Akira - 1988 -
There are very few anime with the impact that Akira had, especially during a period when the medium was attempting to make its journey to the States. Thanks to the Sci-Fi channel and Toonami, Akira has had a lot of success in the Western market, as it was many Americans' first experience with anime, and that set the bar high. Akira is based on a manga of the same name by Katushiro Otomo, but the film actually released two years before the manga was completed. Luckily, Otomo was able to direct and help write the film, so the overall tone of the original work is preserved in the final cut. Before viewing Akira , I read all six volumes of the original manga, which I would highly recommend to anyone, so I had a reference point for what to expect from the film going into it. The story takes place in a futuristic "Neo-Tokyo," rebuilt from the ashes of the original Tokyo that was nuked years before. Motorcycle gangs and drug lords own the str...