The Decade in Review: The English Language Adaptation Industry and Fandom Part 2

And now it’s on to the second part of my decade review of the English language adaptation industry as well as fandom, which of course covers the USA, UK and Australia. In this part I’m looking at the Australian anime industry and fandom, English speaking fandom as a whole, controversies in that fandom and the US industries, anime tourism, tokusatsu titles released in English and industry icons who passed away.

As I live in Australia, I thought I’d dedicate a paragraph or three (or four) in regards to bumpy ride decade we had over here. The biggest surprise was the continuing resurrection of Siren Visual. The company was the distributor for Manga Entertainment back in the 1990’s, but with Madman Entertainment becoming the dominant force here from the late 1990’s onwards, they had fallen on hard times. The early 2000’s saw them releasing a pitiful number of anime titles on DVD, then an ill-advised venture into ero anime, with all of their titles being cut to ribbons to appease local censorship classifications, and unwanted attention from religious right campaigners. Finally, they got it together in the mid 2000’s releasing titles from Sentai Filmworks, Aniplex and Funimation. They also ventured into subtitled only titles with anime still not released in other countries in English on DVD or blu-ray with “Welcome to Irabu's Office”, “Hakaba Kitaro” “Nodame Cantabile” and most surprisingly, “Monster”. But things would come crashing down late in the decade when their distributor, Gryphon Entertainment, went belly up and they seemingly couldn’t secure a new deal with anyone else. While they continue to have booths at the dealers area in every single anime convention in the country selling old stock, it seems unlikely we’ll see any future releases from them.

Out of nowhere in 2012, a new anime company arrived on the scene; Hanabee. Founded by Eric Cherry, former CEO of Siren Visual, initially the company sold gaming merchandise from franchises such as “Red vs. Blue” and “The Guild”. Most of their titles were sublicences from US based companies like Aniplex of America and Sentai Filmworks. Unlike Siren Visual, Hanabee did not release any titles that had not been previously released in other English speaking territories. Like Siren Visual, things unravelled at end of the decade for reasons unknown, with the recent “Initial D” movies being the last release for them around mid 2018. Like Siren Visual, the company always seems to have a booth at every anime convention in the country. Their website now sells mostly gaming merchandise and old anime stock. An update at the end of 2019 stated that the company went under a restructure due to a focus on US company Rooster Teeth. They stated they want get back into anime, but considering Madman Entertainment’s stranglehold on the market, that seems unlikely.

Finally, on to Madman Entertainment’s wild ride of the last decade. One of the biggest things to happen to the company was the constant change in ownership over nearly a decade and half. Back in 2006, toy company Funtasic bought them out for AU$34.5 million dollars. Fast forward eight years and Funtasic was a floundering as a company. The co-founders of Madman plus a small coalition of investors then made an offer to Funtasic to buy the company back for significantly less, AU$21.5 million. To paraphrase Kerry Packer; you only get one Funtasic in your lifetime. Despite Funtasic agreeing to the deal, two years later the matter ended up in court, with Funtasic saying Madman owed them an additional AU$2.5 million credit adjustment. The court rounded the amount owed down to a measly AU$268,000. Later Japan came knocking, with Aniplex becoming a minority shareholder in the company in 2017. In early 2019, Aniplex purchased the anime division for AU$35 million.

Animelab celebrate their one millionth subscription 

While their home video division kept pumping out titles over the decade, the company branched into other areas. The Madman Screening Room evolved into a part free, part subscription service called Animelab in 2014. Despite the competition from Crunchyroll and other overseas services, the streaming service did incredibly well and eventually reached over one million subscribers within four years. In 2019, Animelab was merged into a consortium of other international anime streaming services headed up by Funimation, to steam a far wider selection of titles. As in the US, theatrical animation became a major part of Madman's business. Their annual film festival-like tour of anime films, Reel Anime, was phased out in 2013 in favour of limited runs of single films. Initially these were “events” as with the “Puella Magi Madoka Magica” and “Love Live! The School Idol Movie” screenings, which included bonus items and giveaways at some theatres. However, after these two films, anime in cinemas proceeded without much fanfare. In fact, outside social media, there seemed to be little promotion of anime films. Despite this, Madman had some big hits with these films; for example, “A Silent Voice” grossed over AU$600,000 at the box office.

It wasn’t all sunshine and light for the company. They lost distribution rights to Viz manga titles in 2016 to local distributor Simon & Schuster. For their 20th anniversary, they held the inaugural Madman Anime Festival. The event was so successful it became a touring event with conventions in Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane and Perth. This was after several well-established anime conventions gave up the ghost, mostly in the early part of the decade with the decline of university anime clubs mostly to blame (anime clubs were usually the core part of the committees who ran them). Anime conventions certainly didn't die out with Animaga (Melboune), Smash! (Sydney), AVCon (Adelaide), GeeCon (Darwin) and AICon (Hobart, finishing in 2018) keeping the tradition going. Tons of Japanese guests came to these conventions including Shinichi Watanabe, Yuko Miyamura, Sakura Tange, Kotono Mitsuishi, Toshihiro Kawamoto, Megumi Ogata and Toru Furuya.

Gerry Harvey

After years and years of threats, the federal government finally came through and charged 10% GST on all goods bought overseas from 1 July 2018, regardless of their cost. Previously it was only for goods valued over AU$1,000 (or AU$500 if you are getting stuff delivered via a courier). The main instigator of this law was Gerry Harvey of large furniture and electrical goods chain store retailer Harvey Norman. As Australians are big shoppers on overseas online stores, this move didn't exactly make him popular. The government decided that it should be retailers collecting the tax and then sending the money to the tax office. Many people scoffed at this arrangement, yet somehow many online retailers complied including CD Japan and AmiAmi. However, companies like the Right Stuf and pretty much all UK retailers did not add on GST to Australian orders. This inconsistency led to an unfair advantage for these retailers. Worse was to come with Amazon refusing to collect the tax, and publicly berating the federal government by threatening to block Australian customers from buying products from their overseas sites. The government didn’t fold and on 1 July 2018 Australian citizens could no longer order products from any of their international sites. Amazon eventually relented and began paying the tax while allowing Australian customers to buy products from their US site. However, all other international Amazon sites are still blocked to Australian customers, including the Japanese site. This was quite disastrous for Australian anime fans who wanted to buy cheap blu-rays, books and other merchandise.

While cosplay continued to expand into almost a more mainstream hobby, unfortunately harassment of female cosplayers became an issue at conventions. Explicit anti-harassment policies were enacted by conventions in the early 2010’s, mostly under the banner of “Cosplay Is Not Consent”. Though it should have been something that was common-sense to most, it served as a reminder to fans that cosplayers deserve respect and as a voice for cosplayers in order to report harassment.

Vic Mignogna

As the alleged cases of sexual assault and harassment by Harvey Weinstein, Bill Cosby and Kevin Spacey seeped into the public domain in the final couple of years in the decade, anime fandom had its own “Me Too” moment. Initially this appeared as a list of harassers complied in a spreadsheet on a website called “Broken Staircase”. The idea was people could anonymously send in allegation of harassment which would be entered on the spreadsheet. This method always had the potential to be abused, and was with one very prominent person being included on the list who was completely innocent of the allegation being levelled at him. Unsurprisingly the website was taken down after a short while, but did resurface in an alternate location.

With momentum against sexual abusers and harassers building, the US anime industry’s worst kept secret was brought into the public domain. Several women including voice actors Monica Rial and Jamie Marchi, publicly accused fellow voice actor Vic Mignogna of sexual assault and harassment. An avalanche of accusers and allegations, both from fandom and the industry were publicly aired with Mignogna being terminated from his contracts with Rooster Teeth and Funimation. Mignogna categorically denied the accusations but made a public apology at a convention soon after. He then filed a defamation lawsuit against Rial, Marchi, Rial’s fiancee Ron Toye III, and Funimation with Mignogna’s fans coughing up an absurd US$236,000 to fund the case. Funimation then filed an anti-SLAPP motion which is a piece of legislation designed to provide for early dismissal of meritless lawsuits. The legal team for Mignogna was laughably incompetent. The end result was that his lawsuit was dismissed and he was forced to pay the defendant’s legal fees which amounted to US$223,042.42. Regardless, Mignogna’s fans seem to blindly support him despite the mounting evidence against him.

Internally, fandom had a very difficult decade. It became more fractured and deeply divided than ever before. There were several factors that caused this, but the main catalyst was probably Gamergate. Mixed in with that debacle was sites like 4chan and 8chan (which were both born from large anime communities), lurching to the right or more correctly the far right. But this also mirrored a more fractured political scene in the US with the general population becoming entrenched with one side of politics. To be blunt, this all happened around the 2016 US election. Rightly or wrongly, those from the left and right began to inject politics into anime, even if it was there or not. Fandom became surprisingly prudish, with a new moralism creeping into anime fandom. But not from the Christian right as you’d might expect, but from the left. Those on the right also chased phantoms like “political correctness” being inserted into anime (when it wasn’t the case). At times it really felt like anime fandom was at war with itself and wanted to wipe the other side out. The fracturing was so bad that niche pockets within fandom actively despised other niche pockets of fandom. However, it was quite apparent that the vast majority on both sides never really understood fandom or how that fandom consumed anime, the history and tropes of anime or even Japan itself. You could easily argue that social media enabled this division, and that division was stoked and exploited by individuals for personal and political gain. By the end of the decade, many in fandom were bemoaning social media and pined for the fandom of the previous decades of message boards, fan websites and blogs.

