#resolutely ignoring the bad and scary part of this entry | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

millennialdemon · 3 years

Photo

Coming off of true trainwrecks the likes of Mars of Destruction and Skelter Heaven, I actually came out of Dark Cat with a sense of respect and gratitude for its competence.

For the uninitiated, Dark Cat is a notoriously bad OVA from 1991 that you will see listed in many Worst Anime Ever countdowns. It follows 2 brothers, “dark cats” Hyoi and Rui, who investigate supernatural happenings and purify evil with their somewhat undefined powers of shapeshifting and increased strength/agility. The majority of the story in the OVA is about a school girl named Aimi, who is pining after her childhood friend Koizumi, who since the rejection and sudden death of his crush, has been suffering a depressive episode and ignoring her. Hyoi and Rui sense dark forces are manifesting at the school, and they keep an eye on Aimi while fighting off the increasingly brazen appearances of demonic enemies.

A monstrous ex-dark cat named Jukokubo is revealed to be manipulating Aimi with his dark powers, and Hyoi and Rui fight him, but not before Aimi succumbs to the evil magic -- as well as her own violent jealousy and overprotectiveness of Koizumi -- and transforms into a horrific tentacle monster that kills seemingly everyone in the school.

In the end, Koizumi realizes that Aimi was in love with him the entire time, and doesn’t fight her when she engulfs him completely. Apparently this act of selfless love was enough to purify them both, and although they do indeed die, their souls are “light” and able to ascend. This throws a wrench in Jukokubo’s plan to prove that humans are The Worst, so he turns tail and leaves his boss fight against Hyoi, threatening to return again. In the epilogue, Hyoi and Rui reflect on the mission and wax poetic about the nature of humanity while crossing a busy street.

… Ehm… happy ending, yes?

Now then: there are actually quite a few things I enjoyed about Dark Cat, and they are all very simple things that I had come to miss after days of watching other entries from the Bottom of the Barrel.

It had a narrative, and was -- mostly -- comprehensible in its storytelling, as rushed as it may have been. There was an undeniable presence of an art director, something I’m not convinced was present in a few of the other similarly rated titles I have seen. Some of the shots were noticeably well composed and even clever, and required an artistic vision and some decent effort to create. The animation wasn’t awful, the designs ranged from serviceable to genuinely charming (I like the subtlety of Hyoi and Rui’s cat-like features!), and I liked that the characters actually emoted. It wasn’t as generic as I expected and took some risks, even if they didn’t pay off and left it with a reputation of being “too grotesque to be enjoyable”.

I can understand the common criticisms of the gore and body horror being poorly animated, but I won’t decry it for existing and “being ugly”... of course it’s ugly, it’s body horror reminiscent of The Thing from The Thing. (Now would be a good time to warn people not to look this OVA up, unless they are sure they are okay with body horror and gore of this calibre. Tentacles with teeth and spines rip out of people’s skin from the inside and deform their hosts, it is quite awful! I would also include a warning for trypophobia -- there are shots where the mutations form clusters of holes on the skin.) The body horror in Dark Cat being disgusting and making my skin crawl isn’t a fault -- I think it’s the intended purpose. Though I will concede that:

The phallic imagery of the horrific flesh mutations, particularly that of the teacher who attacked Rui, was… bizarre, considering that otherwise the OVA isn’t particularly dark in tone or otherwise sexually graphic.

Perhaps having grotesque body horror is completely unexpected in a story about two bishounen teens (?) who can turn into cats and fight ghosts.

Yes, Dark Cat, the OVA put on Worst Anime Ever lists for being a grotesque spectacle, is just as commonly placed on those lists for being a dumb anime about guys that can transform into house cats and who fight supernatural entities with not so amazing powers. This is a gripe I’ve seen in a few popular reviews, but there was no point during my watching experience that I thought, “Man, these teens are pansies, they don’t even turn into big scary lions or anything! What’s the point, it’s practically a power-down! cinemasins ding” because I don’t go into anime expecting every single male character I see to be Big & Strong & Cool, because I uh… don’t have brain worms I guess? I don’t know what to say about this criticism really, other than people who watch a lot of shounen have very strange hang ups about super powers.

Otherwise, it seems the biggest reason Dark Cat is lauded as One of the Worst -- perhaps even ahead of the silly concept and nauseating gore -- is actually because of the abysmal english dub. It’s my honour to say that I didn’t watch the dub, so it doesn’t factor in at all into my impressions!

So in the end, perhaps my only true gripes with Dark Cat are:

Despite having no particular issue with body horror and gore existing, the extent of destruction and graphic death gave the OVA a bit of a snuff film vibe.

