First Squad: The Moment of Truth

Ok, there are many reasons why this isn't a good movie, but it being a WW2-inspired fantasy flick isn't one of them. The problem is that it aspires to do things well, takes itself very seriously (have you seen the official site?), announces that boldly… and proceeds failing across the board. It's by all means a schlock feature masquerading as something it isn't.

I had suspected the movie wasn't going to be close to the teaser music video that preceded it—but the extent of difference was truly shocking. All of the titular First Squad members except the protagonist only appear in the movie for a few ... minutes, which came as a complete surprise. Obviously, none of them are anywhere close to being developed as characters—the protagonist is not an exception, sadly. Naturally, most of them don't even resemble people living in USSR in the 30s/40s. The portrayal of Soviet culture and style of life was given an undeservedly superficial treatment (I chuckled at the wooden toys—I still remember those) culminating in laughable designs that are both stupid and anachronistic, such as Zina's tank top under an unbuttoned winter coat. In winter. Nadya wielding, of all things, a *Japanese* sword using *Japanese* fencing techniques is not any less ridiculous. After all, Russians had a war with Japan at the beginning of the century, and were allied against them again in WW2—that's not to mention that fencing styles such as iaido are completely useless against armored enemy—which constitutes pretty much everyone Nadya fights using her katana. At that point one shouldn't be surprised by a fragile girl parrying a huge blade wielded by a muscular man in heavy armor while fighting in deep snow—it's just par for the course at that point. I mean, we've already brought up cliche occultism scenarios, complete disregard for historical accuracy in design and logic in writing, so why not abolish laws of physics while we are at it?

The movie started abruptly, hopped and skipped throughout its runtime, and ended just as abruptly, suggesting the need for a sequel that will never come—instead of using this time to tell a less ambitious but more coherent story. There's barely any significance in any scene. It's almost as if the whole thing was storyboarded and edited together overnight. It's painful to see an initially workable idea ruined by inept writing and direction. Assuming there even was any writing, of course. It sure looked like the studio crew knew how to put some anime into a movie but had no idea how to put the movie in an anime.

Yet perhaps the most dreadful offender is the live-action documentary shots that very intrusively interrupt the brief moments of action whenever they end up happening. They attempt to explain some of the surreal and nonsensical things, but do a piss-poor job at doing so. The most unintentionally ironic comment comes from a featured psychoanalyst who says that human brain is capable of producing hallucinogenic substances by itself under certain conditions, which is technically correct but completely invalidates the testimonies of the veterans who spoke just prior about unexplained events allegedly having taken place there. These contradictions are never resolved. Neither is the need to explain fantasy schlock with scientific or historic accuracy. It explains nothing, and makes the schlock appear even worse, not in the least by robbing it of screen time that could make it better.

To elaborate, the attempt to build up the atmosphere of war by sharing impressions of the veterans who fought in it is misguided in principle. It looks extremely clunky and breaks the immersion and flow of the movie while robbing it of valuable runtime that could be used to develop the story and characters to make the non-documentary parts worth watching. By this point people should know what WW2 was. Even if they don't, they would have been able to *see* it in the movie if it did a better job at actually showing it. Grave of the Fireflies is an anime that masterfully portrayed the horrors of war without combat scenes, let alone veteran testimonies. Elem Klimov's Come and See (Иди и смотри / Idi i smotri) is a live-action movie where most of the action happens off-screen, yet it instills more primordial dread than most war movies combined. This is how to do it right; interrupting cartoony action with documentaries the way First Squad does it is some next level of idiocy. It could've been funny in a very nihilistic way if the crew had found a veteran to give a testimony about sword-fighting against armored troopers in a nightgown in the winter, which surely was a regular occurrence during WW2, though I guess that was the border they didn't want to cross. But then why make this drivel at all?

I'll touch upon the subject of art and sound quality briefly because there's not much to say about it. I've seen most of Studio 4°C's output, and I know they can do much better. But it's not bad by any means, it's just… average. Action scenes (where we actually get to see them) are borderline acceptable if you don't count the amount of extremely unlikely scenarios, deus ex machina moments, and other tropes so typical of mediocre anime, but wouldn't be able to carry this movie even if there were no other faults with it.

To summarize, this is an ambitious, but horribly put together fantasy flick that builds up a lot of hype and ends up with absolutely nothing to show for it. It's not enjoyable, has no redeeming qualities, and I wouldn't recommend it to anyone. Those who are into war movies, historic events, or action in general, and most of all fellow former USSR residents should avoid it at all costs.

I'll admit, I was sort of excited when I found this when I was randomly searching for some good Original Anime Music Videos. Russian rap and Studio 4°C (S4C) animating the video was perfect mix. But as an avid music video watcher in my hey day (when MTV actually showed music videos), one should know that you don't ever take a music video literally or you will lose the game.

Enter, First Squad: The Moment of Truth. I have seen many of S4C's animated shorts recently and have been a fan of most of their work. So to find a full length movie by ... them got me excited. And to realize its all in its 'native' language got me even more hyped up because, how often do you get to watch anime (or even movies) in native languages? It also adds to the level of detail this story tries to tell.

