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Patlabor: The Movie
WHY'D I WATCH IT?
Final Verdict: [Just... Bad]
Patlabor: The Movie
Sci-Fi Mystery / 1989
WHY'D I WATCH IT?
For the Action Movie Countdown.
Supposedly a classic, let's see if it deserves that status.
WHAT'D I THINK? *SPOILERS*
Supposedly a classic, let's see if it deserves that status.
WHAT'D I THINK? *SPOILERS*
It does not.
Fishing, Pizza, Dogs, this was a remarkably boring movie.
It's all about this police investigation into the cause of random Labors', this world's buzzword for mechs, going berserk.
It's mostly a mystery story and it's preeetty dull. The characters are dull, the story is dull, the colors are dull, the animation is dull, it picks up a bit at the end, but that hardly excuses the rest.
Frankly, the story is terrible given that the third act completely shoots itself in the kneecaps with the sudden and inexplicable rapid-fire plotholes that come wheeling right out of ****in' nowhere.
So apparently they figure out, oh-excuse me BASELESSLY SPECULATE CORRECTLY, that the Labors are being set off by a certain sound frequency.
First off, considering that this is supposed to be caused by a secret computer virus by some random dude with a hard-on for the Bible (I like how they talk about Jehovah as "one of the gods of the Bible") clearly intent to cause destruction, WHY make it so inefficient and unreliable that it explicitly depends on the wind currents running through big buildings?
Really? That's our master plan to destroy the city? Occasional gusts of WIND?
How about, I dunno... a TIMER? Nobody can read this code without spreading a virus, which should be MORE THAT ENOUGH PROBABLE CAUSE to recall all of the operating Labors, so what's the fear? Seriously;
It can't possibly be that hard, BUT WAIT! It gets better.
So apparently there's no way to move all of the Labors in time to avoid a typhoon that is predicted to trigger Labors citywide, okay, so turn them off, right? Why move them at all?
Oh, but you can't turn them off, because the frequency will turn them back on. BECAUSE REASONS.
WHAT?? Why in the **** can't you power down the Labor and stop them from going rampant? What, do the super audio sensors STAY ON when the powers off like an Xbox One, so you can say, "Labor On"? Is it like The Clapper?
Turn that ****in' feature OFF! Or even just turn off the sound sensors! You can't MUTE your microphone? Ya ****in' kidding me?
Oh, no you can't do dat, da microdaphone is unturnoffable. Okay, fine, then... REMOVE THE LABOR'S BATTERY THEN!
Oh, no, you can't do that either cause... ppppphhhbhbhbhphppbtttt I DUNNO, they lost the special screwdriver you need to pop it open!?
What in the ****!? Are these designed like Mac computers, you gotta replace the whole damn thing if any one part breaks? Isn't this NEW TECHNOLOGY? You didn't make it in such a way that you could pay a engineer to run around the city for a day and snip a few wires?
NO, no, see, the one true problem here is clearly the big new building they made called "The Ark". See, the Ark is all fulla holes and they're just perfect for creating that frequency we totally just assumed to be the cause of all these Labor malfunctions.
FORTUNATELY, it is destructible. We can destroy it and save the city.
As opposed to the LABORS. Nah, that'd be too hard. No, see, the Ark is perfect to destroy because the storm would do a really poor job of concealing the fact that we're destroying our own property in order to prevent our own ****up from becoming public even though our ****up is VERY MUCH PUBLIC.
Yeah, so we'll just destroy The Ark, that'll do it. And the easiest way to do that is to take advantage of it's emergency fire prevention measures which drop entire sections of the building into the water.
Right, they even say that as they drop blocks that it should reduce the opportunity for wind tunnels to form.
Yeah, okay, that works, sure, but you know what else works? FIRE DOORS.
So they start dropping floors and suddenly they go "OH NO! Moving large parts of the building have increased wind circulation and triggered the resident Labors!"
*FACEPALM*
So at this point the police need to use their own Labors to fight and-wait-why are their Labors immune?
Oh, hang on, they said something about having a different OS which was very poorly conveyed? But then one of them goes berserk anyway. WHY?
Oh, it's a... special "Zero Type" or some ****, okay, why did you take that ******** into this situation if it was vulnerable to the virus?
Nah, see the pilot literally ripped out the OS and the virus just infected the ram.
...
THAT'S NOT HOW ANYTHING WORKS.
Fishing, Pizza, Dogs, this was a remarkably boring movie.
