Back to bigmustache93's Profile bigmustache93's Profile

Gantz o is the ultimate guilty pleasure anime,this is the best way to describe it,the whole premise is kinda dumb and makes no sense but it was a lot of fun,if you aren't familiar with gantz franchise then don't worry there's enough info dumping to make you grasp the story of dead people ,resurrected by a black ball to fight aliens,the characters are mediocre and forgettable ,we have Kato as the main character ,he is a moral guy who has all the requirements to be a hero,he isn't that complex or deep of a character but he stands out among that sea of assholes and ... jerks AKA other gantz players,we have old man Suzuki for exposition purposes and info dumping,we have that asshole from the tv series i dont even remember his name,oh there is also reika ,she has a shiny hair and a big jugs ,she is in full EMO mode after her beloved kurono got killed in the previous mission(thank god he was dead cuz I couldn't stand him for a minute ) then we have Osaka team which is a bunch of douchbags who defined by how many times they won the game and where stupid enough to continue it instead of freeing themselves and get back to there normal lives,there is also a girl among them to provide a cute love story with kato so we could have a speech of heroism and sacrifice for your beloved ones at the end of the movie,the villains are shallow and unoriginal (they look like they've been ripped out of a book of Japanese mythology instead of coming from space ).
the animation was the best aspect of the movie ,the action was intense and bloody,there are some genuine horror moments that would send chills through your spine and some disturbing ones that would leave you scratching your head.
overall fun to watch,easy to hate ,just don't overthink it,turn off your brain and enjoy the damn thing.

Things I've learned from this anime:
-Mongolian girls have the biggest eyes in the world.
-the American mob had a shortage in professional assassins so they hired
a creepy German guy with some weird fetish to build an army of assassins
-Japanese teenagers make for the best assassins in the world
-how you turn someone into a perfect killing machine? that's easy,just lock him in an old abandoned building in the middle of nowhere with a sexy cute girl and train him to shot some brick and that's it.
-you can take a direct gunshot to the chest from a close distant and still survive.
-Stockholm syndrome is an overused ... cliches .
-Japanese are really bad at speaking English.
-German language sounds cooooool:eins,zwei,drei,vier,fünf,sechs,sieben,acht etc...
-the leader of the most powerful crime in the USA has a weird fashion taste.
-when somebody has an amnesia he loses the will to fight and ceased to seek his freedom and will never try to escape (he won't even think of escaping )
-there's yakuza in America and Chinese mafia in Japan.
-a girl could grow from a cute little kid to a voluptuous seductive fully grown woman in TWO YEARS.
-Japanese anime isn't the best medium for crime thrillers.

HUGE SPOILERS,this review is only for those who watched the series.
In an era where anime is plagued by overused cliches and themes like overpowered teenagers,cute girls,bouncing boobs ,came an anime series that was different and for that reason anime fans praised it and rushed to score it 10/10 while ignoring its considerable flaws ,set in post WW2 japan (how many animes are set in that time period ,not so many)This anime had the potential to be one of the best anime of all time but sadly it was a mediocre show and here is why:
-too many plot-holes that went unexplained like why "An chan" is ... in the jail since he didn't kill his father, what's the big deal about the paper that had written by sakuragi's cellmate (this paper isn't an objective avidence that condemn sasaki and ichihara)even the dumb sakuragi told them that he had a proof for their crimes(i mean it would be smarter for him to shut up and wait until his sentence ended then he could unmask their crimes when he is free) why these two act like there is no other authority in the prison, where was the chief warden when they were about to freeze three prisoners to death,and how they got away with killing another officer and burning half of the prison.
This show is full with these questions that never answered, also the show depends heavily on victimizing it's characters to draw audience's sympathy,from the first five minutes you will see them beaten,stripped and had a rectal examination by an old creepy geezer.
- now for the cringiest part of the show,the characters ,oh my god!
Their behaviour during some of the most important plotpoint made me want to smash my computer's screen for example how dumb was sakuragi when he lowered his guard during his encounter with ichihara and let himself stabbed,or when Mario apologized for those assholes to only got his hand smashed by a rock or when he left ichihara instead of killing him for what he did ,and why sakuragi beat his other cellmate during their first day then shared a cigar with them,I mean what did he want by this? Did he want to show them who is the boss ?did he want to show him them how much merciful he is? You have to choose what you want dude,and the list go on and on .
The first part was much more focused while the second part became a loosely connected stories about the main characters (they even forgot to give hetai his own story)
This anime has soooo many flaws and far from perfect but it was something different i will be generous and gave it 6/10 ,it isn't the anime version of the shawshank redemption. No way.

