ANI-MOVIES, *Spriggan

Based on the manga of the same name that ran from 1989-1996(known as Striker in the U.S.), the series gained enough success to garner an anime movie adaptation in 1999. The movie was produced by none other than Akira creator, Katsuhiro Otomo, which helped push its success out in America. It was a major release for ADV FIlms back in their heyday.

The story is about a special organization known as Arkham(or “ARCAM”)which seeks out ancient artifacts that could threaten humanity. They have special agents called Spriggans who hunt down these artifacts. One of their best agents is Yu Ominae. He heads out to stop the ones who have been killing off his friends and other Arkham members. Turns out its the U.S. military, who are trying to prevent Arkham from claiming the actual Noah’s Ark, which has been found in the mountains of Turkey. The Americans send in their “U.S. Machine Corps” to stop Ominae, although he first gets some resistance from the local government, and a few of your standard backstabbing turncoats. He then has to take on two killer cyborgs, one of which is a giant dude with a minigun arm that was Ominae’s old commanding officer. Ominae gets some help from a French Spriggan and then has to free the Ark from the young psychic cyborg, Colonel McDougal. McDougal is under the delusion that God himself lead him to the Ark. The Ark itself is actually an alien spaceship which apparently created all life on Earth. McDougal activates it, and plans to use it to wipe out humanity, and begin a new world. Ominae uses his pumped-up cybersuit to ultimately stop McDougal, although their fight seems like something more out of the last level of an old Mega Mangame. The Ark implodes, and the threat is neutralized.

The movie makes for one badass action flick. The only thing is that it seems to come a little short as far as the actual story, while in some parts its padded out too many long shots of scenery, even if the attention to detail is exquisite, plus some of the flashback sequences come in at the most inappropriate times. The main drawback is all the speeches and overdone exposition. However, the action scenes make up for it big time. This is mostly due to the excellent direction by Hirotsugu Kawasaki, whose other works include Memories and the Naruto movies. Spriggan makes for a great summer blockbuster movie, so make sure you check it out before school starts.

The first known case of tentacle rape

JESI THE GENIE, *Part 5: Page 1

Story by Jer Alford. Art by Aimi Tokutake.

OBSCURE O.V.A.S, *Cosplay Complex

This 3-episode OVA series was one of several titles which came out at the time that catered to a specific branch of anime fandom. Just like Comic Party was about doujinshi artists, Cosplay Complex deals with the obsession some otaku have with cosplay, both in wearing costumes and the fans view of it.

As in most anime, in what seems like a mundane average event like a costume contest and hypes it up to "are you freakin' kidding me" levels. Here, a Japanese high school has a special cosplay club which frequently takes part in competitions, which apparently are supposed to lead up to something called the Cosplay World Series. The ditsy Chako is trying her best to be the group's best cosplayer, but her klutziness gets in the way all the time. Fortunately, she gets help from a small bunnygirl fairy(yes)who came to our dimension with a strange owl creature, and she uses magic to help Chako fit into costumes better. You'd think this would count as cheating as the other cosplayers she goes up against aren't using some genie or fairy godmother to help them win a masquerade contest. Chako first has to compete against the Italian exchange student Jenny who has an anti-Lolita complex. The club then goes for a retreat at a shrine near the beach to hone their cosplay skills, where Chako falls for the photographer in her school. The final part is yet another cosplay contest where our heroines clash with a club from a rival school, who its revealed in a post-credits scene has their own bunnygirl fairy. There's this big subplot involving the sexy widow who Chako lives with who is supposed to be connected to rival school's cosplay club, but that also seems to be left ambiguous at the end.

This is a fairly enjoyable anime, although its mainly done for fan service. The really weird part is that this actually ties into the same universes as both G-On Riders and Hand Maid May(and subsequently Hand Maid Mai), as all three of these were directed by Shinichiro Kimura. It's worth checking out if you're a huge cosplay fanatic, or just looking for some blatant ecchi.

