Post number 11 takes us back to anime as we look at not one but two Yu-Gi-Oh films.
Pyramid of Light
Okay, okay since this is Yu-Gi-Oh, any special or movie is going to boil down to defeat the bad guy in a card game, there's not much else to say on plot on this film or the other one. Pyramid of Light's villain is Anubis, an Egyptian god who seeks revenge on the Pharaoh for his imprisonment so his plan is to implant a card in the deck of Pegasus, Duel Monsters Creator designed to combat the Egyptian God Cards so when sore loser Seto Kaiba comes to collect this card he will use it against Yugi, but said card steals the souls of his friends leaving Atemu to duel Kaiba and eventually Anubis who takes over the battle, Yugi then uses the actual card Pegasus created to fight the Egyptian God Cards to defeat Anubis.
This film is cheesy, but that's only because 4Kids is so over the top with it's voice acting, everything else has been done to death before, Seto Kaiba vs Yugi? This has happened several times already and it's tiresome, it also barely gives any substance to the villain apart from look like an imposing figure so overall this is pretty bad and it's far too long of a film for what is essentially an extended anime episode.
Bonds Beyond Time
Again it's another defeat the villain in a card game but this time it features the leads of all three of the current Yu-Gi-Oh series at time of release. The villain this time is the unoriginally named Paradox who's causing havoc across time by stealing cards and trying to eliminate the game of duel monsters by killing the original creator thereby erasing the future. There are so many plot holes in this so lets list them.
1. I'm pretty sure Pegasus would train successors or at the very least foresaw something like this happening so he could at least keep his company going long after retirement or the possibility of another incident like with the Millenium Eye being stolen which so nearly killed him.
2. It's implied that there was meant to be more to Paradox's mission if Yusei's nightmare was anything to go by, may have given the villain more credit.
3. Judai doesn't recognize Yugi in person despite meeting him at the start of the GX series even though both he and Yusei have at least heard of him or know of him by reputation.
4. This is Yusei's story more than the others.
5. Yusei could've won that duel on his own, there's enough bull**** going on in the actual duel to pull off that kind of stunt.
6. Since when could Yusei time travel?
7. Since all Paradox's cards were stolen shouldn't Yugi have worried about what happened to Joey and Kaiba when Blue Eyes and Red Eyes were summoned by him?
You can tell this film was a rush job and a quick cash in, again I state that Yusei could've duelled Paradox on his own, having Judai and Yugi alongside him was basically fan bait. Also Paradox is one of those hypocritical villains. He wants Duel Monsters destroyed for good but is using Duel Monsters to accomplish that, much like a certain Pokemon villain team.
To the movie's credit it sets the right tone but it's still executed poorly much like the rest of the film.
Final Verdict: Yu-Gi-Oh doesn't hold up well in film format as the concept of the story in most episodes is character A duelling character B and having a slightly bigger earth shattering duel fit into such a small time frame doesn't make the film any bigger compared to the series. Pyramid of Light is cheesy with a tired plot that's been done a thousand times already while Bonds Beyond Time is a hack job littered with plot holes and too short of a feature to make the great big duel between Paradox and the Protagonists effective.
So overall both films are crap.
Post number 9 and we come back to cartoons as we look at the film Minions.
If you’ve avoided the sea of merchandise here’s a rundown, Minions are small yellow creatures that were made to serve evil masters; they originally appeared in the two Despicable Me films working for evil scientist Gru. The Minions themselves have relatively mundane names such as Stuart, Bob and Kevin and communicate using a speech pattern that sounds like gibberish; they serve the two films as comic relief but their popularity expanded beyond their original film which is why we ended up with their own movie.
The story begins as an origin story which contradicts Despicable Me as in that film Gru created the Minions but in this film they’ve been around since the dawn of time and have served every kind of evil mastermind from Dinosaurs to Napoleon with little to no success usually accidently killing their master; when all hope is lost the previously mentioned Stuart, Bob and Kevin, travel to the civilised world of 1968 to try and find a master they can serve, as luck would have it they stumble on the Villains convention where a showcase from Scarlet Overkill persuades them to join her.
