Tag Archives: Action

Override: Mech City Brawl Review

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This game didn’t make too many waves when it came out to be honest. It was around and then just as quickly as it came out, everyone forgot about it. The main problem is that it just didn’t really have a big hook to it. No singular reason why you would play it over some other mech game or anything like that. Still, the sequel brought in Ultraman so I figured…okay let me give this one a shot so I can go play the sequel soon and in the end it was pretty good.

The game actually does have a brief story mode even though there really isn’t much to it. Basically you have to help protect the world from alien invaders that are trying to take over. The only way to beat them is with your giant mech suit that has a ton of power at its disposal. Sounds easy enough, but you are outnumbered. You’re also a rookie so nobody takes you seriously yet. Can you defy the odds and save the world?

You’ll have the game beaten in a matter of hours so don’t worry about any of that. This is definitely not what I would call a really hard game at all. Just keep on punching the enemies away and the game will be over before the difficulty can really spike up at all. Considering that this is a PS4 title I do think they could have done more with the voice acting and budget to make this feel like a modern game. Because otherwise it just doesn’t really feel like it unlocked all of the latent potential. You could have made this game on the PS2 and it would be about the same.

The gameplay itself is fairly basic. You have your standard hits, power blows, and a super attack. Some attacks are so weak that you will never use them though. For example the main character has an energy blast, but it is slow and short range. What’s the point of an energy blast that is short range? I play long range fighters in fighting games for the spamming potential. That’s what I live for but if I can’t even do that then I’m absolutely going for the close range fighter all the way. There wouldn’t be much point in doing anything else at that point.

The gameplay can also be a bit slow. I’d say that using robots isn’t really an excuse for that either because I’ve seen plenty of faster ones. This game definitely could have stood to speed things up a notch but this is starting to sound negative for the gameplay so let me just clarify that the gameplay is still solid. I did have a good time with it because in general I love combat gameplay. You really can’t go wrong with it. It may not hold up against some other titles but I was still having fun. The game is also so cheap nowadays that it makes the value go up.

What this title really needed though was a larger cast, more modes to play, and a longer story. Throw those elements in and we’re talking about a whole new adventure at this point. If I bought this on opening day then I’d be super sad but buying it now, well it works out pretty well. The graphics are pretty decent. Nothing amazing but they’re fun and remind me of the old Godzilla Gamecube title. I also like how you can destroy just about every part of the city just by walking around. It helps show you the true scale of just how absolutely massive these robots are. Everything in their way is basically begging to be destroyed. The soundtrack’s more on the forgettable side though so don’t really worry about that.

In terms of replay value, this is mainly a multiplayer game so of course right off the bat that’s a ton of replay value. Just find some friends who enjoy the game and you can have fun playing against them for a while. Additionally you can work on getting the Platinum. I didn’t really look into how difficult that would be though. It all depends on if they included any online trophies or not but without a doubt it will add onto your overall playing time too. It’s why I still love trophies as a concept.

Overall, Override Mech is a pretty fun game. It’s not particularly ambitious nor does it have the sheer volume of content to compete with most mech titles but it’s a quality title. I always like seeing a new IP try to get out there and survive. This one at least does that and evidently did well enough to get a sequel. Unfortunately that one got rid of the stakes in the story although I’m very early on so that could change. At the end of the day if you like mecha fighting games then you should definitely pick this one up. Trust me you won’t regret it. This is the kind of game that you need to dive into especially when you see the low price.

Overall 7/10

Winback: Covert Operations Review

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All right now this is what I would call a gem in the rough! It’s a game I’d never heard of before and without the Nintendo Switch Online I probably never would have gotten to play it because of how obscure it is. I’d just not have ever thought to look it up. Well, this game is a blast and I absolutely recommend checking it out if you have the Switch Online bundle because this game does not hold anything back.

The story starts with the top notch agents all being placed on a mission. They are being dropped onto an island to stop some terrorists that have taken over to try and use a powerful weapon to bring the world to its knees. This mission is one where failure is not an option so the heroes can’t leave until they’ve guaranteed success. Unfortunately it does not start out well as the copter is shot down and everyone gets split up. You now have to find your comrades while taking on the villains but will you really be able to pull this off?

First up, the game’s story is very impressive. There isn’t really any voice acting here but we still get text boxes and technical limitations did not slow the writer down. You have a lot going on here, a fairly big character cast and also a serious body count. Nobody feels safe and that makes sense because you are behind enemy lines at this point. Make the wrong call and that’s game over. All of the characters understand the stakes and act appropriately. There is always a villain to be stopped and they will follow their mission to the end.

The epic soundtrack helps to balance this out. It reminded me a lot of Oni for the PS2 with the sci-fi vibes here. The costumes are really solid and the villain entrances are memorable when they show up with their accompanying music. One of the first bosses in particular impressed me as he had a very detailed design and must have had some kind of interesting backstory but the main character doesn’t have time for that. He just launches right into the battle and I definitely had to respect that. That’s exactly the kind of energy I would expect to see here. It’s just a fight to the death and it’s not personal as both sides are fighting for a cause that they believe in and would give their life for.

There are a ton of twists and turns to be found in this story as well so get ready for a lot of epic moments like that. The game is also fairly long with over 30 levels, some levels are quite long at that. So definitely a lot of amazingness all around. It also ends up being a bit extra long because the game is very difficult. Far from being a walk in the park, this game has a lot of absolutely brutal sections mixed in. You will be jumped by tons of enemies from all sides and have to try and fend them off. Taking a stray hit can take over half of your health bar. You have to always be taking cover and keeping track of your surroundings.

The controls are very basic. You point and shoot, plus you can hide behind objects. That’s basically it. You can use lock on which is extremely handy but just watch out because sometimes it takes an extra second to find an enemy and by then you’ll have been shot. That’s really where the game is at its most tricky. It’s trying to encourage you to use manual shooting which is without a doubt superior, but it can be really hard to move so quickly. So for me I stuck with auto and just did a lot of extra hiding.

Even with that though, there are so many rooms on the island and they are all filled with enemies. New enemies spawn when you enter a room and then back track so you can really never lower your guard. Some enemies will run up to you and just stab you which is usually a game over. Each level has check points but the check points remember your health so ironically this can actually be a bad thing. Like you survive the first section with one piece of health left so now you are doomed to always start that way until you completely finish off the level.

Yeah I died time and time again in this title. It’s got to be one of the harder games that I’ve played and this is often the case with shooters. It is definitely not my best genre and if I had to play it straight like back at the arcade I don’t see how I would have stood a chance. It’s just so unforgiving because you can finish the first 20 enemies perfectly but then the 21st gets you. That’s really all that it takes to tip the scales which is the crazy part. With the awesome music and story you’ll definitely power through but with a lesser game you’d probably end up being frustrated.

