The original version of my review was lost in one of the deadly HerV crashes, which is probably for the best. Unfortunately for you, I was able to salvage bits and pieces here and remember the rest off the top of my head. So here it is… my Street Fighter Alpha anime review.

Written by Blaine — email south2hell@yahoo.com

Like your mom’s ass, this picture has a lot of ups and downs. There is an abundance of fan service, and if you’ve read Neil’s opinion, probably a little TOO much. Of course, he’s ghey and likes crumpets. There’s also a lot of violence, though IMO, not enough violence, and too much of it centering around Ryu, and WAY too much centering around an original character who is this skinny wild haired hyper faggot. Basically Shirokah.

When Street Fighter Alpha: The Animated Movie was released, it had been long-anticipated by fighting game crowds, building up to a frenzied pitch for the movie’s release. The first time the North American release was pushed back, there was a mad rush to bang the anime, as pantyfags, importers, and arcade rejects fought tooth and nail to secure imports. Despite its ups and downs, did the SFA:TM deliver a worthy addition to the Street Fighter universe?

In a word, yes. In more than you can count, Hell yes.

Now, I know what you art-house fags out there are saying. In nasally, (probably with a salonic lisp) whiney voices, you’re saying. “Whhhhaaaaaat! Thust sthory didnth make thense. I hated Sthun, and I can’t sthand any sthory lesth confusthing and inundated with incomprehensthible bullshit than Akira.” Well you know what? Fuck you. Fuck your VCR. Fuck your parents. Fuck your oxygen.

If you go to the table expecting a story dragged straight out of the mind of Stephen King when you sit down to watch something produced by Capcom, you need to remove yourself from the gene pool. I mean, Jesus Christ, it’s not the hardest thing to figure out. I dunno if you’ve been watching the same animes or playing the same games as me, but Capcom is the group of people that gave Birdie (a race-unspecific mongoloid) a perpetual dicksuck mouth and licensed their characters to Malibu comics for a time. These guys aren’t the biggest supergeniuses in the world. If you’ve seen what I’ve seen, Street Fighter Alpha’s (TAM) somewhat contrived story is an Empire State’s length of steps above what they’ve done before. And, on top of that, they managed two scenes that actually made my blood pump. The moods, the settings, the themes, they were all done well.

That is not to say SFA doesn’t suffer from any downfalls. It is, in essence, a downfall by itself– it’s a fighting game anime, for Christ’s sakes. It’s main problem, however, originates with a single character. In this review, I will state the good and the bad of the Alpha anime. For those of you not inclined to read the full extent of my opinion, I have produced the short rank sheet below that sums up what I thought about it.

Publisher Manga Video
Running Time 90 minutes
Format VHS/DVD
Rating Unrated
Story 2/10
Art 8/10
Music 5/10
Fight Scenes 8/10
Dubbing 8/10

First off, I noticed a heightened level of quality in the trailer alone, not just for a Street Fighter anime, but for something produced by Manga video. A lot of you have probably seen the trailer, so I don’t think I’m spoiling anything when I mention it. The music in the trailer gives an air of impending doom, and the flashing images of Akuma and Evil Ryu lead you on a leash into suspense.

First you get the manga logo up on the screen, and you hear Akuma’s voice (done by the dude who did Sagat’s voice in SF2V, I believe) saying “The true warrior enters the arena with all his powers at the ready.”

The entire trailer gives you the feeling that this isn’t your run of the mill Street Fighter story, and damn is that true. “Kill me,” Ryu says to his best friend in life, Ken. “If I’m possessed by the Dark Hado, and I can’t break free… Ken, I want you to be the one to do it.”

Pumped up after seeing the trailer, I settled in for the anime I’ve been anticipating more than any other for the last year and a half.

As I was soon to learn, the trailer of any anime is ALWAYS better than the content of the entire show. SFA was still good regardless. At times, the combined art, story, voices, and music came together to really pull me into this. For instance, after Shun arrives at the dojo, he lives with Ken and Ryu for awhile, doing what they do, hanging out with them, etc. Sooner or later, he shows up wearing a white headband like Ryu, and Ken begins to make fun of him when it falls down around his face. Ryu rises, removes his headband, and he begins to show Shun how to tie it. The purposeful music kicks in as Ryu begins to tie his own headband. He says:

“Whenever I tie this on,
I always ask my body a question.
Am I worthy of this fight?”