If you have ever watched any type of war documentary, the stories the people being interviewed tell are usually somber tales of death or explanations of why things happen. Some people, don't mind telling their war stories but for most people, their experiences are kept so secret that revealing their story for the first time may be hard to tell. Such is the case for some of the war vets (and scientists) in the 'inserts' of this movie. Most of the inserts felt like they contributed to the story well, sometimes explaining what the next scene is. If you think too hard during these segments your head will explode considering it is all fantastical. If you have experienced any S4C anime shorts you already know that most of the time the story is just plain confusing. This is completely an anime story at heart.

Which is why the viewer needs to watch this with an open mind. The story is more of an alternate universe WWII where magic is real. Many anime and movies have taken this approach and met great success (Valkyria Chronicles and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade?). Taking this anime serious should be thrown out the window from the moment you realize who is a clairvoyant or during the meeting with 'Gandalf'. The story is a very typical David and Goliath type with the frail looking Nadya Ruslanova taking on insurmountable odds. Almost kind of sounds like a shounen anime right? Well it is :)

Don't let the MAL database fool you, the only main character of this movie is Nadya and you follow her from her early beginnings all the way to the end credits. The other characters are mainly support characters and are not shown enough to matter. As for Nadya, you'll either love or hate her. I grew attached to her because she just looks so frail that you just want to protect her. With all the war and bloodshed and overall grittiness, seeing a little girl barely weighing 100lbs (45kg) walk across the Russian tundra will definitely create some sort of empathy for the protagonist.

I'll say this about S4C, they are definitely not the best when it comes to animating but they are better than most. What they truly do shine in is the amount of detail they put in every scene. Backgrounds and any other inanimate objects gets the largest amount of detail. Varying ink blots from the pressures of a typewriter, all the trails routes and tracks on the battle map, Moscow's skyline and even Moscow's unique Subway/bomb shelter, is all great eye candy. Lets not forget that this is a war anime. There will be blood and lots of it. I did find it weird that there was more blood than action but that didn't hinder the experience.

This movie isn't all that bad at all. It's no different than any other anime in terms of plot holes and inconsistency. It's major selling point for me was the whole visual and audio package. If a movie/anime setting is in Russia, LET THEM SPEAK RUSSIAN ^_^ It adds so much in terms of immersing yourself in the movie. And the overall art quality of this show is just amazing. I'd place S4C just below Studio Ghibli and Makoto Shinkai. I think that's a pretty elite list.

Anyone who is a fan of WWII fiction, Studio 4C fan, or even wants to see something truly unique. should at least give this anime a shot or two. If you truly hate the mockumentary inserts nothings stopping you from fast forwarding them. The whole concept of this anime makes me want another movie of this type. Not a sequel per se but something with this idea.

This is my first review, but I feel like it needs to be written because no other review has highlighted how much of a let down this movie is.

Story (3/10): The premise is not terribly deep and can be summed up quite quickly; basically the Nazi's want to summon this ghost to kill all of the Soviets, so the Soviets send this clairvoyant teenage girl fight the ghost. The premise isn't amazing, but the movie could have still been good despite that. Where the story really goes bad are during these documentary-esque live action scenes with 'war veterans' and 'historians' (who are not actually war ... veterans or historians). The scenes do very little to help advance the plot and don't help add to the back story. The movie without the live action scenes would have been just as good, if not better, as they really interrupt the flow at some points. Also the climax was disappointingly short and the movie ended with a 'cliff hanger' that didn't leave me wanting more.

Art (8/10): The art was probably the only thing preventing me from giving this movie a 1/10. The animation, for the most part, was excellent. It wasn't mind blowing, but it was consistent and enjoyable. The only downside to the art was the live action scenes, which were mostly just people talking in front of a dark background, and one person was really quite ugly. I don't just mean not attractive, I mean I almost couldn't stand to watch that scene. Still the live action scenes were short so overall the animation was very good.

Sound (6/10): The voices are in Russian (with a few possible cases of German, not sure though), but I don't really hold that for or against the movie. As for the music, I didn't really notice any amazing music, but I didn't really notice any bad music either. Overall the sound didn't really affect my opinion of the movie at all.

Character (2/10): The characters were awful. The movie is only an hour long, so I can understand somewhat limited development, but there are just too many characters who are literally not introduced at all (random guy with a wooden staff, Nazi chicks with guns, General Below, etc). The only excuse for the poor characters that I could see is that everyone other than the main character doesn't exist because the main character is just a schizo (similar to "A Beautiful Mind"), but there's no big twist, and any speculation that the main character is crazy is left as speculation. There was one decent flashback, which added some actual character depth, but it wasn't enough to help the overall dreadful characters.

Enjoyment (1/10): By about 1/2 way through the movie I was just waiting for it to be over. Some people may find it more enjoyable, but I was really put off by the live action scenes, lacking story, and shallow characters. The animation was good, but it just couldn't compensate for everything it had going against it. From the synopsis I was expecting some epic 12th century sword-fighting during WW2, but there was only a minute or two of sword fighting throughout the whole movie. The movie could have really benefited from any kind of twist, but it didn't have one and it just ended up like a bad joke without a punchline.

Overall (2/10): Obviously I'm not going to stop anyone from watching this movie, but I'd have to seriously recommend against it. There's a two minute trailer on Youtube which has every bit of action and story in the movie. Just watch that and save yourself the other hour and 11 minutes of poor story and underdeveloped characters.

