counting at war (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
kerpingtack) wrote2017-09-15 07:10 pm
kerpingtack) wrote2017-09-15 07:10 pm
Entry tags:
the edge that points toward you
Useless bullet points about the ~ruroken~ live action trilogy:
good!
- The absolute best thing about the live actions is that they somehow found THE perfect Kenshin. Even if the rest of the movies were flawless (which was certainly not the case), I don't think I could have borne it if Kenshin wasn't right. But lo! The casting of Sato Takeru makes me believe God is real.
- I'm devoting a separate bullit pointo to gush about him: You can tell that he really, really understands Kenshin. There's so much going on with him. Kenshin's outward behavior is: quiet, self-contained, AWARE, but approachable, and always always making choices. It's hard to convey that without getting his point of view via text or voiceovers, especially since the movie is thin even on spoken dialogue, but Sato Takeru does it well. And just physically, he is as humanly close as you can get to Kenshin IRL, as in actually looking natural and like a real person (i.e., no purple contacts or fire-engine bright hair). But the small frame and seeming harmlessness, the self-contained elegance and slight androgyny, the speed and economy of movement? *~~~* He is super graceful. Like he moves so, SO beautifully, it does justice to everything Kenshin is supposed to be. And he did all his own stunts!! And that face. criesss. He makes Kenshin feel like a real live person in all possible dimensions. It is freaking amazing.
- The choreography, of course. Every fight is amazing. It all feels legit fast, legit strong, legit skilled.
- The look of it, especially the set design. Beautiful and detailed. I love seeing people in the background in the Tokyo scenes. I loved the Akabeko and the theater in the opening of Kyoto Inferno. The movies truly LOOK like Rurouni Kenshin has been translated into reality.
- The other two standout performances were Aoi Yuu as Megumi and Kamiki Ryunosuke as Soujiro. They were both really, really perfect.
- The way they combined and condensed the Tokyo arc for the first movie was interesting. Including Saitoh from the very beginning was especially clever, I thought.
bad!
- In contrast, the changes to the Kyoto arc in the last section of Kyoto Inferno and... uh... the entirety of the Legend Ends were super strange and... not good. Reducing Kaoru to damsel-in-distress, changing Shishio's motivations (like why on earth would he want the government to execute Kenshin? what was the point of the dinner party?), taking up half of the last movie with a traditional/stereotypical "training in the mountains" arc without much of the humor or complexity in the correlating manga/animu scenes. idk. I was just watching it like, "Well that's an... interesting... choice..................."
- The music is a big problem. I didn't like any of it, besides the Kanryu theme, of all things lol.
- The treatment of the female characters is ACTIVELY ANNOYING. Kaoru has no personality. Misao pretty much has no personality. Megumi gets depth in the first movie, then nothing else in the next two (though to be fair, she's hardly in the Kyoto arc). ALL of them have multiple scenes where all they do is yell a male character's name from the side as they're captured/incapacitated. wat the fuck.
- Everything about Kaoru. Aside from the movies watering her down and fridging her at every opportunity, Emi Takei is not compelling at all. She has no energy in the role, even in the first movie where she actually has stuff to do. Like who IS this person? She's called Kaoru and that's it, there's barely any other resemblance.
- Aoshi is already kind of pointless imo, but within the changes of the live action-verse, he is just COMPLETELY random. His presence is jarring. To be fair, I don't know if there is any good way to integrate him into the plot (because he is fundamentally pointless sry2say). And both fight scenes with him were cool.
watever!
- I watched these movies sometime last month, then read a well-written but SUPER DEPRESSING live action-verse fic where Saitoh is incredibly cruel and horrible to Kenshin. This was a mistake!! When I rewatched the movies, I couldn't stop thinking about it lol. Like just feeling my hackles rise and like "of course YOU would, you petty small-minded bastard," whenever he came on screen. Live action!Saitoh is definitely earthier? and more human than manga/anime!Saitoh. He also feels angrier and wilder and a lot less in control. He takes everything much more personally.
- Sano is reduced to comic relief and ONLY comic relief. No dimension other than "bumbling loyal sidekick", no backstory, no development, no moment of triumph by helping to destroy the Purgatory, etc. Even his fights are repetitive (Beshimi and Anji; Saitoh and Aoshi).
- HOWEVER: Every time I watch the scene where Sano meets up with Kenshin in Kyoto, I legit think that he's going to kiss him. Like NO JOKE, it 1000000000000% looks like he is. CANON UST. I'M OBSESSED.
- Yahiko may as well not exist. He's an Easter egg for the fans, lol.
- Sato Takeru does not look younger than his age, the way Kenshin-prime does - he looks exactly 28 years old. And because the movies don't have a lot of room for ~silly antics~, he spends most of the time in serious contemplation mode. It emphasizes the Kenshin behind the rurouni, as in the kind of person who would need to devise and perfect such a persona: a good man who is very tired and weary of fighting, being stretched and strained and beaten to one limit after another. You can really see this quality in his fight with Saitoh. He's just so pale and thin and tired and delicate-looking. cries. I'm a monster.
- Another note on Sato Takeru: the one thing I'm iffy about is his portrayal of Battousai in the aftermath of a fight - that staggering, stiff-legged walk, like he feels a thousand years old and can barely move. It's a definite acting choice and I can see the reasoning behind it. I just don't think it translates well on screen.
