#and i like the look of the cast for netflix’s lupin! and the quality looks AMAZING

[fostersffff]

Anime I Watched in 2021, from Worst to Best

2021 was the year I got back into anime real hard, after almost a decade of maybe checking out one show a year, if that, so below the break is a list of all 34 of the shows/movies/OVAs I watched to completion over the course of the year, roughly ranked from worst to best.

YASUKE

The actually true story of Yasuke- the slave-turned-samurai who fought for Oda Nobunaga- should lend itself so easily to adaptation that I assumed the Netflix anime was going to be a slam dunk. Unfortunately, it was very clear within the first ten seconds that this was not going to be what I wanted it to be, and if not for the fact that it was only six episodes I would’ve just dropped it completely by the end of the third.

ANGEL LINKS

This is the only thing on this entire list that I watched with complete confidence that it would be bad, and what I wound up with was the most middling anime I have ever seen. A perfect 5/10, the ultimate wash, could have been much better or much worse, I’ll be thinking about this series forever.

LITTLE NEMO: ADVENTURES IN SLUMBERLAND

Little Nemo was a production that was in development for over a decade and involved nearly every talented person in both the American and Japanese film industries in the 80’s at one point or another, resulting in a gorgeous looking film with nothing else going on. The development of the movie is genuinely more interesting and star-studded than the movie itself.

CASE CLOSED: EPISODE “ONE”

The first thirty minutes of this special are made worthless by the fact that everything that comes after is a 1:1 recreation of the first (plus like ten minutes of the second) of Case Closed/Detective Conan, so all the extra exposition that happens during that chunk just wound up getting repeated, and all of the future elements that were added in like Sherry/Ai and the other Black Organization members are ultimately just cameos. It was nice to see it in HD, and for the new dub cast to take a swing at the origin story, but that’s about it.

MICHIKO & HATCHIN

Sayo Yamamoto’s directorial debut was both disappointing and frustrating, because (spoilers for this list) the components that made The Woman Called Fujiko Mine so incredible are all present here, but not used anywhere near as well as that series. And while it may not be fair to compare her earlier original work with a later one that’s also based in an established franchise, if I hadn’t seen The Woman Called Fujiko Mine first, I honestly can’t even say if I would’ve watched all of this series.

LUPIN III: THE FIRST and LUPIN III: THE CASTLE OF CAGLIOSTRO

Watching The First made me retroactively lower my ranking of The Castle of Cagliostro, because I ultimately realized the only reason I’d ever watch either of these again is for the animation. And make no mistake, the quality of animation in both of these films is superb, but both of these fail to deliver on what I want out of a Lupin III story in almost the exact same way.

OSAMU TEZUKA’S METROPOLIS

A movie loosely based on a manga that itself was based on a single frame of a 1921 silent movie, Metropolis spreads itself a little too thin in too many directions in terms of its plot, but I appreciate the ambition involved compared to the previous movies on this list. And, like those movies, it’s also positively gorgeous to look at: even the dated CG has a certain charm to it, considering the setting.

MEGAZONE 23 (Parts 1-3)

The series that was credited with the explosion in popularity of the OVA format in Japan, they’re a little less remarkable in the wake of all the sci-fi stories that have come after it (especially 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim), but still worth checking out. Part 2 is the best, followed by 1, which is a prerequisite for the second part anyway, and Part 3 could probably be passed since it’s ultimately just the story of the first two parts told again, but slightly worse.

MOBILE SUIT GUNDAM: CHAR’S COUNTERATTACK

Char’s Counterattack is a great action movie, but… man, there’s a lot to deal with in terms of what its story is and how it deals with it. It has the distinction of being the only thing on this list that I went through more than once because there was so much to mull over, especially in the greater context of Universal Century Gundam, but even so, I’m comfortable with its relatively low place on the list.

OTAKU NO VIDEO

A charming love letter and cautionary tale about, for, and by otaku, cutting between an animated and romanticized story about otaku life and live-action mockumentary segments warning of the dangers. Gainax- at least early Gainax- seems to have been the king of “listen, we love this subculture with all our hearts, but please don’t let it consume you”.

LUPIN III: GOEMON’S BLOOD SPRAY

I think one of the keys to making a good Lupin III story is to use Goemon sparingly, because he has a very specific set of functions, both practical and comedic. I appreciate the effort involved in making a movie that’s meant to be about him, but of the movies that take place in The Woman Called Fujiko Mine’s continuity, this is easily the weakest.

LUPIN III: FUJIKO’S LIE

It comes up in other Lupin III stories, but what makes Fujiko so interesting among the other members of the core cast is that she’s way more prone to doing horrible things than Lupin is. This movie trades super hard on that, where most of the movie is Fujiko doing one particularly horrible (but very mundane) thing, which is great, but it also suffers from having a particularly ridiculous antagonist.

