Remembering Akira Toriyama

 

Akira Toriyama

5th April 1955 - 1st March 2024

It has been an absolute shock to many, myself included. On 1st March 2024, Akira Toriyama passed away from acute subdural hematoma at the age of 68. The news was announced a week later. A private service was held with his family in attendance, with plans for a commemorative gathering to be held at a later date. There is no doubt that Toriyama had brought joy to people's childhoods over the years and across the globe, especially with the Dragon Ball series, and inspired many people throughout his lifetime.

At a young age, Toriyama drew pictures of vehicles, animals, and during his elementary school years, his own classmates. After graduating from high school, focusing on creative design, he worked for an advertising agency in Nagoya designing posters, before quitting after 3 years, as he got sick of the environment. Following this, Toriyama entered the manga industry, and submitted works for the Weekly Shōnen Jump magazine, but things didn't go down well at first, as his first submission was rejected as it was a Star Wars parody instead of an original work, and other submissions that did get published, including his first work Wonder Island, was ranked the lowest in readers surveys. Toriyama considered quitting, but chose to carry own, due to his own stubbornness.

It wasn't until he created Dr Slump that a success was on his hands. Dr Slump was serialised in the Weekly Shōnen Jump magazine from 1980 to 1984, and it was awarded the Shogakukan Manga Award for Best Shōnen or Shōjo Manga Series of the Year in 1981. That same year, it spawned an anime adaptation, airing until 1986. Toriyama, encouraged by his editor Kazuhiko Torishima, would make his next manga series more action-based, as the former was fan of martial arts films. Toriyama created the two-part manga series Dragon Boy, released in 1983 to favourable response and would evolve into Toriyama's most successful work to date, Dragon Ball.

Inspired by the Chinese novel Journey to the West, as well as Hong Kong martial arts films, Dragon Ball was serialised in the Weekly Shōnen Jump magazine from 1984 to 1995, and became one of the best-selling manga series of all time, having sold 159.5 million tankōbon copies in Japan alone, and was partially responsible for the Weekly Shōnen Jump magazine's circulation hitting a record high of 6.53 million copies in 1995. Like Dr Slump, Dragon Ball spawned an anime adaptation, airing from 1986 to 1989 under the Dragon Ball name, and from 1989 to 1996 under the Dragon Ball Z name. Both the manga and the anime adaptation became a huge hit not only in Japan, but across the globe.

At the time of his death, Toriyama was still working on the upcoming anime series Dragon Ball DAIMA, which is due to air this autumn, and an ONA series adaptation of one of his works, SAND LAND, which had a animated movie adaptation released last year, is due to premiere later this month, which features new scenes not featured in the film, famous scenes from the original manga, and an all new story written by Toriyama himself, taking place after the film's storyline.

In addition to Dragon Ball, and manga in general, Toriyama was illustrator and character designer for the long-running video game series Dragon Quest since it began in 1986, and was also part of the "Dream Team", a group of three designers for the video game Chrono Trigger, and also contributed to the art for the video game Blue Dragon.

Over the years, Toriyama has left a lasting impact in the anime and manga industries, the fandom and many other people in general. If anything, the vast popularity of the Dragon Ball series played a significant part in anime and manga's growing popularity across the globe as a whole. Toriyama and the Dragon Ball series have both served as an inspiration for many other mangaka, who launched their own successful series, including Eiichiro Oda (One Piece), Hiro Mashima (Fairy Tail), Tite Kubo (Bleach) and Masashi Kishimoto (Naruto). Actor Yasuhisa Furuhara, on Twitter, cited Toriyama as an inspiration for the hairstyle of his character, Sōsuke Esumi, in Engine Sentai Go-onger. Outside of Japan, Ian Jones-Quartey, supervising producer of Steven Universe, is a fan of both Dragon Ball and Dr Slump, and uses Toriyama's vehicle designs as a reference for his own, and German comic book artist Hans Steinbach, also known as Hanzo, was strongly influenced by Toriyama. In addition, there were many references to the Dragon Ball series in other western shows and films, including The Amazing World of Gumball, The Owl House, and even the New Zealand comedy film, The Breaker Upperers, to name a few.