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Pre-Review Notes
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I'm going to be using a more freeform style for Movie reviews, as they are much smaller and I can describe my feelings for the movie in a much clearer fashion.


Studio 4°C’s anime transcends the borders of Japan. From Linkin Park's "Breaking the Habit", to the Animatrix, and even to the Gotham Knight, their portfolio is varied and extensive. First Squad, their latest effort, is a collaboration between two Russian directors and 4°C, crossing the sea once again to create international anime. I had high hopes for First Squad, as the Studio's last movie, Tekkon Kinkreet, was excellent. However, the bullets of the ... collaboration were quick to puncture my hopes; after an hour and thirteen minutes they looked like swiss cheese.

The story of First Squad is told in a unique fashion: meshing live action documentary with more traditional animation. There is an interesting interplay, as Russian scholars and veterans ground the fantastical story into reality. First Squad could be commended on this approach if the story itself were not so weak. The plot is predictable; the Nazi's are beckoning vengeful spirits from the other realm, and the Russian's need to stop them. The characters don't do much to salvage the poor tale. The pacing is erratic and disjointed, jumping from scene to scene with little sense of cohesion. The movie's namesake, the First Squad, is a poorly developed cast, with only slivers of background ever filled in. Nadya, the main antagonist, is drawn from clichés –an amnesiac psychic who would give life and limb for country.

The voice acting didn't help prop up the narrative. The Russian voice actors sound deflated, their flat voices conveying plastic emotion. The music was passable, a boisterous overture in the opening that harkens to any military film. The rest of the score is appropriate, weaving melodies from low growling organs with the rhythmic hum of violins.

Studio 4°C does deliver the goods on the art. A muted palette washes over the snowy seas of the Eastern Front. Moscow’s majesty is quiet from the war-torn world, a stark contrast to the Gloom World, a twisted realm where fallen warriors continue to tear at one another. Russia is a feast to look at. Excellent CGI is threaded together with top-notch animation. Artists made a successful effort in modeling the characters, drawn to have a distinctive Caucasian look.

First Squad, to say the least, disappointed me. Despite the pretty little black dress it wears, what is inside does not satisfy. The story is forgettable, the characters are paper-thin, and the voice acting isn’t exactly inspiring. I praise Studio 4°C for attempting to blend two styles –documentary and anime. Hopefully this method of storytelling won’t be thrown to the wayside, and will be used to create a much more engaging and entertaining experience.

I've never written any reviews. This is my first time so I'll do my best to show you my thoughts about this anime.

First of all, this anime has a serious and global topic (you know, World War II was terrible for all people, especially for Russians). The autors had showed the negative side of the war so foreign people can learn some important information about the Soviet culture, fighting spirit and, finally, about different people. It's a very great idea, I support it!

The characters are awesome! Every person has an individuality, his/her own specific qualities. But I wonder why some Russian people are blond like ... Nadya? They are dark blond! Almost forgot: I like the main heroine's name very much because in Russia it means "hope" - the most important thing for poor and frightened people.

I think this anime is a masterpiece because it showed (partly) the real situation of war and the real life of brave Young Pioneers and dashing soldiers. But there is a little problem for me: I can't understand the ending... Hope you can understand it properly.

Considering this is my first review, this is actually a hate mail. Why is that so?
You'll soon see why...
I started watching it believing this would be something interesting. What a fool I was. If you think this anime is going to be "interesting" because it has WW2 and Russia, you're damn wrong. You should avoid it.

I was almost interested for the first 10 minutes. But the acting was terrible. The characters showed no emotions. If you do want to call them emotions, be my guest. I one was rejected by the false interpretation of those "emotions". Oh well... we'll let it be.

Story 1/10
I have absolutely ... no words to describe what I just watched. The story was pathetic. How should I put this...
"Soviet teenagers with extraordinary abilities" - this is actually a phrase from the anime's details. Where did they got the powers? Why them? Because they are teenagers, that's why. It's so stupid that I have no words but I'll try my best. What makes the powers truly special? NOTHING, absolutely nothing. It's actually pathetic. The universe, the story, the way the plot turned out. They took a serious problem(WW2) and they made it a dog's poop. With terrible extraordinary powers that have no place in there, they squeezed things to the story that made me puke. But why did I watch it till the end? Because I've told myself: "When I start something, I'd better finish it, or not start it at all." I guess I'll stop making myself bear through the horrors of life.

Art 4/10
Meh... The art was not good. But I guess it was decent. Not poor and not really mediocre. Just a plain meh.

Sound 3/10
It was like I was watching an old movie with "predictable" sounds. That's what it was exactly. Nothing good... Couldn't even call it mediocre. It was pretty poor.

Character 2/10
"Soviet teenagers with extraordinary abilities". Why? Just... Why?
Why would you take exactly teenagers(I thought they were kids). Why are they so special... Why would you create an army special force consisting of KIDS.
Character development? Nothing at all.
Character expressions? Don't make me laugh.
The characters were poorly designed. More than poorly, they were "dreadful". Ninjas? Are you joking? - I won't explain it too much, cause it might cause spoilers.

Enjoyment 1/10
I would have been happier if I just wouldn't have watched it. I wasn't forced to do so. I chose this on my own. But I still don't regret it, because if I wouldn't have watched it I couldn't have warned others to stay away from it.

