ANI-MOVIES, *Encanto

Getting the Best Animated Feature Oscar, Encanto is a modern fairy tale with a more diversified cast and focuses on an entire family that is totally against formula considering this is a Disney movie. They made a point of making this production a musical which is something Disney usually only gives various segments of their movies to, which Lin-Manuel Miranda and Germaine Franco did an amazing job on. Byron Howard and Jared Bush directed this CGI animated flick that was not backed up by Pixar, and fully committed to making the surroundings itself as a genuine character on its own.

Taking place in Columbia, an unseen group of soldiers infiltrate a small village and chase the surviving couple Pedro and Alma with their newborn triplets. Pedro sacrifices himself to let the rest of his family get away, although Alma is fortunate enough to have a magic candle that conjures up a living house named Casita which can usually repair itself and tends to provide its inhabitants with whatever they provisionally need at the time. The house takes in other castaways and seals them off in a separate realm in the mountains called Encanto. Decades later, the town has flourished with each of the Alma's children and grandchildren getting their own unique super power like strength, enhanced hearing, making flowers grow, shapeshifting, or baking goods that heal people. Even her youngest grandson gains the ability to talk to animals, and each of the family's rooms have their own separate dimension where its bigger on the inside. The only one in the family who doesn't seem to have gotten a magical talent was Mirabel, even though she seems to be more attuned to the Castia's attempts to communicate, although the house has a serious problem clueing anyone in on its latest dilemma as the magic appears to be fading. Mirabel tries to inform her grandmother about the impending doom, but she stubbornly refuses to listen, an attitude that drove off her clairvoyant son Bruno who it turns out has been living inside Castia's cracks with a posse of rats. Mirabel finds out some of her family is not satisfied with the roles their powers have tied them to mostly using them to help out the citizens of the town, so the understanding teen attempts to get her uncle Bruno to do another vision of the house's fate. All signs point to Mirabel making peace with her bratty older sister who has chlorokinesis, even though this act caused the house to crumble faster after Alma disapproves of Mirabel's efforts. The house eventually crumbles and the family all lose their super powers. It all gets salvaged when Bruno reappears from his self-imposed exile and the villagers help rebuild Casita which restores everyone's powers. It might have been a bit more interesting if in the finale the house didn't regain its magic and just stood as a regular home with a normal family trying to adjust to their lives as regular people.

Encanto works as primarily as a musical, as the plot suffers from shifting from one member of the family to another leaving some of them completely out of the story with no real character depth. The magical elements leave an entire textbook's worth of lore left unexplained, like if Casita is alive and knows it's in trouble why it doesn't just tell Mirabel or anyone else of what the problem is. There have been spurious attempts by viewers to determine whether or not Mirabel actually had a magical gift of her own, like displaying comprehension as its own special attribute, but no clear answer has given. There's letting the concept of an enchanted world operate under its own laws of nature, however having the physics of a magical backdrop a complete mystery is for an uncertain way of how it's supposed to be interpreted. This would work well as a stage musical, but the movie's consistency at adding yet another plot complication doesn't make for a clear picture.

OBSCURE O.V.A.S, *The Humanoid

Yet another sci-fi one-shot from the 80's, The Humanoid was a joint effort between studios Kaname Production and Nishiko Pro in 1986 to make a fresh title that stood out on its own and not be tied to any existing media. The story seems like an extension of the Star Trek universe, even though the opening text crawl is strait out of Star Wars The title character appears to be a mix of Maria from the original live-action Metropolis film and one of the Silverhawks. A good portion of this OVA is taken up with showing off its pop music soundtrack which the creators really hoped to be a karaoke hit, and considering the feature is only 45-minutes long makes it even more pathetic. Central Park Media released this in English on VHS, DVD, and a very rare LD, even though it had an exceptional dub from the Ocean Group who most Americans would recognize handling the first few dubs of Dragonball.

Way off in the future, Earth has inhabited the lush planet of Lazeria also inhabited by the alien human Megalosians whose princess is being held there in security until she is old enough to assume her world's throne. The Megalosian in charge of this is the obviously evil Governor Proud who wants to utilize an ancient spaceship called the Iczeon that crashed there centuries ago. On this planet is the Earthling scientist Dr. Watson who has created one of the galaxy's first sentient androids named Antoinette while his daughter is waiting for space trucker Eric to finally arrive hauling his latest cargo. There is an excruciatingly overdone joke with Eric's partner Alan and his obsession with coffee that loses any humor the writers had in mind when they bring it up for the sixth time. Eric's ship crashes with him and Eric making it out on an escape capsule only to get shot down by Megalosian aircraft. They make their way to Watson's home where Antoinette seems to grow attached to Eric. Proud wants the two keys to the Iczeon ship, one of which is in the android's body. Antoinette rescues her friends at the cost of surrendering the key, but she sacrifices herself to stop the Iczeon which had already killed off most of the evil Megalosians.

