Year: 2009

Kurozuka = Kuro + Kuromitsu = Kurosuck

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Guest review by Lothos

As one might expect from the title (kuro = black), Kurozuka is a dark tale. Betrayal, violence, and many twisted experiments run rampant throughout the series. Much of the overall tone of Kurozuka reminds me of the live action film Izo by director Takashi Miike. Izo had brilliant cinematography, some great special effects, and was surrealistically alluring. However, without knowing about the historical figure the movie is based on, you’d be thoroughly at a loss to understand what the hell is going on and why this angry, screaming, masked man is killing everyone he meets. Similar elements found in Kurozuka include: time jumping, a protagonist who doesn’t quite understand what is going on around him, a guy who brings a katana to a uzi fight and wins, and strange musical interludes (the Noh openings though are not quite as weird as the musical styling of Kazuki Tomokawa). However, Izo while being quite confusing and off kilter, is still a very interesting piece of work by the end. Kurozuka eventually gets to the point where you don’t really care how it ends.

Our story begins with Kuro and Benkei, his disciple, running through a forest and fighting some strange zombie samurai. We learn that Kuro is ill, so Benkei suggests that they find a place to stay the night. They see a fire in the distance and make their way to a lone cabin in the woods. Once there they meet the house’s owner, a beautiful and mysterious woman named Kuromitsu. She notices that Kuro is obviously ill (he faints from a fever) and tells them that they may stay as long as they require, but her one condition is that they do not enter her room. As the days go by Kuromitsu takes care of Kuro while Benkei tends to the daily chores. During this time Kuro develops a bond with Kuromitsu, partially due to his fevered state and also due to the times he his cognizant and realizes she is taking care of him. Kuro then wakes up one night, recovered from his illness. It is storming outside, and he feels a strange compelling force drawing him towards the forbidden room. Despite his apprehension, he peers between the cracked doors, seeing Kuromitsu’s secret, and thus their story begins.

We next see Kuro waking up wearing modern-looking clothing. He’s on the outskirts of a large, futuristic city. He doesn’t remember how he got there, all he really remembers is Kuromitsu and that they were separated. He enters the city and begins asking people if they’ve seen a woman matching Kuromitsu’s description. He’s met by a man who tells him he might have some information regarding the woman, but he’ll need to talk to his boss. They go to a bar, and then for some unknown reason some armed storm troopers arrive and begin killing everyone. Kuro, armed with his sword, proceeds to take out all of the attackers. Finally their leader, who looks like M. Bison with dreadlocks, comes in and proceeds to beat the snot out of Kuro. But, he’s in a good mood or something and lets him live. Finally, Kuro is taken to meet the boss and we learn that Kuromitsu is alive, and was in fact working with them at one point, but has since gone missing. We also learn that in this future her blood is sought after by some sort of militaristic omni-corp (who the storm troopers belonged to). So begins Kuro’s search for Kuromitsu and his journey to make sense out of his fragmented memories.

The characters in Kurozuka can all be summed up in one of two categories. Enigmatic or inconsequential. All the main characters are for the most part shrouded in mystery, and anyone who’s not a main character is usually only around for an episode or two and doesn’t really contribute much to the plot. For example, Kuro and Kuromitsu, you don’t really learn anything about either one of them until long into the series. Kuro is trying to find out where Kuromitsu went, and Kuromitsu is pretty much absent from most of the story except in Kuro’s hallucinations/fractured memories. Benkei also disappears for almost 90% of the series after the first episode. You then have some other characters introduced (not really introduced, more interjected into the story) but there is not much, if any, exposition about who they are or why they’re really joining up with Kuro. The vast majority of the characters in the series are also extremely one dimensional, which I can forgive when I’m watching a series just for some good action sequences, but unfortunately that expectation couldn’t be met either.

Things get a little complicated as the storytelling jumps between various time lines. One scene will show Kuro back in ancient Japan, with swords against other samurai. The next might show them being pursued by armored soldiers with guns. The viewer knows that what we’re seeing is in the past, but we don’t know how far back it goes. Whether the previous events were just a few years ago; shortly before Kuro’s most recent bout of amnesia; hundreds of years ago after he first met Kuromitsu; or any point in between the two is mostly unclear. This didn’t particularly bother me, and you begin to figure out the major parts of the time line as the series progresses.

