Danger 5: Episode 1 - "I Danced for Hitler"

Holy shit.

Danger 5 is a TV show. It’s an Australian-produced TV show (apparently developed by the creators of Italian Spiderman, whatever the hell that is). And that’s really the best I can do. There came a point during Episode 1 (“I Danced for Hitler”) where I started to wonder: what the tits is going on? If you strip Danger 5 to its barest essentials, you have a show about a team of powerful, international secret agents battling against Hitler in the 1960’s. Misadventures and various shenanigans ensue. That’s really giving the story more emphasis than it deserves. I don’t think I’ve adequately covered how unbelievably weird and random Danger 5 is, so I’ll describe the opening sequence as fluidly as I possibly can: a trio of French revolutionary girls watch as Nazi zeppelins steal the Eiffel Tower using one of those retriever claws you find in a Claw Machine. One of the girls kills herself for no apparent reason, and then two Nazis and their talking dog storm the hideout and gun down the remaining two French girls. The dog is their commander, by the way, second only to Hitler himself.

This all happens in the span of a minute. In the following scene, at the Danger 5 HQ, the redheaded British agent, Tucker, plays a chess match against a talking Beckoning Cat (maneki-neko) and loses. Danger 5’s colonel has an eagle for a head. And we still have twenty-three minutes to go.

The narrative in “I Danced for Hitler” involves Danger 5’s efforts to stop the Nazis from taking the Statue of Liberty (and, of course, kill Hitler in the meantime). Today happens to be Hitler’s birthday, and the man who orchestrated the thefts of the Statue of Liberty and the Eiffel Tower (along with dozens of other monuments from across the globe) happens to be none other than Joseph Goebbels, the Minister of Propaganda. Why did he steal all these monuments, you ask? To turn them all into a statue of Hitler, as a nifty birthday present. A big shootout occurs, Hitler manages to escape death by jumping out of a window, and Danger 5 returns home using the Statue of Liberty as a space shuttle. Also, this happens.

If the phrase "A bear playing piano at Hitler's birthday party" doesn't get you at least mildly interested, you are dead inside.

It’s quite a ravaging experience, honestly. It is bizarre, surreal, and absolutely random. In spite of its twenty-four minutes (an episode of Aqua Teen Hunger Force contains the same amount of lunacy and absurdity in half that time), Danger 5’s first episode has a creative energy that never, ever flags. The appeal of this show is ultimately subjective. Although that could be said for anything, it’s especially true for something as clinically insane as Danger 5. You either get it, or you don’t get it. The people that get it like this show quite a bit (hence why it was renewed for a second series), and the people that don’t get it? Well, it wasn’t made for them in the first place.

Danger 5 is a perfect example of the shotgun method of comedy. A mass of jokes and gags are thrown at the audience in the hopes that they’ll all work. If Joke A wasn’t very funny, don’t worry, Joke B is coming up in a few milliseconds. There’s enough comedy in Danger 5 to fill about fifty Adam Sandler films (and Danger 5 happens to be funnier than all of them); the wickedly fast timing doesn’t exactly hurt. The pacing does hurt Danger 5 at times; “I Danced for Hitler” veers from inspired to charming to mediocre and then all the way back again, without any kind of discernible pause. The random suicide gag gets funnier each and every time they use it; the bar scene near the beginning is highly amusing. And there is, of course, the eagle-headed colonel.

There’s not much else to say here that I haven’t already said. The cast is surprisingly strong and effective – everyone is amazing in their roles, be it the straight-laced Tucker, the All-American manly man Jackson, the sexual Ilsa, the French-Spanish-Italian-Zimbabwean fun-lover Pierre, or the hapless Claire. The interpretation of Hitler brings to mind the Hitler from Kung Fury (an amazing, 80’s-inspired half-hour film made by David Sandberg), albeit a little more licentious and less concerned with kung fu. The editing and production is fairly slick and charmingly low-key, and the ending theme is kinda nice; I like the organ.

And that’s really all I can say. It is funny, but it is also exhausting. This was a little long at twenty-four minutes (fifteen would have been perfect), and it makes me wonder if the coming episodes will be able to keep up that same kind of quality without becoming shrill and repetitive. Time will tell.

My Top 100 Songs

SO! Let's take a break from the depressing, awful mess that was Angel Beats and move on to a topic I really enjoy discussing - myself! These are my one hundred favorite songs. The last ten or so aren't in any particular order (I don't consider Rope any better or worse than Question; they're equally fantastic) but the ninety before them definitely.