Scarlet wants to steal the crown jewels and asks for the Minions help to do it, but a series of unfortunate events ends up making Bob King, but immediately abdicates in favour of Scarlet, but Scarlet feels betrayed enough to take revenge on the Minions and locks them in the dungeon but after escaping and trying to apologize to Scarlet they interrupt her coronation leading to a final fight between Scarlet and the Minions.
What Minions does right is the opening sequence and the Minions themselves despite being comedy relief could actually hold a film together but are plagued by other poor design choices.
Scarlet Overkill has a bad case of over acting, she started pretty well but gradually got worst as the film went on and choosing to set the film in 1968 is a strange choice as most people old enough to remember that year are probably not the target audience for this film so references are wasted here, but is it a good film?
It’s stupid fun. That’s all it needed to be and it at least achieves that goal; it’s not ground breaking, nor does it rely on a complex narrative, it’s just about yellow pill shaped creatures trying and failing to serve an evil villain and that’s all it needed to be and that’s what it achieved.
Post Number 6 and we look at an anime that is getting quite some interest in the wrong places, our next anime is Keijo.
Now I’m fully aware that Keijo is a current anime that has not long started and there could be changes in opinion in the future but from the three episodes I did see, I pretty much have a fair assessment on what to expect.
Keijo is about a combat sport in which women using their breasts and butts try and knock each other into the water, it’s very much the same as a typical pool party game but some genius decided to make it a sport and give the anime it’s typical over the top flavour it does to all its sports anime, think of it as Hajime no Ippo swimming pool version with girls, our heroine is the gymnast Nozomi Kaminashi who gives up her dream on the Olympics due to Keijo being a sport that can win her more money quickly if she turns professional, joined by other girls, Nozomi will try and turn pro and defeat many major players along the way.
This anime is silly and everyone with a sense of humour knows this and the anime is self aware of this fact, to take some key moments from episode two, the students at the sports college do exercises to improve their butt strength and technique while also learning about and I’m not making this up Asstrology and Boobology, there are also techniques like Butt Guillotine, Butt Gatling Gun and Vacuum Butt Cannon as if it were Monkey D Luffy stretching his butt instead of these girls so if the anime isn’t taking itself seriously then why should anyone else? Well some people do take it seriously unfortunately.
I get so sick and tired of the whole sexist argument when it comes to fan service style anime and while it is appealing to the male audience it’s designed in a way that is not sexist at all.
From three episodes there has only been one male character seen and he has no impact on the story so far and I doubt he ever will and I don’t even think he has a name, that’s important to note, even harem anime has at best one male character and depending on the series said male character is an abuse victim when he’s constantly mistaken for a pervert which is a painfully tired cliché.
People who write and make these shows are not stupid; they know full well that there are people all over the world watching their shows at any one point due to the availability of services like Crunchy Roll and they have to make it for everyone not just a set audience and they are painfully aware of the criticisms it might receive so it does its best to minimize the impact and Keijo would not only pass the Bechdel Test with flying colours, it never showcases the cast doing this sport against their will, each character wants to achieve great things from this sport and as silly as it looks, this is no different to every other sports anime, which makes it painfully predictable but the formula is tried and tested and worth the paper it was written on, Free, Kuroko’s Basketball and Yowamushi Pedal are rated some of the best anime of today and use the exact same formula but with the opposite gender.
Again it’s just a silly anime about a harmless swimming pool game and if you still think this anime is sexist then go watch Eiken, because that is a sexist anime and the worst anime in the world then you’ll see that in comparison this is tame!
Final Verdict: its silly fun at its finest using a formula that is tried and tested, I’m open to an opinion change but I kind of already know what else to expect so I don’t need any more time on it. This show is not meant to be taken seriously and the anime knows this along with 90% of the Otaku community, if you do take this seriously then sorry I can’t help you.
