On Seeing Tim Burton's “9”

I’m not a big fan of Tim Burton, but as a robot enthusiast, I am happy that I got a chance to catch the movie 9.  I was babysitting my cat, who was recovering from a surgery.  She went to sleep on her bed and I wanted to stay nearby, so I turned on the TV with the remote to find something to keep me awake.  There was nothing good on and a little after 11:30pm I turned to the SyFy channel (it should have stayed Sci-Fi, but whatever).  The movie was on and I looked at the TV grid, and it started at 11:30.  I thought to myself, why not, I only missed the first few minutes.  I’ll go ahead and see if I like it.

               And like it I did.  I noticed that the main character 9 was blinking his eyes and they didn’t look like organic eyes.  They were blinking like pair of robot eyes, if a robot could blink.  I thought to myself, Oh, this is neat!  So these guys are actually little robots with bean-bag bodies and goggles for eyes.  I could have guessed 9 was a puppet of a sort, but do puppets move on their own?

The story is a dark tale about a group of robot puppets that eventually band together to put a stop to an evil machine.  Yes, I said evil machine.  Machines can be evil if they are programmed to learn and do things such as fight in wars or cause destruction.  It is actually the programmer who is evil or greedy, not the machine or computer that is programmed.  Of course, there is always that “glitch” in the programming that would be possible.

So it turned out that these little robot puppets had a human soul put inside them that gave them life. I don’t want to give away how that happens, but why else would they have human-like emotions like compassion, anger, fear, and joy?  Especially compassion.   My heart cries happy tears when I see a robot comfort another robot for their sadness or loss.

Astroboy, Android Kikaider, 9—any Japanese anime, otherwise animated and live action movies that contain robot characters with souls and emotions—they are just so fascinating.   A robot with a soul is such an interesting idea to play with in fiction.

Update for Robot Anime I’ve been watching + Mega Man Megamix

Tuesday afternoon I had a chance to catch up on some robot anime. I watched episodes 15 and 16 of Casshern Sins.  There is no bad episode, this show is so great and powerful.

After watching Casshern Sins, I watched episode 8 of Android Kikaider the Animation. It was a compilation episode, but I didn’t mind. It was a good idea that episode 8 happened to be a compilation episode because it has been a while since I watched Android Kikaider the Animation anyway. If I wanted to watch robot anime, lately it was Casshern Sins. Episode 8 of Shotaro Ishinomori’s animated series touched up on some issues that were pretty important to the show; Mitsuko’s feelings for Jiro; Jiro’s loneliness; Jiro’s negative self-image as Kikaider; Kikaider’s strength, and other things important to the story.

Now there are only five more episodes of Android Kikaider TA that I have to watch.  I am almost sorry that the series is only thirteen episodes.  But that means I can watch the series again in Japanese audio.

Recently, I think on the night before watchin the anime, I read the first chapter of Mega Man: Megamix Volume 2. The author and artist is Hitoshi Ariga. This chapter features Skull Man. I can only say that the story for this chapter reminds me of the many reasons why I love robot literature so much, especially when it comes to robot characters that lack something (like love) and are misunderstood.  Even if you are not a Mega Man fan, but you like robots/ robot literature, read this manga.  Hitoshi Ariga’s stories for Mega Man are truly amazing.

Watched Android Kikaider the Animation, Episodes 5 and 6

It's been a while since I watched Android Kikaider the Animation, so I wanted to watch episodes 5 and 6.  I really loved episode 4, and so far, episodes 4 and 5 are my favorite ones. 

I recentely found out when visiting the blog Black Sun that there is a link at the bottom of the page for the website called www.generationkikaida.com/ and the picture for it had what I thought was someone dressed up like Kikaider.  So I went to that website and I learned in the archives for 2002 that Kikaida was actually a live action TV show before Shotaro Ishinomori made the anime.  I forgot, was Android Kikader a Japanese manga series also?  I need to look that up.

Ha ha, I didn't know that it was live action before, so I learned something new.  But I 'm going to stick to the anime.

I would really like to write my reflections on the episodes of that anime that I watch, but they will have to come later.  I especially want to write one for episode 4, since it brings up a lot of interesting issues that the characters Jiro and Mitsuko are individually realizing.  In this episode, titled "Mirror,"  Jiro, the android, still doesn't know what he looks like when he transforms into Kikaider.  Near the end of the episode he does get a chance to look at his own reflection, and he doesn't like what he sees.  Okay, I should save this for another separate post.

Android Kikaider collection complete!

It was much cheaper to get these DVDs separately than to buy the entire Android Kikaider the Animation Collection, which is too expensive for me at this time.  Volume 4 of the series arrived Friday.

Also, the box set of Ishinomori's 009-1 arrived too, so I will watch that later, but at least it's here.  I've been reading the book Cyborg Citizen lately, so I want to watch that series after I've read some more of the book.  I've only seen episode 1 of 009-1, and I know I really like it and would like to view the entire series.  The plus is that female cyborgs star in this show, particularly the main character Mylene Hoffman.  She's such a doll, figuratively speaking.   :)

The Japanese Anime DVDs Arrived...

Thursday the first three volumes of Android Kikaider the Animation arrived at my house.  I was so excited and I couldn't wait to watch it.  I ended up watching the first two episodes the following night.  Amazon.com is so cool...

I've known about Android Kikaider for some time, but I never watched it.  In the spring of 2002 I found out it was coming on the Cartoon Network, but I didn't watch it.  I didn't know what it was about, plus it aired at 11:30pm or midnight.  Over a year later I found out what it was about--an android with a human soul--but the show wasn't on Cartoon Network anymore.

However in summer 2003 I had started watching Cyborg 009, another Japanese animated show that was originally created by Shotaro Ishinomori.  This aired on the Cartoon Network also.   I was hooked on that show.  In another anime DVD I found out that Ishinomori also created Android Kikaider.  Little did I know that I was going to be a fan of his.

I am glad I will finally have a chance to enjoy this Android Kikaider series.