Doomsday is, in short, director Neil Marshall’s amalgamation of John Carpenter’s Escape from New York and The Road Warrior (with a side of Beyond Thunderdome), and the concepts go spectacularly well together. Read more
Movie Review: Doomsday (2008)
Anime Review: Genius Party & Genius Party Beyond
Genius Party & Genius Party Beyond are a pair of anthology films from Studio 3°C. Anime anthology films often open up a lot of opportunities for experimentation and exploration of the craft, and Studio 3°C in particular is a studio who likes to nurture this degree of experimentation. I’ll be discussing both of the two films together, as the films were originally planned to be released together. Read more
Anime Review: Space Pirate Captain Harlock (1978)
I’m something of a fan of Leiji Matsumoto’s work, and particularly the character of Captain Harlock. Harlock made his first appearance as a supporting character in Matsumoto’s other major series from the 1970s – Galaxy Express 999. However, he was popular enough to get his own series in its own separate continuity in 1978. I figured I might as well give my thoughts on the show. Read more
Anime Review: Fate/Grand Order – First Order
Fate/Grand Order: First Order is the latest of a series of anime that have been adapted from mobile titles, and one of the small handful that received an adaptation contemporaneously or not long before their game’s US release. Read more
Anime (Video) Review: Fate/Stay Night (2005)
This time I’m taking a look at the 2005 Anime adaptation of Fate/Stay Night, by Studio DEEN. Read more
Anime Review: Dallos
Dallos is an anime that reminds me a lot of what got me into anime in the first place. I came into anime as a fan of science fiction and fantasy, and I came in through OVAs and films like Akira, Demon City Shinjuku, Ghost in the Shell, and Record of Lodoss War. So, when I found out that Dallos, an anime considered to be the first OVA (or one of the first alongside the Cream Lemon series), and which was directed by Mamoru Oshii (who also directed Ghost in the Shell and Angel’s Egg – which I’ve previously reviewed), had been licensed by Discotek Media, and later made available for streaming on Crunchyroll, I put it on my to-watch list. Read more
Documentary Review: Sgt. Pepper’s Musical Revolution
It’s been a while since I did a review of a music documentary – the last one that comes immediately to mind is a documentary review on the career of Pink Floyd. Well, this year is the year that the Beatles concept album Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Heart’s Club Band has it’s 50th anniversary, and the BBC did a documentary on the album, which also broadcast on PBS, which is where I saw it. Read more
Movie Review: The Legend of Hell House
I enjoy a good haunted house film – like Poltergeist and the Woman in Black. When this film, adapting a novel by Richard Matheson which was in turn inspired by a Shirley Jackson novel, came up on my radar. Read more
Anime Review: Armored Trooper VOTOMS
This time I’m taking a look at another out-print anime, in the wake of Lodoss getting license rescued by Funimation, in Armored Trooper VOTOMS. Read more
Film Review: Mission Impossible – Rogue Nation
In the original Mission: Impossible television series, one of the recurring antagonists outside of the Not-Soviets was the Syndicate, a mysterious criminal organization that was something of a mix of the Mafia and SPECTRE. In the conclusion of Ghost Protocol (which I previously reviewed), Ethan was sent on new mission, to take on the Syndicate. In this film, we finally get that confrontation. Read more
Movie Review: Ninja III – The Domination
Going into this film, it’s important to note that this is a Ninja film released in the early-to-mid 1980s (depending on how you look at it), from Cannon films, and starring Sho Kosugi. That, out of the gate, implies a certain level of camp to the film. That said, Cannon films operates at a couple different levels – fun dumb, and then just dumb. So, the question then becomes which kind of dumb is this film? Read more
Anime Review: Hayate the Combat Butler – Cuties
Well, the time has come to talk about the most recent Hayate the Combat Butler TV series, and potentially the last series to come out, for reasons which I’ll get into, but also a series that is something of a return to form for the franchise’s anime incarnations. Read more
Anime Review: Hayate the Combat Butler – I Can’t Take My Eyes Off You
Hayate the Combat Butler, as a manga, recently came to an end, and I have two Hayate Series that I haven’t reviewed yet (though I have previously done a video review of Seasons 1 & 2). It’s time to cover those bases and finish off the other Hayate series. Read more
Anime Review: Bodacious Space Pirates – Abyss of Hyperspace
