Drink deep of my sorrow as I entertain you with tales of Japanese Animated debauchery.


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Tuesday, August 17, 2010

Patlabor: Commit Labor Crimes, Do Labor... times?

Being pulled over by a cop is awkward, having your car stomped by a cop's giant robot is much harder to explain to your boss when you can't come in to work.

Believe me, I tried.


...Several times.


Arrest your interest as I get up off my dead ass and we FINALLY interrogate my #6 favorite anime of all time...


Patlabor!








Patlabor is the story of a girl and her weird affection for a humanoid robot vehicle that she named after her dog. And her cat. Then her robot. She just likes the name Alphonse.

A premise that only the gods of mecha design could have cooked up. Robot porn has never been so versatile in its application. Ever.

The primary "gimmick" of Patlabor is the suspension of disbelief that when people see giant robots walk the streets, no one bats an eye as though they were as common as forklifts and dump-trucks effictively removing the mystique normally surrounding mecha in japanese animation. "Labors" are basically mecha or giant robots that were originally designed with construction in mind. Following their unintended application towards criminal means, the establishment of a police Patrol Labor mobile force (or PAT-labor) became necessary.


(An AMV depicting a good mix of the Labor combat mixed with the weirder stuff they encounter like sea monsters, sewer gators, Labor accidents like falling into the bay, Noa "stealing" Alphonse, etc.)

So basically, there are Labors, Labors everywhere and occasionally a guy at a construction site gets drunk and goes on a rampage through a neighborhood, a program goes haywire causing a rampage through a school, military Labor goes rogue, criminals hijack a labor and go on a rampage and as you can see there's a pattern to the delivery method of these situations with giant robot rampages as their primary consequence.

Rampaging Labor? Call Patlabor! Monster sighting?! Eh, I guess you might as well call Patlabor. Stuffy top brass reception with terrorists on the prowl? Bring out Patlabor... just in case. Class reunion??? Sure, why the hell not?!

The frequent use/misuse of the Patlabors is an exercise in awesomeness because everyone involved in new at how to really utilize the Labors for city police work, so the higher-ups use them inappropriately to the chagrin of the squad and leads to comical delight without compare.

I should note that CPM's US Manga Corps held the rights to the tv series and OAV series, which they plugged as an action title. While I can't disagree, there are some excellent moments of action sprinkled throughout the series, but the series is primarily a comedy at heart. When entire episodes are dedicated to things like bathhouse brawls, saving kittens, Blade Runner murder homages, porn bonfires that incite civil war, working with a toothache, finding grandma, dealing with a terrorist bear on live TV there is little room for debate on its primary classification and how it should have been billed.
Granted, Its appeal is wildly diverse considering the level of detail crafted into the design of the Labors, the varying levels of comedy versus drama versus intrigue peppered with action and brilliant use of animation on a TV series budget makes this an oddity even amongst the weirdness of Japan's vast, tentacle-filled wasteland.
I'm not saying it can't try on other shoes because it did that and more with the movies, but I am questioning the idiotic ways in which CPM plugged the SHOW which was so awful, goofy and misleading that if I wasn't already WATCHING Patlabor I might not have sought it out. Then there's the dub... it sucks. I know it's early to point it out, but the CPM dub is just plain bad. Or rather, par for the course with regards to CPM's typical quality.

Don't worry, I have more exotic dub complaints coming.


(An AMV with emphasis on the action and Labor combat in the OAV)

For the purpose of Patlabor's primary story, that being a girl and her robot, the entire thing takes place as a squad room/barracks-based comedic drama surrounding Special Vehicles Divison 2 and how their lives, eating habits and quirks affect the surrounding area they're meant to protect. It's comedy gold at its core, but Patlabor is a smart story with surprising depth that touches on politics, philosophy and skirts the surface of genuine human drama.

Capitalizing on the smart stories that make up Patlabor, three movies were made with comedy as an afterthought weaving tales of political intrigue, wild conspiracies and even extraterrestrial life at one point! These take a different shape as they are usually seen through the perspective of Captain Goto as he works with the Patlabor crew to unravel the mysteries tied to the events in the films.