Overall 2/10
(1+4+3+2+1)/5=2.2
This marks the ending of my hate-ma....uh... I mean... review.
I told you why my overall score is that.
You can watch it. But my subjective point of view was that is was terrible.
Maybe you'll like it, it differs from person to person. I found it rubbish, you may find it amazing. I found it a waste of time, you may actually find it a piece of art. It's your call.

First, just a few words about what this film is and what it is not.

First of all, it isn't something complete and standalone. The creators of the movie didn't pretend to have accomplished all their goals in one fifty-something-minute piece. They couldn't, and they haven't. The end of the film is just the point where all events are launched and all characters are deployed, and what happens next is the matter of the sequel. Placing some final rating for the story at this point would be as hurried as, for example, judging a TV series by the first few episodes.

Second, it's a myth. Till today, ... most stories about World War II are either facts cut and bent to the purposes of propaganda, or myths and legends told in a dull and fact-like manner and also bent to the purposes of propaganda. This time, instead, the myth is told in exactly the right way for a myth to be told. Heroic all along, supernatural all around, unreal enough, believable enough, no ideology behind.

Now, on to what I've actually seen in there.

Art and sound: both great and very well fit for an action movie. The art gives a superb feeling of Soviet reality (though some details are deliberately taken from diffenent times, everything is very realistic), sights of war are also quite plausible.

Characters: we get only briefly acquainted with everyone during the movie, there's hardly any place for character development in there. Yet all characters are well thought-out, lively, memorable, with individual traits, all having potential to shine brighter in the sequel. It's natural that the main character, Nadya, gets the lion's share of character disclosure and development, with revelations of her past and the clear feeling of drama ahead of her.

Story: quite a promising beginning of a bigger plot. Though action-centered and bombastic, it gives a proper feeling of a myth and leaves the viewer wondering, "What will come next?" In the end, there's quite a bunch of possible roads to go for each of the characters, all of them equally unpleasant for the characters and promising for the audience.

Overall: I enjoyed it, but it wasn't enough. Hope for an even better sequel.

Note: first I watched the "animation-only" version in the cinema, and then I've seen the variation with "talking heads" insets. Well, those talks are good in themselves, crazy enough to match the story - yet they just don't belong in an animation film, that's all. The movie is better without them. They could make a good bonus video for the DVD edition, though.

I come from Ukraine and the Great Patriotic War is something very important to people of post-Soviet countries. We respect our ancestors who died in this terrible struggle and all those unfortunate innocent people who fell due to genocide that was Nazi occupation. When I first heard of First Squad: The Moment of Truth I already decided that this should be a must-see movie for me. A slightly mystical spin on the story also seemed justified taking into account the rumours about Nazi elites being interested in occultism.

So I grabbed a drink, some snacks, made my self comfortable in my armchair and morally prepared myself ... to watch this promising film. It is to my disbelief that as the movie progressed the plot looked more and more disappointing. Despite amazing animation and stunning detail the atmosphere is missing. It becomes obvious that authors failed to connect the fantastic story with this rich realistic setting. As we follow main character Nadya, we are able to experience the grief for the dead, the hate towards the enemy and determination to go on. However, the fantastic ability to revive friends, to fight skilfully with a katana (why Russian girl is carrying a katana remains to be understood) and to easily defeat her foes whoever they may be, completely negate all those strong feelings towards the horrible period. The fights are abrupt, disjointed and always end with the victory for the good guys making the deep, dark atmosphere dissipate and even look ridiculous: why on Earth all these people die if you can just have Nadya slice the Germans up and send them all the way back to Berlin?

The characters are quite interesting. Nadya's friends look very much like the heroic portrayals of children of the War, the brave street kids who sometimes had more determination than adult soldiers. The Russian actors do their jobs well; the dialogues are well structured and are nice to listen to. Despite this, we don't have enough time to learn about these people, they look distant and therefore their presence is easy to ignore, especially for someone who doesn't speak Russian and doesn't know much about Slavic culture.

One feature which is worth highlighting about First Squad is historical commentary done by war veterans, psychologists and historians who explain a little bit about War and create a very nice connection between the film and the reality. However, as the story takes a mystical spin it wasn't necessary to have someone justify fictional facts about "spiritual connections with the world of the dead". There is a thin line between real historical facts and speculation, and as the story progresses, you see real people talking about Soviets communicating with the dead which looks absolutely ridiculous.

In conclusion, First Squad: The Moment of Truth is a major disappointment. It holds little value in terms of story or in terms of documentary. If you want to have a nice fictional anime to watch there are plenty of other films and shows which would be a much better investment of your time. Likewise, if you want to find out more about Great Patriotic War there are lot of great documentaries and books you can look at. It is a real shame that the authors failed to deliver and this setting remains an open ground for anime directors to explore. Perhaps one day we will be given a chance to witness a real masterpiece. Unfortunately, not this time.

This is my first review, so it may not be literary gold, but bear with me.

First Squad: The Moment of Truth is loosely based on a music video made by Studio 4C, who also made the movie. The story is set on the eastern front during the opening days of World War II. The main character is a young girl called Nadya, member of a secret unit of the Soviet army consisting of teenagers with supernatural powers, who have been drafted and trained to fight off the German advances. With all her squadmates dead, Nadya now finds herself alone in the barren and frozen Russian ... landscape.

