English Dub Review: Eureka Seven Hi-Evolution 1

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After over half a decade away from the airwaves, Eureka Seven returns to animation in the first of three films that reboot the original story. For those not in the know, Eureka Seven was an anime airing from April 2005 to April 2006 (2006 to 2007 on Adult Swim in the states, which is where I first saw it) that centered on the love story of 14 year olds Renton Thurston and Eureka (pronounced Ehl-reh-kah) as they combated oppressive governments and multi-colored alien coral squids with the aid of their ex-military-friends-turned-hippie-commune named Gekko State, giant robots on surfboards, and their hearts. Being animated by Studio BONES, one of the best in the biz, the show had an intense action to go with its trippy mind effing sequences and heart-wrenching drama as it mixed its themes of rebellion and following one’s heart with a toe-tapping soundtrack. It was a massive critical and commercial hit that BONES has been eager to recreate.

But they just couldn’t leave well enough alone with E7, going on to make a feature film retelling of the show, which was just…what the heck?

And even later, a proper sequel titled Eureka Seven: AO, which was…what the HECK?

Suffice to say these later installments weren’t exactly received nearly as well as the original series, so the best option seemed to be going back to the source, with three new movies to tap into what made the show such a fun and unique ride all those years ago while also being something brand new for those seeing it for the first time. And having just seen the first of those three, I can tell you that this film is a much-welcomed return to form for the aspects and motifs that helped the original series to become such a stand out, in addition to finally answering long-sought questions viewers have been dying to know more of for eleven years AND reuniting us with long-forgotten fan favorites whom they can fall in love with all over again.

For the first thirty minutes. Of a ninety minute movie. After THAT, well…

 

Oh man, oh man, oh man, did this go off the rails.

But first, let’s start with the one major positive of this film: the prequel segment. Not only does finally lend a voice to Adroc (courtesy of the prolific Fred Tatasciore, known mostly for his portrayal of Hulk in the Avengers cartoons), we also get to see him as both a parent to Eureka and a human being who is hurt by loss of life and wants to save as many people as he can. He’s also kind of an ugly crier, which is definitely something Renton inherited from him. It was also interesting to see Holland (Crispen Freeman) and Dewey (Kim Strauss) as a team, if ever so briefly, seeing how they were never really shown to even like each other in the show. And, of course, more of Ray (Melissa Fahn) and Charles (Patrick Seitz) was certainly welcome, even if they never changed all that much as characters.

Though now we must tackle the many faults against it. What started as a pretty damn good 30 minutes of crisp action, character development, and world building took a nosedive the moment we hit the stock footage. I have a few theories as to how we got to this point:

1. The staff wanted a movie budget for an OVA and then filled in the time with re-used clips.
2. They actually did plan out the original footage for the movie but ran out of money after finishing the prequel section.
3. Or this was the plan all along and they’re just that crazy.

Any combination of these or something completely different is just as likely, but nothing would really surprise me after seeing this. I understand wanting to start a film adaptation from square one using existing material, but there had to be a better way to go about it. Even Evangelion, whom E7 often gets compared to (sometimes unfairly), pulled off what was essentially a recap movie with better execution, mainly due to them PUTTING THE EVENTS IN THE RIGHT ORDER.

I’m not even really against the idea of this reboot messing around with the established story. As said, Evangelion at least is doing some interesting things with its Rebuild movies, and manga and western comics do tons of what-if scenarios to test how much character dynamics shift when even one thing is moved out of place. The problem with that, however, is you have to make those changes mean something, otherwise, it’s just gratuitous fanservice that even fans of the source material might not even like. E7 has actually tried something like this with their last movie, “Pocketful of Rainbows”, posing daring questions like:

What if Dominic, love interest of an enemy pilot from the show, raised Renton and Eureka as kids…and was also dead?

What if the main antagonist Dewey was unambiguously a pedophile…and was also dead?

What if hippie family Gecko State were actually kids who were artificially aged because of military experiments and determined to destroy the world because they read a weird version of Peter Pan and…look, “Pocketful of Rainbows” isn’t good, don’t watch it.

But bringing it back to Hi-Evolution, this idea of Renton being raised by Ray and Charles as a kid is certainly a neat idea on paper, but, in practice, doesn’t add or subtract anything about Renton as a person, and even undercuts the significance of these characters and their impact on Renton in the show. Longtime fans know them as a seemingly nice couple who take Renton in nearly halfway through the story with no idea who he is, but still accept him and give him exposure to the kind of traditional family life he never had with his parents gone while reminding the couple of how they were robbed of that life by being exposed to the Summer of Love. Them learning each others’ true identities, and that their paths are on an inevitable crash course, is one of the more tragic elements of the original story, thanks in no small part to us having been acquainted with Renton and the Gecko crew for over 20 episodes by that point. Here, we jump into a new version of that story with some events have already happened and others apparently not, and its made all that more glaring with them using the old clips to try and fail to piece together a new story out of that. What results is nothing short of a confusion-inducing Frankenstein of a movie that is no more for fans of the material than it is for people who are going in blind. Don’t get me wrong, I still like the clips, but I liked them more when they were in a context I COULD UNDERSTAND.

I would be remiss, however, if I didn’t bring up the talent of the voice cast, almost all of whom reprise their roles from the show. Any replacements are in minor roles, so it’s not too distracting (or at least not something I could blame on them). Although, what is notable is Johnny Yong Bosch, who plays Renton again here, is much more noticeably struggling to reach that higher octave now that he’s more than ten years older since initially recording for this character.

To sum all of this up, this movie is an intriguing but very frustrating mess. I had the benefit of rewatching the entire 50 episode series to get ready for this and even I got completely lost, so I can’t imagine how newcomers must be feeling. As said, the first third that covers the new material was impressive and spellbinding but it only serves to highlight the utter mangling of the latter two thirds. It is very much closer to the spirit of the work than the other movie or sequel series, but that alone doesn’t excuse it. If you’re a fan of E7, you might get something out of this, but if not, just watch the old show. The remaining two films of this series have a pretty low bar to work from going forward.