This review is a rarity and somewhat a litmus test into how well anime translates as live action, this is Yatterman.
It's a typical episode of Yatterman complete with Dorombo Gang vs Team Yatterman until they stumble upon a plot to steal the Skull Stones which are needed to control time, after a couple of battles it ends in a final showdown between Yatterman and the boss of Dorombo, Skullobey.
Yatterman as an anime is fine if a little formulaic, this imagining of it is strange, for one thing it's just wrong for any robot to be sexualized, poor decision on the director there, also a subplot about Doronjo falling for Gan is just as bad, not the concept but the execution, it really comes off as forced as a result and don't get me started on Gan himself, in the anime he's lazy, a little single minded but at least good hearted, in this film he's a jerkass and you wonder why his girlfriend Ai sticks around.
It's not entirely terrible, the villains are actually accurate to their anime depictions, a couple of clever moments during the fight scenes and a well played 4th wall joke about the villains actually seeing their original voice actors is very good but everything else is bad, thank god there's no dub but if it were a piss take dub it may have saved it.
So if you want anime to work live action this is not the one to show people.
Final Verdict: Cringeworthy at best, facepalm inducing at worst but not the most terrible live remake of an anime, that'll always be Dragonball Evolution but when you set the bar that low to begin with it doesn't take much to step over it and I felt Yatterman live action was looking at the low bar rather than the higher ones set by the likes of Death Note.
Were coming to the last couple of reviews in this A-Z so lets kick off Y with Yatterman.
Yatterman started in the 70s as a follow up to the Time Bokan series produced by Tatsunoko which features a boy and a girl team fighting against an evil trio not much different to Team Rocket using robot animals.
Yatterman is about a boy and a girl team fighting against an evil trio not much different to Team Rocket using robot animals......
Yeah the shows don't change much but lets see why Yatterman went on the longest compared to the others. Well male lead Gan-Chan and female lead Ai-Chan are actually a couple, a very close couple despite Ai-Chan doing most of the work, which makes this formulaic series work better than your standard brother and sister or just friends team.
Yes I said formulaic and boy does it run like clockwork, a typical episode will involve an issue of some kind, usually the Dorombo Gang involved in a cheesy crime of some description using a mecha, now this is Team Rocket's spiritual ancestor, we have the lady in charge Doronjo, the brains Boyacky and the muscle Tonzura. With the evil plot taking place it's up to Gan & Ai to stop the Dorombo Gang, doing so with a robot dog dressed like a fire marshal called Yatter-Wan.
Gan & Ai also have some toys of they're own as Gan uses a Kendama while Ai uses a cattle prod as their weapons of choice. Once the battle gets going Yatter-Wan summons a load of mini robots to attack the Dorombo gang which usually wins the battle for Yatterman. Afterwards the Dorombo gang get chewed out by their boss and literally blast off again, which is actually where the term comes from and not Team Rocket.
I have to say, for a show so strict on formula, it is still able to remain entertaining, it helps that the mini-robots change every week and other animal robots come into the story as it goes along, but the chemistry is so strong between characters it rarely makes mistakes, my only real criticisms are a lack of localization for the west, the 70s original hasn't aged that well and the late 00s reboot should've come back sooner.
Final Verdict: Definitely worth the effort of finding a fansub for. I'd recommend trying both versions of the anime but I prefer the reboot to the original.
