I imagine it's because the insane details in the background will require alot of man hours to draw.
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I watched Akira for the first time and I dont get the love for it.
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I imagine it's because the insane details in the background will require alot of man hours to draw.
Gentleman Jack
Member
Kei's rebel group is pretty clearly small potatoes and in way over their head, only able to get as far as they can by the guiding hand of a corrupt minister with access in government who wishes to gain control over the empowered children, hoping it will lead him to control over Akira's power for his own ends. Ryu is the idealist who thinks things will go well as long as they can expose the truth and pays for it with his life. Kei was just following Ryu. This isn't super clear from the original dub but the first conversation between Nezu and Ryu and the later betrayal once the operation in the hospital goes tits up and Tetsuo is on his rampage makes it clear that Ryu's group was being used as a pawn from the beginning. Nezu only sought power and Ryu had the required charisma and underworld connections to be his personal assault team. The Colonel ended those ambitions with his coup.
...what?
Here's an example:
On the right is a panel with the English onomatopoeia in the Dark Horse release. On the left is the original. Notice that the panel is flipped on the Dark Horse release.
davidwhangchoi
Member
As if everyone hasn't had enough evangelizing the manga, I'll have to do my part as well.
There's a 35-year anniversary boxset coming out towards the end of the year, all in hardcover, not published by Dark Horse, but by Kodansha USA. What's special in this edition is that it reads right-to-left, with original Japanese onomatopoeia. Also includes the Akira Club artbook.
What if you complain that the Akira in the Anime isn't well fleshed-out? Well, that's because the manga isn't anywhere near finished when the movie came out. This collection will rectify all that.
also don't forget to buy Project BM! Kaneda's Bike to finish the collection. without it, your life's incomplete =)
MightyHedgehog
Member
More than that, it really helped if you saw it on the big screen. There just wasn't anything as stylish or well-animated up to that point in the '80s or for years afterward.
The Akira Wiki says that Miyako is actually former test subject of the Akira project, who is blind but able to function because of her telepathic abilities. She claims to have divine religious powers and the government wants to expose her as a fraud, but cannot do so without revealing the existence of the Akira project. She wants to expose the Akira project, but cannot do so without revealing herself to be a fraud.
That's a really interesting wrinkle that I wish had made it into the movie. Both the government and its resistance are corrupt, and too selfish to ever reveal the truth. Gives you a better idea of how completely fucked things are. I think watching the movie you get the idea that the resistance is ultimately in-the-right, when their leaders are actually just as bad and power-hungry.
The women look like male characters with longer hair in Akira.
Did Akira actually get a theatrical release in the United States? I thought it went straight to VHS. I can't imagine any distributors wanting to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to strike celluloid prints of the film. Even in the digital era, anime movies rarely get released to theaters unless it's Ghibli.
GhostWriter24
Member
You don't like a classic, and that's okay. Just be ready to face the backlash when you create an actual topic about it.
Also, calling every aspect of production "Meh" does not justify your arguments -- it's lazy. Provide ACTUAL reasons.
Also, calling every aspect of production "Meh" does not justify your arguments -- it's lazy. Provide ACTUAL reasons.
Visually it's fucking amazing. Some of the smoothest anime ever created, with incredible designs. There's beautiful and striking images throughout. Otomo has a powerful directorial vision. The soundtrack enhances the general fuckedupness of it all.
The plot is a giant mess, ultra condensed and badly paced, with no room to figure out what's really going on or to get to know the characters. The inclusion of the political scenes is a big mistake.
Like a lot of cult films, it's worth watching to soak up the unique things it has to offer, but it's not the complete package.
The plot is a giant mess, ultra condensed and badly paced, with no room to figure out what's really going on or to get to know the characters. The inclusion of the political scenes is a big mistake.
Like a lot of cult films, it's worth watching to soak up the unique things it has to offer, but it's not the complete package.
It did get a limited 35mm release.
I get it. It might be my least favourite Miyazaki film.
The world this movie presents feels tangible, lived in, real. The atmosphere is really something else. The closest thing to compare it to is probably Blade Runner, and this has a punkish energy that sets it well apart from that.