Toriyama has also played a part in gaining my interest in anime and manga. As a child, I watched portions of the Ocean dub of Dragon Ball Z when it aired on Cartoon Network in the UK, although I have no recollection of watching a full episode, I will admit, but it was thanks to the exposure that got me into checking out the Dragon Ball series years later, and back in 2014, the year after I started properly getting into anime and manga (I actually started getting into the two in late 2013), I bought the first Dragon Ball 3-in-1 manga from my local comic book shop, and in Christmas that year, I got Volume 1 of the Dragon Ball anime on DVD from my parents (watching it in Japanese with English subtitles), and I was hooked instantly. It also sparked my interest further for other series, including other big shōnen series, as well as non-shōnen series. If anything, thanks to the Dragon Ball/Dr Slump crossover episodes of both Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Super, it sparked my interest in checking out Dr Slump (at the time of this writing, the anime adaptation is currently not licensed in the UK, and the paperback manga appears to be out of print and is currently digital only, but I could be wrong about that).

Akira Toriyama has truly left us a legacy that cannot be understated. Inspiring so many people ranging from mangaka, actors, staff from western shows and films, and even people from the general public, and even leaving a mark in general pop culture both within and outside Japan. Toriyama may be gone, but alongside his legacy, he will never be forgotten.

Rest in peace, Toriyama-sensei.

Magical Senshi Takes a Look at Lonely Castle in the Mirror

 

Please note: This post may contain minor spoilers, so read at your own risk.

Before I start this review, I will admit, I've seen this film once before. This film was part of the line-up in last year's Scotland Loves Anime in both Glasgow and Edinburgh, of which I went to the former (the first time I ever been to SLA, I'm not going to lie). I actually liked it when I first saw it, but I've been told about the stuff that has been removed from the book has been based on, so I ended up buying the book sometime later, and have recently given it a read, and I've noticed parts of the story that either didn't make it to the film, or were drastically shortened, so it'll be interesting to see how I view the film in a rewatch. 

Lonely Castle in the Mirror was based on the aforementioned book of the same name by Mizuki Tsujimura. Released in Japan in December 2022, production was handled by animation studio A-1 Pictures, with  Keiichi Hara (Miss Hokusai, Birthday Wonderland) as director, Miho Maruo (Ultra Maniac) providing the screenplay, Keigo Sasaki (Blue Exorcist) as chief animation director, as well as handling the character designs, Ilya Kuvshinov (Ghost in the Shell: SAC_2045) providing the visual concept and castle design and Harumi Fuuki (The Deer King) providing the music composition.

Kokoro Anzai, a first-year student at Yukishina No 5 Junior High School, is avoiding going to school due to being bullied. One day, within her mirror in her bedroom, she finds a magic portal, gets dragged into it, and finds herself in a castle. Kokoro is welcomed by a girl in a wolf mask, calling herself the Wolf Queen. Kokoro is joined by six other children, Masamune, Rion, Subaru, Fuka, Aki and Ureshino. The Wolf Queen instructs the children, addressing them as "Little Red Riding Hoods", to find a key hidden in the castle, which would grant the person who finds the key one wish. But there are a few catches. They have to find the key before the deadline on the 30th March the following year, if anyone makes a wish, it will be granted, and the children will lose their memories about the whole thing, and they must leave the castle before 5pm Japan time, or they will be eaten by a wolf.

The main highlight of the film is its portrayal of bullying, and I must say, as someone who faced being bullied at school during my secondary years, they conveyed it rather well, with students refusing to go to school, or leaving home at all, as a result of being bullied, beatings from bullies (although that took place off-screen) as well as nasty comments coming from bullies, and one thing that stood out the most, teachers either playing down the situation, or outright dismissive and doing very little or nothing to help the situation properly. And it's not just bullying at school that has been portrayed. In regards to one of the characters, there has been a case of an abusive stepparent.

Kokoro, being our lead character of the film, naturally gets the most character development out of the seven children. Throughout the film, you see her journey from making a new friend with a transfer student, only to lose that friend to a popular girl who would bully her, the emotional trauma she suffered as a result of the being bullied, as well as making friends with a group with differing personalities to one another, yet are in similar situations. We also have Fuka, who plays piano and initially has a cold personality before warming up to others, Masamune, who is massively into video games, and tends to stretch the truth when bragging, Subaru, who takes interest in Masamune's video games and aspires to become a video game designer, Aki, who had a boyfriend at one point, and was initially unconcerned about losing her memories of the castle, which was likely to mask her personal demons, Rion, who is a football player at a boarding school in Hawai'i and lost his older sister when he was a child, and finally Ureshino, who tends to be unlucky with love. Despite their difference in personalities, many of them have formed different bonds with one another, offering good chemistry with each bond. And of course, we also have the Wolf Queen, whose identity was concealed by a wolf mask, who is often blunt, strong (well, strong enough to tackle Kokoro to the ground and drag her by the leg easily), and has most of the time omitted stuff out in her explanations, so that the others can pick up the pieces. 