I was really into that scene. That’s a big step beyond your run of the mill Street Fighter product. I’ve seen every SF2V episode, watched the original SF2 animated movie, and played pretty much every game. The only awe-inspiring moment previously was when Zangief and his daddy, Gorbachev, danced on the grave of M. Bison. Never mind.

STORY

Breaking it down as simply as possible, this story seems to be a setup for a sequel. Shut your mouth bitch. What they handed us here wasn’t the final showdown between the forces of good and evil (or perhaps bad and worse?) but what seemed like, well, an hour long commercial for part 2. Which would usually be a huge mistake, except that this commercial is fairly decent in the meantime, barring the cursed original character, Shun, who I will get to in a moment. PREMISE: The entire story centers around the Satsui No Hado (wave of evil; Dark Hado) surging within Ryu’s nutsack. Ken returns to Japan on the anniversary of Gouken’s death (for you numbfucks who don’t know, Gouken is the brother of Gouki (Akuma), and the Sensei of Ken and Ryu. Gouken and Gouki were trained by Goutetsu. Goutetsu probably trained with Retsu. Retsu punched the fuck out of Dan in a picture on my HD. Ahh, the beauty of character connections.)

just in time to stop Ryu from shooting his oily load of evil all over the face of Japan. Inexplicably, Shirokah Shun shows up moments later claiming to be off weed forever Ryu’s brother. Ken is very suspicious of this. Ken’s other business in Japan is to enter a Street Fighting tournament. He stays and trains with Ryu, and Shun ends up showing off some moves too. Here’s where the problems with this movie begins: Shun sucks. Shun is a terrible character. Shun is like a bad fanfic original C, and he’s constantly hamming for the camera/taking up time when it could be Ken, or Sakura, or DAN in the spotlight. HERRO CREATOLS OF ANIME? WATCH FATAR FULY ANIME PRS. SULIA is how you do an original character. Shun is… at best, an inconvenience. At worst, he’s squatting over/shitting on every scene. If a connection between Shun and Ryu is being built, I don’t really see it. Capcom continually tries to push it, and does a fair job, but Ryu remains pretty un-readable (which is good, that’s supposed to be the way Ryu is) and since he’s the main character, you’re forced to interact with the story through Ryu, and Ryu doesn’t have much of a reaction for anything. That causes any emotional moments between Shun and Ryu pretty worthless– perhaps the one exception being the one I typed up at the top of this review.

Anyway, meanwhile, Chun-Li is tracking Ryu because he happened to beat the horse piss out of some Shadowlaw terrorists, and Sakura is also tracking Ryu because she saw it and was impressed.

Anyways, it all starts to come together on the way to the tournament, when Ryu refuses to be in the tournament because he’s afraid of the power surging within. Shun protests, and draws the attention of some baddies, whom Shun pretty much disposes of. He doesn’t just kick them all in the balls, I’m telling you he goes Chucky on their asses. It reminded me of Orochi Chris. So they get to the tournament, and well, that’s where it all comes together. The main villain isn’t much; he’s way outclassed by his henchman, Rosanov. Both of these guys just seemed like a way to demonstrate the power growing in Ryu, which obviously means that they aren’t the most awesome villains (not as good as Akuma, obviously), but as I said before, this whole thing is like a setup for a sequel.

That brings me to the next bit.

FIGHTING

The fighting was damn good, depending on who was actually fighting at the time. If it was Shun, it was easy to groan and wait for the next fight. There was also a point during the tournament where Capcom put Shun up against Zangief, making the Gief look like a magnificent dumbass for 1) getting hit by a little kid 2) proceding to beat stomp rape and murder a little kid, which, depending on how you express your hate for Shun, was either the worst thing ever or the best thing ever. Because of ghey time constraints, we hardly got to see anyone but Ryu or Shun fighting, which sucks. Not surprising…SF IS the Ryu show. But ahh disappointing nonetheless. There were a few too many ‘whiff’ fights done by cameo characters (like the fights between Rolento, Guy, Adon, and Dhalsim). Also, the supporting stars (Ken, Chun-Li) didn’t get a whole lot of fighting time. Especially not Chun-Li. Ken’s big fight scene saw him take on Ryu, and that fight wasn’t very long at all.

Everything else he did, other than his fight with Rosanov was a flash across the screen and his opponent keeling over.