I may be wrong on this, but I think Akira was the first thing on that level of darkness or violence to reach US shores. Wicked City and Golgo 13 followed based on the success of Akira.
Commander Jameson
Member
I managed to get the hardcover, numbered limited editions of books 1-5 in colour. I think book 6 was never released in that format sadly. The artwork in colour is just beautiful.
Akira was my first real introduction to anime when I saw it in 1990. My only previous experience of similar Japanese animation were children's cartoons like Battle Of The Planets. The fluid style of Akira really blew me away in comparison.
You'll find that people who love the film will often also not want Hollywood to remake it because movies like Akira don't get made anymore without serious compromises across the board. As to precisely what makes Akira's animation so revolutionary:
It's animated 'on ones' which means 24 distinct drawings for 1 second of film. This is extremely labor intensive and expensive, but it gives every action shot a real weight to it.
And while the camera is often held still to let you appreciate the movement of the background, characters and props, they're also perfectly willing to move the camera around a complicated action shot, meaning everything in the shot is changing each frame, while keeping the lines of motion, shot composition, perspective, secondary animation loops and negative space razor sharp throughout. I need to emphasize how rare this is.
Even if you don't like the stylization of the humans (the lip movement in particular threw me the first time I watched the dub) there's plenty of good writing going on
This very short cut tells you just about everything you need to know about the relationship between Kaneda and Tetsuo, and it's almost entirely done by the animation itself. The plot itself is laced with a lot of pseudoscience babble and I can respect those who felt it got a little precious with the explanations from the doctor, but I don't think it really overshadows Tetsuo's tragic downfall or Kaneda's hunt for revenge. The political upheaval and threat of the apocalypse are all background to a rather personal tale between two old friends and that's really the part of Akira's story I connect with.
It's not a perfect movie, but the consensus is that it's a masterpiece for a lot of good reasons. There's intensity and passion behind every single frame of film, the soundtrack is incredible, the action is stunning, the moments of psychedelic horror still cause me to recoil. It's not only that they don't make animated features like this anymore, they seldom make action or sci fi movies like this anymore.
This group shot is an animation marvel:
What a herculean task.
Quoting this for the new page.
And wow, I did not expect to see people shit on Akira one day.
I'd like to go back in time to the first time I watched the movie and tell my younger self "in the future, there will be people saying that they don't see why this movie is a masterpiece... also, Donald Trump is president of the USA. k thx bye"
'k. If anybody's looking for me I'll be in a corner, crying.
BoxOfficeMojo says it played in literally 2 theaters, for a single week. They probably didn't even make enough money to cover the costs of producing a print.
old manatee
Banned
I haven't seen it in a long time, but I adored it when I was a teenager. I had a copy on VHS and I fell asleep watching it every night for like a month.
Yeah, I would love to go back and read the manga in color. But it looks like the individual issues sell for at least $30 each on eBay. I was hoping that Marvel/Epic maybe had made the colorized version available on their digital services.
Any Questions
Member
Agreed. This and Fist of the North star. Cartoons ah-hem i mean animations were all Disney and singing. Then there was this.
Boom! In you face no F's given.
Made an impression on me, so yup. Being there at the time was to experience some
It was my first anime (that I realized was anime). I hated it (my friends all loved it and I got to hear them quote, "Tetsuo/some other name I forget" and "wait, she's got a gun" all the time. For some reason it didn't turn me off of anime though. But I've always loved animation of all sorts so it's easy to get me into an animation form as long as it isn't super abstract (I want coherency in the story).
I think Akira is a quality movie with incredible craftsmanship put into every aspect of it.
That said, it is kind of difficult to convey the film's impact to someone who grew up with access to all kinds of high-quality anime and adult-themed animation. If your cartoon childhood was nothing but Disney musicals and garbage tier toy commercials disguised as animation (GI Joe, Transformers), then Akira would undoubtedly blow you away.
Similarly, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre or Halloween are laughable and amateurish collections of horror tropes that probably would not entertain most of today's audiences. You need some kind of historical context to really appreciate what innovators did, because everyone that came after used the innovators' style and techniques to a point where it became generic. Someone who watches Akira for the first time today probably just sees it as yet another philosophical and ponderous cyberpunk flick with some good production values.