She soon gets involved in a plot to fight against an SS officer who plans to raise an army of 12th century crusaders and have them help conquer the Soviet Union. The cast of characters is largely forgettable, save for a man taking on the role of Obi-Wan Gandalf, and of course, Nadya herself. Her interactions with her crewmembers, as shown in flashbacks, is largely uninteresting, and only one of them seems to actually have been friends with Nadya. The rest might just as well have been strangers, which bothered me.

The brave, little Nadya is a character you grow to like very quickly. She is a frail, young girl, wandering alone over the tundra, and being chased by forces that in comparison seem insurmountable.

The pacing is good, even if it takes some time for the plot to kick off. The animation is sometimes broken up documentary (or if you will, mockumentary) style, with live-action clips of (probably false) Russian and German war veterans and historians talking about the story as it progresses, which I found to be a nice touch.

The animation is very well done, and the incorporation of CG is nearly flawless. While the animation is not mind-blowing, though high above average standards, what sticks out is how detailed everything is. The backgrounds are generously decorated, the characters all look realistic, and the artists have really done a good job of accentuating the loneliness and hardships Nadya must endure.

One thing that makes this stand out from just about all other anime set in Europe, is that it is not in Japanese. All the voices are originally Russian, and while I have little experience with Russians and their language, they do a good job of bringing the characters to life, especially Elena Chebaturkina (Nadya) and Sergei Aisman (the big baddy). The music is also great, especially the opening and ending songs, which of course would be expected from DJ Krush, whose previous works include a song in LittleBIGPlanet and some other soundtracks. It becomes apparent very quickly that the directors have put effort into making the music fit its Slavic setting.

All in all, I recommend this movie to anybody who has seventy-three minutes of free time. It is a good experience, and if you are interested in WWII, the Soviet Union or just fictional war dramas, then you should definitely watch this.

Overview:

Time to review a REALLY obscure anime that most people have never heard of. I recently reviewed the first Berserk Movie by Studio 4C and lambasted it for the terrible art. Has 4C ever made an anime with really good art? I found that the answer is yes. A few years ago a Russian film studio funded by the Russian government hired 4C to draw a Russian written, acted, and directed anime that would basically be a Soviet version of Hellsing Ultimate! This actually fucking happened!!!

Story and Characters: 5/10

The plot is fairly basic since this is a fairly short movie and half the ... time is spent on real world interviews of Red Army veterans that seem completely out of place and are inserted into random action scenes that not only take the viewer out of the story but break the viewer's neck from the mood whiplash! Some evil SS occultists are using dark magic to bring back Teutonic knight zombies. This army of evil undead must be stopped by some Russian magical girls including one girl that fights with a samurai sword and uses it to scalp Nazis. Did Tarantino have a hand in this project?! The greatest problem is that the characters aren't as fleshed out as they could have been and the Nazis don't have any characters as memorable as the Millenium Squad from Hellsing. This anime badly needed Zee Major!

Art: 8/10

The art is actually good! Studio 4C did it! Apparently studio 4C had help from a Russian animation studio, which is interesting since Russian animation is often VERY hit or miss. On one hand, the Russian cartoon The Snow Queen from 1953 is a favorite of Miyazaki and helped inspire his own art style. On the other hand, it was a Russian animation studio that created the INFAMOUS cutscenes for the Phillips CDI that form the backbone of the "youtube poop" comedy videos and have become the most mocked video game cutscenes in history. Mah Boi! It's time for DINNER!

Sound: 7/10

The soundtrack is tense and fits the atmosphere very well. It also features some Russian folk songs that go along very nicely with the series.

Enjoyment: 6/10

I really wanted to like this one, but it felt a bit disappointing at times and those interviews didn't belong. If they were inserted at the end during the credits that would have been fine, but in the middle of scenes was way too jarring!

Overall: 7/10

This was a flawed, but enjoyable obscure series that I still can't believe actually exists. A famous youtube critic once told people to watch the mainstream series Elfen Lied because "This is so wierd you must watch it and celebrate that this somehow exists!" That guy CLEARLY hasn't seen or heard of First Squad: Moment of Truth. Now THIS is an anime that everyone must see, simply because it somehow exists!

Before I review this anime, a little history: First Squad is a Russian / Japanese film collaboration with Molot Entertainment with anime studio Studio 4C and it was the ONLY anime that was entirely made by Russian filmmakers with little Japanese animators to work with. All I know is that nobody ever seen this anime, even Anime News Network never even bothered to review this and so, like a curious little kid, I bought the film, watched the whole film and......... I was very disappointed in this anime. Talk about a big bitch slap in the face, First Squad is so bland, forgettable and boring, ... that all of those interesting story ideas that this anime had just gets thrown away into a fucking blender and then gets shit out of some guys ass and it's never seen again. THAT is how I feel about this film right now guys.

If you guys wanna know why I did had some hopes for this anime, it's because of the creative plot in First Squad. Taking place in the beginnings of World War 2 in 1942, it tells the story about a girl named Nadia, a child with psychic abilities who lives as an orphange, who is also tormented by the horrors of war and her friends, who were hunted down by German soldiers and Nadia was the only one left alive of the First Squad group. Then, The Nazi army are desperate to defeat the forces of Russia and decided to go to a group occult to resurrect the spirits of the dead, that was lead by this vicious Templar knight known as Barren Van Wolf and therefore, Nadia must contact the dead souls of her friends to fight along side with her and to defeat Barren Van Wolf before Nazi's destroy Russia. It sounded so fucking great on paper, but they had to screw it up with the goddamn awful execution that this film did. It leaves too many questions with no answers, like what the hell is this First Squad and why are they so special? Why did Barren Van Wolf became an evil bastard to kill all those people? and here's another question, How did Nadia got the power to see the future when in her flashbacks tell that she was just a normal person, who she and her parents were just a bunch of circus performers!?!?!?!? EXPLAIN ANIME!! EXPLAIN!!!

