I Thought About It, Therefore I Wrote About It: ERGO PROXY (2006)

Procrastination!!!
Have I not updated all week? No, I don't think so, oh well, I'm here now to update three times hopefully, and four times on My Arcade. Let's start...here:

TITLE: Ergo Proxy
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SUMMARY:

In a post-apocalyptic future humans live in peace with androids in a domed city. However, a strange series of murders has intruded into bored inspector Re-l Mayer's life.

PERSONAL CRITIQUE:

You know I have to do an obligatory anime every week, and I'm doing this one now! Ergo Proxy follows the adventures of Re-l Mayer and Vincent Law as they seek to understand their purpose in the world. Or something like that, it's set in a post-apocalyptic future where humans and machines, called entourages, coexist within domed cities. It's been a minute since I've watched the entire series, so pardon my possible incorrectness somewhere in this text.

Anyway, the series is set, like I said, in a very dark post-apocalypse world, with science-fiction/cyberpunk elements galore. There's a persona beyond Re-l and Vincent as well that is positively amazing and core to the plot, that we're actually introduced to in the first episode I believe. Regardless the core plot point itself is the existence of creatures known as Proxies, which I can't really explain in great detail without breaking into spoiler territory, but let's just say they're rather god-like in power. The point being, the setting is pretty well thought out.

Despite the dark, brooding nature of Re-l and the blandness of Vincent, the two actually draw a lot of attention from the viewer, and, in my case at least, I found it pretty easy to attach myself to the two. In fact, my first experience with the series was a brief five minute jaunt in the middle of the series, and it stuck with me so well I managed to look it up seven or eight years later.

RATING:

Nine out of Ten suddenly self-aware machines would give this movie Four random game show episodes, out of Five.

Speaking of random game show episodes, that's kind of a low and high point in the series, where our heroes randomly wind up in a game show with no explanation, and the audience gets explanations about a lot of the strangeness going on in the world.

Inside a Dystopian Mind: PSYCHO-PASS (2013)

My Dystopia:

In my dystopian universe I struggle to write blog posts, even though I actually get excited about writing it. In my dystopian universe there are three less hours in the day than everyone else has. In my dystopian universe people wait until the last minute to complete anything, making everyone else's jobs harder.

Start the review:

TITLE: Psycho-Pass

SUMMARY:

Psycho-Pass follows Akane Tsunemori in a cyber-punk 2113 Japan, as joins to police force and seeks justice. The Sibyl System, a super computer system that measures the citizens' mental states, helps to prevent crimes from happening, by judging the guilty in advance, but one man breaks every notion of this supposed justice and challenges detective Tsunemori's own judgement.

PERSONAL CRITIQUE: 

Hope you guys don't mind the personal summary, I couldn't find a good short one to just copy and paste. We've reviewed that one of my favorite media forms is anime (that and video games), so of course anime are going to crop up in my lists. Particularly this list though! There are plenty of good dystopian future animes to choose from, but Psycho-Pass definitely stands out to me, because it reminds me a lot of Death Note actually. Follow along, if you will:

We kind of discussed the Sibyl System in the summary, basically it judges criminals before they act on their desires, obviously a broken system. At first glance, that sounds great, sure, no more rape, murder, arson or jay-walking. The thing is, we're judging them before they commit the crime, not only that, it's not fool-proof, very often criminals are not tagged before-hand. There are just a lot of issues with it, and, so that I don't have to throw up a spoiler warning, in the very first episode we see a potential flaw. The guns used by the police (called Dominators) have a lock on them, they will fire based on the criminal's level of danger, a green hue means the person you're aiming at is perfectly normal, they're no threat, so the gun will lock; a yellow hue means they are divergent from the normal state, liable to or are currently committing a crime, the gun will paralyze; a red hue means they are dangerous to society and must be eliminated, the Dominator converts to lethal elimination mode. Mind you, these people aren't necessarily murderers. In fact, based on the way the anime lays it out, people may not have the will to do evil things, but if they find evil things intriguing, or fantasize about them, they're capable of doing them, and therefore they can be put to death.

As an example scenario that the entire internet can relate to, if you're Adolf Hitler, but you never actually act on your desire to create a perfect race, you just sort of fantasize about it, the gun will switch to lethal eliminator mode, and kill you. Done. 

As a side note, the hue colors I mentioned aren't exactly correct, like the main character is supposed to have a light-blue hue I think (the best around?). Anyway, did I get off on a tangent? Anyway, suffice it to say I can easily justify this being a dystopia in that everyone fears that they'll be judged negatively and get kicked out of the system, permanently. In fact, it's possible to worry to much and get labeled a divergent! Like what the heck?!

Anyway, aside from that, the anime does a good job of giving us a detailed setting, with a lot of backstory to the surprise ending, and a collection of awesome characters. More specifically the main character's sidekick, Shinya Kogami, who actually acts as sort of the main character. There's also a particular scene that tore me up from the inside out, and reminded me that sometimes I get way too attached to characters in tv series. So yeah. The final arc of the anime serves to wrap everything up nicely, while also ensuring everything is kept fresh, and the show itself isn't long enough to get stale. Loved it.

