30 Years Later, Science Fiction Still Owes A Debt To AKIRA
Threads of Katsuhiro Otomo’s influential anime can still be seen across all types of art that we consume, from the East to the West.
If you’ve watched a sci-fi film made after 1988, you’ve probably interacted with something inspired by Akira. Katsuhiro Otomo’s highly influential anime is often on the minds of Western filmmakers delving into sci-fi, and threads of Akira’s influence can be found in all aspects of popular culture today – you’ll see the superpowered problem child narrative in films like Looper and Chronicle; you’ll hear the heavy drums and gasps of the film’s loud and abrasive score in Kanye West’s “Black Skinhead” (Ye is known to be a huge fan). It’s another lasting symbol of cultural exchange between the East and the … Continue Reading (5 minute read)
Part of me will never stop wanting that motorcycle.
Legitimate question: what does it mean to “invent” a shade? It seems like we already have a numbering system for every shade our TVs can reproduce, so does this just mean they believe no one has used that shade in television/cinema before?
Beautiful. I saw Akira when I was 13 back in 1990 and it became the gold standard. Nothing I’ve seen compares to it. And the original comic book is mind blowing.
I got to see this in theater when my local theater began re-running old movies. It was incredible on the big screen.
We really should have heeded the warning about the 2020 Tokyo Olympics…
Last time I saw this movie, it was at the music festival “festival d’été de Québec”on 2019. The band SirSly projected this movie on the big screen while playing their song. That was a memorable moment to see it there (without sound or subtitles )
It really is a great movie and I think in the 90s it was the first anime many of us saw that wasn’t a giant robot TV series in the USA.
It’s a masterpiece.
I literally just watched this movie for the first time yesterday. What a coincidence. It was amazing by the way
Unpopular opinion, and this is coming from someone who loves the movie, but the story in the movie is overall confusing and lacking in detail. It leaves way too many questions unanswered and feels incomplete.
The movie is definitely beautiful, and I agree with it being considered a masterpiece, but overall story detail brought over from the manga is lacking. I understand they could only do so much in the time they were allotted, but overall that is the movie’s one weak point.