Ranked #2457

Appleseed

Given that the newer versions of Appleseed have become popular, I figured that I might as well write a review for the lesser known film. It was created in '88 by the man who I believe created Big O. For some strange reason, it took damn near a decade to bring it from Japan to the US.

The story is similar to many other Olympus outings: terrorists trying to bring down the Utopian society so that humanity doesn't become like a caged animal. Generally, this means destroying Gaia, which is the main goal of our two terrorists. The story's decent, and it picks and chooses parts from the 1st and 2nd volumes of the Appleseed series to have in the film. Ultimately, the story satisfied me, so I have no complaints about that.

My main complaint is with whoever they got to do the voice over work. My god, the V/Os for the English dub are awful. Seriously, everyone sounds like a stereotypical New Yorker, and if it's not that then its the fact that it all sounds like it was recorded in a tin can--echoey (is echoey a word?). A curse word is added to every sentence like a period, and this is also only in the English dub. I watched the movie once in both Japanese and English, and while both adaptations are fair, the original language is the one to watch (some things get cut from the American version, for whatever reason).

The characters are roughly the same in the manga. The one I enjoy the most has to be Hitomi, who wasn't done any justice in the recent 04 movie. I don't know what it is, but all the bioroids act like humans instead of clones in both this and in the manga, a thing that the recent films just hasn't really touched on, at least not yet.

All and all, I enjoyed this, but not as much as I expected. It's good to see where Appleseed originates, but don't dive into it with high hopes. If you can stand the ancient graphics and potentially deadly V/Os, then this could be a decent movie for you. read more

I really liked this. Even at only 70 minutes it captures what the story is about very well and has all the characteristics of the great old school 80s animé movies but with more depth than you usually find. The remake is far less meaningful and is basically a platform to showcase impressive CGI - as I see it. It looks basic so might put some of the newer animé fans off, but to me this is a very special film.