LUPIN III: JIGEN’S GRAVESTONE

Jigen’s movie doesn’t have as much to say about Jigen as the other previously mentioned movies do about their titular characters, which is actually pretty alright since Jigen is a little more flexible than the others when it comes to how he’s presented story to story. This instead goes in hard on being a thriller first, and simply gives Jigen the spotlight for the major sequences, which gets it top spot next to it’s siblings.

LUPIN III: BYE BYE, LADY LIBERTY

This was the first Lupin III TV special, released at a time when the series had a lull in popularity. As such, it feels almost like “The Best Of Lupin III Part II”, which made it a delightful watch and my recommendation for how you should get into the franchise, if you’re so inclined.

SLAYERS: THE MOTION PICTURE / SLAYERS PERFECT

In the course of getting back into anime this year, I’ve discovered one of my favorite character archetypes is “unbelievably overpowered protagonist with one or more crippling character flaws that keep them from being boring”. Lina Inverse may be the queen of this archetype, and watching this got me very excited about eventually tackling the rest of The Slayers stuff out there.

PROMARE

The answer to the question “what if the director of Gurren Lagann and Kill la Kill made a movie”. A plot with some aspects that you could argue the depth of if you’re feeling frisky, in service of some really incredible action set pieces with Hiroyuki Imaishi’s distinct type of visual spectacle.

LUPIN III VS. DETECTIVE CONAN: THE MOVIE

The movie version of this crossover is pretty much what I was expecting: a fun action thriller with characters I love a lot. It’s a little more convoluted and the character moments are spread thinner than the special (spoilers for this list), but still a very fun watch.

ARIA THE ANIMATION

Never before have I encountered something with such elaborate sci-fi worldbuilding to set the stage for such a simple slice of life story. Sugary sweet feel good stories about girls being friends and working hard to achieve their goals.

MOBILE SUIT ZETA GUNDAM

I stand by the comment I made in my bigger review that Zeta Gundam feels like Mobile Suit Gundam fan fiction, going a little too heavy on the melodrama after the more grounded original. In spite of that, it’s still a great watch and has some of the best paced action scenes I’ve yet seen in a mecha anime.

YASHAHIME (Season 1)

The biggest compliment I can pay Yashahime is that a large part of the reason I started watching so much anime again is because it reminded me of how much I enjoy anime. It hits the exact same zone that Inuyasha did 20 years ago that makes me go “anime good”.

CASTLEVANIA (Seasons 1-4)

The bar for good animated adaptations of video games. Taking all the seasons together, I do think it got weaker over time, but only incrementally, and it started out with a perfect score.

MOBILE SUIT GUNDAM

Genre-defining series that holds up to this day, even with its dated, budget production values. It would be higher if not for the deep pangs of “what could have been” I feel wondering what if they had gotten a full 52 episode run instead of the truncated 43.

MOBILE SUIT GUNDAM ZZ

Gundam ZZ feels like the true successor to Mobile Suit Gundam, more in line with it thematically and tonally despite having much more lighthearted and much heavier moments. I would’ve honestly put this even higher if the finale had been a little more put together, but even in spite of that I’d say this is my favorite of Universal Century Gundam so far.

TOKYO GODFATHERS

A movie that would be almost sickeningly sweet if not for the willingness to poke fun at itself, both in terms of the main cast being losers and weirdos and for the increasingly unlikely situations they find themselves in. Enhanced dramatically by the stellar animation to punctuate a lot of the comedy.

ROBOT CARNIVAL

An amazing anthology loosely themed around robots whose weakest part still lands a “technically impressive”. It also hits a wide range of genres across all of its shorts, so there’s a good chance that even if you’re a tough sell, there’s at least one that will appeal to you.

MACROSS PLUS: MOVIE EDITION

With the same core creative staff that would go on to make Cowboy Bebop, including Shinichiro Watanabe, Keiko Nobumoto (rest in peace), and Yoko Kanno, it’s not a surprise this turned out so excellent. Some aspects of the story felt a little underdeveloped, but I imagine that’s a consequence of this being a compilation movie of four ~40 minute OVAs.

EXPELLED FROM PARADISE

A terrifically paced action movie that brushes up against heady philosophical concepts just enough to keep things interesting, without getting lost in the weeds. The only real strike I have against this one is the embarrassingly transparent decision to de-age the adult woman protagonist to a sixteen year old’s body for literally no reason other than audience pandering.

OUTLAW STAR

The most rock-solid action series on this list, with a clear, overarching plot strung along fun episodic stories, a fantastic cast of characters, and a setting so unique among stories set in space that I wish there was another series that would actually make use of it (I’ll be thinking about Angel Links forever). It’s a cruel cosmic joke that this series is so closely associated with Cowboy Bebop that it’s never gotten the spotlight it deserves.

PERFECT BLUE

An incredible psychological thriller that you’re probably better off going into knowing as little as possible about, considering my own experiences with expectations of its content.

CITY HUNTER

City Hunter is like a Donald P. Bellisario TV show (i.e. JAG or NCIS) in that every episode has almost the same formula, but the formula is so solid and the characters are so strong that you can just keep watching it forever. Maybe that’s not the most flattering way to describe something so high on this list, but this series and its characters very quickly entered All-Time Classic territory for me.

