy storytelling also makes it difficult to keep up with the wobbly narrative. Studio 4C on the other hand does pump the film with gorgeous visuals to keep the viewer's mind engaged for a brief 97-minute anime production.

ANI-MOVIES: *The Girl Who Leapt Through Time

The first unofficial movie released by Studio Chizu was 2006's The Girl Who Leapt Through Time. Based on the 1967 novel by Yasutaka Tsutsui who also wrote the book Paprika that Satoshi Kon turned into his own anime film, this story has been adapted multiple times in different formats including live-action motion pictures and a TV series. The anime movie was produced by Belle writer Mamoru Hosoda with a screenplay by Satoko Okudera who also wrote the script for Summer Wars. The film is a stand-alone story which acts as a pseudo-sequel to the original 1967 book with the niece of the book's main character. In the book, a girl named Kazuko discovers she can leap back in time to a few days thanks to coming into contact with a man from the future, although in the book she ends up having her memory erased of the whole event, but in the anime movie Kazuko seems to somehow maintain her memories. The dubbing was provided by the Viz Entertainment regulars from Ocean Studios and was first released in English by Bandai, and later on by Funimation. Even though this was eventually redistributed under Studio Chizu, it was initially produced by the geniuses at Madhouse to many accolades.

Makoto is a typical Japanese high school student, not excelling with high grades and somewhat klutzy, but she has two platonic boy schoolmates, Chiaki and Kosuke. Her aunt Kazuko usually referred to as a witch works at restoring paintings at a museum, and Makoto comes to her when she has a strange encounter where she literally leaps through time after nearly hitting a train with her malfunctioning bike. Turns out Kazuko had a similar experience when she was younger which only briefly gets referenced to in the movie, but this makes her think that time leaping is a common thing for some people in her family. Makoto uses her newfound ability to go back to the past reliving similar experiences but exiting whenever she wants, plus she doesn't seem to have to deal with any pesky paradoxes like running into an alternate version of herself as each leap sets up a totally separate timeline for her just slip into. This has a serious caveat to it as it effects the lives of the people around her, this bringing the strange message she first saw when she gained her power which states the "time waits for no one". Makoto learns that a girl has deep feelings for Kosuke, so she tries to set the two of them up, while at the same time Chiaki tries to ask Makoto out. There is a major twist that lays out the entirety of the final act which plays outside of Makoto's control as her supply of time leaps begins to run out, and the giveaway is very convoluted with lots of dangling plot threads and unanswered questions. Ultimately though, the focus of the story is more character-based and how people's relationships can be shaken by even the most minimal changes.

The finale does spread a large emotional doubt on how to interpret the original intentions of this adaptation of a 40-year-old book which just resolved everything by giving all the characters involved with amnesia. However, this remake doesn't make people forget and instead Makoto has to deal with the consequences of her actions in both the present and altered present, even as she comes to terms about how she feels about her friends and what kind of future she wants to walk into. Mamoru Hosadu made this a visually stunning film with many scenes just taking in the beauty of the mundane world in the background which is something he'd utilize in future productions like Wolf Children and Mirai, although Mirai seemed to have a better grasp on the concept of time travel than this film did. The Girl Who Leapt Through Time is more of a character study than a fully realized story and borderlines being episodic as it's broken down into to the 3-act structure, especially at its conclusion. The anime movie is at best a loose adaptation of the source material, and the film is charming most of the time, while simultaneously leaving a hard impact with some of the revelations we learn about upon the way. This delivers as a solid quality animated production, but the time tripping can leave the viewer wanting to know more about the true history of some of these characters which this film doesn't deliver on.

R.I.P. Peter Cullen

 

R.I.P. Tim Curry

 

ANI-MOVIES, *Grave Of The Fireflies

The horrors of World War II have been the focus of several anime films including Barefoot Gen and Rail Of The Star, but Grave Of The Fireflies is considered the definitive movie, especially since it was the second outing for Studio Ghibli. Oddly enough, since this came out the same year as Ghibli's My Neighbor Totoro, it was sold as a double feature with the film in various international releases at the time which makes for a severe contrast in tone going from war atrocities to a cheerful modern day fairy tale. Isao Takahata directed this and went on to direct an even more opposite anime movie in Kiki's Delivery Service which was also an uplifting family picture but didn't hold back on the inhumanity that war takes on both sides of the story, which is striking considering this was the first film Takahata directed for Ghibli. Most have seen this film as being Takahata's magnum opus, even though it's one of the most somber movies ever made and it drains enough from just one viewing that you never feel the need to watching a second time. It's visually revered and thought of as being one of Ghibli's most detailed movies of the 80s, but the sobering effect that the story has on you will quickly take you out of being mesmerized by anything you see. This was based on a short story by Akiyuki Nosaka who wrote it in 1967 to make amends for losing his adopted younger sister as Japan was recovering from the fall of war which he basically saw himself as a coward but still lived to tell his story. This is the only other Ghibli movie that neither Disney nor GKids owned the rights to outside of The Red Turtle.

Starting in late 1945, we see a homeless boy named Seita die of starvation in a train station with his spirit joining that of his departed sister Setsuko in a field full of fireflies. The story then skips back a few months later where their home is bombed by Americans during the Pacific War. Seita and his sister move in with their aunt as their father is still in the navy, but it's later on told that he was probably killed after Japan surrendered. Seita doesn't have a school or place to work at as they were all destroyed during the air raids, so his aunt gets cross with them complaining that she tires of having to take care of anyone outside her immediate family. Seita and Setsuka move out on their own and live in a nearby air shelter, although Seita resorts to stealing from other people in order to keep the two of them alive. Setsuka eventually dies of malnutrition, with Seita burning her body to ashes and keeping them inside a tin can that he used to keep candy in for her.

The message of Grave Of The Fireflies wasn't intended to be an anti-war movie, but more how the lives of those who survive a war are inevitably destroyed by it. There is no real authority working against the pair of siblings, although their bipolar aunt pulls a major switch at some point when she gets fed up with being responsible for estranged family, which in fact shows how the war turned people inwards and only caring for themselves and their loved ones leaving all the other victims out in the cold. Ghibli's craftmanship shines brightly in this despite the haunting musical score and the heart wrenching plight of these orphans who have been abandoned by a self-gratifying society. This film is a must-see for any aficionado of animation as the emotional hand-drawn style is something that is lost on movies of today, however the weight of guilt that the story tries to burden you with makes it difficult to watch more than once in a lifetime.

