Reaction & Review | Gamera 2: Attack Of Legion

Welcome, one and all, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, ladies and gentlemen, I'm gonna be checking out a kaiju film from 1996. That movie is "Gamera 2: Attack Of Legion".

Now, for those of you that are new here and you're reading this review for the first time, a couple of weeks ago, I reviewed the first Gamera movie from this trilogy. And I really enjoyed the hell out of it. It was my very first exposure to anything related to Gamera. In fact, it was also the first kaiju flick that I had seen that wasn't a Godzilla movie. The only other movie that I could, maybe, count was "Pacific Rim", since that movie was about giant mechs fighting giant monsters. Although, I'm not totally sure if I should be counting that one as a kaiju film or not, personally.

But anyway, regardless of all that, the first Gamera movie from this reboot was great. Now as for what I know about it's sequel, it's honestly not much. I know that it involves Gamera, obviously, and I'm going to assume that it's fighting some creature known as Legion. In fact, looking at the back of the DVD case, one of the still images from this movie shows Gamera fighting either a bug or fish creature. I don't know what it is, but I'm hoping that the movie will provide some more context once I start watching it.

Really, guys, I don't know what to expect from this movie. I'm just hoping for it to be as good, if not better, than the first Gamera movie that came out a year before this one did. I'm certainly hoping that it will be, but there is a slight chance that it could disappoint me. So really, the only way I'm gonna find out if this movie is any good at all, is if I shut up, and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Gamera 2: Attack Of Legion".

15 minutes later

Guys, I am loving the tension and suspense that this scene is building up to. It honestly feels like I'm watching a horror movie right now. I didn't think that I'd say that about a kaiju film, but this movie-oh, and we just got our first look at, what I'm going to assume is suppose to be Legion here. It can also evaporate windows with it's mouth. That's pretty cool. And apparently, it just killed the train engineer in cold blood! Well...I think it's safe to say that this movie is already going in a darker direction, and I am loving it so far.

20 minutes later

So apparently, it wasn't enough for Gamera to just destroy that pod with it's fire breath. But it also had to knock it down from that building, and then use it's fire breath AGAIN, just so it makes sure that it's destroyed. I think it's safe to say that Gamera doesn't fuck around, and it's actually making it one of the smarter kaiju monsters I think I've ever seen. Oh, and those fucking bugs finally come crawling out of the subway tunnel, too. I'm curious to see how Gamera is going to fare against them.

14 minutes later

Wait, so this General thinks that there is almost no credibility to this story about Asagi, the girl from the first movie, being able to communicate with Gamera? Then why doesn't anybody go and find her, and bring her over for questioning to see whether or not it has any merit? We, the viewer, know it's true. But you'd think with this woman, Honami, would've already thought up this idea to go and talk to her, seeing as how she's been doing research about what happened in the first movie. Guys, I'm really not trying to rail on this movie whatsoever, because it's been really fucking good so far, but I am curious as to why no one has thought about that yet.

12 minutes later

Ho-ly shit! That might just possibly be one of the biggest explosions I have ever seen in any movie in a long time. That felt like a fucking nuke, guys. Wow...

9 minutes later

All right, I've been holding this question off for a while now, but I need to ask this. So Asagi, like I mentioned earlier, is the one that's able to communicate with Gamera and all. And she says that Gamera will not let Legion have their way. So, if she still is able to communicate with Gamera, don't you think that she should still be feeling the same kind of physical pain that Gamera has been receiving from his fight against Legion? I'm gonna talk more about this when I eventually review it, but I just wanted to let you guys know now that it has been sorta bugging me slightly.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "Gamera 2: Attack Of Legion". Let me go ahead and shut the movie off...OK. So...what exactly to begin with? I guess I should start by asking this question. Is this movie good? Oh, hell yes! This movie was fucking amazing. In fact, I'll go even so far as to say that this movie might actually be better than "Gamera: Guardian Of The Universe". Now, when I eventually rewatch these movies again, I may have to reconsider that thought. But I'll worry about that another time.

Right now, I'm gonna start this review off by talking about the writing. And I want to start with the movie's tone. So, back when I reviewed "Gamera: Guardian Of The Universe", I stated that this trilogy of movies was aiming for a more darker route when it comes to it's tone. And after I watched the first movie, I didn't really think that it was that dark in terms of it's tone. OK yes, there were some dark elements to it, but it wasn't anything ultra serious. Because it was still playing up the nature of it's goofiness as a kaiju movie. So, the tone of the first movie was more balanced because it didn't try to sway too much in either one direction. But in the case of "Gamera 2: Attack Of Legion", it definitely goes in a much more darker path. Our story here pushes itself on being taken more seriously, what with the bugs and the invasion of Legion. Now while it still does have some of it's light-hearted moments, it still knows what it wanted to be with it's more serious story. And in essence, it totally works here. I stated earlier that I felt like I was watching a horror movie, what with the scene involving the train earlier. Well, as the movie went on, it felt like more of a sci-fi horror movie. Something on the lines of, say, "Starship Troopers 2", except in this case, this movie was written a hell of a lot better, while as "Starship Troopers 2" ended up being complete shit in the process. However, that could also be me in just comparing apples to oranges, so perhaps, maybe, it's not the best comparison to make when it comes to a kaiju movie such as this.