The Anime Man & Akidearest

Aside from the seemingly perpetual growth of podcasts (the vast majority of which weren’t worth listening to), the growth and incredible popularity of Youtubers soared. Of course, this also applied to Anitubers (i.e. Anime Youtubers). I am fully aware that I am not in the demographic these Anitubers appeal to, however to be brutally honest, most of the material they put out isn’t all that entertaining or informative. You could easily argue that a fair whack of it is utterly juvenile, serves no real purpose other than to generate controversy in order to get more views (e.g. saying a popular anime “sucks”), promote falsehoods, are completely ignorant of the history and fandom behind anime and even promote piracy over legitimate companies. Despite this, popular Anitubers such as Akidearest, Gigguk, The Anime Man, Mothers Basement and Digibro often have followers in the millions.

In the latter part of the decade, a couple of what could only be described as scams were pulled on anime fandom, but oddly never reported widely on English anime news websites. First up, the Flying Colors Foundation who promoted themselves as a non-profit organisation that wanted to engage with the western anime community in order improve the anime industry. This would initially done via a survey filled in by fans and promoted heavily by popular Anitubers. Red flags started to be raised mid-way through the survey when it asked rather intrusive questions about mental health, including if you had a mental health condition and if so, what you were diagnosed with. The survey wasn’t exactly anonymous; you had to fill in a valid email address at the end of the survey in order to submit it. There was also the fact many filling in the survey were teenagers. The whole thing was rather ethically dodgy to say the least. It was also hard to figure out who was running Flying Colors Foundation. Their senior leadership was cloaked in secrecy until the organisation eventually relented and publicly released the information. However, it was revealed by one fan journalist that there were many more people working for the organisation than revealed, a lot with industry connections. They also claimed that they weren’t paying Anitubers to promote the company, but that had been contradicted by Anitubers themselves who stated they were paid. It was quite obvious that Flying Colors Foundation was set up with purposes of marketing stuff to anime fans and to sell analytics data to companies. There wasn’t anything non-profit about it. When found out, Flying Colors Foundation backpedalled quickly and eventually shutdown operations, stating they’d publicly publish the data from the survey. That never eventuated.

The other scam was the ill-fated cryptocurrency Otaku Coin. Unlike the Flying Colors Foundation, Otaku Coin was immediately treated with a great deal scepticism by fandom. Created by online anime merchandise shop Tokyo Otaku Mode (who also had a hand in the Flying Colors Foundation), Otaku Coin’s goals were vague to say the least. It was apparently meant “to closely and seamlessly connect fans worldwide with creators and otaku-related companies and contribute to the preservation and development of otaku culture”, whatever that meant. 100 billion coins, were to be released with 39 billion of those being distributed to the Otaku Coin Fund for the intent of funding operating expenses, which was a much larger amount than is common for such a scheme. Their website also stated that a percentage of that money would go to the Otaku Coin Preparation Committee Administrative Members, who were oddly a group of people separate to those listed on the Otaku Coin website. While the initial concept paper says that fans will be able to support the wider anime industry with their coins, in reality the coins could only really be spent easily at Tokyo Otaku Mode or other companies involved with creating Otaku Coin. It all seemed rather dodgy and fans stayed away from the scheme in droves.

Easily one of the biggest niche fandoms to emerge in the decade was Sakuga fandom. While this type of fandom had been active in Japan since the 1980’s, it was intriguing that it suddenly became popular in the west this decade. Essentially this fandom focuses on the animation itself and tries to identify the individual animators for well animated scenes. Some parts of fandom did suggest Sakuga fandom only cared amount the quality of animation and not about the plot or anything else, I felt this was misplaced criticism of those fans. Without animators there would be no one to create the anime we love. While voice actors, directors and screenwriters are well known to fans, animators also deserve recognition as well.

Unicorn Gundam statue outside Diver City
Tokyo in Odaiba 

Although anime fans had been making trips to Japan since at least the 1990’s, “anime tourism” seemed to really take off in the 2010’s. While some smaller Japanese tour operators designed tours specifically for western fans, other tour companies were formed to cater to them. Tours catering to specific hot spots such as Akihabara and the Ghibli Museum also emerged. The decade also saw the emergence of new otaku type attractions like the life sized Gundam coupled with the Gundam Front museum in Odiba and the AnimeJapan convention. Of course, there were the traditional otaku events such as Comiket which exploded in popularity, almost to the point where it became almost unworkable. The Japanese government eagerly jumped on the bandwagon with their “Cool Japan” promotional package, but ultimately didn’t spend the money in the places it was need and was rightly criticised as a waste of government funds and a missed opportunity. Coinciding with all of this was mainstream tourists who saw Japan as a hot new destination. By the end of the decade many tourist spots had become overflowing with foreign tourists, some behaving badly, much to the local’s disgust.

Believe it or not, Harmony Gold was still flogging “Robotech” during the last decade. But the company had several legal issues with the three properties which made up the series. Tatsunoko, whom they licenced the properties off back in the 1980’s, claimed Harmony Gold owed them US$15 million in damages, claiming they had breached their contracts including sublicensing the shows and not paying home video royalties. Unbelievably Harmony Gold won and Tatsunoko actually renewed their agreements to the three series for at least another decade. This dashed the hopes of “Macross” fans in the west who had thought that other "Macross" anime series in the franchise would be up for grabs by licencors after the original deal would have expired in 2021. However, licensing agreements with the franchise are far more complex than the mantra “Harmony Gold won’t let anyone licence any Macross anime” that western anime fans constantly repeat.

I thought I’d like to talk about movements in tokusatsu in the west in the last decade because a lot happened in a very short period of time. First up with the freeing of the “Ultraman” licence from Thai production company Chaiyo Productions. Sompote Saengduenchai, founder and president of Chaiyo Productions, claimed the late Noboru Tsuburaya (of Tsuburaya Productions, creators of the “Ultraman” franchise), who had died in 1995, had given him and his company a contract which had given him rights to everything related to “Ultraman” including characters outside Japanese territories, in exchange for a monetary loan. Essentially this was utter bullshit based on what was a highly dubious legal document. After years of legal wrangling, Tsuburaya Productions finally won the case. In July 2019, Mill Creek announced they were distributing the entire franchise on blu-ray in the US, starting with “Ultra Q” and “Ultraman”.

In a surprise move, Shout! Factory, who distributed the “Power Rangers” franchise, began releasing the original Japanese versions of the “Super Sentai” franchise “Power Rangers” was based on. Beginning distribution in 2015 with “Zyuranger”, the company released every series up to “Hurricaneger” and in addition “Jetman”, which was never used for the “Power Rangers” franchise. The DVD sets unfortunately ceased in 2019 due to Hasbro's acquisition of the “Power Rangers” franchise from Saban Brands. In the final year of the decade, Criterion announced their 2,000th release and it was a doozy; a blu-ray box set of the entire showa era “Godzilla” films, i.e. every film from the original 1954 film to 1975’s “Terror of MechaGodzilla”. It was an amazing set with some fantastic extras, though maybe the packaging was a little unwieldy and it could be argued that the artwork didn’t really represent the era the films were created in.

Fred Patten with Osamu Tezuka in 1980

And finally, I am unfortunately ending this post on a rather sombre note. But I must mention that the decade also saw the passing of numerous key players in the industry; Fred Patten who was key player in anime and furry fandom, served as a publicist at Streamline Pictures and was also an avid archivist of anime fandom paraphernalia and fandom historian. Voice actor Peter Fernandez who was most famous for the lead role in “Speed Racer” also left us. As did “Robotech” creator and founder of Streamline Pictures, Carl Macek. Sadly Toren Smith, who set up Studio Proteus back in the very late 1980’s and translated and released some of the best manga ever produced in English via Dark Horse comics, also went before his time.

Well, that wraps up my reviews of anime in both the Japanese and English adaption industries. It took over six months to complete, but I got there in the end. Who knows what will happen over the forthcoming decade? 2020 has already thrown quite a few curveballs and we’re just half way through the year. To be honest, I am not all that optimistic about the future. I just hope creative industries such and anime and tokusastu continue to thrive and fandom continues to enjoy them.

Dead English Language Tokusatsu Magazines: “Markalite”

Publisher: Pacific Rim Publishing Company
Format: A4 (Standard US Magazine Size)
Genre/Type: Tokusatsu, Anime, Japanese Cinema
Years Active: 1990 - 1991
Issues Published: 3

One of the rarest types of publication is the one dedicated to tokusatsu (Japanese special effects) films. Over the years I have searched high and low for magazines like this, but generally come up empty handed. I did discover Asian Trash Cinema (later named Asian Cult Cinema), but I was rather annoyed at its misogynistic tone and its focus on degrading exploitation films. G-Fan didn’t hold my interest either and seemed to have a very narrow focus on Godzilla. But there was one Tokusatsu magazine that stood head and shoulders above everything else; Markalite Magazine (a Markalite is the dish heat-ray weapon that appeared in some early Toho films, “The Mysterians” being the most widely known film to feature it).

