Cat Soup: Horrifically Cute

This little gem from Tatsuo Sato is the story of cats. It’s a messed up story about cats. These cats are strange. There’s a family of them. And a pig. Which they eat. By unzipping him. It’s strange. But at the same time cute. Yeah…

Anyways, basic plot is that the little boy cat goes on a journey with his brain dead sister (who has only half of her soul recovered) to recover the other half of her soul. The go to a circus, travel on Noah’s Ark, meet the most sadistically crazed man I’ve ever seen, and witness some ending of the world. You could say the little cat-boy really loves his sister.

Coming into this, I gotta tell ya, the trailer for this was freaky. And it ended up being so. Not all that freaky, but more the disturbingly quirky route. I mean, these two cats cannibalize and beat to death a pig, who seems to be their friend. He gets destroyed. Hardcore. Obliterated. And he takes it like a champ. You gotta give some props to a character in a short film whose only purpose is to die so that others can live.

And yes, this anime has some allusions to global warming or a second flood. Just in general some environmental end of the world. I don’t get it. But it was a cute little 32 minute film to watch. The characters are quite cute. The music that accompanies the characters is also quite powerful and moving as well. Although there are no audible lines, there are a few thought bubbles here and there, the anime is purely visual.

In all honesty, this short anime film was a breath of fresh air. I rather enjoyed the morbid humor and unique transformation of images that occurred throughout. It’s short and grabs your attention for every minute and, in that way, not a minute of the film is wasted. You can walk away from it however you like, but it’s a nice little horrifically surreal cat film. Worth a watch. 8.3 out of 10.

Saikano… (Strange?)

This anime is a love story. With superweapons. But it’s all about the love. And the possible end of the world. Or something. Not quite sure. But the story is compelling. I’m starting to think this blog might be quite short…

This love story centers around Shuuji and Chise, two high school students who “fall in love.” It all starts one day when Chise asks Shuuji out. Their relationship starts in Animal Club diaries and pretty much moves up from there… sexually… But that’s really not the point… Sort of…

One day after school, Shuuji and his friends decide to go shopping. For necklaces. For one guy’s girlfriend. And then that guy dies. By the way, it was really funny picking out characters I liked in the anime and then having them all die. Not all important characters, mind you. But like, after that first guy, it

Shuuji and Chise. Made for each other?

became a game. (This is just because I have a predisposition to like characters who sacrifice their lives or are more prone to dying. It’s even true in movies.) But after this city bombing the interrupts their man day-trip (one guy’s day trip forever) Shuuji realizes something’s up.

What does he discover? His new girlfriend is a superweapon, made against her will by the Japanese government to protect the country’s borders. From what? We don’t know? From who? We’ll never know. This show’s all about the mystery. It’s also all about the sexy times, non-violent action scenes, and loss of humanity. A true angst-trip if I do say so myself. This girl ain’t got long (13 Episodes) and she’s got a lot of lovin’ to experience. (If you catch my drift.)

Okay, so what is there to say about my likes and dislikes of this anime? Well it has emotion. This anime is run through with tear-jerking moments. This anime has a mecha aspect to it that is never shown. Ever. Okay, once in a while Chise will show her wings or poop out a bomb, but that’s about the extent of the mecha. Her body can literally do things I’ve never seen a girl with a 9 year old’s body do before. Kinda strange. But there are a lot of really touching moments that, in the right mood, there would be quite a wad of teary tissues going on.

The voice acting isn’t bad. Shuuji (Mark Atherlay) isn’t bad and neither is Tetsu (Abie Hadjitarkhani. Wow.). Chise (Melissa Hutchinson) wasn’t all that good, but I kind of found her to be a drag and not really worth Shuuji’s time at a lot of the parts of the anime. That may mean I have no soul, but at this point, Shuuji should’ve cut his losses. The art was fine, shots were okay, nothing really spectacular. Besides the ending. I’m still scratching my head on what the flip happened at the end of this. The second to last episode (no spoiler) sex. The last episode, well, good luck figuring out exactly what happened and why and who and what and all that good stuff. Overall, I’d give Saikano a 5.5 out of 10. (Should’ve watched it subbed and just lost myself in it… How strange…)

Oh, and by the way, there is a live action version of this. Must. Check. Out.