Star Wars: Visions

Disney has been taking over the movie industry step by step, so naturally it wasn't long before they show an interest in anime. What resulted is their first original anime based off a popular franchise that they purchased the rights to about a decade ago, Star Wars: Visions. Deciding to make an anthology about Star Wars was an interesting idea, and they decided to hire seven different anime studios to animate nine short self contained episodes. This resulted in nine episodes of varying quality, but the decision to compile short stories itself had its own strength and flaws.

Let me get this out of the way. ... I am not a huge Star Wars fan in general, and outside of the three main trilogies, Rogue One, and The Mandalorian, I don't know anything else about the universe. So perhaps there are a bunch of references to other shows or books, but I wouldn't know. That being said, I found the episodes with obvious easter eggs to be of lesser quality than the other episodes. Additionally, I can say that one doesn't need to be really familiar to enjoy this anthology.

The pros of short self contained episodes is that it gives more imagination to the creative team and that if one person doesn't like an episode, they can watch the next and perhaps enjoy it. The cons of this style is that people that prefer a narrative and recurring characters might not get invested and that having a one-shot even that one enjoys can become unsatisfying if there isn't more.

Likewise, some episodes in this anthology focus more on story while others focus on style. Depending on what type of person one is will impact which shorts one ends up liking. So I will briefly get into the individual episodes.

The first episode, The Duel, is animated by Studio Kamikaze Douga and is a nice enough introduction. It is very style heavy and utilizes experimental animation. It isn't deep, but the animation and coolness of the characters will influence how much one likes it.

The second episode, Tatooine Rhapsody, by Studio Colorido, has the most amount of references to the main series, but it ended up being the most disappointing. This is doubly true once finishing the anthology and realizing how different it is, and not in a good way. It's aimed much more toward a younger audience with its cutesy and dull animation and doesn't have any stakes worth caring about. It's more of a musical, and leaves more inconsistencies and questions than one would like.

The third episode, The Twins, by Studio Trigger, is what most people expected it to be: an insane sakuga fest of zany action. The story's focus is very narrow and it just sets up the two twins to fight. Interestingly, it serves as an clever contrast to the original Star Wars trilogy. Sort of like a "what-if" scenario. It is easy to poke holes at some things that happen, but it's Trigger, so that isn't the point. Like why does an android need an astronaut helmet in space? The underlying story and action make the episode a fun adventure in the anthology.

The fourth episode, The Village Bride, by Studio Kinema Citrus, has the best soundtrack of the series, composed by Kevin Penkin and has one of the coolest characters in the anthology, simply referred to as "F". The story isn't that compelling, but the atmosphere set up by the animation and soundtrack make a good showing with a bombastic finale with great action.

The fifth episode, The Ninth Jedi, by Studio Production I.G., is possibly the overall best piece in this show. It contains a full story, sets up a potential sequel, and has elements of action, mystery, and suspense. Constructed around a interesting cast of characters, especially the lead, it all culminates in a finely told story which will definitely surprise the viewer. This is the episode that feels like it could have deserved a full series.

The sixth episode, T0-B1, by Studio Science Saru, is cute and fun, but it doesn't do much besides that. The animation throughout the episode is pretty good, especially in the action scene, but it's mostly style and little substance.

The seventh episode, The Elder, once again animated by Studio Trigger, is very different than their previous short. It's more substance than it is style. It is a slow burn, or at least relatively compared to the runtime. It's mainly the two main characters bantering in conversation. Towards the end though, a new character makes an appearance and some chaos ensues. It could have benefited with more of a story, but the calm story and characters makes an interesting contrast to their previous episode.

The eighth episode, Lop and Ochō, by Studio Geno Studio, was one of the more highly anticipated episodes of this anthology, along with the Trigger episode, and this episode is an easy contender with the fifth episode as the best of the show. The animation style, the characters, and the story are brought together in a truly engaging tale of two adopted sisters finding themselves at odds with each other. It could have benefitted with a longer runtime, but that's true with all of the shorts.

The ninth episode, Akakiri, once again by Studio Science Saru, is another instance of extreme contrast between same studio episodes. While the first they did was colorful and cheerful, this is a lot darker in both color and tone. It also plays to their strength of trippy animation. That being said, it's mostly style and if it wasn't for the unpredictably dark cliffhanger at the end, it would end up as a complete turn off of a final episode due to being a very weak stand alone. As it turned out, the dark ending might be why they left it for last.

So that's all the episodes. They all could have benefitted from a longer runtime, but they are shorts for a reason. In general, the longer ones were better than the shorter ones, which makes sense.

