Anime Review – Silent Mobius: The Movie I

This weekend we’re revisiting a series I reviewed just about 2 years ago – Silent Mobius. Specifically, we’re reviewing one of the films based on the manga, which pre-dated the TV series by approximately 7 years.

General Information

Naoko Matsui as Katsumi Liqueur
Chieko Honda as Yamigumo Nami
Gara Takashima as Lebia Maverick
Hiromi Tsuru as Kiddy Phenil
Kiyoshi Kawakubo as Grosspoliner
Kouichi Hashimoto as Robert De Vice
Kouji Nakata as Lucifer Hawk
Masako Ikeda as Fuyuka Liqueur
Maya Okamoto as Saiko Yuki
Tina Gushiken as The other Katsumi
Toshiko Fujita as Rally Cheyenne

Directed by Kazuo Tomizawa and Michitaka Kikuchi
Written by Michitaka Kikuchi, and adapted from the manga by Kia Asamiya
Music by Kaoru Wada
Animated by AIC

Available from Rightstuf.com in a regular or special edition (w/soundtrack CD). Also available from Amazon.com in the regular or special edition.

The Premise

In 2024, Katsumi Liqueur comes to Tokyo to be with her terminally ill mother, Fuyuka. However, Tokyo is under siege by supernatural creatures known as Lucifer Hawks. The only thing standing against them are the forced of the Advanced Mystification Police, or AMP. Little does Katsumi know that she possesses a power that can tip the balance in one direction or another in this struggle.

The High Points

The animation in this film is drop dead gorgeous. The characters look excellent, as do the monsters. The voice acting is also fantastic.

The Low Points

The film has a few problems. First, it’s too short, running at just under a hour. While the film was a double feature on release (with the other film being the fantasy farce “Slayers: The Motion Picture”), the short running time doesn’t do the film any favors. It doesn’t help that the manga had literally just started around this time, meaning that they didn’t have a lot of storyline to work with.

Content Notes

There is some prolonged nudity (for a hour-long film) here, as well as some bloody violence.

The Scores

Originality: This is an adaptation of a manga, but one that takes some liberties with its source material due to how little of it had been written at this time. Still, even with the adjustments made to the particulars of the story, it hews fairly close to the original material. 3 out of 6.

Animation: The animation in the film is fantastic. While the quantity of the animation is small, the quality is splendid. 5 out of 6.

Story: The story is decent, with some well written story beats, though we’re essentially only getting chunks of a larger whole here (basically serving as a hour-long ad for the manga). 4 out of 6.

Voice Acting: The performances here are excellent, and basically everyone here gets well enough into their characters that I’m not surprised that they were all brought back seven years later for the TV series. 5 out of 6.

Emotional Response: Not that strong. Almost none of the comedy from the series or manga is present here Except for one beat where, in breaking free from the bonds of a Lucifer hawk that is constricting her, Kiddy breaks her gun, but doesn’t realize it until she heroically points it at the villain with a “Ha!” right before it falls apart. Other then that, every beat here is something that I’ve would have seen either in the manga or the later TV series. 3 out of 6.

Production: This is kind of hit-or-miss. The music is good when its trying to atmospheric, but there are times when it falls flat. Also, there’s a moment in a dream sequence where we’re supposed to be getting a heart-beat effect, but the effect just sounds wrong. 3 out of 6.

Overall: This is an okay film. It’s definitely not great, but it’s not much of a supplement to the TV series, nor is it much of a substitute either. Either get the manga, or get the TV series. Only watch this if you’re shooting for all of Silent Mobius. 2 out of 6.

In total, Silent Mobius: The Movie I gets 25 out of 42.