Anime Week: Black Magic M-66

Welcome, welcome, welcome to Day 3 of Anime Week.  As I am attempting to stick to themes and genres of anime I thought now would be a good time to do a Sci-fi anime.  Yes, with its myriad of mechas, killer robots, star vessels and orbital platforms, science fiction gets a lot of love from Japanimation.   So it should not come as a surprise that this particular flick hails from the cyberpunk sub-genre manga called Black Magic M-66 created by writer/illustrator Masamune Shirow (Black Magic, Appleseed, Dominion, Ghost in the Shell and Orion) with what happens when technology you so willingly trusted with your very life takes a turn for the worse.  With that thought, you can only amaze the havoc that awaits.    This is Black Magic M-66

Sorry ma'am, no John Connors here.

Leaky: You're going after a story on the spoiler?  You're nuts!







With an aggressive android capable of moving at high speeds, agile, lethal in melee combat and packing an assortment of laser based weapons, nerve gas and an explosive core for self-destruct, it gets worse than that.  Imagine a machine capable of independent thought, tactics and strategy and will not be deterred from its objective.  That in mind, a freak lightning storm strikes the armored helicopter transport frying the pilots and causing the ride to go barreling down into a dense forest.  The android units emerge from their containment pods with the only mission parameter they know, which is a mission to find a specific target.  Their redundancy programs establish that this is their purpose for being and nothing stands in that way.   Hours later while the androids are on the move, two hunters in the woods find a Grizzly bear just smashed like a rag doll and even its thick and heavy paws are snapped and broken.   The units trail the men but they have an off-screen death to ratchet tension I suppose.  

Sir, I stepped in an exposition sinkhole.

We now get to meet Sybel, a freelance journalist with the typical anime girl build.  Yup that's right at least a large C to D cup and hourglass figure.  She pipes into a Military broadcast that an operation is underway and she grabs her cameras, tapes and cameraman Leaky to go investigate.  No sooner do they make it to the "toxic" crash site that the whole area has been sealed off by soldiers and cordoned off by trucks and men.

Tensions are a bit high in this partnership.

A Special Ops team lead by the Major, no other ID than that seems cool headed but realizes he is sending his men into a substantial forest against beings that are faster, stronger and many times more deadly than they.   With the use of massive electromagnet, the retrieval teams hope to capture and transport the M-66s with little to no fuss or muss.

I had a few quick comments on the film now.  With its fairly complex story with tech along you kind of have to go with the flow and not let your attention wander with this one, folks.  It is fast paced, hard hitting action and some nail biting moments worthy of Cameron's Terminator.  With 50 minutes on the clock you will squirm a bit in your seat waiting for the next explosion or possibly jump scare.  A fairly enjoyable movie is what it meant to me.

Form Voltron!!

Larson 80's TV Week: Knight Rider

Hello all and welcome to Larson 80’s TV Week and I thought I would start us off with a series many of us know of and enjoyed.  Some of us scoffed at its creation while many hold it up to the echelons of Television.  What do you get when you cross a Charlie’s Angels philanthropist with a Lone Ranger theme?   Why, you get a former cop operating as a field agent and a car with a few optional extras such as: being bulletproof and fireproof, a turbo boost, oil slick and an artificial intelligence.   So buckle up, sport a leather jacket and get ready to jet across the road.  This is Knight Rider.

What do you mean turtlenecks don't go with a leather jacket, Tim Gunn?

Michael: I need ya spoiler!

KITT: Right away Michael.

Brought to us by creator/producer Glen A. Larson (B.J. and the Bear, Battlestar Galactica, Buck Rodgers in the 25^th Century, Terror at Alcatraz, Trauma Center and Automan) tells the story of a cop wounded to near death in the line of duty.  Having no personal attachments like friends and family, Michael Long is nursed back to health by an anonymous millionaire benefactor of Knight Industries.  With plastic surgery he has a new face and name: Michael Knight.

By your command...

Michael Knight (David Hasselhoff of Shaka Zulu, Fire and Rain, The Final Alliance, The Bulkin Trail, Avalanche, Nick Fury: Agent of Shield, Baywatch and Layover) was recruited by Knight Industries and his only connection has been through an associate Miles Devon (Edward Mulhare of Signpost to Murder, Our Man Flint, Eye of the Devil, The Ghost & Mrs. Muir and Murder, She Wrote).  Devon explains his part in this organization is to equip and support Michael in his new ventures and assignments. 

