Greetings, 1st post.
I did originally watch both movies, if I recall correctly, by borrowing them on VHS from a classmate sometime in the mid 90s. I remember enjoying them though do not remember any of the content other than that they were slow paced and 'serious'.
Firstly my dissatisfaction it isn't for the lack of action, since, as above, I already knew what they were all about in that regard. Actually quite the opposite. I liked the slow meandering none action scenes, especially the detective walk about the city part.
The problem is that the ending just felt anti-climactic. It felt like a gut punch from that hydraulic arm of the Type-0. They 'win' and that's it. After all that buildup about how much of a savant the evil guy was there is no resolution. I thought that would come with the bit where she goes up to the tower but no, again, that was a letdown - or maybe I miss some 'deep' philosophical meaning, a la NGE ending interpretations.
Ironically I read watch order recommendations before and saw, one stating to skip the Early Days series and go straight to the movies 1 + 2, and perhaps 3. Well on the contrary, although the zany comedy is a bit jarring in the ED ones I watched so far (first 3) I much prefer the character development and just slice of life of lowly police recruits fare of the series. Feels much more chill and somehow satisfying.
The problems with the movie are not so much the fault of this particular movie itself as much as I don't really like movies that much at all due to the extreme restrictions they have on time and having to pack so much into just a couple of hours. So not really a fair comparison to put a series against a movie but it could have been done much better within those limitations as many other movies can and do.
This watch has been part of my recent campaign searching for, or re-discovering mecha anime, having almost finished VOTOMS, and the obligatory rewatch of Neon Genesis - the latter which I thought atrocious and absolutely hated it, far more than I remember (I was waiting for this 'controversial ending' which is so much talked about, expecting for it to make up for the mediocre whole series and that turned out to be the WORST part!) - which I am sure will get backlash but that can be for another thread.
VOTOMs has been mostly light hearted fun. The different 'stages' is kept things interesting, though largely unnecessary, but an interesting change. I was not expecting too much for such an old anime. I let the cliche characters slide as it is more just nice to watch from a historical aspect to see how mecha anime was at its inception. I got totally bored coming to the last 3 episodes or so though and don't know if I will bother to finish it and if I do it will feel like work. Just totally lost interest with the final revelation of the main character, which I won't spoil here.
Seems my attention will now naturally turn to gundam.
For the record what I have been searching for is 'real robot', hard sci-fi, mecha. VOTOMs is good like that. Patlabor was promised to be one of the best examples but the issues above let it down with the movie for me. So any recs which might scratch the itch there are welcome. I didn't watch too many back in the 90s as access was harder of course before broadband internet, so it was just a case of what your friends happened to have. I also was in a very rural area so even less access to the latest media.
Not the same but just to mention, I recently got through the whole Fist of the North Star series which I must say was the most fun of all I have watched on my recent anime binging. Doesn't take itself too seriously and the post apocalypse setting is to my preferences in line with my general sci-fi penchant.
I did originally watch both movies, if I recall correctly, by borrowing them on VHS from a classmate sometime in the mid 90s. I remember enjoying them though do not remember any of the content other than that they were slow paced and 'serious'.
Firstly my dissatisfaction it isn't for the lack of action, since, as above, I already knew what they were all about in that regard. Actually quite the opposite. I liked the slow meandering none action scenes, especially the detective walk about the city part.
The problem is that the ending just felt anti-climactic. It felt like a gut punch from that hydraulic arm of the Type-0. They 'win' and that's it. After all that buildup about how much of a savant the evil guy was there is no resolution. I thought that would come with the bit where she goes up to the tower but no, again, that was a letdown - or maybe I miss some 'deep' philosophical meaning, a la NGE ending interpretations.
Ironically I read watch order recommendations before and saw, one stating to skip the Early Days series and go straight to the movies 1 + 2, and perhaps 3. Well on the contrary, although the zany comedy is a bit jarring in the ED ones I watched so far (first 3) I much prefer the character development and just slice of life of lowly police recruits fare of the series. Feels much more chill and somehow satisfying.
The problems with the movie are not so much the fault of this particular movie itself as much as I don't really like movies that much at all due to the extreme restrictions they have on time and having to pack so much into just a couple of hours. So not really a fair comparison to put a series against a movie but it could have been done much better within those limitations as many other movies can and do.
This watch has been part of my recent campaign searching for, or re-discovering mecha anime, having almost finished VOTOMS, and the obligatory rewatch of Neon Genesis - the latter which I thought atrocious and absolutely hated it, far more than I remember (I was waiting for this 'controversial ending' which is so much talked about, expecting for it to make up for the mediocre whole series and that turned out to be the WORST part!) - which I am sure will get backlash but that can be for another thread.
VOTOMs has been mostly light hearted fun. The different 'stages' is kept things interesting, though largely unnecessary, but an interesting change. I was not expecting too much for such an old anime. I let the cliche characters slide as it is more just nice to watch from a historical aspect to see how mecha anime was at its inception. I got totally bored coming to the last 3 episodes or so though and don't know if I will bother to finish it and if I do it will feel like work. Just totally lost interest with the final revelation of the main character, which I won't spoil here.
Seems my attention will now naturally turn to gundam.
For the record what I have been searching for is 'real robot', hard sci-fi, mecha. VOTOMs is good like that. Patlabor was promised to be one of the best examples but the issues above let it down with the movie for me. So any recs which might scratch the itch there are welcome. I didn't watch too many back in the 90s as access was harder of course before broadband internet, so it was just a case of what your friends happened to have. I also was in a very rural area so even less access to the latest media.
Not the same but just to mention, I recently got through the whole Fist of the North Star series which I must say was the most fun of all I have watched on my recent anime binging. Doesn't take itself too seriously and the post apocalypse setting is to my preferences in line with my general sci-fi penchant.
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I can't get no satisfaction.