That’s why it’s good to have developers that really give a title their all though. Every piece of this game is great. From the smooth controls to the solid story, no corners were cut here. Even the length went above and beyond since most games for the console were considerably shorter. Nobody would have bat an eye if it was 15 levels instead of 31 but the game still brought in a ton of content and made sure that the replay value was really on point!

Overall, This is definitely a game that I would recommend checking out. It’s just great all around and way better than I ever could have guessed. It has that retro vibe to it which you just don’t see anymore nowadays. The characters are solid and the gameplay is excellent. It’s hard to beat a good 3D shooter after all. The game is incredibly hard though so props to whoever managed to beat it back in the day. The checkpoints help but we’re still talking long sections in which you can’t save or anything like that. Yeah this probably kept people up at nights trying to conquer it.

Overall 8/10

Haven’t You Heard? I’m Sakamoto Review

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It’s time for an anime that is fairly bonkers and definitely in a good way. This show takes the idea of the perfect student and dials it up to 11. Sakamoto can do no wrong and he makes for a very solid main character. You will probably find yourself identifying with his character and basically going “That’s me for real” the whole time. That’s how moving he is. Yeah the show definitely goes by pretty quickly as a result and each episode has something crazy going on.

For the most part each episode is fairly stand alone but there is a true continuity the whole way through. Past events will be referenced and some episodes do continue. The basic premise though is that there is a student named Sakamoto who is basically perfect. Everyone loves this guy, he aces every kind of class and challenge that gets put in his path. The guy is super agile, powerful, and knowledgeable. Yet the guy has a good amount of humility and will always help others out. The school can use someone like Sakamoto because there are a lot of bullies here and so without him the place would fall into anarchy. Can he make the school a better place or does he have a secret flaw?

The opening song is pretty catchy for the series. It really grabs you and stays fairly memorable. The show itself has a pretty good ost as well with some nice variety in there. I’m not saying it’s the next Naruto of course but yeah this is high quality stuff all the way. The animation is also solid although it’s not a stand out. For a show like this that’s part comedy I imagine they didn’t break the bank in terms of the animation quality. So it looks pretty good but it’s not the top of the line stuff. You wouldn’t likely see it in any best animated moments kind of thread.

Where the show excels is with the humor and writing which is bound to get a few laughs out of you. The situations can just be so out there and absurd that you can’t help but grin a little. You always know that Sakamoto will get some characters out of trouble and it’s just about seeing how he will do it. Sometimes he will do it himself like pretending to be possessed and other times he will manipulate the students into doing the right thing. That’s why Sakamoto is a secret mastermind, he’s always a few steps ahead of the competition.

He has to be up there as one of the best characters in the series and that would probably be true for most people. Even if you don’t tend to like the perfect character trope, Sakamoto is very aware of this and so the show has a lot of fun with it. As a result this portrayal works really well. Sakamoto just makes the world a better place and I only have one negative for his character which is that sometimes he goes too far in sandbagging. Like there’s one episode where he gets blackmailed into buying some sketchy DVDs and another where he ends up being the servant of one of the bullies.

Yes, at no point is he in any serious danger and you know he’s just playing along for fun but it’s still not the best look for the guy. Personally if you ask me, I’d just like to see him stand up for himself there and show them up even if it’s in a subtle way. I’d say he tends to be more passive aggressive in how he handles these moments by being a bit too useful and that’s the gag in those moments but eh…that’s the only time I’m not super impressed with him. His positive moments heavily outweigh the negative ones though which is why he’s still a great character. He’s always got a plan and does his best to stay on top.

His friend Kubota is more of a sad character who gets picked on and isn’t strong enough to fight back. That’s a tough predicament to be in for sure so you do feel bad about that. His role in the show is a lot smaller than I would have guessed though as he doesn’t do much after the initial episodes. He has a running gag about his hair changing a lot but that’s about it. Honestly you forget him as soon as he leaves the screen so we didn’t need more screentime anyway.

Atsushi is one of the main bullies in the show and he gets a big role. Unfortunately he does tend to be one of the more annoying character and takes way more Ls than Ws. This guy gets shown up early and turns over a new leaf but he has very weak willpower which means that he backslides very often. You may think that you can count on him after a point but unfortunately that just isn’t the case. He looks really bad in the climax of the series where he completely loses his mind and the main problem is that it’s due to him being tricked. Now granted he would have looked bad no matter what his excuse was but getting tricked makes it sting extra hard.

The guy just didn’t get consistently better and falling backwards like that is a quick way for me to lose respect for the character. At least the same thing didn’t happen to his two friends but they couldn’t stop him anyway so it didn’t help much. Then you have Sera who likes being the center of attention but of course he can’t compete with Sakamoto. That leads to a lot of jealousy and petty moments for the guy. Unlike Atsushi though, he actually has a consistent character arc and ends up becoming a better person after he is humbled the first time. He has a very unfortunate reoccurring gag about stripping though which does hurt his character. It’s more sad than funny most of the time and you feel bad for him because initially he had such great aspirations for himself. Now he is doomed to just be the comic relief.

Aina is a fun character even if she doesn’t have time to do too much. Basically she likes Sakamoto and aims to seduce him but she finds that it’s not so easy because the guy is always extremely focused. He overpowers all of her techniques and she also has to deal with a lot of people meddling in her affairs. The fight over the Ouija board was a really entertaining moment though and one of the better parts in the series. Talk about high takes, you really had to be careful what answer Aina forced on the group. If the series were longer I imagine she would have had more full episodes but the series is pretty short and mainly each character had to get their moment to shine so there wasn’t much time for general chats.

Megumi is more of a timid character in comparison. While Aina directly goes to Sakamoto to try and get him, Megumi is content to hide and try to take pictures of him in secret. You have to give her points for effort there but ultimately as a character she’s not great. I just tend to prefer the bolder characters and so she’s not going to stack up like that. Even a minor character like Kakuta leaves more of an impact because the gag of him trying to get Sakamoto to be one second late to penalize him is a fun one. The guy just is never able to pull this off.

Shigemi is one of the worst characters here. Her gag is that even though she is the mother of Sakamoto’s friend, she falls for him. His natural charms are simply too powerful and while we all know and understand the gag, it doesn’t make her any less annoying. You’re still shaking your head when she shows up. She only gets one full episode to herself but yeah it’s a bit rough. I think the gag was overplayed right out of the gate.

Maruyama was a more entertaining character and that’s considering the fact that he ended up being more annoying at times because of how that was the episode where Sakamoto was working for him the whole time which was hard to watch. Still, the gag of being scared because of how talented Sakamoto was at least worked a lot better as a gag and could hold up its own episode there. The episode being solid is always the important part. Like i wasn’t a big fan of any of the kids but their episode about not crossing the line was still fun. It showed that Sakamoto would make time even to hang out with some kids.