The reason the fights in this movie didn’t get a higher score was not only because Ryu wins pretty much every fight and pretty much every fight was Ryu vs someone, but because the final fight was inexplicable. I came to expect that, and I was prepared for it, but the final fight goes like this

(Sadler hits Ryu with a massive blast of Dark Hado, Sadler dies)

Also, I had a problem with the massive damage characters tended to take in the story. Shun and Chun-Li really get fucked over bigtime. That’s not such a big problem with Chun-Li, but after awhile my imagination couldn’t compensate for the kind of damage the kid (Shun) was absorbing. There’s also a part where Dan
gets fucking eviscerated by Vega and then shows up without a scratch ready to fight at the end of the movie. That’s not like getting hit in the balls, no matter how bad getting hit in the balls is. You can get up and walk after getting hit in the balls eventually, but after Vega slams his claws through your face, making a comeback is not in your playbook unless you’re Dracula or Jesus Christ.

And I’m not just talking about getting punched a lot. Shun is getting stomped and slammed and kicked by Zangief. Now, I know he gets all ‘Firestarter’ and shit, but still. He gets the shit stomped out of him by Zangief, then minutes later Rosanov shoots his ass, and the little bastard still doesn’t die.

FAMILIAR VOICES: THE DUB

The dubbing in this used many of the same voices from SF2V and the first movie or at least a lot of soundalikes. It’s attention to detail that gives the dub job a lot of high points, no matter what venue it happens to be.

These are the old and familiar faces that make an appearance in the movie: Ryu, Ken, Akuma, Chun-Li, Sakura, Vega, Zangief, Rolento, Birdie, Adon, Guy, Dhalsim, Sodom and Rose. How does your favorite character stack up?

If you bought this movie for the express purpose of seeing your favorite C in action, let me help you out: If your favorite character is Dhalsim, Adon, Vega, Guy, Rolento, or Sodom, pack a condom, you just fucked yourself out of your money. These guys got the least time on screen. Adon got one line, if I remember correctly. Dhalsim was shown for maybe five seconds total. Guy was shown fighting Adon; the movie gave no recognition to his past with Ryu and Ken even though at one point the Street Fighters were all on an airplane together… well, except for Sodom. Sodom manages to almost single-handedly kill the entire cast, and not through some insidious and well-timed plan, but through sheer fucking idiocy.

Rose and Akuma are story-drivers. They don’t get a whole lot of scenes, but Akuma shows up in the thoughts of Ryu and Ken, and is a constant presence in the story. You’ll get a flash of his visage in shadows every once in awhile, signalling his nearby presence. Akuma only makes two in-person appearances in this movie. He still manages to make himself out to be a wicked badass. They really re-inforced the fact that he was bad, and this Dark Hado stuff was truly evil.

This is where Akuma hangs out. They never even try to explain these huge coffin-like pieces of wood with faces, and that makes it properly spooky. But when Akuma’s voice starts floating from whatever dummy Ryu happens to be closest to, that’s when you know that Akuma isn’t just a mean face and a double air Hadoken.

Rose existed mainly to drive the plot forward at akward pauses. She was tolerable because of the el33t voice special effect they use with her, and because she is drawn so well. I’ve always liked Rose because of her outfit. She didn’t get as much airtime as Sakura, but Sakura didn’t get any fighting time in either. The entire point of Sakura’s involvement was entrenching her into the Street Fighter storyline. They did a good job at that.

My personal favorite, Ken, took a backseat to Shun as co-main character, which sucked hammer cock. As the movie progressed, Ken was given a chance to shine but got anihilated in the final battle, where he was pretty much useless. The Ken in the SF2 movie was grown up, and more of a pissant. Not really funny, just mean. Ken only seemed to be important to this anime because the tale was centered around Ryu. :/

THE NEW CHARACTERS

Okay, SFA brought a few new characters to the table, so here’s the information I have about them. There’s five of them: Shun, Old Man, Wallace, Rosanov, and Sadler.

New Character Profile One
Scene-stealing cocksucker. Note: This picture could well have been an A3 char select portrait.

Shun basically shows up and tells Ryu he’s his little brother. Ken and Ryu aren’t really paying attention until Shun mentions that his mother put Ryu under the protection of Gouken to keep him safe. He doesn’t have much to say about their father, except for the fact the he too uses Dark Hado. O_o This was a tricky attempt at Capcom to make you think Akuma is Ryu’s father. In the end, this whole thing turns out to be bullshit. For your sanity, I will spoil it by telling you that Shun ends up being a total liar. Thank God.