It's not easy to score an anthology, as there are strong entries and weak entries, but overall, I would say that whether one is a fan of Star Wars or not, there is enough content of different variety that most people will find at least one episode that appeals to them. Again, the episodes that one ends up liking will depend greatly on personal tastes and whether one prefers substance or style.

I am scoring this anthology an 8. I enjoyed it enough to keep me watching without stopping and there are storylines that I am highly anticipating seeing sequels to if they ever come.

Being both a fan of Star Wars and anime, this collaboration seemed like a gift from the gods. How could I not be excited for this! Even with the score I have given it, it still lived up to my expectations.

※ Story: 5/10 ※

As an episodic series. there was a great variation in the tone for each episode. In some episodes, we viewed a light-hearted and dreamy scene unfold, while in others, we witnessed a more serious tone with more mature scenes.

Each episode did well in differentiating itself from the others in its storytelling. It didn't feel repetitive despite most episodes revolving around ... 'The Force' and Jedis. The direction that the episodes took was also unexpected and not cliche. I found myself surprised with some of the decisions the story writers made.

That being said, there was nothing incredible about the stories, nothing intelligent or awe-inspiring, especially with the time constraints for each episode. Quite a few didn't close off the story but rather instigated the idea of a follow-up.

In terms of being 'Star Wars', I'm glad these aren't Canon. The series took a lot of creative liberty with Star Wars lore, with episodes breaching it on many occasions. That being said, there we iconic Star Wars vehicles, planets and figures that returned to remind you that this is in fact Star Wars.

Of course, this would not be anime without some Japanese culture in it. The Star Wars technologies and Japanese culture were interwoven well whether through the settings, characters or tools. It was very cool to see such a combination come to life.

※ Characters: 6/10 ※

For characters, there were a few well-written ones such as Dan and Tajin who had great chemistry and F. Other than that, no character really stood out as special nor memorable, just average, with a simple motive and a simple personality.

Character designs were done well, especially in the 1st and 7th episodes. I would have liked more Aliens in the main casts, but I'm still contempt with what we got as no main character was appalling, except the furry one.

※ Production: 7.5/10 ※

The animation and sound are definitely where the anime shines. The iconic lightsaber sound coupled with great animation made for interesting fights. The Choreography in this was, I would argue, better than in some Canon Star Wars media, I was impressed with it.

Wide shots in some of the episodes incorporated heavy CG for the scale which was a bit offputting, but completely understandable.

The music definitely had that Star Wars vibe meshed in with some traditional Japanese music, contributing well to their respective scenes.

※ Enjoyment: 5/10 ※

The score for this category is a bit misleading as some of the episodes were superb (my personal favourites were episodes 1, 4 and 7) while others paled in comparison, primarily because of the boring setting and plot.

Lightsaber fights just never get old and the anime maintained that while adding its own originality.

For anyone who is a Star Wars and anime fan, I highly recommend Star Wars: Visions!

If you have never watched Star Wars, you can watch the anime without any problems, if you know what a Jedi is, that's fine. Another attempt by Disney to do something different with Star Wars, being Japanese we can see samurai jedi and homages to classic manga works like "Vagabond" and "Astro Boy" with good art, but it's a shame that it's a bad anime....

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator

-Story: 4/10 (Lack of plot)
Star Wars visions has reasonably good ideas for its episodes but its big problem would be their short screen time, it is hard to build a good story in only fourteen minutes, ... as we can see, in many episodes the flaw is evident, where the anime shows us dramas and fights, without even presenting the characters or a good context. Such factors that make climactic scenes futile and ignorable, unless you're the type to be entertained by anything.

-Art: 8/10 (Beautiful and creative)
The production is the best part of the show, each studio did their best and did their best to make their animations, especially episodes one and three, where it is beautiful in artistic terms and very well directed. impressive.

-Sound: 6/10 (ok...)
The soundtracks vary with the episodes, but there is nothing so remarkable, the sound effects are good, but that's about it

-Characters: 4/10 (disposable...)
Of all the episodes we have at most 3 good characters, little screen time hinders you from generating some empathy for the characters, in its great majority they are nothing but posts without charisma or even without motivations or personality. In a certain episode the anime even tries to make a drama with the death of a character that you didn't even realize was there so useless, it was funny.

-Enjoyment: 4.5/10 (You can stay awake)
Honestly, none of the nine episodes I consider good, what saves the anime from boring you is that it's short. Star Wars Visions is nothing but a show of animation and random fights on your screen.