The conclusion to the story was quite bad.

It could be surmised by the brief plot outline I wrote earlier that Dark Cat isn’t a very complicated story. Demons and ghosts exist and wreak havoc on emotionally vulnerable humans, and supernatural soldiers try to mediate between the realms by purifying tortured ghosts and saving those dragged into darkness by evil entities. These beats are common in the supernatural genre of anime, but Dark Cat’s handling of its tragic morality tale left me more confused than anything.

Koizumi didn’t do anything wrong -- he shouldn’t have had to die for the sin of not reciprocating Aimi’s feelings, nor for developing depression after the rejection and death of his classmate and crush. Aimi… did things wrong, but was nevertheless the most compelling character in the OVA. Throughout Aimi was kind, patient, and forgiving when it came to being treated badly by Koizumi. In the finale however, it is revealed that Aimi was the one responsible for Koizumi’s crush’s death, assumedly having murdered her out of jealousy or out of revenge on Koizumi’s behalf for hurting his feelings. Prior to this, the first students to be killed by the tentacle monsters just happened to be the ones that had bullied Koizumi in class earlier that day -- implying that Aimi was getting revenge on them, as well.

It was with these revelations that I started to wonder: Why not just let the flesh monster manifest as a direct result of Aimi’s negative feelings? Aimi confessed to murdering Koizumi’s crush before the events of the OVA -- would she have done so if she wasn’t being influenced by the malignant force set on her by Jukokubo? I feel that her arc would have been much more interesting without the introduction of a non-compelling and badly designed villain like Jukokubo, because then we would know it was all her. Even if she was influenced by forces exacerbating her pre-existing jealousy and rage, that is a more satisfying option than having a big dumb green cat of a villain to trace everything back to so neatly.

And really, what did Jukokubo do in the story beyond take the spotlight, and the blame, from Aimi? He had some previous relation to Hyoi and Rui, but it’s not developed at all, and his ideological rivalry with Hyoi was trivial. Hyoi could have come to the same conclusions about holding out hope for humanity without Jukokubo there to insist he be a guest to debate on his political podcast.

The lack of accountability regarding Aimi is a part of why the resolution to her conflict with Koizumi feels so wrong -- he succumbs to her feelings because he realizes the evil was born from her suffering, and he feels that he has to sacrifice himself to make up for unknowingly hurting her so much that she turned into a monster from hell. In the end she is absolved via being purified and getting to die with her spirit entwined with Koizumi’s, and he apologizes for having not recognized how he was hurting her.

Aimi kills his crush, kills his bullies, and ends up -- inadvertently, at least -- killing almost all of their classmates, because she was tilted about her childhood friend not realizing she had romantic feelings for him. And when Koizumi learns all of this, he apologizes and dies with her, and this is proof of humanity’s goodness? The dark clouds part and the rain stops and Aimi and Koizumi ascend in a heavenly ray of light, because he decided, while she was devouring him, that he was wrong to ignore his murderous best friend’s love for him?

I guess it’s fine -- it was probably mostly Jukokubo’s fault anyway, and everyone was just an unfortunate victim of his meddling… 😒

Other than the bad writing, the string of deaths that happen in the finale when the monster lets loose in the school are quite uncomfortable to behold. Deformed student bodies are splayed and strewn around classrooms, and the bullies are rendered into unrecognizable mounds of pulsating flesh in their homes. The violence of a fight against a monster like this, I can handle, but the graphic images of helpless death were difficult to stomach. And in this OVA, there is no miraculous reversal of the demon’s damage once it is purified -- there is no implication whatsoever that everyone who died isn’t still just as dead as Aimi and Koizumi in the end.

The main thing I was actually worried about when I watched Dark Cat was that there would be sexual assault, thanks to reviewers griping it for “generic hentai tentacles”. I am relieved to say that there is none, at least not insofar as deserving a comparison to actual porn. There is sexual content scattered throughout the horror scenes: The occasionally phallic appearance of the tentacles, shots of the tentacles coming down from under skirts, and there is one shot of nudity when Aimi’s shirt is ripped open as she transforms, though I would say it’s too horrific and ugly to be sexualized or otherwise considered “fanservice”.

What is the point of the hits of sex imagery in Dark Cat? I have no idea. This isn’t Alien, it isn’t about the horror of sexual assault or the violence of creation -- though the main horror of the scene where Rui is ambushed by the teacher seems to be that she uses magic to seduce him, only to reveal a very phallic tentacle from her mouth that she means to kill (or infect…?) him with, which can have multiple, potentially offensive readings… it is a one off, however -- and there doesn’t seem to be any moral posturing about it as is often seen in slashers. I couldn’t parse any sort of consistent STI allegory regarding the plague of tentacles upon the student body, despite how many summaries I have read that describe the tentacles as that, a “plague”.

