From: seawasp+@pitt.edu (Ryk E Spoor)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.anime
Subject: Re: Fist of the North Star
Summary: Answer to a Question and repost of an edited review.
Date: 4 Oct 92 13:51:45 GMT
Organization: University of Pittsburgh

In article <1684@tnc.UUCP> m0336@tnc.UUCP (Ralph Jenkins) writes:
>
>I watched the English-dubbed (Screamline :D) version of Fist of the
>North Star/Hokuto no Ken this past week, and afterwards I was a bit
>confused.

	You're not alone. FotNS is very confusing. 

>Was this one completely ad-libbed, or is the dialogue even remotely
>close to the original?

	Was most of the dialogue amazingly silly and macho? Then yes, it
was.

>My main question is...what happened to Yuria/Julia at the end?

	Ahh, yes. That's one of the eternal questions. I have been told
that she had "strange powers" that would allow her to promote growth of
plants in the devastated world that Hokotu no Ken takes place in. Thus
she left that little patch of plants as a sign that Ken would find her
in a place of many growing things... presumably that valley he comes to
at the end.

	For your edification and amusement, I re-present the review I
gave of Hokotu no Ken. My overall conclusion is that it's great for laughs,
but don't take it seriously.

	I'm also adding little comments into the review, to clarify or
remark on what I learned after originally posting the review.

			Subject: Hokuto No Sense




	Well, just got done watching the Hokuto (sp?) no Ken movie last night.


	The first thing that strikes me is... did people REALLY watch 500
episodes of THIS? I tried to not have high expectations, but this is 
ridiculous.

	A couple good points: the animation is good. Nice effects on some of
it. However...

	First, let's look at the hackneyed plot: mankind bombs itself back to
the stone age and goes to savagery. Apparently not only has all vegetation 
vanished from known space (the sight of a living plant at one of the later 
parts of the movie has the same awe effect as the next coming of God),
but this is a world where Men are Men, Women are scarce, and the sheep are
nervous. Radiation has odd effects, such as giving all adult males the 
ability to gain more muscles than Ahnold Schwartzenegger.
----------------------

	According to people I heard from after posting this originally, 
this wasn't supposed to be earth and it wasn't just bombing that did it.
However, the plot seems very similar to other post-apocalyptic movies.

-------------------

	(One nice thing... I now can be sure that the slender delicate look
is not the ONLY thing anime artists can produce. Kenshiro and Co. are 
MACHO MEN from HELL.)

	The beginning, though fairly predictable, shows promise. Ken is set
up by his brother, who convinces Ken's friend Shin to betray Ken (for the
sake of getting Ken's girlfriend). Ken is beaten, kicked, etc., and tossed
into a gorge. Pretty classic stuff here, wronged man beaten up, survives by
a miracle, goes out for revenge. We also get a glimpse of bizarre powers that 
these Real Men can wield (Gamma World for sure, but where are the animals?
You'd think there'd be a few Mutant Rats from Hell...).
--------------------

	These powers, apparently, are tremendously souped up versions of the
legendary powers that martial arts masters were supposed to be able to
wield, not mutant abilities. I'd love to know who taught these skills though;
Yoda?

-------------------

	Then we cut to a little brat driving a souped up car that can 
take pretty serious beatings (Lee Iaccoca should toss the airbags and use
whatever THIS thing has; its shock absorber system preserves car and passengers
after dropping out of the top of a skyscraper). The Mad Maxian gang chasing
the brat catch up with them, start beating up both brat and this little girl
that's with him... and that's when things start getting wierd.

	Ken shows up. At first he looks like a stone golem -- covered with
some kind of stone or clay -- and he causes buildings to collapse and
walks right through the falling steel and stone. (One thing you can say
for Ken is, he sure knows how to make an entrance!)
--------------

	Entrances, in fact, are Ken's best thing. He certainly can't TALK.
I think you could fit all the dialogue he has onto a post-it note. Just
as well. Considering the level of the dialogue, the less said, the better.

--------------
	These Mad Max gangmembers, instead of exhibiting any trace of common 
sense, actually get in the way of the resurrected Ken. (there's no obvious
explanation, then or ever, of how Kenshiro survived and got out of the pit.
Perhaps it's explained in dialogue, but it's sure not obvious from watching!)
Ken bops each attacker once, and their heads explode. Hey, I played AD&D,
he obviously has the quivering palm from HELL attack.

