Miyazaki Marathon Day 5: Porco Rosso

Name: Porco Rosso
Type: Movie
Rating: Any Age
Runtime: 93 min
Directed By Miyazaki Hayao
Produced By Studio Ghibli
Year Produced: 1992

The To Aru Kagaku no Home Theater Miyazaki Marathon... and then some... continues, despite public protest!

This is a "festival" where I sit down at spend about a week and a half watching all of the Miyazaki movies that I want to.  I didn't mention this last time, but I don't have any particular interest in Ponyo.

What's still to come are:

Saturday - Whisper of the Heart (1995)
Sunday - Princess Mononoke (1997)
Monday of Next Week - Spirited Away (2001)
Tuesday of Next Week - Howl's Moving Castle (2004)


I've already reviewed Kaze no Tani no Nausicaa, Laputa: Castle in the Sky, My Neighbor Totoro, and Kiki's Delivery Service, so if you're interested in that, then check it out... back there.


During the golden age of bi-wing airplanes, the sky is filled with pirates using sea planes to raid local commercial vessels.  In all this rather peaceful time, there are those who fly the skies tracking down and recovering stolen cargo; Bounty Hunters.
Among all of these fliers, there is one name that every pilot in the Adriatic knows; Porco Rosso, the flying pig.

 ... What?!

... Yes, you heard me correctly, I said pig.

Keeping the local skies safe from all of the pirates, Porco Rosso has made quite a name for himself, and earned himself a lot of fans and enemies, namely these guys...

Don't look very happy, do they?  Well that's correct, but now they've gone and hired an American to come and fight with Porco.  His name is Curtis, and he speaks very good Japanese and French... but not Italian... this again.

Now not only are they rivals in the sky, but also for the love of Gina, a singer at a club and another local legend.  "Every pilot in the Adriatic is in love with Gina".

Probably the best one out of the set that I've watched so far (not including Princess Mononoke).  It was funny and had action, anime dogfights!  Always fun to watch, though they can get kind of confusing if you don't know what's going on, but since in my past experience I have done a lot of research on military tactics, I was set (don't worry, it doesn't get that complicated).

Again, Miyazaki's love of things that fly comes back, this time making a staring role, though the naturalist/environmentalist theme was tuned way down again, possibly nonexistent in this one.
There was probably a humanitarian message in there if you were hypersensitive, but I'm not, so I couldn't tell you.

The music was pretty good, a couple of anthems and some other stuff.  There was also a solo that Gina did in the beginning, but I'm kind of adverse to older French songs.  A lot of vibrato and always depressing.

The Japanese version is the one that I stuck with, though the English one surprised me.  Actually, I've noticed that movies (namely Miyazaki movies because that's all I've seen) tend to have a better selection of English voice actors, so the English versions aren't bad.

Maybe it was the better quality that I found in this download, but the animation definitely looked better, a lot smoother, and it might have been a forced reaction to the abundance of action scenes in this movie.

Porco Rosso MegaUpload
- I'm sorry, but I couldn't find this all in one place.  For some reason, people haven't gotten around to ripping it in any kind of quality in one piece (it comes in parts everywhere though), so I had to find this by web searching it...
... So I'm sorry to whoever uploaded this, but good job, man!  French, Japanese, and English, damn!

Coming up next!

Day 6: Whisper of the Heart!

Miyazaki Marathon Day 4: Kiki's Delivery Service

Name: Kiki's Delivery Service
Type: Movie
Rating: Any Age
Runtime: 103 min
Directed By Miyazaki Hayao
Produced By Studio Ghibli
Year Produced: 1989

The To Aru Kagaku no Home Theater Miyazaki Marathon... and then some... continues, despite public protest!

This is a "festival" where I sit down at spend about a week and a half watching all of the Miyazaki movies that I want to.  I didn't mention this last time, but I don't have any particular interest in Ponyo.

What's still to come are:

Friday - Porco Rosso (1992)
Saturday - Whisper of the Heart (1995)
Sunday - Princess Mononoke (1997)
Monday of Next Week - Spirited Away (2001)
Tuesday of Next Week - Howl's Moving Castle (2004)


I've already reviewed Kaze no Tani no Nausicaa, Laputa: Castle in the Sky, and My Neighbor Totoro, so if you're interested in that, then check it out... back there.


