Higashi no Eden Gekijôban II: Paradise Lost (2010) Reviews

• Eden of the East: Paradise Lost

  Tweekums2014-01-18

  This film follows on from the events seen in 'Eden of the East: King of Eden' and to enjoy this you really need to have watched that film and the series which preceded it as no time is wasted in explaining things to the viewer. The film opens with Akira and Saki's return to Japan where not surprisingly his planned assassination does not take place. The two of them are soon separated; Akira sets about finding Juiz; the artificial intelligence that has been facilitating his requests and Saki goes to find somebody who may be Akira's mother in order to establish whether or not he really is the illegitimate son of the late Prime Minister. As the story progresses Akira meets Seleção No 1 who tries to make a deal to end the game; we also finally get to meet the mysterious 'Mr Outsider' and learn how he picked the twelve Seleção. Having enjoyed previous parts of 'Eden of the East' I obviously wanted to watch this to find out how it ended and by and large I was pretty happy with it although I can't help feeling that it would have been better to have a second series rather than two films. By the end the story was nicely wrapped up and the game was over. Those expecting lots of action may be a little disappointed as this didn't feature as much as earlier parts… not that it was ever an action driven story. The animation and designs were up to the high standards set in the previous instalments. Overall I'd say this was a fine conclusion to the story; definitely a must-see if you watched the earlier parts… and keep watching after the end credits as there is a two minute epilogue. These comments are based on watching the series in Japanese with English subtitles.

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• At least it's a bit better than the first one but I don't see the point in these cartoon movies

  pinkarray2017-06-28

  Though, I don't really see the point in making two Higashi no Eden films, this at least provided more development to Akira's history and character. They did expand on his family, but I found the mother to be pretty clichéd, being the cold parent who doesn't want to have anything to do with her son and pretends he's not her son. Though, I didn't find very many characters interesting here, except for maybe Saki and Micchan. The story was a little bit interesting but it's still too complicated and a bit too focused on there "Oh, has there been any terrorist attacks" thing and it idk, didn't make a lot of sense? There was a funny moment involving Panties and Micchan when Panties hangs up on Micchan all of a sudden while she's panicking about what's happening. There is some more action happening and it paces a bit better and faster but it's still bland and the pacing doesn't have much exciting things going on. It does get weird in the third act, and I found the third act a bit interesting, but its ending doesn't make any sense because Saki and company don't see Akira again and he talks about wanting to start another terrorist attack for some reason. But Saki and Akira are love interests, why would they all of a sudden part from each other? In conclusion, this movie has a few unrealistic moments and unless you're a huge fan of Higashi no Eden or convoluted, slow-paced, underdeveloped anime that doesn't have a lot of action or much going on, I don't recommend checking out the first one. The second one is a bit better and could be something you could try, but it's not very worthwhile, not a waste of time, but just not that good. It's not much special.

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