The magazine was started by two of the most well-known men in tokusatsu fandom in America; August Ragone and Bob Johnson in 1990. Even now, there isn’t a great deal of information about tokusatsu films and TV series in English, especially compared to amount of information and resources that anime fans have at their disposal. This is why I find this magazine so amazing. It is just jam packed full of accurate, comprehensive and detailed information about a subject that was extremely hard to come across in the US. And that’s a claim that many of the English language anime magazines of the time couldn’t make. Certainly in some instances the information presented in those early publications wasn’t entirely accurate. It’s fair to say some of it was completely off the mark and rather misleading. But not Markalite. All of the three published issues ran around 96 pages and were practically filled to the brim of each page with interesting articles and information.

The debut issue had over 30 pages devoted to “Godzilla Vs Biolante”. There’s interviews with the director, the SFX director and even the man in the Godzilla suit, Kenpachiro Satsuma. But it doesn’t end there; we also have a long synopsis of the film, comprehensive biographies of the cast, a look at the special effects and behind the scenes, a complete cast and staff listing and some great side bars about why Godzilla never destroys the Imperial Place and who the heck that scary guy with make-up on was who made a brief appearance in the film (heavy metal singer and personality Demon Kakka). It’s just amazing. Most of the stuff in this magazine you can’t find on the web today.

Other really interesting articles included a listing of every tokusatsu TV show from the 1950’s to 1990 (including air dates, episode numbers, production company, actors and director), the role of aliens in Japanese sci-fi films, the Ultraman series, Ishiro Honda’s Godzilla films and number of then current tokusatsu TV shows. The greater majority of these articles were extremely will written and researched and a joy to read. On the anime side of things, a couple of articles are included, mostly about older anime such as “Gigantor” and “Kimba the White Lion”. Both were written by Fred Patten, a veteran of sci-fi, anime and furry fandoms who would later work for Streamline Pictures. While I really respect Patten’s work as a whole, a third contribution, an opinion piece about how anime in the late 1980’s didn’t stand up to what had come before it, is pretty absurd, more so in hindsight. In the article Patten makes the claim that anime had gone down dramatically in quality since the introduction of the Original Video Animation (OVA) format, and things were never as good as they were in the 1970’s and early 1980’s. He cites the rather mediocre “Genma Taisen” (released as “Harmagedon” in the US) and the rather flawed and overly long “Phoenix 2772” as examples of great anime (amongst the Gundams, Macross’, Yamatos and Harlocks he mentions) which only makes it even more laughable. Yes, I suppose only crap was released after 1985; “Project A-ko”, “Megazone 23”, “Bubblegum Crisis”, “Kimagure Orange Road”, “Touch”, “Akira”, all of them trash. The article’s accompanying satirical cartoon has Astroboy smashing his way through an Ingram robot from “Patlabor”. Yeah, that was trash too, and that no good director Mamoru Oshii didn’t do much after that stinker. Oh, don’t get me started on the 1990’s. “Evangelion”? Bah, not that great. Yes, we should all be watching old anime from the 1960’s and 1970’s because it never got any better than that, apparently.

Markalite’s short run also included interviews with Sonny Chiba and Robert Dunham (an American actor who appeared in many of Toho’s 1960’s tokusatsu films), obituaries for Japanese actors Akihiko Hirata and Jun Tazaki, the Australian/Tsuburaya co-production “Ultraman: Towards the Future (Ultraman Great)” series, Akira Kurosawa’s film “Dreams”, Ishiro Honda’s Godzilla films, Toho’s early special effects films, including the propaganda films made during World War II and the Hollywood live action adaptation of “The Guyver”. There are also some very intriguing titbits in the news section including a report on a never made remake of the 1960’s “Daimaijin” trilogy which was to be released in 1994 as a co-production between Daiei and Hong Kong studio Golden Harvest. There was some bad stuff in the magazine though; some of the writing, other than from Ragone or Johnson, felt a bit fanish and unprofessional. One issue had four reviews of “Godzilla Vs Biolante” over two or three pages, which felt really redundant. Some of the reviews also were rather overly critical of and unfair to films themselves, seeing as most of these films were low budget and B-grade. The magazine also included Maraklite Maidens, a pull out centrefold which usually taken from publicity shots from various films. Perhaps now days this could be seen as a little sexist.

Unfortunately disaster stuck the company only after three issues. Their publisher had some issues with the anime magazine he was publishing, Animag magazine which I have previously written about. Animag took their magazine elsewhere, and this must have been too much for the publisher financially, who delayed the publication of issue 4 of Markalite for over a year. The editors of Markalite eventually threatened to sue and they got their layouts of the magazine back, which were left on Johnson’s porch, water damaged in a plastic shopping bag. After that, the publisher allegedly skipped the state to avoid creditors, leaving Ragone and Johnson $1,200 in debt and having no way to contact the subscribers of the magazine as the publisher handled the subscriptions and had all of the addresses. What an absolutely horrible way for any magazine to end its life, and rather demoralising for its creators and editors. Afterwards some of the material meant for issue 4 ended up online at the Henshin Online website and also in the newsletter “Henshin!”. “Kaiju Fan” was the successor to “Markalite”, but I still haven’t found any issues of that. Bob Johnson would later co-found the SciFi Japan website, while August Ragone would continuing writing about tokusatsu films and would later write the book “Eiji Tsuburaya: Master of Monsters”.

For myself who has a bit more than a passing interest in tokusatsu TV series and films, I find it really disappointing that there isn’t a magazine out there which explores it in depth as Markalite did. Sure, the occasional articles in “Otaku USA” are great, but still I’d like a 100% tokusatsu focused magazine which looked at old and new series that I could pick up from my local comic book shop every time it came out. And sure “everything” is on the internet now days, but sometimes I think I’d prefer reading a magazine and discovering stuff I’d never find out about otherwise.

Unfortunately a lot of the coverage we do get, especially in mainstream coverage of the genre, is quite ignorant of the long history of the genre, it's tropes and conventions. Even today, most modern tokusatsu coverage still hasn't advanced much beyond cliches about men in rubber suits destroying miniature cardboard buildings (when of course it's plainly obvious that cardboard has never been used to create buildings in any tokusatsu film or TV series). In light of that, Markalite's existence and short life span is even more remarkable.

Tokusatsu On the Big Screen: “Shin Godzilla”

Venue: Dendy Cinemas, Level 2, North Quarter, Canberra Centre, 148 Bunda Street, Canberra City, ACT
Date: Saturday 15 October 2016
Distributor: Madman Entertainment
Format: Digital Projection, Japanese with some English and German dialogue with English Subtitles
Length: 120 minutes
Production Date: 2016
Currently on Home Video in English (as of writing): No

It’s an utterly rare event that a Japanese live action special effects (tokusatsu) film is screened in cinemas. But you could say it’s becoming a more regular occurrence with a number of manga to live action adaptions having one off special screenings in the last year or so such as “Paraysite” and the two part “Attack on Titan” films. Interestingly Madman has decided to have a limited theatrical release for this film over a week or two. It’s quite significant as I don’t think there has been a proper theatrical release of any Japanese film (Studio Ghibli and Mamoru Hosoda films being the only exceptions) for nearly five years. It’s a pretty sad statement on modern Japanese cinema.

When I do write ups of cinema screenings, I usually talk about the overall experience. This time there really isn’t much to talk about. I had some difficulty trying to get a ticket online (Dendy somehow cocked up the online ticketing for the film which meant I couldn't order a ticket for any session and had to ask them to fix it), but it was a lovely clear sunny Canberra October Saturday. About 20 people showed up to watch the film. No otakuish types at all. There was nothing of real note to report. So it’s time to talk about the film.

Local police investigate an abandoned cruiser out in Tokyo Bay. Belonging to disgraced zoology professor Goro Maki, a number of curious personal items are left on board, but no clues to his whereabouts. Suddenly the boat rocks violently as a large explosion not far away send jets of water hundreds of meters into the air. A strange blood-like substance pools around the area. Part of the Tokyo Bay Aqua-Line roadway collapses and floods apparently due to the explosion. The government begins emergence action and decides how to deal with the crisis. All flights are halted to and from Haneda airport and people are evacuated from the collapsed tunnel and the surrounding area. The high ups declare that the phenomena in the bay is due to undersea volcanic activity, however Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Rando Yaguchi (played by Hiroki Hasegawa) alerts everyone to amateur footage found on social media sites which seems to show a giant tail flicking out of the ocean. He concludes that a large creature is the cause. However the older bureaucrats mock his theory and announce publicly that the cause is underwater volcanic activity. Their reasoning being that no creature could withstand the boiling water seeping to the surface.

But the government press conference is halted when TV stations start broadcasting live footage of a large creature making its way through Tokyo’s canal system, which eventually causes significant destruction and havoc once it makes landfall. The strange creature seemingly lumbers through Tokyo without rhyme or reason demolishing residential blocks, causing fires in its wake and killing more than a hundred people. Meanwhile government bureaucrats bicker over who should take control of the situation and under what part of legislation could they deploy the self-defence force. Strangely the creature soon returns to the bay. As if it was never there, life in Tokyo soon returns to normal. Inspecting the damage with government officials, Yaguchi laments that in the two hours the creature caused this damage, the government could not figure out a course of action to stop it.