Set in what I gather is roughly 1900 Germany, this movie is about a young witch: Kiki... I don't know her last name.  And her black cat Jiji.  Kiki and Jiji... okay.

Together in all kinds of weather.

When witches turn 13 (-ish), they are fully independent, and as such are supposed to venture out into the world to seek a career in whatever they want to do... magic-wise.  If they ever become something like a surgeon, the Black Book Guild will hunt them down and shove a broom up their ass.

Now officially a teenager, Kiki has been waiting for the perfect day to set out on her epic journey... and it has come.  And what luck!  Just in time for her movie!  All of the planets are aligning.

On the night of the full moon, Kiki and Jiji set out (on a broom), searching for their new home, with the only stipulation being that it be big and near the ocean.  Shouldn't be that hard to find.

GO!

Kiki and Jiji find their ideal city after only like... a day.

While trying to make a good first impression on the normal human citizens of this new town, Kiki almost flies into a double-decker bus.  After what I thought was some pretty impressive air evasive action, Kiki... gets a ticket.

After escaping the full extent of the law (including a strip-search and experimental interrogation permitted under the Patriot Act), she is treated rather rudely by everybody except the good-natured... old man locked at the top of the clock tower...

She mets the boy who managed to distract the cop long enough for her to make a calm getaway.  His name is Tombo... which totally doesn't sound like any language on Earth.  Would you name your son Tombo?

Then again, he does look like a Tombo.

Since the only thing that she's consciously good at is flying (though I didn't get that impression from her takeoff.  If that's her best, what's her worst skill... and how many people have died?), Kiki decides to start a delivery service (again with that sneakily simple plot... damn you, Miyazaki!).

I don't know how much I can say that it was pretty good.  It was fun, but not as... (grinds teeth) sweet as Totoro.

Actually, thinking back on it, I was worried yesterday after finishing the review on Totoro, that I might just be biased and blindly supporting Miyazaki.  I don't think that I am, but I'm probably not the best judge.

All that I can say is that Miyazaki's made some movies that I wouldn't stop to watch if I didn't know that he was involved in, but since I do know, I watch them... and they're pretty good.  I guess that's kind of what he is to me.

The music was shoujo anime music, which kind of fits because this was almost a shoujo movie, but it wasn't lovely-dovey gooey enough (thank God).  No offense, but I just can't handle that kind of stuff.  When guys start talking like that, their either homosexual... or lying.  Maybe not technically lying, but laying in on pretty thick.

I personally watched this in Japanese (because I'm like that)... until I figured out that Phil Hartman was in it, playing Jiji.  Phil... Hartman...

For your information, Phil Hartman is a god to me on many levels, from the work he's done, to what I can gather of his personality, and I greatly appreciate all the influence that he's made on my life.

 Sounds like something Hartman would say.

The English cast of one of the versions also had Kirsten Dunst out of Spiderman.  This I don't care so much about, but it was still interesting.

I've got one more thing to say about the language thing, and if you watch the movie, you'll figure it out yourself... but what is going on with the languages in this world?

I mean, you've got Japanese people listening to a radio with an American DJ... in Germany!  Could someone please explain this to me?

This movie was better than My Neighbor Totoro on the action front, but for some reason, it was loaded with a lot of upskirt shots.

She's also awfully flexible...

... Sorry, that's the way I am, I get perverted thoughts and can usually only control them for fear of reprisal or the idea that they might be misunderstood or whatever, but here, you don't know who I am, and I've done a lot worse... I mean just look at Midori no Hibi... and not even under the spoiler, right there in the visible body!  Besides, nobody's reading, so what do I care?

Miyazaki's style is becoming more unique and noticeable through his works.  A lot more colorful and pronounced, and seemingly smoother.  He's also taken on a big task with this movie.  Inter-city animes are very difficult to do, what with all of the detail that you need to add into the background.
On works like Kaze no Tani no Nausicaa, it was good that Miyazaki kept the background to a minimum (maybe it wasn't intentional), and in My Neighbor Totoro, it was set in a pretty remote location without a lot of fine detail needed, but in this one, you need some extra time to keep things... city-like.

I also noticed that the environmental theme was tuned way down on this one.  Actually, I don't think there was anything about the environment in here, but that's not disappointing, but rather kind of shocking after seeing Nausicaa which was all about it, and Totoro which featured a strong natural side.