Everything was progressing fine, albeit a bit muddled at times, then came episode nine. One would have thought the director/writers suddenly changed because the tone of the series does a complete 180. Out of nowhere terrible sight gags and horrendously corny action sequences (which seemed as though they were directed by Michael Bay) being to infest the series. The misplaced comedy only stuck around for that one episode, but unfortunately the damage was far from done. Ridiculous plot twists and villains that didn’t really even seem to serve a purpose began to run rampant. The show went from being a super slick and dark action/drama to being . . .well . . .stupid.

Kurozuka did at least perform well in one area, animation. The animation was fluid and the art was most of the time above average. The fight sequences were all pretty well done with quick action and lots of detail. Anytime Kuro went into his “hyper-mode” was always the highlight of the episode and was presented very nicely. The main thing that kept sticking out in my head was the overuse of a Star Wars-esque “blaster” sound during one of the final fights. Mind you, there were no blasters in this fight. There was a gun, but it wasn’t making the sound. The music, while nothing really memorable, was also not bad enough to draw any attention. The Noh pieces at the beginning of each episode were the same animated sequence with different lyrics, and the sound was pretty authentic. Not that I’m any expert on Noh theater, but from the live action performances I’ve seen this matched up pretty well with them.

Kurozuka started out so well. It was quite promising. I mean, who wouldn’t be interested in a show about zombies, samurai, vampires, and a story spanning a thousand years all wonderfully animated by Madhouse? It had style out the ass, a kickin’ opening theme, and enough hack and slash action in the first ten minutes to keep you glued. But then . . . God . . . oh God . . . The calamity ensued starting around episode nine, from then on I kept watching because of the grim fascination one gets when watching a documentary about a train wreck and seeing the impending disaster recreated in cheesy CG on the History Channel. I just had to see how terrible this could get, no matter how horrifying I knew it was going to be.

Top 5 Trainwrecks of a Series:

(Trainwreck meaning you don’t want to keep watching but can’t help it, not necessarily that it’s bad)

5. Welcome to the NHK
4. Koi Kaze
3. Neon Genesis Evangelion
2. Saikano
1. Narutaru

Ongoing Investigations: Case #036

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I read books six and seven of Here is Greenwood. Always enjoyable series with just enough realism in the friendships to make the guys seems like people you know. Six is almost exclusively crazy antics while seven finally introduces us to a love interest for Hasukawa. Seven also has a chapter much like Here is Devilwood called Here is Edo. As you may have guessed, it stars everyone in a samurai drama. As always the author’s little comments throughout add as much comedy to the scenes as anything else. Looking forward to finishing this series up soon.  

So I went solo to two anime events around New York recently. Neither of them were enough for a whole report but they were interesting enough to talk about. I went to Spring Fest at Polytechnic. It was a small one day convention. I went to show some love for Subatomic Brainfreeze’s Most Dangerous Anime panel. It was mostly Dave playing Crystal Triangle and  showing some choice scenes from the train wreck that is Gundress. I had only heard of the horror that is Crystal Triangle from AWO but I finally got to see how awesomely horrible it actually was. The audience had a good time MST3King a movie that rightfully deserves it. The theatrical release of Gundress is famous for being released incomplete. It was amusing to see the slapdash job they did to get what was generally a horrible piece of cinema on the screen for the release date. I really liked their little tea room and enjoyed their “mystery flavor” blended tea. There was also a good deal of gaming going on but I would rather be humiliated at playing multi-player games at home rather than humiliated in front of an audience. I was interested in staying for the What The Hell, Game Industry? panel but I had to go to meet someone to see Watchmen. It was basically a large scale meeting of friends from the university than a full-fledged convention. While it was not worth traveling for any great distance, I would recommend it to anyone in the NYC area. Plus it’s a nice, free way to meet other anime fans.

Read book five of Monkey High! It continues to be a wonderful shojo romance that that doesn’t linger on random misunderstandings. I like the pace of the books keeping the moments quick. They have added the idea of a love triangle. However, since Haruna does not seem to be torn between the guys, rather another guy just happens to really like her, it isn’t actually a love triangle. Thank goodness. Monkey High! has done a good job of creating a sweet story about the relationship, not the chase. Looking forward to the last few volumes of this series.

