##20th Anniversary Appleseed and Appleseed Ex Machina Double Feature Interest Thread Tags: Mecha, Sci-Fi, Action, Naval-Gazing *Appleseed* was...
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The original was posted on /r/anime by /u/JustAnswerAQuestion on 2024-10-17 05:42:07+00:00.

20th Anniversary Appleseed and Appleseed Ex Machina Double Feature Interest Thread

Tags: Mecha, Sci-Fi, Action, Naval-Gazing

Appleseed was my favorite translated manga from Viz. You can’t imagine my consternation when the mangaka, Masamune Shirow, moved on to start some other stupid manga called Ghost in the Shell or something.

The initial story, from which the series gets its name, has never had a proper adaption. Both the 1988 OVA and the 2004 movie took aspects of the first two collections, The Promethean Challenge, and Prometheus Unbound, but wrote their own stories. The OVA was condensed down to be an action vehicle. The movie took other aspects, but wrote in a new villain, and flipped philosophical perspectives. At least it features [2004 spoiler]robot gun platforms, the absence of which in the OVA really torqued me.

Oh, did I mention philosophy? Yes, this is the same guy that wrote the Ghost in the Shell manga. Sure, it’s not written and directed by the team of Oshii and Ito, but they didn’t pull that out of nowhere. You will definitely get people standing around arguing about what it is to be human.

Oh, did I mention directors? The man responsible in this case is Shinji Aramkai, who had quite a pedigree in the mecha genre before going down the rabbit hole of CGI for the remainder of his career. Apparently partial to exoskeletons, Aramaki designed the transforming motorcycle suits in Genesis Climber Mospeda, Bubblegum Crisis and Megazone 23, and other exoskeletons in shows such as Metal Skin Panic Maddox 01.

Starting with Appleseed (2004), he has focused exclusively on motion-captured CGI mecha series, including Starship Troopers sequels and GitS 2045. Appleseed, in particular, features a digital painting technique intended to emulate hand cel shading. The Appleseed franchise has been stuck in bad CGI hell ever since.

Yeah, I hate it too. But this is Appleseed. And it’s 2024. And that means ANNIVERSARY REWATCH!

I figured that if I show the first Aramaki movie, I might as well show the second, Ex Machina, an original story. I propose a single rewatch thread for the double feature in the first week of November (say, somewhere between Nov. 1 and Nov. 9):

Not included:

  • Appleseed (1988) (alternate version)
  • Gainax PV for 1998
  • Appleseed α (total reboot movie)
  • Appleseed XIII and its compilation movies. I’m rather fond of this PV, though. (total reboot TV series)

Since these are movies, there will also be a 1-week reminder.

There is the option of splitting them up, a week apart. Less of a double feature, though. And I don’t want to get too close to U.S. Thanksgiving / college exams / football.

Setting

Appleseed is set in the utopic city of Olympus, a perfect society populated by perfect people: engineered by the city designers to perform the functions of the city in a peaceful, orderly manner. The striking arcologies visually underscore the meticulously designed nature of the city. Olympus is also home to some number of natural humans: refugees and recruits from the post-nuclear wastelands outside the Olympus. While the old nation states still exist, Olympus is the dominant global power and attempts to maintain order via mandatory disarmament.

The main characters are Deunan Nut (Knute) and her partner (literally) Briareos, now Briareos Hecatoncheires, a rare Hecatoncheires cyborg. Both are skilled fighters, formerly part of her father’s mercenary group before being separated when Briareos was mortally wounded. They are aggressively recruited by Olympus to join E.S.W.A.T. (Extra-special weapons and tactics) to handle global and domestic security threats. There are those who value freedom and individuality over the rational paternalism of the bioroids.

I may hate the CGI, but this opening is gorgeous, one of the best I’ve ever seen.

Sub or Dub: It took me many years to find a JP version of Ex Machina, and I didn’t watch it until I found it. You might as well stick to the localizations if that’s what you have.

Where to watch: There’s an easily obtainable 4K upscale of 2004 in English. AI can’t make it look any worse, right? Peacock seems to be rather confused about which version they have, it seems to be the OVA. It appears Sentai has the rights, but they are not streaming either movie.

The original PVs for Appleseed

Mecha content: Powered Armored Suits, Tanks

Trivia: Ex Machina was produced by John Woo. I guess he liked the first one.

Reply positively to this thread to be tagged for the 1-week reminder and actual posting.

edit: It’s very hard to spell Hecatoncheires.