Armitage III: Poly-Matrix

Alright a full length feature of Armitage III, all the episodes on one tape and in wide screen. Well not quite. Wide screen is a good thing, and the voice actors for Ross and Armitage were alright, I've seen the actors do better though. Although this movie was watchable and still somewhat entertaining the original 4 episodes were much much better. The problem with the full-length feature was that it was cut down around 30 to 40 minutes shorter then what it would have been if all the episodes where put together. I don't even understand why this was done its not like the movie would have been unduly long, just around two hours. This creates problems and big plot holes. The characters get shallow due to cutting as well, In the movie version it doesn't get into the big reason why Ross hates robots, or why Armitage gets so mad when she's called a monster. If you get any chance to rent or buy Armitage III get the 4 episodes and not the movie.

My rating on the episodes 8.

Here's why: Armitage is awesome!!She's soo totally in-your-face Ross is kinda good looking for a cartoon character. It keeps you thinking & questioning things all the way through. It's got everything a great show needs: corruption, murder, romance, mystery, suspense,Great fight scenes,Cool outfits.....need I go on?? The ending rocks.

Now THIS is what I call anime! Great artistry, good plot, and one heck of a cool battle sequence at the end.

I loved the way that the plot gradually developed from a simple murder into a plot for ....well, you'll have to see the movie to know. And trust me, IT'S WORTH IT!

I've often heard comments about how much anime "rips-off" other sources, usually blatantly. I can often see influences of other movies and tales in anime, but rarely is it such that the anime loses its soul... ...but then I saw Armitage III and understood.

Granted, I saw (1) the compiled "movie" version, and (2) the English dub version (neither qualities that I enjoy in my anime), but Armitage is just a rip-off of Blade Runner, and not a very good one at that.

I wasn't that thrilled with the animation- it reminded me of American "serious" animation, rather than anime; the voice-acting is bad, too; Elizabeth Berkeley is the saving grace (!) of the whole thing, providing a nice distraction from Kiefer Sutherland's wooden dialogue. As Armitage, she is tough, vulnerable, sexy, and naive at the same time. Kief is like one of the voice actors for the English-dialogue version of Megazone 23 part II... emotionless, and sounds like an automatic reading machine. Bleah.

Not recommended.

I hate to make a comment on this movie, as I just watched the obviously butchered movie version. I have not seen the original version, and I can see some signs of greatness in the chopped to pieces version I saw, but over all it was a huge mess. no pacing, no plot cohesiveness, bad dubbing. Do yourself a favor, and watch the original 4 tape version, it has to be better than this crap. Now, if I can just find a copy of it.