Posts expounding these choices will be uploaded l8r.

100. Clair de Lune – miwa (Rhythm Thief)

99. Brick by Boring Brick – Paramore

98. Street Spirit (Fade Out) – Radiohead

97. A Gentleman’s Coup – Rise Against

96. Satellite – Smash Mouth

95. Frontline – Pillar

94. Hurt – Nine Inch Nails

93. You Know My Name – Chris Cornell (  Casino Royale)

92. Stars – Youngblood Hawke

91. I Need To Know – Frank Wildhorn (Jekyll & Hyde)

90. Komm, Susser Tod – Arianne and Shiro Sagisu (Neon Genesis Evangelion)

89. Brighter Than A Thousand Suns – Iron Maiden

88. Hero of War – Rise Against

87. Chop Suey – System of A Down

86. Lights and Sounds – Yellowcard

85. Vyse’s Theme – Yutaka Minobe, Tatsuyuki Maeda (Skies of Arcadia)

84. Dirty Pop – N Sync

83. The Legendary Theme (Acoustic) – COIL (Gitaroo Man)

82. Pretty Handsome Awkward – The Used

81. Stutter – Marianas Trench

80. Ammunition - Switchfoot

79. Vonal Declosion – Stereolab

78. High Adventure – Alan Menken, Howard Ashman (Aladdin)

77. Hey There Delilah – Plain White T’s

76. R U Mine? – Arctic Monkeys

75. Supersonic – Bad Religion

74. Man Up – Book of Mormon

73. Danny Boy – Frederic Weatherly

72. Violet Hill – Coldplay

71. Jack’s Lament – Danny Elfman

70. I Should Have Known – Foo Fighters

69. Take Me Out – Franz Ferdinand

68. Rusty Cage – Soundgarden

67. Shadowboxin’ – GZA

66. Skullcrusher Mountain – Jonathan Coulton

65. Dreamland – Julien K

64. Leave You Far Behind – Lunatic Calm

63. Blue Monday – Orgy

62. Sky Is the Limit – Rebelution

61. Everlong – Foo Fighters

60. Presto – Rush

59. Always Summer (Acoustic) – Yellowcard

58. Fire Woman – The Cult

57. It Ain’t Easy – 2Pac

56. CREAM – Wu-Tang Clan

55. Virginia Moon – Foo Fighters

54. Hot Cherie – Hardline

53. On the Rise (My Eyes) – Whedon Brothers, Maurissa Tancharoen (Dr. Horrible)

52. Tornado of Souls – Megadeth

51. Everything’s Alright / Heaven On Their Minds – Andrew Lloyd Webber (Jesus Christ Superstar)

50. Black Hole Sun – Soundgarden

49. Chosen One – A2 / Mona Lisa Overdrive (Shadow the Hedgehog)

48. Back Home (Acoustic) – Yellowcard

47. Un-Gravitify – Cashell (Sonic Riders: Zero Gravity)

46. Sweet Lips – Monaco

45. Time Hollow – Masanori Akita

44. Stars – Claude-Michel Schonberg, Alain Boublil (Les Miserables)

43. Kashmir – Led Zeppelin

42. Subterranean Homesick Alien – Radiohead

41. Smooth – Santana

40. TaISeTsuNaMoNo - Yumie Huwara (Phantasy Star Zero)

39. At Dawn – Jun Senoue (Sonic Adventure)

38. 18 and Life – Skid Row

37. Dreams Dreams – Tomoko Sasaki (NiGHTS Into Dreams)

36. Point / Counterpoint – Streetlight Manifesto

35. Awakening – Yellowcard

34. No Way Back – Foo Fighters

33. Mr. Brightside – The Killers

32. Supporting Me – Everett Bradley, Jun Senoue (Sonic Adventure 2)

31. Summer of 69 – Bryan Adams

30. Bohemian Rhapsody – Queen

29. South of Heaven – Slayer

28. Makes No Difference – Sum 41

27. Viridian City – John Loeffler, Jason Paige, Andre Betts (Pokemon)

26. Pokemon Theme Song – John Loeffler, Jason Paige (Pokemon)

25. Teknopathetic (e-Pop n’ Disco 80’s Mix) - Hideki Naganuma (Jet Set Radio Future)

24. Stargazer – Rainbow

23. Bad Taste Aquarium – Jun Senoue (Sonic Adventure)

22. Mission Street – Jun Senoue (Sonic Adventure 2)

21. Volare – Gipsy Kings

20. Roxanne – The Police

19. More Than a Feeling – Boston

18. Let It Go – Def Leppard

17. ‘Bout the City – Reps (Jet Set Radio)

