009 Re:Cyborg

Re: Cyborg 009 is, in a word, disappointing. As a fan of the 2001 series since childhood and a great admirer of the studio which worked on this (Production I.G., who are responsible for such wonderful series as Ghost In The Shell: Stand Alone Complex) I expected great things from this darker, more realistic take on the classic franchise. Sadly, despite a promising start and beautiful animation, the film falls flat on its' face, resulting in something which may be worth watching once, but which cannot stand up to even the most cursory analysis.

It would ... be terribly easy to blame this film's failings as yet another example of why remaking children's series as "dark" and "gritty" doesn't work, but to do that would be to disrespect the source material. Why Ishinomori's manga and the preceding anime series were definitely goofy, there has always been an undercurrent of mystery and intrigue to them that is very compatible with darker tones. Sadly, the writer of this film seems to have confused "dark" with "unnecessarily confusing" and "intelligent" with "random statements about God with no connecting thread".

The plot is, for one thing, completely impenetrable to new viewers. If one is not already familiar with the franchise, this film offers only a few badly-executed lines of exposition to explain to you who exactly these
characters are, and does even less to show why you should care about them. This would not be so much of a problem if the premise of the film
and it's status as a stand-alone universe within the Cyborg 009 canon did
not seem to set it up as a jumping-on point for new viewers. The main
character begins the film with amnesia for god's sake, and yet he regains
his memories incredibly unceremoniously, without even the briefest of
flashbacks to hint at his origins. Instead, this is infodumped to you almost
halfway through the film, at which point it might have been better not to mention it at all.

For all the story's numerous failings and it's failure to highlight what
makes these characters interesting, the film at least looks good. Surprisingly, even someone like me who is normally squeamish about CGI mixing with 2D animation, the action sequences are not only dynamic but fluid in a way that
evokes the best of action cinema, making full use of the cyborgs' fantastic powers. Of particular note is the film's rendition of Jet Link, who visually puts
all previous incarnations of the character to shame. A pity the same can't be said for his personality.

Overall, I would recommend this movie most to people who have not interest whatsoever in the source material, but who appreciate good fight
choreography and beautiful animation. If you care about the series at all and/or are unable to turn your brain completely off in order to soak in disjointed action scenes, then you should probably watch the 2001 TV series instead to get your cyborg fix.

So when I saw this in the store I knew I had to have it, as I remember watching the 2001 show growing up. I loved how the cover looked and as soon as I got home I watched it. Sadly, I became instantly disappointed.

The art was entirely CG with a weird outline of 2D thrown in. It was very off putting but I hoped the plot made up for it. The plot itself was very confusing and if it wasn't for the little guidebook they put in with the DVD combo pack I would be soooo lost. The fact that they have to ... put a guidebook with all the characters backgrounds, the vital plot points, and all the cities that's in it, is just a testament to how confusing this movie was. It even had an interview section in the back that had the director trying to explain why they did it and the whole "His Voice" and the angel thing.

Don't get me wrong I liked the movie just fine, with the action scenes and even if there wasn't much character development, they were still decent. If you don't mind a little thought provoking plot and weird art style this movie isn't bad! Try not to compare it with the show or manga as even the director said the movie is based on the "Angels" and "God's War" arc in the manga, and it's their take on what they wanted to happen. Note I haven't read the manga so I can't say if I think they did good on that point.

All in all not a bad movie and I might watch it again if I'm bored, but I have to say I've found a new favorite qoute!!! Though, pay heed, listeners to His Voice: For, some ordeals waged in His honor may not force man to hear as thou. May the devout bring justice to all people of the earth, and let mankind start anew. May His Voice free us from sin, and bless us with glory, honor, and prosperity unending.

This film... this film...
I purchased this film for $2.99 in HD on iTunes. So this is definitely the easiest way to get it. (3.5 GB needed)

If it weren't for the story, everything would be wonderful. The art and animation both make use of 3-D and 2-D blending. The colors are vibrant, and I can see what's going on. They went out of their way to make the VA have non-stereotypical accents native to their country, which is a nice touch on the dubbing I had only previously seen with Unbreakable Machine Doll. (Though I kept the expecting the 2001 VA) It's why I gave ... the sound a 10.

The story... however, is a deep, philosophical rambling about what induced man to have a God and bombings.I feel like the the writers wrote a script for 2 1/2-3 hour epic, but as scenes got cut, the meanings of the remaining scenes got left behind, resulting in so much loss of context that the writers lost touch with what the viewer would be seeing. Alright, yeah, it makes sense... because this deleted scene or what was on the chopping board.

Couldn't it have been just your general 'remnants of Black Ghost'? Throw in some flashbacks and the characters are instantly so much more relatable, and I become invested in them that much more.

And unless you know about the original shooting star ending that the original manga intended to end on, then the ending sorta doesn't mean anything.

Like many anime fans, I'm guilty of under-appreciating the visuals and having my feelings swayed mostly by the story and in particular the characters. Although I want to rectify this, I don't really have a good eye for animation details. So while the spirit is willing the eye-flesh is ... uhh ... what's the visual equivalent of tone-deaf? Art-blind? Anyway, despite my art-blind eye-flesh, occasionally I find myself gravitating towards an anime because of some awesome visuals.