ANI-MOVIES, *Aztec Batman: Clash Of Empires

For a DC Animated Movie to come out after the conclusion of the Tomorrowverse proves that there's some gas left in their direct-to-video productions, but this doesn't live up to the reputation of former DCAU films. Aztec Batman: Clash Of Empires is an original story set in a parallel universe much like the other DC Elseworlds titles. Warner Bros. teamed up with Mexican animation studio Anima to create a tale that would bring more awareness to colonialism and how it affected the Aztecs, although this really took the wrong approach to it. The quality has severely dropped compared to other Elseworlds animated movies like The Doom That Came To Gotham or Gotham By Gaslight and it's like they took any creative idea for an alternate history and filled the cast with random characters from the Batman roster. The animation is stiff and way below theatrical standards, plus the way the story folds out it seems more like one of compilation films of an online DC animated mini-series being broken up into several chapters, even with their own separate fade out scene changes. The real rusty nail sticking out of the whole affair is that it was done intentionally as the first part of a franchise as if there was any potential for it to get a sequel.

Set in another reality, Coatl is the son of a village chief whose entire population is killed off by Spanish conquistadores from Cuba led by the greedy Cortes who becomes this world's version of Two-Face, who is accompanied by the Azrael placeholder. Coatl trains with his family's retainer to become a masked warrior modeled after an Aztec bat god, plus gains an ally in the disguised thief of Jaguar Woman. A forest spirit who here is a good version of Poison Ivy helps Coatl realize his true destiny as a tool for the gods, all while a corrupt priest accepts the idea of madness and murders his family to appease his own delusionary deity by becoming the Joker of this story. Ultimately, the Aztecs repel the Spaniards for the time being with threat of a token Penguin filler villain that shows up in a post-credit scene.

Even though this took a lot of historical liberties, the movie takes people who really existed and rewrote them into being comics characters. The story fills most of the squares in their Batman bingo card when it comes to a new interpretation of the Caped Crusader, but it takes its time getting to each plot point as the characters fill in their roles as Gotham City regulars. This is an R rated movie, so there's a decent amount of bloody maiming, but there is no replay value in this at all and would've been better off as a comic book story instead of an original animated movie.

ANI-MOVIES: *Batman Ninja Vs. Yakuza League

Seven years after the bombastic Batman Ninja anime movie came out, the sequel has the Dark Knight coming across a dark version of the Justice League. Batman Ninja Vs. Yakuza League takes place right after the previous and we got Kazuki Nakashima from Kamen Rider returning to write the screenplay. This was largely all animated in 3D cel-shading with occasional 2D scenes including a loving ode to 70s Super Robot shows, although it's gotten a little bit of an upgrade for the sequel, although Warner Bros. Animation is still falling behind in CGI quality compared to Sony or Disney. The style is the bigger attractor here than the actual story and taking into account how bonkers the first movie was is really saying something. The strange change here is that none of the original English casts came back for this, so voice-over regulars like Grey Griffin, Tara Strong, and Roger Craig Smith were absent. There is dynamic action with exaggerated fights between masked mortals and superpowered gangsters.

After Batman and the others finally return from the alternate feudal Japan, they all awake to find out the world isn't the same as it used to be. Gotham keeps getting attacked by yakuza with jetpacks from floating Japanese city mirroring Gotham in the sky, and the regular Justice League is missing. Batman and Robin go to investigate to run across yakuza-themed alternates to the JLA who are all evil and working for Ra's Al Ghul who manipulated the Quake Engine from the previous movie to fold together a new reality where these superheroes-turned-gangsters are his allies. Fortunately, the alternate Wonder Woman is on Batman's side against Ra's, and she teams up with the regular Harley Quinn to try and save Robin who was kidnapped by the yakuza Superman, plus Joker makes an appearance to help Batman from crashing to his death since killing Batman is his job. The remaining Bat-Family consisting of Nightwing, Red Hood, and Red Robin team up with Wonder Woman and her Amazon ninjas to take down the members of the League including Aquaman, Flash, and Green Lantern Jessica Cruz. The toughest one was conspicuously left out of most promotions for the film was the yakuza Superman that Batman stops with red solar energy. The last part has the Bat-Family and the reformed Yakuza League preventing Ra's from crashing the floating city into Gotham which could cause worldwide devastation.

This was more of a style over substance project as it requires for Bat-fans and your average otaku would be concerned, although the plot remains true to its outlandish premise. There are some inconsistencies between this sequel and the original like what happened to Catwoman and all other villains from the previous film, and Ra's explanation on how he created a whole new reality after tampering with time tripping is very hand wavy. There are plenty of homages to Japanese figures like a montage with the Bat-Family in their own tokusatsu anime, plus Wonder Woman motivating her Amazon sisters by belting out an enka-themed karaoke number, and Harley Quinn sporting her Sukeban Deka punk schoolgirl uniform is peak otaku fresh. Oddly enough, another aspect of the film is that it personifies the yakuza live-action movies of which anime is in the minority of. The entire film was animated by Warner Bros. so there was no other anime studio involved in its production. The high-octane superhero action is a breath of fresh air compared to the fatigue who most have experienced from the MCU, so this is the Elseworlds story you never knew you wanted.

How Anime Influenced My Adventures With Superman: Season 3 Edition

Season 3 of My Adventures With Superman has even more bishonen traits than the previous seasons. This season is a revision of the Reign Of The Supermen saga which originally came in the aftermath of Superman’s first lethal battle with the monster Doomsday, although strangely enough the main instigator of that saga is completely left out of the story. This is possibly because Doomsday was more of a force of nature than an actual villain, so the focus shifted to Cyborg Superman and eventually to The Eradicator who initially was not really a villain either but a Kryptonian artifact that was meant to take Superman’s place in the event of his death. This adds a few more layers to the traditional storytelling involved in Superman than even the comics normally represent.