16. Watch Me Fly – Crush 40

15. Get Lucky – Daft Punk

14. Touch – Daft Punk

13. Dreams of an Absolution – Lee Brotherton / Bentley Jones (Sonic ’06)

12. Dim – Dada

11. Hallowed Be Thy Name – Iron Maiden

10. נפלא פה – HaBiluim

9. Paranoid Android – Radiohead

8. Escape From The City – Jun Senoue, Ted Poley (Sonic Adventure 2)

7. Fly by Night – Rush

6. Rope – Foo Fighters

5. Stairway to Heaven – Led Zeppelin

4. At The Sound of the Demon Bell – Mercyful Fate

3. Question – System of a Down

2. A Matter of Time – Foo Fighters

1. Peace of Mind – Boston

Angel Beats: Additional Comments

I remember, once, liking Angel Beats. Mind you, this was back in middle school when I was innocent and impressionable, thinking that anything that looked deep and complex was, in fact, deep and complex. And to be fair, there was a lot about Angel Beats that, on the surface, looked cool. A dark and edgy story-line about passed-away teenagers fighting against the afterlife to retain their quasi-existence? Cool! Yes, I remember enjoying it quite a bit, but it had been so long since I had actually watched the show that I wanted to go back and figure out exactly why Angel Beats was so good, at least at the time.

And the first few minutes of Angel Beats were honestly really cool. I was hooked from the first opening shot. The air of mystery and disorientation was awesome - even if the dialogue between Otonashi and Yuri was completely lifeless, I was willing to overlook that. Even when Kanade said "there are no hospitals because nobody gets sick here" and the following scene showed Otonashi lying in what was clearly a hospital bed, I was willing to overlook that. Even when the dark, brooding atmosphere of the first two or three minutes quickly turned to unfunny slapstick, I was willing to--

At the exact moment Otonashi woke up in the hospital and got the shit beaten out of him by that guy (Noda or something?), I remembered something. I'd unearthed a memory of sorts, to tell you the truth; it was a memory I'd suppressed for a long time, only to be fully realized at the exact moment Otonashi got the shit beaten out of him.

This show sucks.

It's not even "Otonashi gets the shit beaten out of him" that bugged me. It was the execution that bugged me. After the precious few minutes of exposition that set this show up as a possibly mysterious, dark show full of opaque mythology and tense action, the show discards those few minutes and turned Angel Beats into a wacky comic opera, full of slapstick, shouting (an uncomfortable amount of shouting), and characters acting like idiots for the sake of comedy. This tonal imbalance became a problem the series never shook off; when Angel Beats gets dark, it gets dark fast, and then it just as quickly falls back on wacky gags and farcical action, as if it never happened at all. Couple that in with the mind-shattering plot holes and questionably bland characters, the whole thing felt like a rip-off of itself.

To sum everything up...

STORY

Fuck, what was the plot? Angel Beats' "story" was all over the place. Stuff happens, and the only connecting link between "stuff that happens here" and "stuff that happens there" is the episodic structure. The plot, on the surface, is easy to follow: "A group of teenagers don't want to pass on from purgatory; they wind up doing so." But it's the way they get from Point A to Point B that made the story confusing as all hell. "Otonashi knows first aid despite having never been to college, let alone med school." Okay? "Otonashi's heart saved Kanade from a heart transplant, but she wound up in the afterlife before him." Huh? "A computer software system that alters reality." What?!

You know that phrase? "Throw crap at the wall and see what sticks"? Yeah. That's the best way I can summarize the story of Angel Beats.

ANIMATION AND DESIGN

One thing that I will give Angel Beats - it looks good. Like, really good. Some of the visual direction is top-notch, and there are individual shots that are absolute killers.

The problem, however, is that the animation is not all that smooth. The series is well-drawn, yes, but it is not well-animated. A majority of the characters move stiffly on a constant basis, or sometimes they'll go horribly off-model; this wouldn't be so bad (because we are human, and prone to error), but these lapses in skill and judgment look especially terrible next to the lush backgrounds.

