バンブーブレード / Bamboo Blade

Sports anime tend to fall into three categories: slapstick manly comedy (Slam Dunk), moody and usually cheesy drama with homoerotic appeal for the girls (Prince of Tennis) or slice-of-life whimsy with lots of moé sweetness for male otaku. Bamboo Blade is in the latter category, and it does the concept the best I’ve ever seen it done.

Revolving around a kendo club and its quirky female members, it is reminiscent of other feelgood, small-scale stories about groups of girls like Azumanga Daioh and Manabi Straight. There are prominent male characters too, budding romances, powerful rivalries and a neat balance of very successful comedy with warm moments of friendship. Tama-chan, the central figure, is as moé as they get, spacey and innocent and childlike, but with a prodigious talent for kendo. It catered both for people with no knowledge of the game and those who have trained in it without alienating either, while good production values complimented the great acting, facilitating a very pleasant aesthetic and nice smooth animation. The characters are all loveable and the humour is some of the best I’ve seen in recent years.

The only thing I can fault about Bamboo Blade is the cheesy way it ended, with very artificial ideas of strong feelings allowing people to catch up on years of training, which simply isn’t the case in any sport, but then again, is rather a staple of anime. For all people moaned about the ending of Hikaru no Go, though, one has to respect that it was realistic and mature when it came to wins and losses. Bamboo Blade is, on the other hand, intentionally lighter and cuter.

If you want something heavy and sophisticated, or if you find moé frivolous and unnecessary, this may not be for you. But anyone who wants something nice and light and genuinely funny, I’d recommend Bamboo Blade highly.

(originally written 2.3.09)

天空の城ラピュタ / Tenkū no Shiro Lapyuta / Laputa: Castle in the Sky

In light of Film 4’s current ‘Ghibli Season’ (which should really have been called a ‘Miyazaki Season’, given that no other Ghibli directors are represented, and that two films predate Ghibli’s foundation), I thought that perhaps it was time to dust down my old CDs and slightly less old DVDs of the great studio’s productions and give them a proper evaluation. First, then, to Laputa.

A favourite of many Ghibli enthusiasts, Laputa’s main appeal is its charm, but for me at least, therein also lies its greatest flaws.

An airship is attacked by pirates, targeting a young girl named Sheeta, who wears a mysterious and precious stone around her neck. In trying to escape, she falls from the ship, but instead of getting splattered across the mining town below, she is enveloped in soft lambency, a light emitted from the stone at her neck, and so floats down to earth slowly as a feather. She lands in the arms of a young boy called Pazu, and so their adventure begins: not only are the pirates still after the girl, but so are the army, for Sheeta's stone may just be the key to finding the lost floating city of Laputa.

The staff of Ghibli were clearly still perfecting their craft when Laputa was made. The framing of shots and the cutting is for the most part very conventional. The animation is varied, ranging from superb shots of flight over the countryside and the collapse of huge pieces of architecture to decidedly awkward running animations and repeating backgrounds. Joe Hisaishi’s music, so magnificent in later films, especially Mononoke, is anaemic and sometimes inappropriate. Admittedly, I was watching a badly-compressed digitised version of an old VHS fansub, so quality was poor, but it didn’t stop me seeing the art was also of mixed quality. The voice acting has an improvised quality I like, giving a natural and familiar feel to proceedings, but Pazu (voiced, amusingly, by the woman now best known for her inspired, inimitable performance as Monkey D. Luffy in One Piece) grated slightly with too many over-exaggerated noises meant to imitate exertion, and the bad guy became so cheesy at the end that it was all a little bit painful.

But the thing that makes Laputa a success is that it has charm by the bucketload. Julie Andrews’ conversation over tea and crumpets in a gazebo in an English country garden couldn’t be more charming. Pazu is plucky and extremely loyal, Sheeta is the very personification of sweetness (yet can stand up for herself when she needs to), hearts of gold are found in unexpected places, the mining community is populated by kind souls who only want to help the vulnerable and love a good scrap with ne’er-do-wells, fathers’ dreams can be reached, magical sights really exist, million-to-one chances always resolve in the favour of our heroes and good triumphs over evil with a minimum of fuss. It all makes you smile, uplifts your spirits, and that’s what makes the film genuinely enjoyable.