ANI-MOVIES, *Surf's Up

I caught this on Cartoon Network a while back, and was pleasantly suprised. It was marked when it first came out as yet another “penguin movie”, although it kinda made fun of the fact that there was already about 2 or 3 other movies with nature’s most perfect waterfowls in it. Hell, it was a step up from Pebble & The Penguin! This was created by Sony Pictures Animation who later did Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs, and you can see how their direction improved from this movie.

The movie is done like a documentary for an unknown network for animals(kinda like Animalympics)that is covering a surfing contest named after the dead surfing penguin, Big Z. Cody Maverick is a short but determined surfer from Antarctica who is major fan of Big Z, and makes his way into the contest, which takes place on the tropical island of Pen Gu. He makes friends with fellow surfer, a chicken from Wisconsin named Joe, plus the cute penguin lifeguard Lani. Cody’s main competition is Tank, the champion of the last few years, and the one who defeated Z in his final surf. Cody ends up loosing in a challenge to Tank, and Lani takes him to a hermit, who Cody figures out is really Z. He faked his own death in his last match because he felt threatened by Tank, and was tired of all the fame that came with being a big surfer. Z tries to get Cody to get his confidence back by helping him to make a new board. With a little cohersion from Lani, Cody gets his groove back, and re-enters the contest. He, Tank, and Joe are the finalists, but Cody sacrifices his chance to win by stopping Tank from knocking out Joe, so Joe ends up winning. Z has to save Cody from some reefs, in so revealing himself to the masses. However, Z convinces the other surfers to do surfing just for fun, so Cody and the other have a big party at the end of the movie.

I’d say that this was an enjoyable send up of surfer movies, without it pulling in alot of tropes and stereotypes. The voice acting was a seller too, with Shia LaBeouf almost paroding himself as Cody, Jon Heder(Napoleon Dynamite)is great at the clueless Joe, and Jeff Bridges(“The Dude”)is awesome as Z. The animation is pretty impressive too, matching the positive surfing scenes with the funny animal motifs. Surf’s Up is a decent movie for animation fans, and worth showing the kids for a good time.

JESI THE GENIE, *Part 4: Page 20

Story by Jer Alford. Art by E. Aedo.

OBSCURE O.V.A.S, *Plastic Little

Satoshi Urushima is best known for his work on such anime productions as Record Of Lodoss War and Bubblegum Crisis, or his designs for the Langrisser and Growlanser video games. However, a few of his own creations like Legend Of Lemnear have been adapted into anime as well. One is the oddly-titled Plastic Little, a one-shot OVA that was not originally a manga but the basis for its own action/sci-fi anime.

Set on a colonized alien world in the future, Tita is the spunky teenage captain of an airship/submarine called the Cha-Cha Maru whose crew seeks out exotic creatures. This trade is referred to as "petshop hunters", although it makes you think that they track down strip malls. Tita saves Elysse, the daughter of a brilliant scientist while she is on the run from the corrupt military. The highly-helmeted commander, Lord Guizel, plans to use Elysse's knowledge of a gyro system which sustains their nation's capitol in the air so he can take over the government. Tita takes Elysse back to the Cha-Cha Maru where she introduces her to the rest of her crew(who have some of the most stereotypical European accents ever!). Guizel eventually works out how to operate the gyro system, and its up to Tita to storm the complex and stop him. After making short work of the stormtroopers, Tita copies the ending to Return Of The Jedi by sending Guizel down an energy shaft. She then pulls out a Capt. Kirk-like deus-ex machina by exploding a typhoon to take out the rest of the evil fleet. Elysse leaves to help repair the damage caused by Guizel, which pretty much caused the entire city to be destroyed.

The OVA makes for a good story, although there was some pretty blatant boob-shots thrown into it, so much so that for its DVD release, ADV Films implemented their patented "jiggle-counter" with it. It features some impressive animation and character designs, plus the ending undersea battle is a real eyegasm. A short-lived manga series by Urushima acted as a sequal to the OVA, and released in America through CPM Manga. This is one of those anime titles that was a standard to own in the 90s, and I'd mainly recommend it to anyone from the era of gratuitous fan service!