So anyway, setting aside the movie's tone, our story here is great, and almost everything here does make some sort of sense, save for one thing that I'll get into in a second. But for the most part, our story here is basically about Gamera trying to overcome this threat known as the Legion, who invade Earth via a comet, and they just start wrecking shit, mostly stuff involving electronic communications. Now there is a reason as to why they do go after those certain objects, however, I am not going to risk spoiling too much about that here, because I really don't want to spoil very much about this movie for you guys. The movie was also able to work in some of it's humor. And while not all of it is funny, mind you, it is still there in helping this movie showing off a bit of it's light-hearted goofiness that this film tries to hold onto. Our characters here are, admittedly, not as fleshed out as what was shown in the first movie. However, I will say that the story here more than makes up for the lack of character development. So, I'm willing to give this movie a pass here with regards to that, because the writing here is good enough to where it doesn't exactly need strongly written characters in order for this story to work.

That being said, I do want to talk about one thing that kinda, sorta bugged me a bit. Mind you, this is a very minor point, but it is something that I still wanted to make mention of. So, in the first movie, I talked about how Asagi was able to communicate with Gamera as a psychic through her magatama. And not only was she able to communicate with it, she was also vulnerable to feeling the same kind pain that Gamera goes through, such as whenever she received cuts in the same style that Gamera went through in the first film against Gyaos. Now while she's still able to communicate with it in this movie, she doesn't exactly feel any kind of real physical pain, aside from one part towards the end of the movie. The closest to this is when during Gamera is fighting Legion near a rescue copter that was transporting a bunch of civilians to safety. And during this fight, Gamera was getting the shit kicked out of it, especially when Legion was able to stab it's body where Gamera was just gushing blood! But when any shots are focused on Asagi during these bits, there appears to be no kind of stab wound on her body whatsoever. The closest we get to see her in any kind of pain from this scene is when she starts to feel fatigue after the fight between Gamera and Legion has concluded. And you'd think, since Asagi is able to communicate with Gamera, that we'd see something resembling a stab wound on her body. But for some reason, that's not the case. And it's those small details that can be kind of an issue, especially if you think about it for too long.

But apart from that, the rest of the writing here is really strong. And that's saying a lot, because the first movie was also really fucking good. And yet, this movie was still able to retain most of it's quality that was carried over from one movie to the next. And it makes me curious to see how the third movie is going to play itself out? I don't know how they're gonna do it, but I'm genuinely excited to watch the third movie. However, I'm getting ahead of myself here. Point is, the writing in this movie is great, and I'm really impressed by how well it turned out. Now that being said, let's get into the acting. Once more, I opted to watch the English dub. And much like the first movie, the dub here is pretty good, though it isn't great. I wouldn't necessarily say it's better than the first movie, but it's not on completely god-awful levels either. Unless, of course, if you're not able to stomach English dubs, then this movie does have the option to where you can watch it's original Japanese dub with English subtitles. So, at least this movie on DVD is able to cater to both sides of the coin here. So really, the best way I can summarize the dub here is that it's not great, but it's still decent enough to where it doesn't border on being unwatchable.

Our special effects here are really good. Once more, the suit-work here for the monsters is really good, and the blood effects are definitely taken up a notch here. Not just for the train engineer I mentioned earlier on, but also for Gamera as well. Gamera gushes a LOT of blood in this movie. Which is something I thought I'd never see in a kaiju flick, but this movie definitely has a ton of that here. The miniatures and sets look really good. This movie also has a lot of CG. And unlike the first movie, the CG in this thing looks great. Especially when you consider that the first movie's CG was somewhat questionable, mostly when it came to the missiles. Granted, some of the CG in this movie isn't up to par with today's standards, but then again, you'd also have to be completely foolish to compare the CG from 1996 to the CG we have today. So overall, the special effects in this movie are great, especially by 1996 standards.

Camerawork here is really good. The lighting here is mostly fine. The sound-mix is also mixed really well. The score in this thing is also just as good as the first movie was. I can't say much about the actual soundtrack, since there weren't really any actual lyrical songs in this movie apart from the ending credits that I just shut off, but I can say that the score definitely makes this movie sound wholesome. So overall, the music in this movie is, for the most part, really good.

Ultimately, guys, when everything is said and done, am I able "Gamera 2: Attack Of Legion"? If you enjoyed the first movie, then you're definitely going to love this second movie. As I stated earlier, I would argue that this movie is just as good, if not better than "Gamera: Guardian Of The Universe". And I can only imagine how good that third movie is going to be. I seriously cannot wait to watch it. However, I do have to wait a couple of weeks, since I am covering something else next week, as I often do when covering franchises for this series. But still, I would wholeheartedly recommend "Gamera 2: Attack Of Legion". It does what most sequels should do, by taking whatever problems that were in the first movie, and fixing them here. Now admittedly, not all of the problems here are fixed perfectly, such as the lack of character depth. However, it's mostly just a minor complaint, since the writing, as I just stated, more than makes up for that lack of character depth. And I seriously hope that the third movie in this trilogy will live up to the standards that the first two movies have already set. It is a big hurdle mind you, but it's not impossible to overcome. In the meantime, I'm gonna go and watch something else. And seeing as how this movie had bugs in it, it kinda made me want to go and watch the first "Starship Troopers" movie again. And who knows, if I'm up for it, I may even pop in the third movie as well and see if it still holds up. So, I'm gonna go and do that next after I'm done putting this review together.

And with that, guys, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all later. Peace.