We see this through the eyes of a girl who loves Labors named Noa Izumi as she becomes a member of Special Vehicles Division 2 and the Pilot of Division 2's Machine #1, AKA Alphonse. She's partnered with the snarky bastard Shinohara, estranged son of the man behind Labors and the head of Shinohara Heavy Industries (essentially the Microsoft of Giant robots) who uses his immense wealth of Labor design knowledge to advise Noa during altercations with other robots as he drives around in an armored truck barking orders. Noa has a Transport driver named Harumi, he failed Labor pilot testing because he's a giant of a man and cannot fit into the Labor cockpit. He's the definitive gentle giant, who sews, cooks and makes his garden a priority, Harumi strictly hauls Noa around as support crew or is used to physically retrain Ohta outside of his labor.

Her partner Labor, Machine #2, is piloted by a psychotic bastard named Ohta who has an obsession with firing off his massive revolver when he is frustrated by a Labor scuffle or is desperate OR is piloting on a day ending in the letter "y" requiring him to begin firing at random any time he's turned loose in his Labor. Ohta is partnered with a mostly quiet fella named Shinji who does the double duty of driving Ohta's Labor transport truck and advising him when Ohta feels like listening. There's an American officer from Hawaii who steps in to train Ohta named Clancy, she ALMOST makes Ohta behave like a human, but... well, you know what they say about silk purses from pig's ears, right?

This squad of misfits is led by a eccentric genius detective named Goto, who is directly under the command of Capt. Nagumo who commands Special Vehicles Division 1 and is usually given credit for their unity, collective professionalism as a team and their superior skill in keeping collateral damage to an absolute minimum. Conversely, SVD2 is a force of nature notorious throughout the country as loose cannons and monsters crazed with bloodlust. For the record, that's really not the case, they're just apocalyptically clumsy.

The other characters to take into account are Detective Matsui who periodically shows up in the series seeking Goto's help and is Goto's partner during the course of the first two movies, the Station commander who rains on everyone's parade whenever possible, the two senior techs who maintain the Labors and the lower techs who operate as kind of a Greek chorus and random moments of comic relief.

It's hilarious to see relief turn to panic when citizens realize that they've deployed the 2nd deivison to deal with whatever situation faces them. Their very presence inspires prayer, confessions, surrender and hilarity. I hate to do another Dirty Pair comparison so soon, but the reaction is exactly the same when someone lets slip who they are or they catch the shield on their vests.

The TV show and OAV are technically different storylines, the OAV stories bleeding into the movies and the TV Show being its own universe respectively. For the most part, the stories themselves are interchangeably amusing because they are mostly about Noa & Co. as they rampage through Japan destroying real estate for the sake of justice and cheap ramen. Also tomatoes.

It's all laughs galore until the movies...



(Wow... I... Dude. This AMV covers the all the sexy highlights of the first film. You see how the characters have grown, particularly Noa who has become an amazing badass Labor Pilot when she's all alone up against the Type Zero with Clancy trapped inside.)

Patlabor 1

The first Patlabor movie stands apart from the series especially in artistic style going for a more realistic look similar to Ghost in the Shell, which is not a coincidence because the folks behind that were also behind this.
A crazy bastard who has a flock of pet crows develops a god complex and implements a design flaw in the new Windows, er I mean, The new HOS system being uploaded into Labors worldwide. Instead of the blue screen of death though, some random element sets off Labor programming to make them go kill-crazy berserk, which is what the SV2 is dealing with at the beginning of the film.

Goto & Shinohara take center stage with the original Patlabor crew joining in as part of the investigative team (mostly with everyone manipulating Shinohara into doing all the footwork and theory testing). Matui & Clancy join in on the fun as they discover the small Labor issue to be a potential worldwide epidemic that leads to awesome high budget action sequences.

The Manga Video dub is outstanding, but it feels a little weird because the script is mainly aimed at people who have never seen the show. Alternatively, this makes it a great point to jump on for new viewers. The pacing, dialogue and comic timing at dead on from the original Japanese version. In fact, I'd even argue this dub is better than its Japanese counterpart! Outside of Ranma that doesn't happen often.

Conversely, the currently available dub from Bandai sucks trucks! It misinterprets the shift from comedy to drama and does the whole thing as a bland, lifeless exercise in boredom. Basically, they copy/pasted the subtitles into the dub script and directed it like they were talking out of fish puppets or something. I dunno, it sucks and I don't know how better to express that.