And that's what happened in the case of "009 Re:Cyborg", which, despite having heard that the story makes no sense, I've been wanting to see ever since I was ... blown away by the visuals in the trailer.

It turned out to be more or less as expected. The movie's most striking aspect is the animation, which is entirely CG. People in the fandom tend to praise CG in anime in much the same way as people in the health industry like to extol the virtues of smoking, but I think in the case of "009 Re:Cyborg", the CG is closer to eye candy than eye cancer. Admittedly, some of the movements still look a bit synthetic, but I love the character designs, and the action is spectacular.

The action sequences are the best part of "009: Re-Cyborg". The movie's action set pieces made superb use of the CG capabilities, blowing me away with special effects such as the matrix-esq slow motion shots. These sequences are further enhanced by the throbbing techno music that wove a montage-like tapestry of sound in the background, its release of melodies timed carefully to the choreography and its ebb and flow orchestrating the ease and build-up of tension as one scene segued seamlessly into the next. The trailer actually managed to capture a lot of what made the action so good, and that played a big part in persuading me to watch the movie.

I couldn't get enough of the action, so it's a little unfortunate that "009 Re:Cyborg" is not a particularly action-heavy movie; it's arguably more driven by the mystery and intrigue. So let's talk about the elephant in the room when it comes to this anime - the story.

First, a bit of background: the 00 cyborgs are a team of nine cyborgs led by a human scientist Dr Gilmore. Like a team of superheroes, they originally fought various threats to the world, but "009 Re:Cyborg" takes place many years after the team disbanded. In this story, Dr Gilmore tries to bring the team together again to counter a new threat: the destruction of high rises in large metropolises around the world, carried out by terrorists following the orders of "His Voice".

From what I've heard, the original "Cyborg 009" was the product of the social political climate of its time, so it's fitting that the remake also reflects the anxieties of the world we live in today - the relevant topic this time round being terrorism.

Given what I'd heard about the movie beforehand, I found to my surprise that most of this movie seems to make sense. As someone who knew little of the back stories, I thought it did a good job of supplying the necessary background without getting bogged down by exposition. I also appreciated its commentary on terrorism and the roles that religion, greed and politics play in its inception.

However, as it went on, "009 Re:Cyborg" increasingly obsessed over its religious themes to the detriment of everything else in the story. So much so that I started feeling like I was witnessing a religious fanatic having a revelation: perhaps it all makes sense to them, but to me it just comes across like incomprehensible madness. This downward trend accumulates in an ending that had me head scratching to the point of severe hair loss. Besides eliciting responses like "what the fuck just happened," it's an ending of such colossal magnitude of deus ex machina that it makes most other such endings look like ones borne of natural plot progression.

In the end, that somewhat ruined "009 Re:Cyborg" for me. Still, I don't regret watching the movie - it was worth it just for the visuals. After all, once in a while even art-blind eyes can enjoy eye candy. Mmmm candy... *drools*

Personal rating: +0.5 (decent)

The Cyborg 009 series is an outstanding series, however this movie doesn't quite like up to that. Though the visuals and sounds were outstanding, I had a mediocre experience.

I understand the apocalyptic theme and if executed well, the story works. However, there are a tremendous amount of holes in the plot that make the entire story make little to no sense. There were many questions left unanswered about various points made in the story. The is especially directed toward the ending, which made no sense. How did they all end up on a remote island-ish type place? How did they survive? Where did ... this and that character disappear to? Who the heck are they all talking about? We never get real answers to any of it. Don't get me wrong, it's nice that it all worked out in the end. I prefer happy endings, except when the story is still very much incomplete. Well, that's what it felt like to me. It could have been done better.

Besides that, I love the action packed scenes. They were stunning. The dubs were very good and not hurting my ears, though I may try it in subs in the future.

well this really stands out as a weak point compared to everything that came before it as all the other series kept a similar tone while this says fuck the tone the other series had it wants to be edgy action which makes it feel nothing like a 009 series it has the characters but that is about it

story 4
the story had a basic action movie kind of plot were they once again have to team up things happen to ramp up until the climax were they have do something to stop many people dying but for some reason the movie also decided to throw ... in weird fictional history about similar events happening long ago that really felt unneeded and just wrote in a way were everything connected to that part of the plot felt poorly used

art 7
i will say it atleast looks good it have a few scenes on destruction that are really eye catching and most of the action looks good and it uses darker coloring to better match the tone it was going for the i do think the art work for the characters suffered a bit they at times just look bad and don't have a distinctive enough look expected from main characters

sound 5
the only thing worth really noting is i felt the voice acting sounded bland and definitely fit what would be heard in a action movie that is trying to be edgy so basically emotion other that maybe anger or emotionless lines is rare

characters 3
they feel nothing like the characters seen in pass movies and series the lighter parts of there personality is completely gone Francoise is the only one that gets one or two lighter characters moments but her gentle nature is basically gone and the rest of the characters including 009 are no longer the characters they are expected to be and as a result they feel like a very bland bastardization of the characters that makes me wonder why was it made part of the 009 franchise

overall 5
this does the generic action plot well enough and eye catching enough to get a five but do to how badly the characterization was handled this is definitely a disappointing entry to the franchise that didn't know how it wanted to fit in it and doing a good job with how it looks is not enough to hold it together and make it good this is mediocre at best