But it’s also what prevents it from ever being special. The very warmth of spirit that makes Miyazaki such a great writer makes this film movie feel like a low-quality Saturday morning TV cartoon. The story is as flimsy and formulaic as they come – baddies want the McGuffin, our heroes are put in peril as a result, girl gets captured so boy goes to rescue her, the McGuffin magically leads to the climax, and everything turns out right in the end. The characters never feel very fleshed out. Yes, I like cuteness. Sheeta is adorable, but never really does much. Pazu is also sweet (bafflingly, I was once told I looked like him, despite being in university at the time and he being about 12. I was actually quite flattered...) in a typical young-boy-hero way, but the way he can just call up superhuman agility and the great power of coincidence at will really saps any tension from scenes with him. As I mentioned before, the bad guy is just way too nutty to be taken seriously. The only characters who aren’t so flat that they irritate are the two seniors of the pirate family.

That’s not to say perfectly good movies cannot be made with very obvious and uninspired elements. They can, and this is one of them. It’s just that beside the truly memorable classics Ghibli have produced, a movie that is simply good just isn’t enough.

(Originally written 6.8.06. Note that Hisaishi since recorded a new and far superior score for the film, although apparently it has now been cut again from 2010 DVD releases. I have of course seen the film in better quality since this, and while I'm probably a little fonder of it in hindsight, and want to stress how beautiful the scenes with the robot soldier peacefully gardening are, it remains one of my least favourite Ghibli works)

ヘタリア/ Hetalia

When did I first hear about Hetalia? Hrmm, a few months before the anime. I enjoyed a web-manga called Afughanisu-tan, and after it was all translated people online compared it to Hetalia. A few girls I know started talking about it, saying it was adorable, and then all of a sudden it was an anime, it was dubbed…it was huge.

Hetalia personifies the countries of the world, almost all of them as pretty or cute boys. A few countries are girls, but…well, none feature very prominently. The first season concentrates on the Second World War and the relationship between the Axis powers, while the second is more general, mostly twentieth century but with a bit of variety.

Its success is astronomical. Teenage girls in particular latched onto the characters and the numerous homoerotic hints and begun to draw, write and enact all sorts of perverted things. There can be few anime fans now who have not heard of Hetalia, and as with many popular things, it now attracts a lot of hatred. Much of this is directed only at the fans, who tend to be loud and obnoxious, and do things like have pictures taken doing Nazi salutes on Passover, or disrupt veterans' parades and drag flags around indifferent to whether they go on the floor or not.

This doesn’t bother me, but a lot does. I mostly get frustrated at how it just doesn’t seem like the writer really understands any of the history he is writing about (and yes, the mangaka is male). I accept that Hetalia is supposed to be about stereotypes, and how a Japanese person (presumably also influenced by life in America, where he spent three years) sees other nationalities - often very differently from how we do in England - but too much just doesn’t make sense. How is carefree, stupid Italy compatible with the Fascists and Mussolini? (There are occasional references to orders from ‘bosses’ but I’m talking about national characteristics.) Why is only Italy (and right at the end Germany) split into two separate parts, when other countries have at least that much difference between their different regions? Does he know about Finland and Russia’s war? Does he know about Italy’s campaigns in Africa, a continent almost entirely ignored here? The invasion of Libya and slaughter of the Bedouins? Does he think that the Holy Roman Empire was around at a time that it could interact with anything resembling modern Italy? Does he think that ‘Splendid Isolation’ meant the UK was politically alone…during the British Empire when it ruled half the globe (as opposed to isolated from the great powers of Europe)? Does he really think that Japan’s arguments in favour of whaling are eloquent and persuasive (even put in the mouth of a cat)? There were just too many little irritating mistakes or misinterpretations: I’d probably have liked Hetalia if it just stuck to stereotypes interacting and funny little nuggets of information, but superfluous and inaccurate bases for plot points just irritated me too much.

The only part that worked really well was Sealand. Not just because he was adorable, but because Sealand is just so simple and easy to understand, as well as fundamentally funny, so he couldn’t really get things wrong.

Otherwise, well, episodes were only five minutes long, and most of the humour was just character-based – if repetitive – so there was no great horror to watching it. But too much irritated me to recommend Hetalia.

I bet the feature-length film will be terrible, too.

ブレイブ・ストーリー/ Brave Story

It may not be the most well-known anime, but Brave Story has made ripples: a decent-sized Western DVD release, video games based on the same source novel and there’s even talk of a theatrical release here in the UK. I don’t actually remember when or why I got hold of it, but I’m glad I did, because it has instantly earned a place amongst my favourite anime movies.

This is partly because it’s so ‘classic’ – there’s little original thought here, and it can be called clichéd and derivative, but that only makes it more of a pleasure to watch.