After dealing with a small band of professors and experts that provide no real help in determining what the creature is or how to stop it, Yaguchi is tasked with building a research and countermeasures group. His choices are unconventional with mostly young staff with little experience; however the group soon collectively discover that the creature is emitting radiation. One junior staffer from the Environmental Department, Hiromi Ogashira (Mikako Ichikawa), theorises that the creature could be powered by a natural nuclear fission reactor in its body. Though initially dismissed, the theory later seems more plausible when further information arrives. This is in the form of material brought in by US special envoy Kayoko Ann Patterson (Satomi Ishihara). She reveals that Goro Maki had prophesied that such a creature would appear after hundreds of barrels of radioactive waste had been secretly dumped into the bay many decades ago. Maki had left a very strange document which apparently shows the DNA structure of the creature. However none of the staff can make head or tale of it. Patterson does a deal with the Japanese government to provide Maki’s research in exchange for samples the creature left behind. Maki’s documents also give a name to the creature; Godzilla.

Yaguchi’s team theorise that Godzilla went back to the ocean in order to cool down as it is in its next stage of growth. They discover it uses its blood and fins as a cooling system for its internal fission reactor. They suspect that they could freeze Godzilla using a coagulating agent and kill it or at least stop it in its tracks. But before they can come with a workable plan, Godzilla returns in its next stage. Twice as large as before, it lays waste to three of Tokyo’s wards. The self-defence force proves ineffectual. And though the US military via its use of stealth bombers seems to making headway, Godzilla soon wipes them out and causes a major disaster within Tokyo. With the government and the capital in taters, the UN, with a push from the US, decides to use nuclear weapons on Godzilla. However Yaguchi is determined that his team can stop the monster before they strike.

Only two years after’s Gareth Edward’s rather good Hollywood version, surprisingly Toho decided to yet again resurrect the Godzilla franchise. Of all dates to do so, on 1 April 2015 they announced Evangelion director Hideaki Anno would be helming the project with Shinji Higuchi (“Attack on Titan”) who would co-directing and be special effects director. While some fans were concerned, Anno and Higuchi are certainly no strangers to tokusatsu. Daicon Film, while mostly known for their two short animated pieces for the Daicon conventions in the early 1980’s, made mostly tokusatsu shorts. Higuchi would later work on the 1984 “Godzilla” and was the special effects director for the 1990’s “Gamera” trilogy, considered by many as the pinnacle of daikaiju tokusatsu film making. We all know Anno is a tokusatsu tragic, but also directed the short film “Giant God Warrior Appears in Tokyo”, a 9 minute short which was screened with “Evangelion 3.0” in 2012. A lot of the shots in that film do feel similar to those in “Shin Godzilla”. Perhaps that film was a demonstration for Toho as some have theorised.

While a lot of reviews bizarrely consider this film to be deeply nationalistic, anti-American and pro-military, I think those comments are almost totally off the mark and totally misunderstand the film makers. First up, Anno is an otaku, through and through. He’s not really pro war, but he certainly does love military machinery. You can see that quite clearly in the film's battle sequences. They lovingly show off the machines in question (complete with on screen text giving the full names of the battle machines in question), especially the tanks. But in the end the military are completely ineffective against Godzilla (perhaps more of an abysmal failure), pretty much the same as most other Japanese giant monster films. The nationalism claim doesn’t hold much water either, especially when you compare this film to mainstream Hollywood features. There is some anti-American sentiment, however it isn’t really pronounced except for a couple of sequences.

There are some really interesting themes in the film. The major theme is the battle of the old guard and the young who feel they aren’t being listened to. This is most apparent in the way the older government staff treat their younger counterparts. The Japanese government bureaucracy is really given a belting and is portrayed as bunch of public servants who can’t take decisive action in times of crisis. This of course is an obvious criticism to the government response to the 2011 Tohoku tsunami and earthquake and the scenes of the initial destruction are an allusion to the disaster itself. Some reviewers have claimed that this film is a satire on the bureaucracy; however in the end Yaguchi’s team wins the battle, so I think its false claim. The most interesting part of the film though is that while the old guard and the military fail in defeating Godzilla, Yaguchi’s rag tag group of otaku, misfits and other assorted people society reject, actually triumphs in the end.

While it is very dialogue heavy and is mostly shot of groups of people around tables and in conference rooms, it really held my attention for the two hour run time. It is literally about the government trying to deal with a situation beyond their comprehension and trying to solve that problem. Somehow it just works as a film. There are three major sequences that involve Godzilla and all three are quite spectacular. It would seem that Godzilla was purely CG in the film. I don’t think there are any suits or models in the film at all. I think it was pretty ballsy for Anno and Higuchi to show a juvenile Godzilla. It does look a little weird (like a salamander), but the idea and the effects seem to work well. The reveal in the second major Godzilla sequence was quite stunning. The actual physical look of Godzilla here is reminiscent of “Godzilla Vs Destroyah”. The new powers may be a little over the top, but I enjoyed it immensely. The climax was a little too much considering the rather realistic portrayal of what had come before.

The acting is pretty good and cast don’t ham it up (thank god). Satomi Ishihara's English is decent, but poor for an American born woman, which she was portraying. A couple of her English lines really need subtitles and were almost unintelligible. At time the film does really feel like an Evangelion film with Anno’s use of onscreen text and even variations of the music track "Decisive Battle" from Evangelion being used in the film (during sequences involving Yaguchi’s team, adding to weight of the theory Anno is championing otaku in the film). A couple of Akira Ifukube’s pieces from the original Godzilla films also make an appearance. Anno also adds in a few other references such as the old Toho titles and having the opening title reference the original 1954 Godzilla film title. This film can certainly stand on its own two feet and I didn’t think this blatant nostalgia was needed. You could also probably say that the film feels very much like an Evangelion film or TV episode to a degree with Godzilla in place of an Angel (and with no actual Evangelion to fight the creature either). Apart from the use of "Decisive Battle", note that Mikako Ichikawa's uniform bear some resemblance the colour scheme of the NERV members uniforms. I also felt this film at times had the same feeling of dread as the Evangelion films had.

The cinematography is quite good (some really interesting POV shots keeping in with our social media saturated world), however there were some rather strange shots and far too many close ups. I also thought that some sequences could have been trimmed (Ishihara’s English quips were grating after a while). The other major problem I had was that final battle. Parts of it were a little too absurd to take seriously. It’s a bit of shame as the film is relatively believable and realistic (or suspension of disbelief was easy) for the most part. It's also interesting to point out that this film was made for less than a tenth of the cost of Gareth Edward's 2014 film. In my opinion it's a far more engaging and interesting film than Edward's. I also think this film easily outshines all of the millennium series Godzilla films. Finally I must say Funimation’s trailer (I’m assuming Madman used that one) for the film is utter shit. The Japanese trailers are far better. Overall, it’s pretty good film. I’m going to give it a solid 8 out of 10.

Video Backlog: “The Next Generation - Patlabor -: Tokyo War”

Publisher: Panorama (Hong Kong)
Format: Region A Blu-ray, NTSC, Japanese Dialogue with optional Cantonese Dub and English and Chinese (Traditional and Simplified) Subtitles
Length: 94 minutes
Production Date: 2015
Currently in Print (as of writing): Yes

The year is 2015. While the members of SV2 take a well-earned break, a missile is fired into the Rainbow Bridge in Tokyo, echoing the attack on Yokohama Bay Bridge in 2002 (as seen in “Patlabor 2 the movie”). The SV2 are recalled to duty and are visited again by Kei Takahata (played by Reiko Takashima) of Public Security. She plays them a video of the attack she has obtained from a private film company. It shows an actual missile being launched towards the bridge and the explosion. An analysis of the video also shows a previously unseen helicopter. Yuma Shiobara (Seiji Fukushi) who is a military otaku recognises the silhouette of the helicopter; a AH-88J2 Hellhound, the Grey Ghost, a stealth attack helicopter from the Japanese Self Defence Force (JSDF). Later in a private meeting with the SV2’s Captain Keiji Gotoda (Toshio Kakei), Takahata provides him with a wealth of information regarding the case. She tells him that a group people sympathetic to the ideals of Yukihito Tsuge (currently in prison for the attempted coup d'etat on Tokyo in 2002) stole the helicopter and preparing to wage war on Tokyo. A JSDF pilot Rei Haibara (Kanna Mori) apparently defected to the group and killed her co-pilot. Strangely all data relating to her was deleted from JSDF computers.

Gotoda and SV2 covertly take on the terrorists at their hide out with the two Labor crews storming their stronghold and the mechanics using the Revolver Cannon by itself to fire on the building. Despite their efforts and Takahata and members of Public Security belatedly proving support, Haibara and the Grey Ghost escape. Later Gotoda is contacted by his former senior, Shinobu Nagumo (Yoshiko Sakakibara), who has returned to Japan in secret from her overseas stint with the UNHCR in the Middle East. She explains why her and Captain Gotoh's disappeared after Tsuge's failed coup d'etat and how they left a “time bomb” at the SV2 in the form of the potential for this new terrorist attack.

