[Dead Monky]

I've been trying to be calm about this.  Really, I have.  When I first heard they were making this......"film" I was angry.  Yes, that's the word.  I was....angry....they were going to remake a cinematic classic, a landmark in animation, and one of my all time favorite movies.  Anyway, I was none too happy.  We'll leave it at that.  Then, a while later, I found out it was dead.  "Oh happy day!  That-Which-Must-Not-Be-Named has been slain and all is right in the world." I thought.

Or at least I thought it was dead.  But no.  No no no.  They had to go and resurrect it.  This horrid abomination of an orphan-soul eating cinematic abortion is back.  And it looks like they're actually going to go through with it.  And not just go through with it, but make it live-action, set it in New York, fill it full of white people, and then they're going to make a second one.  They'll probably be in fucking 3D to top it all off.

I am not a happy Monky.

Sorry I don't have any links.  I don't feel like dealing with tags right now.

[CanRay]

And they cancel Firefly.  *Shakes Head*

[PeterSmith]

Firefly was canceled because it was crap, and legions of Joss Whedon fanboys and girls couldn't muster enough effort to do something.

As for an Akira remake, I say bring it. The anime wasn't nearly as good as the manga, what with half the story missing.

[FastJack]

Oh, Peter. Peter, Peter, Peter.

Looks like we'll have to schedule another "marathon" to show you the error of your beliefs.

Back on topic. I found out about the "whitewash" from George Takei's tweet shaming WB for their decision.

[Dead Monky]

Peter, I won't deny that they cut a lot when they made the movie in '88.  They sort of had to.  The manga is over two thousand pages long.  It would have been like six movies.  I'm looking at this solely from the standpoint of the movie itself.  Which WB is going to horse rape.  Horribly.  Did you know that, in addition to moving it to the US and recasting it with my fellow crackers, they're aiming for a PG-13 rating?  Yeah.  How much do you think they'll have to trim and neuter to get that?  And have you seen some of who they're talking to for the roles of Tetsuo and Kaneda?  Robert fucking Pattinson?  Justing Timberlake?  Really?

Honestly, I'm surprised you aren't more pissed about this than me.  At least the '88 film tried to do the manga justice.  This thing is just going to shit all over it.

[Loki]

Firefly was canceled because it was crap

 I don't get the Firefly hate, but then I enjoy complex dialog and characters whose flaws are there for more than just the occasional plot device and they then return to being wooden (ST:TNG I'm looking at you).

Ok where at WB do we send the email bombs to stop this abortion. I mean really, live action and Anglicized. I want to claw my eyes out, better yet WB's eyes.

[PeterSmith]

DM, I don't have enough time in the day to get worked up over something like this. Pattinson did a decent enough job in the Harry Potter movie, I didn't have any issues with Timberlake's work in the third Schrek movie (the only movie I saw him in). When I see trailers I'll start to form an opinion then. As for going for a PG-13 rating so what? Takes out the hard profanity, takes out some of the blood, and people need to keep their clothes on. That means, what, we won't see Kaori's shirt get ripped off? Won't hear f-bombs dropped? The laser cannons will be clean (as they probably should have, cauterized wounds)? On the upside WB gets a larger audience. Might be able to get more of the story told.

So we get the rule of 10%. If 10% of the Akira fans show up then that's considered a success.


Loki, the dislike comes from the creator.

[CanRay]

We get something aimed at a larger audience, we get something made for "The Lowest Common Denominator".  Not a good thing.

[Loki]

Ah, yeah his preachyness can get on my nerves too. When he keeps his RW politics down to a dull murmur he writes some damn good characters IMO.

[Dead Monky]

Honestly, Pete, I'm more pissed off about the fact that the movie's being remade at all than I am about any of the actual changes they're making.  Remakes almost universally suck.  R-rated to lower-rating remakes are even more awful as they tend to trim far more than necessary and dumb down and neuter the story.  And animation to live action remakes are usually worse yet.  Whatever.  My fuming over it won't change anything and it's not like Akira is the first, and won't be the last, movie that was ever remade into a horrid pile of crap.

[EmperorPenguin]

I have no personal attachment to Akira, but I can definitely agree with DM that remakes have a lot to live up to, and they usually don't.  At best, you get something that is different, but still watchable.  At worse, well, we all have our own opinions of what terrible is.  But we can all agree that it exists.

You're worried that someone is out to exploit your favourite IP for cash.  That's fair (and they most likely are).  But maybe you can hope that someone will, however much they stray from the material, have the vision to at least make a decent film. 

I wouldn't be too worried about who is being cast.  I would definitely worry about who is directing and the orders they're taking.

[Stahlseele]

Akira is, mostly, what got Anime and thus Manga a shoe into the door to the western world . .
And most of these self proclaimed otaku/fanatics(no, not fans, fans is harmless) don't even know that -.-
It's maddening . . Emmerzilla, Bayformers, now this too?
God damn it all to hell . . i am getting too fragging old for Media -.-

BUURRNN IIT!
And the People who make it.
And the place it was made in.
Nuke it from orbit.
It's the only way to be sure!

[CanRay]

Nuke it from orbit.
It's the only way to be sure!

Don't give them ideas, they might remake that next.   

[Kontact]

They've remade Aliens a hundred times.

But you'd just call it a rip-off instead of a remake - I guess the difference is in the budget.

As far as Akira's story goes, it's really become generic anime fodder.  Ripped off hundreds of times in hundreds of stories.

Childhood friends pitted against each other.  Secret government experiments gone wrong.  Society in crisis.
I'm pretty sure the Japanese don't have a word for cliche.

[CanRay]

And, from what I've seen of their commercials, a diagnosis for Epilepsy other than kids never allowed to watch TV ever again.