No. 16, Crayon Shin-chan: The Storm Called: The Hero of Kinpoko, aka Crayon Movie: Anything They Want! Golden Spear of the Brave (at least, that’s that the Google translation from Chinese). At any rate, the Crayon Shin-chan movie from 2008. The last one I can find.
What’s becoming apparent, having seen (in Japanese) three Crayon Shin-chan movies, is how different they are from each other. Each movie takes the foundation of the “Crayon Shin-chan” TV show and builds from there, tossing that semi-normal universe into bizarre fantasy. Those fantasies have no overlap in substance or style. The Storm Called: The Battle of the Warring States told a period feudal tale with relative seriousness (and boredom). The Legend Called Buri Buri 3 Minute Charge used a comic kaiju framework to deliver potty jokes. And now The Storm Called: The Hero of Kinpoko explores pure, surrealistic fantasy, never laugh-out-loud but always light and comic.
It’s ever clearer that these movies were a way for the Shin’ei Doga animation studio to explore further visual approaches, while maintaining the baseline Shin-chan look. Number 16 is the most formally inventive in that matter, using an occasional Wonderland-lite dreamworld as its own personal playland. Consider the image below, part of the most gorgeous sequence in any of the Shin-chans I’ve seen.
The plot, as best as I can work it out from the visuals alone (Japanese language track, no subtitles – well, okay, subtitles in Chinese), is the standard tale of an alternate genre realm colliding with five-year-old Shin-chan’s land of Japanese satire. Here, a magical, all-powerful Sword of Mystery (or possibly a Golden Spear of the Brave) is stolen from the evil Jester King of the Clown Kingdom – look, I dunno what these things are called, I’m just assigning the most obvious designations. So a beetle, which we never see again (though a later good guy proves to be a shapeshifter), shutters this sword off to the Shin-chan universe, and we’re off!
Now, based on the too-small poster, and presumably the movie’s pre-release Japanese hype, audiences are now primed for Shin-chan to get his hands on said sword so that wackiness can ensue. The first ten minutes in Shin-chan’s company expend plenty of energy on Shin-chan’s newfound sword mania. For he sees his TV hero Action Kamen using one and, well, what a kid sees on TV… Lord knows if his obsession with butts came from television too, and then if his family gets the BET.
Shin-chan goes to the store to purchase an Action Kamen-Approved Plastic Killing Sword of Death. Because we’ve all seen movies like Gremlins and Small Soldiers (and, er, Child’s Play), we know the main character, by total stupid lucky coincidence, shall end up with a magic sword, or some such. That’s why it’s such a shock, build-up aside, when Shin-chan gets home to discover the sword box instead contains – a ruler?!
But Shin-chan’s also independently taken in a black dog which is a perfect double for their usual white dog, Shiro. So if that ruler is a misdirect, then something is up with the dog, surely.
That night begins a series of visitations, as Shin-chan plays host to the Jester Lord’s devious minions. First up someone I call the Tall Man, out of the fact he looks nothing like the villain from Phantasm. The Tall Man tempts Shin-chan, as all these spectral clown types shall, with any number of magical fantasies like out of “Yoshi’s Island.” Presumably, so I guess, this is to get him to give up the “sword,” as apparently it has to be given, cannot be taken. So it’s psychological warfare against the anal obsessive Shin-chan, a character without psychological depth. He repeatedly spurns the demon clowns’ advances, either through being incredibly smart or incredibly dumb. But not before the Tall Man leads his stylistically unique sub-minions in a song and dance number, like something out of The Nightmare Before Christmas (a possible influence upon this entry). There are two original songs in this film (not counting the credits pop song), making, uh, Crayon Shin-chan: The Storm Called: The Hero of Kinpoko something of a musical.
Apart from these nightly temptations (hmm, what could that be a metaphor for?), Shin-chan’s life goes on as normal – All the better for the animation budget to stretch when called for. No one else believes the child’s tales of evil clowns, though those who ignore evil clown warnings learn to pay. Even while this is meant as the “normal” section, there are still context-free moments of strangeness which defy commentary:
This is a TV show (Japan, man!) which inspires Shin-chan, in its deviancy, to do his patented “buri buri” dance – that is, to remove his trousers and vibrate his sphincter directly in front of his parents’ faces. They shut the TV off, putting a premature end to the film’s dedication to the butt. It’s necessary to call ass attention at some point, so they’re getting it out of the way.
