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Quote:

Originally Posted by Den-O

Revenge of Belial was so excellent. Zero really gets to shine there, and that's also where they tie into a little bit of Nexus

Including a cameo by Yasue Sato. I almost didn't recognize her because she was smiling.

But yeah, just watched Revenge of Belial and really, really loved it. There was a definite fantasy quest structure to the film that I really liked. It reminded me a bit of 80s fantasy films like Neverending Story or Krull, and as a big fan of those films I definitely enjoyed this.

The visuals were amazing, too. Outside of the few shots where the suit actors were clearly standing on solid ground in the middle of space, the greenscreen work was fantastic and the overall visual design was incredibly inventive and well-executed. Honestly, the whole film really feels like Tsubaraya let the creators just go wild with whatever crazy things popped into their imaginations. This film clearly had a high budget and you can see it in almost every single shot.

It's kind of hard to gather all my immediate love for this film into coherent thought, as there were just so many aspects of it that worked for me. The characters were all great, the suit designs were both varied and fun, the action was good, and the story was really enjoyable. The climax was kind of an ass-pull with the Noa ex machina, but I think it worked better than The One With the Ridiculous Title, if only because that film crammed way, way too much into one movie (Dyna's cameo was great, for example, but also totally out of left field; same with pretty much every aspect of Zero's existence). Still, it was a really fun movie and I know I'll be watching it again at some point.