Super Nova

Project A-KO is probably one of my first forays into the world of Anime (Japanese Animation). With its female characters, martial arts fighting portrayals, collateral damage, super-science, super-powered people, aliens and spaceships, this movie successfully spoofs the Anime genre up until 1986.

This is a great introductory movie for people that want to start enjoying Anime. It is campy, light-hearted and exciting all at once. Since the movie is a comedy-spoof, it almost always fails to take itself seriously.

Project A-Ko is one of the most enduring Anime experiences of all time. The English dub is done rather well so those that dislike subtitles can still enjoy the movie with little distraction.

9.5/10

Project A-Ko is one of the most action packed, funniest and fun anime's of the 1980's. Basically a comedy with lesbian undertones, as B-Ko battles A-Ko while trying to romance C-Ko, who is a total bubblehead and creator of the worst (but most beautiful) lunches in the universe. It helps to see this if one is a fan of 80's anime since it sends up nearly every single one of them. Just a really fun movie and well worth seeing.

If it wasn't for this Anime, I would never have gotten into the genre. This is simply an amazing movie. I never tried anime before watching this movie. I had thought that all anime was kinda bad, with the drawing styles and speed lines and other stuff.

I was wrong.

This movie ruled. The sequels were good, but they didn't quite live up to the first movie. Everybody that worked on this movie done right.. it was funny, fast moving, had characters you could care about.. the list goes on and on.

Of course, no anime would be complete without the annoying comedy relief, C-Ko, but even she had her redeeming qualities. If it wasn't for her, this movie wouldn't have much of a point.

This film was an anime that I first caught on the Scifi channel, back when it was still cool to me. It had weeks where they showed Godzilla films, they had the last three seasons of MST3K and they had anime week. That week introduced me to a lot of really cool cartoons like the now well known Akira and lesser known films L. I. L. Y. C. A. T. This is another of the films I saw and while not as good as some of the other features I really enjoyed it. I rewatched it recently though and it has lost a bit of luster to it as it really moves kind of slowly at times and now I have seen other anime movies that are funnier and a bit more clever. Still, it was enjoyable enough on this latest watch.

The film introduces us to A-Ko, a typical schoolgirl who has super strength! She is friends with C-Ko and both of them are about to go to a new school where they will run afoul with B-Ko, a young woman from their past who becomes obsessed with being friends with C-Ko and wants A-Ko out of the picture. Well B-Ko is not super strong, but rather super smart and she uses those smarts to design mech suits to battle A-Ko! Meanwhile, a group of aliens are heading to earth as they may have found their long lost princess!

The film's plot is kind of absurd and at times is just one big swerve as first time watchers are going to think one thing, but the film will hand them another. The characters are quite funny though and the situations so bizarre that it does make for an entertaining film, though not as good as other classic anime films. It also features more nudity than I was expecting when watching an uncut version for the first time and lots of panty shots...

So, it was pretty good, but could have used better pacing. A few of the military scenes just lag on a bit and this gets a bit frustrating when it interrupts A-ko's and B-ko's epic battle. I also wish A-ko was not reduced to being a bit weak in the final act. Throughout the film she is portrayed as insanely strong, able to toss giant robots with ease, but then she is having trouble fighting one of the aliens with a sword, an alien she smashed through a wall and such on several occasions without even giving it a though, but at the end it can stand up to her? Other than this and a few other gripes though it is pretty entertaining, but I think I prefer my anime movies to be a bit quicker paced.

Though flawed this is a great and sometimes hilarious anime about a schoolgirl named A-Ko and her friend C-Ko. Meanwhile The Psychotic rich-girl B-Ko wants to have C-Ko as her friend and her friend alone. And this is while Earth is under attack by alien women who look like men. And it gets stranger. With more anime in-jokes that you can shake a Veritech Fighter (Ya know, Robotech... oh never mind) this baby is jam packed with cheeky good fun. And can you find the real alien princess? You'll figure it out after the movie.