It's all about this police investigation into the cause of random Labors', this world's buzzword for mechs, going berserk.
It's mostly a mystery story and it's preeetty dull. The characters are dull, the story is dull, the colors are dull, the animation is dull, it picks up a bit at the end, but that hardly excuses the rest.
Frankly, the story is terrible given that the third act completely shoots itself in the kneecaps with the sudden and inexplicable rapid-fire plotholes that come wheeling right out of ****in' nowhere.
So apparently they figure out, oh-excuse me BASELESSLY SPECULATE CORRECTLY, that the Labors are being set off by a certain sound frequency.
First off, considering that this is supposed to be caused by a secret computer virus by some random dude with a hard-on for the Bible (I like how they talk about Jehovah as "one of the gods of the Bible") clearly intent to cause destruction, WHY make it so inefficient and unreliable that it explicitly depends on the wind currents running through big buildings?
Really? That's our master plan to destroy the city? Occasional gusts of WIND?
How about, I dunno... a TIMER? Nobody can read this code without spreading a virus, which should be MORE THAT ENOUGH PROBABLE CAUSE to recall all of the operating Labors, so what's the fear? Seriously;
If currentDate >= doomDate then ESPLODE.
It can't possibly be that hard, BUT WAIT! It gets better.
So apparently there's no way to move all of the Labors in time to avoid a typhoon that is predicted to trigger Labors citywide, okay, so turn them off, right? Why move them at all?
Oh, but you can't turn them off, because the frequency will turn them back on. BECAUSE REASONS.
WHAT?? Why in the **** can't you power down the Labor and stop them from going rampant? What, do the super audio sensors STAY ON when the powers off like an Xbox One, so you can say, "Labor On"? Is it like The Clapper?
Turn that ****in' feature OFF! Or even just turn off the sound sensors! You can't MUTE your microphone? Ya ****in' kidding me?
Oh, no you can't do dat, da microdaphone is unturnoffable. Okay, fine, then... REMOVE THE LABOR'S BATTERY THEN!
Oh, no, you can't do that either cause... ppppphhhbhbhbhphppbtttt I DUNNO, they lost the special screwdriver you need to pop it open!?
What in the ****!? Are these designed like Mac computers, you gotta replace the whole damn thing if any one part breaks? Isn't this NEW TECHNOLOGY? You didn't make it in such a way that you could pay a engineer to run around the city for a day and snip a few wires?
NO, no, see, the one true problem here is clearly the big new building they made called "The Ark". See, the Ark is all fulla holes and they're just perfect for creating that frequency we totally just assumed to be the cause of all these Labor malfunctions.
FORTUNATELY, it is destructible. We can destroy it and save the city.
As opposed to the LABORS. Nah, that'd be too hard. No, see, the Ark is perfect to destroy because the storm would do a really poor job of concealing the fact that we're destroying our own property in order to prevent our own ****up from becoming public even though our ****up is VERY MUCH PUBLIC.
Yeah, so we'll just destroy The Ark, that'll do it. And the easiest way to do that is to take advantage of it's emergency fire prevention measures which drop entire sections of the building into the water.
I-I-I'm sorry, whuwuwuwhy the **** do you think you can prevent the damage of spreading flame by destroying ENTIRE FLOORS OF THE BUILDING IN QUESTION???
O-o-o-o-o-once again, we're met with an outrageously extreme solution to what should be a simple problem.
Audio bug? BLOW UP A SKYSCRAPER.
Fire? OCEAN. DONE, BITCH!
O-o-o-o-o-once again, we're met with an outrageously extreme solution to what should be a simple problem.
Audio bug? BLOW UP A SKYSCRAPER.
Fire? OCEAN. DONE, BITCH!
Right, they even say that as they drop blocks that it should reduce the opportunity for wind tunnels to form.
Yeah, okay, that works, sure, but you know what else works? FIRE DOORS.
So they start dropping floors and suddenly they go "OH NO! Moving large parts of the building have increased wind circulation and triggered the resident Labors!"
*FACEPALM*
So at this point the police need to use their own Labors to fight and-wait-why are their Labors immune?
Oh, hang on, they said something about having a different OS which was very poorly conveyed? But then one of them goes berserk anyway. WHY?
Oh, it's a... special "Zero Type" or some ****, okay, why did you take that ******** into this situation if it was vulnerable to the virus?
Nah, see the pilot literally ripped out the OS and the virus just infected the ram.
...
THAT'S NOT HOW ANYTHING WORKS.