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Ninja Resurrection Director: Yasunori Urata Number of Items: 1 Picture Format: Academy Ratio Format: Color, Animated Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated) Running Time: 100 minutes Studio: A.D. Vision Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1 Region Code: 1 Product Group: DVD Release Date: 1999-12-07 Buy from Amazon |
 "What a disappointment!"When I heard that a sequel to Ninja Scroll was released on VHS, I eagerly waited for its release on DVD. As soon s it was released, I purchased a copy from Reel.com. I was so disappointed with this movie that I returned it the following day! Thank goodness Reel.com had a "no questions asked" return policy. The plot was practically non-existant. The little action that they had was poor. The overall animation was marginal at best. Save your money and time on something more worthwile.  "There must be a better reason why people hate this...."Not to say that this anime is a masterpiece. Absolutely not. In fact, this anime is far from the definition of "masterpiece." But, it's better than most animes of this genre that I've seen. The characters are not spectacular, and show very little development. Jubei is pretty cool, but is shown vaguely in both episodes of the OVA. Shiro Amakusa, the so called, "New Christ," is shown more often than Jubei, and has a horribly disturbing death. He dies pleasuring a woman. Musashi Miyamoto seems to be a rival of Jubei's who lives in the mountains and draws pictures, but other than that you don't know too much about him. The animation in this DVD is very sub-par. In the first episode, much of it is static and many of the people have absolutely no eyes. But the artwork and animation details near the end prove this anime has something going for it. The second episode has much better animation and dynamic camera angles with alot more character development and an emphasis on the evil guys. It's almost hard to believe that the second episode is even in relation to the first in terms of animation. There are several perverted aspects of this movie, such as the "doing the dirty thing in the church" scene and "making the girl go *pop*" scene. But, scenes like this (ok, only one scene) were in Ninja Scroll also, and that is poked at less than this for being perverted. Plus, if you're mature enough you can look past the aspects of those scenes and learn to like the action and characters in the series. If they ever start making the third episode, expect alot from it. After the first two episodes, the series can't really get any worse. The main reason people hate this series was the advertising of the sequel to Ninja Scroll, which now has been taken off of the boxes. So why are you people still complaining about this anime in relation to Ninja Scroll? You should appreciate this anime for what it is.  "Ressurecting a Genre"Lets face it with the exception of Ninja Scroll most Anime titles that deal with ninjas absolutly bite! Yet with Ninja Ressurection, no this is not a sequal to Ninja Scroll, ADV Films brings us a series of epic proportion. The detail to histroy is a nice touch on the series and the story line is stronger then that of Ninja Scroll. Where does this seem to fall short? Mostly in animation, which is good don't get me wrong but it is a bit rusty compared to the animation quality of Ninja Scroll. I will also say that events in this first installment, such as why Jubei has a patch on his left eye, are explained in volume 2 of the series Ninja Ressurection: Hell Spawn. For all the flaws though in this title it is still a strong anime that is worth worth seeing if you liked Ninja Scroll. "Deceptive Title"ADV should be ashamed at themselves for the marketing ploy of calling this Ninja Scroll 2. The Jubei character does not remind me of thye original, except for the swordsmanship. They should also check the running time. It sure seemed shorter than 50 min. They should have just put parts 1 and 2 on one tape but they were greedy. Don't buy this video thinking you'll get a good storyline as in "Ninja Scroll". The storyline didn't grab me or hold my interest. I won't rent or buy part 2 because I don't think it would be worth it. Borrow the movie from a friend if he has smashed it already. The animation is decent and there is a lot of blood and gore near the end. But a good anime must have more and this does not. "Deceiving Title"Maybe I wouldn't have been so harsh with the rating had they not deceived people by claiming the movie to the excellent "Ninja Scroll". I also felt cheated by the short running time. I don't understand why they couldn't package parts 1 and 2 on the same tape. I guess I do, it's all about the money. The problem with that being that after viewing part 1, I had no desire to go and rent or buy part 2. The animation is decent but the storyline wasn't interesting. I have seen lots of anime and a good anime has more than just blood and guts. It must have an interesting story. It fails in that respect. |
