Crid

Polar Bear's Cafe (Shirokuma Cafe) is a slice-of-life comedy anime with humans and talking animals. But unlike many shows or films with talking animals, here the animals are drawn in a fairly realistic way rather than in a cartoony way. It is pretty family-friendly and about the most "mature" thing you'll encounter are a handful of instances of characters (often the animals) getting drunk.

As the name suggests, one of the main characters is Polar Bear who owns a cafe. Many of the customers are human, but most of the characters that we see here are animals. The other two main characters are Penguin and Panda. There are also recurring side characters such as Polar Bear's friend since childhood, Grizzly, who runs a bar, and Llama, who just wants to be noticed as much as the other animals in the zoo.

Did I say zoo? Many of the animals work at the zoo. But those are only daytime jobs and they go home to their regular houses of a night. It's a scenario that perhaps shouldn't be thought about too deeply, but it sums up the logical disconnect that can lead to some funny moments in the show.

Being a slice-of-life show, there isn't a big overarching story to the whole show. But somehow that doesn't really matter. There is a bit of progression of some characters though. The humour can range from the gentle to the completely unexpected. Sometimes running jokes are set up, only for them to take an unexpected twist in a later episode. A couple of episodes missed the mark for me, but in a show that's 50 episodes long (24 minutes each), that's a good average. Most of the time I was watching with a stupid grin on my face.

One thing the show does very well is the portrayal of friendships. This isn't a show about conflict (although Polar Bear does enjoy trolling people from time to time - especially Grizzly). It's about friends doing things for one another, but also sometimes teasing each other. My wife and I came to really like these characters and their interactions, and we were sorry to get to the end of the final episode.

There is no English dub for the show, so we watched it in Japanese with subtitles. Some of the verbal humour would make it pretty impossible to dub - for instance, Polar Bear is fond of puns involving similar- sounding words. The subtitles told us the relevant words in brackets, which was a reasonable trade-off.

The Japanese voice cast were pretty much perfect and it's hard to imagine the characters with other voices after watching the show. I particularly liked the voices of Polar Bear and Grizzly Bear.

This is one of those shows that I wish more people knew about because it was pretty consistently enjoyable across the entire run. Perhaps the lack of (and problems of doing) an English dub are part of the reason for this.

I will admit right at the start, I'm not a big fan of subtitled anime. I always prefer to watch with an English dub track, unless the dub is really bad. I prefer to watch what is happening on the screen rather than having to constantly flick between the picture and the words.

For this reason, I put off watching Tokyo Godfathers for a long time. I had seen Satoshi Kon's other releases. I found Perfect Blue very uncomfortable to watch. Millennium Actress used clever storytelling but I felt a bit too distant from the story itself (I suspect this was because there were a lot of Japanese cultural and historical references in it). Then I found Paranoia Agent and thought it was excellent (despite the strange ending). In the end I bit the bullet and watched Tokyo Godfathers and wished I hadn't put it off for so long.

The story may be a little unconventional, both for anime films and also Christmas films, but Kon makes it work. This film will certainly go on my "must watch at Christmas" list, along with Nightmare Before Christmas (another unconventional animated Christmas film).

Some reviewers have criticised the number of coincidences that occur in the story, but personally I feel that the viewer can interpret this however they want to. If you believe in a higher power you can take the numerous references to 12-25 and the event that saves Hana as an indication that a higher power is pulling the strings. If you don't believe in such things, you can take it as serendipity or just a story with several happy endings.

The film itself is a little different from Kon's other works. It doesn't try to blur the line between fantasy and reality (except for one short dream sequence). Despite the subject matter (three homeless people) it's actually a pretty happy film on the whole, with only a couple of slightly unpleasant scenes. It'll make you laugh, it'll make you cry, it'll make you go "awww".

I do still hope that one day this film will be re-released with an English dub track. But even with subtitles the dialogue moves slow enough that you can take in the film and the subtitles without feeling you're having to rush your reading or that you're missing some beautiful visuals.

I am now eagerly awaiting seeing Kon's next film - Paprika.

It is perhaps inevitable that Broken News will be compared to The Day Today. Although The Day Today is probably the funnier of the two shows, I don't feel that this means Broken News should be written off as a waste of time. Both shows may be satirising the same subject, but they choose different ways to do it. Broken News perhaps stays closer to the real thing while The Day Today chooses to get a bit more surreal with the stories they report. Despite the similarity between the two shows, I don't get the feeling that Broken News is trying to copy The Day Today.

The back of the DVD box says the show satirises "the on-screen world of rolling news where there's too much airtime and not enough news to go around". That's a pretty accurate summary of the show and some of it is cringingly familiar. The recognisability of it makes it even funnier, especially when you then go back and watch the real news and see those things happening there. Some of the parody is actually pretty close to reality.

The show holds up to repeat viewing quite well. Many of the jokes are quite subtle and it's easy for them to slip past you the first time. There are also the ticker-tape messages scrolling across the bottom of the screen which you tend not to read the first time you watch an episode. I found these particularly funny in the "hijack" episode (which is also my favourite episode).

The large cast did help to lend an air of reality to the whole thing and virtually all of them were convincing. Having real Americans playing the American newscasters was also a nice touch which could have easily been overlooked.

My only complaint was that the same jokes did get used in several episodes. In some cases this worked well, but in other cases I did feel like hitting fast-forward. However, the "channel hopping" format of the show actually works in its favour here as it helps segments appear longer than they really are without drawing a joke out for too long.

If the BBC commission a second series, I hope they add more writers. I think there's certainly scope for more, although the stories would probably be more surreal in order to avoid going over too much of the same material from the first series.

I saw a trailer for Azumanga daioh and thought it was going to be childish nonsense. Admitedly the trailer only showed a modified version of the show's introduction sequence, rather than real footage from the show. Shame on the makers of the trailer, I say! Then I watched an episode of the show and was instantly hooked. This is probably one of the best comedy animes I've seen so far. While shows like Abenobashi or Excel Saga are funny in a zany way, Azumanga is funny in a more realistic way. As other reviewers have noted, there is no plot as such - it's more like a sitcom.

The characters seem very likable and all have their own characteristics. Some of the teachers also feature, and I think this gives the show an interesting perspective as you see that they just as quirky as the kids. (OK, perhaps MORE quirky than some of the kids).

One of the reasons this show has hooked me is that it is consistently funny. Some other shows I've seen have had a few episodes that were hilarious and a few that barely raised a smile. I think every episode of Azumanga has had me laughing out loud.

If you haven't seen this show because the trailer put you off, don't panic! Yes, there's a certain amount of cuteness (especially Chiyo), but the show is a lot of fun. But the Muppets demonstrated that cuteness doesn't mean it's only for kids.

Azumanga may not be suitable for young children because of some cuss words and slightly teenage/adult content (although children see that on TV before the watershed these days). Teenagers aren't likely to be too worried by any of that though.

This 37-year-old male gives Azumanga daioh 5 stars out of 5!

This movie was better than I expected. I'd actually put off seeing it, but now I'm glad I went.

My girlfriend told me this movie was a spoof, but I don't think it is. The laughs are too thin on the ground to be a comedy. I'd say it was a science fiction with its tongue firmly in its cheek. When the comedy appears it's very funny and silly. Particularly the ending.

I'd compare this movie to Ghostbusters. There's the same silliness mixed with a few bits to make you jump, but nothing particularly scary. The story itself is competent enough and some of the CG segments are pretty impressive.

I give it 7/10.