Truly Dreadful Film

disgusting, overrated, pointless

A different way of telling a story

The best films of this genre always show a path and provide a takeaway for being a better person.

I like surreal experimental films and animes. I don't mind when it's bizzare or even incohrrent as long as it got a point. Now this anime is bizzare and it does got a point but it is also disgusting and gives so many wrong messages. This must be the kind of anime that makes many people hate anime, over sexualized girls all over being extremely teasing with nonsensical plot and visuals. The sad thing is the creativity behind this anime is huge with amazing animation and so many creative ways (even though silly) to showcase the symbolisms. The story is about the coming of age story of Naota and everything else is his sexual growth it's problems and the woman involved. Now the anime is already pretty nonsensical with the other story arc of the alien girl who uses this boy as portal to bring robots to use them against an alien corporation. But the problem is this non coherent anime got only one thing that makes sense to everyone, it's about how a 12 year old boy is manipulated and used by 3 girls among them 2 older girls and one of them adult, along with a horny father in the house it's always about sex. A sex comedy about a 12 year old boy is not ok. It's ok to show a 12 year olds sexuality and sexual awakening, it's even ok if it is sometimes comical but this show is just atrocious in that aspect. The boy is completely manipulated by girls. At the beginning he's manipulated by the 17 year old girl who was his brother's ex girlfriend and she uses him for her pleasures even if it's not so extreme. Then the alien girl comes and starts manipulating him and he totally falls for it, even at the ending when he could have been better off he's still not out of it. In the middle of the anime the whole sex and death thing with the father is too weird and even after that the boy falls for that girl. All these problems are secondary because it's almost impossible to figure out all this. The biggest problem is while figuring out what's happening one would assume to get something out of it but not something so disgusting, disturbing and appalling. The amount of phallic symbols used in this and the use of cultural references for sexual awakening would be enough to think they aren't symbols anymore. It's almost like pro pedophile.

Well, I simply had to write a mini-review of this. I don't consider myself an 'anime fan', although I've seen around 30 of them in my life. I value ones like Death Note, Monster, Berserk, Hunter x Hunter, Shingeki No Kyojin, Hellsing Ultimate, Baccano etc. This one, it just does not convince me.It honestly was extremely hard for me to watch. Even though it only has 6 episodes, I was struggling to continue through a single one of them. I had to watch it in around 8 sessions and I usually watch multiple episodes at once. I am aware it's meant to be a parody, but it simply doesn't convince me. I agree that the visuals are superb even for current times and probably genius for back then. The music is also above average. But it only makes me more irritated. Because both the visuals and great audio could be used back then to tell us some original story. A real, new story. Not some kitsch random set of scenes supposedly aimed to be ironic. I do not agree about it being 'the essence of growing up' or a sensible parody of anything. I can see the references to Neon Genesis Evangelion, but a creation which is not sensible itself can't be considered a good parody either.I know there will be many who'll disagree. But I wanted to warn the ones who expect a real story not to count for it in this series' case. The title is quite adequate - coolly form and fooly essence.

FLCL is a Japanese animated show that has no real plot to truly speak of. I mean there is of course a plot but that is no the real draw of FLCL, really that honor belongs to the animation and the characters of FLCL. The animation to this show is absurdly good. Like much better than an anime television show usually is. To put that more into context; anime is well known for using pretty much every trick in the book to use as little actual animation as possible to work on a bare bones budget and incredibly constrained time-hacks. FLCL does not do that. It is animated like a strange dream, fluid and beautiful in a way that just doesn't happen normally. Its a joy to watch. The characters are all interesting and act much differently than most other characters in traditional entertainment as they really don't seem to act on a certain drive to achieve some goal, instead they all just act upon feeling. Excitement, Loneliness, lust, anger, they just live how they feel and with animation backing them up their emotion can be sowed into their very reality with art style change or visual gags impossible to achieve in live-action. I would recommend this with a warning that since the show is about following emotion instead of logic I would like to acknowledge that this will turn a lot of people off the show, but I loved my time with it.

Granted had the series gone on I would not have a clue as to how it would have continued with the story. It wrapped up rather nicely, though I have to say it had a really strange ending. Then again the whole series was rather strange and I am sure it was a metaphor for one thing or another not to be taken to literally. My guess something along the lines of a boy going through puberty, or something along those lines. The story has a normal, well not exactly all that normal boy going about his daily life. He has kids that are his age that he sort of hangs out with, but he also hangs out with this older girl that apparently dated his brother who is now playing baseball. Well things are not normal in this town (the giant iron that goes off and is some sort of factory is proof of that), however things are getting even less normal when a gal driving a little scooter soon hits the boy and leaves him with a very nasty head wound and soon moves into his house and life. The boy lives with a rather perverted father and introducing this gal as a new member of the household the cartoon shifts to a manga format. Yes, this show is wacky and crazy as there is also a robot and other objects come out of the boy's head (yes, you read that right). The whole show is very funny and very high energy. One of my main complaints is that sometimes the pacing is too fast and you miss a lot. The characters are great with the crazy alien chick that moves in is very funny as is the dad. The boy at times is a bit whiny, but overall I liked all the characters. To bad the show could not run longer, but on the plus side it is a rather easy show to collect on DVD.