RATING: 

Nine out of Ten system breaking psychopaths would give this one Five Lethal Eliminations, out of Five.

Seriously, this isn't my favorite anime ever, but it's definitely concise enough while being super detailed to earn a five star rating. I'm pretty generous, sure, but IMDB gives it an 8.3, MyAnimeList.com gives it 8.5, and so does TV.com, so it obviously did something right. A lot, it did a lot right.

Fabricating a Mask: Code Geass (2007)

New Subjects and Old

I've made a sort of personal resolution to research android development a bit, maybe put out my own little apps eventually. Takes time to learn, but I'll start today hopefully and pick up quickly with any luck!

That's a bit of a side note, which these openings tend to be. Aside from that, on My Arcade yesterday, I explained some uses of masks, I also stated that I basically had a plan for today's post. And I do. I wanted to save this for a point where I could tackle a whole anime week, but this seems appropriate, so here we go.

TITLE: Code Geass: Lelouch of the Rebellion

DETAILS: 

            DIRECTOR: Goro Taniguchi

            LEAD ACTOR: Jonny Yong Bosch

            MAIN ANTAGONIST: Hard to pinpoint

SUMMARY:

Lelouch, the exiled son of the Emperor of Britannia, wages a war for liberation on behalf of the Elevens, Japanese citizens downtrodden by the empire's take over. Lelouch uses the power of Geass to seek justice for his late mother and assemble an army to crush Britannia.

I feel like that's a pretty good brief, there's not a reliably short one on IMDB...

PERSONAL CRITIQUE:

The best...around. Okay, probably not actually, I can see it being a little hard to follow occasionally (I never had any trouble, but I can see where the multiple plot lines might lose someone), but in my opinion it's one of the most well put together and animated animes ever. Aside from a good bit of science fiction in the anime (giant robots, new WMDs, strange energy sources) Code Geass earns its position this week due to the nature of the protagonist, he's a masked man. In all fairness the story follows two protagonists, Lelouch Lamperouge (vi Britannia) and Suzaku Kururugi.

Lelouch served as our masked hero who seeks to usurp his father, restore the Japanese people to their proud state, and a lot of other things. Man's got goals. To do this he uses two key tools, the first is his Geass, the power of the king, which allows him to issue any command to a person and they will follow it absolutely. (there is some debate about this and I may post a follow up mini post about this) His second tool of choice is his alternate persona, Zero. If you checked out my post yesterday on My Arcade, you will have noticed the mask I spoke of helped the character to become someone else and hide their own identity. The mask of Zero serves much the same purpose, but without any magic behind it, just good politics and a lot of charisma.

You see, Lelouch was exiled from his homeland after his mother's demise, in order to unmask the people behind the assassination the young prince (youngest I believe) sets out on a quest to overpower the Britannian military, and what better group to use than a pre-existing terrorist cell in Tokyo (I think). Being a Britannian Lelouch would generally not find any reception from the Japanese, or Elevens as Britannia chooses to call them, but when he saves their near forfeit lives more than once he is able gain their trust, but not as Lelouch Lamperouge the school boy, rather as Zero, the masked hero. (whom everyone presumes is an Eleven, or at the very least a Number, not a Britannian noble) 

Anyway yeah, I did my little tangent about the power of the mask, but the series actually makes several underlying references to masks, and I realize I'm reviewing this one detail a lot more than the series in general, suffice it to say I think the series was terrific, with an amazing plot line, great animations, and...well...Johnny Yong Bosch voices Lelouch, so I cannot seek better voice acting!

SPOILERS AHEAD!!!

There are a lot of masks in the game actually, it's just not as obvious as you might think. The series makes a point though that the mask of Zero is not the most important mask there. It's the lies that Lelouch always wears that really matter. His lies, and those of everyone else. You...stopped reading before the spoiler mark right? Or you've seen the show and this is basically redundant? Or...you don't care to watch the show and just wanna hear what I have to say? You're so sweet! 

One of the biggest lies in the show is never actually outright stated, a mask is worn in front of Lelouch for the entirety of the series and he never realizes until the mask is removed. Why should he? According to Charles and Marianne (Lelouch's parents) everything is according to plan. Seriously? You planned for your own son to accuse you of the assassination plot against his mother and then seek you down to the ends of the Earth after making a contract with a witch that gave him a very limited source of unlimited power. (the Geass has some very specific limitations) Not only has Charles been basically maintaining that facade, but he proclaims very plainly that the entire world is just a mask, or rather, God is a mask. God is a web of lies constructed by humanity to hide them from the pain they're meant to feel, or something like that, but ultimately the only reason any pain is felt is due to these masks. So Charles and Marianne plan to kill God (the lies of the world) by using the Ragnarok weapon, but Lelouch says "No way, I like masks!" and kills them...or banishes their spirits...okay that scene is a little off the wall, I'll grant you. 