This anime also has one of the worst character developments I've ever even experienced in an anime. It's so rushed and it doesn't even give you time to feel connected to the characters and these characters barely have any backstory or reason to be in the story, cause it doesn't give you time to know them. Also, the villains are either bland or stupid, cause jesus, the Nazi commander is barely even interesting or fun to watch, he just stands in the hall in one scene and in the other, he just raises dead people to fight alongside with him..... WEAK! Nadia's friends at least have some personalities to boot, but it can't save them from the rushed script and incredibly short length of the movie and speaking of which, the movie was too goddamn short!!! It was only 75 minutes of the movie and it went out so fast, that I asked myself "WTF just happened right now?!" If the film was longer, it could have add more story and character development to the characters, because this anime needed it so badly, that it's fun factor just drops dead into the final climax of the film and BTW, the climax of the film was bullshit, it ended too fast and it was BORING! It makes the climax of Dragonball: Evolution look awesome in comparison. The onl good thing about the anime is the animation by Studio 4C, cause it does look beautiful and the city of Russia is well animated and I really enjoyed the musical score by DJ Krush, but since the anime is goddamn short, it doesn't add a lot of value to it. The voice acting is pretty good and it's also available in Russian language, which is a nice option for those who wants to learn to speak Russian I guess.

First Squad had so much potential with the plot and creative ideas, that in the end it gets butchered in the development process and what we got is an anime with more style than substance. An epic pile of donkey dog piss of an anime that should be avoided at all cost.

First Squad is a really bad movie. The only reason I even watched this movie is that it came as part of a box set, which I bought to get Paprika, Memories, Tekkonkinkreet, Steamboy and Metropolis. It was a good deal, although I also got some things I really didn't want. Like Cowboy Bebop the Movie and Tokyo Godfathers, that I already owned. And some random movie called Millennium Dragon and, you guessed it, First Squad.

I already knew this movie was gonna be bad going in. So I took the approach of 'Let's just relax with an hour of mediocre explosions and fun fights' attitude. ... And trust me, this was NOT what I got. So let's explain why:

There was no story. Nothing was resolved, there was never any tension and no character was interesting. They had a romantic subplot going on, but that was never resolved or given any depth. They had something going on with some Nazis, but again; no depth and resolve and no character development. But this is an action movie, you say. You are not watching for a deep or complex story, you are watching to see shit blow up.

This doesn't happen either.

The animation is atrocious. For a movie, especially one that's only an hour long you'd think there was at least something going on there, but no. There is surprisingly little movement and what little footage there is is reused several times in the movie. Some clips are shown three to four times throughout this very short motion picture. The animation is also done on threes. For anyone who doesn't know the in's and out's of animation that means that there is only animation on every third frame of twenty four, making this essentially animated at only eight frames per second, same as most TV animations. Movies are usually made at the full twenty four frames per second. The character designs are horribly bad as well.

Sound effects are ... fine, I guess, but only when they're there. They seem to be missing from a lot of places where they obviously should be. The dub is REALLY bad, though. Very few characters have any hint of emotion at all, and the ones who do don't have a major speaking role. I would still recommend the dub, though, since it fits with the tone and setting of the movie.

Oh god, the characters.

I am currently writing my own manga inspired comic, and the dialouge is really, really bad. But that's not my focus, and I'm only sixteen years old, writing in a foreign language. With that said, though, these characters are written so poorly, a delusional seven year old would have trouble thinking up so poor dialouge. It's probably the worst part of the entire movie, and that's saying a lot. None of the relationships feel genuine, none of the kids feel real and everything comes off as completely forced. In fact this is one of the few movies that can compete with The Room and Birdemic in terms of terrible dialouge and characters. YUCK.

With all that negative talk, though, in the end I'm still recommending this movie. But not as a fun action flick, because even the action sucks, not as a war drama(lol), but as a comedy. It falls in to the category of 'It's so bad, it's good' kinda movie. And as much as I cringed while watching this I was also laughing out loud, something I very rarely do while watching any movie.

As an action movie it gets a very bad 1/10

But as a comedy it can definitely work.

I'm going to start this off by saying I love anything related to World War Two, especially anything about the Eastern Front.

I'm willing to make a whole lot of exceptions for Eastern Front films, but in this case, even I couldn't overlook some glaring flaws. The film opened with an enjoyable ten minutes, and a very realistic depiction of an airstrike, I thought I was sold, and had the film ended there, I'd have given this a 10.

But then the rest of the film happened.

While I never expected them to play the setting straight, they could have at least taken the time to make a ... coherent plot. We are introduced to a number of characters in the underworld/afterlife who make a grand total of "zero" effect on anything in the story. It feels as if the writers came up with a bunch of different story ideas for this film, placed all their manuscripts in a blender, and then stitched together the pieces to make a (thankfully) short film.