With several other superhero animated shows now playing on American TV like X-Men 97, Batman: Caped Crusader, and Invincible, My Adventures With Superman had to separate itself from the rest of the herd in order to maintain its own identity which is why the anime-themed fight sequences were amped up to shattering levels of destruction. The show was not afraid to get brutal either with entire buildings being destroyed and background character being reduced to piles of ash, although it equally played on the happy-go-lucky everyday shenanigans that Clark, Lois, and Jimmy get into, plus with the addition of Kara now doing her best Starfire impression in not being able to pick up on Earth colloquialisms makes her a perfect fish out of water candidate.

The third season starts roughly a year after Brainiac’s attack, with Supergirl now in her new outfit and Jimmy giving her room to explore the world by dating with up-and-coming super villainesses. Superman finds a backwards but well-meaning clone of himself who would be Bizarro that skulks away and gets a job selling ice cream. Luthor has set up his own business with Slade as his partner, and they remake astronaut Hank Henshaw into the Cyborg Superman who goes haywire. To stop this, Clark and Lois’ son Jon came from the future to stop Henshaw. Superman fights Henshaw but loses his powers in the fight, and Jon returns to the new future, but later an alternate Jon comes back with his younger sister Lara. Luthor makes an advanced clone called the Eradicator who steals Jon’s time travel watch to escape through time, although Luthor knows when he’ll return. Clark gets Bizarro to take him back to his Fortress and has his powers restored as the Superman Family, Checkmate, and the Cavalry battle Eradicator who beats all of them. Superman arrives and wipes out Eradicator, Jon and Lara go back to the future, and Lois proposes to Clark.

So far, there’s been no confirmation about the fourth season, although a spinoff of My Adventures With Green Lantern featuring Earth’s second female Lantern, Jessica Cruz, who made a brief appearance showing her admiration for Supergirl. There remain several dangling plot threads what effect the Jon and Lara’s efforts have on their own future, what did Superman have to sacrifice to the Kryptonian god Rao to get his powers back, what was lying out in space that spooked Luthor so much, and how the heck did Amanda Waller go from a being hunted fugitive to becoming head of Checkmate. These and many other questions won’t be answered until the next Super-Time, next Super-Channel.

Where the previous seasons were cluttered with shonen elements, Season 3 goes full Dragonball Z as this borrows almost everything from the Cell Saga. Instead of Future Trunks, we get two variants of Superboy from separate futures and even added the Supergirl modeled after her Dark Knight Returns counterpart. Eradicator was clearly modeled after Cell himself as he could regenerate from any physical attack, plus replicating himself into hulked-out copies that he could just summon out of thin air. Even when Eradicator first arrives in the final battle, the show took the brief Future Trunks vs. Cyber-Frieza fight by having Superboy just cleaving the Eradicator in two with a Final Fantasy sword, although he should have chopped him into pieces and blasted them into ashes. There’s also plenty of scenes where Superman or other Kryptonians experience a momentary power up if they dig deep into their convictions.

My Adventures With Superman took a few pages out of more recent superhero shows like The Boys and Invincible by cranking up the violence. Superman fights copies of himself like Eradicator and Cyborg-Superman which leave behind devastation, and like a good portion of Super Sentai shows, Metropolis is just somehow completely back up to specs by the next episode after a climactic battle. Another aspect that it takes from various sentai shows is Superman’s evolving armor he shows up in at the final fight which even came with shoulder pylons straight from Evangelion. Luthor also steals from Professor X when he uses a Cerebro knockoff to take control of the Eradicator.

Most of the mecha designs keep to the ones established in the previous two seasons. The only big difference is when Toyman returns and uses a Gundam bootleg to attack a comic convention. Although all the other Kryptonian-based hardware still gets hacked into which you’d think that Luthor or Waller would’ve tried to prevent considering how often it happens.

Clark and Lois' relationship goes to a real shojo-themed arc, specifically from Sailor Moon. Lois realizes that she’s going to be a mother by having her children coming back in time, so at the end she decides to solidify a better future by proposing to Clark. Most shojo anime had the main couple doing the whole “will they, won’t they” routine to eventually getting together, but the fact that Lois had the guts to be the one to propose is step up from your average schoolgirl romance. Jimmy and Kara’s relationship is explored, although they decide to remain friends, which is something consistent from the comics as the two of them have never had a canonical relationship.

What the future has in store for this show as well as other animated shows based on DC Comics is largely up in the air, partially due to the Warner/Discovery merger, plus James Gunn’s consistency of making big plans for a series only to go back and cancel the idea is getting repetitive. My Adventures With Superman is not a part of Gunn’s scheduled DC timeline, so even if that ends up falling flat like the Snyderverse, it shouldn’t cause any problems if this series continues. There’s the Green Lantern spinoff series in the works that takes place in the same continuity. Showrunner Josie Campbell is also in charge of a new animated series about Starfire before she came to Earth as one of the Teen Titans, so there might be connection to the My Adventures universe, plus the initial designs appear to be deeply rooted in anime. Just as the original Teen Titans animated series was already a tribute to otaku favorites, this season was stacked with battle shonen tropes.

ANI-MOVIES, *Wolf Children

Studio Chizu's first anime movie under their label after they had done The Girl Who Leapt Through Time with Madhouse was Wolf Children an original story that continues Japan's regret of hunting wolves to extinction over a century ago as reflected in anime like Wolf's Reign. Mamoru Hosada directed both movies, but this was one that started Studio Chizu with character designs by Gainax founder Yoshiyuki Sadamoto who had just previously worked on Summer Wars. Wolf Children is a supernatural tale set in modern day that highlights how important the role of a mother plays in people's lives. Maquia was a good example of maternal praise, but the mother figure here should win Mother of the Millenium for all her efforts as she's the perfect example of how difficult it can be for a single parent raising a family.

