Matt Cooper Anime, Films

Words Bubble Up Like Soda Pop (2020) by Kyohei Ishiguro

Yui Sakura (Someguro Ichikawa), known familiarly as ‘Cherry’, is a quiet, thoughtful young high-schooler, working part time at a day care centre for the elderly, and spending his free time compiling haiku. Yuki (Hana Sugisaki), known online as ‘Smile’, is an outgoing social media influencer who has taken to wearing a face mask to avoid revealing the braces straightening her buck teeth. The two bump into each other at the mall and soon form a strong friendship despite their differences. Yuki agrees to help Yui find a record for one of the old people at the care centre, Mr. Fujiyama (Koichi Yamadera).

“Words Bubble Up Like Soda Pop” treads familiar ground as a feel good teen drama, with strong visuals, and simple, brightly-coloured art, giving it a dazzling quality that instantly captures the imagination, creating an upbeat, enjoyable, summer atmosphere in keeping with the characters and setting. The character and world design all utilise a simplicity of style with recognizable characteristics, this stereotyping further emphasised by the use of nicknames for many of the main characters, including ‘Cherry’, ‘Smile’, ‘Japan’ and ‘Tough Boy’. The story too is pared back to its most basic elements, essentially a youthful summer love story twinned with Mr. Fujiyama’s search for the missing record and his own forgotten romance. With an upbeat pop soundtrack and colourful animation the film is a perfect watch to lift your spirits.

“Words Bubble Up Like Soda Pop” creates a tension between the traditional poetry form of haikus and the ultra-modern elements embodied by Yuki, such as an obsession with mobile phones, social media and celebrity. The film brings haiku to a contemporary world, showing the power of words and poetry. The “beauty through simplicity” of haikus is an ethos that aptly describes the film itself. The story, the visuals, the animation, are powerful precisely because of their simplicity. Examples of this include the moments where we see Yui and Yuki in split screen, drawing our attention to their similarities and differences. Yui wears headphones to avoid having to engage with the world, while Yuki wears a face mask avoid the attention of the world. It is these moments that make the film such an enjoyable watch; what appears on the surface a straightforward story, on second glance has so many elements just below the surface. It is possible, just as with a haiku, to find genuine beauty in this simple romantic tale.

Matt Cooper Anime, Films

Evangelion 2.0 You Can (Not) Advance (2009) by Hideaki Anno

In this instalment of the “Rebuild of Evangelion” series we are introduced to a new Eva pilot, the feisty, confident Asuka Langley Shikinami (Yuko Miyamura), who joins Shinji (Megumi Ogata) and Rei (Megumi Hayashibara) in battling the Angels. There are a number of other subplots introduced here, with the return of Ryoji Kaji (Koichi Yamadera), a former friend of Katsuragi (Kotono Mitsuishi) who appears to be involved in some sort of plot with the head of NERV. We also see more of the shadowy SEELE organization, and two more Eva pilots, Kaworu Nagisa (Akira Ishida) and Mari Makinami (Maya Sakamoto).

This time round there is much more going on in the story, with the film asking you to keep track of several plot threads. The film manages to fill its run-time with great character interaction, extreme action scenes with clashing Angels and Evas, and numerous mysteries to keep things interesting. Asuka is a great addition as she adds not only more firepower to NERV, but also another stumbling block for the socially awkward Shinji to tackle. We learn more about Katsuragi in this film, and even something about Gendo Ikari (Fumihiko Tachiki) that goes some way towards explaining his cool demeanour. The film sees a step up in the level of violence, underscored with a rock inflected soundtrack from Shiro Sagisu as we see the Evas literally tearing Angels apart, and cities awash with blood. As in the first the animation is incredible in evoking a sense of scale. The film’s mix of mechs and metaphysics comes to a head in the final head-spinning moments when the fate of the earth and humanity are brought to a thrilling (almost) conclusion. This second film builds on everything the first did so well, the intriguing interpersonal struggles, the awe-inspiring action, while adding several more layers to everything to create a film that rewards re-watches for details that perhaps only become clearer with greater context from subsequent films.

“Evangelion 2.0” deals a lot more with the themes of family, friendship and belonging, as we see the children enjoying themselves, and even a tender scene between Shinji and his father. Asuka represents everything Shinji is not, confident and fiery, but both share a sense of selfishness and repressed fear of rejection. The film sets up various conflicts, between Shinji and Asuka, Shinji and his father, SEELE and Gendo, NERV and the Angels. It is a world in which there is no clear sense of right or wrong. Shinji is again forced to work out what he stands for. The film ends with an awesome, tantalising, bewildering cliff-hanger, that upends everything that has gone before and leaves you desperate to find out what will happen to the characters. An incredible sequel that brings together adrenaline-pumping action in a battle of truly Biblical proportions.

Matt Cooper Anime, Films

Appleseed Saga: Ex Machina (2007) by Shinji Aramaki

Deunan Knute (Ai Kobayashi) and her partner Briareos (Koichi Yamadera) are assigned with ESWAT to an old cathedral to rescue EU officials taken hostage by cyborgs. On returning to Olympus Briareos is sent to recuperate while Deunan is assigned a new partner. Her new partner, Tereus (Yuki Kishi), seems strangely similar to Briareos old physical form, and Deunan learns that he has been cloned from her former partner’s DNA. Olympus is once again imperilled when they discover a mysterious signal being used to control both cyborgs and humans (who have taken to wearing a popular headset communication device). It is this signal that is prompting the increasing waves of terrorist activity. Meanwhile, Athena (Gara Takashima) is attempting to convince world leaders that they should join together a global satellite network that might prevent future terrorist attacks.

Shinji Aramaki directs this sequel to his 2004 “Appleseed” film. This time around we get more focus on the relationship between Deunan and Briareos and the introduction of what might be considered an atypical love triangle with the introduction of Tereus. The plot is focussed on an external threat to Olympus and therefore more familiar territory to action movies. Again the film provides us with a thinly veiled commentary on everything from terrorism, consumerism, surveillance, and communication technologies with a story that moves briskly between several incredible action sequences. The animation style is altered slightly from the first film, with less of a cell-shaded appearance to the characters. It is interesting to see the development and introduction of several new technologies, such as the bee-like flying transports early on and the Connexus devices that satirise people’s addiction to mobile communication tools. Tetsuya Takahashi again provides the music, this time alongside Haruomi Hosono. While the techo-beats and electro-rock are carried over there are also more of the softer moments and a heroic score to complement the narrative of our protagonists fighting against attempts to destroy Olympus.

“Appleseed: Ex Machina” raises interesting questions about the need for difference. Unity is something that many in society strive for, here exemplified by the idea of bringing together the world’s satellites into one system. However, when large numbers of cyborgs and people are following the commands of a single source we also see the dangers of unity (or perhaps more accurately “conformity”). We see the zombie-like citizen completely under the control of the mysterious force. It is good to see a film tackling such fundamental questions as what a Utopian society should or might look like while criticising what many consider to be an ideal.