Since the Tall Man failed, Shin-chan is next visited by the Boob Harlequin (who appears further down, and is unmistakable). Of course, breasts are Shin-chan’s main weakness, just like, well, the majority of human males. These being temptation enough, Boob Harlequin forgoes more ostentatious fantasy. But still Shin-chan relents, partly at the new dog’s insistence. Yup, that black dog is gonna be important!
Boob Harlequin reports back to the Jester Lord (that guy above, because clowns aren’t scary enough already). Let’s talk about this evil Clown Kingdom. On top of the film’s visual ambition, it seems Shin’ei Doga finally got themselves the budget for a CGI department. CG is at the best of times difficult to marry well with cell-style animation, and it fares much worse here. The 3-D renderings look like they’re for the N64 (you know, the polygon era). Which is a shame, because otherwise the Clown Kingdom looks like something Tim Burton would’ve dreamed up had he been born in Tokyo. It’s partly an M. C. Escher bio-mechanical nightmare, with black and white card slaves and shifting shapes made up of puzzle pieces. This is an unusual land, and a grand achievement.
That shapeshifter I hinted at long ago, the one I think was the beetle, now escapes from the Jester Lord’s carnival clutches, in the form of a kid’s puzzle box. He goes to Shin-chan’s house.
So this shapeshifter has a name I actually parsed out – Mata. Beats calling him and/or her the Clown Child. Mata, now in androgynous human form, exposits to Shin-chan some…things. Damn this language barrier! All this is to prepare Shin-chan for the next night, and the Tall Man’s final visitation – where he at last resorts to violence.
Shin-chan first tries to defend himself with a “buri buri” – can’t see what good that’ll do – when Mata rather transforms the family’s dining room into, basically, TRON only gay. The world is now an infinite grid made of the pinkest pink that ever pinked. Mata then transforms him/herself into a biplane of most inadequate CG rendering. The Tall Man does likewise, and even morphs himself into a whole squadron based on his “whatever the filmmakers wanted to do” powers. And the chase is off!
It’s an extended dogfight, done almost entirely in CGI (unfortunate, unfortunate CGI). There are many rendering errors you wouldn’t think would make it unscathed into a theatrical release, at least not in a year post-1990. The hollow interiors of the planes are visible, as they shimmy in and out of existence. It’s embarrassing, considering how successful the traditionally animated moments are. Even Shin-chan, the lone 2-D feature in this sequence, remains the most visually appealing element. One has to admire the detail the animators give him in freefall, even if it means a flopping penis getting tangled up in his inexplicably-loosened pants. I don’t get this continued emphasis on Shin-chan’s organ.
Shin-chan escapes, and the Tall Man is seemingly dead, since we never see him again. Returning home, Mata sings a dreary lullaby to the moon, knocking off the film’s musical quota nice and early(ish).
Some more time wastes away with a desultory depiction of the family’s normal life, possibly reusing animation from way back in the “Shin-chan” archives, a necessary step to allow the budget to create hideous CG abominations. But once that’s complete, night comes again, and Shin-chan can face the violent retribution…
Of Boob Harlequin!
Note, this is in the “real” world now, Shin-chan’s family right there. So they can at last see the breasts he’s been prattling on about. Instead they’ve been frozen solid, as if by Professor X himself. But Mata rescues them all, transforming the nature of reality in one of those successful moments of animation (i.e., 2-D). Oh right, and Mata even magically grants the entire family new circuit outfits, the only dignified means of battling the forces of clowns, as they are about to do.
I maintain that the finales of damn near every anime go way off the rails, at least by western standards. And they start early, leaving the whole Third Act to boast such oddness. It affords the maximum amount of interesting animation, at the cost of cohesion. But different cultures consider narrative strength differently; consider Italian horror movies, or even ostensibly “coherent” anime features like Ghost in the Shell. It’s easiest in these instances to just go with the flow, and enjoy the experience for what it is – stream-of-consciousness ramblings taken cinematic form. Usually with ultimate good battling ultimate evil.