College student Hana lives on her own and falls for an unnamed man who later reveals to her that he is a werewolf, and probably the last one in Japan. The two of them have a daughter named Yuki and eventually a son named Ame. The wolf man is killed after chasing a bird in his beast mode, so Hana moves and her children to a place near the mountains which is where their father claimed to come from. Hana has to fix a ramshackle old house all on her own and learn to grow her own crops since they don't have enough money for groceries. Fortunately, the neighboring farmers come around to helping her in her efforts and she manages to get a job. Meanwhile, Yuki and Ame are learning to keep their lycanthropic heritage to a minimum as they can shift between human and wolf forms but realize they need to keep that a secret, so the locals won't start chasing after them with silver bullets. Yuki goes on to become an accepted student among her peers, while Ame has trouble fitting in. A new student named Sohei discovers Yuki is a werewolf after she loses her temper around him, but he comes to respect her and keeps her secret. Ame on the other hand leaves elementary school and begins to commute with the other animals in the mountain which is directed by an old fox Ame calls Sensei. Yuki eventually decides to live as a human while Ame embraces his wolf side and becomes a protector of the forest with Hana being proud of both of them, even though the film never reveals how Yuki explains to the neighbors that her son is missing.

The main message of Wolf Children is perseverance and the willingness to endure hardships for the ones you love. Yuki is probably the single greatest mother in all of anime considering everything she does to protect her children. She has to move to a new environment, learn agriculture, get a professional job, and repair their old house mostly all by herself, plus still being a loving mother without ever becoming mad at them. There are stunning moments of pure joy that the small family have when they're on their own, specifically the scene where the children experience snow for the first time and run free through the hills as wolves while still keeping their human child mentality. Despite some of its dramatic overtones, this is a great family feature with excellent pacing that totally ensnare you. Mamoru Hosada is another one of the animators that people refer to as the next Miyazaki, similar to Makoto Shinkai, but Hosada's particular passion for coming-of-age stories have left their mark, particularly with his further productions of The Boy And The Beast, Belle, and Scarlet. Wolf Children is an emotional experience that will tug at your heartstrings and won't let go even after the end.

ANI-MOVIES, *Puss In Boots: The Last Wish

While most of the last few Shrek movies were met with varying standards of quality, the first spinoff of Puss In Boots from 2011 received a mediocre response. So, it’s weird that 11 years later that DreamWorks would choose to a sequel to it. This time under Universal instead of Paramount, Puss In Boots: The Last Wish, the production got juiced up to Spider-Verse levels of animation with paintbrush aesthetics. Gone are most of the pop culture references, fart jokes, and pointless singalong finales as we got fantastic thrill ride with a familiar character but in a totally different kind of fairy tale parody. For one thing, there was way less Disney-bashing in this as showing disdain for them has practically become a national pastime at this point, and this helped DreamWorks give the Shrek franchise its own pair of legs so they’re not just throwing eggs at their old bosses. The film was in development limbo for a while, and it’s possible that this would have gone straight to streaming and even thought that worked for K-Pop Demon Hunters, it might not have found the audience it wanted if parents didn’t already trust the Shrek brand as something for the children to watch in theaters. This wasn’t just a fantasy adventure either but an ode to Clint Eastwood’s Dollars Trilogy with desperado showdowns mixed in with Puss’ swashbuckling antics.

Taking place after parting ways with the regular Shrek cast, Puss has gone back to being a solo buccaneer and dies after fighting a giant. He awakens to have a doctor tell him that he’s down to the last of his nine lives, which at first Puss brushes off, but gets terminally scared with a huge wolf claiming to be Death himself comes to claim his last life. Puss tries hiding in an old cat lady’s cottage where he meets the overly chipper puppy Perrito. Suddenly, the criminal gang of Goldilocks and her bear family come looking for Puss to help them find the Wishing Star that lies in the middle of the Dark Forest to grant them a single wish. The map to find this is in the clutches of a grown-up Jack Horner who hoards magical items and wants to wish for all the magic in the world. Working against all these grabby hands is the inclusion of Puss’ old girlfriend Kitty Softpaws who also want to make a with, so Puss teams up with Kitty and Perrito after getting the map so he can wish for more lives, with Goldilocks and the bears are on their tail, plus Horner and his enchanted arsenal in a big chase to claim the wish.

Antonio Banderas and Salma Hayek’s return as Puss and Kitty is the only big continuation from the former Shrek productions, but they put on a great performance reprising their roles. Producer Joel Crofford helped raise the grade of animation as even though the character designs are roughly the same but with added textures and less motion blur effects which make the movements seem more fluid which helps give the movie a better adaptation of an illustrated fairy tale. There’s great detail given to the background with subtle jokes and callbacks, plus real drama is added to the serious parts as the final duel between Puss and Death, and the body count piles up as people literally die along the way. The Last Wish is amazing as a stand-alone story that doesn’t require you to have seen the original or any other Shrek stuff, so give it a watch and you’ll find out why this sequel to a spinoff was worth all the hype.

ANI-MOVIES, *The Ribbon Hero

Osamu Tezuka was the point of departure when anyone brings up the founding of anime and manga, and one of his lesser-known creations was Ribbon No Kishi, otherwise known in English as Princess Knight. This was a manga Tezuka came up with in the 50s, and had it turned into an anime series in 1967 which had a limited English dub that aired in syndication. Since then, there has been no new animated adaptations, even though this was one of the first anime heroines to lead her own series and began the concept of genderbending in anime which inspired shows like Utena and Rose Of Versailles. The story is about a princess who was born with the heart of a male and female and usually engaged in swashbuckling adventures you’d expect out of your average Musketeer tale. Cue ahead to 2026 where Netflix finally dusted the idea off for a new movie titled The Ribbon Hero and made the point that this is a reboot and not a remake as there are some hints to the original franchise that show up near the end. With all the gender-fluid anime out now, you’d think this movie would embrace the non-binary aspects, but instead the director Yuki Igarashi barely covered it and turned this into a compressed story under two hours long, so it’s almost like you’re watching a TV series compilation instead of a fully fleshed out plot. This is a shame because animation studios Outline and Twin Engine did manage to make it beautifully picturesque, even though there are moments of slapstick that hinder the experience.