Arriving back at the SV2, head mechanic Shige (Shigeru Chiba) is ropeable at the captain’s disappearance. He explains to Gotoda that while he was away Security Bureau came in an effectively shut down the SV2. Gotoda orders the SV2 to salvage as much material they can to prepare for an attack by the Grey Ghost. Gotoda is later called in to explain himself to the police chiefs at headquarters. They seem to be more concerned with his actions than those of the terrorists that stole the Grey Ghost. Eventually he can’t take anymore and asks them to dismiss him from his post. But before officers can take him away; the Grey Ghost attacks the building, shooting a hail of bullets into the conference room. Gotoda escapes and heads back to the SV2 where the SV2 hanger has previously been taken out and destroyed. Luckily the mechanics and Labor teams had hidden the Ingrams and their carriers under camouflage nets away from the hanger. Shige is still devastated at the loss of his “home”. Meanwhile the Grey Ghost shoots up various buildings around Tokyo including the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Offices. JSDF helicopters and F-16s try to take out the Grey Ghost but have no luck. Gotoda leads his team to defeat the terrorists as his seniors had done so previously.

This is the concluding chapter in Mamoru Oshii’s "The Next Generation - Patlabor -" project. In the original press material before the film was shot, the public were promised that while the movie series (which I reviewed a while back) would be comedy, the film would be a dead serious affair. The reality was that the statement wasn’t exactly true. Certainly in the first quarter hour it has moments which are just as silly as those found in the series. The remainder of the film is essentially a complete remake of “Patlabor 2 the movie”, occasionally shot for shot, sometimes with dialogue taken directly from that film. This is the major problem with this film. I mean, why in god’s name would Oshii do this? It immediately draws comparisons between the two films and “Tokyo War” does not come off well in that comparison.

First and foremost the story of “Patlabor 2 the movie” does not slide easily into the world of "The Next Generation - Patlabor -". You may remember from that film that the key reason Shigeki Arakawa chose to use the SV2 was the fact Shinobu Nagumo was formerly Yukihito Tsuge’s lover. Here that link is not present. There really isn’t a valid reason that Gotoda would accept Takahata’s request to storm the terrorist’s hideout. Nor does it make sense that Gotoda would order the Labor teams to take on the Grey Ghost when both the JSDF attack helicopters and F-16s had no effect at all on it. What the hell are two outdated, broken down, Labors supposed to do? The terrorist’s motivations are obscured as well. It is never really spelled out what they want, if anything. Other than that are sympathisers of Tsuge’s ideas, we are told nothing.

Gotoda’s involvement in all of this is clouded and not explained well either. In the final episode of the series, he visits Tsuge in gaol and later receives Captain Gotoh’s old mobile phone in the mail and a mysterious phone call on that mobile. In some of the translated promotional material it suggests that Gotoda was helping plot a coup d'etat before he joined the police force, but none of this information seems to have made its way into the series or the film. Nagumo’s (played by her original voice actor Yoshiko Sakakibara, continually in silhouette, her back to the camera or off screen)  return is meant to fill in the blanks but just adds more confusion. For example we’re told that the former SV2 captains left a “time bomb” for the current SV2 which turned into the current terrorist actions, but it is never articulated how or why the captains did this. The other major question mark is Rei Haibara. Mystery surrounds her, but in the end nothing is really revealed, at all. It’s truly bizarre. I mean why devote so much time to her and leave the audience hanging. The final frustrating scene in the film suggests that she might appear in a sequel of some sort.

A lot of these gaps in this film may be due to the fact that the production company released a director’s cut five months after the original release which contained an additional 27 minutes of footage . This seems to be a deliberate ploy by the company to make fans come back to cinema a second time. However when the original 94 minute cut (which is the version on the Blu-ray I'm reviewing) was released, it was pretty much a box office bomb. So there really isn’t any logical reason why they would release a director’s cut of a failed film unless they already had the film made and the theatres already booked and couldn't get out of it. It’s kind of baffling why they stuck to this plan. Why didn’t they just cut their losses and go direct to video? To be honest there are a couple of redeeming features to the film. The most obvious one is the cinematography which is gorgeous. I particularly like the sequence where Takahata is investigating a former landing site of the Grey Ghost and the crime scene with the terrorists “appear” around her in her mind’s eye. The external shots of the F-16s while in flight are really well done too. The action sequences including the SV2’s attack on the terrorist’s hide out and the finale with the Labors versus the Grey Ghost are really well choreographed, though the latter comes off as a bit implausible. The music by Kenji Kawaii is as per usual fantastic, though he does refer back to “Patlabor 2 the movie”, which is to be expected.

But having said that the main problem with the film is it’s a pale imitation of the original anime. It cuts out a lot of elements which made “Patlabor 2 the movie” a fantastic movie such as the reasoning behind Tsuge’s actions, the sense of confusion inside Tokyo due to the radio jamming and the blimps full of potentially lethal gas, the occupation of the city by the military and the substantial connection between the main culprit and the captain of SV2. All of these elements contributed greatly to “Patlabor 2 the movie” and here they are sorely missed. Why Oshii thought this would be a great idea is beyond me. The whole project feels like a missed opportunity. Maybe if the budget was larger, maybe if the project was given to a creative team other than Oshii we’d have something far more entertaining than this cynical rehash. I really haven’t like any of Oshii’s works since 2001 (“Sky Crawlers” being the sole exception). I note that it was around the time that long-time collaborator Kazunori Ito stopped writing screenplays for him.

As with the movie series Blu-rays, there aren’t any on disc extras. It does come with a 16 page explanation booklet, in Chinese. I assume this was culled from the Japanese standard edition DVD and Blu-ray sets. The subtitles are maybe a little better than the ones on the movie series BDs. I still think they could have been better. They’re not up to snuff when compared with US anime releases. In conclusion, it’s a rather disappointing film. I really have no desire to seek out the director's cut version (which isn't available commercially in English at this stage). I don’t understand why Oshii felt the need to make this series and film, nor understand why the financial backers decided to fund it. I’m guessing they made a loss on their investment. 5.5 out of 10.

Remaining Backlog: 10 movies, 6 OVAs/specials, 13 TV series, also waiting for second parts for four shows to be released before viewing them.

Video Backlog: “The Next Generation - Patlabor -”

Publisher: Panorama (Hong Kong)
Format: Region A Blu-ray, NTSC, Japanese Dialogue with optional Cantonese Dub and English and Chinese (Traditional and Simplified) Subtitles
Length: 15 minutes (Episode 0), 48 minutes (Episodes 1 to 11), 32 minutes (Episode 12)
Production Date: 2014 - 2015
Currently in Print (as of writing): Yes

Eleven years have passed since the events of “Patlabor 2 the movie”. The construction of the Babylon Project is a long distant memory and a deep and long recession has hung over Japan. As a result Labors are far scarcer and so is Labor crime. Special Vehicles Unit 2 (SV2) therefore was halved with Division 1 being made redundant. Only two AV-98 Ingrams remain and have been remodelled endlessly with little help from the manufacturer. All of the original SV2 staff have left with only Shigeo Shiba (known as Shige within the SV2) remains and is now the head mechanic. Shige recounts the changes in the SV2. While he was indifferent to replacements for the original staff, he sympathises with the current SV2. The SV2 are under the constant threat of being dissolved by their parent group the Security Bureau.

But the current members of the SV2 are just as odd as the original members were; Akira Izumino (played by Erina Mano) is the video game loving first Labor pilot, Yuma Shiobara (Seiji Fukushi) the back up for the first Labor and military otaku who is constantly making plastic models, Ekaterina Krachevna Kankaeva aka Kasha (Rina Ohta) the chain smoking, back talking back up for the second Labor on loan from the Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation, Isamu Ohtawara (Yoshinori Horimoto) the second Labor pilot who is a trigger happy maniac cop and an alcoholic to boot, Hiromichi Yamazaki (Shigekazu Tajiri) the first Labor team’s carrier driver who is way too soft to be in the SV2 and cares for chickens in his spare time, and Shinji Mikiya (Kohei Shiotsuka) the second Labor team’s carrier driver who is recently divorced and uses his Pachinko addiction to pay his child support. Presiding over this ragtag group is Keiji Gotoda (Toshio Kakei), the rather easy going captain.

Most days at the SV2 are filled with boredom as the mechanics and Labor teams try to get through the long days by bickering with each other, playing video games, watching TV and other pastimes. With the manpower essentially halved since the dissolution of Division 1, the two Labor teams are constantly on standby and are forced to take turns in doing eight hour shifts around the clock. This leaves with no personal life at all. Food is an issue with the only local restaurant, the Shanghai finally getting sick of 15 years of orders from the SV2 and just delivering large vats of fried rice and noodles. The only other option for food is a poorly stocked convenience store several kilometres away. Occasionally there will be a Labor incident, but this is rare. More likely the real threats come from the harassment from Security Bureau wanted to shut them down as well as members of Public Security trying to force them to take on missions out of their scope, due to their history under the former two captains. Worst is the fact that with no support from the manufacturer, the Labors barely work for more than a five minute at a stretch and constantly break down when they do.

As the series progresses, the SV2 are forces to deal with some very strange situations from batteling giant Kappa monsters, terrorists holding convenience stores for ransom, game centre battles, fighting rouge Russian Labors, mad bombers, assassins and being chased by raptors under the labyrinth of sewers beneath the SV2. It’s pretty much as per normal when compared with their predecessors.