Boob Harlequin, like the Tall Man before her, employs a vehicle to attack her quarry, all while in a stylized and overly colorful fantasy world. She uses a clown convertible (of evil!), forcing Mata to become a…strangely thin car thing. This chase is wacky, nigh incomprehensible, and violates most of the laws of physics even as they exist in the anime realm. And though they’re at the bottom of a valley, a sudden cliff way makes them fall up. Which leads to this:
A momentary adoption of a totally different drawing style, for all of 3 seconds – it’s frankly the film’s funniest moment. There’s a lot of this sort of visual experimentation in Crayon Shin-chan: The Storm Called: The Hero of Kinpoko. It’s non-diagetic, follows no rules, and raises the film to the next level.
Mini-bosses defeated, it’s time to face the Jester Lord himself. Since the Lord has turned himself into a dragon, our heroes use their “whatever powers” (really, it doesn’t matter) to become a sort of Voltron amalgamation – Shin-chan is the head, while everyone else is some naughty bit (his father is the groin, and it’s saying something that this is not one of the more puerile Shin-chan movies).
Craziness then occurs, naturally. The Jester Lord is like a multi-form boss, for as soon as he’s defeated in dragon form, all but Shin-chan again freeze, and Shin-chan must face the Jester Lord in his…Jester Lord form. This is the cue for that glorious sword to at long last come into play. Would you believe it was that cheapo ruler all along? Well, it is. So what of the black dog, in its misdirection? It turns out the dog was really a magical shield in disguise. Sure, why not?
Entering a new visual area, keyed off of German expressionism such as The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, Shin-chan swordfights. There are more crazy variations, even, as the Jester Lord possesses hydra-like abilities to split in half and duplicate. Why, this’ll require Shin-chan take on a new unexplained form of awesomeness – an angular light being with a Super Ultra Mega Lightning Sword of Destiny, or whatever!
We’re nearing the end, so Shin-chan summons the biggest lightshow remaining budget will allow for, and he wins. Not much more to relate, Mata exposits whatever’s going to happen to the Clown Kingdom now, explains why it should concern us, and Shin-chan returns to the Universe of Japan.
I’m not sure if anyone but Shin-chan retains memory of all this. His mother Misae doesn’t seem to, as instead she’s mad at Shin-chan over recent shenanigans. As a capper, she dangles him violently by the ears, which is this series’ equivalent of Homer Simpson strangulating Bart: grotesque iconic child abuse played for laughs.
Two more Crayon Shin-chan movies to date have followed Crayon Shin-chan: The Storm Called: The Hero of Kinpoko, though there’s the possibility that 2010’s Crayon Shin-chan: Super-Dimension! The Storm Called My Bride will be the last.
In 2009, series creator Yoshito Usui fell off a cliff while hiking, and died. As he’d been personally responsible for the “Crayon Shin-chan” manga ever since its 1990 inception, that put an end to that…though the discovery of some excess manuscripts allowed his apprentices to extend the series through 2010. But out of respect for the heart and soul of Shin-chan’s butt, manga production has ceased, lest it become a zombie property.
As TV’s “Crayon Shin-chan” did mostly adaptations of each and every manga, it too has felt the sting of Usui’s untimely de-cliffing. Some debate has suggested that they may continue production ad infinitum anyway, citing “Doraemon” and “Sazae-san” as other properties which have perpetuated post passing. This pertains to the movies too, even though they were never as central to the series. They weren’t the direct products of Usui’s stories, but rather financial and creative outlets for the animators. So wither the TV series, thus too the movies (that annual off-season TV show effluvia). Crayon Shin-chan, the movies, may continue, but it’s too soon to say.
RELATED POSTS:
• Series introduction
• No. 10 Crayon Shin-chan: The Storm Called: The Battle of the Warring States (2002)
• No. 13 Crayon Shin-chan: The Legend Called Buri Buri 3 Minutes Charge (2005)
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