In addition to the bullying portrayal, the film's story often has twists and turns, which make things more interesting, such as the children's lives outside their mirrors (I won't go into details, you'll have to either read the book or watch the film to find out), who Ms Kitajima, the counsellor of the alternative school, really is, and the identity of the Wolf Queen (the last two examples were revealed at the end of both the film and the book). The music composition is immersive to the setting of the film, and more often than not, it really sucks you in to what is happening. And visual designs really capture the heart of the film's settings, and is complemented by its animation, and A-1 Pictures' animation isn't usually something to write home about.

The film though is not exactly problem free though. A film adaptation of a book is not without its hurdles, and Lonely Castle in the Mirror is no exception. Due to its runtime (1 hour and 56 minutes, to be exact, including credits), some parts of the story had to be shuffled around a bit, cut down a portion (some of it, a huge portion) or even outright removed, resulting in rushed pacing in a good few scenes. This setback has also resulted in characters getting less fleshed out than in the book, leaving us a few empty gaps in Kokoro's storylines, the other characters' personalities and backstories, amongst other things.

Our main cast consists of Ami Touma providing the voice of Kokoro, Sakura Kiryu (Nagi Amano in Weathering with You) voicing Aki, Takumi Kitamura (Naomi Katagaki in Hello World, Mamoru Suzuhara in Seven Days War) voicing Rion with Akiko Yajima (first voice of Shinnosuke Nohara in Crayon Shin-chan) voicing Rion as a child, Rihito Itagaki (Heure in Kamen Rider Zi-O) voicing Subaru, Naho Yokomizo (Mayuko in Birthday Wonderland) voicing Fuka, Minami Takayama (Dilandau Albatou in The Vision of Escaflowne, Conan Edogawa in Detective Conan) voicing Masamune, Yuki Kaji (Gaon/Zenkai Gaon in Kikai Sentai Zenkaiger, Katsuhira Agata in Kiznaiver) voicing Ureshino, Aoi Miyazaki (Shōko Sano in Colorful) voicing Ms Kitajima, and finally Mana Ashida (Ruka Azumi in Children of the Sea, Yui in The House of the Lost on the Cape) voicing the Wolf Queen.

Overall, Lonely Castle in the Mirror is a good film with interesting plot twists, and well executed social commentary about bullying, only to be marred by issues of trying to adapt a book into a film lasting for just under two hours, resulting in pacing issues, removal of some characterisation and other parts of the story. Personally, I think it would've been better done as a single cour anime series, or an OVA series if there isn't enough material to cover an anime series, if they want to adapt the whole book. Would I recommend the film? It depends. If you can view it on its own merits, then I'd recommend it, but if omissions from the book put you off a bit, then I would probably stick to the book.

The English language version of the original book Lonely Castle in the Mirror is available at all good book retailers.

Magical Senshi's First Impressions: Bakuage Sentai Boonboomger

 

Please note: This post may contain spoilers, so read at your own risk.

In recent years, each Super Sentai series have been experimenting with different things, such main teams consisting primarily of robots, having the first ever male pink, and an entire series where it takes place mainly on an alternate version of Earth to name a few (there are too many examples to list), and now were onto the 48th Super Sentai series, and the fifth series in the Reiwa era. Bakuage Sentai Boonboomger aired its first episode yesterday (or the day before, depending on your time zone). For this series, the head writer is Atsuhiro Tomioka, who has worked on the Pokémon anime series since the beginning, and while this is his first time working on a Super Sentai series, he was head writer in a tokusatsu series before, in particular, K-tai Investigator 7. The main director for the series is Shojiro Nakazawa, who was previously the main director of other Super Sentai series, such as Juken Sentai Gekiranger, Kaizoku Sentai Gokaiger and, most recently, Kikai Sentai Zenkaiger.

Taiya Hando, a "delivery driver", abducts Mira Shifuto from her wedding after being forced into an arranged marriage, and ends up in a pursuit. They then encounter the Hashiriyan, an alien mafia gang who invades Earth to gather the screams of humans as their energy source known as Gyasoline. During a visit to a clothes shop, after Mira got into a change of clothes, Itasha uses a Hashiriyan Ignition Key to turn Mira's wedding dress in to a monster called Wedding Dress Gurumar. After Taiyo promising to get Mira's wedding dress back, using the Boonboom Changer, he transforms into Boon Red. Taiya's informant, Ishiro Meita, takes Mira to get to the airport to complete their "delivery", but on the way, Mira decides to "take the wheel for herself", and chooses to fight alongside Taiya, who gave her a spare Boonboom Changer. Ishiro and Mira then transforms into Boon Blue and Boon Pink respectively, and the team comes together to defeat Wedding Dress Gurumar. After their battle, Mira breaks up with her actual boyfriend (who ordered the "delivery"), and chooses to stay in Tokyo and become a member of the Boonboomgers, much to Ishiro's disgruntlement, but Taiyo didn't mind, as the job was done, but it was "re-routed" to the Boonboomgers.