… I realize I am probably the only person on earth to give any aspect of Dark Cat’s production this much thought. To sum up: It seems to just exist for the shock value. Considering the extent of disgusting imagery already present a la The Gore and Deformation of Human Bodies, I don’t think this OVA benefitted from featuring some explicit looking tendrils, beyond cementing its abhorrent reputation.

Is this all to say that I think Dark Cat is a good OVA? No, of course not. It’s tone deaf, and tasteless, and has awkward pacing and bad writing. But compared to the utterly soulless and artistically devoid works the likes of Skelter Heaven and Mars of Destruction, I would say the fact I was able to write this much about Dark Cat is testament to that fact that it at the very least, contains content -- and some of that content was like, decent! Skelter+Heaven was such a mess it was all I could do to understand the sequence of events, and Mars of Destruction was so bland I literally have no posts about it on the blog despite watching it more than once. Psychic Wars was a snoozefest I barely finished that similarly has no mention on the blog, and Hanoka’s production gimmick couldn’t save it from being a totally forgettable romance story.

Therefore, Dark Cat is the best worst title I have seen thus far, by virtue of being executed with an average amount of competency for an OVA from the early 90s, and for having a balance of good and bad elements that gave me something to hold onto and mull over after viewing.

3/10.

Oh, and I loved the bad 80s insert songs.

#:Dark Cat #dark cat #2138 words later the verdict is. It was ok

2 notes · View notes

a-queenoffairys · 5 years

Text

Brainstorming a better Bad Connection. Quite long and rambling. Been thinking about a lot of these things for a while but a lot of these ideas only got solidified after listening to the new RTTP episode.

Might refine these ideas later and input is welcome, for now I’m just putting various thoughts into words.

----

Odd’s parents

We’ve already established a few things about Odd’s parents and his relationship with them in Odd’s diary entry. Instead of the unrealistic and petty “we never fight” reason to be upset with them, make it something to do with this established canon.

His parents are often away travelling for work and Odd doesn’t see a lot of them at home. He mainly lives with his five sisters who bully him. His parents are cool and supportive, but apparently not enough to be more present and do more about the bullying situation.

Given how their conversation with Delmas goes, they may be supportive to a fault, excusing their children’s bad points or bad behaviour. I headcanon at-home situations like “Mum! Adele drew a mean picture of me!” “Oh Adele, it looks so much like him! You’ve improved so much!” or “Dad, Odd broke the stereo!” “Wow, you took it all apart properly, aren’t you a little mechanical genius?” as in, finding something positive in what the child did wrong and praising instead of punishing them, and ignoring the complaints of the other kid(s). Even something directed at the parents in particular, like Odd running off just after greeting them at the school, they just shrug off and find a way to explain in a positive light.

Going off this, you could easily say that although his parents are loving and supportive, it often seems like they ignore his problems. And because they don’t punish bad behaviour, it just continues. The kids eventually feel like there’s no point in complaining to their parents because they don’t do anything about it, or they react positively instead of negatively to the bad thing that happened. So although they have what looks to be a really good relationship, there’s that bit of disconnect. The kids feel like they’re not being listened to.

So in short, the source of Odd’s annoyance in the episode is the feeling that he’s being ignored by his parents, and frustration that even when he’s rude to them they still don’t try to, well, parent him and try to teach him better behaviour. He rejects their kindness out of that frustration.

Outwardly it looks like they have a good family dynamic, and an enviable one. So when Odd’s friends meet his parents they don’t understand what Odd’s concerns are about, and maybe think he’s making things up when he says they don’t listen to him. Like he’s just being a rebellious teenager for the sake of it and taking such wonderful parents for granted when his friends aren’t so lucky.

Though when you make the relationship conflict so not-petty it makes it harder to wrap up at the end, hm. The pettiness could be Odd behaving downright rudely towards his parents in order to try and provoke a reaction, either disciplinary or “what did we do wrong?” I guess these ideas could use some tweaking but one thing I’m sure of is I do want some sort of resolution at the end after all this time spent setting it up (I don’t feel like they concluded or resolved anything in the actual episode, the plot thread kinda fizzled off before the end) but “Oh I see now that my parents are so nice I can ignore their faults!” is not a resolution.

