ILLANG: The Wolf Brigade???

[easnoddy]

It's on Netflix, a WB production...

It's a live-action version of Jin-Roh. Set in the near future in a unified Korea.

Did these Koreans just blatantly ripoff Oshii's work?

Looks like Oshii knew about it.. I'd hope he gets some royalties thrown his way.

Edited November 2, 2018 by easnoddy

[505thAirborne]

I watched this last week, not bad but nothing I'd watch over & over again. The opening scene in the sewers is pretty much a shot for shot remake, though the Anime does it so much better. 

[AN/ALQ128]

Heard about it, but I have no real wish to see it. Seems pointless.

[kajnrig]

Yeah, this was mentioned in either another thread or the general TV thread.

3 hours ago, easnoddy said:

Did these Koreans just blatantly ripoff Oshii's work?

Looks like Oshii knew about it.. I'd hope he gets some royalties thrown his way.

It's an explicit adaptation of the anime, so no, it's not a ripoff. Not sure about royalties, but just wanted to clarify that it's an above-board production.

2 hours ago, 505thAirborne said:

I watched this last week, not bad but nothing I'd watch over & over again. The opening scene in the sewers is pretty much a shot for shot remake, though the Anime does it so much better. 

The anime has a very heavy sense of motion and a subdued, deliberate soundscape, neither of which translate well to live action. That's to say nothing of the usual pitfalls of recreating anime in live action shot for shot (the change in color, contrast, etc. is always especially noticeable). Something exquisitely animated usually feels cheap in live action.

Watching a little bit of it, my predictions were more or less confirmed. It doesn't do anything particularly interesting with what it's got, and the shift to near-future Korea from alternate-history Japan makes what elements it does borrow from the original that much more bizarre. The armor doesn't have the same intimidating presence as in the anime, nor the same sense of weight. Again, the heaviness in the anime didn't make the transition. The characters don't sell the idea that they're trooping around in slow, heavy, but nigh impervious suits of armor.

Once I finish it, I'll get back with an opinion on the story, but the bit I did see of the beginning isn't leaving a positive first impression.

[Big s]

I haven’t had time to check it out, but my favorite live action scene of protect gear was the opening of red spectacles. I really don’t like that film, but love the opening and wanna do a comparison to see which films do live action protect gear best. I’m also gonna have to dig out my revoltech protect gear to get me in the mood.

[no3Ljm]

Is this a sequel to this?

 

 

[easnoddy]

Its the same. I did a search for the film name and nothing came up.

Its less cheesy than the Oshii live- action productions IMO. They felt more melodramatic than this. The sewer scene was well done. 

[slide]

12 hours ago, no3Ljm said:

Is this a sequel to this?

 

 

A Handy primer on the Kerberos universe courtesy ANN

I found it quite helpful to put all the bits I've seen into context/timeline

[kajnrig]

On 11/2/2018 at 1:58 AM, kajnrig said:

Once I finish it, I'll get back with an opinion on the story, but the bit I did see of the beginning isn't leaving a positive first impression.

To summarize what would otherwise be a (not unusual, admittedly) wall of text: It trades out the original's Oshii-typical contemplative, metaphorical storytelling in favor of a run-of-the-mill modern action thriller. The fights get spruced up and the story and characters get dumbed down in order to make it ostensibly more palatable to modern audiences, but that just renders it kind of... generic. Soulless. The political backdrop is also understandably reworked, but the result is... unbalanced, to say the least. It renders the events of the movie just that little bit more unbelievable.

It doesn't hold up as well under scrutiny as the original does, but as its own entity... I suppose it's just as good and bad as any other Korean action movie.

Some spoilery nitpicks:

- In the opening protest scene, which as someone said is basically a shot-for-shot remake of the original but not as good, the Sect members in the crowd - all 5 of them - decide to fire upon the riot police after causing the crowd - ie their cover - to disperse due to their setting off satchel charges. In order to fire upon the riot police, they form a line in the middle of the open street directly in front of the bulletproof vest-wearing and riot shield-wielding officers. The police, for their part, don't immediately use lethal force but instead shoot tear gas into the now-empty street. The cans fly past the Sect shooters and into the, again, now-empty street. Why? Because it's what happened in the original movie.