Ghibli 13 Movie Collection (Dual Audio) Nihonomaru
Kiki's Delivery Service Minitheatre

Coming up next!

Day 5: Whisper of the Heart!

Miyazaki Marathon Day 3: My Neighbor Totoro

Name: My Neighbor Totoro
Type: Movie
Rating: Any Age
Runtime: 86 min
Directed By Miyazaki Hayao
Produced By Studio Ghibli
Year Produced: 1988

The To Aru Kagaku no Home Theater Miyazaki Marathon... and then some... continues, despite public protest!

This is a "festival" where I sit down at spend about a week and a half watching all of the Miyazaki movies that I want to.  I didn't mention this last time, but I don't have any particular interest in Ponyo.

What's still to come are:

Thursday - Kiki's Delivery Service (1989)
Friday - Porco Rosso (1992)
Saturday - Whisper of the Heart (1995)
Sunday - Princess Mononoke (1997)
Monday of Next Week - Spirited Away (2001)
Tuesday of Next Week - Howl's Moving Castle (2004)


I've already reviewed Kaze no Tani no Nausicaa and Laputa: Castle in the Sky, so if you're interested in that, then check it out... back there.


Set in the Japanese countryside (assumability the rice farming area), the story is about the Kursakabe family, consisting of two daughters Satsuki and Mei (older and younger), their father Tatsuo, and their mother Yasuko who's staying in a hospital in the city because of her weak constitution.  I'm guessing that moving out to the country-side was for their mother's health because Tatsou is a archeology teacher at a university, and the commute sounds hellish.

All of their earthly possessions are right there.

Either way, the Kurasakabe family loads all of their earthly possessions onto one of those... cars, I guess, I actually don't know what they are, but I've seen them in pictures.

Have you ever seen one of these in real life?  The shrine... not...

They arrive at their new home which... looks like Luigi's Mansion on a clear day (an obscure reference to an old Gamecube game which is strangely a lot of fun to play).  Though I can't complain, I've lived in worse.

Their new house.

They have a moving day, inspecting the house and discovering many new and interesting things about their new abode.  Such as the fact that it's haunted by living soot balls, or "Soot Gremlins".

 

Cough.

They apparently aren't dangerous, they can just get in you lungs, give you the Black Lung, and kill you (my opinion, I mean... they're balls of soot!  That's not a good thing!).

And so they settle into their new life there.  Satsuki starts going to a local elementary school, dad goes to teach at university, Mei starts exploring the local property (she's 4) and mom's... sitting all bored in the hospital.

During the course of her investigation, Mei discovers... the creatures on the Ghibli logo.

So they're... Ghiblis?

... I like it.

Mei follows them deep into the forest, and then into a hole in a tree, right out onto...

A big bear.

I don't know about you, but unless you're brain-damaged, you have the general sense that standing on the top of a clawed creature 20 times your size is a bad idea.  It's kind of like a basic instinct.

But Mei's not worried at all, and God knows why, because she's not brain-damaged, she's 4... okay, she's... inexperienced with the ways of killer beasts.

Turns out, it's a god, or something along the spiritual path, even better!  I think I'll walk on a god's stomach and see what happens.

But Totoro's (that's it's name; Totoro) one of those cool, chillaxed gods/spirits.  Not many of those outside Japanese philosophy/mythology (I don't want to offend anyone here).

So now the Kurasakabe's have got a new neighbor; Totoro, hence the title.  Miyazaki's sneaky like that.  So the rest of the story is about their interaction with the fuzzy Totoro, and about their mother(who's in the hospital, remember?).

Along the way they discover many new and wonderful things about the countryside, their other human neighbors, and ways to get around the "Shoe Custom".

Do you take off your shoes when you go inside?  I personally think it's kind of creepy to wear shoes inside, I was raised where you took off your shoes because of the carpets and hard-wood floors.  Plus I live in Hawaii, we're a melting pot.

This was a fun movie.  Actually it was (and I hesitate to use the word) sweet.  I don't like using this word because I usually use it in a different situation (usually applying to girls).

I wouldn't say that it was funny, but I did notice that it had those moments where you smiled without being amused (per sea), hence the "sweet" thing.

It was Miyazaki all over, I mean, he even wrote the ending song; Totori no Totoro, which wasn't bad, just like the opening song.

 ... And nobody does the "Tough Walk" like Studio Ghibli.

