Customer Reviews

Plastic Little - The Adventures of Captain Tita (Essential Anime Collection)

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Good things first. This is easily one of the most breath-takingly, beautifully illustrated and animated anime out there, EVER. The intricately hand-drawn and shaded character designs are beyond compare, and the frame rates are so silky smooth that probably only CG-3D stuff or Disney or Miyazaki stuff are more smoothly animated. By that virtue alone, Plastic Little easily belongs on every anime fan's must-watch list.

Now for the bad. If there ever was an award for an "all glitter and zero substance" anime, well, Plastic Little would easily win. The story is quite laughable in its cliches and pathetic lack of logic. Characters are annoyingly one-dimensional and have no depth whatsoever to speak of. Worst of all, the storyline is disappointingly anti-climactic. It should be criminal for an anime with such a rare striking beauty to be strapped to a storyline so unrewarding.

In all fairness, Plastic Little suffers the most from its own brevity. It barely clocks in at 45 minutes, and that's including the ending credit roll. If this was more of a full-length feature (say, 80-90 minutes), then there would have been a good deal of time to flesh out the characters and their relationships, and to elaborate on the futuristic society and its technology.

Heck, even with its current short length, the creators could have squeezed some of that into the storyline and have it make a lot more sense. Instead, the creators chose to spend the time with numerous scenes where the female characters are seen either nude or topless, taking bath or being bandaged. Granted, they are probably some of the most beautifully drawn breasts in all of anime, but I say that one such bath scene is enough for a 45-minute anime. I'd gladly trade a couple of the topless bouncy-breast scenes for a better developed plot.

To sum it up, in terms of sheer beauty of the animation, Plastic Little belongs in the top 10% of all animations ever made worldwide. In terms of intelligent, engaging, INTERESTING storyline, this one is near the bottom of the heap. A total, utter shame.

The story takes place on the planet Yietta. The planet, or at least the city, is kept afloat by a gravity device. The film opens with a 16 year old girl named Elysse and her father running from the evil Guizel. Elysse's father activates a escape pod for Elysse, but he is gunned down. As it turns out, Elysse's father had built a machine that affects the gravity device. He found out too late that Guizel had plans to mistreat the device (mistreat is a understatement). Tita, captain of a group that captures various creatures in the clouds and sells them, meets Elysse one day when Elysse is fleeing from Guizel. She helps Elysse escape temporarily, and they become friends. Of course, anyone friends with Elysse is an enemy to Guizel, and Tita, trying to help her new-found friend, gets involved.

To be honest, I wasn't expecting much from "Plastic Little". I had heard different opinions about this one. One of the reasons I saw this anime was because at that time, I was feeling like a decent comedy/adventure. "Plastic Little" filled that hunger more than a snack, but less than a feast. One of its flaws was for me that it was too short. At one hour, some of scenes seemed to be too short, while some were too long. However, I enjoyed the animation which the was eye candy. It was beautifully animated. It helped me sit though certain scenes. The character designs are well done and interesting looking. The only character I disliked was Guizel. He bears a resemblance to Ashram from "Record of Lodoss War", save the hair color and a couple other things. He serves as the tall, unmerciful bad guy. Like most Anime fiends, he tries to dress in the faishonable black cape. To add to his little costume, he wears a big helmet that looks so heavy that it could probably crush his skull. His personality would have been much more satisfying if they had revealed more about his past. The Plot gave no idea at all to what his motive was for wanting to cause so much utter chaos, death, and destruction. But that doesn't mean all the characters were poor. With a couple of them, you'll probably become attached too them, while most of the supporting characters personalities seem as bland as cardboard. For example, Elysse was suprisingly not that annoying as most anigirls, (unlike the EXTREMELY obnoxious brat C-ko of "Project A-Ko" ), and her story was told slowly, and was very important to the plot. Elysse was one of those characters that you get attached to. But Mei, like most of the crew members, did not do anything that was particularly memorable.

The plot may be a little weak, but it's executed well enough to make it worthwhile and entertaining. The animation really added to the overall feel of the movie. You can tell it doesn't take itself seriously. I also enjoyed some of the action in this movie. The action packed bike chases are one of the high points of "Plastic Little". Certain parts are fast-paced and exciting. It's too bad that "Plastic Little" tends to surprise you in situations that seem calm, instead of attemping to build tension.