this is the most overrated anime i have ever watched and this is coming from a huge fan of studio ghibli, i don't know what make people and critics consider this as one of the greatest war movies of all time.

the movie tries to manipulate your emotions by showing two siblings starving to death in WW2 japan but this tragedy came as fake since it isn't caused by the war but by seita's selfishness and huge ego,watch the movie to understand what i mean.

seita and setsuko lost their mother but they have a caring aunt that welcomed them in her home and provided them food ... and shelter,so instead of looking for work or going to school seita who is a 14 year-old and who is living in a country in a total war,decided to spend all of his time playing with his sister,then get pissed off when his aunt told him to get a job or something instead of playing(working in young age is okey during wartime or poor economic conditions),he decided to leave her and to live on his own depending on his mother savings which he spent on buying some food for him and his sister until they have nothing left,and when he and his sister were starving he refused that oldman advice to return to his aunt and to apologize to her and the result is the death of him and his sister,see how irresponsible and childish seita is he was the reason of his sister's death and his later death,the whole tragedy that people are crying about didn't caused by his evil aunt but by his dumb decision ,so he deserves what happened to him,he doesn't deserve any sympathy but what his poor little sister has to do with that, i feel sorry for her,seita is one of the worst anime protagonist i thought he would be responsible and mature but he was the opposite he was a spoiled useless brat who need somebody to beat him so he can understand what's the best for him and for his sister.

another thing about this movie is how fake the emotions are,that's particularly obvious when seita saw his burned mom he didn't shed a tear even the toughest men would cry like babies when they saw their most beloved person in such devastating condition.

the beatiful animation and music can't redeem this anime for its sins,i really feel cheated , i wonder how roger ebert praised this movie and called it one of the best animated movies? how they managed to trick him ?

i wrote a review about NGE before but i felt like it was a bit hypocrite and didn't reflect my feelings and thoughts twards the show.
my first encounter with NGE was while watching a video on youtube and what i saw was a gaint robot tearing another robot apart savagely and splitting its blood(isn't that cool a robot that can bleed) all over the place ,on the streets and on the buildings it was a disturbing and scary scene that made me curious about this show and what it was all about,so i went to evangelion with high expectations especially after i ... knew that it is one of the most successful anime franchise and among the most influential in the medium but it was a big disappointment to me.
the story is about teenagers piloting giant robots to save the world in a post appocalyptic settings,throw to this mix some random religious symbolism and a lots of psychological and philosophical babbling that make little to no sense along with very violent and disturbing sequences and of course a good amount of fan service,this was the magnum opus that used by director hideaki anno and it proved to be successfull since it followed by dozen of shows that combine giant robot elements with religion and mysticism ,it was just different so people deemed it to be great and cool,but while watching the show i felt like it was trying so hard to be deep and philosophical ,i found it to be pretentious and bizarre and couldn't take it seriously.