Sadly, the difference here can be applied to both films as the first and second were in Manga's capable hands in the USA until the last couple of years.


(Opening scene for Patlabor 2 as dubbed by European Anime monster Manga Entertainment, a vastly superior dub to the Bandai one applied to their recent re-release)

Patlabor 2: The Movie

Following off the hot plate of intrigue in the first movie, this movie is eerily similar to the finale for the tv show Homicide, in which the original cast is called in after they've all gone their separate ways to solve a case that affects them all. Okay, the similarities aren't THAT eerie because the situations are completely different, but at least the premise or resurrecting the old police squad is the same.

Most of the Squad left to pursue bigger and better things like department higher-ups, base commander, Labor combat instructor, Labor field testers, etc. Goto, Shinobu and Hiromi stayed behind on the base to train a new squad of unnamed characters.

Following a seemingly random attack on a crowded bridge by a fighter jet that can't be clearly identified a mysterious man claiming to be military intelligence comes to the base to find Goto. He shows Goto & Shinobu the unedited footage and explains that Shinobu's mentor is the man behind the missile in a conspiracy to destroy Japan's government from within.


(The Japanese Self Defense Force mobilizes to occupy their own country in protest towards the rash series of actions taken by the police force. A frightening calm washes over Tokyo as people don't really know how to react on either side in a scene that defines the subtle genius behind these films.)

No one takes the threat seriously until weird things start happening like air traffic computers being hacked and disinformation tearing apart the once peaceful common sense binding law enforcement and military officials to their duty and igniting the flames of civil war.

Things swell to a head when jammers block any and all communication in the city as faux gas attacks cause SDF forces to rampage and panic within the cities, then an attack on the Labor Hangar leaves SV2 without anything to retaliate against the oncoming threat... except for some old Ingram named Alphonse and two additional Ingram 98's that were donated for testing purposes...

This was the movie that really pulled me into the franchise. The action is intense and gritty with only enough comic relief to humanize our already beloved characters. Again, like Patlabor 1, the previous Manga Video dub puts the currently available Bandai dub to shame.

Regardless, this movie is one that should be put into your veins, much less your collection. It's easily my favorite anime film ever made and one of the most gorgeous sights you'll ever behold. It's smart, it's sexy and it dices tomatoes cleanly after sawing through steel.

Just shut up and watch it, wiseass.



(Move trailer for the third film, as you can see there's a strong horror/monster element to the film.)

Patlabor: WXIII - Wasted Thirteen


So pissing all the original stuff out the window, WXIII takes place out of sync with the original series and movies since you see the SV2 make a cameo in the film, but the main characters are a pair of detectives and the most annoying female scientist since Cindy Crawford put on glasses and pretended to be one and at least Cindy Crawford was a hot scientist that didn't make me want to slit my wrists.

What was I talking about? Ah, yes... Cindy Crawford. I feel her career was cut short and her acting was on par with Shakespearean players. Watch some of her older films, you'll understand.

Wait, monsters?? Oh yeah! So Wasted 13 turns out to be the UNsexy Species-ish experiment conducted at some clandestine corporation, which creates a horrible fish monstery thing with breasts.

After eating enough Japanese people it grows to apporpriate monster movie size and the SV2 fellas have to take it on Godzilla style. Leading up to the entire reason you watch the movie anyway, two police detectives stumble onto the trail of bodies almost literally and start picking up pieces that lead them back to the crazy bitch scientist that our young hero has been growing his OWN giant monster for. Heh.

Buuuuuuuuuuuut, without trying to outright spoil anything there's not much save for a bittersweet ending and a desire for alcohol poisoning awaiting you. The dub was handled by Pioneer or Geneon or whatever they become before they went under. Whatever. To its credit, the dub for WXIII is better than either of the Bandai re-dubs of the previous two films, but they reuse so many of the voice actors it's like they had three guys in one booth doing the whole film and one woman did her lines in a separate booth.
I don't KNOW if Bandai snagged this movie too, but then I don't care either because I don't own this one film and I don't plan to anytime soon.

Awful monster movie thing aside, the films look gorgeous, flow well and coupled with one of the funniest TV series I've ever seen, I'm smitten with love for Patlabor and I'm certain you will be too. Give it a shot if you can find it since CPM went under and the TV/OAVs are still floating in the ether.




(Closing credit sequence for the TV series)

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