The Archive: FLCL

FLCL/Furi Curi(Gainax/ production I.G,)

Seasons: 1 (6 episodes)           Original Run:April 26^th, 2000- March 16^th, 2001

Rating: pg-13

“When you’re in a town like this all covered with smoke, you forget that there’s a world outside. Nothing amazing happens here. And you get used to that, used to a world where everything is ordinary. Every day we spend here is like a whole lifetime of dying slowly.” –Naota

            FLCL created by the legendary combination of Gainax and Production I.G. is the story of a young boy named naota and how his once boring life is thrown absolutely out of control when a woman known as haruko hits him with her vespa and causes a giant robot that comes to be known as Kanti to grow out of his forehead. It’s wacky, it’s fun, and it’s just a little bit insane. Taking a new spin on the slice of life genre one thing I can promise is you’re in for one hell of a ride Kupo!

 

One of the best things about FLCL is the heavy amount of character development packed into each of the six episodes. Flat characters like Naota go from emotionless jaded middle school student to a heroic (key words here Kupo!) young adult who grabs hold of his destiny when it really matters. With a small but colorful cast to work through the human interactions are well written and fleshed out through normal and completely extraordinary situations (every day school conversations and giant mecha battles to name a few)

Moving onto animation FLCL shines in a rough but vibrant sketchy type style that stays edgy while retaining a simplicity that fits really well with the simple and realistic settings the characters find themselves in. to say FLCL could retain a lot of what makes the show what it is in a live action setting. Character designs are thoroughly ground in reality with the exception of the walking TV headed robot Kanti and the other robots he fights throughout the short but beautiful series.

Lastly I want to talk about the Soundtrack, done mostly by the j-rock band ‘The Pillows’ flawlessly sets the stage for each episode with their smooth garage style rock tunes. A literal anthem to diversity and an underling vibe of Indie rock that seems to seep its way into every moment of the show really makes buying the soundtrack a must if you’re a fan of the genre.

There isn’t much to say about what the show could have done better other than make it longer. Six episodes goes very quickly leaving you wanting more out of not only the story but the characters. Stories seem unfinished and the character growth seems a little pointless when all is said and done, as there isn’t any moments when you can see the characters live their lives after the climax of the show. This might seem like a small gripe but I found myself wanting more for Naota in the end which may just show how good this show really is.

Overall FLCL is a great show, with good character development, awesome music and a breakneck pace from beginning to end. You’ll probably find a place in your heart for at least one of the quirky but interesting characters by the end of your brief time with them, defiantly a great show to kick back to watch with some friends.

I rate FLCL 4/5 Kupo!

 

 

The Archive: Silent Hill

Silent Hill (Konami)

System: Playstation     Release Date: Jan 31^st, 1999

ESRB rating: M

Do you remember when Resident Evil was more about being scary and the atmospheric survival horror that made the series famous? Me too, back when Resident evil was still bringing the scares a new challenger appeared to attempt to take the title of scariest consol game ever. This game was Silent Hill.

Set in a sleepy mid west town enshrouded in a mysterious fog, silent hill took some of the basic game play mechanics from resident evil and applied them into a darker, more disturbing atmosphere. Gone were the well lit rooms, zombies, and police. Instead you played a father looking for his little girl in the dense fog, unknowing of the horrors that crept just beyond your vision.

Atmosphere plays the biggest part in silent hill’s master formula for fear. The silence is deafening as you wander through the fog in the ‘real’ world sections of the game only to be replaced by the unsettling musical style of Akira Yamaoka with industrial tracks that set your nerves on edge as normal settings turn into grotesque panoramas of rust and gore in the ‘otherworld’ that the main protagonist Harry Mason finds himself wandering into time and time again.

The choice to ditch zombies for lovecraftian style horror easily set silent hill apart from capcom’s Resident Evil, the sense that the town wants you dead grows with each location you visit in the thick fog and the monsters are terrifying. Skinned dogs, flying beasts, and faceless children with knives along with a few other nasty surprises chase you through each terrifying set piece as you are driven further and further into the town and to your daughter.

Graphically Silent Hill isn’t anything to look at. The day time sections of the game while covered in fog are crisp and the town is well laid out. But during the otherworld sections the environment can sometimes blend together in the warped mix of rust browns and crimson reds. The characters are about on par with most other third person games at the time and are pretty expressionless. But the darkness and the fog are really well done and leave you in fear of what might walk out of that darkness.

Story wise Silent Hill one leaves something to be desired as it is fairly bare bones, five different endings and one joke ending make up for the lack of solid storytelling with plenty of replay value. And it wasn’t until other games in the series released did Silent Hill one’s story really come into its own.

Over all a heavy contender for scariest game on ps1, and easily holds its own on atmosphere alone. Clunky controls might turn off new gamers and the graphics haven’t aged well, a good alternative is the reimagining ‘Silent Hill: Shattered Memories” which shares some of the basic story elements but does them somewhat better.