	Okay, I can put up with this... the first appearance of the resurrected
superhero is supposed to be impressive.
-------------

	But I still can't get over how dumb those gangmembers are. I mean,
this THING comes at you, having walked THROUGH a skyscraper, and you
ATTACK IT??? Hell, *AKIRA* wouldn't want to mess with Ken!

-------------
	I dunno who the girl is or the brat. Everyone in this movie seems to
know everyone else, so I have to assume that in prior stories they were shown
to meet.  The girl seems to have vast psychic potential.
--------------

	From a source that wrote me after I first posted this, apparently
the girl's powers and Yuria's special abilities are somewhat parallel to
those of Ken; special meditative, etc., abilities, not really psionics.
This is a Man's universe, of course, so the women don't fight. No matter
how powerful they are.

--------------
	The first real laughs come after this. Ken is lying down, relaxing
after his minor efforts of destroying major downtown districts, when he
senses (presumably from the girl) that the kids are in danger again. He
sits up... and the thing he was lying on explodes and shatters. BUTTOCKS
of the North Star? Jesus, no wonder he almost always walks -- cars probably
explode when he sits in them.
	So Ken goes to rescue the little brat. The girl is in the hands of
the leader, a man about the size of a semi truck, and making even the
steroid-muscled Ken look like a girly-man. His thugs go after Ken, who 
bops and explodes heads without showing any sign of effort -- Ken hits them
with a halfhearted energy that reminds me of brushing away a fly. Whap, head
swells grotesquely, brains fly. Ken gets to the leader, and THEN things get
REALLY funny. Now Ken actually has to make an ATTACK! And when Ken does,
it's with a high pitched whooping that sounds exactly like the Three Stooges.
What, is he Moe or something? I almost DIED laughing! No wonder there's
no defense against the Fist of the North Stooge -- er, STAR. No one can
concentrate on a defense when they're laughing...
-----------------

	By the way, it can be even funnier to watch that scene (starting
with the exploding table) to the song "Gaston" from Disney's "Beauty
and the Beast".

-----------------
	After this, things go down hill. Everything Ken faces dies, usually
by exploding rather messily after a single touch. Most things Ken encounters
slow him about as much as a kindergarten class would slow the T-1000. By
the third "fight", I wondered if there was any point to continuing to watch;
it was obvious Ken had to win, nothing could challenge him. He never even
changes expression.

	Ken gets a nice companion along the way, a man who has a similar
power which slashes its victims apart rather than blowing them up. Two
such manly men are obviously meant to be together. 

	Now we get to see Shin with Yuria, Ken's old girlfriend. She is of
course true to Ken, who she thinks is dead. Despite the fact that she shows 
herself capable of bending iron bars on her own, she's nothing but a 
helpless shrinking violet in this world of Real Men, and  after she learns
that Ken is still alive and tries to escape, she is of course captured by
the Really Bad Guy and used as a hostage.

	No, the Really Bad Guy is not Ken's brother, who fought Ken once
before and was disfigured (he wears a funny little metal structure that
holds his head together!) by the Fist of the North Star. Ken's brother
is confronted by Ken, who isn't touched by anything he can do (including
dumping flaming gasoline all over Ken). Ken hits him again, causes the
pressure to rise so high that his exploding head breaks through the metal
brace, and thousands of gallons of blood spray everywhere. However, these
are REAL MEN, so even with cerebral edema sufficient to put Mentor of 
Arisia in the hospital and blood loss high enough to kill a blue whale
the brother manages to make a dying speech before finishing exploding.

	Given all these superhuman (and now very boring) feats by Ken,
we need to make sure that people understand that the Really Bad Guy is
a Really, REALLY Bad Guy Who Can Dish It Out Too. So we get to see a
scene made expressly for this purpose, with a war between some kind of 
desert barbarians and a better equipped army under the control of
the Really Bad Guy (note: we have to KNOW he's Bad, so instead of riding in
a car or truck like ALL the non-footsoldiers in his army, the Really Bad
Guy gets to ride a Big Black Horse with glowing eyes.)
	The Barbarians are losing, but the Barbarian King turns out to have
a Neato-Wow power of his own, and adds a bit of X-men to this Mad Max
universe: he turns to solid steel and charges out. The King is Really
Really REALLY Big too (as opposed to all the other Real Men, who are just
either Really Big or maybe Really Really Big), so he can do neat things like
squash people by stepping on them or bite them in two. 
	Ever watch Saint Seiya? See people go through walls? Nothing so
piddly here! The Really Bad Guy gets to hit the Barbarian Chief and send
him through an entire MOUNTAIN. Then the steel-covered Barbarian cracks
and expands. Obviously, we now know, the Really Bad Guy must have the
Fist of the North Plot Device as well, so he and Ken might actually
work up a sweat!