Then we have Hayabusa who is another great character that you could rank near the top. He may be the head honcho of the bullies but he seems like a standup guy. He has a solid honor code and lets his people do whatever they want. He seems to just want to have a good time and for nobody to get seriously hurt. He even sticks up for Sakamoto when the going gets tough. This guy is the real deal and definitely someone that you want on your side. His episode where he tries to survive a fancy restaurant experience was also a very noble one.

Trust me that’s a rough spot because a lot of that fancy food doesn’t even taste good. He did it all to support his father which was really nice of him. Now at the end of the day you should stick up for yourself and make sure not to get yourself into a jam like that but his heart was in the right place. He did want to make things better all around so it’s hard to fault him for that.

Finally we have Fukase who is the big villain here. The head honcho, the big cheese. He does a good job of ending the season off with a bang. Now this is one plot where I wasn’t crazy about the resolution though because I was just expecting more. The gag itself is funny to an extent but the fast redemption arc just didn’t feel earned. This guy caused a whole lot of trouble after all and while it’s great that he will be a better person now, I wanted more of a true fight. This guy felt like he could be on Sakamoto’s level with all of the tough talk so I just needed to see that in action.

In the end he was more of a strategic fighter which is cool too but seeing someone give Sakamoto a run for his money would have been fun. Maybe next time I suppose. The ending itself was still pretty fun as an emotional climax and a solid name drop. I was thinking it would have been cool to have seen Sakamoto join a new school or something. My theory was that he was like an alien or something sent to make the school a better place. I found out about a darker theory after finishing the show which makes a lot of sense though in which case you can see why they went with this ending.

Overall, This was a really fun show. It’s a full on comedy title that really makes use of the absurd humor style. It can sometimes be tough for a show to get going right away with the humor but this one pulled it off. It was important to start fast too considering that it’s not like this one has 50 episodes to burn. A lot of comedy titles need a second genre to work as well but this one just went all in and it turned out well. I’d say the replay value is fairly strong as well since there are so many gags per episode. Throw in a solid main character and a pretty decent cast overall and you’re set. Outside of the episode with the Mom chasing Sakamoto, all of the other episodes were pretty solid as well. I’d recommend this to anyone looking for a good time. Even if you’re not typically a comedy fan, I’d say to give this one a chance because it’s very accessible.

Overall 7/10

Paycheck Review

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It’s time for a film with a pretty interesting premise, in part because I could see this actually happening in real life at some point. Companies want to keep things confidential after all and right now people sign non-disclosure agreements but at the end of the day those are hardly full proof. What if they could just erase your memories? Oh man that would be a company’s ultimate dream! This movie is pretty fun and will keep you entertained the whole time but I do have to admit that the main character does come across as gullible.

The film starts off by introducing us to Michael who basically contracts with various companies to work on specialized projects. After which his memories are deleted and he goes off to live his life. The positive here of course is that he’s making absolute bank. The guy is basically rich because of the missions but the negative of course is that he’s missing massive parts of his life. He’s completely okay with this and feels that it’s a fair trade off though. Well, one day an old friend shows up and asks him if he is interested in a longer term contract. This one will last 3 years and of course he won’t remember any of it. Michael agrees but when he wakes up, it turns out that he gave away all of his money for some reason and all of the records have been destroyed. Now he is being hunted and it’s all an elaborate frame up. What can he do to get out of this?

I have to give the film more credit here because this is exactly what my worst fear would be. When you’re erasing whole chunks of your memory like that, you seriously have no idea what happened previously and that is opening up the door to all kinds of trouble. You can’t properly defend yourself from someone accusing you of something when you yourself don’t know what occurred right? So long story short, I would never even consider doing this even if the money was really good like this. An added wrinkle is in this film the procedure of removing memories is actually super dangerous as well so one wrong move and you will lose all of your memories or potentially even die in the machine.

Michael is one of those guys who usually takes things in stride. He’s fairly confident in himself and is skilled but as a character I wouldn’t say that he’s great. He’s cool with having one night stands since he figures that he will forget all about them afterwards anyway and that doesn’t make for a particularly solid romance. So once he does fall for someone you have a hard time buying into it. The romance doesn’t seem all that convincing and in large part it’s because the main character doesn’t exactly seem like a great guy.

You still feel bad for him of course since being framed is rough but that’s about it. As the main heroine Rachel isn’t bad. Taking aside the romance plot of it all, she does contribute a lot to the plot and can also be rather tough which I always like to see in the heroine. Michael also has a friend in Shorty who is very helpful here. The guy has a bit of an “I told you so” attitude but it is completely justified he whole time. Like this was a bad idea from the jump and it was pretty clear to see.

Now where the film taps into some interesting themes is with how Michael keeps having items on hand that are useful in very specific circumstances at specific moments. It’s basically as if he is following a destiny that is pre written by his past self who saw into the future. I always like theory crafting with time and looking at all of the different ways it could work. Basically, if you can see into the future then does that imply that your future is written in stone, you are just seeing one possible version?, or was that the future but the instant you saw it, it has now changed since you can effect things?

Personally I always go with the one possible version theory because to me it makes the most sense by far. You should be able to change the future once you have seen it and everything being pre written is just hard to buy for me. That said, this one is mainly going in that direction as Michael saw the future and planned things out extremely carefully in a self fulfilling cycle where he saw what was going to happen and made sure that it did. So what happens when two people see the future? Well that’s another interesting one.

The climax is pretty fun as it deals with all of that. On the whole I wouldn’t say the film is super action packed or anything like that but there are a whole lot of chase scenes. We also get the government involved which is always fun. Of course they do tend to get in the way a lot at first as they take everything at face value and fall for the villain’s traps. The fact that they went straight to torturing the lead and nearly frying his brain was a really bad look for them. Come on now can’t they at least pretend to not act like the villains for a little while?

Overall, Paycheck is a pretty fun. On its surface it’s just a classic action thriller but the time manipulation and sci-fi elements help to make it stand out. It has some interesting themes there and while that’s never the focus, it is still a fun little thing to touch on even if it’s just temporary. I’d recommend checking this film out, it’s a solid cautionary tale about how technology can get really dangerous really quickly if you rely on it too much. At the end of the day I personally recommend not letting anyone mess with your memories, but hey that’s just me. Also important to note that even if you don’t remember something, it still happened. So Michael’s idea here about doing stuff since he won’t remember it later on…yeah not a very good idea.

Overall 7/10

The Accountant Review

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This review is of the TV-14 edited version of the film. All thoughts below should be addressed as such as a review of the unedited version would be more negative

I saw this film a little while ago and it’s definitely a solid action film all around. I remember the trailers and promotions for this one really well. The idea of an Accountant being the main character who is also a fighter and it was enough to get some eyebrows raised. Now granted, the film plays out a little differently than I expected since I was basically expecting accountant by day and Punisher by night but the route the movie goes is still solid.