That said, it is kind of difficult to convey the film's impact to someone who grew up with access to all kinds of high-quality anime and adult-themed animation. If your cartoon childhood was nothing but Disney musicals and garbage tier toy commercials disguised as animation (GI Joe, Transformers), then Akira would undoubtedly blow you away.
Similarly, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre or Halloween are laughable and amateurish collections of horror tropes that probably would not entertain most of today's audiences. You need some kind of historical context to really appreciate what innovators did, because everyone that came after used the innovators' style and techniques to a point where it became generic. Someone who watches Akira for the first time today probably just sees it as yet another philosophical and ponderous cyberpunk flick with some good production values.
Stiflers Mom
Banned
Bullshit. Even Ghibli cant match the animation in Akira.
It still looks better than most animated films.
Just realized this released before I was born...
Indeed. It's much smoother and the technical aspects were beyond anything. Still amazes me how everything was done by hand. The making of feature was such an eye opener. It still holds up in animation quality to this day.
People also forget how influential it was to sci-fi and anime. Kaneda's bike design is still a thing of beauty.
Patrick S.
Banned
My first exposure to this movie was a segment on TV I saw as a kid. They talked about what anime was, and how awesome Akira was, and then they showed the clowns chase scene and the riot scene. I was blown away. You got to understand, many of us western kids had never seen anything like that. The animation movies I knew where Asterix movies and The land before time. Seing Akira really was a culture shock.
sir_kevith
Member
I'm finding myself depressed too.
I went to see the movie on a giant IMAX size screen and a bunch of anime fans in cat ears and other cosplay crap showed up and they all fell asleep.
I was wide-eyed and awake because I always wanted to see it on the big screen. Went home and watched all the making of stuff I could find. I just dont even wanna talk to anyone that is "meh" on Akira.
Akira blew my damn mind when I first saw it ten years ago, and it's only improved for me on repeat viewings. It's practically unrivaled purely on a technical audio-visual level. The plot's a lot more straightforward than people make it out to be: the rivalry of two brothers growing into their own selves interposed with youth violently destroying a corrupt, decaying power whose time has come. There's a lot of rich world-building surrounding it, but the details aren't essential.
Hot take: the movie is better than the (also excellent) manga, because it's forced to keep things very elemental.
You really didn't "have to be there" to appreciate Akira. Beyond the particular cultural context of mid-80s bubble economy Japan, it's aged incredibly well.
Hot take: the movie is better than the (also excellent) manga, because it's forced to keep things very elemental.
You really didn't "have to be there" to appreciate Akira. Beyond the particular cultural context of mid-80s bubble economy Japan, it's aged incredibly well.
DieNgamers
Member
YES! I challenge anyone to give me some Animes that are better based on their reasons of not liking Akira.
It's the equivalent of not enjoying movies like The Godfather, 2001, Clockwork Orange, Alien etc. It's ok to say these movies didn't click with you because maybe you didn't like the characters or the story but you have to admit that it's not that hard to see where the praise comes from.
I think Akira being as popular as it was in America was a coincedence and has nothing to do with the quality of it. This isn't Dragon Ball or Naruto we're talking about but state of the art animation mixed with adult entertainment.
There haven't been animated films with a scope like this since Princess Mononoke. This era is gone, I feel. The love and care that went into it has only been matched by very few works in the media.
Robot Carnival
Member
I was told by someone who recently had a conversation with a couple 20 something Japanese young men that the joke about Akira and the 2020 Tokyo Olympic completely went over their heads and they have no idea what Akira is... that's freaking depressing man...
rofl, the story of eva in the 90s was not trash. the hell are you even talking about? if you watched end of eva after the tv series it makes perfect sense and is a staggering accomplishment, it is almost perfect to me. it sure as hell is a better story than movie akira
the only part you could say was trash was all the religious allegory that kind of went overboard. but the overtly religious pulls and even most of the action scenes and non character scenes in eva are mostly just window dressing. but it makes it more entertaining. just have to ignore all the comicy stuff and focus on the humanity
KANEDAAAAAAAAAAA!
nkarafo
Member
I love the character designs. They look more human than your average Anime character with buggy eyes and no other features
Also, the word "nice" doesn't even scratch the surface about how great the animation is. There are very few handcrafted animations out there that come close to this quality. I can name a few but it's not the point.