	Meanwhile, for no discernable reason, Ken has left his slasher
friend with the two kids, and they have discovered that Ken's girlfriend
is alive. At about the same time, Ken has tracked down Shin, his ex friend,
only to find out when he hits Shin that Shin was already a walking dead man --
the Really Bad Guy beat him up first. There's the classic Long Death speech,
and Shin's chest explodes and sends a huge jet of blood straight up. Like
many other things after the War, the laws of physics have changed too; none
of the blood comes back down. In fact, despite all the blood and guts that
get strewn around, things stay remarkably clean. Even when Ken kills a 
mutant Sumo wrestler from hell (the size of a small hill), the resultant 
explosion doesn't even leave a spot on the ground. Ken doesn't even get
blood stains on his nice shiny leather outfit.

	The brat and the little girl sneak into the Really Bad Guy's
stronghold to see Ken's girlfriend. They also give her the plant that
the little girl has found, despite the fact that if it stays underground
one would assume the plant would die. Of course, doing sensible things
is not the Thing To Do; the plant is just another Plot Device which
must be left with Yuria or whatever her name is so that the Really
Bad Guy can see it, realize her friends are in the area, and bring us
to the Climactic Battle Scene.
------------------

	The plant is also there to illustrate the amazing powers that
the girl and Yuria have to make things grow in this barren world.
	(One source told me that ALL plant life had vanished. This made
me even more impressed by the Real Men; to not need oxygen is an amazing
acheivement)

-----------------
	Of course they put the Plot Device -- er, Girlfriend, up on a
cross. Ken's slasher friend challenges the Really Bad Guy, but we know 
that he has to lose because he's not the main character. Once 
things have gotten to the point that the friend can't be saved, THEN
the little girl sends out another psychic summons to Ken. (Why didn't
they call Ken right away? Oh, right, plot requirements) Ken arrives
in time to see slasher go down. Ken does not pay any attention to the
bimbo on the cross, thereby proving that Male Bonding is far stronger in 
this universe. Ken and Really Bad Guy face off. They glow with auras that
can wreck entire city blocks. Hmm. Gold Saints? No, no Saint would have
a battle cry that sounds like a Stooge. Neither of them pay any attention
when their combat knocks the cross down and the girl almost bites the
big one, proving that the real issue here is Who's Tougher?

	At least here Ken has to work for a living. But after the two
combatants take down dozens of buildings and cut each other to
ribbons, the little psychic girl steps in, gives some kind of sweetness
and light speech, and the Really Bad Guy nods, puts hands on her shoulders,
and walks off. If she could talk that well, why didn't she say something 
BEFORE all this crap happened? After everything this clown did, why does
Ken let him go?

	Well, everything comes out semi-all-right in the end, with the
little plant (which was dropped before the Big Battle) apparently
deciding it was time for a growth spurt and putting out 'leventy-dozen
new shoots in a few minutes so that the kids can find them. The girlfriend,
who was with the kids just minutes ago, is nowhere in sight, and she isn't
with Ken when we see him later (having crossed the desert and come to a
great forest), so we don't know what happened to her; I suspect that she
rushed over, kissed him, and exploded (Lips of the North Star), but
they mercifully didn't show THAT. Only Manly Men can touch and survive in
this world.
-------------------

	As noted before, apparently Yuria went off to be a sort of cosmic
Josie Appleseed and spread flowers everywhere. Not surprised she left Ken,
though. The fact that he ignored her entirely during the Big Showdown
proves that she was just an item on an agenda, and not necessarily
the most important item.

------------------
	All in all, I give this a one-star rating as a serious show,
two stars if I take it as a comedy (out of a ten star system).
-----------------

	My opinion of FotNS has mellowed some. As a serious show, I 
give it about two stars. As a comedy, five, six if you change the soundtrack
in the right places.

-----------------------


                                 Sea Wasp
                                   /^\
                                   ;;;