Seven years ago, the kingdom of Silverland was decimated by a monstrous Nergal, a stone-skinned kaiju under control of the mysterious King of Ash, and one of the only survivors is the Princess Sapphire who lost an arm during the attack. The other survivor is the royal scientist Zirco who is a short old lady that uses a small hovercraft to get around and makes Sapphire a new mechanical arm. The two make their way to the kingdom of Goldland led by the Mitra forces which have kept the King of Ash at bay by making the occasional sacrifice with innocent young souls. Sapphire makes friends with the local girl Pine and the two of them for a very sapphic bond, but she gets a job working in the mines digging for a special crystal. On her first day, Sapphire uses her magical ribbon to transform into a warrior called the Princess Knight when a Nergal attacks. This attracts the attention of Mitra lord Velvet who gets Sapphire to attack several points on the map that Nergal could return from. Despite these efforts, Nergal slowly begin to invade Goldland, and it’s up to the Princess Knight to save the kingdom as the gigantic King of Ash finally appears to receive its sacrifice. It’s later revealed that Sapphire is the latest incarnation of the Princess Knight and it’s a position given to a champion forged to defeat evil, so Sapphire has inherited the title from her 1960s predecessor.

The Ribbon Hero is a radical departure from the original premise and incorporates elements of the magical girl genre, particularly from Madoka Magica. Lesbian fangirls will revel with the sapphic representation here, plus the addition of the androgynous Velvet helps diversify it. The problem with the film shifts from a serious world-shattering crisis to a Tex Avery cartoon in a heartbeat. The narrative seriously lacks context and has trouble centering on a singular objective as near the end the film switches to live-action shots of the anime studios that helped produce it like the fourth wall breaks in End Of Evangelion. It’s hard to compare this to the original Princess Knight TV series because it’s presented as a stage play divided into acts where each is like a condensed arc. Sapphire’s binary nature also isn’t as prevalent here as in the 60s show, but the story does succeed in delivering the idea that the tale of the Princess Knight can be retold for a new generation and continue as an enduring legend.

R.I.P., Michael Donovan

ANI-MOVIES, *Isle Of Dogs

Whereas The Fantastic Mr. Fox was based on a Roald Dahl book, Wes Anderson's second stop-motion animated film was an original idea thought up mostly by him in Isle Of Dogs. This is a futuristic future fable set in a fictional Japanese city but told through the perspective of American viewers. Wes Anderson's auteur-driven filmmaking is on full display here with distinctive symmetry, unique color pallettes, quirky writing, and introspective dialogue. The animation is more fluid than Mr. Fox with a better frame rate which takes this up to Laika levels of productions, although there is some 2D animation thrown in whenever they have the occasional shot being shown a video display. Anderson was inspired to do this from the old Rankin-Bass 3D specials, plus borrowed some plot elements from various Disney films shown from the dog's perspective as well as The Plague Dogs. The film was PG-13 and intended for older audiences as there is some animal cruelty and mature themes which wasn't as cohesive as most people with families might have hoped for, but despite its limited theatrical release it gained numerous accolades. There was some controversy as the plot was catered more for Americans which incorporated colonialism as well as ignoring genuine Japanese culture as the film has stereotypical elements like sumo wrestling, kabuki theater, and haiku is apparently the ultimate form of speechmaking, plus the addition of a blonde American transfer student to advance the story who was ultimately pointless.

Happening in the 2030s, the Japanese town of Megasaki is under the corrupt rule of Mayor Kobayashi who has been planning on ridding their streets of dogs as most of the people running the town are huge cat lovers. To accomplish this, they design a flu intended for dogs, have all the dogs banished to the neighboring garbage-ridden Trash Island, and suppress any chances or protests to thwart their plans, including poisoning a professor who had developed a cure for the flu. Kobayashi inherited his position of mayor from his brother who passed away, and he adopted his rebellious nephew Atari who has created his own self-repaired plane to rescue his guard dog Spots. Atari crashes and is found by a pack of five dogs who decide to help him find Spots, even though the one stray of them named Chief isn't totally with the others on their decision. Chief and Atari get separated from the others and finally come across Spots who it turns out to be Chief's long-lost brother and is leader of a tribe of outcasted dogs, so Chief accepts his brother's position of bodyguard. All this is going on when the minority of dog lovers in Megasaki work against Kobayshi's plan, specifically a foreign exchange student who secretly falls for Atari. The showdown comes down to the dog refugees with their advocates breaking into Kobayashi's re-election celebration where it's revealed that everything was engineered by the mayor's Major Domo who planned this whole conspiracy. The dogs are accepted back into the city, the dog flu is cured, and Chief begins a partnership along a nice female dog he briefly met earlier in the movie.

Isle Of Dogs is one a kind in comparison to other stop-motion animated movies, even among the craft of Tim Burton's productions, although it does give into some cartoon cliches like whenever there's a big dog fight the entire scuffle is covered by a cloud of dust. The cast made this an amazing experience with Bryan Cranston as Chief returning to his anime roots back when he dubbed Macross Plus, plus other Wes Anderson regulars like Jeff Goldblum, Edward Norton, and Bill Murray. The story relies heavily on flashbacks and monologues that is big on backstory, so be ready for a non-linear experience. Anderson's idiosyncratic brand of cinematography shines in his second animated outing, and despite some its cultural flaws this is a film that demands repeat viewings to soak up all the hidden gems.

ANI-MOVIES, *Angel's Egg

For the first original movie by Ghost In The Shell director Mamoru Oshii, Angel's Egg is probably the most surrealistic anime movie ever made. Coming out in 1985, Oshii partnered with Final Fantasy artist Yoshitaka Amano to make an enigmatic fantasy that to this day people are still trying to figure out. Studio Deen who first broke out in the Urusei Yatsura TV series was the production company behind this multi-layered film. This was an original story dreamt up by Oshii and Amano to which there has yet to have been anything to compare it to, and it has only recently become available in English thanks to GKids. After 40 years of escaping American localization, Angel's Egg had finally been cracked open for otaku everywhere to discover and dissect for themselves. The animation and design are incomparable to nearly any other anime of the time, and its visually breathtaking imagery could only have come out at the dawn of the OVA market when experimental production was at its peak. Titles such as The Time Stranger and Nausicaa would blend otherworldly elements together, but Angel's Egg was a bold new direction taking place in a completely original world of its own. However, the films esoteric perspective made it a hard sell for Western release despite its hypnotic appeal. The slow-moving animation coupled with the slightly muffled musical score creates its own world for the viewer to get lost in and either brush off as being dull or to be thoroughly analyzed in ways that make Evangelion look like a list of cheat notes.

