Garou Densetsu

This one is the best of the three so far (Fatal fury 1 & 2). The story is more touching and the character interactions are good. As for the plot, Terry has to face a new battle and this time, the enemy is not human! There is also new love for Terry, a girl who seek help from him. Another high about the movie, Mai, the cute ninja girl plays a more important role here. It was good to see her around.

Yes, the inspiration for this anime movie was a video game that was basically a "Street Fighter" clone that for me was not the most entertaining fighting game ever made. Here you have character from that game in a fight with a madman that is after the armor of mars, which of course makes its wearer very strong. During the course of the adventure you get to see the fighters display their various moves and even have an appearance by a character in a castle whose part in the movie makes him nearly pointless. You get to see two of the characters fall in love and you get a somewhat bittersweet ending. They do a bunch of moves to where they yell out their special attack which is sort of like a Dragonball Z show which also helped me enjoy this one more even though I was not particularly fond of the game. The character are rather interesting too, as they add much needed depth to the characters as opposed to just a bunch of dudes fighting in tournaments. So all in all a nice anime based on a not so nice video game.

This film is a continuation of the two previous Fatal Fury movies, but unlike the previous two members of the trilogy, this one is of normal length for a film and appears to have a theatre-release budget.

The time and budget were put to competent use, as no one can deny that this is the most "epic" of the three. The fight scenes are bigger and longer, the moves from the game are shown in their full glory, and you just get more and better of what you got in the first movie as well as a lot more of the sexualization of Mai from the second movie.

In raw terms, however, the plot is generic martial arts fluff. A rich man with apparently infinite money at his disposal is looking to collect a bunch of pieces of Exodia to achieve ultimate bragging rights. He has cyborg henchmen and mutant henchmen (whose eyes also glow red sometimes so they might actually be cyborg mutant henchmen).

The plot will be like water, filling any of the various containers it's put into. Characters will defy gravity for no reason, the relationship between twins will show a complete defiance of basic biological principles, and a team of martial artists that had trouble defeating the henchmen of gods will suddenly have no problem defeating the giant god itself. I would would laugh at how they turned a game about petty revenge in martial arts circles into an international action thriller of global proportions, but actually the King of Fighters series is no stranger to plots involving the saving of the world from otherworldly divine forces, so it fits.

It's a big beautiful mess, with sleek animation and all the cameo appearances from the game you could want, as well as a healthy dose of Mai Shiranui and the twins. Action anime fans and fans of SNK lore won't be disappointed with this adaptation.

Honourable Mentions: Fatal Fury 2: The New Battle (1993). I found the simplistic plot arc and marginally better character and villain development in the second movie to be much more fulfilling from an artistic standpoint, but the grand nature of this film did give it a lot more mainstream appeal.

I admit that it's hard for me to judge this seeing as how I'm not into the "Fatal Fury" series that much. Of course, when you know as much about pop culture as me, you can't help but recognize a couple characters. I at least know Terry Bogard and Mai Shiranui. There were some cameos by characters who unfortunately didn't have much relevance to the story, like Duck King. Of course, it's hard to have a character with that name being taken seriously. I actually do like the romance in this movie. It does come off as pretty believable and a lot of it ends up pretty tragically.

Maybe this was in fact in the actual games, but you don't really see much romance in fighting games. Yeah, I'm such a sucker for that stuff. I admit that the animation does look pretty bad at some points. I guess old anime doesn't hold up that well. I still found the cast to be pretty likable, especially Mai Shiranui. She seriously steals every scene she's in and yeah, that is kind of because she's so amazingly beautiful. The story could have been better but as far as movies based on video games go, it was certainly better than most. ***

Garou Densetsu (***1/2 out of ****) Director: Masami Obari Legendary prize fighter (Terry Bogard) and company are hired by mysterious (and beautiful) young woman to prevent her hot-headed twin brother from capturing the "Armor of Mars" and becoming a god. A stunning portrayel of character emotion that is sparkled to imaginable (if barely credible) vitality. Fine and colorful production designs, unique character development, and director Obari's visual finese (not to mention a story well told) will assist the viewer to look past hokey dialogue and contrivances. Obari's theatrical debut is a spectacular achievement in every way!