That clip demonstrated many of the things I hate about most anime. Obviously I hate the sweat drops, and the flying kicks that are nothing mor than a still of a chracter with speed lines flying past them, but I realize these is not in all anime. However, this video is just as bad. Sure, the designs aren't as terrible as say, Pokemon or Teen Titans or whatever, but it was just lazy. The chraacter's movements are choppy, the animation has no fluidity. And the lip sync, God. Either the lips aren't moving in a manner that corresponds with the dialogue (there's like, two variations; open and closed), or a huge portion of the dialogue takes place with the character's mouths offscreen. And then there's the overuse of stills, such as that one still down the corridor, the character's are practically off screen, talking, yet they manage to hold it for like, four-five seconds. And a five second pan across his unmoving eyes? At least give me a freaking blink. Some of the fighting's kind of impressive, at least in terms of direction, but for fairly realistically designed characters, they sure move in unhuman ways, and even here the animation is still choppy. Sorry, but I just don't like it. And I'm not saying all anime is bad, but most of what I've seen is, and that doesn't encourage me to search out the so-called "good stuff." I'll still buy this Batman DVD, and I'll give it a chance, but as of this point, I'm not happy with the anime style. Maybe I'll be pleasantly surprised an the animation will rock, maybe not. As long as it's got a strong story and voice acting, I'll be able to live with it.