Also, the word "nice" doesn't even scratch the surface about how great the animation is. There are very few handcrafted animations out there that come close to this quality. I can name a few but it's not the point.
I didn't like it that much on my first watch but it's grown a lot on me since. I think people overthink the ending, it's a bit heavy on the technobabble but the base events are simple. Kind of like how 2001 ends isn't that hard to get but told in an interesting and evocative way. I suppose the movie could have done a better job getting that across but eh, some rough edges won't kill you. It's a very memorable finale compared to so much other science fiction and one of the best ever showcases of someone being overwhelmed by their own powers. God the shot where Kaori gets crushed is so damn creepy.
Any Questions
Member
Not depressing, it's just that it was so different.
It is different, but hey why bother to critique and explain why you don't feel the differences don't work contextually in today's day and age when you can just say 'meh' and be done with it
Poor GRIMES
Banned
The story is a muddled trainwreck and even plot summaries can't simplify the story enough for me for it to be coherent. Beautifully animated and the OST is absolutely wonderful though.
PHOENIXZERO
Member
I bought Akira on DVD many years ago... Watched it once.
British Monsoon
Member
It's a classic, even with the story being butchered to fit a film's length - got to see the original 35mm print last year and it was absolutely stunning, some of the best, most exhaustive hand drawn animation you'll ever see in a film.
I thought the movie was a nonsensical mess. People often say though that the manga is miles better than the movie and that's the version to consume. So I read it last year and guess what? It's a nonsensical mess
I love the illustration and the cinematic presentation but holy shit the pacing is awful and all the philosophy and supernatural nonsense just gave me a headache. I'd go so far as to say everything after the first book is just crap.
Tezuka this ain't. It's not even in the same league as Urasawa.
I love the illustration and the cinematic presentation but holy shit the pacing is awful and all the philosophy and supernatural nonsense just gave me a headache. I'd go so far as to say everything after the first book is just crap.
Tezuka this ain't. It's not even in the same league as Urasawa.
I always saw it more as a cool way to have some scenes from the manga animated in what was at the moment some of the most impressive animation I had ever seen.
I understand that today it might be less exciting but for me it is still a good movie and an amazing visual achievement.
If you can watch the documentary about how it was made it blown my mind the detail they put into it.
I understand that today it might be less exciting but for me it is still a good movie and an amazing visual achievement.
If you can watch the documentary about how it was made it blown my mind the detail they put into it.
Yeah, I've never really felt like I agreed with people who say the plot sucks. At it's core there's a very simple emotional arc pulling the characters through the story, and while not all of the external details are perfectly explained I think, for me, it only adds to the tangible nature of Akira's Tokyo. As an audience member, you feel like you're looking through a window into a preexisting world with it's own history, politics, and spirituality and the film version gives you just enough hints about the nature of that world that some of the specific details of it don't necessarily​ need to be explicitly explained to me. I can make my own insinuations about motivations and backgrounds based on the incredibly dense amount of detail put into the setting.
Akira gets you to ask a lot of questions about its world, but it also seems content not answering everything and I was never really bothered by those lingering mysteries like some people were. Granted, I never read the manga so I never sought those answers out, but at the same time I didn't have the baggage of being frustrated by the film leaving out details I knew existed.
For me, Akira is like a force of nature on screen. Beautiful, unique, powerful, a true sense of kinetic energy just oozes off the screen which largely rests on the quality of the animation, cinematography, and music.
IbukiLordSA
Member
It was the first major anime release in the west that threw out the stigma associated to Japanese Animation at the time.
It was a big budget movie with incredible animation and style. 30 years ago it blew peoples minds.
It was a big budget movie with incredible animation and style. 30 years ago it blew peoples minds.
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