Bubble

The trailers for this movie honestly didn’t inspire much confidence. The visuals were undoubtedly gorgeous, and I was extremely excited to see what this outstandingly talented group of industry veterans was going to create, but the premise and characters looked so boring, and boring is the last word that comes to mind when I think of Tetsuro Araki. Typical “boy meets girl” story; obsession with the Tokyo Metroplex; generic Eve pop song; inconsequential-looking friend group; pretty boy protagonist wearing Beats™ by Dre. If you told me those were the trailers for the next Makoto Shinkai film, I would’ve been like, “Wow! Why is his directionsuddenly so engaging?!” But I still would’ve believed you. However, after having actually watched the movie, I’m glad to say many of these elements were likely included for marketing purposes only, none of them are ultimately a detriment to what makes the film good, and the actual execution is quite something. I was surprised to realize this film was inspired by The Little Mermaid. More specifically, the Hans Christian Andersen tragedy, not the Disney fairy tail. Its highly symbolic world and setting is visually breathtaking and a total joy to become immersed in the beauty of, but it’s also deliberately mystifying. A giant bubble has formed around the city, and gravity has gone haywire, but never do you comprehensively understand why. The film provides the audience with the exposition necessary to understand what’s directly relevant to the plot, but otherwise, it let’s your imagination run wild, and it’s done not in a way that feels cheap and underdeveloped, but instead deliberate and magical. If Bubble had deep and memorable characters on top of everything else it has going for it, it could’ve easily been a genuine masterpiece, but without them, it’s not suddenly a bad movie, because everything else about the film suggests it might actually be one anyway. Araki’s imagery combined with the thrill of Sawano’s music never fails to blow your mind. The artwork and animation is simply stunning, even for WIT, Obata’s designs are splendid, Sawano is rightly praised as a legend by virtually everyone, and Araki is one of my favorite directors for a really good fucking reason. With more and more studios desperately trying to copy WIT’s 3D environments, it’s worth reminding ourselves why WIT’s were so impressive in the first place. Yes, the renderings and graphics were perfect, but the real reason they felt so exhilarating was because Tetsuro Araki was the one directing the shots. If you saw the trailers for this movie and didn’t immediately think, “Well, alright. This is obviously just an excuse to have people parkour around a weightless and inventive cityscape with jaw-dropping animation and electrifying visual action.” Then, honestly, you need to do yourself a favor and watch more of Araki’s work. Watching this felt like watching Promare in theaters. Around half an hour in, I realized it wasn’t trying to be Imaishi’s next Gurren Lagann or Kill la Kill; it wasn’t trying to be deep; it was just trying to be a visual feast, and it succeeded. GKIDS had a translated interview with some of the creative staff which played after the screening, and if I remember correctly it was Shigeto Koyama who kept talking about how the “movement” of the film was constantly bringing him to tears. Everyone laughed as if he was joking, including himself, but he insisted he was serious, and when asked to elaborate, he just kept repeating that same word. “Movement.” While Bubble didn’t move me to tears or anything, I completely understand what he was saying after watching it. I wasn’t terribly invested in the story or characters, but I understood and appreciated them, and with even such a simpleminded connection established, I was able to get swept away by Araki’s sheer creative vision. People, generally speaking, think I’m a cunt. They think I hate anime, and I just make excuses to bitch and complain. They think I nitpick and overemphasize every tiny little issue I can find as a cynical excuse to hate on whatever anime I’m talking about. I insist this isn’t true. I insist my harsh analytical criticism is merely a product of my high standards, and should an anime meet those basic standards—a competent production, a competent script, a competent director, and so on—then I’m actually extremely generous. As long as an anime has a solid foundation and doesn’t actively annoy me, I’m very easily entertained, and Bubble is irrefutable proof. It’s not that the film is nothing special, because it is special; it’s that the film isn’t tremendously deep or complex. If, by the sound of things, you think you’re too good for something this fast and loose, then Bubble may not be for you, but I cannot say the same for myself. Indeed, this film may just be too good for me. Thank you for reading.