The movie starts by introducing us to Christian who as a kid could not really handle any external stimulus. This would result in a lot of different episodes and panic attacks which gradually caused his mother to run off. His father did his best to train Christian and his brother Braxton even if his methods could be rather intense and tow the line of going too far. Well, it ended up working for Christian who is now an expert accountant who has been able to lead an ordinary life. He continues to train himself for stimulus every night using a custom setup at his house. His latest case is to find out if some money has been stolen by a huge company and this mystery goes back many years. An intern named Dana discovered this so she wants to help him out but he’s a solo act.

Is this guy hiding something though? Ray, the leader of the Treasury (Makes it sound like a big gang organization right?) hires a lady named Marybeth to find out the secret behind this accountant. He blackmails her so that if she refuses he will send her off to jail. That’s a pretty strong motivation so she’s all in but Christian appears to just be an alias that he uses and the guy has been the accountant for many powerful gangs and influential people across the globe. He always vanishes once the job is done and contacting him is next to impossible. Will she be able to pull this off?

Now the film is mainly focused on the two different plots, Christian’s and Marybeth’s. The latter is mostly a red herring in my opinion as you keep waiting for the two paths to connect. Of course they do to an extent but not as much as you would think. I feel like this was all leading up to a big sequel where you will have the payoff but even if we don’t get a sequel, I think this works pretty well. It’s a fun subversion as she continues to be one step behind him throughout the film as opposed to finally getting one over on him. Why is this a good thing? Well, it’d be a little cheesy if someone who just joined the force could track down the man that nobody has ever encountered yet. It would just be a little too fast, but give her a few years and that can of course change.

She’s a solid character through and through though. She also makes the right call in the end which I was glad about because for a bit there I was getting nervous. The “call” involves choosing to accept the help of a vigilante or not and yes while that can sound tricky, I think it’s clear that you have to say yes. You’re putting villains behind bars, it doesn’t matter where the intel is coming from. Meanwhile Ray was also a pretty solid character. He should probably tread lightly because he doesn’t want the Accountant for an enemy but I liked his drive. Replaying his backstory over and over was a bit much but I thought he pulled his weight really well in keeping the subplot interesting.

For the main plot, that’s where the meat and potatoes is. Christian makes for a really fun main character. He’s definitely been through a lot so it was nice to see him be in total control in the present. He has his system and knows how to protect himself. He’s also an expert fighter which is nice and balances out his serious side and comedic moments well. It also comes down to the fact that he’s just a nice guy in general. The film throws a whole lot of plot twists at you by the end and the best one involves the identity of the lady who works with him over the phone.

I thought that was a really nice touch and shows how he really helped improve a lot of other lives around him. It’s a twist that I absolutely did not see coming but works perfectly well when you see it there. That’s why it is such a good twist. Not every twist in the film lands though. One involves the identity of the main villain. So here’s the thing, it’s an unexpected twist which is cool but I think it was handled a bit too abruptly. No matter who the identity is, we know that this villain has been murdering a lot of people already. It’s hard to just let bygones be bygones.

While you could say that the villain is a vigilante like the Accountant to an extent, he’s certainly much more willing to cross the line at the drop of a hat. He’s an assassin for hire after all and while the victims we saw were other villains, he does murder them in rather intense ways and based on his reputation you are led to believe that he has quite the body count. All of this is just to say that you’re not really inclined to root for him in the present no matter what happened in the past. I actually liked him a whole lot in his past scenes but for the present it’s going to take some time.

Meanwhile Dana is a decent character although I don’t think she brought much to the movie beyond trying to squeeze some Hollywood romance in there. Christian works well as a solo act all the way through and they didn’t have a whole lot of banter or enough of a dynamic to make the extra character worth it. If she returns in the sequel you could probably do something with her but it did feel like this was probably it for her character. Her arc is concluded after all so the sequel would likely introduce some new characters.

The film doesn’t actually have a lot of action but the fights that we do get are pretty solid. Again that’s where the film tricked me a little because I was expecting a ton of fight scenes but really we just had the climax and a brief fight in the past. The choreography was on point though and the story is engaging enough where you’re invested all the way through anyway. The film can be sad, funny, serious, etc. It has a whole lot of range here and makes for a very complete film.

What seals the deal on this one being solid is the ending. A film like this could have absolutely destroyed itself with the wrong ending but it leaves a lot of room for a sequel and is satisfying for all of the characters. A whole lot of world building was accomplished here as well which is impressive for a stand alone title. It probably needs to sell me a little more on how Christian managed to stay alive for so long in such a brutal business but you could partially chalk that up to luck or him never really being in a position where someone wants him silenced. We do see some of the specifics on how he stays safe like a moving base and all buttttt I’m just a little skeptical.

Overall, The Accountant is a pretty good movie. The soundtrack may be a little forgettable but the writing is good and I liked the premise a whole lot. It really does throw a unique element into the mix (Being an accountant) and really rides that all the way through to the end. That will also prevent this film from just being forgotten because no matter how many other thrillers come out, it’s unlikely that they would end up copying that part of the plot. Even if they did, it would squarely be known as the copycat which just makes this one get brought up yet again. I’d recommend checking this film out for sure.

Overall 7/10

Black Clover M: Rise of the Wizard King Review

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Okay it’s time to jump into the latest mobile adventure! This game got a ton of hype when it was announced. I feel like we had to wait months and months over in America for it, but this was definitely worth the wait. It’s a very ambitious title and one that should last you for a very long time. In a way the fact that it is so ambitious is why I didn’t last very long though. It’s the kind of game you would want to sit down and play for hours but you will have to dedicate a whole lot of time to it and I wasn’t prepared to do that just yet. I played all of the available levels but I won’t be sticking around for the next few years of updates.

The game covers a good chunk of the Black Clover manga and it’ll be interesting to see when it passes the anime. I suspect it will be a very long time since the game is very detailed so far so it covers the content rather slowly. Usually this only gets more and more noticeable as the game goes on to buy even more time. Even titles like Pokemon Go do this by holding onto the Pokemon and only releasing a few at a time. So yeah don’t expect this to go all the way to the end any time soon but the more content the better right? Black Clover fans can rest easy knowing that everything will be adapted here.

The gameplay is your classic turn based combat title. You have several attacks to choose form and you can use synergy to attack with combo moves. The gameplay is fairly simple and it’s also customizable so you can turn attack animations off to save time or have the computer play automatically for you. Of course the drawback there is that the AI is intentionally not very good so they will often make a whole lot of mistakes. It’s the price to be paid for convenience I suppose. You will get the hang of the game very quickly although mastering it is another story entirely.