What is WITH the brown-haired guy's face?

There are exceptions. I have a feeling that the animators were smitten with Kanade and wanted to do the best possible job with her; it shows. In comparison to the stiff, out-of-sync Battlefront members, Kanade's movements are fluid and precise, especially in her fight scenes. The Shadows from Episode 11, despite being a complete narrative fuck-up and coming out of absolute nowhere, were also really effective bits of animation, threatening and creepy and vaguely mechanical. But, as a whole, Angel Beats is not well-animated, which makes the whole project look clumsy and cheap.

CHARACTERS

Lifeless. There's a grand total of twenty characters (Kanade, and the nineteen Battlefront members) and only three of them are ever truly important. This wouldn't be so bad if they had personality, but I'm afraid to say they don't. It's incredibly hard to care about the characters of Angel Beats for any considerable length of time: Otonashi is a stock "innocent young man with a heart of gold who learns about the world around him", Yuri is an annoying bitch with no discernible personality, and the rest of the Battlefront have no personality to speak of. They're agents of chaos, and you cannot use agents of chaos as characters. Only Kanade is even a little appealing, but that appeal fades away in the last four episodes when the story decides to focus on the far-inferior Yuri.

Just a handful of the "sympathetic, well-rounded" characters of Angel Beats lore.

The only truly appealing character, the soulful, soft-spoken Iwasawa, disappeared after Episode 3. And, weirdly, it was after her disappearance that the writing stumbled. What a coincidence.

MUSIC

I have nothing to say here. I remember kind of liking the J-pop song that opened up each episode; but by the end, I couldn't have hummed a single measure even if you put a gun to my head. The rest of the score is rote and disappointingly mediocre.

You'd think that in a show that featured a guitarist, it would have good music.

BEST LINE OF DIALOGUE

"Wanna die?" - Noda, Episode 1.

Best I could do. There's no other line in this entire series that stands out.

BEST INDIVIDUAL MOMENT OR SCENE

Iwasawa's backstory in Episode 3. Visually striking, effective, and didn't overstay its welcome, unlike the unimportant, out-of-place backstory of Naoi, the easily-discarded backstory of Hinata, or the stupidly melodramatic backstory of Yuri.

WORST INDIVIDUAL MOMENT OR SCENE

Too many to name, but I distinctly remember crying because of how panderingly stupid the classroom scenes in Episode 5 were. So, I'll pick one of those.

MOST PRETENTIOUS MOMENT

Yeah, "Reality-altering computer software" did it for me.

OVERALL EPISODIC SCORE

Episode 1 (5/10) - Strong opening quickly ruined by uninspired slapstick humor. World established effectively - this is the only time throughout the show that the sense of world-building is this strong.

Episode 2 (3/10) - Boring action scenes, uninteresting dialogue, poorly-written Yuri backstory, and the completely pointless inclusion of an elaborate manufacturing plant. Looks pretty, but it really isn't all that pretty.

Episode 3 (8/10) - Refreshing. Well-written, fluidly-paced, inspired. Resolves Iwasawa's character arc and opens up new threads for Kanade, Otonashi, and Yuri.

Episode 4 (4/10) - Nonsense. Pure, unadulterated nonsense.

Episode 5 (3/10) - Good exchanges between Otonashi and Kanade, saves this episode from being truly contemptible. The non-stop assault of unfunny, poorly-executed humor makes the majority of this episode more of an endurance test than anything.

Episode 6 (3/10) - Edgy.

Episode 7 (6/10) - Perfectly fine. Otonashi's backstory is good, if melodramatic. Confusing, out-of-nowhere humongous fish.

Episode 8 (4/10) - Good opening and ending ruined by a consistent twenty minutes of pure bullshit.

Episode 9 (3/10) - Awful, needless addition to Otonashi's backstory.

Episode 10 (5/10) - While sweet-natured and a relaxing break from the crushing darkness and plot holes of the last four episodes, Yui is annoying and didn't need an entire episode focused around her.

Episode 11 (2/10) - The Shadows are cool. Other than that? An all-time low for the series. Rushed as hell.

Episode 12 (4/10) - Profoundly deranged, like a sugar rush. Pleasurably surrealistic and campy, but it doesn't hide the absolutely horrendous narrative.

Episode 13 (1/10) - Holy cock.

And that'll about do it. Good evening, world.

(Never watching this again.)