Anime

Blue Thermal review

Serialized in Monthly Comic Bunch, Blue Thermal told the story of a college freshman joining the aviation club. Protagonist Tsuru Tamaki’s journey was substantial, detailing the progress toward becoming a pilot as well as the ...

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Deemo: Memorial Keys review

Although Western animation frequently employs full computer-generated imagery (or CGI), Japan hasn’t embraced the technology as swiftly. The reasons for this are rooted in the budgetary as well as the artistic. Historically, anime has embraced ...

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Giovanni’s Island review

Production I.G’s 2014 film depicts the atrocities that accompany conflict and the aversion of people to succumb to abhorrence. An exceedingly fortunate few won’t have to witness atrocity. But the rest of us will be ...

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The House of the Lost on the Cape review

Entertainment tends to turn tragedy into spectacle. Habitually, the focus is on delivering vivid depictions of the catastrophic rather than exploring the inner turbulence faced by those affected. Fortunately, that’s not the case with The ...

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Fortune Favors Lady Nikuko review

Conventional roles are muddied in director Ayumu Watanabe’s (Children of the Sea, Space Brothers #0) Fortune Favors Lady Nikuko. Nikuko has lived a capricious life. Impulsively fallen for different men, she’s moved in with them, ...

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The Deer King review

A directorial debut can be a difficult undertaking. Often, experience is indispensable when it comes to artistic expression. But Masashi Ando and Masayuki Miyaji aren’t amateurs in the animation field. The former served as animation ...

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Panda! Go, Panda! Blu-ray+DVD review

In October 1972, the Ueno Zoo received a pair of pandas, commemorating diplomatic ties between China and Japan. This wasn’t the first time this kind of gesture of goodwill had been offered. According to historical ...

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Ryoma! Prince of Tennis review

The Prince of Tennis has enjoyed a whimsical 23-year history. The original manga debuted in 1999 and followed Ryoma Echizen, a student enrolled at Tokyo’s prestigious Seishun Academy, a private school with a prominent top-tier ...

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5 Centimeters Per Second review

The first episode of 5 Centimeters Per Second clarifies the meaning of the film’s title- it’s the rate that cherry blossoms fall. As Japan’s unofficial national flower, sakura has been celebrated for centuries. In March, ...

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Children Who Chase Lost Voices review

Ideally, art provides contemplation of life’s inevitable hardships.  But far too often, many modern movies deliver little more than sugar-coated platitudes. But that’s not the case with Makoto Shinkai 2011’s film, Children Who Chase Lost ...

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