Star Driver The Movie
I watched this yesterday, and I think someone should probably report back on the verdict instead of just posting gifs from the first 5 minutes of the film. Although, to be honest, for most people who have seen the original series, those few minutes are probably the only thing "worth watching" out of the entire 150min runtime, since the majority of the movie is just a typical recap movie. Having said that though, I think there is something there for those who are actually interested in the series but might not have finished it, or didn't like certain aspects of the series.
For me the most attractive thing about Star Driver was always the promise that it would do for mecha action what Utena did for high school dueling. That promise was never quite met, although the series did try to introduce various themes and metaphors which played on the aspects of how the actions on the island were in many ways a reflection of life lessons young people have to learn before they set out into the world on their own. I think by distilling the content of the series into a single film and removing all the fat and junk, the film actually does a much better job of letting these themes shine.
The structure of the movie is fairly well constructed as well, with a relatively tight Prologue->Act1->Act2->Act3->Climax->Epilogue format. The editing isn't quite as clean and it's still very obvious that the footage is taken from a TV series, but it's serviceable most of the time. It helps that for the most part the series was pretty good looking, but it also means that scenes with lower detail stand out a lot more. One thing which the movie made me appreciate more is how great a lot of the scene layouts and the use of music and song is in Star Driver. When it comes together well, it really works.
Unfortunately, as a whole, the movie also highlights the biggest weakness of the show - many of the characters and the actual story are paper thin and in many cases simply don't work. There are too many tropes and ideas which are thrown together simply for more variety of content in the series which ultimately weakens the work. Even by trimming much of the fat in the film, it feels obvious that beyond the core themes, the production values, and the evocative visuals and sound, there isn't really a strong cohesive narrative tying the entire work together.
But when viewed in a single sitting here, it feels much more forgiveable because the entertainment and reflection provided by exploring the themes solely through sights and sounds creates a much stronger feeling than it did as a TV series.
So yeah, it's still Star Driver, but it contains some of the best of the series, along with a pretty complete vision of the message the show wanted to have, all in a single package lasting 2 hours and 30 minutes. The prologue feels very much like pure fanservice for those who liked the series, giving a tease of what the future holds, but beyond that there really isn't much for those solely looking for "more Star Driver" after the series. But for those looking to give the content of the series another chance, I would certainly recommend trying this instead. It might work for you, it might not, but it certainly feels tighter than the series did when it aired.
