Oban Star-Racers

[BennyParsons]

Wow. This is...so not good. I thought they promised "epic production values" on the website. Poor, simplistic character designs.

The voice actors are nothing special, either. They should have sprung the extra bucks to get some mainstream VAs like Maurice LaMarche or Frank Welker or Venus Terzo, etc.

As far as French/Japanese co-productions, we're a long way from "Belle & Sebastian" or "The Mysterious Seven Cities of Gold."

[Vicserr]

Well, but at least the premise is interesting, and the series is pretty kinetic(simple designs helps with that) althought the character designs go for a more european flair but the 1st 2 eps show more promise that full seasons of Beyblade or B-Damon

[BennyParsons]

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Vicserr said:
but the 1st 2 eps show more promise that full seasons of Beyblade or B-Damon

[/ QUOTE ]

Funny you should mention Beyblade/B-Damon as I view those shows as not being "real anime" along with shows like the entire Dragonball franchise or Yu Gi Oh or Pokemon. Technically, Oban is more of a "fake anime" show because it was co-animated/written by the French, but as bad as it was I'd still have to rank it higher than any of the Toonami crap.

[rainking187]

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BrownieElf said:Funny you should mention Beyblade/B-Damon as I view those shows as not being "real anime" along with shows like the entire Dragonball franchise or Yu Gi Oh or Pokemon.

[/ QUOTE ]

Why is it that some people feel they have the right to decide what is and isn't anime based on whether they liked it or not?

[Black Jack]

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BrownieElf said:
Funny you should mention Beyblade/B-Damon as I view those shows as not being "real anime" along with shows like the entire Dragonball franchise or Yu Gi Oh or Pokemon.

[/ QUOTE ]

And based on what criteria do you decide which Japanese cartoons are "real anime" and which aren't.

[Black Jack]

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rainking said:
Why is it that some people feel they have the right to decide what is and isn't anime based on whether they liked it or not?

[/ QUOTE ]

From my interaction with a number of different anime fans over the years it's simply another form of elitism within the fandom. Basically they feel the need to look down or attempt to disparage shows by claiming they aren't "real anime".

[Sweeped]

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BrownieElf said:
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Vicserr said:
but the 1st 2 eps show more promise that full seasons of Beyblade or B-Damon

[/ QUOTE ]

Funny you should mention Beyblade/B-Damon as I view those shows as not being "real anime" along with shows like the entire Dragonball franchise or Yu Gi Oh or Pokemon. Technically, Oban is more of a "fake anime" show because it was co-animated/written by the French, but as bad as it was I'd still have to rank it higher than any of the Toonami
crap.

[/ QUOTE ]
This is one of the most illogical things I've ever read. DragonBall not anime? buh? Despite the fact that pretty much every weekly shounen show you enjoy is influenced by DB in some shape way or form...as for the others, they're anime, plain and simple, there's no logical arguement to say otherwise...

[Damo]

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Vicserr said:
Well, but at least the premise is interesting, and the series is pretty kinetic(simple designs helps with that) althought the character designs go for a more european flair but the 1st 2 eps show more promise that full seasons of Beyblade or B-Damon

[/ QUOTE ]
The first two episodes were awsome, they were premiered at the recent London Expo, the creator of Oban was also present. One interesting comment he made regarding the character designs is that the French thought they were too Japanese and the Japanese thought they were too french. They did suit the series style though and also retained a lot of their look from the original "Molly Star Racer" short.

[ic14]

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Damo said:
The first two episodes were awsome, they were premiered at the recent London Expo, the creator of Oban was also present. One interesting comment he made regarding the character designs is that the French thought they were too Japanese and the Japanese thought they were too french. They did suit the series style though and also retained a lot of their look from the original "Molly Star Racer" short.

[/ QUOTE ]

Im with Damo on this, the first two episode where fantastic, and i love the character designs (hence me putting the freebie poster on my wall)

[Johnny]

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Sweep said:
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BrownieElf said:
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Vicserr said:
but the 1st 2 eps show more promise that full seasons of Beyblade or B-Damon

[/ QUOTE ]

Funny you should mention Beyblade/B-Damon as I view those shows as not being "real anime" along with shows like the entire Dragonball franchise or Yu Gi Oh or Pokemon. Technically, Oban is more of a "fake anime" show because it was co-animated/written by the French, but as bad as it was I'd still have to rank it higher than any of the Toonami
crap.

[/ QUOTE ]
This is one of the most illogical things I've ever read. DragonBall not anime? buh? Despite the fact that pretty much every weekly shounen show you enjoy is influenced by DB in some shape way or form...as for the others, they're anime, plain and simple, there's no logical arguement to say otherwise...

[/ QUOTE ]

Exactly. Just because DB/DBZ is ultra popular and mainstream doesn't make it any less anime than anything else.
So, does that mean I should shun Naruto now that it is on TV and getting more and more popular?