A note to parents: this movie has gratuitous upper body nudity. To some, this is a warning; to others, it is another reason to see the movie. It seems like the artists were a little preoccupied with womens chests. The worst scene was when Mei suggests Tita and Elysse should take a bath. As it turns out, the "bathing area" is more like a theme park. It consists of a bunch of water slides and swiming pools. However, Nichol, a male fellow crew member with a crush on Tita, tries to peep at Tita. Tita retaliates by electrocuting him. That's the most sexually oriented scene. The rest is just excessive nudity. While the nudity is related to the plot, expect to see plenty of skin when someone is shot or injured. Also, everyone in Tita's crew wears a skintight suit. The violence for "Plastic Little" wasn't that graphic, but a couple scenes are fairly grim. At one point, Guizel lifts up Tita and starts to fire a gun into her stomach. The scene may be fairly disturbing to young children. Another one of the worst scenes was when Tita blows a persons head open, but it's tastefully done, not hardly as messy as it sounds. Barely anything is shown. Also, at the very beginning, Elysse's father is shot up very badly, but, like when Tita blasts into the head, it's done tastefully and controlled. There is also profanity, which is quite frequent. They say sh*t, cr*p, and b*tch when they are frustrated.

In my opinion, the mature content of "Plastic Little" is a fairly low R. Trust me, Anime can get far worse.

Overall,I liked Plastic Little. After I viewed it,I showed it to two other people,who both enjoyed it. Visually,it was extremly impressive,but character wise,it lacked decent personalities.

Bottem line: Some of the characters have personalities as colorful as a little,

plastic,tupperware container,but tupperware has never been so well animated.

It seems to me that people who reviewed this title either loved it or hated it. I myself think somewhere in the middle. The artwork in Plastic Little is very good, and in a way it is kind of funny. One fine example of this is when Captain Tita, and Elysse, are sitting together, after having seen a beautiful sunset, and just as they're talking about Elysse's code a spaceship comes out of nowhere and blasts out the window next to them. Yet another fine example is that the pilot, Nichol, kind of likes Tita, but he himself is very femminine, right down to his name.

Many people have said that there wasn't enough character development. I agree with them in some ways, but in others I completely disagree. I agree with them because there really wasn't too much character development. That's the thing though is that there doesn't need to be more than there already is. You get to know that Tita is kind of lazy, and that Nichol is kind of in love with Tita, and that's enough. Had this been made into a series though I am sure that there would have been much more development of the characters. As it is though the entire story is only 50 minutes long, so you can't very well fit too much in.

Many people again say that the plot wasn't good, or long enough, but I again agree and disagree. I agree because it truly wasn't that long, but again for the purposes of this type of anime, the plot doesn't need any lengthening, or shortening. I am sure again that had this been made into a full fledged series Elysse wouldn't be the only person Tita would run into, and I am also sure that there would be plenty of villans in the story as well.

Now for the most infamous bit; the nudity. I personally didn't see anything wrong with it. In the bath scene the two girls were just doing anything that they would normally do in a bath or shower. Of course this title was targeted at male viewers, but again it was just a scene with two girls in a bath, they weren't touching each other at all, except once when they were going down a water slide together. And again you have to realize that they were both women, and they didn't care what they looked like naked. Even when they had their tops off in the hospital ward, those times were only because of gunshot wounds, and the doctor was a woman.

All in all I liked Plastic Little, even though there were some bits and pieces in there that I didn't like. It was a little short, but there's nothing I can do about it now, so if you want to buy it go ahead!

I saw this movie with an open mind as I knew I had to to watch anime (I had just been introduced officially to it). I liked it a lot. THe animation was fluid, the art was superb, and the story was very original and excellent. You might have heard there is a lot of nudity, but if you ask me, the screen time of the breasts (that's all the show) would be a total of less than five minutes, so... blah! Don't let that stop you from seeing it! It's a great movie even if you don't like anime. Dubbing isn't bad at all, either.

(Discussions of plot, fan-service, etc., are much better covered in other reviews. This review is exclusively to mention some behind-the-scenes information about the dubbing of this feature, from one of the voice actors in the show.)

I provided the English-dubbed voice for the engineer, Mikhail. Or was he the engineer? It's been so long since I've seen this thing (and I recorded it in 1997 or so), I can't really remember much about it -- which, I suppose, says something of the overall plot.

My use of a Russian accent was planned well; the execution of that accent wasn't planned well at all. I don't recall who decided that it should be that thick. In order for an accent to be believable and natural, it is often best to paint it on thinly rather than trying to go over the top. So my apologies right off the bat for that one -- I didn't do nearly as well as I could have done. My best contribution was to provide some actual Russian, such as "Har' shoa" (very good) and "turok" (stupid, or idiot -- much like the Japanese "baka"). Please note the transliterated spelling of the Russian words is likely to be completely wrong; it's just how it sounds to my ear.