----

The attack

The idea of having the characters’ personalities somewhat intact while possessed was unique, but it took some of the edge off what could’ve been a pretty scary XANA attack. The idea seemed to be that XANA had possessed the entire school plus Odd’s parents and they were all coming after him, but there weren’t a lot of tense scenes. At some points he and Sissi would be running from place to place and constantly finding enemies waiting for them, but these scenes often had a lot of talking and nobody ever tried to lunge at the kids and use their weapons against them.

There are a lot of people at the school and when you’ve got all of them out searching, no hiding place will be safe for long. Odd could be constantly on the move, finding somewhere he thinks he’s safe and then getting caught soon after and being forced to flee again. Just constantly being found and attacked by all these various students and teachers, never a moment’s rest. I actually have nightmares about this scenario sometimes :))) Maybe after outsmarting a couple of people and saying some wisecracks like with Nicolas and Herve he’d get worn out pretty quickly and eventually get backed into a corner somewhere.

Constantly being found and attacked. No reprieve. No pausing to have conversations. Just run for your life.

If you want to keep the characters’ personalities like in the episode, at least make it a lot less standing around talking and a lot more trying to capture and kill their target. You know, like a XANA attack. The weird makeshift weapons could be interesting if anyone actually bothered to use them like a weapon. They could say maybe one line relating to their weapon or character or something when they find Odd, but no long conversations or anything.

Otherwise you could do it like the attack in Lyoko Minus One, with Odd’s parents giving orders to an entire school of possessed, non-talking lackeys who are just out to get Odd. (And did only Jim and Hertz use electricity in that episode, not the students? Again you could do the makeshift weapons and it doesn’t seem too bad but then Odd’s parents show up wielding lightning and oh no! Scary!)

After being pushed to his limits being chased by the entire school, Odd is genuinely afraid at this point. He regrets being so rude to his parents because although they’re not perfect, they do love him. And they’re not trying to kill him, that’s always a good thing.

----

Sissi

In the episode, Sissi brings up how Odd always makes fun of her in his films. (In the French it’s worded to say that Odd only ever makes films just to make fun of her.) She never brings this up with Odd personally, and there’s no mention of it at all throughout the rest of the episode until Odd is doing the screening. Despite expressing annoyance at Odd, she has no problem immediately teaming up with him when the rest of the school starts acting strangely (and not even in an obviously deadly way like with other XANA attacks, see episode 69). After that short conversation, she and Odd don’t really interact in any meaningful way, they just run away from people together.

So a few ideas here. For one, Sissi could misinterpret the situation and join the mob to come after Odd because she’s upset about how he treats her in his films (and just in general tbh). Odd looks her in the eye and sees that she’s not possessed, so "Why are you attacking me?!” and trying to explain that everyone else has been possessed. Maybe even a joke about “I’m so tired of having to explain this to you over and over” because her memory keeps getting erased every time. Sissi asks why she should bother helping him when he’s so mean to her. On finding out that everyone else is actually out to kill him, not just maim him or something, and seeing him worn out from constantly being chased she decides to help him instead.

You could have Sissi pretend to be part of the mob in order to give Odd some reprieve, like the classic scene of someone pretending to beat another person up behind a closed door and making all these noises to try and convince the people on the other side of the door. Like Sissi: No, let me have him, he’s mine! *shuts door* Take that! [banging noises] Odd: Aaahh! Noooo! Ohh you’re hurting me so bad oh please stop! While the possessed people are just standing on the other side. Eventually they get annoyed and open the door only to find Odd and Sissi halfway out a window trying to escape.

Just. An interaction beyond “Huh everyone’s acting weird” “Yeah they sure are. Oh no here they come let’s escape.” The episode gave us empty Odd/Sissi carbs, I need sustenance.

Key thing: Odd learns that Sissi is upset with him and why. They actually have more than one decent interaction during the attack. So at the end of the episode when he has that beautiful butterfly *wink* moment it’s him acknowledging her concerns about his films, as well as her help during the attack.

----

Lyoko

The system bug was a weird plot point but I guess not totally unheard of for this show. Maybe they could show up at the lab only to find one of the xanafied students has beaten them there and messed with the computer. They have to fight the student before they can get to Lyoko and there’s a chance Jeremie will be attacked while the others are getting to the tower.

The one thing I can’t not think about is how once the Manta(s) are destroyed, the tower is completely unguarded because the other monsters are on the opposite side of the platform nowhere near it. Aelita could’ve flown up there and deactivated it at any point. Put some sort of obstacle or monster in front of it and you’re good.

#code lyoko #cl:91 bad connection #-I have many feelings about this episode #-I don't hate it but they really squandered the potential

27 notes · View notes