Set in an undetermined time and place, an unnamed girl dwelling in an abandoned city collects water for herself while taking care of a large egg she found and carries with her. The girl come across a wandering older boy carrying a strange crucifix-shaped weapon, and the two of them watch as numerous fishermen throw spears throughout the city in the chance of spearing schools of non-corporeal giant fish which only cast huge shadows with no physical trace of their existence. The girl tells the boy that she believes the egg is that of an angel which might bring new life to the world, although the boy believes that the egg symbolizes that they are all caught in an endless loop, so he smashes the egg when the girl finally sleeps. The girl awakens to find nothing but a cracked eggshell, so she chases after the boy leading to a very ambiguous ending which depending on your perspective either shows the dystopian landscape either being freed from despair or it's just a moebious strip ensnaring all within it in repeating purgatory.

Prior to GKids, Angel's Egg did get a physical release in America in 1988, but this was a totally different beast. The film was a blending of the anime along with original live-action segments in a forgotten project titled In The Aftermath which diverts the story in an even more incomprehensible way. New Line Cinema premiered this with a VHS found usually only in video rental stores, and Arrow Video gave it a Blu-Ray release in 2019, but a majority of American otaku were blissfully unaware of this Frankenstein creation. Even though anyone who watched this version of the movie was probably confused out of their mind when comparing it to the original anime, hardcore anime fans became familiar with Angel's Egg thanks to good old reliable fansubs. The new GKids release has the entire unedited animation motion picture with its first ever English dub, even though it did take its sweet time getting here considering the caliber of talent behind it. New Line's slapdash rehash of the anime kept the film in licensing limbo for years, but now its overdue homecoming has arrived and available on Blu-Ray and streaming.

MISC. MANGA, *Space Opera Xanadax Across The Unknown Dimensions Of The Galaxy

Original graphic novels are still as strong on the comics market as ever, and Space Opera Xanadax Across the Unknown Dimensions of the Galaxy gives you a gripping cinematic experience. Created by Tom Scioli who did the kaiju ode to literature in Godzilla's Monsterpiece Theater, his latest hardcore sci-fi epic has probably one of the longest titles for an American comic book to date. The character designs appear as if they're out of the box cover to an NES game, and there's two concurrent storylines going on at the same time, although the plots never actually seem to meet up before the end of the book. There's is also the bonus story of Princess: The Space Princess From Outer Space which also has an abrupt conclusion. No word as yet if this was intentional for either story or if there are plans for a future volume to continue the saga.

The story is broken into two parts. One involves a cyborg named Xanadax who was given bionic parts to become a more effective minor after his brother sentenced him to work in the mines while he kept his cozy command job. Among other gizmos like a mechanical eye, Xanadax also gets a pair of laser claws similar to Wolverine which he uses to bust out of jail. Along the way, he gets into a bombastic slugfest with the escaped supervillain Vokonokov which takes him the majority of his story to defeat while avoiding his pesky brother's troopers. The other story has a pair of space pirates first taking over a farming planet but then getting conscripted into stealing a powerful treasure which accidently kills their benefactor, so the stellar swashbucklers decide to keep the deadly secret to themselves.

The story of Xanadax plus the space pirate subplot make you feel like you're really watching a sweeping motion picture with action scenes going one after the other with no time for exposition or character development. Tom Scioli's style is an homage to the works of Jack Kirby while simultaneously giving off the appearance of a shonen manga with mainly just the colors of red, white, and black throughout the entire graphic novel. Again, it's unknown if this setting up a series because the cliffhanger ending for both Xanadax and the Princess backup stories, but hopefully it will continue to highlight Scioli's beautiful illustrations which are a throwback to 80s action movies.

ANI-MOVIES, *The Croods: A New Age

Joel Crawford was given the reigns of the Puss In Boots sequel which took everyone by surprise, but before that he directed another DreamWorks sequel, The Croods: A New Age. Released 7 years after the original, this continues the prehistoric sitcom as the titular family finally reach some other humans. This took longer to release because of the pandemic which caused much of the work to be done by creators working in lockdown from home. The Croods was doing good enough as a franchise with an animated TV prequel, and was given a follow-up taking place after The New Age. All the original cast returns with this being Cloris Leachman's voice over swansong, plus the addition of Peter Dinklage and Kelly Marie Tran makes the new talent welcoming.

Still on the look for a perfect settlement in their new country, Guy and Eep get further along in their young romance. Conveniently, Grug discovers a family called the Bettermans made of Phil, Hope, and their daughter Dawn who managed to create their own sealed off paradise all because they cut off the water supply to a valley to their home. The Bettermans were friends of Guy's family and they got separated before his parents died, and now Phil along with Hope plan to get Guy to be Dawn's husband, even though he's already betrothed to Eep. Grug and Ugga pick up that the Bettermans are trying to push them away, so get back at them for eating all the bananas which is the one forbidden fruit the Bettermans have a rule for. Turns out, Phil would give all the bananas to an army of punchy monkeys who in turn offer them to their giant mandrill overlord, and they all kidnap all the mens. So now, it is up to the remaining females to rescue them as they ride in on wolf-spiders to defeat the primates and save their families.

The Croods: A New Age is a good animated movie sequel with an noticable upgrade in the animation, although the designs on the Bettermans seem like they were copied from a cache of unused DreamWorks background characters. A large number of the jokes fall flat, and the movie is overly reliant on needledrop moments for their soundtrack. It's an amusing feature, although whether or not you'll find much replay value out of this is up to the viewer.