The story overall was given as much seriousness as we could gather for it, perhaps realizing that it really is a "fan service" flick at best. We (the voice actors) gave it a helluva shot, and that's about the best I can say on our behalf. This isn't the same caliber as, say, "Neon Genesis Evangelion" or "Serial Experiments Lain", so it really didn't get the same amount of attention or expertise from any of us. That, I confess, is a failing. The Tao would tell us, "Pay as much attention to the end as to the beginning, and there will be no error."

Not perfect, but certainly not a one-star anime. The animation is simply amazing. Rent it for that if nothing else. Compared to Plastic Little, every other anime looks like Scooby Doo.

Remember the scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark where Jones is about to face a giant with a sword, then rather than fight him, Jones just pulls out a gun and shoots him? That unconventional not-what-you-expect touch made the move unique. A lot of the fights in Plastic Little are like that. That's why some people here are upset because rather than another set of big super-fights, the heroes/villains use guile and end it quickly. It's unconventional, but after seeing dozens of other animes, it's nice.

If you're not familiar with anime yet, I would suggest you pass this one up and get Tenchi Muyo, Birdy the Mighty, or Ah! My Goddess! The plot is much easier to follow in those animes. If you've seen a lot of anime, and are looking for something new, Plastic Little may be what you're looking for.

Captain Tita is a PET HUNTER who, with her crew, ends up saving Elysse Mordish from Lord Guizel, a Darth Vader want to be, who wants the computer code she has. The code will allow him to use her father's work for evil. That's the plot, no surprises or too many plot twists.
On the other hand it has LOTS of nudity, explosions and techno-babble to please most male viewers. And the non-sexual relationship (or skinship as Patrick Drazen might call it) between Tita and Elysse could be enjoyed by female viewers.
It has ONLY 50 minutes so not a lot in character or plot development. Think of it as a short film or a extra-long episode. Extras include jiggle counter, sketches and storyboards.

Ugh. This mishmash of fan service, horrible English voice-acting (for you people who do dubs rather than subs), and an all-around headache-inducing plot is, at best, worth a rental. Don't buy it. It crams a plot that would have been better done over the course of two hours into 45 minutes, and as a result details like character development and plot coherency fall by the wayside.

If you like cheese by the way of fan service (Satoshi Urushihara really loves the female form) ... /still/ only rent this one. You'll be seriously peeved off unless you're looking to vidcap the bath scene about 25 minutes in to death.

Satoshi Urushima is best known for his work on such anime productions as Record Of Lodoss War and Bubblegum Crisis, or his designs for the Langrisser and Growlanser video games. However, a few of his own creations like Legend Of Lemnear have been adapted into anime as well. One is the oddly-titled Plastic Little, a one-shot OVA that was not originally a manga but the basis for its own action/sci-fi anime.

Set on a colonized alien world in the future, Tita is the spunky teenage captain of an airship/submarine called the Cha-Cha Maru whose crew seeks out exotic creatures. This trade is referred to as "petshop hunters", although it makes you think that they track down strip malls. Tita saves Elysse, the daughter of a brilliant scientist while she is on the run from the corrupt military. The highly-helmeted commander, Lord Guizel, plans to use Elysse's knowledge of a gyro system which sustains their nation's capitol in the air so he can take over the government. Tita takes Elysse back to the Cha-Cha Maru where she introduces her to the rest of her crew(who have some of the most stereotypical European accents ever!). Guizel eventually works out how to operate the gyro system, and its up to Tita to storm the complex and stop him. After making short work of the stormtroopers, Tita copies the ending to Return Of The Jedi by sending Guizel down an energy shaft. She then pulls out a Capt. Kirk-like deus-ex machina by exploding a typhoon to take out the rest of the evil fleet. Elysse leaves to help repair the damage caused by Guizel, which pretty much caused the entire city to be destroyed.

The OVA makes for a good story, although there was some pretty blatant boob-shots thrown into it, so much so that for its DVD release, ADV Films implemented their patented "jiggle-counter" with it. It features some impressive animation and character designs, plus the ending undersea battle is a real eyegasm. This is one of those anime titles that was a standard to own in the 90s, and I'd mainly recommend it to anyone from the era of gratuitous fan service!

Tita is the young Captain of a Pet Shop Hunter ship, inheriting the position from her father who died on the ship. On her way to work one morning (late as usual) she runs into a little girl, on the run from some suspicious men. Tita vows to help her with her problems.