The framing device of using real people telling their stories as if they were a part of this in real life was interesting, and could have worked, had the plot not revolved around an (absurd) SS Officer trying to bring back knights from the Teutonic Order (which was nowhere near Moscow by the way) to use as an army against the Soviets. Let's pretend for a moment that bringing back an undead army armed with swords to fight tanks was in any way tactically sound, we're still left wondering... what is the main character doing here again? No really, the entire film is basically the main character going to different places to have some other person give a half-done exposition speech before going off to do the same thing for about an hour and twelve minutes.

Overall score, 0/10, but that's not an option, so they get a 1.

This is my 1st recommendation I hope you like, First Squad is a film anime russian Japanese that I personally loved it, a totally great animation the action scenes are very well made although the plot is somewhat rare and out of the ordinary is what good enough the movie to keep you glued to your seat without taking his eyes off the screen, the OST is magnificent and the protagonist trapped in the well-known vortex of violence that was the 2nd World War is EPIC! history is not closed all hopefully the 2nd part of this incredible story was a fitting end to this ... great Russian-japonesUn anime anime with action, drama, a bit of gore and many loads of suspense is what awaits you in First Squad.

OK, at first an anime about WWII seems a little odd the very moment you hear about it. of course that is just my oppinion. Anyway, about the movie. I find the studio and the director's job quite facinating and awesome. The idea of the movie is quite interesting and original, if I may say, involving such mystycal story for such ruff times. There was alot of action and blood which are making the mood even greater. And at last but not least - the art of the movie. Even supported with some PC activity at times, combining the anime style with the traditional ... Russian animation was briliant and gave perfect results. That is the thing I really, really loved in the picture.

When I started watching this anime I did not have any expectations except strong disapproval of the topic. In fact, we study WWII and the Great Patriotic War as a part of it for many times (at school + college and uni if u attend them), leaving behind the fact that there are many subjects that provide with the information of the kind. Plus state holidays each year. That is why the topic held me somewhat tense and suspicious.
More detailed acknowledgement showed it was not that bad. The idea and the story were decent (mixing GPW and magic is interesting at least), moreover, the art ... was well-done. And watching usual anime stamps (like the scene in the garden, or Leo, or two Nazi agents) in the context of Soviet reality was quite unusual and fun (however, they made the story hard-to-believe in).
And here goes the point. I put a 7 due to the fact that I just DID NOT BELIEVE the anime and its creators. The idea like "enemies summon knights, and a Russian girl Nadya summons 4 pioneer friends and they win" is sooooo old and unbelievable (say hello to American action movies!). The characters are also hard-to-believe in: there couldn't be any bright lipstick or katana or pink teddy bear, and I really doubt that a Soviet boy could kiss a girl so simply. IMHO, there is either too much or too little realism, and the true motifs of the creators remain unclear.
To sum up, if you see First Squad as a fairy tale action in the setting of GPW, it is ok. If you want something more - better give your hopes up.

As a weeb of Russian descent I would've loved nothing more then to have put this anime in my top ten list and rub it into the face of every weeb I'll meet. But sadly, I can't do that.

On one hand Studio 4C did an incredible job with animation and sound design and honestly saved this movie from being a complete disaster. Where First Squad falls short is story wise.

If this wasn't a movie I feel like First Squad would've had a chance to be pretty good. The story utilizes a lot of strong story elements that in themselves can carry any story but ... in this case were rushed because of limited run time and didn't really let any of the potential shine through. They add magic and superpowers which under normal circumstances would make me so happy I'd spontaneously combust. But they don't establish any rules for the power system or how things work or function. It uses clichés like a wizard and a prophecy to start off the story but doesn't deliver in a memorable way that would make the viewer care ab. Visually the characters all look and sound great both in Russian, English or Japanese, whatever you want to watch. But story wise almost nothing is given to grow the main cast. Almost no character development is given to any of the characters except for a relatively shallow flashback. Characters are one dimensional and forgettable even though they are supposed to be a driving force for the plot.

In conclusion this anime had a lot of potential and failed to flesh it out because of its short run time. If your looking for thoughts on whether or not you should watch this movie then hear me out. I feel like its below average. But its really not a waste of time.

P.S. I didn't know how to fit this info into the review but there is a version of this film with short interviews that are slotted in throughout the movie between cuts that basically have people retelling the story that this movie is based on. It does shine a new light on this story if it's somehow inspired by real events.

Pervy orjad - First !ORDER!
The reason why I hate this anime is Because:
It is boring - THEY JUST TALK FOR F*** SAKE!
Story sucks - It is nonsensical, ends without point
History? - Yeah no match hear, It is... I dont even know.
Bonus:
Why the f*** is she having katana? Japan and Russia were enemies (russian WWII melee weapon was knife). They are speaking German, but not Russian. As a Czech history student and WWII book writer I found this really odd, in this anime Germans were not amused by cold. The art was fair, but soundtrack poor (I wanted to hear rap but no vocals).
This anime ... is waste of time

Every now and again, there is an anime project done in conjunction with a country outside of Japan. With First Squad, the project was done in conjunction with Japanese animation studio Studio 4C and a Russian company Molot Entertainment. Molot Entertainment doesn’t seem to have done much else besides First Squad besides another animated film called Ivan about a post-apocalyptic world filled with magical creatures such as dragons From what I can find, the company seems to be focused on helping promote independent projects.