the story at first follow a generic monster of the week formula it helps to introduce you to the characters and the settings then it slows down in the middle then takes a dark turn towards the end,the show has many plotholes for example why did they build the headquarter of NERV(the organisation that lead the fight against the alien) under the largest metropolian area on the planet eventhough they knew it contains something that would attract the angels?why did they call those aliens the angels?from where they come?what interest me the most and keep me watching was the EVA units their origin and what they have to do with the aliens,the concept behind using those giant robots and why they only piloted by 15 years old teenagers albeit convoluted but at least they try to give a reason.
there is a lot of pseudo-scientific babbling that went in the operation room of NERV during each battle it was too hard to follow it.
i have to admit i don't like psychological shows and i don't like teenager protagonists this is why i don't like EVA characters ,since the main trio are angsty driven teenagers,rei has no personality ,no emotions she is basically a doll couldn't they develop her character more and flesh it out ,asuka is an annoying bitch she could have been a great character if they had reduced her tsundere side a bit,and shinji is the biggest emo loser i've ever seen,they try to add depth to these characters by giving them tragic backstories and parental issues but that wasn't enough to make me care for them, the characterization was plain awful many characters spend most of the show angsting and when they didn't going FULL EMO MODE they were yelling at each other,if you want to create flawed characters try to give them a certain amount of likability so we could care for them ,my biggest problem with shinji character is that he's got almost all the attention in the show basically the whole show revolves around him but taking into account the inherent annoying nature of his character, it was too painful to watch him and i don't like his development since he always return to the same point he began from it,his presence feels too forced in the show ,there is so much emphasis on him, each time he is about to die the deux ex machina of his eva come out of nowhere to save his ass,i'd prefer if his character take a back seat for another protagonist while continuing to descend in his depression.
shinji psychological problem and inner struggle minimized when you take into account the situation of humanity in the series,what i mean is that when an angel attack you will forget every thing about shinji and demand him to get his head out of his ass and to do his job.


SPOILER

it would have been better if he got depressed after what happened with toji , refuses to pilot his eva again and maybe commit siucide to end his misery


END OF THE SPOILER

for me the adult characters in the show where more interesting than shinji ,i wish if they had more screen time .
EVA is considered very influential because of its the charcters although i hate that influence since it popularized beta male characters,tsundere and kuudere(whatever shit they call them),many eva fans praise eva and hate anime today even though their favourite show could be blamed for some archetypes they hate so much and call it a plague that must be exterminated ,they hate wimpy spinless male characters yet they consider the shinji as the best anime character,this is what i call hypocricy.

as for the religious symbolism it has nothing to do with the story ,just random biblical names for the sake of it,don't try to dig deep into it only pretentious overthinkers would do that,if you're looking for deep and meaningful religious symbolism go watch movies like" there will be blood" or "the matrix".

the character design is attractive and appealing,the design of the robot is iconic and demonic,unfortunately the animation is bad , it only became good during battle sequences and the las two episodes couldn't even considered a motion picture.
the opening theme is memorable but the use of classical music was just hilarious.


in the end each one has an opinion and this was my opinion about NGE i found it to be highly overrated and silly,before evangelion anime was edgy after evangelion anime remain edgy but became pretentious as well.

