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Jan 26, 2024
Before we get started, I have a huge problem with the name change of this film which isn’t a criticism of the film itself; rather it is with the “”””localization”””” of this film. The name “How do you live” is actually a message in this film compared to a dumb tepid “Boy and the Heron”. This style of name changes need to die off. What is the point of changing its name if there is no clear dire need for it. In Arabic, it was translated to the name of the film rather than naming it something meaningless. Enough of that. The final movie of
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a director, who retired right after its release, is always going to be quite contentious. It is true that this isn’t the first time Miyazaki announced his retirement; only to later return to direct another movie, but I think this will very likely be his last. The man is closing in on his 90’s, and he expressed that he can’t do this type of thing anymore. I mean no wonder. The average animator and director work themselves to the bone. I’m rambling on small details, so let’s begin the review.
Intro:
Our story begins with a child (Mahito) waking up to loud bomb sirens. He soon finds out that one of the areas that was obliterated by a bomb was a hospital; someone close to him was staying there, and he immediately bolts to the site of the explosion to rescue that person despite being advised to stay at home. This event greatly impacts him and the future events of this film.
Story & Characters & Theme:
The story feels surprisingly concise unlike the other films Miyazaki directed. Noticeably better than say something like Whisper of you Heart which felt a bit too dragged and boring. Throughout the movie, Mahito meets different characters that aid him along his objective to return someone. I felt that the characters in this film were properly developed with the limited screen time they had. All of them had enough depth for you to feel like you cared somewhat about them. This is where the name “How do you live” begins to show its significance. Highlighting the lives of different creatures and people that go through changes; including the changes of Mahito’s own life. The main events of our story begin after he moves to a different location, and begins to observe oddities in its environment. At the end, I felt a sort of emptiness. Initially, I thought that the movie may have ended too soon, but all of the major plot points have been tied. I later realized that this feeling is probably because us viewers only see certain portions of Mahito’s life, and the final minute of the movie was the end of our viewing. I felt curious to know where life took him next, but the film had already ended. I could feel the film asking me “How do YOU live your life?” Within the long and boring stretches of our lives, there is surely an interlude that brings the much needed life into the boring human monotony. 7.5.
Animation:
Lmao. This is a ghibli film. No less is expected than magic and wonder breathed into animation frames. Absolute 10.
Sound Design & Music:
It was great. What more could I say on this topic? Every second was impactful in terms of music. Every sound felt proper and on point. 10.
Overall:
I recommend watching this movie. I prefer this to most of their other movies (which is saying something). It felt properly paced, and the characters are enjoyable. Every plot point was tied up nicely. I can only applaud Miyazaki . He went out with a bang to retirement with a great final movie as a director. 8
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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Jun 29, 2023
This was great. I just came back from watching it, and I recommend this 200%
Animation
I was slightly worried on whether or not the CG would affect how the characters moved, but it was done really well. I'm glad they added some 2D for that. The characters all moved so fluidly, and it was amazing. At times, I thought that this was a real match because of how real the movements of the characters felt.
Story & Writing
The movie takes a slight departure from its source in how the story is approached. I don't mind that they changed the main character and added some drama, but I
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think they slightly overdid it in the drama section. The pacing of the drama kind of hampered my enjoyment of the film. I think the drama was mostly very good (except for one goofy crying scene. That scene was a bit too extra); I just think had it been implemented better with the pacing or movement of the film then I think it would have been perfect. Very good story and writing, but the pacing of the drama kind of holds it back. The tense moments were done perfectly, and I really enjoyed the humor. Regarding the humor, it was reduced by a decent bit to make way for the drama; I don't mind, but I wonder how other avid followers of the work will feel about that. I thought the ending was fantastic.
Music & Sound
The music was amazing and fitting with the speed of the players. The dribbles, basket, and shoes all sounded super real! It was absolutely immersive. I don't remember a single moment where I thought "That didn't feel right." It was perfect!
