Street Fighter II Movie

Based on the popular video game of the same name by Capcom. This movie contains each of the characters up until Super Street Fighter II. Therefore, fans of particular characters will at least get the opportunity to see their favorite do something. Although in some cases they won't get to see very much. For those whom may not know; I hate video game to anime films. Mainly because in terms of quality anime almost none of them have cracked the ceiling of mediocrity. Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie somewhat fits into the category. Fortunately, for a video game to anime translation the movie isn't toobad because it gives something to the fans, and it's many notches above awful titles such as Art of Fighting, Fatal Fury: The Motion Picture, and Devil May Cry. Street Fighter delivers well animated choreographed fights between some of the most popular characters in the SF universe. SFII contains some of the best hand to hand action scenes in fighting anime. The animation is very fluid during the action scenes. The characters battle with real martial art moves for the most part, and I enjoy the attention to detail. Some of the characters actually perform the regular moves from the game and most of them are very cool to see. The artwork is great also with the characters perfectly resembling their video game counterparts. The art style fits perfectly for this type of anime. I also enjoyed the soundtrack with standout songs being Them Bones by Alice in Chains and Blind by Korn. However, several times I can remember the BGM was quite boring, and has caused me to come quite close to dosing off. In other cases, it brought out the best during some fight scenes. The voice actors and seiyuu are pretty good to me. I don't have any complaints except the dialogue can be very cheesy at times. Plus, there's a bit of profanity thrown out there which can be a bother for some. I have to give credit to the production team for bringing SF to the TV screen for fans. Now, speaking from a fans point of view. I really did enjoy seeing some of my favorite characters going at it, but that's where the major problem begins. As in all video game to anime I have seen; non fans of the game will come away feeling as if they wasted their time. Outside of the main characters it is highly unlikely a non fan will learn anything about the remaining cast. Character development is very low to non existent because so many characters were just squeezed in. Characters appear only to deliver a couple of moves and disappear as quick as they came. The plot is very boring and I was rarely sucked into the story. Thankfully the pacing makes the movie less painful. The fights are well dispersed, and most of them make the wait well worth it. In truth, the action is the only reason to bother with this. Street Fighter II is something that I can only recommend to fans of the franchise. However, if you're not a fan of the franchise but love action anime in any form; then this may be for you as well. It's definitely better than all of the fighting game to anime I have seen, and better than its so called sequels or side stories, but it's not a great anime by any stretch of the imagination. Non fans of the franchise and action films should skip it without hesitation. Pros: Very good fight scenes, very good animation and artwork, pacing, good for fans.... Cons: ...bad for non fans, boring plot, too many character appearances

Before I get into my review, I have to preface this by admitting that Street Fighter II in particular has played a very huge part in my preference when it comes to video games so I can admit that there is going to be a bit of bias during this review. Animes based on video games have been,for the most part, a huge smoldering ash pile of disappointment. They often do not stick to the source material of the game, take too many liberties on a simple story line that is starring them right in their over ambitious faces, and ultimately its a blunderbefore it even gets started. Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie is the exception to the latter. When you are doing a cross over of a popular ip and placing it into another medium, taking from the exact source material is a very very crucial detail that will aid in your success. Anime studio Group TAC understood this and by the end of the film, I could have literally jumped out my seat and kissed them for it if they were standing close by. The first crucial element of my happiness with this film was the obvious character design pulled directly from the conceptual art of those involved directly with the original game. Every character looks like the genuine article, and it further pushes the films enjoyment when the true magic takes place. It goes without saying that the stand out moments of the film are where they are supposed to be, in the fighting. Most of the fight scenes are choreographed with the utmost attention to detail while incorporating many of the moves that fans of the series have come to love. What plays a minor part in the scenes that make the experience of these scenes bigger as a whole are the sound effects as fists clash against flesh in a realistic manner excelling the enjoyment of what takes place as you watch. The first scene of the films sets the stage for all of this perfectly and by the films title introduction it is clear that your going to be in for a good watch. The story, while pretty generic in its approach, did enough to push the plot and not take you out of the film. M. Bison, the films antagonist, is monitoring the worlds strongest fighters in search of a vessel that will aide him in his quest for world domination. As the plot progresses, you find a few character story lines from the game meshed in between. It may have made for a much better film if the script was fleshed out to involve more of the characters but for the most part you get a sense of the motivations from the main protagonists and I personally thought that was good enough. Before I jump into the soundtrack, it is very important to note that there have been various versions of the film over the years and the one that I specifically watched was the original. The original score was by no means grandiose yet and still it did enough to please and I prefer it greatly over the redone version that came to the western shores. It must be said that despite the minor scenes that were omitted from the western version,if you have not seen the uncut version or the original, you may just want to save your criticisms about the film until such time that you have. Ultimately, Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie was an amazing showcase of the source material and in my opinion, should be judged from that view point alone. To just watch this film with no context of where this film derived from will do you no justice. Make no mistakes -- this was fan service at its mind blowing best!!