The Humanoid is difficult to recollect after seeing it. The OVA's only real claim to fame is that the title character was designed by Hajime Sorayama who made a career of pinup of sexy metallic robot women. Aside from the cliche of a robot learning about human emotions that had already been done to death at that point, there isn't anything holding the viewer's attention aside from some decent aerial chases. This is more like a sample of what anime is to newbies in the late 20th Century.

OBSCURE O.V.A.S, *Cybernetics Guardian

Before he got started on gore fests like M.D. Geist, Koichi Ohata directed this OVA from 1989 that acts as a semi-prelude to his future cyberpunk saga, Genocyber. The special one-shot was written by Guyver author Riku Sanjo who had already worked with Ohata on the first M.D. Geist. Cybernetics Guardian came out in 1989 by AIC who was already dominating the OVA market with Bubblegum Crisis, in fact they did a production very similar to this earlier with Metal Skin Panic MADOX-1 which was about someone getting stuck inside a battle mecha. For this one, you can see a little of influence from monster movies like Frankenstein and King Kong playing a major influence in it while sticking to the recent success of Robocop.

In the city of Cyberwood in an alternate 2019 where mankind has learned to harness psychic energy, the Central Guard Company has created a new weapon for urban pacification, specifically intended to deal with a crime infested section simply referred to as Cancer. The mecha pilot aptly named John Stalker has his hardware infected by an evil spirit conjured up by the even weirdly cult named Doldo. The Doldo disciples capture John to summon up their dark messiah Saldo which is a part-beast/part-machine hybrid that starts wrecking up the city. The slimy government agent Adler wants to destroy this robot nightmare, partially so he can get in bed with John's girlfriend Raia who helped create the machine, but also to stop any plans for clearing out the city slums for a big political affair. John in the Saldo armor is being chased by the police as it continues to destroy most of the city's defenses in a particularly bloody sequence. John kills off the majority of the Doldo cultists just as Adler shows up in his own mecha suit called the "Genocyber", which really makes you wonder of this was supposed to be directly connected to AIC's future anime series. John and Aldo have a bot battle with John ending up on top as he takes control of the demonic cyborg suit that he plans to use for good along with Raia.

Cybernetics Guardian has a confusing story with a near infinite number of plot holes for a running time of only 45 minutes in a one-time production. It was released in America through Central Park Media on VHS and DVD featuring a pathetic dub, as well as frequently bundled together with their release of Genocyber. Aside from some grindhouse level brutalities, there isn't anything all that remarkable about it.

ANI-MOVIES, *Ron's Gone Wrong

As the next 20th Century Animation theatrical release since The Book Of Life, former Aardman animator Sarah Smith directed this first Fox cartoon movie after being bought out by Disney. Ron's Gone Wrong takes the premise of "a boy and his blank" but for the current generation addicted to social media. The film stars Jack Dylan Grazer as the boy in this story who also performed in Pixar's Luca that came out in the same year, along with Zach Galifianakis as the titular robot who is trying but failing to do his best impression of Baymax from Big Hero 6. It's an original story not based on any existing material, but a commentary on how people rely on the internet to make friends instead of in real life.

The huge Bubble corporation releases their latest product, a 2-ft. robotic capsule branded as a B-Bot. Everyone in the neighboring small mountain town of Nonsuch goes crazy for one as all the kids in school get their own. The only one left out is Barney who is usually an outcast as his previous friends were scared off years before at his birthday by his former-Russian grandmother and his clueless father who has the sad career of selling novelty toys online. For his current birthday, Barney gets a broken B-Bot his father got that literally fell off a delivery truck. The malfunctioning robot has a faulty startup, thus getting everything that he learns about Barney mixed up. The entire opening relationship between boy and bot becomes a running but endearing Who's On First routine, even though Barney grows to like his companion's quirky programming. The glitchy robot causes a scene with some bullies that gets him taken back to the Bubble store where he is sentenced to be crushed. Barney saves him and calls him Ron, keeping it a secret from his family, even though Ron follows him to school the next day and entices a riot unlocking all the other B-bot's safety protocols. Barney doesn't want to lose Ron, so he runs away from home with him into the woods. The duo has some real fun on their own, but Ron realizes that Barney can't survive away from civilization, especially with asthma, so he brings him back home. Luckily, Ron is saved from being destroyed by the B-bot's creator Marc, even though Ron's real algorithm is locked in Bubble's cloud network which Marc doesn't have access to as his corrupt partner Andrew has outed him as CEO. Along with his family and newfound friends, Barney leads a heist on the Bubble headquarters to find Ron's lost marbles. The ending is something similar to the finale of The Iron Giant, even though the world is left a little better because of Ron's actions.

