nodisalsi

Akino is a new recruit into the elite of all department store shopping clerks in the prestigious Hokkyoku (North Pole) department store - that serves customers who are all animals.

None of the gravity of tragic theatre and convoluted plot twists here, just a Christmas day treat. Although, for all the levity, we should be reminded that many of characters we meet - are now extinct species.

I've just watched this in GFT as part of Scotland Loves Anime festival 2023 and the whole movie theatre was enchanted in seconds, moments of silence with ripples of laughter all the way through. We loved it, we cared, this is one of the most accessible animes ever. 8/10.

Followed by 18 episodes of banal Hollywood formula.

It's a real shame, this boxset begins with heavy shock cavalry charge that I felt was immersive, powerful, and directed well. I thought this might herald the prospect of a docudrama that dares to be accurate...

...then, they take their helments off and start acting. And from that moment to ad nauseum it is the same old scripted formula: * principle actors without helmets swinging at stuntmen with helmets, * heros get injured repeatedly by sword, spear, arrow, bolt, and mace - but they can still ride away on a horse and leave no scars when they've recovered, * pointless and historically absurd love affairs because some school of script writers think this what they need for female viewers to relate to, * ZERO subtlety about who the bad guys and good guys are and their motivations being noble or treacherous, * chronically boring tragic soliloquys from good guy dying slowly in the arms of their clostest friend/brother - while the BATTLE STILL RAGES and extras are fighting in the background,

I was shouting at the screen so bad I had stop watching in middle of S2E6 and abandon watching this boxset forever. Watch from 2:41 to 5:20 of the S1E1 and forget the rest. I only gave this two stars because I thought Mark Hamill carried this lost cause brilliantly.

For two boys Roma and Toto, aged 15 and 16, this will be final year of their hidden secret gathering place "Don Glees" as they will all most likely seeking separate careers going separate ways. For this final year a third teenager, Drop, has joined them - he's new to the group but brimming with enthusiasm for one-in-lifetime experiences.

So Roma is pushed into blowing his entire allowance on a camera drone for an ambitious attempt at a good close-up film of a fireworks display, but events on night do not go according to plan.

This will force them into an adventure deep into the forest without detailed maps and scant phone coverage, taking them through tragedy, terror, heart-ache, and culminating with a truly epic closure.

I watched this at "Scotland Loves Animation" festival in October 2022 and out of 4 entries for the Audience Award - this the only one I felt compelled to vote for. With an excellent script and visuals, intelligently nuanced characters, plot and storyline, this will keep me alert in future for any more work by the writer and director Atsuko Ishizuka.