This is the infamous recent movie series (released in cinemas first in seven parts, broadcast on satellite TV a few weeks later, then on home video. Much like the “Yamato 2199” series) helmed by Mamoru Oshii based upon the late 1980’s and early 1990’s anime. Believe it or not, since the late 1990’s there have been a couple of attempts to make the franchise into a live action film. First Christophe Gans (“Brotherhood of the Wolf”, “Silent Hill”), had a go but couldn’t get past the script stage. A pilot film directed by Oshii mysteriously appeared in 1998, however it was never revealed as to why it was made. In 2013 we finally found out that this was a film project that Oshii was determined to make. The promotional material for the series certainly made it quite an anticipated project; it was given a two billion yen budget (which included a full length theatrical feature to conclude the series) and two eight metre Ingram Labor props were built for the series and were later used in promotional events.

The reality turned out to be quite different. This series seems to be despised by fans of the anime. Online Japanese retailers are filled with one star reviews for the series. Most of the reviews average out to barely two and a half stars out of five. The main complaints are that it’s quite hammy (it’s mostly a comedy) and the Labors don’t get much use at all. And there’s also the use of an idol as the lead character (Erina Mano is a graduate of the Hello! Project, most famous for giving the world the idol group Morning Musume). Having finally seen the series in its entirety, some of these criticisms are quite valid, others not so much. The original “Patlabor” OVAs and TV series were comedies, absurd, even farcical at times, and many episodes didn’t feature the Labors at all (it’s a work place sitcom essentially), so I think it’s a bit rich to complain about “The Next Generation - Patlabor -” being a comedy which hardly features the titular robots. However as it is very much a series based in reality and a fair wack of the comedy, especially the parts mimicking manga-like elements, comes off as a bit cringe worthy. However these are mostly confined to the early parts of the series. As the series progresses it uses these elements sparingly, and the episodes become more dramatic and serious, though there is always a farcical element in each episode.

Oshii certainly knows how to frame a great shot. A lot of the footage is utterly gorgeous, especially of Tokyo. Even the pollution filled waterways look beautiful. The scripts, mostly co-written by Oshii himself, can be quite funny at times, though his usual self-indulgent philosophical moments do crop up. The action is also surprisingly well choreographed. A gun battle inside a convenience store and a short battle between an Ingram and a Russian Labor are two of the highlights in the series. Oshii has quite a lot of interesting things to say in the series such as highlighting the absurdity of Japanese corporate and public servant culture and the way the SV2 obsess about their hobbies over work because of that soul crushing culture. But the major problem with the series was the blatant recycling of material from the anime. The main cast are facsimiles of the original characters with minor tweaks to their personalities (I will give Oshii points for recasting the original voice actor as Shigeo Shiba). Great swathes of dialogue from the anime are reused, word for word in some scenes. And bizarrely two episodes are practically remakes of two anime episodes, with only minimal changes to names and dialogue. I don’t understand why he has done this. Perhaps to parody or satirise the original?

The CG elements of the show are quite reasonable when you consider the budget of the show. The Ingrams in motion aren’t spectacular, but get the job done. Certainly the setup of the show was a work around so there would be as little Labor action as possible. The acting is also not brilliant but more than passable. It’s certainly not as hammy or silly as I was expecting. A lot of it is played straight (with the exception of a few characters) and comes off as quite natural in the more serious parts of the series. Kenji Kawaii supplies the music again. As per usual it’s brilliant. The series got an English subbed release from Hong Kong distributors Panorama last month. I thought the concluding film would get a subbed Hong Kong release, but to get the series subbed as well is quite unexpected. There aren’t any extras as such (except for an unlisted 10 minute recap). The subtitles are a little on the mediocre side. A lot of it reads very in a stilted manner, possibly a little too literal in its translation. Towards the middle there are a lot of typos and little of the on screen text is translated. Overall it’s passable. The show itself fairs the same; it has flashes of brilliance and can be quite entertaining for much of its length. But yet again Oshii is terribly self-indulgent and goes over the top with farcical elements (luckily the philosophical elements aren’t quite as prominent in this work). The series finale is a short prologue to the feature film, which should really have been tacked on to the start of the film itself. On balance the series deserves a 6.5 out of 10, but it really isn’t a patch on the any of the anime versions.

Remaining Backlog: 11 movies, 6 OVAs/specials, 13 TV series, also waiting for second parts for four shows to be released before viewing them.

Video Backlog: “Garm Wars: The Last Druid”

Publisher: Animatsu (UK)
Format: Region B Blu-ray, PAL, English Dialogue
Length: 92 minutes
Production Date: 2014
Currently in Print (as of writing): Yes

The planet Annwn was home to eight races of humanoid beings called Garm. When their creator Diarne left the planet, the races started waring with each other. Eventually over the years and years of wars, only three races remained; the Columbia who are specialist in aerial combat, the Briga who are specialists in land combat and the Kuntak who only survived as they provided their technical expertise to the Briga. As result of the battles, the land is wasteland for the most part and the air is polluted. Regardless the battles still continue on. In an ongoing battle, the commander of a Columbia cruiser notices that the Briga are chasing one of their own shuttles. It is suspicious enough to want capture of the shuttle by Columbia cruiser soliders who battle the Briga fighters as the chased shuttle eventually crashes. Inside is a Kuntak named Wydd (Lance Henriksen, Bishop in “Aliens”, Frank Black in “Millennium”), a Gula which is a kind of holy dog, and a Druid named Nascien (Summer Howell, Alice in “Curse of Chucky”). The Druids are supposedly an extinct race, yet here is one with a Kuntak. The Druids are said to hold massive amounts of data and are able to do millions of calculations. They are extremely useful as tactical weapons.

Wydd and the Druid are transported to the interrogation room by a solider named Khara (Melanie St-Pierre). Wydd thanks her predecessor who died in battle (Khara is a clone) while saving him from being captured by the Briga. He offers her a chance to be blessed by the Gula, however they arrive at their destination before she has a chance to be blessed. In the interrogation Wydd is more concerned with parting his philosophy on why the Garm races are fighting each other than answering the Columbia interrogator’s questions. They are initially dismissive of the fact that the person next to him is an actual Druid, however Wydd eventually convinces the head interrogator to give the Druid access to the main core (the Columbia cruiser’s main computer) in order to prove his claims. Despite some of the interrogators misgivings, Wydd links the Druid to the main core and within minutes the Druid causes an overflow of data into the main core, killing all of the interrogators and eventually the commander of the cruiser and anyone else linked into the main core.

A Briga squad, led by Skellig (Kevin Durand, who played Martin Keamy in “Lost” and Fred J. Dukes in “X-Men Origins: Wolverine”) storm the Columbia cruiser in order retrieve Wydd, the Druid and the Gula. They enter the sleep hive where Khara’s cloned sisters live and kill them all, retrieve Wydd, the Druid and the Gula and make their escape. Khara is devastated at the loss of her sisters and is determined to fight the escaping the Briga. The Columbia cruiser is sunk only moments after Khara leaves in her aircraft fighter. She follows the Briga craft and manages to damage it but is shot down herself by enemy fire. She survives and begins to walk across the barren landscape. She soon comes across the downed Briga craft and tracks the survivors for several days though some extreme terrain and weather. There at the edge of the Tork sea is the remaining Briga solider, Skellig, as well as Wydd, the Druid and the Gula beside a Briga tank.

Khara takes on Skellig in an attempt to kill him, however he gains the upper hand and throws her to the ground. But before he can deliver the fatal blow, the Gula jumps on Khara, blessing her. Wydd reminds Skellig that it would be foolish to kill someone who has been blessed by a Gula. The group forms an uneasy truce when Wydd reveals to Skellig that he has been directing him towards the land of the Druids and not the Briga command base. He tells both Khara and Skellig that they are both cut off from their tribes and convinces them to join him on his quest to discover why the creator Diarne left Annwn. Despite the fact the pair do not have much Mana (essentially a life giving energy that both of them use), they agree to help him and set out on the Briga tank across the sea and wasteland. Khara soon finds she is questioning the war and everything around her, though Skellig doesn’t share her concerns.

In the last couple of years Mamoru Oshii has made a number of live action projects; the epic yet box office failure of the “Next Generation  -Patlabor-” mini film series and full length theatrical feature and “Tokyo Mukokuseki Shoujo (Nowhere Girl)” which looks like a genre B-movie exploitation piece. The third live action project was this film; “Garm Wars: The Last Druid”. Initially announced by Bandai Visual in October 1997 as "The Record of Garm War" or "G.R.M.", it was seemingly abandoned and never made. Most people assumed that his 2001 live action film, “Avalon” was made in response to that or was cobbled out of ideas from "The Record of Garm War". It came as a major surprise when out of nowhere in late 2012 it was re-announced as co-production between Bandai Namco, Production I.G and Canadian film company Lyla Films. The film eventually debuted at the Tokyo International Film Festival in 2014 and got a small theatrical release in Canada the following year. Since then not a great deal has been heard about the film. Madman Entertainment’s Eastern Eye imprint released the film on DVD and Blu-ray in March this year and Animatsu (formerly Manga Entertainment) gave the film a UK BD release as well in the same month. The film still hasn’t received a Japanese release. That won’t be until the 20th of May this year.

