Tsunami Jones' Weekly Review: Street Fighter review 2 pack

[Tsunami Jones]

Ok, here we again. Some basic stuff first. HeeroYuy, I haven't been able to get my hands on anything from Aura Battler Dunbine (I hope I got that right), but I'm going to keep trying.

Also, TallonKarrde23 brought up that I should do some "newer" anime (although I have reviewed some "newer" stuff, like Tokyo Godfathers, and Abenobashi Magical Shopping district). So this week, I'm going to go ahead and try to borrow some newer stuff from my friends (since I'm to poor to buy anything).

And as always, I'm open to suggestions about what to review. If you want to know about a series, or you just want me to review it 'cuz it's your favorite, go ahead and PM me. I'll do my best to try and get ahold of the anime in question and I'll put it up ASAP.


Anyways, this week I decided to go ahead and review Street Fighter II V and the Street Fighter Alpha movie.





Street Fighter II V (return of the spoiler lever - as I kept forgetting it- spoilers = light)



One of the best series of fighting games comes to life in this awesome series . . . sort of. This takes the games that most of us are familiar with, and puts and interesting spin on the series. Instead of seeing Ryu and Ken as the bad asses that they are in the games (and the two Street Fighter movies), we get to see them as teenagers, before they can do amazing things like throw fireballs, etc.

The series starts of in Japan with good ol’ Ryu, who soon receives a letter from his best friend and training partner, Ken. Ken simply asks that Ryu comes to America to visit him, and has already taken the liberty of enclosing a plane ticket to California. Ken is nice enough to pick Ryu up and the airport, bring him over to his super-huge house, and then take him out for a night on the town. Unfortunately (or from their reactions, fortunate), Ryu and Ken end up getting in a fight with some guys from the nearby air force base, and of course they proceed to beat their heads in. But things quickly turn around when a certain character named Guile shows up and hands Ryu’s ass to him on a silver platter. Needless to say, Ryu doesn’t look too good after the fight. So then, in the morning Ken decides to go take some revenge for his buddy and fight a hung-over Guile himself . . . and does about as well as Ryu did. That’s when Ryu and Ken decide to travel the world over to find the best fighters and refine their own fighting techniques.

And that’s pretty much how the series goes. They go from country to country meeting new martial artists (all the important ones are all pretty much from the games), and training their butts off. All in all, for a video game turned series, it works out amazingly well, and is especially cool when they meet up with a character from the games, although, some of the characters have had their design changed (for instance, Fei Long no longer looks like Bruce Lee) which some might find as a turn off. Anyways, this series is pretty damn cool, especially when people start throwing punches. And as can be imagined, the fighting is easily the best part of the show.

The fighting sequences in the show are awesome, although there are a few that are kind of weak, but these all involve characters that aren’t from the games and aren’t a major point in the show. Street Fighter II V also contains one of my favorite anime fight scenes of all time (which is Ken vs. Vega, btw). One thing that I want to point out quickly that some of you might not know, is that when Street Fighter 2 was originally coming to the states, their was a translation error, and this error is still with the series to this date. What was this error? Well, they messed up and a few of the character got their names switched. The characters were M. Bison, Vega, and Balrog. M. Bison was supposed to be Vega, Vega was supposed to be Balrog, and Balrog was supposed to be M. Bison (Mike is what the M. supposedly stands for; though over here in the U.S. the only thing I’ve heard for the M. is Master). Now, they changed it in the dub and in the subtitles, but in the Japanese language they use their original names, which is why I’m pointing it out, as some might be confused.

But anyways, like I’ve said already, the fight scenes are great, but like I’m sure you can guess, not everything in the show is as good as the fighting, not even close. The biggest problem is the script. The writing generally ranges from poor to lame. The second problem is the animation. Now, most of it is pretty good, but they do something which is a pet-peeve of mine. They use repeated animation. Yes, repeated animation. Now, their might be a few of you who actually might not of been exposed to this phenomenon (I haven’t seen anything use this for a long time). But anyhoo, repeated animation is used to save money; they simply take a scene that’s already been used and re-use it (sometimes they flip it horizontially so it looks slightly different). Personally, I find it very lame. And the third problem is the music. It’s very weak (and Manga didn’t help it by replacing the original theme with their own music).

Now at the end, Street Fighter II V has its fair share of problems, but I’m still going to recommend it to all who haven’t seen it (especially if you’re a big fan of the games). The final rating that I give it is 3 out of 5 stars. One last thing that I have to mention is the price. The series is pretty affordable. It’s 26 episodes, on 4 DVDs, for around $22 bucks each. Not bad.





Street Fighter Alpha (or, Street Fighter Zero) Spoiler level = light to medium



Now, for those of you that might be familiar with the games, this movie has nothing to really do with the game of the same name (except for some of the characters and their design). In fact, some of the character were removed, the biggest one being M. Bison. Yes that’s right, Bison isn’t in the movie at all, and he was replaced by a never before seen villain (who isn’t nearly as cool, or very cool at all). But even with that fact, this is the best Street Fighter anime that has been made to date.

Early in the film, we see Ryu and Ken, but it soon becomes apparent that Ryu is fighting against an evil power that is raging inside of him: the Dark Hadou. Also, a character new to the series is introduced, who claims to be Ryu’s little brother. Yes, it’s odd, but it works pretty well, and it helps that the kid is an amazing fighter (he even goes up against Zangief, although that doesn’t turn out well; can you say, “Spinning Piledriver?”) And besides the kid, they end up managing to squeeze in an amazing amount of characters (including Dan! Yes, Dan is in the film, and gets killed by Vega, but ends up coming back for more! That’s perseverance!), but the character that I think is the best in the film, is Akuma. It shows him as the bad ass that he is, and what Ryu would become if he let the Dark Hadou consume him.

