Beat that Boss

To begin, let's get this out of the way: I didn't watch the internationally beloved anime before seeing this movie. With that being said, I thought it was amazing. I loved the characters, loved the story, loved the sci-fi, simply thought it was awesome. Tonally, it's an action movie about self-discovery with some hardcore science fiction and dazzling visuals. It has interesting overtones about what it means to be human but it's not bogged down trying to be a huge, intellectual movie like, I assume, the anime was. Does this make it a worse movie? Depends entirely on expectations. If you're entering the theater expecting to have the same sensations that you had during your initial viewing of the anime, you're probably going to be disappointed. But if you're going in hoping to see a well-crafted action movie with a fascinating cyberpunk background then it'll be money well spent.  When I say well-crafted, I mean that it's coherently edited (unl...

Captain America: Civil War successfully blends literally a dozen superheroes, complete with their own quirks and motivations, a coherent, relevant plot, and a massive overhaul of the MCU's structure moving forward. How does it manage to pull it all off? http://www.disneytouristblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/captain_america_civil_war.jpg Essential to the idea of having two teams of 'heroes' clashing on a grand scale is a well-defined and coherent plot that clearly lays out an insurmountable difference of opinion that logically can only be overcome by the use of force. Introducing such an question of ethics in the superhero genre can be a slippery slope for a franchise because heroes, by their very nature, fight for what we, the audience, perceive as 'right'. If handled incorrectly, the battle between the two forces feels unearned with one side inhabiting the role of the good guys and the other becoming simply a road block. Fortunately, this question is ha...