Bodacious Space Pirates was a show, back from 2012, which was a fantastic anime series, which had all the fun of old-school Juvenile SF, but without the problematic elements that those works often run into (and the problematic elements from some contemporary SF). However, the end of the series left me hoping for more, and in 2014, a film sequel to the series came out, subtitled Abyss of Hyperspace, with US release coming later in 2016. At long last, I’ve finally had a chance to watch it, so it’s time to give my thoughts. Read more
Movie Review: Ralph Bakshi’s Wizards
Wizards is what I’d describe as the first film in Ralph Bakshi’s trilogy of fantasy epics – this film, Fire and Ice (which I previously reviewed at Bureau42), and Lord of the Rings (which roughly adapted The Fellowship of the Rings and The Two Towers). The later films are certainly superior works, but the three films together definitely show a development of Bakshi’s craft when it comes to epic fantasy. However, what about his first big fantasy film? Read more
Movie Vlog Review: Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 2
This past weekend the latest installment of the Marvel Cinematic Universe has come out, and I’m giving my thoughts on the film. Read more
Anime Review: Soul Eater
Shounen fight anime and manga, in the past few decades, has developed a very definite style from Dragonball (and Dragonball Z) on – no matter the tone, the series tend to have a bright color palette for both characters and for the overall visual style of the series. Things might get dark and stormy in bits with narrative and tonal weight, but the colors for the characters themselves will maintain that color. You’re never going to see Naruto, for example, putting on an all black traditional ninja outfit for a really serious or dramatic mission. This gives Soul Eater a visual edge that really makes it stand out from the pack. Read more
Anime Review: Fate/Kaleid Liner Prisma Illya (Season 1)
The Fate universe has, in the works I’ve reviewed thus far, has generally formed a cohesive narrative whole – with the exception of clear comedic side-stories that are deliberately intended to be outside continuity like Carnival Phantasm. Others have adapted alternate routes of the visual novels that are part of Type-Moon’s Nasuverse (like Fate/Stay Night mostly adapting the Fate route and Unlimited Blade Works adapting that route). Fate/Prisma Illya is a true alternate take on the Fate Universe. Read more
Movie Review: Samurai Cop
It would be reductive to say that Samurai Cop was is what you should expect from a film from the late ’80s, and early ’90s titled Samurai Cop. Reductive, and not entirely accurate. Not because the film is better than that description would imply – but because the film is actually worse. Read more
Anime Review: The Garden of Sinners (Kara no Kyokai)
Before Kinoko Nasu created Tsukihime or Fate/Stay Night, he put out a light novel series titled “Garden of Sinners” (or Kara no Kyokai). The books set up some concepts that would be folded into to the collection of series that is generally known as the “Nasuverse” – though the series aren’t exactly in direct continuity with each other. In the mid-to-late 2000s, they were adapted into a series of animated films by Ufotable, prior to them getting the gig for Fate/Zero and Unlimited Blade Works. Read more
Anime Review: Carnival Phantasm
Having gone through the melodramatic gravitas of Fate/Stay Night (both regular route and Unlimited Blade Works), it’s prequel Fate/Zero, and the adaptation of the visual novel that came out sooner – Tsukihime, if I was to describe the next Type-Moon anime to come out in a short phrase, it would be “And now for something completely different!” Read more
Film Review: The Longest Day
This time I’m taking a look at the first of the film adaptations of Cornelius Ryan’s books, with The Longest Day. Read more
Film Vlog Review: Kong – Skull Island
I saw the latest installment of the Legendary Films Godzilla Cinematic Universe! Here are my thoughts (mostly spoiler free) on Kong: Skull Island. Please refrain from spoilers until 4/15/2016, to give people at least a month to see the film. Read more
Anime Review: Tsukihime (2003)
Thus far, the three shows in the Type-Moon universe that I’ve covered: Fate/Stay Night (F/SN), Fate/Zero, and Unlimited Blade Works (UBW) have been two-cour shows – spending 24 episodes to tell their story. In the case of F/SN and UBW, they have each adapted one route from the first Fate game – with the former title dropping a few elements of UBW in to give Rider a little screen time. However, Fate was not Type-Moon’s first game. Before this came Tsukihime, which set up elements that came up later in F/SN and Fate/Zero, and it too received an anime adaptation, one that came out prior to the release of F/SN – and with only a single cour (12 episodes). The question then becomes, how well can it tell its story in half the length? Read more