It’s cut from the same cloth as Kingdom Hearts – a young, goofy and good-hearted boy is taken from his world to another, where he meets various loveable creatures and learns to fight against unpleasant monsters with the magical weapon bestowed upon him. However, the cool, slightly older boy he admires in a more or less overtly homoerotic way has the same goal as him, and will resort to more extreme methods to get there, which will inevitably bring the two friends head-to-head sooner or later. The seme/uke relationship of Sora/Riku, Hikaru/Touya et al is repeated almost precisely here, the naive one looking up to the knowing but standoffish one until the pure heart of the dumber one ends up forcing the angstier one to acknowledge his own flaws. As usual, there is a token female love interest for the main character, in this case a catgirl, but let’s just say that at the end there aren’t any tears shed for separation with her and it’s not her who appears in the final scene of the movie.

As I said, the plot is classic – our hero Wataru is having a hard time at home. His father is walking out and his mother is taken ill. Seeking to escape, he follows Mitsuru, the new boy he is infatuated with, through a magical doorway to another world, where he is given the RPG class of a hero and is told that if he fills his sword with magic stones, one wish will be granted. Looking to repair his broken home, he sets off on an adventure, his good heart and loud mouth getting him into scrapes, his sword and his friends getting him back out of them, until he finds Mitsuru and realises just how far his friend will go to get his wish. Ultimately, Wataru comes to understand the cost of getting his own desires, and that he will have to balance his own desires with the needs of many others.

This standard fare is made fun by great characters, that adorable homoerotic subtext that female Japanese writers do so well, some fantastic imagery and smooth animation with the usual CG touches Gonzo have incorporated into their work since Last Exile, energetic voice acting and of course, the naivety that doesn’t care whether old ideas are rehashed or goofy, cutesy ideas get a stage, and also likes to pluck hard at your heartstrings. Cheesy, yes. Simple, mostly. Unoriginal, certainly. But who cares when there’s so much to make you smile?

(originally written 26.8.08)

ノエイン もうひとりの君へ / Noein: Towards the Other You

The mangling of science for a good story is no great crime. Something like Jurassic Park is just feasible enough for you to nod and get on with the story. If I’m watching comedy, it really doesn’t bother me when parallel universes, temporal paradoxes and time travel are used to make an entertaining story – Back to the Future, Bill and Ted, Red Dwarf, Day of the Tentacle, Terry Pratchett’s Discworld books…they all deal with similar ground to Noein. But the trouble is that Noein sets itself up so seriously, tries to make itself look so clever, that its basis in Quantum Theory really irked me.

Noein tells the story of when soldiers from a possible future invade our time to retrieve the great MacGuffin, in this case the Dragon Torque (I don’t know if the physics pun is intentional, but it IS a necklace), which is embodied in a normal young girl named Haruka.

Perhaps fifty years ago, the incompatibility of quantum with a probabilistic, uncertain, chaotic macroscopic universe being solved by the idea of infinite possible worlds was new and exciting, but by now it’s a total sci-fi cliché. And Noein really makes things worse by oversimplifying, picking and choosing buzzwords from the Many-Worlds AND Copenhagen Interpretations, and showing a fundamental misunderstanding of most of the concepts it drew upon - from seeming to think that Schrödinger’s Cat would start disappearing in its box until its being acknowledged by an observer made it solid again to falling into the usual (perhaps inevitable) pitfalls of storytellers working within infinite spacetimes. These would be placing too much emphasis on a central, coherent timeframe (as if it wouldn’t diverge infinitely over the course of the series), thinking that a person can be unique in spacetime for more than a frozen moment (infinite divergences happen at infinite moments, so our central character’s powers cannot be unique to one version of her) and thinking a threat to time, space and causality can appear and become a slowly-unfolding threat, constraining to time what is supposed to be disrupting it.

I know that I’m watching anime to be entertained, not for Quantum Theory to be faithfully represented, but when I see gadgets mapping an infinity of infinities or random mysterious old men who can push the story forward when the writers can’t think of any consequential manner to make it happen, I have to fight the urge to get madder than Ming the Merciless. What the writers really wanted was a classic comic book parallel universes story, but had to try and be all smug and knowing with scientific theories, and it just detracted from what was otherwise a great story.

Because, yes, Noein was an excellent series, absolutely outstanding in many aspects. It had a quirky style of art and animation that reminded me of Mahou Shoujotai: Arusu and character designs with a similar retro feel to Fantastic Children, two series I very much enjoyed. Animation was some of the most remarkable I’ve ever seen in a TV anime, with incredibly strange CG weapon-creatures and smooth body animations, especially on the kids, that were absolutely superlative. The fight scenes deserve mention, too, for taking such risks – the art would simplify and the camera would pan and swoop around the fighters with such dynamism that it makes most other anime fights look extremely lazy. Occasionally it goes too far, and the art is too noticeably simplified, at one point just looking like a couple of shaking storyboard images, but usually these sequences are incredible, and unlike anything else.