"you are my friend but if things get worse, i don't know you" this line that you will hear during the ending theme of each episode, summarize the philosophy of our heroes(or should i say our villains ).
i find myself obligated to write a review about this awesome OVA since it passes under the radar of so many people, i discovered this hidden gem lately and i am glad i watched it .
this anime isn't about cute girls with magical powers or teenagers piloting giant robots to save the world or some overpowered kids who embark in an epic quest ,no,it is all about bromance ... ,delinquents gangs,bad boys beating the crap out of each other , slapstick comedy and hilarious situations in order to summarize it, do you remember slam dunk? do you remember when sakuragi and his gang were goofing around and going in some crazy adventures ? now imagine a spin-off that focuses on these adventures and the result would be this OVA.
the story revolves around mitsuhashi and ito two transfer students who trying to make name for themselves by becoming delinguent in their new school so one of them dyed his hair blonde and the other make his hair like a porcupine spikes,at first they didn't get along due to their opposite personalities then they became friends and form a formidable team that strikes fear in the heart of other delinquents ,the story is episodic and most of these episodes aren't connected but who cares it's still funny as hell ,it will begin with fighting delinquents gang in their high school then fighting the most formidable high school gang in the town and finally they will get involved in a feud with the yakuza, the story doesn't take itself too seriously at all, except for some serious moments that will turn into a big laugh because of mitsuhashi witty tricks or imai stupidity.
like any comedy the characters are the most important thing here,they aren't deep or complex ,they don't have epic quest or dark past but they are funny and likable , first you've got mitsuhashi and ito they are complete opposite to each other ito is fair and honorable, he fights like a man and never take opportunities or use dirty tricks,while mitsuhashi (the blonde wolf ) is dishonorable,tricky and opportunistic he will never waste any chance to backstab his opponent or use any available object to defeat his opponents ,he is a coward who prefers easy victory or escape instead of hard victory and has no problem abandoning his friends when the need call for that,he is not a bad person though since he abandoned some of his principales to save his friends on some occasions ,imai is an unlucky idiot with a heart of gold, ,his stupidity and cluelessness along with mitsuhashi antics are the main source of comedy here , all the other characters aren't all that important since they will only appear for one or two episodes.
the animation is outdated it isn't all that great by today standard( i don't have any problem with that) ,the character design is like any old school anime , the boys look like boys (actually some of them look like fully grown men in their thirties) the girls look cute and pretty my only complain is the lack of diversity ,many characters look similar ,they even have the same haircut .
the voice acting is amazing they managed to make the jokes funnier and added more personality to the characters.
the soundtrack is nothing special ,the ending song is funny though.
overall this anime among the best i've seen ,it is funny and hilarious,there
is no anime that make me laugh so much like that since slam dunk,we need more animes like this.
recomended for retro anime fans(especially 90's anime) , slam dunk fans are going to like this so much.

before i start this review i want to thank bobsamurai for his youtube video about this OVA without it i wouldn't get the chance to watch this hidden gem.
the creator of this is GO NAGAI so you should know what to expect from this anime,it is not meant to be philosophical or deep or thought provoking ,it is just a non stop action movie about ninjas , invincible robots and a mysterious alien power that work in the shadows ,yes robots and ninjas the story is one of the craziest i've seen in anime ,robots slaughtering ninjas by dozens in feudal japan,oda nobunaga ... is possessed by an alien force that give him all the meanings he needs to annihilate his opponents,it is a blend of science fiction and historical fiction,it sounds crazy but it works,all of these are background for the main story which is a manhunt that turns wrong and the hunter became the prey ,to simplify it imagine if the terminator was sent to feudal japan instead of 1980's US and suffered from an error in his program that make him view every ninja as sarah conor.

the characters aren't all that special you have the hot headed cocky teenager who thinks he is too cool for school and ends up failing miserably ,we have the ninja girl which was obnoxious towards the main hero at the beginning then she develops some feelings towards him by the end, the most memorable was ganai he is a non-stoppable killing machine ,each time they think he is killed he come again, he remind me of alucard from hellsing,or t800 from the first terminator movie, he is just too ruthless and powerfull to the point his opponts feel completely helpless after all their failing attempts to kill him,oh and the guy also has a backstory that explain his origin and motivation.

the animation is bad it isn't fluid or good at all but somehow they managed to have some good fighting scenes,the gore and violence will make for the lack of animation quality along with the terminator feeling throught the ova.
the character design is an old school style ,bushy and thick eyeborrows ,no androgynous male character,beautiful female design,i like it.
there is nothing great to mention about the soundtrack.

overall it was quite an enjoyable experience,if you like ninjas, feudal japan, crazy science fiction elements and don't mind gore and violence or you are just an old school anime fan then you will enjoy this.
i recommend this for people who enjoy ninja scroll,hellsing ultimate and the terminator.