First Squad itself seems to have an interesting history by itself. Starting out as a music video in 2005 by both Studio ... 4C and Molot Entertainment, with the song for the music video done by MC Ligalize. It even won an award at the MTV Russian Music Awards for best hip-hop video in 2006. By 2007, the Russian studio behind the music video announced that they were working on a film adaptation of the music video.

2 years later, First Squad: Moment of Truth was released to the public. Apparently, is was well received enough in it’s home country of Russia that it even went on to win an award by the Kommersant newspaper’s prize. There was even a graphic novel adaptation the year after First Squad’s release. So with the surprisingly interesting history of First Squad out of the way, let’s have a closer look at it.

Set during World War II on the Eastern Front, a group of Nazi mystics plan to resurrect Baron von Wolff and his Teutonic Knights during the “Moment of Truth”, a moment that has appeared throughout various points in time that will determine the outcome of any significant conflict. To prevent this, Division Six of the Soviet Military intelligence has enlisted a group of young people with special abilities to fight the invading German armies and prevent the Nazi’s from reaching their goal.

The story follows a young clairvoyant girl named Nadya, who survived a deadly air raid attack only to be left shell-shocked. While recovering from her concussion, she soon discovers that she has a new ability, the ability to foresee said “Moments of Truth”. Soon, she is taken into Division Six, and is trained along with the rest of the rest of the squad to prevent the Moment of Truth from being used by the Nazis to win the war.

Unfortunately the whole movie is a bit of a mixed bad. While the premise is great, the rest of the movie is a bit underwhelming. The fact that this movie is only an hour long is the thing that unfortunately drags this whole thing down. I’m going to assume that the team behind First Squad not having a bigger budget, not having enough time, or not having both is the reason that the length of this movie is so short. I don’t know how much better it would have been having an extra 15 minutes, but I feel like the whole thing would have definitely felt a lot smoother.

As a side effect of the length of this movie, the characters don’t always get the character development they need. Nadya pretty much gets most of it because she’s the main character, but the rest of the characters only get the most minor of character development, something that could have been solved with a longer length. The few action scenes that this movie gets are just OK, nothing to write home about.

There is actually two versions of First Squad. A “Theatrical” cut and a “Director’s” cut.The only difference between both versions is every now an again in the “Director’s” cut there are a brief interviews done with veterans, historians, and other live actors in between the rest of the movie. These are basically just here to not only try and lengthen the movie with the meager budget they had, but these are more of a mixed bag than anything. Some of them don’t really add anything, such as the one interview that simply explains what sedatives are.

Maybe it’s to give it some authenticity, but considering that the whole thing flows much better without them, I can’t really recommend the “Director’s” cut unless you found something about the original interesting enough to warrant something more.

First Squad: Moment of Truth might be a rocky in terms of quality, but I don’t really hate it. It’s not something you should immediately go out and see, but it’s worth checking out if you some free time and it looks interesting to you.

The main reason I enjoyed watching this movie is for the visuals, seeing Soviet troops drawn and animated in Japanese anime style, and the Russian voice acting.

This is by no means a good movie. But it might be one of those so-bad-it's-good kind of films. You have to accept from the outset that this movie is completely absurd; it's a flight of fancy about an alternate WW2 where magic and occult mystical powers are real but kept secret.

It is well known that on the German side the high ranking SS were very obsessed with theosophy and occult matters and imagined themselves as the ... spiritual successors of the ancient Teutonic Knights. This actual quirk of history gets riffed on in this anime and made literal in the story.

The Russians for their part have their own quasi-mythic heroes of the ancient past, like Aleksandr Nevsky, who dealt the Livonian order of the Teutonic Knights a crushing defeat and has been invoked by Russian Tsars and Soviet officials and contemporary Russians as a national hero. Nevsky was a real historical figure, but his legacy takes on mythic proportions over time as a potent symbol of Russian patriotic resistance to foreign invasion, part of national mythology in the same way a figure like Abraham Lincoln for America or George Washington and the cherry tree have these larger than life mythic qualities attached to them.

These competing embellished myths, more than actual history itself, are the material from which the ridiculous story of this anime movie was spun. This movie shouldn't be taken seriously, and the use of live action documentary footage clashes tonally with the rest of the animated portions of the film...it tries to add an element of realism to an utterly absurd tale and falls completely flat. One wonders if this inclusion was at the behest of the Russian side of this production and the Japanese staff simply acquiesced to the desires of their Russian collaborators who wanted to tell a more serious story about their Great Patriotic War while the Studio 4C people just wanted to make an exciting (if patently ridiculous) movie. If this movie were re-edited and the live-action cut scenes cut out it might be salvageable as an engaging action film of fantasy history.

I don't know why Nadya has a Katana....she's a war orphan, former Young Pioneer, and has psychic powers. Maybe she had a grandfather who fought the Japanese in the 1905 war and this was a war trophy / family heirloom....best not to think too hard about it. She has it because "anime"; no deeper reason is really necessary.

This movie is worth a watch for just how WEIRD it is. It's a failed experiment, but a pretty glorious failure. If you accept up front how utterly absurd it is, it will help you actually enjoy this film. If you're hoping for a serious account of the Soviet experience during WW2 in anime form, you've come to the wrong movie.