Movie Review - ROD: Read or Die (2001)

There's a lot of anime out there in the world.  There's folks out there that like their action, some that like their horror and some that love their pr0n (NOTE: I use the Internet term "pr0n" because it's hi-frickin'-larious) or as the Japanese call it, "hentai." I choose my anime carefully, and make sure that I leave certain anime to their own devices if its general presence gets too ridiculous like the stateside phenomenon of Dragon Ball Z/GT/Kai/LOL. Now don't get me wrong: I've geeked out to many an anime and DBZ is no exception. But when I see a grown-ass man in suit and tie whine like a child because the comic book store didn't have the latest bootleg Japanese tape, something is WRONG with the show's fanbase and it goes without saying that I RAN AWAY VERY FAST.
With that said, I wish to acknowledge a certain sect of people since neglected in the wake of the anime revolution of which this anime is subconsciously dedicated to: LIBRARIANS.

ROD: Read or Die follows the exploits of one Yomiko Readman (voiced by Rieko Miura/Kimberly Yates). This young woman is an avid reader and part-time school teacher. She's absent-minded, leaving post-its on the stacks of books in her apartment as reminders to be a productive member of society. While she may not seem like much other than a mousy bookworm on the outside, she harbors quite the interesting life.

As a member of the top-secret, world-spanning British Library Special Operations Division, Miss Readman holds the rank of their best agent. She also had the mental powers to control paper on a molecular level. By harnessing this miraculous skill, she can use the harmless scrap paper in the suitcase she totes everywhere as anything she wants. This has also eaned her the goofiest code name ever spoken: "The Paper". Miss Readman is informed by her dispatcher Joker (voiced by Hozumi Goda/Crispin Freeman) to track down and foil a plot to take over the world by a previously unknown party called "I-Jin". The other thing that is known about the case is a very rare book is involved-- and with that, Yomiko is on the case. Joker's not letting her out of HQ without assigning a partner, so "the Paper" now has to contend with the unflappable Nancy, codename "Miss Deep" (voiced by Michiko Neya/Amanda Winn Lee). Blessed with superior combat skills, intangibility and a fathomless bosom, Miss Deep and the Paper work together with an agency sniper commando named Drake (voiced by Masami Iwasaki/Jason Lee) to take down I-Jin's genetically altered versions of... historical and legendary figures? What kind of methamphetamine grab-bag is this?
Believe it or not, the first enemy they fight is based on French entomologist Jean-Henri Fabre (voiced by Junko Takeuchi/Douglas Rye), who rides into battle on a giant grasshopper. A serious case of WTF will grab your brain and not let go, especially if you're not up on academia. Many other important figures also pop up in the three episode OVA, who equally kick ass. But not as much as the music kicks ass.

Very much in the musically sharp style of 1970's action music, the opening music rocks. It's almost as if you look at the opening animation and just feel the city it shows you--I wouldn't be surprised if the neighborhood shown in the opening is none other than the Akihabara District in Tokyo, Japan. I'm probably wrong, but it would be an interesting touch. The bird's-eye view of the city isn't the cherry on top with this OVA, it's something far more affable to my sensibilities. The very idea that an introverted bookworm is the central protagonist to a three-part globetrotting action/adventure filled with over-the-top scenes AND wraps up with efforts to thwart a world domination plot goes against the grain. It damns the traditional hero with a flip of a page, teaches us all the power of books... and that "reading is fundamental".

Movie Review - Jason X (2001)

We'll start this movie review off as I usually do: through a anecdotal segue.
Ever since I started watching Hercules in the Paramount Pictures' Action Pack, I began to take more and more interest in the work of Sam Raimi after Army of Darkness. The director has a great body of work after the Evil Dead trilogy (looking at you, Cleopatra 2525) and hit the big time with Spider-Man. While Spider-Man is great, my mind still remembers a time when the gods were cruel and plagued mankind with suffering and lands in turmoil cried out for heroes. Most lands preferred Lucy Lawless' Xena, but I preferred Kevin Sorbo.