(Since I'm on the topic) The music wasn't bad, but again, not to my taste.  It was kind of the music you see in children's movies and stuff, and as I already stated a while back, I'm more into rock/techno music.  Don't worry, I'm making a point to review an anime that has my type of music in it presently, though I don't know exactly when I'm getting to it...

Japanese, though the English dub was very good.  I don't know what happened (though on a side note, Satsuki and Mei were played by actual sisters I think, people with the same last name at least).

You should probably watch this movie.  It appears to be Miyazaki's brain child or something, and it's an experience either way.  I mean, would you want to miss...

CATBUS?!

I know I wouldn't.

Ghibli 13 Movie Collection (Dual Audio) Nihonomaru

My Neighbor Totoro Minitheatre 

Coming up next!

Day 4: Kiki's Delivery Service!

Miyazaki Marathon Day 2: Laputa: Castle in the Sky

Name: Laputa: Castle in the Sky
Type: Movie
Rating: Any Age
Runtime: 124 min
Directed By Miyazaki Hayao
Produced By Studion Ghibli
Year Produced: 1986

The To Aru Kagaku no Home Theater Miyazaki Marathon... and then some... continues, despite public protest!

This is a "festival" where I sit down at spend about a week and a half watching all of the Miyazaki movies that I want to.  I didn't mention this last time, but I don't have any particular interest in Ponyo.

What's still to come are:

Wednesday - My Neighbor Totoro (1988)
Thursday - Kiki's Delivery Service (1989)
Friday - Porco Rosso (1992)
Saturday - Whisper of the Heart (1995)
Sunday - Princess Mononoke (1997)
Monday of Next Week - Spirited Away (2001)
Tuesday of Next Week - Howl's Moving Castle (2004)


I've already reviewed Kaze no Tani no Nausicaa yesterday, so if you're interested in that, then check it out... back there.


Set in (again, no name) what appears to be a coal or other fuel mining town, Laputa is a magical story about a young girl... actually, I don't have any idea how old the two main characters are.  About 12?

This is Sheeta, the main character.  You try and guess her age!

She is being held captive by a group of strange, suit-wearing men... gentlemen (not), for reasons unknown (I love that word... that phrase).  Suddenly, from out of the clouds comes...

Mutant... dragonfly things.

Well, you explain it!  I don't think that this could work, even in fantasy... especially not with two people riding...

PIRATES!!

And guess what, they've come for Sheeta (of course.  If you can't predict these kinds of things yet, you need to leave.  I actually think that a story about the hero's friend would be awesome.  Yeah, probably slightly boring, but it'd sure as hell be different).  Actually, they didn't come after her, but rather the jewel that she is carrying.

Doom.

So Sheeta brains her guard and escapes through the window.  She's just forgotten one vital thing...

Oh dear...

The fact that she's really high up.  She's above the clouds, for God's sake.  Looking back on it, she probably regrets her choice to brave the outside of the ship, but then again, hindsight is 20x20.

Sheeta manages to crawl along the hull of the ship until she gets to the window in the above picture... then she slips and falls.

If she died, then that would make it impossible to make the joke that I always do, but since she didn't, and I'm getting tired or being predictable, I'll just say this.

She flies away...

...

... no, seriously!  I'm not the boy who cried wolf, dammit!  She actually flew... not away, but she sure as hell floated!

Woah...

She floated down to the surface of Earth... or wherever, where she is spotted and then "caught" by this guy, Pazu.  The guy from Ghost in the Shell SAC before he grew up.  Not.

Pazu...

"Catch".

Actually, in all fairness, that's not what happened.  This is what it looked like (since it is a freaking screen-shot).

Yes, girls are heavier than they look (not intended to be a derogatory remark of any kind).  I can attest that you are not one of those heroes out of any number of B action films.  Neither are those heroes, actually, if you look, they're straining.

Anyway, now that everybody's after them, they've got to get away... naturally.

Okay, I watched this twice, and I have to say that I liked it a lot better the second time.  It had one of the best scenes in it, involving idiotic American-Style fighting!  No spins or twirls or anything, just punch as hard as you can.  It's pretty awesome... actually the whole scene was awesome...

POP YOUR BUTTONS, BOSS!!

WOOT!!

The characters were fun and awesome, and nobody that you cared about died, which was cool.  By the way, the above two characters (especially the second one) are among my top-ten favorites right now.