*Spoilers marked* I can't say a lot about this movie, because there is not a lot to speak about. We start with the foundation which is basically Akira, going down into the route of Weathering with You, The Little Mermaid, and countless other "outsider must learn how to behave like a human" anime—I swear at one point I felt a Chobits vibe. This should already sound alarm bells that there is too much inspiration from other works, and nothing here to call their own. Even when attempted, it'd just be forgotten as fast as it came in (see last few minutes and Hibiki backstory). Seriously, if Ihad to go and think up what was originally here, I'd have to go and rewatch the entire thing because I got nothing for you. The actual inspired content was nothing too heartfelt anyway. I suppose that's a given with some elements here, like how the side characters exist to only aid the main guy in whatever he wishes, but it's not even like the main dude was the strongest of characters I've come across in recent time. The same is also true for Uta. That reminds me, the romance here is mediocre as well since it only existed during parkour moments or moments that were dramatic. There was nothing of natural romance which is quite a shame. The only selling point here, although somewhat of a sellout way to go, seems to be only the audiovisuals, which are undoubtedly amazing. Well, maybe not Shinkai level if we are going to talk about crystal looks being on a pedestal compared to the actual story, but you know, it's stuff people would usually look at with starry eyes. No less expected from Wit. Music was good for the most part too, Sawano did well on that. Everything was correct to the scenes that took place. Although it was just a variation of the main theme and song only Hibiki and Uta can hear, they still delivered to high quality if nothing else. --------- *Spoilers here* Now, this part is going into spoilers and the review has essentially finished, but whilst watching this movie I came up with too many damn questions. It was unreal. In fact, some moments were so flawed my initial 7 is now turning into a 5 lol. I usually don't like being too critical, and I find enjoyment in most things I come across. But when you hear the following, led by a team of elites, you will see where I am coming from. The biggest issue I have is some of the world's logic and questions are never answered. Let's start with Hibiki's mom. Some no-one who looked like she wanted to kill her son. For what reason? Dunno, probably because he had hearing aids or something, but her existence feels so wrong in what she does, or at least, the directing made it confusing to present her in a light that was simultaneously two different things. She's a no one in this story, but since she is connected to the main character I thought I'd talk about her. Hibiki seemed to have no problem with her from what I recall tho, maybe I am overthinking. There's also another question as to why the hell Hibiki is even the prince to Uta anyway, of all people. Because he could hear the song? Would love to know but it never goes into detail. They just found each other and fell in love. Some world logic that makes zero sense. Towards the end of the movie, Shin's prosthetic leg is perfectly fine in kicking steel from Tokyo Tower AND well enough to continue on inhuman parkour with zero problems, but breaks when Hibiki jumps from it lol. Also, the Under Takers are literal plot devices. Those guys streamed all the parkour in an illegal area and no one is coming to bust down the place. Odd if you ask me. It also made zero sense for them to help out Blue Blazes save Uta when they had no issue with sending people close to their deaths via that blackhole thing. Lol. You could call all this nitpicking, but I found it funny that this existed. There are a lot more irregularities that feel unnatural but I'd be here forever if I listed them all so I just left my favourites. --------- That's all from me really. Can't keep expectations too high these days, but I don't really regret watching this, it's a time killer thing rather than anything to look back on with great pleasure. It is what it is.

The new and highly anticipated Netflix original film with the best staff gathered, a new anime with the most respected people working on it, a not so new story? Bubble is a movie that takes place in Tokyo which had suffered from a supernatural phenomenon and left the capital of Japan uninhabitable with floods on the ground and bubbles in the air. The story starts off with introducing us to the characters, the characters are not too different from most anime movies that have come out in the past years, the main character is a stoic person who does not bother being with other people, aneccentric and energetic younger kid, a boy who seems to have anger issues, funny enough, it also features a story that seems familiar, a survival type romance which is taking place because of a supernatural phenomenon. For the first half, it becomes quite hard to be interested or care about the story or the characters as nothing new or special is shown, no character interaction that catches my attention and no development that I want to witness, just some parkour racing that the characters are involved in, which looks like something that would be more attractive to someone who likes 1) Parkour 2) anime like beyblade or bakugan. The story does take a turn when our stoic protagonist encounters a near death experience and gets saved by this bubble girl who turns out to be someone who took a shape of a singer or actress and is originally a bubble that looked like it had a soul. Our protagonist and the girl start to form a relationship and this relationship is what starts the development of our protagonist who gradually starts to care more and show more emotions. In the second half, things became more interesting with the protagonist: Hibike and the bubble girl: Uta, as they take part in a race together to save another one of the characters, this race was one of the more interesting parts which was uplifting and enthralling however as the story continued the pacing did not get better, switching between high action scenes to normal conversations, not maintaining a balance and often forcing me to zone out. It introduced side characters that had a role in the movie but their roles were not much fun either and it failed to make the characters seem important to the story. Now with a good deal of pacing issues, boring characters and story, we move on towards the ending which I think suffered the most from all the previous issues such as pacing and being able to make anything seem important, with some backstory which made me think that things are more interesting now, with bare explanation to the phenomenon and my lack of interest for the parkour concept and a declining interest in the main couple I did not enjoy the final part enough, there are movies like Weathering with You in which I felt more attached to both the story and the characters and enjoyed it throughout, this movie barely had anything fun or interesting for the first 75 percent that what was supposed to be the best part of the movie, I could not be invested in it. I still give credit to the main couple who had backstories and development complemented with beautiful animation and sound that made scenes with them together more beautiful and had more feeling in it. The animation was my favourite part of the movie, with amazing camera movements during parkour scenes, beautiful and vibrant colours that you would just want to frame on your wall. The movements were fluid and dynamic, the camera following the characters created a great cinematic experience. Some of the shots which closed up on Uta and Hibiki's face were cocaine to the eye with the colours and the details. The sound was top notch, great soundtracks which were used well and created a deadly combo with the animation. These were the things that gave scenes in the movie more feeling to them and more joy to watch when things were at the best, although at some points these elements did not match the feeling of the scene, or at least it tried to force the feelings on to the viewer. Personally, someone who is less invested by the parkour races and a story and characters that look like a repeat of other films, the style was not enough to make up for flaws, even the state of the art animation and sound only partially helped. I'm convinced that Netflix original anime are now to just try things out that's it, no one on this platform wants to make a complete story with a good idea put to use.

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