I don't know if it's just that he's a pretty man or if chicks in the Hellenic Period were easy, but Mr. Sorbo has brought more babes to bed as Hercules than Captain Kirk in Star Trek. When Mr. Sorbo left the Greek world, he ended up in a world created by Star Trek's creator Gene Roddenberry called Gene Roddenberry's Andromeda. There, he's Dylan Hunt, captain of the Commonwealth Fleet's warship called the Andromeda Ascendant. He's the only Commonwealth officer to exist after 300 years and he wants to rebuild the lost government with the help of his Rag-Tag Crew™. Two members of his new crew are the human pilot Beka Valentine (played by Lisa Ryder) and the ship's android avatar that goes by the name "Rommie" (played by raging Anglo-Filipina hotness Lexa Doig). Now, I bring up these two characters from Gene Roddenberry's Andromeda to illustrate a weird coincidence that happened in the casting of the tenth installment of the Friday the 13th horror series called Jason X.

Our story shows up at the capture of our main antagonist Jason (played by stunt master Kane Hodder). I'll never know why people think they can just catch Jason, tie him up and be done with it. You can't. The people who have him in custody are government types who are going to dispose of Jason (good idea) by driving him cross-country to a dumpsite (bad idea) and getting rid of him there. The doctor on staff for the transport of Jason is Dr. Rowen (Lexa Doig), a woman highly opposed to giving Jason any chance to escape. Don't worry, say the higher-ups on site; he's in chains with guards watching him, he's not going anywhere.
Sure enough, the guard (note the singular form) is killed and Jason goes on a rampage, killing many soldiers and chasing Dr. Rowen about. She tricks Jason into a cryogenic chamber to freeze him for 500 years, but he stabs Rowen through the cryotube and they both are frozen for 500 years. Over the years, mankind destroyed Earth and fled to space. A team of medical students is on a field trip to the dead planet Earth to see what they can find in its ruins. They stumble upon the facility that holds Jason and Dr. Rowen, taking both back to their spaceship in orbit.
While Jason is put on a dissection slab, a machine that regenerates parts via nanotechnology revives Rowen in the ship's sickbay. She wakes up and all she can talk about is Jason. The group of young, nubile and horny med students on the ship, including the introverted Tsunaron (Chuck Campbell) and his confused android KM-14 (Lisa Ryder) tell her that the big guy they found with her is quite dead and he won't be bothering anyone at all.

They could not have been more wrong.
Shortly after dispatching the dissecting student with liquid nitrogen, Jason does his thing and kills teenagers having sex. Then he pulls an Alien and goes for the shadows. The man responsible for the field trip, medical professor Lowe (Jonathon Potts), brought Space Marines to fill out the body count. These doomed and poorly disciplined soldiers follow Sgt. Brodsky (Peter Mensah), a badass soldier dude who knows how to relax. His troops don't know how to act, so they get chopped up and Brodsky gets injured trying to save them. Or something.
Needless to say, the people on board are scared and have no way of beating Jason. Tsunaron and KM-14 are stuck somewhere and they come up with a plan to defeat the Voorhees menace. The method employed was good, but the after-effects couldn�t have been worse. Upon being blown to bits by an enhanced KM-14, Jason lands on the medical regenerator. Since most of his body was blown away in a hail of gunfire that DIDN'T pierce the hull, the regenerator had to make do with metallic parts. After moments of cutting back and forth between Jason's carcass and the completion gauge, Jason is all crazy-ass cyborg. Some more shit happens and half the ship starts to fall apart. The leftover crew makes it over to the other side of the ship to execute a plan to hold Jason off.
The plan is to use the ship's holographic projector to make a fake Crystal Lake campsite and hold Jason there while they escape in an escape pod. Two holographic sluts, who easily have the best lines in the movie, delay Jason from pursuing the survivors. This scene alone is comedy gold.

Jason breaks free of the hologram and almost has his prey when Brodsky shows up and faces off with Jason. This gives the survivors enough time to escape in an escape pod. Not to be discouraged by a life-or-death battle in space, Jason jumps and lands on the escape pod and tries to kill the survivors. Brodsky's there too and lunged after Jason, knocking him off and fighting him as they both fall into the nearby planet's atmosphere. You'd think this was the end of Jason, the way Rowen, KM-14 and Tsunaron celebrated as if he was finally dead. Such a belief would be the end of you, but not the end of the Friday the 13th franchise.

This movie sucked, yet held an immense entertainment factor. It's not a great horror film or even a good B-movie; but it has to be one of the best comedies I've seen in a while.