Overall
What really drew me towards the film was the fact that Inoue Takehiko (the mangaka himself!) was the director! How often do you see that??? I will reiterate once more. I recommend this movie 200%
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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Jul 18, 2022
It is tough to put into words how frustrated I feel realizing the amount of effort it took from me to read this. It feels very avent-garde; I do not even know what that word fucking means, but the closest words I would associate it with is probably fake and plastic. It is extremely exasperating when I realize how high this is spoken of then contrasting to the reality of actually fucking reading it. It is important to note this since this section is flooded with 10s and 9s putting a pretty high expectation of this manga. It is hard to figure out the purpose
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of this manga aside from being p r e t t y and a e s t h e t i c. Reading this was a chore, and I do not recommend this in the slightest. Okazaki Kyoko’s stories tend to be like this in that you barely understand much and whatever questions that are unanswered will stay unanswered. This applies to another work of hers which is Helter Skelter. The author’s paneling is very hard to follow as well. It is not that it suffers from overcrowding rather it is just extremely clunky at times; so much so that sometimes I would spend at least three minutes trying to understand what is exactly happening. A very superficial work which is art in name only and mostly made for privileged intelligentsia, so they can vicariously live through oppression.
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Jul 20, 2021
Intro -
In the realm of manga where annoying characters exist (Shinji Ikari) and chapters where it is just battle after battle after battle; things become very exhausting where it is the same piss willy character who is way too kind and I constantly face-palm through my brain. This is where "The Fable" truly shines with its unique cast, art, and story. A seinen slice-of-life type of manga which is pretty damn rare when you look at the amount of manga in this garbage website. It has a certain absurdist feel to it which makes me relate to it to some degree; a type which Quentin
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Tarantino would think "damn, manga can actually be good?". We start with our MC, who is an assassin, killing a bunch of fuckos and running away with a real fine beauty to their small HQ where their boss tells them "You two motherfuckers, are going back to colleg-" wait wrong one. Anyways something akin to that, where they have to stay at some place for a year because they killed too many people in one year.
Story -
People usually complain about this part being the weakest, but I cannot really understand them in the slightest. We usually judge a story based on how well-paced it is, and how the author uses the characters to his advantage according to its setting, interaction, and atmosphere through the flow and path of the story. It is not too difficult to draw and map out a slice-of-life seinen due to the nature of slice-of-life being a little slow. Coupled with some mystery on the background of the characters which gives an air of suspense and making you want to know more about them. The world itself is slightly lack-luster due to its neutral nature which could at time make you wonder if the author could have spiced it up a bit. 8
Character -
This is perhaps the best part while still being dragged by its slight weaker side characters. Our cast actually exude a sense of realism in the way the act and behave along with their elements of chaos which proves to be entertaining unlike most manga where you have your protag getting smothered by women "accidentally" drop on him from the sky with their tits and ass (not that I have a problem with that but I read manga for the story not the porn). Along with great translations which makes it feel like you are watching a mobster film. Our MC is fucking great. A guy who chills in his house naked and sleeps in his bath tub every night He is a pretty laid-back chill type of guy. His (fake)sister is probably the best where she likes to use her free time in doing stupid shit (you will find out i do not want to spoil it). A very unconventional cast which proves to be very entertaining. This is as far as I go with characters to avoid spoilers. 8
Art -
This is coming from someone who has read hundreds of manga, and I consider this to be perhaps one of my favorite art styles I have seen. A very unique art style with the body positions and postures of our characters being great as well; it feels like they are actual human beings. Granted, it is not any Murata Yusuke, but the art is still great when it comes to fighting. Wait a second, our characters actually look like human beings and actually look Japanese/Asian?... huh. 10
Enjoyment -
I smashed 90 fucking chapters in one day. 10
Overall -
If you like Yakuza type seinen manga with some slice-of-life elements mixed into it I recommend this wholeheartedly. 10
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
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Feb 27, 2021
Coming from a fan of Mori Koji's Holyland (favorite of mine) I expected Jisatsutou to be a great manga, but unfortunately the symptoms that slightly hampered my enjoyment of Holyland (still a favorite) killed Jisatsutou completely. You might as well say it plagued the manga completely turning it into a dying zombie waiting to be killed.
Story 3/10
The story starts with our mc attempting suicide but ultimately failing to do so; He then wakes up in an island with a group around him most of them consisting of people who failed to commit suicide as well. The bad pacing of the story begins at
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the start of the story with extremely irregular pacing. The story begins to truly shine after chapter 20 all the way until 60. The problem is how the author forgets what to do with his characters and decides to prolong it all the way to 168. The pacing starts to really weigh down on the reader after chapter 60 to the point I didn't even want to continue reading this abomination (rarely happens). Horrible decisions one after another perplexed me. Granted, I read this in one sitting, but I have done the same with many other great manga namely Mori Koji's other work Holyland. Mori Koji's name was the only thing that carried this abomination all the way to the end in my case.