LUPIN III VS. DETECTIVE CONAN (The Special)

I was hoping I would enjoy this crossover, but I absolutely did not expect it to be basically perfect, in that it did everything I could have wanted to see utilizing both the Lupin III crew and the cast of Case Closed. The only flaw, in hindsight, is that it used up the crossover potential so expertly that they didn’t have much left for the sequel.

LUPIN III: THE WOMAN CALLED FUJIKO MINE

Strikes a perfect balance of being artistic without being totally up its own ass, completely willing to have fun with its characters and settings while also being much more dramatic than what I would typically expect from a Lupin III story. Without going into detailed spoilers, I also think it’s possibly the most perfect retroactive origin story for an established character ever told.

MOBILE FIGHTER G GUNDAM

In my heart of hearts, I will always love big, dumb, hot-blooded combat series more than anything else, and this is the big, dumb, hot-blooded combat series executed with perfection. Nothing speaks more about how confident it is in its own execution than ending the final battle with the literal power of love, and completely nailing it.

If you read all this: thanks for indulging me! I hope you have a safe, healthy, and happy 2022!

#long post #anime #review

[twiststreet]

What are some good heist caper movies?

Well, easy start:  I have a hard time turning off an Ocean’s 11 movie (and am really looking forward to Logan Lucky this summer for that reason).  I like Soderbergh’s sense of humor, going back to Schizopolis or whatever, and the way those movies are assembled (the Dave Holmes music, the way they look, the way people dress, how they carry themselves) plug right into the ol’ pleasure center for me, in a way where … I mean, even the one I “don’t like” or have the most problems with (Ocean’s 13), it came on when I was in a hotel and I could just watch and watch and watch it.  

After that, Sneakers, which is also probably the best hacker movie ever made.  Sneakers is pretty much the best.  To Catch a Thief.  Bottle Rocket.  Now You See Me.  The Thomas Crown Affair and maybe some of the remake (not the part with Rene Russo drinking a soda though).  Cartoonwise, I think you have to count Miyazaki’s Lupin III.  Grand Slam.  Topkapi hasn’t aged well at all, but I remember it having some moments.  De Palma got the setpiece for Mission Impossible from Topkapi, at least, if I’m remembering right.  I don’t know if you count Office Space, but.  I like really junky stuff like the Italian Job remake, too, though, which is pretty terrible. That’s not even really a cast that I’m into besides Donald Sutherland and Ed Norton (though Ed Norton’s really fun to watch in that movie).    I like The Hot Rock.  That one takes a while to get going, so I know some folks think it’s boring, but I think it’s got a nice build to it, that movie.  I kinda think of The Big Short as being structured like a heist movie but just.  My estimation of that movie has really grown over time (which I guess is true of every Adam McKay movie but especially that one).  I don’t know– I’m forgetting a bunch…

There’s some big ones I’ve never seen, though– the original Ladykillers, Fun with Dick and Jane or Gambit, say (the remakes are all not very good, though the Coens one has some qualities, even if it’s shaking out to be their worst movie).  I never saw Tower Heist, but always meant to get around to it cause I’d probably like it.  I never saw Coin Heist either, that Netflix movie about teens stealing coins, because it’s for teens and tweens but I’m probably going to see it at some point because I think teens and tweens are solid folks.

But it also depends on your definitions:  I think A Fish Called Wanda has become a badly underrated movie, I think that movie’s in contention for any kinda hall of fame, but the movie’s more about the aftermath/getaway, rather than the planning/execution, so would you call it a heist movie…?  It depends where you draw your lines.  Same for the original The Getaway, Quick Change, or kinda Charade.  Or I’m not sure where you put, like, a whole buncha classics like Thief, Sexy Beast, Uptown Saturday Night (which is a classic but unfortunately is a Cosby movie, so you know, probably not as fun to watch anymore), Heat (I’d say that’s just a heist movie and not a caper movie, say), or Out of Sight– Sight kinda counts but that movie’s just wonderful for a whole bunch of reasons, so I don[’t know if anyone thinks of it as a heist movie even though that’s where it all leads to.  I think about Clooney ripping off his tie at the beginning of that movie nearly every single time I have to wear a suit, though.  (Note: I’d put con movies in their own category, even though a con’s basically a little heist.)

It’s just a good thing for a movie to be about.  Movie stars get to act like movie stars, and if you got a movie star, it shows that off more than, like, them running from a dinosaur or whatever.  The set design and costume people and whoever all just get a “make things cool” instruction so it’s fun seeing their work.  And it’s just easy to root for the characters.  And it’s easy for one of those movies to just be visually engaging because … an audience doesn’t really have to sit there and care what people are saying to each other that much, to follow along.  Even a forgettable one like that Kurt Russell Art of the Steal movie, I just find pretty watchable.  (Well, I started a Bollywood one called Happy New Year or something the other day, and I had to turn that off, after steam starting coming out of an angry guy’s ears, but).