ANI-MOVIES, *Lu Over The Wall

After The Night Is Short, Walk On Girl came out in 2017, Science Saru had their second anime film released in the same year, both put out by Toho. Lu Over The Wall might seem like yet another anime take on The Little Mermaid, although this one is not a romance, however you will notice the film bears a resemblance to Ponyo as the mermaid here is more of a little sister to the male protagonist. Even the creator Masaaki Yuasa began to see how his story reflected Ponyo as he was making it, and he took the same approach a few years later when he directed Ride Your Wave. Science Saru really experimented with different styles of animation with hand-drawn key frames with all the in-betweens done with Flash, and keep in mind this was still the late 2010s, but the film still looks like a traditionally animated production. There are a few songs added to this movie too, but it couldn't count as a musical as its all performed by a band. GKids did gave the dub a good treatment, although for some reason a few of the songs were left in Japanese while some were dubbed in English.

Set in a bayside fishing village, Kai lives in emotional solitude with his father and grandfather while his mother left them to have a singing career in Tokyo. Kai has his parents' love for music and a talent for it which gets the attention of two of his schoolmates, Yuho and Kunio, and they form a band called Seiren. Kai's music attracts a Ningyu which is the Japanese equivalent of a mermaid, but instead of being a nice-looking redhead this mermaid named Lu looks more like baby Muppet, plus she grows human-like legs whenever she hears music she likes, and she takes a real liking to Kai and his music despite the fact that sunlight could kill her. Lu's existence becomes known to the rest of the village, and they want to use her as the mascot for their abandoned amusement park, so Seiren tries to help Lu along with her giant shark father, but the townsfolk prejudice evokes a curse which threatens to drown the village. Lu and Kai eventually lift the curse, then Lu along with the other merfolk creatures must leave the village coast because there's no longer anything blocking out the sun, but Kai resolves to pursue his passion in music until he and Lu can be reunited.

Lu Over The Wall is a fine movie for the whole family with no violence, even though there are some frightening imageries throughout the course of the film. Masaaki Yuasa took this comic fantasy in an unorthodox direction, both visually and tonally, plus the animation style can radically change which make it hard to keep up with figuring out whether the scene you're seeing is a flashback or not. Again, don't expect this to be a tale of star-crossed lovers like The Little Mermaid, although there is a small romantic element to it. If you've already watched Ponyo, then this isn't too unfamiliar, but it does pick up to slapstick levels of Tex Avery antics as it goes along. The plot is diverse as well as divisive among anime fans, but you might find something refreshing here.

ANI-MOVIES, *The Bad Guys 2

Being the franchise factory that they are, DreamWorks figured they'd apply the same arrangement for The Bad Guys. Coming out three years after the original, The Bad Guys 2 not only put the brand name back on tracks but also helped launch a prequel animated TV series on Netflix. The animation here reaches an even higher peak than the original did, and they literally raise the stakes by taking the premise and launches it into space which is usually where you take a franchise after you don't know what to do with it anymore (see Jason X for reference). The story takes a good approach on showing how reformed villains are treated after they renounced their evil ways by how no one wants to give them a chance at fitting into civilian society. The story does advance things a little fast as most characters seem to get more advanced in their personal progress that a single sequel should cover, although at least DreamWorks doesn't look like they'll keep this premise jumping through several hoops like they did with the Shrek movies.

Now being good, the Bad Guys have been trying to get legitimate jobs but keep getting shut down. Meanwhile, a crimewave hits town with a new thief called the Phantom Bandit when it's really a trio of female crooks referred to as the Bad Girls who set up Wolf and the others to join them in their latest caper by having them take the fall for a heist involving a luchador wrestling match. The Bad Girls include their leopard leader Kitty Kat, Pigtail the boar, and Doom the raven who manipulates Snake into falling for her. Kitty Kat's big scheme is to steal a space shuttle and collecting a made-up mineral called MacGuffinite to attract all the gold in the world to the International Space Station which for some reason is totally unmanned, and as leverage Kitty threatens to expose Governor Diane's criminal past. The Bad Guys go along with it, but the Bad Girls get the drop on them and expose Diane's hidden history to the internet. With nothing left to lose, the Bad Guys get a lift on the shuttle, win over Pigtail and Doom to their side, and stop Kitty's ludicrous plan. However, they along with Diane fake their deaths and are asked to become part of a special spy team called ISGLOP, while it turns out the entire caper was a plot by the villain from the first movie to get out of jail and is really an alien.

The Bad Guys 2 isn't a common sequel and leveled up the formula by taking it several steps forward. Normally, the first sequel to an animated film has the characters running through the same routine as in the original, but this film continues the story and levels it up to Super-Saiyan 2. The best aspect here is the animation which takes anthropomorphic characters with standard cartoon designs and blends it together with stunning action sequences. The CGI animation is dynamic and takes quite a few hints from Sony with their Spider-Verse outings. The only downside is that it tried to stuff too much into a single film meaning that the third movie will go ballistic with whatever outrageous plot it has in store.

ANI-MOVIES, *The Place Promised In Our Early Days

Makoto Shinkai's first full-length anime movie came out in 2004 titled The Place Promised In Our Early Days, and similar to his future works such as Your Name and Weathering With You this anime has star-crossed lovers separated by cosmic forces. This was also the first time Shinkai had worked with a full staff as opposed to when he started out doing his animated-short movies and OVAs all on his own, so when he hooked up with Comix Wave Inc. it was a match made in heaven as their combined efforts left its mark for years to come. This movie was able to bridge a great divide that still exists between anime fans and non-fans that anime is a media and not a genre, meaning its appeal isn't limited to simply a certain demographic, and this became much clearer as Shinkai's career went on as his productions went on to enrapture audiences, mostly due to the creator's work becoming more accessible to newcomers and when his films were given longer running tile, not that this hampered 5 Centimeters Per Second which was just under an hour long and got a live-action adaptation. The story itself is an alternate history yarn, and like most tales of that genre it involves WWII, but this is combined with a coming-of-age romance with heavy sci-fi overtones. It's almost like you're watching Evangelion minus the giant robots and monsters. In fact, most of the expository scenes that try to fill in the technobabble your used to hearing from Star Trek looks like all the high-tech facilities look like they take place in Tokyo-3, even the computer displays and control room layouts. Taking this parallel universe premise and fitting in a believable love story wasn't easy, but Shinkai managed to do it.