Post number 5 looks at Police anime You're Under Arrest
I find it oddly appropriate that this review is on a franchise that has been around for 30 years as I have also reached that milestone in age as of last week.
You're Under Arrest is about the life and times of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department particular the officers of Bokuto Police Station and on the partnership of two of their finest Traffic Police Officers Natsumi Tsujimoto and Miyuki Kobayakawa. Every episode along with the movie focuses on a crime or a personal character development moment in which we watch the station handle each episode, while the focus stays on the friendship of main characters Miyuki and Natsumi we also get some glimpses of the secondary cast as well.
The show can be very slow paced, very tame and a little sketchy with it's own stories but in general you can pretty much jump in at any time and not know the whole backstory and you can pretty much work out how each of the characters functions as well but to sum up.
Natsumi is the reckless one.
Miyuki is the bad ass driver.
Nakajima is the manly one who is a little awkward with romance.
Nikaidou is the klutz.
Aoi Futaba is probably the best portrayed transgender character in any media.
Saga is another klutz but more tolerable than Nikaidou.
And Toukairin who is Natsumi's foil.
Add in a souped up Honda Today (Common Japanese Car in Japan only) and you've got your whole story there.
Couple of things to really bring up, the same creator did Ah My Goddess and Ex Driver so the art style is quite noticable and the cars are always done to perfection which showcases the creator's love for cars.
And again with Aoi Futaba, you cannot find me another transgender character done any better than Aoi Futaba which is one of the shows main strengths along with the friendship of Miyuki and Natsumi, it's any wonder that there have been four series, a live action version and a movie, yet they all appear to share the same sort of stories.
So it's not for everyone, mainly because it's rival is the eternally famous Kochikame but for a Police show it never really takes it's set pieces onto a higher plain, granted I don't want to see it turn ultra violent but at least show some teeth. Dub is average, some cases of screeching and over acting especially if your name is Nikaidou.
Final Verdict: Take it or leave it, this is very much an anime that will suit some fans better than others, the action crowd will lose out a bit on the tame and low levels of violence but it can be made up by those fans who like character development and nice cars.
Post number 4 and were going classic anime with OVA Sol Bianca.
Sol Bianca is a ship crewed by a team of five female space pirates as they go through the universe plundering what they can find, our ragtag band of individuals are as follows.
April: The main fighter of the group, she acts as the stereotypical male space hero even though she’s clearly female, she also acts as captain when the regular captain is too drunk to be useful.
Feb: The captain and a master tactician and more than a little bit of an alcoholic.
Janny: The butch muscle of the group complete with temper to match.
June: The hacker who is also whiney and a little bitchy.
May: The chief half pint engineer who is often seen piloting a small mecha as well as act as the quote on quote youngest team member with the personality to match.
Now we’ve met our crew all named after months out of pure laziness so what happens?
Well this OVA is only two episodes long so don’t expect it to be ground breaking, the first episode starts with a boy smuggling himself onboard of the Sol Bianca who wants to go to a planet called Tres who is caught in a revolution against the Planet Uno. The second episode the crew steal a large supply of a special mineral apparently worth more than some planets but get caught up by a competent band of bandits who successfully hack the ship and try and get the minerals back. There’s also a subplot about June not being completely human but the anime ends in a way that there is meant to be more episodes but nothing happens because of cancellation.
Sol Bianca had potential and the remake Sol Bianca: The Legacy shows that it wasn’t a total failure but this OVA as a standalone is dull and lazily written with nothing stringing together the plot or anything that really tells the audience what’s going on, I will get to the remake at some point but based on what I’ve seen so far, it might be a bit of a far cry to expect too many changes. At least the art direction and music is good.
There is a dub but the copy I watched didn’t have it packaged with it, which is a shame because some of the actors chosen for the characters looked really promising and may have salvaged a bit more from this anime.
Final Verdict: Lazily written and quite dull, I even fell asleep during episode 2. I have higher hopes for Sol Bianca: The Legacy but at the moment I can’t really give this anime a passing grade.