See this is where the game gets a little too fancy. There are so many things to customize that it’s hard to know where to start. Characters have their gear to equip, attacks to level up, attacks to equip and leave on the bench, character ranks you have to use in order to get further level ups, bond ratings you have to improve, food, stats for the pyramid, etc. It just keeps on going and the UI gets very cramped very quickly. I think this could have absolutely been presented in a much clearer way to avoid all of the clicking. You’ll be clicking around through the menus constantly and it gets really distracting after a while. Particularly when you keep on getting collectibles and EXP at a high rate so you have to enter again and again and again.

There needs to be some shortcuts and such to make this faster. Fire Emblem Heroes for example still has the cleanest menus for a busy game like this. I was never confused or clicking on the wrong icon. Dragon Ball Legendz was another good one. I think Clover’s devs need to take some time to make the menus more polished. It’s great that they want to have so much content and for the people who take the game very seriously there will be a whole lot of depth to the gameplay. It’s just overwhelming for the casual gamer. I wouldn’t even call myself casual and it was a whole lot to take in.

I can already see how the game is poised to make a ton off of micro transactions with so many ways to make your characters stronger. If you want to style on your friends and beat people up then just pay some money and you can immediately get stronger. It’s that kind of game but that’s really all gatcha titles to an extent. So you can absolutely still play this as a freemium player and have access to all of the tools and items. It will just take you a little longer of course.

The graphics here are definitely impressive from start to finish. The game’s animations are very faithful to the anime and make good use of the CG character models. You won’t find much better looking graphics on the mobile and especially with the sheer number of cutscenes that are here. It almost feels like a full remake of the anime just with CG. The soundtrack is also very good. There are a good amount of tracks in the game although it would have been awesome if they could have grabbed the anime’s openings and ost in general. The cutscenes here don’t hit quite as hard without those.

It also goes without saying that as a mobile game there is a near infinite amount of replay value here. You could play this for years and likely not get to the end of the gameplay. That’s just how much content there is here and it’s an area where mobile does tend to dominate the competition. Gatcha games can only succeed for as long as they can churn out more and more content with the developers are quite aware of.

Overall, I do think this is a great game. It’s clear that a ton of time and resources was put into it. It could seamlessly make the jump over to consoles to be honest as there are so many cutscenes and such a big cast of characters. In a way that’s why it’s hard to do as a mobile title though because those games I am typically just playing a bit here and there with the exception of Pokemon Go which was made to be an outdoors experience. So I absolutely recommend this game but definitely treat it like a full console experience and you’ll be all set.

Overall 8/10

A Force of One Review

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A Force of One is a pretty good film that really follows all of the right steps. You’ve got some good martial art scenes (Even if it does overuse the slow mo a bit so they don’t keep up with the recent action films I’ve seen like Kickboxer) and the film even avoids throwing in the obligatory romance. All in all it’s a well balanced movie and while it may not end up becoming one of your all time favorites or anything like that, it’s consistently solid all the way through.

The movie starts with a pair of cops trying to crack down on some drug smuggling going on and so they tale one of the guys into a store. Unfortunately they are taken down by a mysterious kung fu fighter before they can even get any shots off. It’s a huge deal because both were murdered and so now the cops really have to try and stop this right away. They even go as far as to try and learn martial arts by asking the champion, Matt for help. Matt is reluctant but ultimately gets involved. He may even suspect who is behind this but will even he be a match for such a deadly fighter?

You can understand why Matt doesn’t really want to get involved here. He is a fighter to be sure but this is really police business and it’s a huge responsibility to jump in like that. He’s got a lot on his plate but this does end up getting personal later on in the film which really ends up forcing his hand. Once Matt is serious he definitely shows why he is one of the top fighters out there. I thought he would do a little better outside of the restaurant in his first main fight with the villain but I suppose he was taken by surprise so you have to consider that.

Once we get to the big fight Matt is dialed in and it’s clear that he is more powerful than his opponent. He really did end up being the strongest and it was nice to see him just be able to win straight up without needing a pep talk or anything like that. Those moments can work sometimes but other times you just want to be able to follow a lead who can just defeat the opponents with no real help.

His son Charlie gets a fairly big role here as well. He wants to be a really great fighter but does tend to get distracted a lot. He’s very young and still has a long way to go but he’s got a lot of heart and means well. He definitely could have handled the final situation a bit better but he still kept on trying all the way to the end so you have to give him some credit there.

Mandy is the main heroine here and she is really invested in stopping the cop killings. Her main task was getting Matt on board and she does a good job there. From there on out she does her best to keep things professional while trying to get more info but the film mainly sabotages any chance for them to get too close which is good. With a serial killer on the loose there really isn’t any time for side adventures right? At least that’s the way that I see it here so this really made a lot of sense. Later on when Mandy tells Matt to stay out of it and focus on the match is the only time I didn’t really agree with her. That just wasn’t possible by that stage.

Then you have the main villain and since the film is part mystery I won’t say who that is. He works well as the final boss since he is powerful and can hold his own for a bit. There just isn’t much time to really develop him as a character though. He barely gets any screen time which will also make it a bit hard to guess that he is the villain so props if you figured it out early on. The film probably could have done more with him but I get their wanting to not spoil the twist early by mistake.

As mentioned the fight scenes are good so you’ll be entertained there. The film is actually pretty good about never making the battles too violent or over the top either. It’s pretty clean martial arts action most of the way through and you can really enjoy the battles. The writing is also good which will keep you engaged and the characters are solid so it’s really a win all the way around.

The weakest aspect of the film is probably the cops trying to piece together what’s going on. Some of their deductions just take too long like not realizing until the end of the film how odd it is that one of the officers had clay in his fingers. That should have stuck out immediately and while it wouldn’t have broken the case wide open, it would have led them on the right track. It felt like that was held back for dramatic effect over the actual logic in universe. So the movie was definitely much stronger when it was just focusing on the battles. I did enjoy the light hearted banter and slice of life moments in the middle though. We had several fun dynamics which you could picture them building a show around. Matt helping out the cops on different cases and such. Yeah I think that would have had potential.

Overall, A Force of One is a pretty good movie. The title is certainly appropriate as well considering how Matt really dominates the characters when it’s a straight fight. I think the worst thing you can say about the film is perhaps that it’s not going to be super memorable by the end. Sure it has the mystery angle going for it but for the most part the film isn’t actually trying to have you solve it. You’re just waiting for the villain to make their move and then the fights can resume. The movie is very by the numbers for the most part but this is another example of why execution is so important. It can all be a little generic as long as it’s still a lot of fun and this movie succeeds in that area.

Overall 7/10

Suspect Review

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This review is of the TV-14 edited version of the movie. All thoughts below should be addressed as such as a review of the unedited version would be more negative

It’s time for a big mystery about who the true culprit is. Prepare for a lot of red herrings and a ton of people all trying to make this as crazy as possible. I always like a good court case so that made this film pretty fun and we also have some jury tampering going on which spiced things up. There is a completely unnecessary romance plot trying to get in the way though.