Excuse me, I'm Spanish and I don't usually write in English. You can read this review in Spanish. In order to talk about this film, it is impossible to ignore the fact that it adapts the first world-famous videogame of the saga: Street Fighter II (1991). For that reason, it deserved a film to match. Although the studio in charge of the work, Group TAC, was not one of the most outstanding studios of the moment, the visual result exceeded expectations and had the involvement of industry heavyweights such as director Gisaburou Sugii (Night on the Galactic Railroad, 1985; and The Tale of Genji, 1987). Street FighterII: The Movie (1994) is a work that fits perfectly within that group of action films of the 80s and 90s in which the plot was almost an excuse to show great action scenes: car chases, destruction of cities, displays of superhuman strength and, above all, fights to the death. Although deadly encounters are strange here, the film is mostly a huge gathering of wrestlers and their numerous battles throughout the footage. Each member of the Street Fighter II squad is present to show off his fighting style (karate, muay thai, sumo, etc.) and characteristic techniques (Shoryuken, Sonic-Boom, Hadouken, among others). Not one of them will be left without their share of the limelight to show us the best they have in amazing 1v1 fights - except for the last one for the collaboration of Ryu and Ken against M. Bison. And one server says amazing because these battles, which include martial arts, magic, supernatural powers and other types of unknown arts, in terms of action are a joy for the viewer. Beyond the very successful soundtrack that accompanies them, the fights stand out for their fluidity of movement and the display of strength of the fighters. None is very marked by extreme violence, except the meeting between Chun-Li and Vega for being a little more savage. It is also the most remarkable showdown, although all fights are worth it and none are the same. In visual terms, most agree in the use of short shots and in a continuous dynamism without interruptions. Unfortunately, he is far from winning the Oscars because there are a couple of drawbacks that deny him such an award. Like Ninja Scroll (1993), the reviewed film is almost a succession of combat after combat that ends with the confrontation against M. Bison. However, Kawajiri's masterpiece is above her. Not just because it's creatively so superior, but because a lot of the adaptation's fighting isn't built into the main plot. Battles like Blanka and Zangief or Dhalsim and E. Honda have no relation to their main plot. In other words, they are little more than fanservice for fans of the video game. It is clear that they contribute to the show, but the null participation of the characters and the absence of any personality and background prevent them from functioning as they do in the video game, where there is a gameplay. If you are a stranger to the franchise, in addition, your emotional connection with the fighters is non-existent. This unnecessary accumulation of characters also impaired the characterization and development of the relationship between Chun-Li and Guile, who occupy a privileged place within the narrative as representatives of justice. The connection between the two characters is related to the fact that they share the death of a loved one at the hands of M. Bison, but this question is not explored. Nor does the relationship strengthen beyond Chun-Li convinces the man not to take revenge alone. In fact, his contribution to the resolution of the conflict is insufficient, so much so that if we discount the work of the Interpol members in the search for Ryu and the destruction of the hideout, the only thing they did was defeat Vega. And this feat is a credit to Chun-Li, which is why Guile ends up in a worse place. Interestingly, both also share the absence of a relationship with the protagonist, who learns of Shadaloo's existence from other fighters with no connection to the duo and all this mess. Fortunately, Ryu and Ken's bond is better built thanks to the presence of small flashbacks that inform us of their friendship and rivalry during the time they both trained together in the same dojo. Although there is no contact until the end, this issue does not present problems beyond the lack of creativity of their mental breakdown and joint fight. Which, by the way, if we talk about them, we must mention the person responsible for their confrontation: M. Bison. Despite the fact that he is the classic evil and powerful antagonist who seeks to rule the world, without any particular background, his dictatorial character and his displayed superiority in fighting give him a certain charisma and moments to shine. You can also find my review here: https://elarmarioanimados.blogspot.com/2020/10/resena-street-fighter-ii-la-pelicula.html

