Korean Animation

Wonderful Days (C-) and Aachi & Sipakk (B-)

Korea's developed quite a reputation for a high level of craftsmanship with it's animation studios. Mostly owing to its studios doing 90% of the grunt work for American productions like 'The Simpsons', 'Family Guy', and such. These two recent examples show what Korea's capable of when left to its own devices. Well, that and there's some new law in Korea making local theaters show local films at least 100 days out of the year.

Wonderful Days (aka Sky Blue) is beautifully animated, there's no doubt. It's just a Generic Post-Apocalyptic World Where the Bad Guy goes, "Nyah-ha", the Beautiful Heroine is a Cop Dedicated to Enforcing the Law in this World, And she runs into Her Former Lover Who is Now on the Side of the Rebels Dedicated to Overthrowing the Bad Guy. Surprise, surprise, she joins forces with him after some initial skirmishes and they both triumph. Is there a flow-chart from which all these type of movies are supposed to come from that I'm not aware of? It's technically proficient, but I'd give it a pass unless you're the type of cgi-obsessive animation geek-completest that has to see this type of thing.

As for Aachi and Sipakk, well... The setup is that the world's only form of viable energy comes from, er, 'dooky'. More specifically, 'Dooky' from you and me. In order to harvest this source, everybody has a ring put into their ass (keep reading), and every time they 'pinch a loaf', they are rewarded with an addictive Popsicle. Still with me? One side effect is that these Popsicles become a black-market commodity, like cocaine or meth. The two leads team up with a porn actress who's had a whole bunch of 'rings' put into her 'end', making her the goose that lays golden 'eggs', as it were. Complications arise when a cult leader who commands a bunch of addicted pygmies and the powers that be get wind of her 'abilities'.

I tell you what, I love this type of sophomoric humour and over-the-top violence. And the Dave Cooper-inspired design is perfect for this type of story. While it gets a little too reliant on in-jokes at times, it's pretty funny. I suspect it came out of the years of Korean animators toiling on mindless American animation, finally snapping, and crafting this vulgar little gem as a not so subtle 'Cho-Ka'! to their earlier toil.

Here's a clip...