Promare

Thirty years ago, a new race of flame-wielding mutants suddenly appeared, destroying a large portion of humanity. These so-called “Burnish” have continued to appear at random, leaving a trail of death and destruction in their wake.

The autonomous republic of Promepolis is a thriving nation thanks to the incredible efforts of their leader, Kray Foresight, against the Burnish. A team of firefighters known as the Burning Rescue is tasked with stopping these horrifying monsters, using the most performant technology available thanks to their incredible mechanic Lucia Fex. Galo Thymos is an energetic young man, who considers Foresight his hero for saving his life and is the rescue team's most recent recruit.

A terrorist group calling themselves Mad Burnish has been causing havoc all over the nation. After an encounter with Mad Burnish leader Lio Fotia, Galo sets out on his fated journey to find the truth about these mutants, ultimately leading him to question everything he previously held to be true.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Fotia, Lio Main

Saotome, Taichi Japanese

Thymos, Galo Main

Matsuyama, Kenichi Japanese

Fex, Lucia ing

Shintani, Mayumi Japanese

Ardebit, Aina ing

Sakura, Ayane Japanese

Vinny ing

Kobayashi, Kendou Japanese

Gueira ing

Hiyama, Nobuyuki Japanese

Foresight, Kray ing

Sakai, Masato Japanese

Meis ing

Konishi, Katsuyuki Japanese

Ex, Ignis ing

Koyama, Rikiya Japanese

Puguna, Remi ing

Yoshino, Hiroyuki Japanese

Wakabayashi, Hiromi Producer, Art Director

Masumoto, Kazuya Producer

Ukai, Keisuke Producer

Imaishi, Hiroyuki Director, Storyboard, Art Director

Reviews

May 24, 2019

Draculoid

Recommended

While Gurren Lagann used drills and Kill la Kill used thread, Imaishi and Nakashima`s new “Burning ion” storyline takes the symbolism to the next logical step, using fire itself (and shapes) to drive the story forward. It`s both boldly new in appearance with it‘s bright colours and liberal use of CG yet immediately recognizable as an Imaishi work. While many haven’t been blown away by the studios output as of late, I think it’s important to realize how little this resembles your standard Trigger release.


This film is their first in the almost 8 years the studio has been ... running and a similar affair to Darling in the Franxx in that it is a collaborative work. How it isn’t similar, though, is that it isn’t shit and their collaborative studio, Sanzigen, are a CGI studio who work in the field of revolutionizing CGI use in anime. While some of collaborations mainly focus on background armies and mechanical parts, their standout title Bubuki Baranki from 2016 received praise across the internet for being the best looking use of CGI in anime to date and many claiming it to be the future of CGI anime. It’s clear with Promare they are wanting to take their highly praised CGI/cel shading anime aesthetic and combine it with the stylings of Imaishi and Nakashima to create the most traditional looking anime CGI project to date, and here I believe they succeed.



On the quality of the CG and integration, I personally found it fantastic. There were a small number of times the frame rate seemed only slightly off, but in the grand scheme I'm only making this criticism to be fair. For my personal enjoyment of the film it had very, very little impact. After seeing the film and following the discussion online, I want people to understand that enjoying or praising this film doesn't mean the individual is a fan of or sympathizer of CG integration in anime, but can appreciate a well animated, piece using it. For example, even though they are stylized vehicles, I love the cuts in episode 6 of Panty and Stocking with Chuck and Fastener fighting in their cars. It’s easy to dismiss CGI outright without actually analyzing what works and doesn’t in a scene, and with Promare, I’d say it almost always works. Also, even thought there is a lot of CG integration, there is a ton of purely 2D cuts as well. The conclusion to the fight between Galo and Lio among many others is entirely 2D and there are some seriously awesome cuts that people are going to see in .webms for a long time to come.

Concerning the story itself, it is a Nakashima Kazuki story through and through hitting all the right Imaishi notes. It begins setting up a very familiar chaos vs order story line but quickly begins to focus mainly on discrimination and instead of breaking apart order with progress and chaos, the idea of unity and rebirth. It's a very familiar story, but with just the right variation to the tale to make it feel fresh and relevant. It definitely moves very quickly, as it's covering a story that could easily have been expanded and made into a longer series, but as is, it works. I was all in, but can also immediately see where a lot of the backlash for this film is going to stem concerning the themes and criticisms of society present. This film is apparently going to be getting a more global release, and I implore you if interested to catch this film on the big screen. The visual story telling at play was fantastic and the film had my blood pumping from beginning to end.

Touching briefly on the music, I enjoyed Sawano's soundtrack but a few tracks were a bit repetitive. He has a recognizable sound.. And the soundtrack of was most remenisent of Kill la Kill, albeit a weaker Kill la Kill. All things considered however, Kill la Kill is one of my favourite soundtracks of all time, so this is barely a criticism. The music wasn't a highlight of the film for me but still very enjoyable.