- For copying as much from the original as this movie does, one bizarre change was to the encounter with the little girl. Fuse is a rookie, and this is his first exposure to the tactic of using young women and children as operatives, so he pleads with the girl, and when she reaches for the pin despite his pleas, he asks her "Why?" When she pulls the pin, her eyes are wide and desperate with fear. Lim, on the other hand, has been with the Special Unit for at least five years now and is much more... abrasive with the girl, ordering her to "Surrender" and "Stop." When she pulls the pin, her face doesn't show fear but defiance and hatred. There's nothing inherently wrong with the change, but it's just... odd.

- In the original, the above scene sets up Fuse and the film's overarching moral question, one which he and it continuously re-examine before finally providing an answer. Here, it jumpstarts the meeting with Yun-hee (this version's Kei) and returns a total of once for a PTSD episode, but Lim's true inciting incident happens during the opening monologue, during an event called Bloody Friday. Neither episode get much play, as the movie is too busy going from plot point A to plot point B, but it's weird that they invent Bloody Friday for this movie in the first place if they were just gonna keep that scene in. Again, it doesn't make or break the movie by any means, it's just a nitpick.

- They change the ending. Part of the "run of the mill action thriller" thing. You can probably guess what changes, and it's a bad change. The movie is much, much worse for it.

[dizman]

43 minutes ago, kajnrig said:

Some spoilery nitpicks:

  Reveal hidden contents

- In the opening protest scene, which as someone said is basically a shot-for-shot remake of the original but not as good, the Sect members in the crowd - all 5 of them - decide to fire upon the riot police after causing the crowd - ie their cover - to disperse due to their setting off satchel charges. In order to fire upon the riot police, they form a line in the middle of the open street directly in front of the bulletproof vest-wearing and riot shield-wielding officers. The police, for their part, don't immediately use lethal force but instead shoot tear gas into the now-empty street. The cans fly past the Sect shooters and into the, again, now-empty street. Why? Because it's what happened in the original movie.

- For copying as much from the original as this movie does, one bizarre change was to the encounter with the little girl. Fuse is a rookie, and this is his first exposure to the tactic of using young women and children as operatives, so he pleads with the girl, and when she reaches for the pin despite his pleas, he asks her "Why?" When she pulls the pin, her eyes are wide and desperate with fear. Lim, on the other hand, has been with the Special Unit for at least five years now and is much more... abrasive with the girl, ordering her to "Surrender" and "Stop." When she pulls the pin, her face doesn't show fear but defiance and hatred. There's nothing inherently wrong with the change, but it's just... odd.

- In the original, the above scene sets up Fuse and the film's overarching moral question, one which he and it continuously re-examine before finally providing an answer. Here, it jumpstarts the meeting with Yun-hee (this version's Kei) and returns a total of once for a PTSD episode, but Lim's true inciting incident happens during the opening monologue, during an event called Bloody Friday. Neither episode get much play, as the movie is too busy going from plot point A to plot point B, but it's weird that they invent Bloody Friday for this movie in the first place if they were just gonna keep that scene in. Again, it doesn't make or break the movie by any means, it's just a nitpick.

- They change the ending. Part of the "run of the mill action thriller" thing. You can probably guess what changes, and it's a bad change. The movie is much, much worse for it.

 

Oh no..... they wouldn't do that to the ending would they?! I was going to skip this but you got me. Now I have to watch the movie to see how bad they messed it up since that scene is the most pivotal part of the original movie.

[easnoddy]

Oh that ending is a mess and completely ruins the feel of Oshii's vision of the story.  It goes on at least 3 scenes too long and completely changes your opinion of the main character, which is unfortunate.  The anime ending feels pretty brutal with the reveal by the head of the special section into the true nature of the main character.

The last fight scene with the main character in full armor is pretty sweet though.