The music must have been good for the show because I don't remember it at all!  If I had particularly liked it though, it would have stuck in my memory.  I do get the feeling that it was a lot of light, probably woodwind instruments.

Both the English and the Japanese were good, and Mark Hamill makes a comeback as the bad guy.  What's going on there, man?  Am I going to see him in My Neighbor Totoro too?

 Mr. Skywalker?

Check it out, it's good fun.  "Clean" if that's the right word, though I'm not too thrilled about the term "Good, clean fun".

Laputa: Castle in the Sky Minitheatre

Ghibli 13 Movie Collection (Dual Audio) Nihonomaru

Coming up next!

Day 3: My Neighbor Totoro!

Miyazaki Marathon Day 1: Kaze no Tani no Nausicaa

Name: Kaze no Tani no Nausicaa
Type: Movie
Rating: Any Age
Runtime:  116 min
Directed By Miyazaki Hayao
Produced By Studion Ghibli
Year Produced: 1984

Welcome to the To Aru Kagaku no Home Theater Miyazaki Marathon... and then some...!

As I pretty much stated in the freaking title, this is the week and a little over where I watch and then review all of the Miyazaki movies that I can lay my hands on, starting with his oldest one... well... this one.

I'll be doing the following in the following order (one a day)...

Tuesday - Laputa: Castle in the Sky (1986)
Wednesday - My Neighbor Totoro (1988)
Thursday - Kiki's Delivery Service (1989)
Friday - Porco Rosso (1992)
Saturday - Whisper of the Heart (1995)
Sunday - Princess Mononoke (1997)
Monday of Next Week - Spirited Away (2001)
Tuesday of Next Week - Howl's Moving Castle (2004)

And now you know why the "... and then some..." is there.  Anyway, let's get this party started!

For the record, I actually haven't seen a majority of these films at all.  The first anime that I ever watched was... okay, Pokemon, but that's beside the point here.  The first anime that I watched and got hooked on was Princess Mononoke, when I was like... 12.  It was awesome.

Apart from that, I've only the work that he's done after that (up until now, of course, I just watched this movie).  I did take a peek at Whisper of the Heart, but that's okay since he technically didn't direct... all of it.

Okay, granted, I also have a bias here if you want to get technical.  I'll tell you the whole story.

After I had finished watching Princess Mononoke for about the sixteenth time, and had watched the others a couple times as well, I went "God dammit, this guy is the best!!".

Then, it somehow came to my attention that Mr. Miyazaki had published a manga.  A few, actually!
... I nearly had a heart attack.  Can you imagine a 14 year-old having a cardiac arrest?  It wasn't pretty.
So of course I bought one of them, and downloaded the others (yes, I'll give you the links at the end).

One that I downloaded was a little known work called Shuna no Tabi and it was... well, I don't know if I should call it a manga, since it was written in a really strange format... you'll just have to check it out.
You'll see some definite parallels between this manga and Kaze no Tani Nausicaa, as well as Tales from Earthsea.
There is also another one that looks like something that he drew during high school or something.  I can't tell if it's supposed to be historical or not, but it is set in China before the Mongols came.  But the it has the city of Pejite, and I'm pretty sure that that's not real, though I don't have a firm grasp on Chinese history.

The second was... yes, you guessed it!  Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, the English name for Kaze no Tani Nausicaa...

HOT DAMN!

It was probably the best manga that I read that year, and one of the top three that I've read so far (and since I have a strange paranoia about stating favorites, I can't tell you the others).

Miyazaki engaged to create this manga in 1982, and worked on it sporadically until 1994.  It was published in Tokuma Shoten Animage over the 12 years, and then published again in 7 bound volumes (or 4 if you bought those squat, fat ones).

The manga and the movie... weren't the same... at all.  The character's were pretty much all different, and my favorite characters Kushana and Kurotowa looked like the assholes that they were in the beginning of the series.  Damn.  Well, you've got to draw the line somewhere.

 Kurotowa will never stop being awesome, though.

The story is set in the post-apocalyptic world of... wherever the hell they are (they don't actually mention in the anime or the manga... well), and is about the beloved Princess Nausicaa, princess of a small valley that is struggling to survive with a decaying planet.

 That's Nausicaa...

... that's the aforementioned valley.

... and this is what's happening to the Earth.