-Are you tired of all these battle shounen cliches and overused tropes?
-Are you tired of neverending stories that drag to absolute garbage as time went by?
-Are you tired of the same repetitive formula of training then fighting the bad guy then training to defeat the next bad guy?
-Are you tired of teenagers yelling the name of their technique each time they use it and pull power ups out of their asses with no explanation given other than nakama power?
-Are you tired of underdeveloped interesting side characters that get overshadowed by the boring main character?
if so ,then you should watch FMAB and this is why:
1-it ... has one of the most intriguing plot in anime that grow more complex as the story progress at first it look like a diconnected events and stories but as the story progress all these plotlines will come together to form a much bigger scene,it will surprise you with its turns and twists that will drop your jaw.
2-the characters are likable and interesting from the vengeful scar to the cunning mustang to the playful hughes to the mysterious hoenheim,the elric brothers aren't your typical shounen lead who knows only two things to do which are eating and training, Edward uses his brain to understand what's going on and relys on tactics more than brute force and he didn't get any power ups during the series (except if you consider replacing his broken prosthetic arm a power up) then he got three powerups during the entirety of the series ,the last thing I have to add is that all the supporting cast get developed and fleshed out ,all of them have their moments to shine ,by the end all of their character arcs get resolved in a satisfying way.
3-it has the most important thing for a shounen which is an intense fights,FMAB doesn't hold back in this department ,you will know how intense these fights when it take a bunch of supporting characters and dozens of soldiers to just disarm one of the villains , this series has some of the most badass fighting I've watched,the most enjoyable are the ones that involve wrath,mustang and scar.
4-it tackles heavy and dark subject for a shounen like genocide and ethnic cleansing ,political corruption, terrorism and experiments on human subjects.
So why 8 /10 instead of 10/10 because the show isn't perfect it suffers from many issues that may be a turn off for some people which is :
1-the comic relief and the humour is so childish and silly that would hardly make you laugh even worse it make a drastic tonal shift that ruined the dark atmosphere of the series.
2-the pacing of the first 13 episodes is soo rushed that make you wonder what's going on it felt like random adventures that has nothing to do with each other (at first) this weak beginning would be a challenge for some people patience so if you could make it through these episodes then trust me you won't regret that.
3-although FMAB didn't fall for many overused tropes in the genre it still fell pray for some other tropes like drama that crosses to the melodrama territory (the elric brother tragedy was weak and i didn't give a damn about them)or the dumb "killing is bad" philosophy even when the villain deserves to be crushed under your boot like a an insect and guess what the ones who defend this philosophy are a hypocritic hero who previously choked a soldier to death and a sniper who killed people by dozens during the war, oh I almost forget one of the most important supporting characters suffer from what I call vegeta syndrome (if you know what I mean).
Don't let that hold you back from watching this awesome series there's a good reason why it's number 1 on MAL because it's the best shounen ever made .

Nausica of the valley of the wind is based on manga by the same name written and illustrated by hayao myazaki ,the success of this movie paved the way for the foundation of studio ghibli. the story takes place in a post apocalyptic world after one thousand years of the destruction of the the industrial civilization the opening credit summarizes all the back story and ... even give us a glimpse of what is going to happen in the movie, now a toxic jungle is spreading and threaten to bring the human race into extinction by its lethal spores and to make things worse this jungle is inhabited by giant insects that act Like guardians to the jungle and attack whoever try to harm the jungle or its insects ,the story revolve around a small country called the valley of the wind and it's princess nausica and her struggle to insure the safety of her people in the middle of a war between two other nations and to keep harmony between human and nature . the setting is strange and bizarre from knights claded in armour yet they use guns ,airships and tanks in battle to lakes of acid and vast wastelands ,to the creepy insects ,but it works well because it is detailed enough to make us invested in this world and its people ,we see how the people of the valley live ,how they use the wind of their valley by building windmills and use the shells of the dead insects to make tools and equipment . the character are diverse and likeable ,they give the story the needed amount of conflict that make it interesting and keep the viewer attention , most of them are morally grey ,each have their Own reasons to do what they do,heck even nausica which most of the time is depicted as a saint or a Christ figure is flawed you will know that when In a moment of rage she take a sword and kill multiple soldiers thus making her a flawed heroin and not one dimensional boring main character,other interesting characters are kushana the leader of the tolmekian army ,lord yoba who is a top tier badass warrior and a father (or uncle ) figure to nausica,also there is the old woman who would deliver some of the most memorable lines in the movie,all the character will have their moments to shine even the most secondary of them ,technically there is no main villain just different groups of people fighting each other for the greater good of their nations and each doing what he considered the right thing. as for the art and animation it is typical ghibli art style if you are familiar with other myazaki works you will notice many characters resemble characters found in other myazaki works like future boy Conan and Laputa,what I like about the character design is how it manages to depict beautiful women without over-sexualizing them when you look at nausica and kushana you can immediately tell both are pretty but with no boobs that defy gravity ,myazaki make sure to keep his female characters innocent and pure , and never let them turn into sex toys. the animation is from 80's which some would consider it old but compared to other anime of its time it's pretty good the only movie that beats it in terms of animation and from the same era is akira, my only problem was that during the beginning of the movie the colour of nausica legs made her look like she was running around with bare butt but later on the movie they changed the colour to blue and fix it. the musical score is composed by Joe hisiashi and as expected it's among his best and the opening theme is memorable and amazing I've even downloaded it and listen to it frequently,i almost forgot i watched it in the ENG DUB because it is fantastic the voice acting is suberb just hear lord yoba voice and the old woman voice and you will know what i mean it is one of the best english dub i've ever watched .
Nausica of the valley of the wind is an environmental epic with strong female lead ,awesome flying machines, terrifying creatures and a grim fate facing humanity, it's one of the best myazaki movies and one of my favourite anime of all time.