The movie starts off with a guy shooting himself and a lady gets murdered by the river. A suspect named Carl is picked up. He’s homeless and can’t hear or speak which makes it difficult for him to explain what’s going on. Kathleen is assigned to defend Carl which she is not thrilled about but she doesn’t really have a say in the matter. Carl isn’t being very helpful either and has an attitude issue where he keeps on attacking people. She needs to try and get past that to find out the truth but all signs point to Carl being the villain. He was seen going through the victim’s belongings and was conveniently around at the time of the murder. Fortunately Kathleen does have help from one guy, a juror named Eddie who is a lobbyist and used to getting things done. Will he be able to solve the case or will her sense of ethics get in the way?

A big focus in the movie is that of course this is completely not allowed. Jurors can’t try to investigate a case that they are in and vigilante justice is frowned upon. Jurors cannot interact with the defense or prosecutor at all or it would be a mis trial. Eddie doesn’t care about all of that though because he wants to see to it that justice is done and after some convincing, Kathleen gets on board with this as well. Now the question is, do you as the viewer go along with it?

Well for me it’s a definite yes. There’s a lot of things I don’t agree with in the justice system. The fact that I could hold the literal smoking gun of the murderer in my hand and it wouldn’t count if it wasn’t turned in as evidence in time or came out after the trial is a shame. The fact that you can have the crime on tape, but it would be inadmissible in court depending on how I got it is crazy too. So of course you need rules around the jurors so that they wouldn’t all be vigilantes but if they are able to find something out then I say that’s fair game.

So the fact that we actually have a film where a character is able to jump into the court process and get stuff done is great. This is exactly what I’ve been hoping for the whole time here and that part’s really solid. Now the characters aren’t always smart about this like heading into the main research library together to look at old files since that’s where the judge or other jurors would be if they needed intel but for the most part they’re discreet about things. If anything it’s probably easy to conspire together in most circumstances because people ultimately aren’t paying that much attention to the jurors.

Kathleen is a decent main character even if at first you can be annoyed waiting for her to accept Eddie’s help. As he says, “I thought the whole point was to find the truth right?” It’s a really good argument as well because if your client is going to get life in jail or something then you really have to do your best to win. Once she’s on board then they make for a good team. Ultimately Kathleen knows her stuff and is fairly quick to adapt when the situation isn’t going well.

Eddie is really the standout character here though. Initially he didn’t even want to be a juror but once he was the guy got interested in the case and did some digging right away. Deep down he still believes in justice and maybe working in such a corrupt field helped him out with that. So that was good to see but of course the romance does hold him back somewhat. Eddie is the kind of guy who does whatever it takes to get his objective including affairs and while this romance is supposed to be real, it just feels like it’s out of left field.

There is no reason for the characters to like each other except if they just need a desperate fling or something. Additionally there just isn’t time for this because they’re busy trying to solve a huge case right? The romance doesn’t enhance the film and should have certainly been cut out. Meanwhile the film didn’t do a great job with Carl if you ask me. Regardless of if he’s innocent or not, the guy was caught red handed stealing, he actually attacked several police officers including stabbing one of them, tried to murder Kathleen when he first saw her, etc. It gets to the point where it doesn’t matter if he’s innocent because he just committed a bunch of other crimes.

Imagine if the film ended with him being innocent of the murder charge but then still going to jail for all of the other stuff? Because that’s basically what happened. Yes, Carl’s been through a lot but it doesn’t ultimately excuse him from all the bad stuff that he’s actually done. If we were to give him a pass for all of that then it would actually undermine the legal system far more than all the juror stuff going on.

I’d argue it also makes the situation even more unlikely for Kathleen to be quite as helpful as she was. You’d think after nearly getting murdered that would be it. Also the film does need to throw in some danger so we have a psycho running around with a knife too. I would have switched out that plot with more of the political stuff since Eddie’s subplot never gets much of a resolution. The closest we get to that is when his side wins on one of the issues and he is visibly upset rather than being happy about it. I’d say that’s in line with how he’s become a lot more ethical now but it’s still not really closure per say.

Still the mystery should keep you engaged which is the important thing here. There’s a lot going on at all times and of course there are a ton of twists all throughout the movie. You won’t want to miss a beat here and the ending is pretty fun. We even do get a chase scene near the end where someone has to run from someone holding a knife and it’s an interesting scenario to try and put yourself and imagine how you would play things out. Imo one thing you have to do is find a way to make the elevator get stuck so you can’t be followed. Jam a coat and other clothes in the middle to prevent the doors from closing or something.

Overall, Suspect is a pretty good movie but it definitely does have a lot of unnecessary material in it as well. You only need so many red herrings in one movie after all. Cutting out the romance would have been good so we could focus completely on this being a mystery thriller as the heroes get closer to cracking the case. Maybe more screen time into the actual court proceedings as well. I felt like the prosecutor was completely destroying the main heroine purely from an arguments perspective so as the juror I’d be leaning on a guilty verdict but maybe seeing some of the deliberations could have helped with that or more of the counter arguments since we didn’t get to see it all. I also wouldn’t have minded some more scenes on the political end with Eddie really making waves and manipulating everyone. He definitely does seem good at his job and ultimately that works out well for everyone here. If you enjoy a good court drama and don’t mind some vigilante material then this one is all set for you.

Overall 7/10

Bloodsport Review

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This review is of the TV-14 edited version of the film. All thoughts below should be addressed as such as a review of the unedited version would be more negative

It’s time for a big tournament epic! Bloodsport is a film I can’t say I was too familiar with even though it’s a whole series. After watching it I can definitely see the appeal though as I always enjoy a big tournament like this. Now the story beats may be overly predictable to a dramatic degree as the film really telegraphs every moment but even with that it’s executed well.

The film starts off by introducing us to Frank. He used to get into a lot of trouble but eventually he was taken in by a nice man and learned the ways of the martial arts although mostly it was second hand as he wasn’t taught directly. The guy’s real son was the one who was meant to be the champion but unfortunately he ended up dying early. Frank figures it is up to him to achieve the dream of winning the ultimate tournament now and so he gets some training in and then heads over there. This tournament is a huge deal so fighters from around the globe will be participating. It’s all done under the books as this tournament isn’t exactly official. Now why would you enter a tournament where you could die? For some it’s a matter of honor and for others it’s the money. Either way it’s the opportunity of a lifetime!

