Appleseed

Publisher
Manga Entertainment
Director
Kazuyoshi Katayama
Production
Bandai, MOVIC, Tohoku
Country of origin
Japan
Format
OVA
Running time
63 mins
Year
1988

Appleseed VHS

By John Huxley
26th Apr 04

Masamune Shirow is one of Japan's most respected manga artists, although he makes his living not through his manga, but his drawings for magazine covers, advertising and character designs. Manga is just something he does for his own pleasure, and Appleseed can be considered his life work. Spread over five volumes (although volume five has yet to be translated and released outside of Japan) Appleseed tells of utopian future where the world is united by one company called Aegis, who've managed to disarm all nations, build massive metropolises free from crime and bring true peace to the world. Of course, if that were true, we wouldn't have much of a story, would we? Deunan Knute (haha) was a member of the elite SWAT team before war broke out, and along with her cybernetic lover Briareos they begin to become more and more paranoid as life treats them unusually well in the city of Olympus. Before long, they are dragged into a plot of resistance, power struggles and all-round mayhem.

At least that's how I remember the manga version. The anime does things a little differently due to time constraints and misses out large portions of the manga, and suffers atrociously for it. You see, unlike the beautifully scripted Akira anime, Appleseed didn't have it's creator at the helm and so loses out on some of the vital scenes, themes and characters that make the Appleseed manga the brilliant thing that it is. Instead we get roughly the same basic plot with none of the characterization, elaborate multi-layered story lines or even all the information we need to piece the whole story together. We are not even told why it's called Appleseed in this version!

The animation is OK, but the art isn't anywhere near as good as Masamune Shirow's. Although it resembles the original, it's as if its been photocopied and the machine was set to 'dull and boring', with flat representations of Deunan and Briareos and mech designs that don't even come close to representing the minute detail the author puts into every frame of his work. With animation and a plot that barely touches the original, it's hard to advise anyone to watch Appleseed. That said, it is a nice gentle introduction to Appleseed - and Masamune Shirow's work in general. Just make sure you follow it up by reading his manga, too.

-- John Huxley 26th Apr 04

Appleseed Images