Boys and girls get ready for one of the strangest anime I have ever seen in my life…which is truly saying something.
This is undoubtedly one of my absolute favouritemusical anime of all time. When I first stuck it on I wasn’t honestly expecting much, maybe just something to pass the time. But the more I watched, the more I came to love the characters and their absolutely insane lives.
You have to see it to believe it, Detroit Metal City!
Detroit Rock City (Aka: DMC) is originally a manga that features soft hearted Negishi who is really into cute Swedish-pop music. He moves from the quiet countryside to study music in Tokyo. He is very talented on guitar and finally graduates, however his dreams is shattered when he ends up playing for a Japanese death metal band. You may be wondering how such a sweet guy like Negishi could hackit as a death metal front man. Well the truth is, when Negishi puts on his wig, makeup and body armour he becomes a totally different person. When Negishi hits the stage and the fans are screaming he transforms into Johannes Krauser II, the most fearsome man in Japanese metal.
Many of you will know that I am an avid fan of Japanese manga and anime.
One aspect of this form of animation that I really appreciate is the diverse stories and highly original content. While most Western animation seems to be ruled by the mundane and simple repetitive plots, it always seems that the Japanese are moving forward and evolving their style and storylines. Gankutsuou, a new anime that I have been watching lately, has taken elements of an old classic and transformed them into a universe spanning sci-fi space opera that really captivated me. Which classic you may ask…well, The Count of Monte Cristo, if you can believe it!
The Count of Monte Cristo is a well known French novel by Alexandre Dumas pere, which was created way back in 1844. The anime itself is not extremely new in our own modern sense. It was produced by Gonzo and aired between 2004 and 2005.
Do you think Alexandre could have ever imagined that his story would still be so popular even till now? Can you fathom a story that has endured so long, has been recreated into a sci-fi, by a culture that at that time was still shrouded in mystery…the Japanese that is. While the original story is set in 1815, Gankutsuou is set in the distant future of 5053….which is obviously quite a difference.
It has certainly been a long time since I did a review on an anime.
Well until recently I was kinda despondent with some of the newer anime coming out. That was until I stumbled across a rather erratic, but beautifully put together series called Baccano.
Firstly let me just say that this anime is actually from 2007. SO perhaps it’s incorrect to call it “new”, but rather, recent! Anime News Network says that there are 16 episodes, however from what I have heard there are only 12…so a single season series in other words. Each of the episodes runs for about 25 minutes…give or take.
As soon as you start an episode you get a feeling for the time period the anime is set in as well as the overall “groove” of the series. The opening track called Gun’s & Roses (no Axl Rose I can assure you) sets the scene for 1930’s America. The music is really nostalgic and makes me back to the days of Cowboy Bebop…which is perhaps the best anime soundtrack I have ever heard…well, besides The Pillows job on FLCL.
Doesn’t it annoy you when Hollywood gets hold of a fantastic book, but then does a piss-poor job of actually translating the flick across into a motion picture. It vexes me to no end!
The interesting thing is that it’s not only with big budget movies that grand mistakes are made.
I’ve found that in many circumstances anime fails to do a good job of making manga into a worthy transformation of the original. It’s frightening just how often manga plot, characters and even story length is twisted and watered down.
What is strange is that 3 manga that I have commented on in the past have been converted poorly from manga to anime: Berserk, Gantz and Blame.
Berserk is an epic seisen manga that has been running for absolutely forever. Its styled in a very “Dungeons & Dragons” vibe, that has a hard hitting fantasy story base. I absolutely love this manga! The characters are classic, the storyline is heavy and dark and there is no shortage of twists and turns in the plot.
Strangely enough I only got into the manga only after I watched the anime version. Look, the Berserk anime wasn’t horrible, it had its moments and definitely sucked you into the main character Guts’ world. However, when I read the manga I was shocked to find out that they had left out many of the important story segments as well as characters, not to mention that they had chopped the storyline down and left the anime series on a MAJOR cliff hanger, which is never fully resolved. I remember raising my eyebrow and wondering what the hell was going on…the whole series had been epic and then a seriously confusing ending.
I cannot understand why they chose to edit the storyline the way they did with Berserk, it was perfect the way the manga had done it to begin with. Perhaps the biggest problem was taking a manga that was already so HUGE and trying to chop it down and turn it into a series that may never continue. However, now I hear rumours that they will be making a second series, which will show us how the ending “works” and the adventures past the cataclysmic ending. I’m looking forward to seeing the series because I want to know how they merge and continue the story that they over-tweaked.
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