#no judgment ofc get that puss out there

[senruthmartinsbob]

Chica… la jubilación ya gastao o q?

[dweamofsweep]

I’m gonna try to withhold judgment of the show’s contents until we actually get to see it, but man, the visuals have a lot going against them. Especially because the last full-blown remake was 2003 which was (IMO…and I think I’m right lol) the best looking AB adaptation thus far, and made right at the very end of traditional-media-based anime (with those showstopping backgrounds and painted animation cels… beautiful lighting and color choices and the look of being shot on film UGH). It has major league competition and I’m guessing it doesn’t have the budget necessary to match the scale and grandeur in looks alone.

It’s not even that the new stuff is atrocious, I’ve seen much worse trust me. It’s just kind of underwhelming, also considering that 3D animation has been making some very cool stylistical advances (like Spiderverse ofc but also Bad Guys, Puss in Boots: The Last Wish, Nimona, etc.) The images presented thus far seem to be avoiding visual innovation, and that bothers me more than the random lines everywhere on him or the somewhat uncanny eyes.

In terms of story, I was thinking a bit more about it, and I think there could be potential here in the “keeping the fact that he’s a robot secret” sort of thing. I think that moves the allegorical element of being a robot from an identity that you can’t hide, usually race / something visual, to one that you can conceal, like being closeted gay or trans for example. But of course in real life, hiding your authentic self or feeling like it’s unacceptable to others has a lot of psychological consequences. So I think if they at least touch on that aspect that would bring up some interesting points and issues!

It does bother me that the synopsis suggests that Astro is the only robot with feelings / is special in that regard. I think part of the original intent of the story is that all the robots have a soul of some kind, have feelings and thoughts, but because humans have convinced themselves that robots are just machines designed to serve them, they disregard this. Humans play god with tragic consequences for the robots (especially in stories like Greatest/Strongest Robot on Earth). Astro happens to be the best equipped to //appeal// to humanity because the way he looks, and expresses himself, are both very close to being human, but he also still understands and empathizes with the experiences of robots. His origins are very much that of a robot: created with a particular, finite purpose in mind, and when he failed to fulfill it, he was cast aside like a broken tool or machine. However, he was brought back to live like a human kid: go to school, make friends, come home to parents and a sibling(s). So he can form the bridge of understanding between both groups as he integrates into the human world while maintaining his connection to his own kind. The new synopsis makes it seem like all the robots really are just machines without true personalities or consciousness, which is rather uninteresting and kind of raises the question as to why Astro would even care whether humans will accept or treat them well? However, we have to see how this is actually carried out in the real episodes, they may be keeping it vague or misleading on purpose.

So yeah, I think that’s my beef with what I’ve seen so far. Also I’m afraid of what the other characters are going to look like. Astro is usually the one who gets the LEAST messed up. And what exactly the reasoning is going to be for that secret identity thing — if they follow the original canon of him being a government project, that seems super unethical, lying to the public 😂 What do y’all think? I’m also curious about whether or not they will adapt specific stories from the manga, but we likely won’t find that out until much later.