New Character Profile Two
This Dipshit is Wallace.

I guess Wallace is supposed to be Chun-Li’s interpol agent buddy or something. I think they just put him in here to make Chun-Li look like a good detective or something. The first time you see Chun-Li she’s chasing after armed men with guns, and Wallace’ ass is about five blocks down the street running to catch up. He was probably standing in line at the donut stand when Chun-Li took off after the bad guys and figured she’d kick their mamby-pamby asses anyway. Or he’s just incompetent, either one.

What’s that Chun-Li? You don’t know why your dad is missing? Probably because they saddled his ass with a deadweight like Wallace. Shadowlaw’s basically M.Bison, Balrog, Vega, and a troupe of retarded stooges. None of the damn Cammy clones follow directions, and basically the whole organization is constantly falling all over Bison’s ugly ass, and Interpol can’t shut him down because the higher-ups think it’s a smart thing to give guys like Wallace loaded firearms.

New Character Profile Three
The old man isn’t really a character, but I listed him anyway…

Because he’s a trip. I mean, every time you see the old man he’s sweeping. And he doesn’t have any lines, he’s just laughing. Actually, he may have had some lines but they were probably like “Eat your vegetables, not pussy”, I dunno. I think Ryu felt sorry for him and let him stand around sweeping all day. The doddering old bastard is constantly sweeping. When Shun first arrives at the dojo to talk to the old man, the old man is sweeping. The camera pans out, and you see that he’s about fifty feet from any sweepable surface. The senile old fucker is sweeping the dirt from the dirt. (click on the old man’s pick above to see that.)

New Character Profile Four
Rosanov (is that even its name?) isn’t a pushover.

The best new character of the entire anime is Rosanov. You’ll see why. I don’t have a lot of pictures of him, because just about every one of them is a spoiler, but this monster generates some of the best fights in the movie. He can deflect hadokens and take all kinds of damage, as well as fire charged beams of green energy. Oh yeah, he’s probably stronger than Birdie and Zangief combined. If his voice sounds familiar to you, that’s because the same voice actor did Bison in SF2V.

New Character Profile Five
Sadler is a queer individual.

This gaywad is the main villain. Those of you who’ve seen this gimme a show of hands: who would have liked to have seen him die a Dr Frankenstein death? Rosanov is much cooler, and in voice and appearance, you can see connections between the death cyborg and Bison. At the end, Sadler becomes some fucked up gay midget on roids and fights Ryu. It would have been awesome if Rosanov had gone traitor, killed this shithead, and siphoned the dark energy itself. Oh well, the story is retarded. What can I say?

ART

This particular anime had quite good art. The art often joined forces with the music to put you right in any scene at hand, especially scenes at the large, empty dojo in Japan. Some of the dojo scapes were beautiful. Other images, like the one of Ken, Ryu, and Shun sitting on the roof are also excellent.

The Legendary Dojo
This is the legendary dojo where Ken and Ryu trained from children into their late teens under the strong fist of Gouken. Click on the image above to get a different, larger view of the dojo.

I find the art in this to be much more thoughtful than in either SF2 or SF2V, because there is a lot of heart in the drawings. The art just seemed to be a lot more thoughtful, and emotional, and you could tell. Each picture meant something beyond just portraying the events.

I find the art of Ken, Ryu, and Shun watching the sun set to be l33t.

So basically, this is the rundown of my review: Street Fighter Alpha delivers a pretty crappy story, but that is to be expected. What’s there flows rather well into a sequel and sheds light upon Ryu’s past. The shadow of Akuma lurks over the living progeny of Shotokan and Ryu must overcome the Dark Hado or lose his soul forever. The art seems a lot more graceful and meaningful than other Street Fighter animes. The music is good, although the tunes in SF2V are more powerful. The fight scenes are good overall, with a few very noticable failings.

Ken, on the scene
Ken doesn’t get as big a role as he deserves.

RUNDOWN

In conclusion…The dubbing is great across the board. The characterization, especially in the cases of Ken and Akuma are absolutely fabulous. I’m just as eager to see a new Alpha anime as I was to see this one. Let’s hope they pick up the ball and use all the buildup they gave us in this one and make a sequel, and please… NO ORIGINAL CHARACTERS. Final verdict: If you are a big fan of SF, rent this, it’s worth watching at least once.

Reader review by Blaine. Send comments here.

• Publisher/Developer: Ryokodisk
• Reader Review by: Blaine