Movie Review: Danguard Ace: The Movie Collection (1977, Toei Animation/Shout Factory)

...most genre aficionados have a fairly good idea of when they were first privy of the category of animation, coined as 'anime'; for some...much like this ardent viewer...it was a uniquely visual oddity, which one grew up with...at some point, forsaken for a stretch...and then, picked up later, when the artistry of this particular venue of animated storytelling, had evolved, considerably. Oh yes, thinking back upon the early days of embraced amine...that is, before such productions were called 'anime', and were merely known as 'cartoons'...how uniquely individual, were these engrossing and embraceable animated imports, as compared to countless American youths' regular domestic diet of animation, from cartoon 'factories', such as Warner Brothers, Filmation, Tex Avery and Hanna-Barbara. Amongst the best...Speed Racer. Gigantor. Astro-Boy. Kimba, the White Lion. Personal would-be 'anime' favorites, shuffled in amongst domestic classics...the simple and jerky rendered animation of such, translated and dubbed for domestic consumption...and betraying what made these imported 'toons so darned compelling: the ability to present likable, relatable and embraceable characters, engaging in fantastic, albeit complex and emotionally-driven stories. For this viewer, as mentioned previous, one...well, as the old saying goes, "...one has to grow up, sometime" (...uh, bite your tongue, you stiff-shirted 'inner mature' voice of reason, dammit), and as such, there came a time, as a youth, to move onto other things...in this viewer's case, it meant taking a sabbatical from dedicated animation viewing...those Saturday morning and after-school respites, and...well, OK, I admit it...this viewer did occasionally take a peek through the crack of an unclosed door, to see where the world of anime was taking ardent viewers, both domestically and internationally...

TV on DVD Review: Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers, Season Three (1995/96)

...having been wrought from a generation, which at a younger age, went salivatingly ga-ga over Godzilla & Gamera movies, Ultra Man & Johnny Sokko episodes, Infra-Man and Gigantor, this viewer often found it so easy to diss the occasional, wayward, stumbled upon, broadcast episode of this 'what-the-heck-is-it' TV oddity, called 'Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers'; after all, in the onset, the whole franchise seemed nothing more than an adolescent-geared hybrid knock-off of ideas and concepts previously explored...albeit in a somewhat more hallucinogenic meld (...jovially, I recall an episode of VH1's "I Love the '90's", where Dee Snider, of Twisted Sister, spoke of how his own kids 'got caught up in this mind**** of a show'). Given a viewing of sporadic episodes, here and there, this viewer vaguely caught onto the ideas, interlaced into the show's super-hero-istic forefront, whereby each episode would invoke a simple-to-understand level of drama amongst the dynamic martial arts monster fighting...sometimes even exuding poignant concepts on human values and social behavior...once again, emulating the old 'let's trick kids into learning' diversion...something which, despite being as equally deceptive, was much more apparent and obvious, back in the '70's, with the 'Schoolhouse Rock' thing, and instructively preached, epilogued portions of Saturday morning kids shows. And so, when afforded the opportunity to examine the crust of a whole season of the "...Rangers", this viewer's first reaction was...NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! The Agony!!! The Horror!!! The Torture!!!...