[michaelwb]

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IanC said:
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Damo said:
The first two episodes were awsome, they were premiered at the recent London Expo, the creator of Oban was also present. One interesting comment he made regarding the character designs is that the French thought they were too Japanese and the Japanese thought they were too french. They did suit the series style though and also retained a lot of their look from the original "Molly Star Racer" short.

[/ QUOTE ]

Im with Damo on this, the first two episode where fantastic, and i love the character designs (hence me putting the freebie poster on my wall)

[/ QUOTE ]

Strongly thirded. I'm been anticipating this for years and it doesn't disappoint.

The design are a great blend of Japanese and French animation traditions.

Eagerly looking forward to the rest...

[BennyParsons]

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johnny said:

So, does that mean I should shun Naruto now that it is on TV and getting more and more popular?

[/ QUOTE ]

Actually, unless they start animating the "2 years later" stories and drop the horrid filler episodes pretty soon here....

[Johnny]

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BrownieElf said:
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johnny said:

So, does that mean I should shun Naruto now that it is on TV and getting more and more popular?

[/ QUOTE ]

Actually, unless they start animating the "2 years later" stories and drop the horrid filler episodes pretty soon here....

[/ QUOTE ]

Well, yeah the filler isn't the greatest but what is the alternative? Putting the show on hold for months while the manga progresses enough?
And anyway, I'm talking about US/UK TV here. It's gonna be a while before either run hits filler.

[BennyParsons]

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johnny said:


Well, yeah the filler isn't the greatest but what is the alternative? Putting the show on hold for months while the manga progresses enough?


[/ QUOTE ]

Actually, that's exactly what they should do. Layoff/reassign most of the staff but keep the core creative staff together so that once enough manga issues have come out they can quickly start up production on new episodes.

The Kenshin production staff has admitted that they should have simply shut down operations for a year or two and then started producing new manga-based episodes rather than go off with the endless filler that they did.

Kinda like how British TV shows do it where you often get four years inbetween new episodes.

[Sage58]

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michaelwb said:
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IanC said:
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Damo said:
The first two episodes were awsome, they were premiered at the recent London Expo, the creator of Oban was also present. One interesting comment he made regarding the character designs is that the French thought they were too Japanese and the Japanese thought they were too french. They did suit the series style though and also retained a lot of their look from the original "Molly Star Racer" short.

[/ QUOTE ]

Im with Damo on this, the first two episode where fantastic, and i love the character designs (hence me putting the freebie poster on my wall)

[/ QUOTE ]

Strongly thirded. I'm been anticipating this for years and it doesn't disappoint.

The design are a great blend of Japanese and French animation traditions.

Eagerly looking forward to the rest...

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm impressed, too. I remember seeing the original Molly Star-Racer trailer years ago when I was in college. I wanted more. It took a number of years and some international money, but finally there is.

Visually, the show is absolutely mesmerizing. It's like a psychedelic sweet tart. Plotwise, the guys at Sav! The World have been plotting this thing out for a good amount of time, so I have high hopes it'll transcend traditional kiddie fluff and pack a dramatic punch or two. Aurally, who in their right mind replaces a Yoko Kanno theme with generic kid show rock?

[Spoofer]

What's the original language for this show, French? Is it also airing in Japan? And where could i hear the original Kanno Op & Ed? :{?

[BluWacky]

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Spoofer said:
What's the original language for this show, French? Is it also airing in Japan? And where could i hear the original Kanno Op & Ed? :{?

[/ QUOTE ]

The show was written by Frenchmen and first aired in France so... French it is.

There's no start date confirmed for a Japanese broadcast yet, although it'll certainly get shown there at some point I should think.

And for the Kanno OP and ED, the OP is on Youtube and various other sites (I think Sav! The World had it available on their site for a while, but I can't seem to find it any more) but I've forgotten where I found the ED and I don't have it any more I'm afraid.

[ChibiGoku]

Actually, it'll be starting this Fall in Japan, supposibly on Disney's Jetix Channel. As for the opening, while the version of Savin's French Oban site is a billingual mix of french and japanese, the original opening song is actually full japanese.

The ending song, we've yet to get a full version of. The TV version airing is a 30-second version. (A version, mixed together from episode 1's ending and episode 2's ending, was made, showing part of the first lyrics, and the later part of the lyrics.)

[michaelwb]

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BluWacky said:
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Spoofer said:
What's the original language for this show, French? Is it also airing in Japan? And where could i hear the original Kanno Op & Ed? :{?

[/ QUOTE ]

The show was written by Frenchmen and first aired in France so... French it is.


[/ QUOTE ]

Adding to the mix. Animated mostly in Japan by Japanese animators with some additional elements added in France by French animators.

Much of the music was performed in Japan by Japanese musicians.

Funding Japanese/French sources. A joint French/Japanese production.

It's airing first in France but was also negoiated from the beginning for joint European/Japanese release.

It's one of the more nuanced international projects.