The design of some of the characters didn’t work for me, though. Atori, with his crescent moon of hair on his Wicked Witch face, looked too much like a hastily-conceived caricature and had a 2-D personality to match until he lost his memories and became zomboid. The best-friend character, Fujiwara, suffers in early episodes because he’s the comic relief, but his big chattering square teeth and funny face often look TOO daft; while he develops well later, his catchphrase (‘Ariane!’ – impossible) just about worked as a catchphrase in ultra-cute Pretty Cure, but not here. And then there’s the capitalist pig minor bad-guy, who just looks like he was lifted from a primary school doodle pad.

The positives far outweigh the negatives, though. Rousing choral music and some deliciously crackling electrical sound effects seduce the ears while Haruka’s cute round pacman eyes (and voice – Hagu from Hachikuro), Tobi’s ethereal prettiness and Karasu’s undeniable coolness (assisted by a great performance (or two!) from Nakai Kazuya, Zoro from One Piece), keep the eyes sated even between the incredible fight scenes. The characters are likeable and some soap opera scenes of puppy love really bring you closer to the characters. Far from a perfect anime, but one that indeed does overcome its flaws to be entertaining, impressive and yes, perhaps a little groundbreaking too.

(Originally written 9.1.07)

The Lion King (1994)

The Lion King deserves a review from me. Disney’s influence on the world of animation has been singularly immense, for better or for worse, and while not every one of their films is a classic, The Lion King is quite possibly their masterwork, by far my favourite of the studio’s works, and probably my favourite animated movie of all time.

Few people are likely to need a synopsis, but in brief: the lion king Mufasa rules over his pride with dignity and wisdom. A son and heir is born, the adorable cub Simba, and he grows up mischievous and headstrong with his friend (also his ‘affianced’, by arrangement) Nala. However, second in line is the king’s brother Scar, who arranges a clever coup: he has his hyena accomplices start a stampede in a gorge, trapping Simba there. Mufasa comes to his rescue, and Scar makes sure he ends up dead. He sets the hyena on Simba too, but the cub escapes, meeting the carefree duo Timon and Pumbaa and growing up in an idyllic jungle. However, the Pride Lands have fallen into ruin, mismanaged by Scar. Searching for food, Nala meets Simba and recognises him – and hearing about his home, Simba is also reminded of his responsibilities, and eventually he is convinced to go back and confront his uncle.

Much has been made of the similarities to Hamlet, right down to comparing Timon and Pumbaa to Rozencrantz and Guildenstern, but the story is unique enough to seem more homage than rip-off – not that, of course, Shakespeare is to be credited with much in the way of original storytelling. And this is not even mentioning Tezuka’s Kimba. Still, the twist of having the traditional story set in the animal kingdom of Africa works so well, and makes for some of the most beautiful animation and scenery ever drawn. Mufasa’s circle of life speech, with the camera panning around father and son, is amongst the best shots I have ever seen rendered in animation of any sort, done with consummate skill by an animation studio at the height of its powers just a few films before an undignified fall from grace.

I first saw The Lion King in the cinema as a primary school trip. A friend then passed on a pirated VHS until we could buy the legitimate copy. Since then I’ve got the DVD (dust forming what looks very much like the word ‘sex’ excised), seen it in the IMAX and gone to the musical adaptation numerous times. At one point I could very probably have transcribed the entire film from memory. There is very little I do not love – the cast is superb, especially Jeremy Irons, James Earl Jones, Nathan Lane, Rowan Atkinson, Matthew Broderick, Whoopie Goldberg and Cheech Marin. The songs are the best in any Disney film since The Jungle Book, from stirring epics to comedy numbers, and Hans Zimmer’s haunting score adds so much, with incredibly strong themes and stirring Swahili choruses from Lebo M.

There are a few minor problems if you overthink the story. Who is Nala’s father? Shouldn’t a pride have just one male? Do these lions kill prey begging them for mercy? Can an ecosystem really get devastated and recover that quickly? Do we really need a ghostly vision, for all the Shakespearean precedent? And sure, you have your noblest characters played by black men, but superb as the performances are, why are those lowly hyenas all so…ethnic? Why is Scar so much darker of hue than Mufasa? But these are such tiny matters, on a par with the little animation errors I can’t help but notice after seeing the film so, so many times. They don’t matter at all. Because as with Aladdin, TLK was Disney in such a strong position that they could take risks. The film contains stark death scenes, scary visuals and doesn’t even introduce its two main comedic characters until halfway through. There is a certain formula to the plot, but it is far from by-the-numbers and staid. ‘Nothing new’ is not a criticism that can be levelled here.