Ron's Gon Wrong has Dreamwork's level of animation and character design which is not exactly up to modern Disney CGI theatrical movies standards or anything Pixar is puting out. The story is welcome to all ages with nothing really to shame kids with, while at the same time not having to rely on fart jokes or outdated references to pop culture junkies. I'd recommend this feature to any audience as a healthy reminder of knowing people IRL is more important that getting likes online.

OBSCURE O.V.A.S, *Twin Signal

Sachi Oshimizu created this manga in 1992 that got a 3-episode OVA adaptation in 1996. The best way to describe it is similar to Mega Man or Astro Boy where robots are part of everyday life. Twin Signal is an action-comedy that only got a limited release in America on DVD through Media Blasters which only features a mildly decent dub.

Nobuhiko is a young boy who is living with his grandfather, the genius scientist Professor Otoi. To protect his grandson, Prof creates a special android named Signal to protect him who looks like a long-haired bishounen most of the time, but every time Nobuhiko sneezes, the superhero robot turns into a baby chibi version of himself. Signal has to fend off his evil prototype Pulse who has been sent by Otoi's rival scientist making for the occasional bot battle.

Twin Signal caters to the otaku of the time that were into similar 90's anime like Ranma 1/2 or Nuku Nuku with wacky characters forced into slapstick situations. Director Takashi Sogabe worked on everything from Saint Seiya to Samurai Pizza Cats, but this was one of the productions he oversaw. The animation quality is charming, but nothing particularly memorable, with a mostly bland dub.

OBSCURE O.V.A.S, *Parasite Dolls

One of the last anime entries in the Bubblegum Crisis franchise was this 3-episode OVA series sold as a single featured titled Parasite Dolls. The problem is that there are conflicting resources as to which series this fits into, the original 80s OVA, or the TV series remake. If this is connected to the original OVA then it would be a sequel taking place after Bubblegum Crash, but if it's really connected to Bubblegum Crisis: Tokyo 2040 then it would be a prequel similar to the A.D. Police TV series. AIC was the studio behind this police drama which gives no mention at all to the Knight Sabers who were the major draw of Bubblegum Crisis, i.e.: the female quartet of armored vigilantes who fight out of control robots. Parasites Dolls focuses in on a special portion of police who deal in crimes involving the mechanical Boomers. Each segment of the series takes place at a certain time of this sci-fi action feature.

Starting in 2034, a secret faction of the A.D. Police labeled as the Branch deals primarily in cases with Boomers, lifelike androids that helped build the metropolis of Genom City, which might have been another name for Megatokyo from the original anime. The first case has detective Buzz leading up an investigation where Boomers are hacked by thrill seekers that send the robots on suicide runs to share the same experience in virtual reality. The second segment happens a year later with a Boomer hooker going around and killing of her high-profile clients. The finale takes place in 2040 where the corrupt Minister of Justice sets up Buzz and the rest of the Branch to take the fall on a plan he has for destroying Boomers all over the city based on a scenario Buss wrote for his college thesis. The surviving Branch members manage to clear their name while ending the villain's scheme, but still leaving most of Genom City destroyed.

Parasite Dolls took the gritty action that the A.D. Police Files OVA series had and that the A.D Police TV series lacked. Bubblegum Crisis is thought of as being a comic book superhero saga, where the A.D. Police material dealt with the steamy underground in its futuristic setting. Parasite Dolls doesn't focus on the division between man and machine, or the fear of artificial intelligence taking over that most cyberpunk stories are soaked in. This OVA instead shows the real implications of having a potentially destructive technology affecting the general population. The largest downside is that it doesn't have the killer soundtrack of the original 80s series.

OBSCURE O.V.A.S, *Dragoon

Based on a trilogy of JRPGs that never saw an American release, Dragoon got a 3-episode OVA series adaptation that only covered the beginning of the story. Anime studio Magic Bus produced this ramshackle anime about role-playing tropes that gets blended with gratuitous nudity scenes. If they had left out the fan service material, it might have made for a decent enough family anime as there is little action in it and more just the cast of characters meandering from one plot point to another.

A young swordsman named Sedon who finds a naked girl lying out in the snowy forest. She later wakes up and says she is May, but with no memory of her life up until that day. A team of armored hunters from a feuding empire are looking for her, and Sedon's father fights them off. There's a whole backstory involving Sedon's pop being a captain of the guard who fought off an invasion from the evil empire years ago, and vindictive soldier who wants revenge against him for cutting his eye, but all this only really gets mentioned to pad the anime out to three episodes. May, Sedon, along with his annoying healer sister Millie add some more to their party including an outcasted prince and a gambling sexy sorceress as they make way to the same empire who wants to capture May in the first place.

There is almost nothing appealing about this OVA with a total absence of interesting characters. The animation is mediocre by Magic Bus which is one of the last in a line of OVAs they created before going full time into working on movies and TV anime. ADV Films only released this on VHS after the turn of the century with an underwhelming dub. It's hard to say if even fans of the original video games cared about this limp vegetable of a production.