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| Overall | Art | Animation | Character Design | Music | Series Story | Episode Story | Reviewer | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Watch | 8 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 6 |
 Ggultra2764
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[series:589#1552] | |
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Decided to rent this as a quick watch via Netflix since I have Silent Mobius on DVD for my "rainy day" pile. By the looks of it, this movie only briefly tackles the elements of the series and puts much of the focus on Katsumi's past from before she joined the Attack Mystification Police. Other members of the AMP are only around to influence Katsumi or advance the plot of this short movie so there isn't really much to get out of this. Having seen the first two episodes of the TV series when Katsumi arrives in Tokyo, I did definitely take notice of differences with the events involving Katsumi's arrival to the city and her initial mistrust of the AMP, including an appearance from Katsumi's mother who was already dead at the start of the TV series. Visual presentation was quite decent for an early 1990s movie with fluid movements in battle scenes and vivid scenery. Beyond all this, there isn't really much else to discuss. Unless you desire to snag anything Silent Mobius related or have yet to even see the TV series, this movie only digs into details on Katsumi's character without expanding on details concerning other AMP members, the formation of the AMP or the appearances of Lucifer Hawks. It's a decent quick watch yet not one I would want to see for repeated viewings.
Last updated Saturday, March 26 2011. Created Saturday, March 26 2011. | ||||||||
| Watch | 8 | 8 | 5 | 7 | 7 | 0 |
 Devil Doll
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[series:589#752] |
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[score: 66%]
Uh-oh. I was the one who praised the series... thus let me be the one to definitely warn you about watching this movie. On one hand, the audience cannot really understand what is going on in such a complex universe (13 manga volumes) by getting just 60 seconds of explanation; unfortunately this makes important parts of this movie's storyline pointless (especially those about Katsumi trying to understand her own nature). On the other hand, the film makers did everything they could to make it all wrong. They spilt gallons of tomato sauce, and they actually added a nudity scene where Katsumi under the shower is attacked by a Lucifer Hawk and embraced by his tentacles - which not only is pointless but is even sheer nonsense, as other LH just exploded when touching Katsumi body only a couple of minutes earlier. I understand they wanted to make an 'adult' movie out of a great Manga series (and later made that great TV series 7 years later!) but turned it into a splatter movie instead, at least partially. It's just so sad. :-( Note that I removed "Romance" and "Epic" as compared to from the keyword list of the series and added "Suspense" and "Surreal" for this movie - that's about it, folks. The series provides quite some stuff to think about - this movie simply doesn't do that. As for the story, it starts somewhere in the middle of the series (no Lum Cheng there yet, but certain weapons already in use - maybe we could even find the exact episode number between 5 and 13), but we are told it's 2028 already (which might then cause contradictions easily). And this is how the whole thing is going on: Lots of uncalled-for discrepancies with the (Manga and Anime) series, Katsumi being shown as hysterically yelling little girl instead of how she acted even in episode 1 of the series, and all that. Sigh. The storyline itself is twofold: In 2028 we see AMP on location, but in the midst of confronting some LH our Katsumi suddenly flashbacks to 2024 where she came to Tokyo to meet her mother Fuyuka (who died long before that in the series, but well ...). Except for the final section of the movie, the remainder of the story takes place in this flashback where we learn some nice stuff about Fuyuka (who didn't play any 'active' role in the series, not even in flashbacks), but we have to pay for that with lots of contradictions between movie and series - the whole plot could never have taken place in the series' timeline at all (or else episode 1 & 2 of the series would need a complete rewrite). Finally, we return to 2028, and we at least learn why this flashback happened - the movie storyline in itself does make sense and doesn't have any major flaws. It could even have worked without that basic assumption ... None of the AMP staff members actually have any remarkable scene. We get lots of Kiddy in her early stage, watch some more of Nami than usual (which is a plus, after all), Yuki-chan has about three lines of text, and Lebia plays a role that has nothing to do with her special abilities at all. Mana doesn't even appear; Rally is acting strangely, compared to what we know about her from the series - there is just no time to develop any of these characters (not even the relation between Rally and Fuyuka is dealt with, which leads to one strange decision in the movie). The only characters that we really learn about are Katsumi and Fuyuka, whose relation is the core of the whole story. (Sadly, no Gigelf at all - would have been quite nice, at least in some flashback.) So who can I suggest watching this movie? Only those who are eager to get introduced to a marvellous Fuyuka character, the only one that actually works well in this movie. But this would have been possible without breaking the original series' logic that many times, had they not decided to base the whole story on events that definitely couldn't have happened there. Actually, watching this movie doesn't even spoil watching the series, as there is so little information about the series in the movie. But then, watching this weak movie may well prevent you from watching the best of all anime series, so this movie narrowly escaped an 'Avoid' rating. Still, for me who did a bit of research about all the esoteric stuff and rituals used in this story (including the buddhist reference of the Kandata tale) it has quite a few interesting elements. Now that this Movie has been re-released on DVD in 2007, Art and Animation are good, even for today's standards. But the music cannot match the one from the series in the least - most of it is gloomy and depressing, unlike the brilliant and bombastic themes from the series' score. Finally, there is a Silent Mobius The Motion Picture 2 from one year later that seamlessly continues the story of this movie but works better in nearly every aspect. Last updated Friday, November 23 2007. Created Friday, June 13 2003. | ||||||||
