Eureka Seven Movie

I watched this movie 24 hours ago and I am still speechless on how to describe it. From my favorite anime, comes a movie that is COMPLETELY different, and I actually thought it was better than the series? It was a shocking moment for me.

Basically, if you ever thought that the series was a little too kiddish, this will make you reconsider it. There is violence, and no more pink cloud explosions. It's brutal, but it's also intense in other ways as well. Compared to the anime, the ending of the movie, and the entire movie as a whole is very sad... But it's just amazing in the end. The interpretation of the characters are much better, and some of the main characters in the anime get killed or die. There are a lot of moments taken straight from the anime and redesigned into the movie, and I found that a little disappointing, but the story and the atmosphere more than made up for that.

It is a must watch for anyone - not just Eureka Seven fans.

Ok lets get this right out of way first thing, they have completely re-wrote the story I guess you would say. I would not reccomend this movie to an avid fan of the anime such as myself, mostly because they changed so much of it and characters are in roles they shouldn't be. This being said it is still a solid movie for fans and people who have never seen the anime.

The story is this: Renton and Eureka were childhood friends until a group in the military came and kidnapped here for experiments. Cut to 8 years in the future and Renton is now a soldier serving under Commander Holland aboard the Gekko. During a rescue mission of a highly classified subject, it turns out to be Eureka. The main enemy of the human race is the Image or Eizo I believe it is also called, and Eureka is actually a spy robot for the image. With out trying to give to much away they get involved in plot to reach "the other world" or "Neverland" as it is called in the movie. The story takes quite of few interesting twists and turns and is overall solid, but I just found it too much of a departure from the anime.

Sound is great as was in the anime. I did miss some of the signature songs from the openings and closing of the anime though. Oh well can't have everything.

As i explained above, the characters have been greatly twisted and there motivations are really strange. Some of the characters you wouldn't think would die, do. I think they would have been off creating new characters to fit those roles instead of using old ones, especially ones that had an established history from the anime. For example Dominic actually plays Renton's teacher and is at the age he was in the anime, but this time he's at that age when Renton is a child. Unfortunatly, and this may have been because I was watching using the original japanese voices and english subtitles, but most of the story flew right over my head and I couldn't really make heads or tails of it till the very end. Even then I was still left confused as hell.

Like the anime seris, the animation is top notch. One hugely notable flaw is the recycling of old scenes from the anime. I could understand if they took inspiration from some of the scenes from anime, but they completely kept old scenes, right down to the dialogue used. That is just completely lazy.

Overall, this movie is pretty solid, but I kinda wish they had called something other then Eureka Seven, as it got my hopes up that this would be exactly like the anime, and that was a direction, the creators of the movie didn't want to go. I feel they would have been better off just creating new characters (and new scenes) and use them in the same universe as the anime. Do not watch this movie expecting a loving recreation of the anime because you'll be disappointed. But all in all, it is a solid movie and despite some minor and major flaws (laziness) any fan of anime should atleast try to check this movie out.

P.S. This has nothing to do with movie, but I had one hell of a hard time finding this movie. And it only showed for one very poorly advertised night in the U.S.. Which many did even here about, I know I didn't.

If you are a big time Eureka Seven fan or not you would have loved this movie.

(If you where a big time E7 fan you had to let a few things go as this was a new myth not the same one as before. If you watch the movie %100 through you would Know what I mean and love the movie even more.)

It was made not as a extension to the series but a whole new story (myth as said in movie) so if it was you first time seeing it you would not be lost and you would be able to understand and love the movie.
That is the biggest thing everyone needs to remember going it to the movie is that it is NOT just a add on as the creator had stated he wanted something that was not just a extension he wanted a movie something that you could just go and watch and not have seen the series.

Yet this movie still has every thing that a E7 fan would want and need in the movie. While still keeping it original and new.

So there was a special one night event in theaters for this movie and I was lucky enough to go see it X3. I have to say if you're watching it for a continuation to the TV Series, look away. And if you're watching it for the sake of it being just a movie, just sit back and enjoy where it takes you and get what you can out of it.

Storyline
It's basically an alternate setting with some of your favorite characters in different roles than what you're used to seeing them as. However it still focuses on Eureka and Renton's love, where it can lead and what awaits them . I guess all I can really say is that the movie is a bit darker than what you're used to.

Music
That's one thing that made me kind of sad :(. They didn't have that much music in it. However the end track called "Space Rock" by iLL has a psychedelic feel to end it all.

Characters
Different roles and different personalities were a part of the movie. However I felt a lack of connection between the characters and the viewer, but that also might be caused by me being biased =p. I'd also like to say wow to Kari Wahlgren for playing our favorite pink haired lady. She did an awesome job for playing a role even she herself wasn't used to.

Animation
Beautiful yet again. I think the most awesome battle scene was the aerial battle between Renton and dun dun dun.... well you'll see =p. And another scene that holds dear to my heart is the very very end scene. It was simply breathtaking.

Overall
It's funny how when the movie was over I had my usual list of negatives ready, that is until I watched the little extra commentary that was at the end of the movie with the English dub team and I believe the director? Tomoki Kyoda. His view was that he didn't want the movie to be something that followed after the show and have the usual fans saying "You have to watch the show or you won't get the movie." He wanted it to stand alone and have the non fans just watch it on a whim if they wanted and maybe that would draw their interest to the series. He wanted to try something different and I find that admirable. So I'll go with A for effort and B for product.

The movie was a good watch and I'm glad I got to see it on the big screen. I wouldn't say this is a must see but I will say if you like romance and you're just going without expectations of the series, you might just enjoy it.

Oh and I have to say the very best part of the night was watching the bloopers from the English dub team. Hilarious stuff and a good way to end the night with a laugh.

Well,

Back home from the show... Personally, I really enjoyed it! NO SPOILERS HERE! I DON"T BELIEVE IN BEING THAT CRUEL TO ANYONE.

Technically speaking, I mean, come on, that is important too...

Animation -- It was very, very good. Almost awesome. (I guess seeing real amine in Hi-def., and on the big screen to boot, was just too much for my poor little eyes to handle.)
Audio The sound ~seemed~ like it was probably Dolby 2.0. I didn't bother to check the credits; so, I'm guessing there. although the sound was very solid, only one "sound clip" caught me totally off guard... And I mean completely. There should have been several more.
Dubbing -- English dubbing quality was, I must say, really top-notch. In fact, it was as close to perfect as you could get. I mean, considering it was dubbed after all.
Music -- I gotta say, I really enjoyed it. Both the "songs" and background were great.
Storyline -- Well, here I'm a bit conflicted. Why? Well, because I watched the series first, of course. That, plus the fact that it is a movie after all... Even with it being an alternate story line, two hours ain't much time to develop what you can do with 50 episodes. So, if you can get over that and just sit back and enjoy the show, you'll be happy. And happy is what it's all about.

All that being said, I knew that the story line was going to be an alternate. If I had gone in there thinking it was supposed to be an extension of the TV Series, I probably would have been disappointed, as were some of the folks in the theater were... Oh well; they'll get over it. (Maybe what they really need to get over is themselves.)