The Lion King does everything right – and what’s more, it does it all beautifully. Truly superb animation.

(The Lion King 2 here; The Lion King 1 1/2 here; The Lion King 3D, with trivia and observations, here)

黒執事/Black Butler / Kuroshitsuji (first season)

(Season 2 impressions here: http://adziu.blogspot.com/2010/11/kuroshitsuji-season-ii.html
OVAS here: http://adziu.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/kuroshitsuji-ovas.html )

It’s taken me some time to get around to finishing Kuroshitsuji, which I started watching over a year ago. I suppose to some extent I lost interest, especially when the anime diverged from the manga, and instead of going to the interesting, dark places the original went in the circus arc, embarked on its own climactic section opposing the demon with an angel.

Kuroshitsuji is the story of a little boy with the unlikely name of Ciel Phantomhive, a young earl in Victorian Britain, although mangaka Yana Toboso apparently never found out an earl needs another name to go with the title. Poor Ciel has had an incredibly sad life, losing his parents and very nearly losing his own life as a human sacrifice. He was saved only by a Faustian pact with a powerful demon, who takes the form of a butler. With this immense power under his control, Ceil becomes a great aid to the Queen, solving lazily-plotted supernatural crimes, tangling with some flamboyant death-gods and introducing finger-food to the Great Exhibition, all with the aid of his inept but super-powered staff members.

I am perhaps describing it unfairly, because while it has healthy doses of silliness, it is an anime that presents itself with a pleasing lack of irony, and aims for elegance and some degree of emotional depth. The heart of its appeal is the homoerotic, pederastic relationship between the 12-year-old boy and his pretty-faced adult demon, and some scenes, such as when Ciel is disguising himself as a girl and needs Sebastian to put a corset on him, are open references to the homosexual implications of the scenario, even if they are jokes. The rather pretty coupling has attracted a huge female fanbase, who like that sort of thing. Personally, perhaps to the surprise of some, I didn’t really find Ciel cute or Sebastian interesting, and thought Finnie was much sweeter. Possibly it’s just an aversion to the tsundere character mould.

That said, the character designs are very nice, with special emphasis placed on the attire, kodona rather than authentically Victorian, and the animation from new studio A-1 Pictures (put together by Sony to be, presumably, a more complete, standalone anime studio than Aniplex, A-1 are working on adaptations of games like Persona and Valkyria Chronicles, but are also one of the studios behind the disappointing Fairy Tail anime) is unspectacular but neat and pretty to look at.

The danger is taking Kuroshitsuji too seriously, for while the manga has managed to take itself to more mature places, the anime is still about demons fighting with silverwear, naked werewolf-men, effete shinigami with stationary chainsaws or paper scissors and elite assassins working in the kitchens and sculleries. There is tragedy at the heart, but Kuroshitsuji is primarily daft and proud of it, and that’s why it was almost always fun to watch. And while the ending went off on a strange tangent about Queen Victoria and ended with a very unimpressive power-up moment, it also impressed in several ways: I rather liked the way lots of clichés about London were used, but transplanted: there was a Great Fire, but with a shot of the Monument to make sure the viewer knew this was no anachronism. There was a London bridge, falling down, but it was Tower Bridge, under construction. And then the very ending…well, with its charged eroticism, sado-masochism and finality, it was something I certainly didn’t expect to see – and it’ll be interesting to see how the second season deals with it.

One minor quibble at the end, though – I really hated the way Shinsen-Subs (and a lot of others following them) decided to translate the show’s catchphrase, ‘あくまで執事です’, ‘akumade shitsuji desu’, which means something like ‘(I am) a butler through and through’ or ‘(I am) a butler to the core’, but also serves as a pun: ‘悪魔で執事です’, or ‘(I am) a demon and a butler’. Seeking to preserve the pun, Shinsen decided to translate it as ‘I am a hell of a butler’, which everyone seemed to love. I thought it was terrible. It’s just horribly anachronistic (especially from a British-biased group like Shinsen) and gives a false impression of confidence rather than humility. I’m sure some suitably infernal reference could have been devised, like ‘I am a butler from very deep down’ or similar. But that is just a translation issue, and nothing to do with the actual series.

I will watch the second season, and continue to read the manga, too. As Kuroshitsujii’s popularity swells, so does antagonism towards it, and it weathers a lot of abuse for being aimed squarely at ‘yaoi fangirls’. But I’ve never abandoned something I like for its reputation, and if it does aim vulgarly for that market, so what? It’s not like it aspires to be great art, and it’s funny!

(Originally written 3.4.10)