Akira kurosawa's seven samurai is considered one of the most influential movies of all time beside that it's one of my favourite movies and that's what happen when somebody ruin one of your favourite movies and turn it into garbage seriously what were the staff members thinking when they remade this classic into anime ,so what we have here ,the original story is set in feudal Japan, it's the story of seven samurai recruited by the farmers of a small village to defend it against a horde of bandits the story was simple yet it was a great commentry on Japanese society and cast ... system as well as a great tale of heroism and sacrifice, it seems that studio gonzo thought the feudal Japan setting won't do well so they decided to change the world building into something post-apocalyptic mixed with some sci-fi and historical elements and what a mess they had created the setting is among the dumbest I've ever seen there is no explantation to the this world physics how could a sword cut throgh a giant mecha ,how could normal human defeat these gigantic machine the settings are silly and random at best also why the nobuseri need rice while they are just robots who need fuel and energy not rice to keep them alive they should have replaced it with something equal to the level of this advanced technology like a precious fuel or energy source ,also why in this world you need even swords where you have all this machines and robots .seems the studio want to have futuristic setting yet they still need the historical setting but they miss both of them ,then we have the animation which is a big pile of trash they used too much ugly CG and ended up with ugly backgrounds and mecha design, the art style is shit most of the characters look like video game characters or rock and roll band memebers,kambie and gurobi look like thugs,hihachi look like a mascot, kyoso look like a video game character and oh the most memorable character kekuchyo (who played in the movie by the legendary toshiro mifune)is now a robot,thankfully what redeem this anime and prevent it from turning into a big pile of shit is the characters who are (despite their shitty design)are diverse ,great and memorable from the veteran warrior who despised war after he experienced its brutality to his old buddy during war time to the rocky warrior who is trying to live up to his family name, to the rebel against the social system who crossed the lines between casts to the badass warrior who only want to have a good fight against a worthy opponents these characters may look stereotypical but remember that this movie is what established them as archetypes ,one notable thing about this show is that it doesn't hesitate to kill some of its main heroes when they face an impossible situation, however the characters lost a lot of their charm and depth due to the dumb settings ,as for the soundtrack nothing is memorable maybe the best thing was the ending theme.
overall samurai 7 was an ambitious attempt to introduce one of the most hailed cinema classics into anime medium but it failed to capture the spirit of the movie because of its ugly art style and ridiculous settings ,I think this anime would have done much better if it was set in the historical time period of the original movie it would be much more successful maybe it would have became among anime classics like cowboy bebop and princess mononoke, it is a good anime but why would you watch this inferior version of the story when you have the superior version ,just don't waste your time on this anime go watch the movie and you won't regret that.