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Ah, to be in love. One of several of director Makoto Shinkai's films about young people longing for each other in absurdly detailed anime settings, "Weathering With You" delivers on all the J-pop needle drops and dramatic "I have to see her again!" moments that made his previous efforts, such as the 2016 smash hit "Your Name" global successes.

In the midst of the worst rainy season in Tokyo's recorded history, teenaged Hodoka attempts to make a life for himself away from his suffocating family and island home. A series of unfortunate (and some fortunate) events means that he becomes acquainted with the young Hina, ... a young woman who has the ability to replace the rainy sky with a sunny one. The pair work together to lend Hina's services to those who may need it, kicking off a love story for the ages.

Following in the footsteps of "Your Name", "Weathering With You" is impressive in its ability to render a setting so vivid as to make it truly feel like a modern-day fantasy. Shinkai's dedication to blending real-life elements with his animated world wind up making what would otherwise be cheap product placement feel like an essential component of the setting. These decisions work in service of making Tokyo feel grand in scale, as reflected by regular shots of the city being impacted by changing weather conditions. Films like these resonate the most strongly when we can imagine ourselves as the depicted characters, imagining being a teenager again and remembering when that special connection we had with someone else was the most important thing in the world. In that sense, characters using Apple computers or relying on Yahoo!! Japan for answers does a great deal. The film may be animated, but it really does feel like these characters could be any other teenager who one day fell into a fantasy story.

This notable strength is also a glaring weakness, unfortunately. "Weathering With You" and other films of its ilk (Mamoru Hosoda's "The Girl Who Lept Through Time" comes to mind) soar when you're able to emotionally connect with the action onscreen. If you watch one of these films in the right place at the right time, they can give you a feeling that's hard to match. If you're *not* the target demographic, though, things get a little muddy. Despite the fact "Weathering With You" is an altogether solid film with several strong points, I personally struggled to connect on a deeper level. I wouldn't be so hard on it if not for the fact that I know it's possible to tell an emotionally radiant story without sacrificing those outside of the niche. Naoko Yamada's "A Silent Voice" plays along similar emotional lines as "Weathering With You", following down-on-their-luck high schoolers who don't know anything except that they love someone, but supplements that premise with a far more thoughtful and well-rounded rendering of its characters. The additional texture and willingness to paint its main characters in a less-than-heroic light is not present in "Weathering With You", which means that it must rely solely on the main story engaging the audience to keep them watching.

"Weathering With You" is still a respectable film, of course. It's willing to go in an emotionally complex direction with its ending, and will more than service viewers who responded to Shinkai's previous works. It doesn't quite speak to a universal idea of young love, but it also isn't trying to. Honestly, with the amount of times Shinkai's made something about the universe keeping a perfect couple apart, you have to wonder what he went through.

What is the appeal of "Spirited Away?"

Arguably the most successful of anime giant Studio Ghibli's works, it has enjoyed a level of exposure in the United States rarely given to foreign films. A quick glance through other Letterboxd reviews will show a great deal of praise for its creative story, gorgeous animation, and deep themes. A more careful glance will reveal those who sing the film's praises only really go into detail about the animation, and sometimes the progression of main character Chihiro. Strange. You'd think a story as creative and cerebral as "Spirited Away" apparently is would inspire more detailed reactions.

To be fair, the ... animation *is* incredible. Praise of the ways in which Ghibli have recreated life through the fantastical lens of the film is so ample it could make up its own review. Characters move and react with an unreal level of smoothness at the same time as the film isn't afraid to play up certain moments to help them land. In a medium that has become heavily commodified and homogenized, "Spirited Away" fearlessly shows that anime is much more than dinner-plate sized eyeballs and canned reactions. Make no mistake, this is top-quality stuff.

The problem is that all of this beautiful art and detail is in service of an overloaded film frequently misconstrued as open-ended. What is ostensibly a story about a child growing up and gaining courage is both too detailed and not detailed enough. The character of No Face is a perfect example of this. Much like Chihiro and their future travelling companion Bo, No Face is a lonely soul whose anxiety towards the world leads to problems engaging with it. The symbolic significance of not only their transactional relationships, but also their misunderstanding of boundaries (as they swallow "friends" they've earned through their gold whole) is brilliant, but is diminished by their sudden loss of relevance at the end of the film. No Face was very close to being a creative and thoughtful depiction of one of the many ways in which people can struggle to connect with others, but an abrupt conclusion instead condemns them to being a function of their ideas, rather than a full-fledged character.

This is a recurring problem with "Spirited Away" that cannot be emphasized without a brief discussion of some of Studio Ghibli's other works. One of the unsung strengths of the best of their catalog (and, arguably, a strength iconic of the finest Japanese films) is an understanding of and respect for life so deep that the kind of extremity rampart in Hollywood productions is replaced with beautiful subtleties much closer to reality. No country's film output is a monolith, of course (Sion Sono's passion-fueled "Why Don't You Play In Hell", for example, revels in depictions of a type of streamlined carnage on the level of some exploitation films), but this awe at simple existence is a defining feature of Ghibli's (and Japan's) greatest works. "Princess Mononoke", for example, brings the nature-versus-society themes present in "Spirited Away" front and center, and depicts the consequences of these two states clashing with a frankness that is both shocking and refreshing. 2013's "The Wind Rises" wonderfully contrasts the bombastic "Oppenheimer" (2023), by showing a more demure version of a scientist in World War II coming to terms with the ways in which their creations have been corrupted by the very forces that enabled them. "Ponyo" wisely centers itself around its anticlimax, disrupting convention and "adult" notions of reality thanks to its steadfast belief in the goodness of children. The list goes on. The problem is that this list does not include "Spirited Away".