Art 9/10
As expected, the art was brilliant. The art that Mori Koji polished through eight years of writing and drawing Holyland paid off (wish the same could be said for the story and characters). There really isn't much complaints here to be said about the art. Undoubtedly, this is a preference since some would complain about the weird art style.
Character 2/10
Good lord almighty the characters really got on my nerves. You do not know the amount of times I wanted to smash my head with a brick because of how naive or stupid the characters were. The mc is the worst sinner in this category. I don't think I have ever hated a mc more than this one. It is surprising at how one quality could truly make or break a story. Specifically, in this case it is the mc's hesitation. Wow, at times I really felt like the author was doing this shit on purpose. At the story's most critical moments the mc made the worst choices. Naivete and hesitation also affected a few other characters but not the degree of our mc. There was perhaps one notable brilliant development of a character that carried me to finish the story. There were also a few other plot issues which really made me question whether or not a certain decision made by a character was really a choice that character would make.
Enjoyment 5/10
Even though I absolutely German Suplexed the shit out of this manga, I would be lying to you if I said I didn't enjoy this manga at some point. After chapter 20 we had signs of a characters reform which truly made me smile and will most likely be the only thing I remember of this dumpster. After around chapter 60 my enjoyment dipped horribly due to terrible choices by the author. I truly wonder what was the author thinking while writing this. I suppose after eight years of drawing this manga he probably forgot his sense of direction of this story and began repeating the same actions and behavior patterns of nearly all characters.
Overall 5/10
I read this manga, so you didn't need to. If you want something survival or psychological, go read the author's only good work holyland, homunculus, or kokou no hito
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Oct 10, 2016
Intro & Story
We have all heard of successful people who have earned the place through their work and efforts, but do we know what they went through? The success to the top is extremely glorified in this world, but have we seen the pain that is required to reach that spot? Ping Pong the Animation shows the pain and brutality of the top, and it shows us the true struggle. The visceral pain of knowing that you may just not be the biggest fish, which more often than not leads to great self-anguish. This anime asks the viewer how do you define success. Some characters
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had a goal that ends at one point and some characters had a never-ending goal. Do you want to be the strongest? Do you want to be the best? Do you want to be famous? It could be none of the ones mentioned. Here the anime asks what is important to YOU, and none of these goals are overshadowed by the other. Normally a regular anime would just be vague and answer "nakama and friendship!" (which is not bad or anything but it does get jaded after a while). Ironically, Ping Pong is not really about the sport unlike many other anime in its genre, but it is about the struggles our well-developed characters go through as humans to succeed at a personal level. All these characters have their own goals along with great story-telling bestowing it a real spot in my favorites
Characters
We meet our main protagonist Makoto (Tsuki)moto who is a quiet boy with a stoic looking demeanor nicknamed "Smile" (pretty ironic), and his friend (Hoshi)no or as he is nicknamed "Peco" both of these guys are members of their high school Ping Pong team. While (Tsuki)moto plays for fun, (Hoshi)no plays to be best in the world, making two amazing characters. These characters are relative yet opposite to each other like ying and yang, and they also help develop the secondary characters perfectly. These guys are all so different, yet we can all relate to them in one way or another.
Sound
I can promise you whenever I hear the OST of Ping Pong I get the chills and it perfectly meshes along with each scene during the anime. It was made by Kensuke Ushio who is not too well known compared the omega popstar Sawano Hiroyuki.
Animation
Now I seen a lot of people saying that this animation is "bad" because it isn't high quality. Does our anime need to look like Fate Zero to be counted as good? We have timeless classics like Super Mario, Donkey Kong, Persona, Metal Gear Solid, Pac-Man, etc, and to this day people are still playing them! Ping Pong's funky art style suits the anime perfectly, and it wouldn't be the same if it had the regular anime art style.
Enjoyment
I watched this anime three times without experiencing a single second of boredom 'nuff said.
Overall 100/10
I was blown away. Surprisingly, a brilliant work for a director who usually makes pretentious anime. I truly believe you should give this beaut a good watch.
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
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