The identity Michael Knight is allowing him to operate as a federal agent linked to the justice organization, the Foundation for Law and Government (FLAG) and Michael needs reliable wheels and behold the Knight Industries Two Thousand or KITT if you will.  A armored 1982 Pontiac Firebird Trans Am with an artificial intelligence, with smoke screen, oil slick and even a NOS injected turbo boost to be used sparingly (once per episode).  Coupled with the lovely engineer  and personal assistant Bonnie Barstow (Patricia McPherson of Prime Risk, Knight Rider, Starman, MacGyver, Star Trek: The Next Generation and Warehouse 13) an a decent right cross, Michael and KITT go head to head against organized crime, drug dealers and even terrorist cells.

I had just a few observations of the show at this time.   While this is considered somewhat hokey today the advancements of technology is not that farfetched but the expenses of KITT would be obscene.   KITT loved by many was deemed worthy an adversary named KARR (Knight Automated Roving Robot) KITT predecessor that had only been programmed for self-preservation and had no qualms about human safety.    The auto cruise option actually moved Hasselhoff in the passenger seat while a stunt driver sat in a black outfit.  Several of the kit KITT cars were done with scale models at 1/8^th scale Monogram kits model trains for jumps and KITT Pontiac cars.  The life sized scale vehicles were fiberglass units for crashing in the water, and the jumping car was completely hollow to launch off a ramp hidden well away from the cameras but occasionally got caught in frame not unlike the boom mike.

Punch it, KITT!  We gotta get out of Burbank!

Eurozombie Week: Hell of the Living Dead

Hey there kiddies!  I bet you are hankering for what I am hankering for.  Well actually really could go for a roast beef, light on the lettuce on toasted rye with Dijon mustard so how about a bleak and depressing zombie film instead? Yes once more into the cinematic breach dear friends as we jump into the fairly warped psyche of Bruno Matte.  Who is that you may ask?  Well folks this director/writer is responsible for a lot of Italian Lackluster films, unofficial sequels and far too many Women in Prison films.   Sound fun yet?   Well strap yourselves in people it is about to get a whole lot worse.  This is Hell of the Living Dead.

Am I late for the Walking Dead audition? I wanted to meet Michonne.

Lt. Mike London: Spoilers have people in them.  We’d better go investigate.

From the bent mind of writer Claudio Fragasso (Guardian of Hell, Women’s Prison Massacre, Rats-Night of Terror, Strike Commando and Double Target) a frequent collaborator of director Bruno Matte (Guardian of Hell, Double Target, Zombi 3, Born to Fight, Cruel Jaws and Land of Death) features a story of a top secret chemical research station called  Hope Center 1.   The irony is not lost on these people as two technicians work on the chemical batter (might be Ooze from Turtles 2) when a freak accident occurs causing a massive chemical leak in the facility turning the entire staff and crew into flesh devouring zombies.   That is literally the first 8 minutes of this movie and yes we even get the cliché, “How dare we play God,” line tossed in for good measure.

Telling you Pierre, this jumpsuit is riding right up my Hardy Boys.

During the meanwhile, in a unnamed country in Europe a collection of terrorists know of the Hope Centers as a bio-weapons division the collective governments are keeping quiet and they demand they be closed down forever.  Before that can happen a scruffy four-man commando team led by Italian Ross Hagen…I mean Lt. Mike London (Jose Gras of Mad Foxes, Depravacion and Conquest), sneaks in, knives most of the terrorists then smokes the rest into chunky salsa.  Not quite a Rambo movie but dang they got pulped.

After that fine bit of slaughter our boys are flown out to New Guinea due to communication failing to receive or transmit from Hope Center 1 and of course our hapless commandos are on a need to know basis about the research center so the “terrorist act” story is all they have to go on.  

Our crew encounters a cameraman and reporter Lia Rousseau (Margit Newton of Hunter of the Apocalypse, The Final Executioner, The Adventures of Hercules II and Act of Revenge) and she has reports of villagers attacking people at random in savage behavior similar to cannibalism.  Nearly mutilated in the New Guinea jungle our team are forced to take a raft and what little munitions they have left to complete their mission and finally make their way to Hope Center 1.  Mind you at this time we have to wait for the commandos and reporter to catch up what we already know. 

Well folks what is there to say of this movie?  Decent gore gags with the zombie dispatching, the dubbing clearly got muddled in translation and yes guys there is some nudity for ya.  Most of the music had been lifted with no payment to the intelligent property owner Goblin or George Romero and most of it is straight off of Dawn of the Dead.  My recommendation for this film is an adult MST3K party and no the kids SHOULD NOT be allowed to watch it.

Porn shoot that goes horribly awry!