There's also this huge ordeal with Lelouch's girlfriend Shirley where she realizes that all along Lelouch has been Zero and it was his actions that caused her father's death. This is a really emotional and fantastic story arc in and of itself, and it plays out very well and tugs on your heart strings until the last order she is given. As she runs through the school looking for someone to confide in she realizes that everyone is wearing a mask, everyone has something they're hiding and she doesn't know who to trust anymore. It's basically true too, of her closest friends, three were terrorists, one was in the military specifically to die, and even the student council president lied about being perfectly content when she was far from it. Rivalz on the other hand...was just a ditz, he may have been perfectly innocent.

Ah but the anime ends with this fantastic idea, Lelouch puts on the ultimate mask, by taking off the Zero mask and passing the title on to Suzaku, he has the savior of the world bring an end to the greatest evil Earth has ever known, himself. In order to save the world Lelouch becomes the ultimate lie, he fabricates one final mask of pure evil in order to plunge the world into peace, it works too. I'm sure ultimately there will be war again, every story like this ends like that eventually, but in the epilogue we don't see that. Instead we see that no one is wearing their masks, they all lead happy, normal lives, lives even more normal than you might expect. Ex-terrorist generals and super weapons owning orange orchards, going to school, and joining in peaceful debates. Well, everyone except Suzaku drops their masks, but Suzaku must live on as Zero.

Do you agree that it's the greatest anime ever? If not you should go watch it again until your eyes bleed from those exact scenes we discussed above!

RATING:

Nine out of Ten Men in Masks would give this show Five Orders to Live out of Five

I seriously cannot express how much I enjoyed this show. If Ender's Game is my favorite book, Code Geass is my favorite series to which no spin off can ever do justice. Thanks for reading everyone, and see you tomorrow!

Treasure Planet this is Not: HARLOCK: SPACE PIRATE (2013)

KEEP IT UP!
How much longer until I run out of material? Well, yesterday, actually. I had intended on writing up my weekend posts throughout the week, but then I realized I didn't know what other material to cover! So excuse me if the material becomes a little subpar.

I was...going to post Jupiter Ascending...but I pulled the boxart from IMDB and saw the rating of the movie...and realized I probably didn't remember the movie too well. Then I watched the nostalgia critic's review (there's a first time for everything I suppose) and became utterly convinced I had no business posting about the movie at least until I re-watched it.

So, instead, you get to see my first anime post! Sort of...Harlock: Space Pirate! Because I'm in a Space Opera mood.

TITLE: Harlock: Space Pirate


DETAILS:
            DIRECTOR: Shinji Aramaki
            LEAD ACTOR: David Matranga
            ANTAGONIST LEAD:

SUMMARY:

Mankind is dying. Only one man can do anything about it, Space Captain Harlock, but the Gaia Coalition will stop at nothing to end him.

PERSONAL CRITIQUE: 

I sat down and considered re-watching Harlock, and believe me I will at some point because I did enjoy the movie, but not right now. So here's the best impression I can give from one semi-uninterrupted viewing. It is a steam-punk-esque space opera anime about an immortal pirate and his search to save humanity or something. Sounds like anime movie material to me. Evidently there's a manga and anime series out there, I don't know if I'll ever sit down and delve into those though.

There are some particular things that set this movie off, like an issue with lots of things being lost in translation. I don't know how major the differences are, but it's notable that I watch movies with subtitles, I like to read along to reinforce what the characters are saying, and it's particularly helpful with whispering characters. Not in this case, as with many anime the english dub and subtitles from the Japanese dub don't quite match up, generally this will be the addition/absence of small descriptive words, or even articles of little import in other languages, but in the case of Harlock, there's a mass of dialogue changes from the very beginning of the movie, with the narrator telling two different stories.

Harlock: Space Pirate has a terrific atmosphere and really brings out a detail about space opera that seems to draw the most attention, huge space battles. Which was basically the reason for the special effects in Ender's Game as well. Centering on a plot that may be a little outlandish (super outlandish) Harlock jumps into an epic story without much explanation behind how it's possible. Seriously, we hear a lot about there BEING dark matter engines, but no explanation of how it works really except that it doesn't stop working. And...

SPACE SPOILERS!!!

We know that there are aliens, but we don't get a lot of info on their origin or when they were met. Maybe all of this is divulged in the manga, but not in the movie...so that's kind of what I have to base things on. Even though we don't get a TON of detail, we get enough for things to be explained away, which is perfect, I don't think space opera is intended to be Hard Sci-Fi. It's...intended to be space opera.

Benefit of the doubt handed out, we have an awesome immortal protagonist, with a standard issue viewport character who serves both as key plot element, and binding point for both sides of a pretty well told story. Even though we're dropped into the middle of the action, we get plenty of background information to build the world without having read the source material, even if we don't get absolutely everything. There are plenty of characters in the space pirate's crew that avail themselves to a name and rank, and each of them is deserving in their own special, unique way.

All in all, not a bad shot at a sci-fi anime movie. 

RATING: 

Nine out of Ten Immortal Space Pirates would rate this one Three signs of life on a barren planet out of Five.

If you're into anime and sci-fi, this will probably float your boat, I know it floated my gravity distorting, dark matter driven, deathclass cruiser. (Deathclass...)