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Black Box (2020, Amazon Prime)

 

Pretty good mystery thriller where Mamoudou Athie stars as a guy trying to piece his life back together following a serious brain injury - and struggling to comprehend the strange flashbacks he sees.

 

It's maybe a bit overlong (1hr 40mins) and would have made better, tighter, 45-60 min episode of Black Mirror - but the cast is engaging, and storyline reasonable enough to keep you entertained for the most part.

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On 26/07/2023 at 19:11, mfnick said:

Invincible

 

Just discovered and binged this on Prime. Why is there not a bigger fuss made about it? Absolutely fantastic. That train scene will stick with me for a long time. 

 

Yeah it's absolutely fantastic, we started and finished it earlier this week. Absolutely loved pretty much every second of it and can't wait for S2. 

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The Invincible premiere date of November 3 was announced at SDCC 2023. The second season will have eight episodes, four released in November, with the remaining expected early in 2024. 

 

There is also the Atom Eve one-off which is available to view now, apparently?

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Was anyone else courageous enough to watch the One Piece adaptation on Netflix? I've seen the first three episodes now (they're rather juicy at almost an hour runtime each) and I'll admit it's pretty decent. Extremely high production values, solid CG effects and it seems to respect the source material – at least as far as I remember, as it's been over 15 years since I read one of those manga.

 

It's still 'just' a shounen so don't go in expecting any kind of depth, but so far, so good. 

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I really want to watch it but I had never seen the anime so made a start on that first, I wanted to have some context for who the characters are and didn't want the live action to ruin key plot points from the anime if that makes sense.

 

But, yeah, I'll definitely get round to it, it looks good and reviews-wise has been a hit.

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That's the big question though – how far are they going to take this? Realistically there's absolutely no way they'll ever get to the end so I wonder what point they're going to choose to wrap it up. And if they're going to pull a Game of Thrones and write a completely different ending.

 

I just watched the last two episodes and it's really solid throughout. It manages to tone down the goofyness far enough for it not to be laughable, but it's obviously still ridiculously over-the-top at times. I think a good comparison point here is the Scott Pilgrim movie from a while back which also managed to put real actors into a scenario that shouldn't work, but somehow did.

 

It also helps that they did some great casting choices here. Nami, Luffy and Sanji are the highlights among the crew, but some of the secondary characters and villains came alive really nicely as well. The only one I wasn't really feeling was the actor who played Zoro, didn't really 'feel' like the character I remember (but then again it has been 15 years as I said).

 

As for the question whether or not one should know the story beforehand, I have no idea. I think the anime is pretty bad to be honest – it's one of those quickly put-together weekly shows that reeks of a strict deadline with lots of still images and subpar animation. I think the manga is a better choice to catch up beforehand, would also take up significantly less time.

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Blue Eye Samurai, not technically an anime, so I put it here.

 

A revenge story set in Japan's Edo period, focusing heavily on the country's isolation during that period and the xenophobia that came with it while also highlighting some of the chess pieces that will eventually lead to the Meiji Restoration. The setup is very trope-heavy with a lone ronin, a blacksmith master, a princess with a rebellious spirit. But while it doesn't reinvent the wheel, the execution is excellent, with a couple of surprises both in terms of its overarching storyline and character developments.

 

I had some issue with a few tonal shifts, one of which comes from the protagonists's comic relief sidekick. Overall the theme of the show is relatively mature and there's both an abundance of gore and a surprising amount of nudity, but I doubt anyone above the age of 12 would find the sidekick's shenanigans funny. The show also tends to veer from serious dramatic moments over to some Tarantino-esque over-the-top action scenes, but those gel a bit better in context, even if the switch can initially disorient a bit.

 

Visually this is one of the most beautiful works of 3D-animation I've seen in a while. The backgrounds are strikingly beautiful and some of the fight choreographies are masterfully done. Character design can't quite keep up with the rest, but at least the main cast is really expressive. I was particularly impressed by how they animated princess's Akemi's eyes – that character could have been mute and they still would have been able to portray everything she felt with 100% accuracy. Just like Arcane, this was animated in France, and it seems those guys are really becoming a powerhouse in that department, which is particularly obvious in times when Disney and Pixar seem to just copy-paste Frozen's style ad infinitum.

 

I'm still unconvinced about whether I agree with the direction they lay out for a Season 2 (which is hopefully coming). But until then I can only recommend this, it's for most of its runtime an extremely high-quality show if you don't go in expecting more than an expertly crafted, classic revenge tale with swords and samurai.

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Just finished Cyberpunk: Edgerunners... I don't generally do much Manga (is it Manga?) but that was excellent, took a while but grew to love Rebecca.

 

It's not mentioned much in the game thread but the music (in the game) and in this is also excellent.

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