I have yet to see any of the original "Marvel Anime" direct-to-video miniseries or films that came out around two years ago, but because I was quite keen on seeing how my beloved Marvel characters would look given the anime treatment, I quickly bought Hiroshi Hamazaki's Iron Man: Rise of the Technovore when I saw the DVD on the shelves in a shopping mall. I didn't even know it was a brand new release.
The story of IMROTT basically begins with Tony Stark about to launch a new satellite (named "the Howard" after his late father) into space, a machine which will have access to electronics all over the planet, supposedly for the greater good, when the launch is attacked by a mysterious assailant with several high-tech minions and a highly-advanced personal suit of armor which exceeds even Tony's tech. The attack leaves Tony's friend, Col. James "Rhodey" Rhodes, aka War Machine, fighting for his life, and Tony is out for vengeance, even if it means dodging S.H.I.E.L.D. and teaming up with the Punisher.
Yes, this "anime" version of the world's favorite armored Avenger is every bit as stupid as the plot synopsis sounds. It's complete and utter drivel.
The first truly grating aspect of it was the dialogue, with the villain of the piece spouting unbelievably pretentious pseudo-philosophical gibberish that sounds annoying enough in the countless original anime films from which it was lifted, but sounds downright insufferable here. The English dub is at least marginally better than the dialogue suggested by the subtitles (yes, the subtitles, presumably of the original Japanese dub, are radically different from the dialogue uttered by the characters in English, as stupid as that may sound), but it can't remedy some inherently idiotic conversations among the characters.
The characterization is equally poor; this is hands down the dumbest iteration of Tony Stark I have ever seen in any media. His reasoning for refusing to cooperate with S.H.I.E.L.D. is flimsy, even more so his "team-up" with the mass-murdering Punisher, and worst of all, his "solution" to fighting an enemy who appears to be smarter and better-equipped than he is proves to be downright laughable: he tries to hit him. When that doesn't work, he tries to hit him again. Good God.
Speaking of characters, the visual design of the main villain was similarly grating. While I understand the directive was to give the characters, all of whom are actual comic-book characters, the "anime" look, Punisher (again, who has no real place in this travesty of a story) looks ridiculous, and the whole androgynous look for the bad guy Ezekiel Stane has been done to death in countless other anime. If they had made him into something approaching the bald hipster rebel he was when he appeared in the comics, even an "anime" take could have worked. His appearance, though, coupled with his his voice actor (more on that next) just made his character utterly forgettable, or more appropriate, yet another forgettable aspect of this bad joke of a film.
Finally, the English dub of this film features more of the generic, cookie-cutter voice acting I have come to despise about so many English-dubbed anime films or series. I almost enjoyed Norman Reedus' turn as the Punisher, but at the end of the day, the character really has no reason for being in this film in the first place.
The film's lone redeeming feature is the animation, and, of course, nobody does fighting robots better than the Japanese. War Machine done in anime, in particular, was one heck of a treat. If only for that, this film was not a complete waste of time.
But it sure as hell came close to being one.
1.5/5
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