Adaptions of games, particularly fighting games, into anime are usually disappointing. I generally go into them excited at the prospect of seeing familiar characters in some ass kicking action, only to see it turn out like a one legged man in an ass kicking contest. "Fatal Fury" movie was bad; The recent spin-offs from the"Street Fighter IV" games managed to reach the dizzying heights of mediocrity; and as for "Tekken: the Motion Picture"? Well what a big pile of sh*te that was! But once or twice, there's comes an adaptation that's actually pretty good, and the pick of that bunch is "Street Fighter II: The AnimatedMovie". Despite being one of the first anime I watched, I still see it as the standard which other fighting game adaptations are judged against even to this day. It pretty much ticks all the boxes that fans of the game look for when it comes to these kind of adaptations. Let's take a look, shall we? 1. Faithful adaptation of story? Check. Fans, especially purist fans, hate it when adaptations take too many liberties with the story, especially if it ends up not obviously better than the original. "Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie" was careful to remain faithful to the source material, and built its story from that instead making wholesale changes. And in fact I heard it said that this movie inspired capcom to take some of its plot points and incorporate them into the official "Street Fighter" canon [INSERT YOUR OWN CITATION HERE]. It's a testament of how well this movie adapted the story (if it's true). It would also explain why I find it really hard to tell where the official part of history ends and where the anime exclusive material begin. So what is the story? Well, the basic premises is that Bison's Shadowlaw crime syndicate are monitoring fighters around the world and recruiting the strongest ones to their cause. Having witnessed Ryu's extraordinary power in his battle against Sagat, Bison and his organisation are scouring the world to try and find him. Ok, sounds a bit thin on the ground, but hey, it's a fighting anime based on a fighting game, what did you expect? At least it works well for its purpose, and isn't utterly ridiculous, qualities that can't taken for granted when it comes to these kind of anime - just look at that load of tosh from "Variable Geo"! 2. The fights kicks ass? Check. This is usually the most disappointing aspect for fighting game adaptations - I can overlook a paper thin story when it comes to these kind of anime, but the fighting is the thing you expect the most from them. But too often the action ends up being boring or, in the case of "Street Fighter IV: The Ties that Bind", nearly non-existent. With "Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie", the fights are the best part of the show - they're great to watch, having been choreographed by a professional fighte. There's little or no repeated animation in sight, and the final boss fight is for once appropriately climatic. This is how things should be! What's more... 3. Special moves from the game are seen regularly during the fights? Check. Ok, you can call it fan w*nk material or whatever, but the fact of the matter is that it's always exciting to see special moves from the game being incorporated into the fights (unless you're unfamiliar with the game... but who cares about those people). The "Street Fighter II V" series had some nice fights, but special moves from the game were so sparse in that anime that something feels amiss. This movie on the other hand, gives the fans exactly what they want, throwing those special moves out with great regularity, and not just those staple Ryu/Ken hadoukens either: Fei Long's Flame Kick? Yep, seen that. Guile's Sonic Boom? That's here too (though it misses and flattens a hut instead). Chun Li's Spinning Bird Kick? That's used in the best freaking fight in the movie! Which brings me to another point - the special moves are properly integrated into the fights and not just spammed all over the place and end up bogging the action down. What more could you ask for? 4. Lots of cameos from characters of the game? Check. This is kind of similar to 3, in that in addition to seeing special moves from the game, it's also exciting to see lots of characters from the game making cameo appearances as side characters. To be fair, most adaptations of this type actually delivers on this point (well, apart from that recent "Tekken: Blood Vengeance" movie, in which they used about 5 characters in total), and "Street Fighter: The Animated Movie" is no exception. There's an argument about throwing in tons of characters from the game for no reason being a bad idea, but the way I see it, if you can do it in an unintrusive way, where's the harm in it? I'd rather have some background characters who happen to be game characters rather than faceless mobs, and that's exactly what this anime does - Fei Long turns up in the ring as Ryu travels around looking for new challenges; Balrog just happens to be one of Bison's henchmen, etc. They don't have to be there, but they don't distract from the story, and add a bit more game flavourings to procedures. Also, it's good that none of the characters are so intolerably annoying that they end up ruining the show (again, I'm looking at you, "Tekken: Blood Vengeance"!") By this point, I've probably made the movie sound pretty close to the greatest piece of animation mankind has ever made, so I should probably put things in perspective: "Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie" is a good anime, no more, no less. I'm raving about it because it's the ONLY fighting game to adaptation I can think of that's actually good. The story may be a bit simplistic, the music may be distractingly heavy at times, and the dub might be a let down as usual, but it's an anime that duly delivers everything that fans of the game would want, and that's surprisingly rare.

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