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We're two episodes in. Tony Stark has arrived in Japan, and is being his usual self--only he's being screwed with by this secret organization known as Zodiac. All he wants to do is bring free, clean, unlimited energy to everyone, but people keep hating.

So what's everyone think so far?

Admittedly, it'd be nice if I could get better avi encodes, and I wish the CGI would go away, but I think it's pretty awesome so far.

For those who weren't impressed with episode one, give episode 2 a try. One of the coolest "armor up" scenes in recent memory, plus Tony gets to take on "Cancer" of the Zodiac and he...I won't spoil it. Watch for yourself. You know you want to.

Also? SO MUCH BETTER THAN ARMORED ADVENTURES!
 
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It's pretty good. I wish the female reporter character could be at least slightly smarter than a bag of hammers, though.
 
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I wish the female reporter didn't exist. Nothing against female characters--where the heck is Pepper?!?!

She's so much cooler than this girl, who looks like a more dull version of Fujiko from Lupin.
 
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This is what they get for putting Inoue in charge of the screenwriting, I guess.
 
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I dunno, I find this show really interesting just to see what happens when you match a plot clearly created by a high-concept guy like Warren Ellis with the style of a meat-and-potatoes Japanese superhero writer like Toshiki Inoue. The animation itself is nothing special, but the flavor of the show is much more interesting than I expected.

Madhouse isn't just phoning in a "gaijin anime" here, there's a very sincere attempt here to tell an interesting Iron Man story in a more typically Japanese style. Warren Ellis is actually a fan of certain Japanese takes on the superhero-- he's written about how much he likes Rahxephon, for example-- so I think he's a better choice for this than some other writers might be.

The female reporter is dumb as a bag of hammers because she's pretty much Inoue's take on Shinji from Ryuki, just a chick. The real problem here seems to be that Toshiki Inoue just can't write a convincing reporter to save his life.
 
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Wtf, I didn't know this started. I've been asking everywhere. Anyone know where I can watch/download it?

Does this mean the Wolverine Anime started too?
 
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I dunno, I find this show really interesting just to see what happens when you match a plot clearly created by a high-concept guy like Warren Ellis with the style of a meat-and-potatoes Japanese superhero writer like Toshiki Inoue. The animation itself is nothing special, but the flavor of the show is much more interesting than I expected.

Madhouse isn't just phoning in a "gaijin anime" here, there's a very sincere attempt here to tell an interesting Iron Man story in a more typically Japanese style. Warren Ellis is actually a fan of certain Japanese takes on the superhero-- he's written about how much he likes Rahxephon, for example-- so I think he's a better choice for this than some other writers might be.

I don't know, I like it so far, but I don't really see the "high concept" like I did with Extremis just yet. Still, we're about 1/8th of the way through, so hopefully it will surface later?

I guess the fact that they really want to tell this story in a more Japanese way is the reason why we got a brand-new villain group as opposed to someone like AIM, who I thought would've worked a lot better.


The female reporter is dumb as a bag of hammers because she's pretty much Inoue's take on Shinji from Ryuki, just a chick.
The real problem here seems to be that Toshiki Inoue just can't write a convincing reporter to save his life.

Dammit! That's why their reporter's place looked so familiar! I kept thinking, "Man, this place looks just like Shinji's office from Ryuki, but...nah, no one from that is working on this, right?"

And no, Kivat. They're going by seasons, I think. So we'll see Wolverine in the Winter, and probably X-Men in the Spring.
 
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I thiiiink Wolverine is going to run in the same timeslot after Iron Man finishes.

Right now it's being subbed by a group called Force Works. Here's links to torrents for episode 1 and episode 2. (Sorry, I don't DDL anime so I can't give you DDL links.)

This series is "pre-licensed" by G4 TechTV and I believe is scheduled to run dubbed on US TV next year, too. The series ties in with the Iron Man movie continuity, right down to a Tony design patterned after RDJ.
 
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I don't know, I like it so far, but I don't really see the "high concept" like I did with Extremis just yet.

Extremis was high concept but also a revamp. This can't be ambitious in quite the same ways because it has to tie in with the films. (Also, everyone ended up hating Extremis. Last I checked, it had been retconned and blamed for Iron Man's unpopular behavior in Civil War.)

The high concept I see here is Ellis musing on how a character like Tony Stark, who is a reformed arms dealer but at heart still kind of a weaponsmith, interacts with a society like Japan that hasn't had a real military in over 50 years.

For instance, Tony clearly wants to develop the Dio suit in Japan because he thinks, with no real standing military, he'll be free to act as with all his altruism without anyone trying to exploit his work. Japan is famously technology-forward, though, and how forward can you be with no military industrial complex?

I suspect that wanting to explore this theme is why we have a new villain group rather than any established Marvel group. I'm betting that Zodiac turns out to be a front for activities by the JSDF or some other group that wants Japan to have its own military again, with the need to fight Zodiac as an excuse.

"Man, this place looks just like Shinji's office from Ryuki, but...nah, no one from that is working on this, right?"

Toshiki Inoue is actually responsible for some of the worst Ryuki episodes, at least in terms of trying to portray Shinji as a reporter and totally failing. I kinda liked his Ryuki episodes a little better than Kobayashi's, though, Kobayashi's at the time felt a little amateurish.
 
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