I rate Silent Hill 3/5 Kupo!

The Archive: Sailor Moon

Sailor Moon (Toei Animation)

Seasons: 5 (3 movies)  Original Run: March 7^th 92- feb 8th 97

Rated: pg-pg13

Sailor Moon, this Moogle cannot remember a Saturday morning he didn’t hear the theme song to this show; a classic that many trace their anime fandom back to as much as they do Dragon Ball Z.  a daily dose of justice at the hands of a couple colorful girls in short skirts. Today we’re going to go back and look at a classic, both as a review and as a fond trip down memory lane.

Sailor Moon started as a simple girl’s alternative to Power Rangers. Familiar formulas of a handful of unsuspecting teenagers suddenly are granted magic abilities to fight a weekly monster and dispense some much needed Morality to every episode. What Sailor Moon introduced was a soap opera-esk romance and an interconnected narrative of growing up as a teenage girl. While this might not sound like a good show for boys it was the only anime that broke the mold of karate and fireballs of DBZ and to this Moogle, Variety is the spice of life.

The tale begins when Serena (Usagi) when she discovers a talking cat Luna, who quickly informs her that she is Sailor Moon and that it’s her duty to defeat the monsters that threaten the earth and find the other Sailor Scouts. Long story short there is some time travel, some masked men, and lots of tentacles. Once again the story was interesting but the focus was the weekly monster fights, and of course the problems solving that lead to the inevitable sharing/caring/friendship message of every episode.

Now on to the fun part, Sailor Moon as most of us were exposed to it was not as it was intended. A lot of the show was heavily edited for American audiences to exclude, blood, Tentacle groping, panties fan service, and lesbian relationships. While these things seem to turn this innocent kid show into a perverse old man’s fantasy Sailor Moon remained at its core a Magical Girl anime about growing up and fighting monsters from space. It’s never quite as clean as we want it to be but I think the raw flavor of the uncut release make this, a show that has to be experienced by many if only to see how well it explored the themes presented.

While not the best looking show Sailor Moon still inspired a generation of anime fans to believe in the truer, more innocent side of justice soaked in teen angst and tentacles. It’s a classic with some flaws (the English dub is woefully unintelligible by today’s standards) and it’s pretty hard to come by as the licensing has probably been long since buried. If you know someone or have ever had a chance to enjoy this classic, give it another try and see how it was taught to the kids back in the early 90s.

A pretty decent show that was a shining beacon of hope for young girls all over at the time and spawned many anime fans adventures into the unknown world of Japanese Culture, bad dubbing and shoty animation make it a hard one to return to…

I rate Sailor Moon 3/5 Kupo!

The Archive: Final Fantasy I

Final Fantasy I (Square)

System: NES    Release Date: Dec 18, 1987

ESRB rating: E – E10(PSP)

Final Fantasy, a name that immediately invokes thoughts of crystals, saving the world, and dashing adventures; but did you know before we began to sail the skies in a airship this little game saved the company that gave it life?

Final Fantasy got its name back in 1987 when the main planner Hironobu Sakaguchi was faced with the then unsuccessful Square going bankrupt. In a last ditch effort he got a team together to make what he believed would be his ‘Final Fantasy’. Little did Mr. Sakaguchi know that the little game he was making would change the face of role-playing games forever. 

Final Fantasy focuses on a simple premise. You are one of the four heroes of light and there is a great evil you must help stop. Your characters are as deep as you make them as they don’t have any back stories or even a fixed class taking a note from a certain table top game about dungeoneering, your characters and their actions are all player created. With a vast world map (for the time kupo) and an open ended quest you set off to find your place in this strange new world.

Now on to combat, Final fantasy was unique for its presentation in a side view battle system called ‘Turn Based Combat’ that was largely menu based as opposed to the first person dungeon crawling games that preceded it. Your four heroes each had their own class and perpose in the game and each felt unique and interesting, while your enemies came in all sizes from small gray wolves to massive screen filling dragons. Battles quickly became a game of chess as moves and the order they were preformed decided the fate of your small band of adventurers.

Being such a classic, Square did the right thing and made sure to bring it back again and again fixing graphical issues, and battle imbalances. Some of the most note worthy remakes being the GBA edition “dawn of souls” or the masterful PSP version.

But for all of its classic Nostalgia inducing greatness, Final fantasy was far from a perfect game, little story direction and long hours of grinding mar the magic of being on an epic quest. More often than not you’ll be walking from one village to the next and be attacked by something you are not prepared for, leading you to grind in the same places for much longer than you need to. But these are things that have been fixed and reworked as Square has slowly perfected its formula in making a dynamic and interesting story to tell with each iteration of what some thought would be the last Fantasy from a then dyeing company.

Nostalgic storytelling can sometimes blur the clunky controls and lackluster grindfest; defiantly worth looking at remakes and other games in the series due to their masterful manipulation of the roleplaying genre.

I rate Final Fantasy I 3/5 Kupo!