The Sea of Decay is a forest of toxin-spewing plants that has overtaken a good surface of the Earth.  No human would be able to survive for more than 5 minutes in such a toxic environment, but that doesn't mean that it's uninhabitable.  It's filled with...

 ... Giant bugs.

 Really giant bugs.  This one is called an Ohm in the movie and Ohmu in the manga.

The Valley of the Wind is full of peaceful people who only care only about cultivating their crops and generally having a good time... that is until a random barge sails into their valley and smashes into a cliff.

... Shit.

Unbeknown to them, the ship was carrying vital cargo of the Torumekia, and imperial, militaristic nation, and they want whatever was in the hull of that ship back, so they come and bring an army to the Valley of the Wind.

 They're actually a lot more gray than I wanted them to be.  I always pictured them with gold armor and blue or red capes.

Pretty cool, yeah?  And it's Miyazaki, so it's got to be good.  Even his earliest stuff was righteous (especially since I'm into strong female leads).

The characters were limited.  I have to admit that I didn't like how Kushana and Kurotowa ended up like I already said, but they were still cool characters.

For your information, Kushana is a lot more of a badass in the original manga.  She led a cavalry charge, fought with some really freaky creatures, and then slaughtered a ship-full of Doroks (that's something that was only in the manga, as were all of the things that I sited here (and no, the freaky creature was not the one out of the movie)).

You've still got Yupa, though (another bitchin' character).

 Yupa annndddd....

 TETO!!

Since this is an adaptation of only about the first 2 volumes (in terms of the 7 volume set), it's limited in it's capacity to develop the characters like the manga (this movies was created part-way through his production of the manga, you know?).  Miyazaki actually introduced at least five more pretty major characters later on who you don't see at all in the movie, unless I'm really missing something.

The animation style was classic, in a good way.  It was a lot more colorful than I would have originally imagined, but that was a good thing.  I would never have used so much pink and purple, but somehow it was all good.

I actually only watched this in Japanese, and I have to admit that I was scared to watch this in English, despite the cast list (Patrick Stewart (various roles, but I remember him from Excalibur and... Star Trek), Uma Therman (you'd probably know her from Kill Bill), and even Mark Hamill (not technically a star, but... Luke Skywalker, damn.)).

The music is something that I'd classify as strange.  It blended into the background it you weren't careful, but since I had to listen for it, I heard... a lot of weird stuff in there.  I don't even know what the influences for the music were, but they were definitely from the East.  It was still good though, didn't distract you from the story or anything, so that's good.

Manga:
Shuna no Tabi Scum Scans
Sabaku no Tami Mediafire

Anime:

Kaze no Tani no Nausicaa Minitheatre

Ghibli 13 Movie Collection (Dual Audio) Nihonomaru

(You need an account to access the links here too)

Coming up next!

Day 2: Laputa: Castle in the Sky!

Gankutsuou: The Count of Monte Cristo

Name: Gankutsuou: The Count of Monte Cristo
Type: Television Show
Episodes: 24
Rating: TV-14
Runtime Per Episode: 24 min
Director: Maeda Mahiro
Produced By Gonzo
Year Produced: 2004

Ignoring the totally yaoi covers and pictures that I found online, I have my own opinion of this show.

Since I have a hard time being mean, I'll have to say this...

It was... interesting.  In a good way, though.

The whole story is vaguely reminiscent of the actual classic... The Count of Monte Cristo, written by... I don't know and I don't particularly car, I'm nowhere near a literal guy.  If the book isn't loaded with pictures and speech bubbles, I don't usually bother with it.

I kind of remember watching that one movie: Man in the Iron Mask, or something like that, but I don't remember well enough to cross-reference.

The story behind this one version is that in the distant, distant future, you've got a bunch of noble brats... and then a heroic soldier from I dunno what campaign.  As you can tell, I already have a slight bias, but not debilitating (and I didn't like the soldier much better than the others, it was just that I agreed with him a lot more than say... I dunno... Albert (pronounced "Ahl-bhere", since he's French... wait, that explains it!)).

Albert is the son of a famous General (famous from some other campaign), and some rich princess-kind of person.

Bored with his mundane life of... whatever the hell it is that young nobles do, Albert and his friend Franz go on some kind of vacation to another world.  They arrive just in time for some big festival, and during the course of it, Albert meets a mysterious, pointy-eared, freaking green tall noble, who drops his pocket watch.