The fact that no large film distributors or home video companies have picked up the film and its staggered release speaks volumes about it. Certainly it’s not as self-indulgent and frustrating as his very early live action work such as “The Red Spectacles” and “Talking Head”. Over the years he has developed as a live action director. This film is very much in the vein of his 2001 film “Avalon”. Its filled sepia toned landscapes, militaristic hardware and the usual Oshii philosophy. His infamous fetish for basset hounds is also here in big way. The first time we see one is right at the five minute mark. In the film the dog plays a major role as a Gula, a kind of holy animal which can bless people. Apart from showing several battle sequences with lots of militaristic machines, Oshii also concentrates on religious themes (another Oshii trait) most of which seems to use a lot of language and elements of Genesis in Wydd’s quest for his creator.

There are several aspects of the film which annoyed me. First and foremost is that film feels like it’s been pieced together from bits and pieces from previous Oshii films. Khara certainly feels more than  a bit similar to Motoko Kusanagi, a scene in forest battle sequence feels like it’s a direct lift from “Patlabor 2 the movie” and the Briga tank seems awfully similar to the one in “Angel’s Egg”. I will admit that much of the photography and CG effects are utterly gorgeous at times. However some shots just looked too over processed and utterly unnatural. Some of the shots of a battle sequence inside a forest also looked quite unnatural, especially shots of a CG Skellig climbing over a giant creature. Wydd’s dialogue at times can seem rather waffling and pointless. You can almost see an expression of “what in god’s name am I saying?” on Lance Henriksen’s face. However I thought Melanie St-Pierre and Kevin Durand (the other two main actors in the film) were pretty good, despite a small portion of their dialogue coming off a bit silly. The script was co-written by Geoffrey Gunn who does a decent job, though his career seems to be in a rut, his CV credits him mostly writing scripts for terrible genre and exploitation films.

In the end, that’s what the film feels like; a B-movie. It's ambition more often than not outstrips it's budget. I sort of wonder if this film will end up in a line of those cheap DVDs you find in supermarkets and dollar stores, full of films that you’ve never heard of. Kenji Kawai yet again provides the score for another Oshii film. It’s mostly ethereal and otherworldly like a lot of his other work in Oshii films, but in some spots it does come off as bit generic which disappointed me. Most of the story and the designs are pretty damn good. What lets the film down though is that it can be a little hard to figure out what is going on. Oshii has created a fully realised world, however it requires a minute and a half info dump of non-stop dialogue before the credits to get people up to speed. The ending also felt a bit too abrupt and not well thought out, almost like an afterthought. Overall it wasn’t a bad film. There are some fantastic elements to the film. But like a lot of Oshii’s films, there’s too much navel gazing, too much self-indulgence. It’s certainly not a patch on “Avalon” which I think is his best live action film. 6 out of 10.

Remaining Backlog: 12 movies, three OVAs/specials, five TV series, also waiting for second parts for four shows to be released before viewing them.

Video Backlog: “Ultraman Ginga”

Publisher: Vicol Entertainment Ltd (Hong Kong)
Format: Region A Blu-ray, NTSC, Japanese Dialogue with optional Cantonese dub and English and Chinese (Traditional) Subtitles.
Length: 12 episodes x 25 minutes
Production Date: 2013
Currently in Print (as of writing): Yes

Teenager Hikaru Raido (played by Takuya Negishi) returns to his hometown Furohoshi during the summer break. He has been living London with his parents for a couple of years as they chase their dreams of becoming musicians. He rescues a childhood friend, Misuzu Isurugi (Miyatake Mio), who becomes stuck in a runaway pram after attempting to help an old lady and her dog (I know, it’s kind of an implausible scenario…). Hikaru says he wants to visit his grandfather at the Ginga shrine, but Misuzu leads him to the local primary school. She explains that the shrine was apparently hit by a meteor and was burnt to the ground. The principal of the school, Kyoko Shirai (Kino Hana) and Hikaru’s grandfather Hotsuma (Tsugawa Masahiko) explain that the school closed recently due to lack of enrolments and the principal kindly let the shrine set up shop temporarily. Misuzu also decided to become a shine maiden. Hotsuma explains that at least the sacred relic survived the fire. Hikaru suddenly feels the need to see the relic, but cannot fathom why he feels this way.

Later than night, Hikaru sneaks into the shrine to inspect the sacred relic. He grabs it and sees visions of large beings fighting monsters. A hexagon symbol briefly appears on his hand. A voice asks him if he seeks adventure. Hikaru is surprised to discover that it seems to be coming for a small plastic doll. The doll introduces himself as Ultraman Taro. Hikaru thinks someone is playing a prank on him. But the doll disappears out of his hand as if teleporting. Taro tells Hikaru to come to Mount Furohoshi. Regardless, the next day Hikaru hikes out to the mountain where he meets Taro. Taro explains that the Ultramen and monster where shrunk and turned into dolls by a malevolent force and traveled through space where eventually they landed on the mountain. On the mountain Taro discovered the Ginga Spark, the sacred relic in the Ginga shrine that apparently has the power to beat its evil opposite, the Dark Spark. However only a saviour can use the Ginga Spark which Taro believes is Hikaru. He also believes that he restore his original form. This involves placing the Ginga Spark on the hexagon symbol on the base of Taro’s left foot, however it doesn’t work.

Later Hikaru bumps into Misuzu who is out having a picnic. She is upset with him that he has taken the Ginga Spark from the shrine, and surprises him by revealing that she already knew about Taro. Hikaru is drawn to spot behind a bush where he discovers another doll, a dinosaur creature called Black King. Feeling as he has nothing to lose, he tries the Ginga Spark on the doll and it works. But somehow Hikaru’s soul has been transposed into the now giant Black King monster. There’s no time to figure out why the Ginga Spark only worked on Black King, as a giant monster seeming revived by the Dark Spark, Thunder Darambia, arrives to attack Hikaru. Just as Hikaru looks like he is about to be beaten, a new doll materialises out of the Ginga Spark, Ultraman Ginga, which Hikaru then uses to transform into and defeat the monster.

Ultraman Taro hypothesises that Hikaru can enter the bodies of the Ultramen and monsters because their souls where removed when they were shrunk and turned into toys. Taro’s soul was retained in his body even as toy due to Ultraman and Ultra Mother protecting him. It also becomes apparent the monsters attacking the town have all been resurrected by the Dark Spark, by someone inside the school. The dark elements of former students of the school have become the elents driving the monsters. Two of Hikaru’s old friends, Kenta Watarai (Ono Mizuki) and Chigusa Kuno (Kirara) even end up becoming the souls of monsters at one point. Even Misuzu becomes a monster. What is the link between the school and the person who is wielding the Dark Spark?

Apparently this show was made as part of Tsuburaya Productions 50th anniversary of the company. Ultraman stared back in 1966, but despite being dubbed in English and broadcast on US TV in 1967, it never really took off in the western world, despite many attempts to get various parts of the franchise into the consciousness of the English speaking world. Not helping is the ongoing dispute over who holds the rights to the various early TV series of the show outside of Japan. In Japan it’s ingrained in the public’s conscious. Everyone knows who Ultraman is. It was a massive hit in the 1960’s and early 1970’s, but popularity of the show waned in the very early 1980’s, until it made a resurgence with “Ultraman Tiga” in 1996.

There isn’t a great deal of tokusatsu material available commercially in English. When that material is available on blu-ray, well, my wallet automatically comes out. As per most Hong Kong releases of this type, it’s pretty bare bones. You get the show and that’s it. No trailers for other movies or TV series, let alone extras for the show. Surprisingly the subtitles are professionally translated (which to be fair is far more common than the Engrish horrors of commercial Hong Kong DVDs of 10 or 15 years ago), but do contain some typos in the latter episodes. The video and audio are good as you’d expect.

However my joy at having a slightly obscure Ultraman show on blu-ray and subtitled was tempered by the fact it’s not a very good show. To be blunt, it plays out as a really crappy drama with Ultraman elements tacked on. The core cast (Hikaru and his three friends) are picked from acting schools who promote their talent if they were male idols and the two female leads are in idol units. The acting is what you’d expect; utterly mediocre at best. The regular supporting cast are older adults (the principal, the priest and an incompetent cop) and like the younger cast are also pretty underwhelming. Admittedly they don’t have much to play off. The script is really hammy and goofy. Nearly all of the action takes place at the school, so with that and the fact the cast is pretty small, you can tell this show has a meagre budget.

But what really pisses me off is the blatant merchandising within the show. The dolls of the Ultramen and monsters are the exact same ones you can find in toy stores all over Japan. Even Taro is the exact same toy you can find in a store. He’s crapily manipulated like a puppet for the entire show, with some close up shots of the actual Ultraman Taro mask added in. At the end of almost every episode, there’s a short called “Spark Doll Theatre” where Taro and a few of the monsters as dolls do silly comedy skit, with Taro usually saying “I want to become big!” at the end. That right there says it all about this show; it’s all pretty daft and silly. Interestingly the follow up series “Ultraman Ginga S” and the latest series “Ultraman X” (which the few episodes I saw on TV in Japan back in November and December didn’t impress me) use the same Spark Doll idea at their core.

The second half of the show is a little better. The core cast, plus a few outsiders become trapped with the school and numerous monsters appear. Somehow it seemed be a lot more intense this way. There’s also the theme of broken dreams played out through the series, though this intensifies towards the end. However towards the climax of the series it, all becomes a bit schmaltzy. Granted this is not all that uncommon in some Ultra series (especially some of the films from the 1990’s onwards), but here it’s just adding to the pain of a show that’s not that great to begin with. All of the monsters and Ultramen (besides Ginga of course) are from or are variants from various Ultra series. One could suggest this is a great budget saving measure as the producers could just raid the Tsuburaya archives for old suits rather than making new costumes. But fans would get a lot of pleasure spotting some famous and rather obscure monsters from years gone by.