The next day found me going to Anime Day at Kinokuniya. I have to say Kinokuniya events get really nice turn-outs. While this means it is another good place to meet people, it also means that most of the events are standing room only. I came in half way through so I missed out on getting a Soul Eater Key chain. While this breaks my heart I somehow found a way to trooper on. I noticed from Scott’s twitter that those two girls who cosplay Ranka and Sheryl were on the cosplay panel. I finally arrived at two and I mostly only popped in on all of the panels they were presenting. The mixture of having nowhere to sit and having cool things to look at in Kinokuniya  distracted me from the events themselves. After browsing around for a bit, Scott, his friend, and I went to lunch where I discussed why bringing poor Hayate Ayasaki and Nagi Sanzenin into Internet arguments stands against all that is good and holy.

Been keeping up with Rideback this season. After watching episode nine, I still stand behind it being the show to watch from the winter. I have really liked how the pace built over the episodes, slowly moving from school centered to politically centered. It was done in such away as to not jar you. As secrets, plots, and characters are revealed the depth of the world involved is becoming clear. The animation continues to impress as well as the coolness of ridebacks. Instilling in us that we all need one right now.

While at Kinokuniya I made some purchases that were worth mentioning. It seems my prayers to the gods of anime merchandise were obviously heard because they released an all Saber art book. It is pretty good. Not enough fighting Saber to make me happy but enough variety to make me want it in an instant. Of course we have to have a maid exploitation (or maidploitation as I like to call it) picture of Saber and the raciest shot we get was Saber in a tight school bathing suit. I always appreciate the lack of utterly depraved Saber pictures because I would like to show people the art books I own without deep shame. My favorite pictures are Saber on a motorcycle and Saber dressed as Rin. I also got a book of Kido Senshi Gundam-san manga. I will admit I partially got number 4 just because it has Sayla Mass on the cover but I don’t feel anyone can fault me for that. I am very amused by a Gundam comedy series using the Universal Century characters. I noted it was only characters from the original series. Does anyone know if there are plans to do the same thing with charters from Zeta or the UC Gundam OAVs? My favorite section had to be the misadventures of sexy but angry White Base nurse Sayla. Some one has to get to translating this series because it looks priceless. It has smoking Zaku’s and baby Garma. What more do you want. Oh and naked Char. See something for everyone. I also saw an awesome Gundam Heroines book at Book Off. It seemed to be all the Gundam series up to Gundam X. I had already spent enough at Kinokuniya that I decided to hope it was still there the next time I would swing by there. Does anyone own the book? Is it worth picking up?

Rideback is the only show I am keeping up with this season, so this is the pic of the week:


The Shining Darkness Series: 5cm Per Second

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One of the major questions I have always asked myself is whether or nor it is worth reaching for an seemingly impossible goal? At what point is grasping at some thing that you may never reach stop being noble and start being self-inflicted misery? At what point are you giving up before the fight truly started? Are you clinging to memories that are merely holding you back? Is fighting for a noble and impossible ideal running towards something or running away? 5cm Per Second looks at that same question and weaves a beautiful but heart breaking tale from it.

This was actually the first work by Makoto Shinkai that I watched. And honestly I don’t know why I hadn’t watched the others. I knew of them for so long, but grabbing up this film made me desperate to go back and watch the others. And I honestly don’t think the order of films is important in terms of his ability to tell a story. However, you can clearly see the progression of the animation and character designs.

5cm Per Second is broken into three distinct parts each with its own title but they are all part of the greater story about Takaki Tono. It starts with Cherry Blossom Extract which introduces us to Takaki Tono and Akari Shinohara‘s blossoming long distance relationship. Cosmonaut skips ahead a few years to high school where we see Takaki and his friend Kanae Sumida. She is in love with him but cannot bring herself to tell him. 5cm Per Second concludes the tale and we see how Takaki and Akari have grown up and how the events of the first story have effected their lives.

Takaki is very single-minded and while in the first short this makes him endearing, by the end it is his greatest flaw. He shows that the things you think and want as a child have to change as you grow up or you may never get anywhere. It also makes me think of a fleeting idea that the things you love about someone, you can come to dislike after a period of time. It is a very honest lesson and a very difficult one to reflect upon while watching. Contrastly, all the girls in the film seem to understand the concept of letting go or reaching for someone that can never truly be there. Kanae I found to be very relatable (though all the characters have extremely empathic qualities) because she has the passion for something, in this case, surfing, but displays indecision of where she is going in life.

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