Trigun

Good old fashioned 90s anime, it's a hard thing to beat.

This easily the weirdest show this week but I promise if you stick with it you will find an amazing show. It very much mixes genres, with more of an emphasis on westerns mixed with a bit of sci-fi, as we follow two insurance workers Meryll Stryfe (Guess which actress that name sounds like.) and Millie, or as my favorite anime reviewer so hilariously put it, "Giant Jennifer Aniston and regular sized Courteney Cox", on the hunt for an infamous criminal known as Vash. Through consecutive episodes they come to realize the man who has a price on his head of 60 billion dollars is actually the bumbling weird guy they keep bumping into, and they start travelling the desolate, almost Tatooine style planet named Gunsmoke. Yes, like the TV show. They encounter mercenaries, robots, and other weirdos throughout until a personal conflict from Vash's past steps into center stage. What really struck me about this show is that, you don't know anything about the environment the show is set in from the beginning but as the episodes go on you pick up on important details. Humanity has taken to space and starts colonizing worlds, it's so far in the future they use Star Trek style stardates, there are robots and cyborgs abound, but near the end you really start getting the heavy information. And I mean, heavy. Important pieces of information that just sock you right in the face emotionally, and ends on a very impactful note. Needless to say, when I first watched this all the way through I was stunned. And the same goes for the characters, you get a quick handle on who Meryll and Millie are, but with Vash you can tell there's so much more to him than he lets on and it gives you more and more depth to him as the show goes on. You find he's very pacifistic and refuses to kill people which grows more mystery as to how he got his nickname the Humanoid Typhoon, and there's even more beyond that which you want to learn. It's a wild and weird show to be sure, but a very gratifying and interesting watch even on multiple viewings. The animation you can immediately tell is at a time when computers barely had a thing to do with animation. The shading, lines, and coloring are excellent with it not looking super clean and pretty. Which honestly makes sense when you see the world of the show and it's style, but it was just how animation was done regardless of where it came from. I'm actually a much bigger fan of this style of anime, when you know and can tell this was all hand drawn and animated, you have such a strong respect and appreciation for the show creators. Now am I saying anything after 2002 is lazy because they use computers and doesn't look as good as this? Don't be ridiculous. It's just something I like more. Plus it has one of the most hardcore opening intro songs in animation history, I downright challenge you not to headbang to it. It starts out as a fun and charming adventure series but grows darker and heavier to the bitter end. A true classic to many and for plenty of good reason. 4 stars, 8/10! This was a great week to talk about such amazing shows and I genuinely hope you give them a try. We may make you a fan just yet. Back to regular movies next week, see you then!