So yeah it’s very much a Mortal Kombat setup right from the start here. There are a ton of battles and that’s one thing I really liked about this film. A lot of times in these martial art titles there can be a lot of deadtime before you get to the tournament. The training is important too of course but I want to see the matches. This has to be one of the longest tournaments that I’ve seen in a long while and trust me when I say that this is a very good thing. We see all kinds of opponents so you are reminded that this isn’t just a small battle with the main character and a bunch of throwaways.

A small detail I appreciated here is that most of the opponents put up a fight. For example in your average film the main villain will sleepwalk his way to the grand finals. Instead Li actually has a tough go of it at least for a little bit against several of these opponent. His victory is never in doubt but I’m glad that they at least landed shots. It feels a little unrealistically when the villain just steamrolls everyone no matter how good he is. These are all professional fighters after all.

Each fighter also has a different fighting style. You really get to see a lot of variety here and all of the fights are really intense. We’re talking kickboxers, sumo style, aggressive hands, jumping around, etc. It works really well as a solid blend to keep each match really interesting. You also get to recognize the characters as they go through the rounds. So yes this tournament was handled excellently with the bracket and actually making every fight feel real.

The pacing is on point as well and Frank makes for a good main character. He is confident in his abilities and really does well in battle. I also appreciate how confident he is, Frank knows that he is a good fighter after all. My only complaint is when he didn’t step in as a guy was harassing a girl on the bus. Feels like most main characters would have stepped in there. It was also a bit of a bizarre intro to Ray’s character as he’s meant to be the likable sidekick after the opening scene.

He brags a ton and the more he brags the more you know his ending is going to be painful. Even so you’re meant to like the guy so the opening scene just doesn’t work. I’ll also say I think the film overdid it with all the bragging in the final round. Cmon I don’t care how overconfident the guy is, he knows exactly who he is fighting. You don’t just turn your back like that for so long. The scene is so exaggerated that it would be funny except you knew that a lot of pain was coming up.

This film definitely does go all in on the finishing blows which is another thing that will feel like Mortal Kombat. The fights with Li always end with a final blow where it feels like a 50/50 on if you’ll die or not. He holds nothing back and the tournament isn’t going to eject him for it so he keeps escalating. He has murdered someone more than once after all. The tournament’s moment of silence definitely didn’t make sense with how callous they were the whole time. It’s also a completely empty gesture considering they aren’t going to disqualify him either way.

Li’s definitely a bad guy through and through however he makes for a great final boss. You do want a powerful opponent like that at the end and the final fight has a lot of good back and forth. Li does have to cheat so it does show right away who’s better but the final fight is really on point the whole time. It’s also a little less exaggerated of a comeback than Kickboxer so you can buy into the eyes closed fighting a bit more. Ultimately it makes for a fun climax.

Now I did still have some issues with the film. First off is the romance subplot with the reporter Janice. She can be pretty annoying the whole time. So at first she wants to get into the tournament and is doing whatever she can to make this plan work. Then once Janice gets in she starts to think that the violence is too much and gets angry at Frank. I never like this kind of plot because everybody told her to stay away but she insisted that she could handle it…and then she couldn’t. Cmon…that’s just bad.

Additionally the romance is really abrupt and comes out of nowhere. Given that it’s not even going to continue, it just feels like a waste where we could have had more fights instead. Frank also needed to give the tournament his full concentration so the fact that he was almost late to a match because of that was rough. The other time was because of the army so I can cut him a little slack there.

Also the government plot could have been cut out. I suppose it helps to explain why Frank is so powerful and well conditioned but you could have easily established that with his origin. The plot just doesn’t add anything to the film except for a slight obstacle that isn’t taken very seriously anyway. The fact that they were ready to knock him out is crazy. It gives us some decent humor scenes but eh the film would have been okay either way.

Overall, Bloodsport is a pretty solid film. It has a nice sense of humor and a pretty good cast of characters. You should be warned that the film can definitely be quite violent, particularly with the finishing blows. In some cases it’s not even the blow itself that is so intense, but the build up to it because you always know what’s about to happen. Still the fight choreography is really on point and for the most part the film is careful not to overdo it the way that Kickboxer did. Yeah this is one I could safely recommend.

Overall 6/10

Tista Review

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Tista is a manga that’s not super well known but due to the success of Spy X Family you should be seeing it around a little more often now. It’s very short at only 2 volumes and you get the feeling that it ended up getting axed be cause there’s a lot of directions it could have gone. It’s definitely an intense story and one with a whole lot of tragedy mixed in. I’d say it works well although I could have used a bit of a stronger ending.

The manga starts by introducing us to Tista who is a legendary assassin. She is so skilled at sniping that none of her targets have ever even seen her. She can hit someone from multiple buildings away and basically pulls off impossible shots like it’s nothing. The reason for this is because her eyes are natural trigger lens as if from a gun. She can auto lock onto anything which makes her the perfect sniper. As people keep on dying, is there anyone who can stop her? Additionally the more Tista murders people, the more she wonders about the meaning of life in general.

See Tista works for the Church. While most people know the church to be a loving environment that takes in orphans and makes the world a better place, what they don’t realize is they have been training these kids into child soldiers whose only aim is to destroy all evil in the world. Now their reasoning for it is basically that the legal system is limited and there are often a lot of villains who escape unscathed because blackmail and corruption run rampant in this town. The villains have gotten so much influence around here that they basically operate out in the open. Of course this is an argument that most anti heroes/villains make so it doesn’t tend to hold water.

I will grant that it’s always a very interesting villain rationale though and it does tend to make a lot of high quality villains like Light Yagami. In this case Tista was groomed into this role ever since she was a small child so it’s not like she ever had much of a choice. It’s basically like brainwashing and that’s a main theme of the whole series. If you grew up in an environment where you were taught to murder from a young age and your eyes grew into aiming signs from the jump…did you ever really have a choice? Once you’re an adult maybe you can snap out of it but Tista’s still a teenager here.

That’s where some of the darker elements of the series come into play. The town is also such a rough place that you either murder the villains or watch them murder someone else. The cops are unfortunately not going to be very helpful here. We do see some good ones but as always there isn’t much point if the higher ups are involved in shady dealings as well. To their credit, the series doesn’t really go too hard on that area so we can presume most of the cop are good here and they’re just really ineffective in stopping crime. Additionally the country is a huge place so it’s not like you can stop every criminal. There will always be crime no matter how many people you stop. That’s true even with Tista bumping everyone off.

Tista does meet a guy named Arty who she starts to become friends with and that puts her in a rough spot. It actually creates vulnerabilities in her that the villains can exploit since he’s the first one to get her to doubt her mission. As I mentioned at the start one of her big advantages is that she can fire from super long distances so she’s never in any danger. Later on she likes murdering people at point blank range to see their expressions and naturally that puts her at a much greater risk. If there are any survivors then she will be remembered and of course all it takes is a lucky shot and she could die.