Where Ghibli's other works have the confidence to provide mixed if not bittersweet endings, "Spirited Away" falls flat as it pastes over its subtext to make a storybook. The titanic "Porco Rosso" concludes in a way that is both disappointing and thoughtful, as it denies audiences the ability to easily reconcile the plight of its main character while also giving a surface-level happy conclusion. "Grave of the Fireflies" pulls no punches, memorializing the untold number of Japanese people who fell victim to the nation's wartime nationalism while also showing that even in the darkest of times, childlike wonder at the world is possible. "Spirited Away" seems to be moving along these lines, but is simply too overstuffed and linear to explore them fully. What lessons are we meant to take from the film's criticisms of its greedy characters? Apparently, only the ones it wants us to. Progression of characters such as the baby Bo suggest that the layered filmmaking present in Ghibli's greatest films was not forgotten, only de-emphasized in favor of telling a more direct main story. A narrative bottleneck is created when all of its broad ideas and imaginative concepts must be tied into The Point, which is that Chihiro returns to reality with a changed perspective and a newfound preparedness for adulthood.

The appeal of "Spirited Away", then, is that it is a gateway. This fact is deeply ironic given the regular use of gates and mystical boundaries in the film, but perfectly explains how it could see massive success abroad despite being out of step with with what Ghibli films are at their best. It provides viewers a path into a fantastical world unlike anything they're ever seen, while also giving them a clear enough route through it to avoid feelings of real loss or confusion. It is far from a bad film, simply misguided in its attempt to guide the viewer. Its choices make it easy-to-follow for those new to anime or Ghibli, but in doing so lose out on what makes the medium truly special.

I am deeply critical of "Spirited Away", and I even would go as far as to say I dislike it. I will not, however, deny its clear value. If you're someone whose primary exposure to anime or Japanese cinema was through this film, or if you're generally a champion of Studio Ghibli, I hope my review has inspired more excitement than anger. There's far worse films to enjoy than this one, and it remains a useful jumping-off point for those who want to find out more about anime or Japanese film as a whole (not that further exploration is required, of course - you do you). For many, "Spirited Away" was likely one of their first steps into a larger world. One should never be critical of people taking their first steps, but should still keep in mind how much more they'll see if they keep walking.

In the current year, Sonic the Hedgehog is mostly known for a slew of modern-day game titles as well as a trilogy of live-action films. While releases such as the 2017 game "Sonic Mania" have sought to honor the decades-long legacy of the blue blur, they fall short due to emphasizing the content of Sonic rather than its spirit. It is for this reason the 1996 Sonic OVA, created by anime studio Pierrot, is an essential piece of Sonic media. In a brisk 54 minutes, it gives its viewers a crash-course on the essence of Sonic while telling a story barely tied to the game ... series.

When Sonic the Hedgehog and his buddy Tails are called in to defuse a hostage situation initiated by the egomaniacal Dr. Robotnik, they discover their world, Planet Freedom, is on the verge of catastrophe. Thanks to the arrival of a new threat that has ousted Robotnik from his home, less than a day stands between our heroes and total armageddon. It's up to a reluctant Sonic and a resolute Tails to plunge into the heart of darkness that is Robotnik's mechanical metropolis and save the planet from disaster. A premise straight from the series' halcyon days is bolstered with a few extra surprises down the line. They will not be shared here, but they're always a total treat.

The Sonic OVA is at its best when the zaniness inherent to its star characters shines through in actions both great and small - which is another way of saying the Sonic OVA is nearly always at its best. Perfectly in line with the series' most successful games, the story zigzags from a sunbathed beach to a stuffy government office to the eerily familiar ruins of a city, constantly escalating and rarely stumbling while doing so. With a runtime of less than an hour, it's genuinely impressive how well Pierrot was able to render a globe-trotting adventure starring the world's coolest hedgehog. The OVA repeatedly capitalizes on its animated nature by injecting a level of life and personality in its characters even blast processing couldn't muster.

Perhaps even more impressive than Pierrot's understanding of its source material is its ability to have its newly-created characters keep pace. Freedom Planet's President's daughter, Seira, is a special standout. Paired with Robotnik for most of the film, her outspoken and sometimes bratty nature allows her to match and check his hilarious outbursts. This is no small feat - Robotnik steals every scene he's in, and their dueling attitudes make up a great deal of the film's comedy. It's a shame that so many characters like Seira have fallen to the wayside in the franchise's recent years - they do a great deal to give Sonic media like the OVA a distinct personality and flavor.

There's really not much else to say: The Sonic OVA is a must-watch. It stands as a perfect artifact of Sonic The Hedgehog at its best - bouncy, playful, and energetic, while still leaving room for reflection and depth. It harnesses its youthful energy to deliver a completely unforgettable iteration on what has become one of gaming's most successful series, and never compromises along the way. A standout product of the classic Sonic era, and a perfect thematic compliment to the games that made Sonic famous.