- In true Rurouni Kenshin fashion, the villains are incredibly cheesy and over-the-top. Houji and Chou are scenery-eating machines.
good!
- The absolute best thing about the live actions is that they somehow found THE perfect Kenshin. Even if the rest of the movies were flawless (which was certainly not the case), I don't think I could have borne it if Kenshin wasn't right. But lo! The casting of Sato Takeru makes me believe God is real.
- I'm devoting a separate bullit pointo to gush about him: You can tell that he really, really understands Kenshin. There's so much going on with him. Kenshin's outward behavior is: quiet, self-contained, AWARE, but approachable, and always always making choices. It's hard to convey that without getting his point of view via text or voiceovers, especially since the movie is thin even on spoken dialogue, but Sato Takeru does it well. And just physically, he is as humanly close as you can get to Kenshin IRL, as in actually looking natural and like a real person (i.e., no purple contacts or fire-engine bright hair). But the small frame and seeming harmlessness, the self-contained elegance and slight androgyny, the speed and economy of movement? *~~~* He is super graceful. Like he moves so, SO beautifully, it does justice to everything Kenshin is supposed to be. And he did all his own stunts!! And that face. criesss. He makes Kenshin feel like a real live person in all possible dimensions. It is freaking amazing.
- The choreography, of course. Every fight is amazing. It all feels legit fast, legit strong, legit skilled.
- The look of it, especially the set design. Beautiful and detailed. I love seeing people in the background in the Tokyo scenes. I loved the Akabeko and the theater in the opening of Kyoto Inferno. The movies truly LOOK like Rurouni Kenshin has been translated into reality.
- The other two standout performances were Aoi Yuu as Megumi and Kamiki Ryunosuke as Soujiro. They were both really, really perfect.
- The way they combined and condensed the Tokyo arc for the first movie was interesting. Including Saitoh from the very beginning was especially clever, I thought.
bad!
- In contrast, the changes to the Kyoto arc in the last section of Kyoto Inferno and... uh... the entirety of the Legend Ends were super strange and... not good. Reducing Kaoru to damsel-in-distress, changing Shishio's motivations (like why on earth would he want the government to execute Kenshin? what was the point of the dinner party?), taking up half of the last movie with a traditional/stereotypical "training in the mountains" arc without much of the humor or complexity in the correlating manga/animu scenes. idk. I was just watching it like, "Well that's an... interesting... choice..................."
- The music is a big problem. I didn't like any of it, besides the Kanryu theme, of all things lol.
- The treatment of the female characters is ACTIVELY ANNOYING. Kaoru has no personality. Misao pretty much has no personality. Megumi gets depth in the first movie, then nothing else in the next two (though to be fair, she's hardly in the Kyoto arc). ALL of them have multiple scenes where all they do is yell a male character's name from the side as they're captured/incapacitated. wat the fuck.
- Everything about Kaoru. Aside from the movies watering her down and fridging her at every opportunity, Emi Takei is not compelling at all. She has no energy in the role, even in the first movie where she actually has stuff to do. Like who IS this person? She's called Kaoru and that's it, there's barely any other resemblance.
- Aoshi is already kind of pointless imo, but within the changes of the live action-verse, he is just COMPLETELY random. His presence is jarring. To be fair, I don't know if there is any good way to integrate him into the plot (because he is fundamentally pointless sry2say). And both fight scenes with him were cool.
watever!
- I watched these movies sometime last month, then read a well-written but SUPER DEPRESSING live action-verse fic where Saitoh is incredibly cruel and horrible to Kenshin. This was a mistake!! When I rewatched the movies, I couldn't stop thinking about it lol. Like just feeling my hackles rise and like "of course YOU would, you petty small-minded bastard," whenever he came on screen. Live action!Saitoh is definitely earthier? and more human than manga/anime!Saitoh. He also feels angrier and wilder and a lot less in control. He takes everything much more personally.
- Sano is reduced to comic relief and ONLY comic relief. No dimension other than "bumbling loyal sidekick", no backstory, no development, no moment of triumph by helping to destroy the Purgatory, etc. Even his fights are repetitive (Beshimi and Anji; Saitoh and Aoshi).
- HOWEVER: Every time I watch the scene where Sano meets up with Kenshin in Kyoto, I legit think that he's going to kiss him. Like NO JOKE, it 1000000000000% looks like he is. CANON UST. I'M OBSESSED.
- Yahiko may as well not exist. He's an Easter egg for the fans, lol.
- Sato Takeru does not look younger than his age, the way Kenshin-prime does - he looks exactly 28 years old. And because the movies don't have a lot of room for ~silly antics~, he spends most of the time in serious contemplation mode. It emphasizes the Kenshin behind the rurouni, as in the kind of person who would need to devise and perfect such a persona: a good man who is very tired and weary of fighting, being stretched and strained and beaten to one limit after another. You can really see this quality in his fight with Saitoh. He's just so pale and thin and tired and delicate-looking. cries. I'm a monster.
- Another note on Sato Takeru: the one thing I'm iffy about is his portrayal of Battousai in the aftermath of a fight - that staggering, stiff-legged walk, like he feels a thousand years old and can barely move. It's a definite acting choice and I can see the reasoning behind it. I just don't think it translates well on screen.
- In true Rurouni Kenshin fashion, the villains are incredibly cheesy and over-the-top. Houji and Chou are scenery-eating machines.