Reviewer’s Rating: 8

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Sep 19, 2019

MaskettaSenpai

Mixed Feelings

Trigger, I think we need to go on a break.

Now, I love the studio's punk-like, devil-may-care attitude. It was so cool to see an upstart animation studio so flagrantly try to play by its own rules, especially a studio with that Gainax pedigree. But over time I've come to realize it's less that I like what the studio has actually made, and more that I just like the attitude of the studio itself. I loved the original Little Witch Academia shorts and Space Patrol Luloco, but everything else has, at best, left me wanting.

And nowhere is that more the case than Promare, perhaps the Triggerest ... Trigger production. It's a blend of themes, imagery, plot points, character archetypes, etc. that the studio has mined before squeezed into a 110 minute package. Here more than ever, though, it all feels so surface level.

The visuals are, of course, fucking sick, with this blend of 2D and stylized-3D that reminded me of Into the Spider-Verse's splendor. The opening ten minutes put it all on display in this kinetic and fun action sequence, but that's where it peaks because afterward the script completely falls apart. Goddamn is the dialogue so clunky and mechanical, all in service to a plot that's propelled only by inelegant exposition dumps. Goddamn is most of the cast utterly expendable, and the rest two dimensional (save the villain, at least). Goddamn does this feel like a 12 episode series crammed into less than two hours, with so much happening but very little having any impact. This doesn't even feel like its own film; this is like a compilation film for a show that never got made.

Wait, no, that show was made 12 years ago and it was called Gurren Lagann, but lifting Kamina's design and the entire set-up to the show's second half isn't enough to recapture the magic (and this certainly isn't the first time they've tried). So blatantly aping your past work just makes the shortcomings of the present that much more obvious. Perhaps I'm also just tired of idiot heroes saving the world from assured destruction by sheer force of belief, rather than letting the pragmatic villain have a point, because god forbid we let the characters wrestle with an actual moral dilemma.

The finale is a spectacle that's at least worth a watch on Youtube, but I was so disengaged by then that I could not enjoy it as much as I so clearly should have. It's a shame that such great direction and style and visual-sense are all wasted on a cruddy foundation - the script. I love what you want to be, Trigger, but until you seriously invest in the writing of your works (or Imaishi just goes full, Dead Leaves-style gonzo from here on out), I think I should be seeing other studios for a while.

Reviewer’s Rating: 5

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Sep 17, 2019

Zeniatus

Not Recommended

My disappointment is immense and I've lost all hope in Trigger as a studio.

Some background:

I love Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann. I love Panty & Stocking. I enjoyed Kill La Kill. From what I saw: I liked Imashi's works. At the very least they were enjoyable. They knew what they were and what they were doing.

Trigger as a whole I wasn't liking.

I thought Kizunavier was a idea-centric story that eventually threw up it's hands and said: "This idea was contrived and stupid." But that was by Mari Okaba. She wrote IBO also. And I hated both shows. So it was her.

I ... thought Darling in the Franxx was terribly written. Character focused at the start, which is fine. But then turns story focused and brings in amnesia as a plot element and reveals a bunch of plot twists one after another before climaxing prematurely and leaving ejaculate everywhere to clean up.

I thought SSSS.Gridman was the same as Darling in the Franxx. More focused on the episodic character "fleshing out". Until they introduced a shit ton of plot twists and suddenly tried to make a sociopathic character seem victimized in the last 2-5 episodes.

Both shows also had a lot of references to other, better shows.

But maybe those were just one offs. Maybe Imashi will carry the studio. Maybe it's all Imashi. Maybe Promare is different.

It wasn't. Same plot twist cascade. Referencing other shows obviously because that's the only way they can piece together a film. Obvious pandering. The characters were ass. There's one character that is just there for plot relevance and to be the main character's squeeze. She does nothing. Most of the entire Fire Force squad does nothing. If the villain didn't do one thing, everything that he was doing would be reasonable. And the only reason why the world was still saved afterwards was because of an asspull that was only known to be possible after they fought. It's one of the worst anti-racism movies I've ever seen. Because it's so contrived to the point where it legitimizes the reasons why the Burnish are discriminated against.

It's a great spectacle though. If you only came to watch cool shit go down and cool fights to happen then this will be entertaining. I don't like the composer's works. The soundtrack is really carried by the singers and the two Superfly tracks. The soundtrack is mostly the singer's nice voice with a repetitive drum beat in the background. It does fit the movie so I don't think you'll be bothered by it if you don't care about the story.

I do. And this is only somewhat better than Gundam Narrative.

If you want better mecha stories I'd suggest re-watching Gurren Lagann, Gunbuster, Diebuster, GaoGaiGar, King Gainer, L-Gaim, Turn A Gundam, Iczer 3 and more.

If you wanted a better anti-racism film I'd suggest the Titans. If you wanted anime I'd suggest Parasyte, Haibane Renmei, maybe Trigun.

Reviewer’s Rating: 3

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