This is set in modern day in a world where Japan was split into two sections post-WWII, the north occupied by Russia, and the south occupied by America, also the Cold War is still active in this timeline. Two schoolfriends in the south, Hiroki and Takuya, are rebuilding an old aircraft they found and plan to make it flyable again so they can go to an enormous tower in the north region. Hiroki has a crush on his schoolmate Sayuri and invites her to see their progress. The boys promise to take Sayuri with her on their future endeavor, but then she goes missing and three years pass with Hiroki and Takuya abandoning their planned flight. After a time skip, Takuya is now a physicist working on a method of utilizing energy from parallel realities and finds out that Sayuri has been in a coma during all this time and her dreams are affecting the interaction between their universe and others. Hiroki has been living on his own but gets dreams from Sayuri who finally breaks through and informs him that her subconscious is trapped in a world where she's the only one in it, so Hiroki teams up with Takuya to free Sayuri from her mental exile. The two old schoolfriends meet up again to finish repairs on their plane and fly the comatose Sayuri to the tower which is acting as the nexus for all the multiverse mix-ups run by the northern faction. Since it's only a two-seater, Hiroki pilots the plane with Takuya stays behind all while both halves of Japan on the brink of war. Not to give away the ending, but it has a more satisfying conclusion than Shinkai's Five Centimeters Per Second.

The Place Promised In Our Early Days was first released in America through ADV Films but was later available on certain streaming servers and only subtitled. GKids eventually re-released it on home video format and streaming with the American dub. This was Makoto Shinkai's big theatrical debut, and it won lots of film festival awards, although in comparison to most of his other works this movie is slightly jumbled when Shinkai tried to combine a slice-of-life story with the overlapping interdimensional tropes. Shinkai managed to untangle this knot by the time he started his Disaster Trilogy as most of the otherworldly elementals are explained as simply being magic. Aside from the plot complications, this anime is glittering with Shinkai's particular style with lush horizons and backgrounds that make Ghibli look pale in comparison, plus the character designs are simple and reminiscent of 90s TV anime which at times works against the detailed landscapes. The film altogether is great but compared to Shinkai's future works it is not as memorable.

ANI-MOVIES, *Hercules

Rather than sticking with his original name, Disney decided for its 35th full-length animated movie to go with the more well-known Roman name of the mythical Greek hero, Hercules. Instead of this being an epic saga up there with The Odyssey, Disney decided to turn this into a musical done to gospel for some reason and threw in more pop culture callbacks than any historically inaccurate parody could comfortably contend with. This was directed and written by the combined talents of Ron Clemments and John Musker, and they figured that their modernized approach to the Hercules myth could work exactly like it did with their take on Aladdin. The Disney version attempts to establish how Hercules was the original superhero prototype and how he went through several struggles to reach his fame, although instead of crafting a relatable story that most kids in 1997 could wrap their head around it Disney went with a bit more of a cash grab and have a lifetime cycle of victories and losses into a whirling cavalcade of whatever happened to breeze into their minds at the time. This adaptation of Hercules showboats more than it needed to and could have been just a high production animated adventure which is a genre that most theatrical Disney productions tend to skip on. Obviously in order to make the film more kid friendly they had to edit out most of Hercules' tragic moments like when he turned psycho and killed his whole family, but accomplish that Disney had to pacify the general audiences. To this they added music numbers that had no business being in the film specifically sung by the main characters about what they want out of life. Another unwanted premise was the quirky attention-grabbing secondary character introduced halfway through the movie which worked for Genie in Aladdin but here started Disney's spiral down with the introduction of the annoying Phil and continued onward with other placeholders like Mushu in Mulan and BEN in Treasure Planet which are characters that demand you stop thinking about the ropey narrative and pay attention to their overhyped antics. Hercules isn't based on a fairy tale, so that was already working against the Disney formula, plus anyone who spotted the historical hiccups in the Pocahontas movie most have had a field day pointing the ones in this one. Despite the plot complications and its questionable approach to bringing a world-famous fable to life, Disney did manage to make this one of the most visually arresting animated films of the 90s which is something a great number of people failed to notice upon seeing this for the first time, and its character designs by cartoonist Gerald Scarfe helped establish the film's unique style.

In ye olde Greece, Zeus and Hera have their god newborn son Hercules, but Zeus' charismatic brother Hades sees his nephew as a serious roadblock in his future plan to take over the world. Hades gives baby Hercules a potion which makes him mostly mortal with no memory of his origins and is raised by mortals. Years later, Hercules gets in touch with his real father who relays that Hercules can get his godhood if he becomes a genuine hero. To get this Hercules trains under the hero training satyr Phil, when it should have been Chiron who was Achilles' Jedi Master. A while later, Hercules returns and begins to bash monsters and other menaces with his super-strength which angers Hades whose plans involve releasing the Titans from their prison and conquer Mt. Olympus, so he sends a distressed damsel who owes him a favor to distract him. The non-princess heroine Megara (or Meg) gets in good with Hercules and become the Delilah to his Samson, even though she begins to actually care about him and sees the real goodness in him. The time comes for Hades' scheme to unfold, so he makes a deal with Hercules to become totally mortal while the Titans assault Mt. Olympus so long as Meg isn't hurt. Meg saves Hercules at the cost of her own life which gives him his strength back and defeats the Titans. Herc then travels to Tartarus to free Meg's soul, regains his full godhood, and sends Hades drowning in the river Styx for probably all eternity.

Hercules did very well and made three times its budget back merely from the theatrical release alone. The music by Alan Menkin is good but most of the songs not sung by the gospel-themed muses are flat. The star-studded cast includes James Woods in the performance of his troubled career as Hades, and the former Broadway version of Belle actress Susan Egan as Meg, although Tate Donovan as the title character is lackluster, and Danny DeVito's unriveting riffs as Phil get real tired real fast. The movie managed to spawn a non-canonical midquel animated TV series that lasted only a single season and didn't get much traction, even after a crossover with Aladdin. Disney's Hercules made its mark on cinematic animation, even though after three decades its flaws are still transparently apparent.