This is the first movie that I ever watched that truly lifted me off my feet, sucked me into it's world, and made me never want to leave.
For reviews about stuff I like, I try to highlight the stuff I don't like to make it more evenly balanced and try to weigh the good and the bad more evenly with each other, but I think this review kind of broke my objective perspective a little bit. I just love this movie to damn much.
Story 9/10: Although not perfect, there aren't any major noticeable problems or potholes that I can point out. The story does a great job of giving things a reason to happen, and for the most part everything that does happen makes sense in it's universe. The only improvement I could offer would be to make the entire story longer to stretch out the narrative and give the hypersonic speed of the plot a little more room to breath.
Art 10/10: This was made well over 30 years ago, but you could honestly tell me the animation was made last month and I would believe you. The color pallet was beautiful, the character designs where inventive and easily distinguishable, and all the mechanical moving parts were outstanding. Nothing to say here besides amazing.
Sound 10/10: The opening theme alone is enough to give this a 10. I realize this is more subjective, but Girl Who Fell From The Sky is probably my favorite single piece of OST of all time, and it still send chills down my spine when I hear it. The rest of the soundtrack ranges between perfect and perfecter, no complaints here whatsoever. Disliking the soundtrack to this should be classified as a cardinal sin.
Character 8/10: I don't feel they deserve a 7, but anything above 8 just isn't fair. The weakest link in this movie by a landslide. Not because they're bad, but because everything else in this movie stands miles above the bar, even by today's standards. The movie is so laser focused on showing you everything all at once and wowing you with an amazing spectacle of animation and world building, they almost forgot about the characters necessary to pull it off in the first place. It feels like they never have enough time to fully flesh out the characters to the extent I would have preferred, but I won't count that against the movie that hard; it's extremely difficult to do anything even resembling this with only 2 hours of runtime, and they did a great job with what they had to work with. The main characters get the short end of the stick for this movie, and have the common Shonen trait of being the least interesting people in their own story. The rest of the cast was amazing though, but lets talk about the MCs:
Pazu: Teeters between being a gigachad knight in shining armor and a straight up overpowered Gary Stu, and he occasionally makes decisions that don't entirely make sense. However, he never does anything that would actively slow down the plot or wouldn't make sense for his character. Overall, he did a good job, but was definitely not perfect and I could understand why people might dislike him.
Sheeta: A damsel in destress, and moves the plot forward by having Pazu saving her over and over again. She wasn't that bad though, she did things that made sense for the most part as well, had a decent character arch, and great chemistry with Pazu and the rest of the cast.
Enjoyment 10(11?)/10: It's one of the greatest works of pure escapism I've ever had the joy of diving headfirst into, to say I enjoyed this would be an understatement. It starts off fast, and ends faster. Everything about this movie bleeds action, adventure, and a childlike sense of wonder, exploration, and discovery.
Overall: 10/10: While I realize it's not everyone's Magnum Opus, you'd have to be made of stone to genuinely not feel anything watching this masterpiece. I saw this movie when I was 10, and I vividly remember this being THE thing that sparked my fascination with storytelling as a whole. Watched this 7 years later, it's still just as wonderful. Do yourself a favor, and set aside 2 hours to bask in the glory of this film, however cheesy it may be.