Now, the fight scenes in the show are masterfully done, and they sport some amazing animation to go along with them. Also, one thing that the fights do a very good job with, is making some of the fighting more “real”. The martial arts are portrayed very well (Chun Li actually looks like she’s using Wu Shu, and she even does her upside-down spinning kick, only it looks like someone might actually be able to do it). Also, the music is pretty good, which helps had to the mood of the fighting, but I personally wouldn’t purchase the soundtrack.

Now, as this show was very well done, there isn’t much wrong with it, but there are a few things. For one, having an unknown bad guy in the show is kinda lame, especially when it could’ve been Bison, or even Akuma if they wanted a change. Also the script isn’t bad, but it is kinda wacky.

Wow. This review ended up being pretty short. Oh well, what can you do? Anyways, I give Street Fighter Alpha 4 out of 5 stars, as it’s definately worth owning to have in just about any anime collection.


See you next week!

[Rhyevaln]

Wow. This review ended up being pretty short. Oh well, what can you do? Anyways, I give Street Fighter Alpha 4 out of 5 stars, as it’s definately worth owning to have in just about any anime collection.
See you next week!

How could you say such a thing??!?!?!!?!?!? That was an absolutely horrible movie(compared to what it should have been). That kid was so annoying and totally added in a whim to make the movie! I am almost embarrased that they made it the 10th anniversary movie. They could have done a hell of a lot better... damn kid.

The only thing that saved that show was the fights and Chun-Li. The plot was so "Fight him... now go fight him, yes that was harder to do right? Now go fight him, start losing and then bust out with enlightenment and kick some ass".

Me after watching the movie:
-_______- *ugh*



P.S. From the first scene to the last, Chun-Li gets and awesome tan. ^_^

[VegettoEX]

Agreed. <I>Alpha/Zero</I> is one of the worst movies/OVAs I've ever seen in my life.

And I <B>love</B> SF.

[Tsunami Jones]

Wow. I didn't know that people hated the film with such a passion. I personally enjoyed the movie a great deal, and I didn't find the kid annoying at all.

[Rhyevaln]

Wow. I didn't know that people hated the film with such a passion. I personally enjoyed the movie a great deal, and I didn't find the kid annoying at all.

I don't hate it, I don't hate it with a passion either. In fact, I own the DVD All for Chun-Li though.

The kid aside, and the fact that the movie leaves a bitter taste in my mouth after watching it. It is a fairly decent show. A lot better than most people would like to admit. However, I am still dissapointed in the movie...

[Tsunami Jones]

Wow. I didn't know that people hated the film with such a passion. I personally enjoyed the movie a great deal, and I didn't find the kid annoying at all.

I don't hate it, I don't hate it with a passion either. In fact, I own the DVD All for Chun-Li though.

The kid aside, and the fact that the movie leaves a bitter taste in my mouth after watching it. It is a fairly decent show. A lot better than most people would like to admit. However, I am still dissapointed in the movie...

Yes, Chun Li did totally rock in the movie. And I can totally see why people can be dissapointed with it. Heck, I might have been, if I had gotten it for retail price, but my view on it might be skewd because I got it for $6.44. No, it's not a bootleg, the place I used to work at carried used DVDs, and it was that after employee discount (I'm guessing though, that the person who sold it to us didn't like it though, as it came in to the store very soon after release).

But anyways, I'm just happy that one of these reviews is actually being discussed.

[OmniStrata]

I hate to break it to ya guys
but Virtua Fighter TV is better in my opinion

[dodges thrown silverware]*



Catchy opening song [that's dubbed in the English version not badly]

And Akira's personality / Character traits are freakin' hilarious
the DUB kicks royal ass too...

I miss doing reviews
I wonder if I wrote one for this anime already?

[Tsunami Jones]

I hate to break it to ya guys
but Virtua Fighter TV is better in my opinion

[dodges thrown silverware]*



Catchy opening song [that's dubbed in the English version not badly]

And Akira's personality / Character traits are freakin' hilarious
the DUB kicks royal ass too...

I miss doing reviews
I wonder if I wrote one for this anime already?

I've never actually gotten around to seeing the Virtua Fighter anime. I remember seeing the previews and going "wow, that looks like it sucks" (mainly because the previews were woefully unappealing). And, until now, I hadn't talked to anyone whose actually seen it. But now, I guess I'll have to put it on my list of things to watch.

[Heero_Yuy84]

Ok, here we again. Some basic stuff first. HeeroYuy, I haven't been able to get my hands on anything from Aura Battler Dunbine (I hope I got that right), but I'm going to keep trying.

Yeah, you got it right...don't worry, no rush on it...just figure at some point it'd be nice to see it reviewed (the show could use the exposure...)

Hmm...might have to look into the Street Fighter animes now...at first wasn't quite sure what to make of them

[Tsunami Jones]

Ok, here we again. Some basic stuff first. HeeroYuy, I haven't been able to get my hands on anything from Aura Battler Dunbine (I hope I got that right), but I'm going to keep trying.

Yeah, you got it right...don't worry, no rush on it...just figure at some point it'd be nice to see it reviewed (the show could use the exposure...)

Hmm...might have to look into the Street Fighter animes now...at first wasn't quite sure what to make of them

Good stuff! They're all worth seeing (at least for the fighting).