Like any good conniving upstart, Albert uses the return of said pocket watch to have a meeting with the mysterious man, who is introduced/actually introduces himself as the "Count of Monte Cristo".

Now the big question running through my head right now is: "If this is space, and most of the humans alive in that age probably haven't even heard of Earth, then where in the hell is "Monte Cristo", or is that not even a place?".

Anyway, the two get together and CoMC (... you know, I'm not even going to explain it to you.  If you get it, good, if you don't, then you've got a problem) invites Albert and Franz to brunch at a... public execution.  What the fuck?  Have people in the future reverted back to some kind of medieval entertainment system?  Then again, this is based on a classic set in those times, so maybe this is supposed to be happening.

And so their wild and utterly annoying time together starts.  If you know the story of the Count of Monte Cristo, then you know where this story leads, and if you don't... then I guess you'll just have to watch it, won't you?

I actually watched a bit of this before I even decided to do this blog, so I had a good idea what I was getting myself into, and I choose to anyway because this anime had a couple of things that I wanted to talk about.

First of all, the director Maeda Mahiro was staff on a couple of other animes that I liked, such as a couple of Miyazaki movies like Kaze no Tani no Nausicaa, Castle in the Sky, and even Porco Rosso (all of which are coming up in quick succession), and he also worked on Samurai Champloo (which I just recently watched... it wasn't bad), and Last Exile (which I didn't love at first, but after watching it a second time a while back, am starting to like).

Maybe because of all of his work on stuff that I already liked (though he didn't direct any of those), or maybe because he's just good, I found the style and such of this anime to be really cool... it was just the characters that pissed me off.

The other thing that I'll bring up is the clothes.  I don't know if this is unique, or something Maeda Mahiro's take from one of his other animes, or what, but the way the clothes were animated was really interesting.  Since I'm an aspiring mangaka myself, I'll let you in on a secret.

Mangakas, being people who don't want to work themselves to death on every little detail have come up with something called a Screen Tone.  What that is is like a sheet of a "tone" with a given pattern on it.  What they do is cut it down, then basically glue it over the parts of their work that they want... toned.

... Like all that black in night scenes... do you really think that the mangaka spent about three days coloring all that shit in?  Well, maybe, yes.  But probably not.

For those of you who are reading this without any frame of reference in this anime or manga, then I'll tell you... that you're out of luck.  You might as well just close this down and go watch the anime I'm talking about.

For those of you who are following me, then I'll just finish up with; "What made this anime worth reviewing is the fact that they use a stable tone on the clothes.  So there's no crinkles or anything, it's just a shifting tone on a body.  It's really kind of cool and new."

Since this is from a book, I couldn't tell you if it was "true to the original work", but it seemed to flow nicely and keep a good pace.  Actually, I don't really recall a down moment, there was always something weird or aggravating going on.

Character development was good, actually.  The Count's history came to light in bits and pieces, though if you had half of a brain, you could usually see the plot "twists" coming from an episode away, but that's okay.
Albert's history and personality... I don't really give two shits about.  He was a little prick, the end.  In this show, I found myself liking the supporting cast way  more than... Albert.  The Count was okay though.

The animation style, I've already said everything that I want to about that, but still, even if it's just for the first episode, I highly recommend checking it out just for that.  It was a really mind bender the first time I saw it.  No matter how much I plug it though, I actually didn't find it all that appealing.  It was new and all, but it kind of distracted me for a while, not that the story line was keeping me enthralled.

Japanese or English, it doesn't matter, Albert was still weird.  Actually, both versions were good enough.  And in the English one, Albert's wimpy side was made all the more clear by the actor, so good job, man!

The music was... harsh on the ears in the beginning.  I dunno what that guy was on when he wrote that, but the dumbass tried to cram too many syllables into a line, then he scratched on another, and all kinds of weird stuff happened.
All in all, I wouldn't have kept that take... or the song, for that matter (I thought the song in general was crap too).  Eugenie's version wasn't bad though... mainly because nobody was singing it.

The ending themes were pretty good, more to my style of music, and when you're following up "We Were Lovers", it's hard not to be better.

Okay, I've bashed this enough for the visible section... oh, and I watched this from a borrowed DVD, so that's why this post isn't overflowing with pictures and stuff.

Gankutsuou: The Count of Monte Cristo Minitheatre

Coming up next!

Miyazaki Week... and then some!

Day 1: Kaze no Tani no Nausicaa!