Summing up, it’s a pretty crappy show. I can’t believe that Tsuburaya Productions would make this cheaply produced crap their 50th anniversary show. Yes the fights are pretty decent, but that’s all you could say was good about the show. The follow up series, “Ultraman Ginga S”, is more of a traditional team show with lots of mecha as well as monsters and looks a lot better than this show. There is a preview at the end of the last episode of the disc, but so far no blu-ray release of the show in Hong Kong or anywhere else in English. Despite the fact this show is a rarity (i.e. a modern tokusatsu commercially available in English on blu-ray), the quality of the show should make you think twice before purchasing it. 5 out of 10, and I’m being very generous with the score.

Remaining Backlog: Five series, one movie, one OVA also waiting for second parts for two shows to be released before viewing them.

Video Backlog: “Godzilla Vs Biollante”

Publisher: Echo Bridge Entertainment (Miramax, USA)
Format: Region A Blu-ray, NTSC, Japanese Dialogue with optional English Dub and English Subtitles
Length: 105 minutes
Production Date: 1989
Currently in Print (as of writing): No

In the climax of the 1984 film "Godzilla" (released in the west as "Godzilla 1985"), everyone's favourite giant monster destroys Most of Tokyo and the nifty looking mecha the Super X, Godzilla is lured out to Oshima island and then into the volcanic Mount Mihara. In the aftermath of the destruction, many of Godzilla cells lie in the rubble. The Japanese government sends out a military team to collect these cells as they have an amazing regeneration properties and could be used to create an anti-nuclear bio-weapon. However they are not alone in thinking this. A US company called Bio Major has sent out a team to recover one of the cells. In the process of recovering a cell, the Japanese team discovers them and a fire fight breaks out. The Bio Major team manage to wipe out a Japanese army platoon whilst in the process of escaping down in the bowels of the Tokyo subway system with a cell. But just as they think they've got away with the cell, an agent from the middle eastern country Saradia shoots them dead and steals their cell.

The agent then smuggles the cell back to Saradia, where the government has set up a laboratory for Dr Genichiro Shiragami (played by Koji Takahashi) and his daughter Erika (Yasuko Sawaguchi). The government has hired them both to work on developing wheat crops that can grow in the desert. The Godzilla cells regenerative powers would help in this regard. But tragedy strikes when Bio Major bomb the lab, destroying the cell and all the their work, and killing Erika in the process.

Five years pass, and it seems that Godzilla is awaking from its slumber. Teenage schoolgirl Miki Saegusa (Megumi Odaka), an esper, has predicted his return as well as the other children in the Japanese government's physic program. Though some in the government are sceptical of their abilities, they duly prepare for Godzilla's return with the construction of the Super X2. The second part of the plan involves the Godziila cells. The government hope to produce Anti Nuclear Energy Bacteria in an attempt to kill Godzilla. But the only scientist who can create the bacteria is Dr Shiragami, who wants nothing to do with Godzilla cells after the death of his daughter. An earthquake triggered by an eruption on Mount Mihara changes his mind. The earthquake destroys the glasshouse containing a rose bush, resulting in the destruction of the plant. Dr Shiragami agrees to create the bacteria if he can have a Godzilla cell for a week. Unbeknownst to the Government, Dr Shiragami is crossing the Godzilla cell with the rose bush to create a plant which cannot die. The rose was originally creation of his using  his dead daughter's cells, so in effect it contains her spirit.

While Dr Shiragami is away, two Bio Major agents ransack the house looking for info on the Godzilla cells. The Saradian agent plans to take them out, but the rose bush, which has now mutated into some horrible monster, takes out one of the Bio Major agents, with the remaining agent barely escaping. The creature then breaks out of the house and grows into a monster rose plant in a local lake causing the military to block off the area. The remaining Bio Major agent refuses to give up and blackmails the Japanese government in order to obtain the Godzilla cell. He warns if they don't hand over their Godzilla cells, he'll set off an explosion on Mount Mihara which will free Godzilla. The government complies, but the Saradian agent intervenes again, killing the Bio Major agent in his truck, and in the process destroying the equipment that controls the bomb, and steals the cells. The bomb goes off and Godzilla is released from his molten lava tomb.

The self defence force attempt to thwart Godzilla from reaching the mainland but fail. During the evening, Godzilla arrives at the lake to battle the giant rose monster, now called Biollantie. A fierce battle ensues, but even though Biollante gets the upper hand at one point, Godzilla burns the plant monster to a crisp. It sends it's seed high into the air as it dies. Godzilla then heads off to recharge itself at a nearby nuclear reactor, but the self defence force makes a terrible error. They gamble that that he will land in Nagoya, but he instead ends up in Osaka where does terrible damage to the city and completely destroys the Super X2. I The only positive in the battle is that the army manages to inject the bacteria into Godzilla via bazooka missiles. The problem is that his body temperature is too low to make the bacteria active. n a last ditch effort to stop Godzilla from reaching Tokyo, Miki attempts to battle the monster using her psychic powers, but loses. As Godzilla head towards Yokohama, the self defence force plan another attack. This time they plan to use the secret Thunder Cloud System. In theory the lightning strikes on Godzilla should increase his body temperature. Luckily this turns out to be true, but even though the bacteria seems to be taking effect, it's still not enough to kill him or even stop him. But before he can take another step forward, Biollante resurrects itself, in an even meaner, more vicious form. A fight begins that Godzilla may lose.

After Godzilla's successful return to cinemas in 1984, Toho certainly took it's time releasing a sequel. In 1986, Toho held a public competition where budding script writers could send in their own script for the next Godzilla film. The wining script was by an American named Jim Bannon. In his script, Godzilla would fight a giant super computer and a tank-like robot. I think it would have been a great film to see. Somewhere along the line Toho thought otherwise. Jim's script was made into the much maligned "Gunhed" (sans Godzilla elements), and although the effects were great, plot-wise the movie was a bit of a mess. The runner up in the screenplay competition was a Japanese entry written by a dentist by the name of Shinichro Kobayashi. But in the end it seems only elements of his screenplay made it into the resulting film, "Godzilla Vs Biollante".

Godzilla's opponent in this film, the giant rose monster Biollante, is probably the most original monster seen in the long running series since Hedorah. The two versions of Biollante are quite amazing and look like a real menacing creature, and not like a guy in a suit as previous monsters have. Godzilla too has never looked so mean and threatening. He actually looks a like an actual monster and not like a man in a costume flaying about like some of the late 1960's and early 1970's Godzillas. It's a real far cry from the "defender of justice" Godzilla who batted away and roasted wave after wave of a seemingly unending supply of alien invaders and their monsters during the 1970's. The effects overall are spectacular. In particular the self defence forces have never looked so realistic in a Godzilla film. Models and stock footage are blended almost seamlessly to create rather realistic battles. The other element I liked in this film was the Anti Nuclear Energy Bacteria. It's a very clever and original device to kill Godzilla, though with just about everything the humans try to use to kill the beast, it fails.

For the most part, the plot and story are pretty good. For the first time the esper, Miki Saegusa, appears in the series. The character would make quite a few more appearances before the final film in this series, "Godzilla Vs Destroyah". Her telepathic duel with Godzilla was one of the highlights of the film and quite inventive and original. Some have complained that the movie contains too many characters, but I didn't have many problems with this. Some could have used a bit more development of their characters, but overall it didn't really over complicate the film or make the story hard to follow. One of the most disappointing elements of the film is the acting by the film’s foreign actors and their terrible English dialogue. Luckily you can watch the film in Japanese with English subtitles. However the worst aspect of the film hands down is the ending, which after being probably the most serious and well thought out Godzilla film in twenty years, turns it into complete cheese. The chase sequence with the Saradian agent was unnecessary too. It just seemed tacked on for no apparent reason other than to tie up a loose end which really didn’t need to be tied up.

Echo Bridge’s blu-ray is pretty damn good. The video is more than acceptable (some dark scenes are a bit murky) but the audio is only OK. It is better than anything we’ve seen before in an English language version of the film. The disc comes with two extras. The first is a fantastic one hour making of featurette which is sourced from the 1992 Japanese laserdisc box set of the film. Apart from behind the scenes footage and interviews, it includes several deleted special effects shots and an alternate ending. It’s rather interesting hearing that the effects drove and shaped the final script of the film. The second feature which is runs only a few minutes, also sourced from the laserdisc box set, shows off maquettes of the various concepts for Biollante.

Wrapping up, the plot is solid for the most part and the effects are pretty stellar for a Japanese film of the time and stands up and even surpass some of the effects in the last film in the millennium series; "Godzilla: Final Wars". I found it very disappointing that the follow up film to this movie, 1991's "Godzilla Vs King Ghidorah" ended up as corny and camp as the 1970's Godzilla films. It was a direction in the series I wished they hadn't taken. I hoped Toho would have done more Godzilla films in the same vein as this one. 8 out of 10.

Remaining Backlog: Nine series, four movies, two OVAs also waiting for second parts for three shows to be released before viewing them.