At first, Steamboy seems promising with its philosophy of science versus science as the nation's military forefront plot, whereby scientific achievement is acknowledged as a scale to maximizes power. Those two very distinctive beliefs are stimulated by Dr. Eddie and Dr. Lloyd which also happened to be the main character Ray's dad and grandpa. Dr. Eddie believes that science as mankind's modern God should have been used for military purposes while at the same time, Dr. Lloyd believes that science should be used for the greater good and not for the greedy shareholders in the capitalist world.
But as time progresses, the debate between those two characters is getting really really reaaaallly boring. It felt like the film is suffocating me with its never ending midpoint plus their lack of emotional build ups, and to be honest if its not for their highly detailed “animation” i’ve mentioned earlier, i would for sure click the stop button cuz holy schnitzel i legit wanted to punch my laptop screen. To think that at first i thought Dr. Eddie is the antagonist made me wanted to punch both my face and my laptop screen (again) simultaneously cuz in the end it doesn't matter, both Dr. Eddie and Dr. Lloyd is just a bunch of sick delusional boomers that are blinded by their judgments. And when it finally gets better in their "rising action" act, the film somehow shifts its attention into a hero concept film by using Ray’s child innocence, sigh. But oh wait it gets worse when you hit the climax. The only way i can explain it into words without giving any spoilers is basically like listening to Vivaldi's The Four Seasons Summer in Presto opening that goes on and on but twice the speed with no ending at all.
The only interesting part i find from this film is their character placements. By placing three very different generations as their main focus and Ray as the center, it perfectly explained of how different their own generation view science can give a huge impact to mankind during the Victorian-era war. But to be honest that's it. I really tried to like this film tho, my expectations were very high specially this was Katsuhiro Otomo's film after Akira and Memories, which for me are two of his Magnum Opus.
So to sum it up, in the end im dissapointed and i don't think i'll ever try to rewatch it. It's suffocating and tiring, really.
