If any of you remember, I was supposed to have done an Eat Man vs Eat Man 98 review a bit ago. Unfortunately, I contracted the death plague of flu murder and have been out of commission from blogging or working for some time. Thankfully, I am now back and better than...worse things, and my cat is still a bastard, so here is the long awaited by no one review.
Eat Man (non 98 original style) is a delightful blend of the action scifi animes of the 80's and an exceptionally bizarre concept that is as simple and straightforward as it is absolutely absurd. It is important for me to make 2 disclosures at this point. First, I am a huge sucker for 70's-90's sci fi anime. Seriously. It is bad. Secondly, this is not Eat Men the gay porn, so if you are looking for that, wrong blog (I can only assume there is one called Eat Men). The story of Eat Man is, surprising surprise, about a man who eats...metal. Why eat metal, strange Mr. Bolt Crank (yeah, his name is bolt crank, thank you 90's. Also, no relation to LoL)? To make fucking weapons WITH HIS MIND. Anime News Network summarizes, as they are professionals
"Bolt Crank is the World's Greatest Mercenary, and with good
reason. He has the ability to eat any object and, when needed, reproduce
it from his right hand. Also in the world of Eat-Man is the Alvion, a
flying ship that flies even though it is a destroyed wreck. The ship
floats in the sky, and is always where Bolt is."
http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/encyclopedia/anime.php?id=143
This seems fairly uninformative, but that is really all that can be said as a summary without giving way too much away. I am not here to summarize though, so let's get to the reviewing. Eat Man has all of the grit you look for in a good 90's action anime. The animation has that wonderful, over saturated look that borders between 2 and 3 D, and the stylized weapon and costume designs give you little doubt as to what time period the anime is from. See manic grin and red eye glasses. Given that this is an action heavy show, the stark muzzle flashes and twists of smoke typical in earlier action anime are also executed with perfection. Unfortunately, another feature of action anime from the past century is also prolific, sexism. Now, sexism in anime is a broad topic with many facets, and I am not going to engage in all of that here. It is important to note, however, that any rights conscious anime viewer will be cringing at the interspersed hyper sexualized female costumes, constant attempts at seduction of the male lead, and lack of self sufficiency or physical ability in almost all of the female characters. This is not a good thing. There, we have acknowledged this, it is an artifact of two decades ago, no excuses, moving on (in a later pose I may substantively deal with the issue). This feature aside, the tone and plot of Eat Man are rather interesting. There is an almost constant sense of foreboding and laziness, a hard duality to pull of well, that reminds me of my first impressions of Cowboy Bebop (do not worry, the shows are not actually comparable so I will not attempt to do so), and yet there are still times for personal moments that give hints that Bolt may actually feel emotion. These moments are quickly destroyed for most of the series. In regards to plot, the epsidoes are very self contained early on, acting more as action vignettes than continuous plot, but move into a more contiguous story later on. The various conflicts are interesting, as strange as the concept itself, while fairly well constructed. There are certainly points when the narrative seems to skip over important details or take too many liberties with plot twists, but overall the series can be followed without any glaring holes ruining the experience. All in all, an excellent piece of action shenanigans.
TO THE FUTURE
Eat man '98 is a direct continuation of the previous serious, same hero, same job, same ludicrous and awesome ability. Anime News Network says it best
"The continuing adventures of Bolt Crank, the World's Greatest
Mercenary, who has the ability to eat any object, mostly metal and
weapons. When the time comes, Bolt can then reproduce those weapons and
items in his right hand."
http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/encyclopedia/anime.php?id=144
Wait, that said virtually nothing at all. Well, since my beloved ANN has let us down, time for meandmycat industries here at Shit You Don't Care About to take up the blazing torch of anime reviewing and give you a bit more information. Stylistically, '98 pulls of the same 90's action feel fairly well, with some obvious graphical updates. There is a fair amount of smoothing the 90's flat color saturation and giving it a bit more depth, but without going so far as to change the visual style entirely. Instead, we are given a more crisp and shadowed version of the same thing. Plot wise, 98 gets a lot more wild, with constant attempts to trick and surprise the watcher, without feeling too manic. At times this definitely gets a bit tiresome, like an M Night Shamalan movie marathon (why would anyone do that), but overall leads to more fun than annoyance. THe other primary update the series receives is stronger female leads, so yay for franchises keeping up with the times in some respects. Though this iteration is usually heralded in reviews as superior to its' predecessor, my nostalgic love for earlier series combined with what I see as a more daring and unapologetic approach in the former leads me to say that, while both series are definitely worth your time, Eat Man will always be a bit closer to my heart.
As a finally apology for my late sick laziness, look forward to staged battle scene photographs of my Gundam collection getting all space violence and shit.
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