Looks like we're off to a strong start with the series. The premiere focuses primarily on Mira, and already, we're seeing a little bit of characterisation coming from her, as at first, people always make the decisions for Mira, but a fed up Mira has had enough of it, eventually deciding to make her own decisions before joining the Boonboomgers. Not only that, we see her try to blend in to the team with two already experienced members, Taiya and Ishiro. Plus, her reactions to the whole situation regarding the Boonboomgers and the Hashiryian was priceless. 

While Taiya and Ishiro don't have as much focus on this episode, I'll be looking forward to how things progress with them in due time. We also get brief appearances of Jou Akuse (Boon Black), a police officer who's one of the victims of Wedding Dress Gurumar, and Genba Bureki (Boon Orange) admiring Taiya's customisation of the latter's car, indicating that Genba already knows Taiya. Interesting to see how it develops. Of course, we can't forget about Boondorio Boonderas, or Boon Boon for short. His first scene shows him making curry at the team base without a care in the world. But often, he's a hyped-up fireball of a machine, and Rica Matsumoto embodies the role perfectly.

We also have a fun group of villains in the Hashiriyan. Consisting of Dekotrade, Itasha and Yaiyai Yarucar, we see them causing mayhem on the roads while pursuing Taiya and Mira, and at the same time, funnily enough, respecting traffic laws when it comes to people crossing the road on a traffic crossing before resuming their pursuit. One other stand out moment from them in this episode is when Dekotrade and Itashi, while initially confused about what's going on, are rooting for Yarucar when they (I don't know the gender of Yarucar) are trying to stop the Boonboomgers from preventing them from making Wedding Dress Gurumar into a giant.

Following the heavy usage of giant screens and green/blue screens (mainly the latter) for locations in Ohsama Sentai King-Ohger, we're finally back to doing outdoor fights on a regular basis, and we're treated to some excellent action choreography in Boon Red's debut fight. For the suits, I really like that they're going for a racer-style bodysuit, with a seatbelt-style belt, complete with the buckle. At first, I wasn't quite keen on the helmet, particularly the wheel and alloy, but once I saw it in action, the helmet designs really grew on me.

As for the mecha action, I like the Highway Space setting, which kind of reminds me of the Rainbow Road on Mario Kart (I don't know if this is an intentional reference). The cockpits for each mecha is a mixture of phsyical elements and CGI/green screen, and at first, the CGI elements have looked so real to me, I thought the whole cockpits were real. Impressive, to say the least. As for Boonboomger Robo itself, it's an okay design, although I did like one particular feature from Boonboom Off-Road. The Bakuage Driver, which acts not only as a sword, but as a screwdriver, to unscrew the bolts from the giant Gurumars.

A few known voice actors for this one, for the voice actor enthuisasts. Boondorio Boonderas (as mentioned earlier), as well as the equipment, was voiced by Rica Matsumoto (Satoshi/Ash Ketchum in the Pokémon series, Arthur G6 in Chikyuu Sentai Fiveman),  Dekotrade was voiced by Junichi Suwabe (Victor Nikiforov in Yuri on Ice, Absolute Tartarus in Ultra Galaxy Fight), Itasha was voiced by Nana Mizuki (Tsubasa Kazanari in Symphogear, Pxycholon in Super Hero Taisen Z), Yaiyai Yarucar was voiced by Sumire Morohoshi (Emma in The Promised Neverland, Kyōka Izumi in Bungo Stray Dogs) and the monster of the week, Wedding Dress Gurumar was voiced by Masaharu Satō (Buffaloman in Kinnikuman, Khan Digifer in Gridman the Hyper Agent).

Overall, the premiere of Bakuage Sentai Boonboomger has been strong throughout, with exciting moments, brilliant action choreography, and a great introduction to some of our characters. Hopefully, they'll keep it up in future episodes. While people have said that the series takes a back to basics approach, I wouldn't be so sure yet, as this is only the beginning of what's to come.