She basically becomes super blood thirsty by the end which was an interesting character development choice. It’s pretty easy to see how she was messed up after we see her origin story though. There’s domestic abuse and a close friend attempts to commit suicide. In both cases the culprit got to walk off free so Tista took care of that. That’s really set her on the path to being an executioner because if she can destroy all of the evil people then she can give the victims some peace.

Her broken psyche is represented by a chibi-monster version of her that appears to offer its own twisted input. It makes for a pretty interesting inner voice since Tista herself doesn’t talk much. At the end of the day naturally Tista takes some blame for this since she’s committing the murders but it’s not like she has much of a choice here. If she stops then she will end up being erased by the orphanage. If she turns herself into the cops she will be dead on the spot. If she just runs off and gets a new identity then every time she turns on the news and sees another crime she will feel responsible if the person has any priors since she would have been tasked with eliminating that person.

So there’s a whole lot of interesting themes here but of course the series is only 2 volumes long so it really ends just as it is still beginning. It’s the kind of series that could have been a bit risky if it kept on going though as with the dark themes I could easily see the series taking a step too far. Certain things are heavily implied here but the series mainly avoids being exploitative. Bad things happen and we know about them but the series doesn’t go out of its way to show them or drag them out which I appreciate.

In the end Tista is a very depressing series where characters are put into bad situations. The school side of things with Arty is fairly light hearted and in a way it shows just how alone Tista is. Most people live a fairly carefree life unaware of how twisted the rest of the city is. In a lot of ways Tista helps to preserve the peace so she can take a little solace there. It’s just that after you’ve murdered enough people it makes sense that you’re not really going to see the sunlight anymore.

As the main guy, Arty is a pretty solid character. He can be a little off like with the way that he drew a picture of Tista but for the most part he’s just your average guy trying to live life. He gets a lot of points for never selling Tista out or getting her into trouble. She saved his life after all and it’s always really annoying when the characters falters anyway. Owing your life to someone is a huge deal after all so there’s no room for mistakes like that. It would have been nice if he could have learned how to fight or something though. I think if this series had become a long running one he would have gotten something to do later on but as it is his role is a lot smaller than you’d expect.

On the cops side we have Snow who is one of the higher up agents looking into the Tista case. She is good at role playing and getting the suspects to lower their guards but ultimately she isn’t able to find a lot out. Arty gets a lot of credit there and of course the orphanage for having a lot of connections. They know how to shut down a story right away and with their brainwashing it is really hard to touch them. It’s another interesting dynamic of basically working for the villains. Usually you see villain orgs burying evidence and using legal loopholes to get away from the heroes and for once this is what’s protecting Tista.

Proko is one of the big members of the Church and he’s a rather twisted individual. We see how quickly he’s able to entertain the thought of just destroying Tista when she starts to doubt the mission. He really believes in destroying evil at any cost but that also means becoming evil himself. While you could say that the series tries to keep the Church in the grey for the most part, this guy teeters over the line into being flat out evil. The instant you are discussing murdering a child when there is no reason to do so, there isn’t any way to defend you.

It’s already murky enough training child soldiers but murdering them is another step entirely. I’m sure this guy has quite the dark origin story that led to him being so radical but many people have sob stories. It doesn’t give you the excuse to go over the edge and start doing things like this. Down the road I’m guessing Tista would have had to end up fighting the church and assisting the cops. As well intentioned as the group may be, we’ve seen this story many times where the vigilantes end up becoming full fledged heroes. The justifications just naturally continue to escalate which is why in general heroes try not to take a life. It gets a little too easy to keep on taking them afterwards which is why you have to stop that right at the jump.

The artwork for the series is really good. In some ways I’d say it even looks better than Spy X Family but maybe that’s just because this one has a lot of action. We get a lot of impressive double spreads and the background details are really on point. The visuals really pop out at you and go a long way in backing up the story. It’s all got a lot of weight behind it and it shows what Spy X Family could look like if the author ever really embraces the action element more.

Tista not being afraid to tackle some religious themes here also adds some extra depth to the series. After all, the Church is supposed to offer up a chance for redemption and the idea that you always have another chance. So doesn’t murdering these guys go against that? Well, Proko’s feeling here is basically that these guys have no shot of redemption on their own and so you’re removing them from the planet to spare others who actually could be redeemed. It’s also mentioned that this is a mercy in a way although I don’t think any of them actually believe this. The Church isn’t fully united in this mission either as some have second thoughts about this which would probably be a subplot the longer that the series went on. I fully expect a twist that the Church murdered Tista’s father as well since it’s implied so hard that it may as well be confirmed.

I can totally get it if some people are turned off from the series on the premise of the Church potentially being evil here but I just think it’s such an interesting view on the usual anti-hero argument. How bad is it to murder someone who is obviously evil? What’s the difference between doing so in normal peace times vs during a war? The latter is generally accepted by all while the former is frowned upon. Typically there are three reasons for this: 1. Reasonable doubt that the person is actually guilty which is why you need the judicial system and due process of law. 2. The punishment doesn’t fit the crime. For example murdering a murderer may be fine but murdering someone for jaywalking would obviously not be okay. 3. Inspiring other vigilantes who may not have as strong of a moral compass or will murder innocent people by mistake.

All are very logical reasons and why you couldn’t do this widespread. Now if we take this specific example into play, in Tista so far the Church only punished people with such crimes that are worthy of death and of people who we know 100% did commit the crimes. That does solve the first two issues and nobody can really copy their approach because of the special eyes that the Church developed. (We don’t actually know exactly how that works which is something a longer series would delve into. Tista seemed to steal the eyes power right before her friend could unlock them in order to spare her the pain but the whole process is wrapped in mystery) The only weakness is of course if the Church gives Tista a false target she would never know which opens up a can of worms.

So are they doing more harm than good or vice versa? In this case the city is shown to be so evil and corrupt it’s hard to make an argument against them. They’ve destroyed so many murderers and gang members who would have gone free to terrorize people. I think this could be a good editorial for the future about anti-heroes but again that’s why this series is so interesting. Long story short, I don’t disagree with the Church’s actions. I don’t trust them but so far from what we’ve seen they are only making the world a better place and until they actually cross the line of murdering any innocents, whether they be one of the kids or a reporter who is getting close to the truth, I’d be rooting for them.

Overall, Tista is a solid series. It does a good job of showing the amount of psychological damage any sane person would get after murdering enough people. Even if you believe you are doing it for the greater good, murder is murder and will place a heavy burden on you. Additionally that means you are constantly being exposed to the darkness of the world and too much of that is tough as well. I wish the series could have really had time to explore more of the world and the characters even if it could have been a little tricky but ultimately a lot gets done within the two volumes. As long as you’re prepared for the adventure to get a little dark, this is a solid title to check out. There’s really a lot to ponder and discuss considering how short the series is which is impressive.

Overall 6/10