The Ideon: Be Invoked

The Ideon: Be Invoked is the thrilling conclusion to the Space Runaway Ideon franchise. In my eyes this is one of the best anime movies of all time and still is today, almost 35 years after its release. A little bit of background is necessary coming into this movie. Space Runaway Ideon was a television series that aired from 1980 to 1981. Originally intended to last a full year, the show got cancelled after 39 episodes. The show’s director and much of the crew had been involved with the show Mobile Suit Gundam, which had suffered a similar fate, but had been provided with a4 episode extension to finish the series. The show’s staff tried for the same with Ideon, including even storyboarding the final 4 episodes, but were unable to get the extension. As such those final 4 episodes were never produced, and the final episode of the series ends right in the middle of the action with a very brief and disappointing end sequence. Thankfully the show’s staff were provided the opportunity to finish the story with a pair of movies. The first, A Contact, is a compilation movie covering the majority of the series. As a viewer you have the option to either watch that movie before seeing this one, or watching the first 38 episodes of the television series. My recommendation would be to watch the television series. The depth of character development can’t be matched with the brief compilation movie and said movie leaves things out, enough so that you will be confused by certain aspects of this movie. Be Invoked provides us with an edited version of the final episode of the TV series (with the ending sequence removed) and those final 4 episodes of footage that never got created. It provides a conclusion ending to the franchise. This movie is the highlight of the Ideon in pretty much all respects. It greatly builds upon the characters and storyline from the TV series. Technically the movie truly shines in several respects. The animation of the movie is quite strong, significantly surpassing that of the series (significant portions of the final episode, which appear in this movie were reanimated). The franchise’s character designer/animation director Tomonori Kogawa truly does a great job here and I’ve heard that he personally animated significant parts of this movie on his own. Admittingly, I’m a biased fan of late 70’s and 80’s anime, but I think the animation quality here really stands up, even today. The music of this movie is also breathtaking. They really went full out with it. The epic scenes in the movie are made all the more so by the music supporting them. The music delivers regarding of what the scene calls for, whether it’s thrilling battle music, more somber themes or something else. There have been individuals who have listened to this movie’s music and weren’t even aware it came from an anime such as this, it is so grand in scale and style. The director and animators also don’t flinch from using interesting style choices throughout. For example the movie even features some live action footage, something virtually unheard for the format of this era. The setting of the movie takes place entirely in space and a significant portion of the running time is the various battles between our heroes, the crew of the Solo Ship and their enemies, the humanoid alien Buff Clan. This is space opera and combat at its finest. Some tremendous battle sequences throughout the movie that don’t ever leave you bored. The sheer scale of things is often impressive, and is greatly helped by the movie format. At the same time, the movie contains enough character and plot scenes to provide a proper conclusion to the story threads and character arcs that took place throughout the series. This includes proper resolution to one of the show’s biggest mysteries in the nature of the Ide, the energy that powers the Ideon. I’d really only have 2 warnings for people wanting to see this for the first time. First, the movie has a reputation that has a good chance of overshadowing the viewing experience. The vast majority of the people who see this movie likely are into it due to its notoriety and as such will be at least somewhat spoiled. I think the movie lives up to the hype (granted I saw it long before there was any hype over it in the first place), but there is the possibility that one expects so much of it that it can’t hope to live up to their expectations. The movie also has some content that will offend some. This movie is extremely violent and gruesome at times and doesn’t hold back. For example, the movie opens with a character seeing his love interest decapitated by an explosion, her bloody head flying past him. There is a particularly infamous scene where one of the young children gets killed in similarly gruesome fashion. The movie also contains a significant amount of nudity. I would hope that most viewers wouldn’t avoid the movie for these reasons, but they are things to consider before watching it. Strong animation and music, thrilling space battles and plot twists, resolution and answers to the storyline from the series, I couldn’t recommend this movie further.

"Be Invoked" is absolutely fantastic, but it doesn't stand on its own (unless you just like pretty animation and gruesome deaths). If you want to care at all about any of the characters or understand any of what's going on, you'll either have to watch "A Contact" or the TV show first, neither of which quite match the standards of Be Invoked. If you watch "A Contact", you'll get a compressed version and miss much of the characterization. If you watch the TV series, you're in for a long haul of 39 episodes, some of which are just garbage, but the last~17 episodes are great and set the stage for "Be Invoked" in the way that "A Contact" doesn't. Let's get this out of the way first: this movie is infamous. If you've seen End of Evangelion, you know what to expect, since Evangelion was partly inspired by Ideon. The only reason I can imagine that this movie is listed as being PG-13 instead of R is because the characters almost never bleed, even when they have massive head wounds—and the movie hands out massive head wounds like candy. If you are feeling down, or in the mood for something light, just watch something else. But this movie isn't just infamous for body count or on-screen decapitations, it's infamous because it makes you care about each one of those deaths. That's because the characters are superb. Everyone has been pushed to the breaking point and shows their growth. Karala is confident, Sheryl is broken, Lotta is courageous, Kasha shows restraint, and Cosmo has the tranquility to accept his fate when he can't change it. It's unfortunate, but if you missed the first part of the story, then none of this means anything to you. The villains are also a cut above the standard fare from the TV series: Doba is not only fearsome but conscientious, and Harulu is strong but at the same time she can't see beyond her own pain (again... which you missed if you skipped first part of the story). Kasha and Cosmo get a nice moment together which stays true to their characters and doesn't resort to cliche. By modern standards, the animation and action sequences hold up remarkably well. Gone are the copy-pasted fight sequences from the series, and we have beautiful, fluid scenes in their place. Itano, who also did key animation on the Cowboy Bebop movie and the good Urusei Yatsura movie, is said to have inspired a generation of animators and this movie is a part of that legacy. In spite of the plot's galactic scale, the movie is economical. Scan through the movie all you like, you won't find anything worth cutting. No clumsy exposition, forced plot movement, or shoehorned character development. It all fits together organically. This beautiful economy starts right from the opening scene, which does more justice to Cosmo and Kitty's relationship in two minutes than all of episodes #23-25 could manage in a full hour. This is followed by a rework of episode #39, which shows a marked improvement over an already great episode in half the running time. With the occasional pause for breath, the pace continues for the full running length of the movie. If this had aired on TV instead, it would probably be a full 13-episode cour all by itself. Be Invoked's theme is about whether people can escape bad karma. To that end, you may want to read a little bit about Buddhism before you sit down with the movie. The story's conflict started almost accidentally, perhaps it was nothing more than a misunderstanding, but at this point both sides are so attached to the conflict that they can't escape its gruesome conclusion. Even when the Ide delivers the possibility of peace on a silver platter, nobody can see past their own desire for war. Sometimes your only hope is to find happiness in the next life. This core message is why people can say that Be Invoked has such a happy and sad ending. I find it difficult to think of any real flaws in the movie, except one. Simply put, this is not just a hidden gem of 80s mecha anime, but a masterpiece. It's such a shame that the movie doesn't hold up by itself.

It was all worth it. The awful first half, the nonsensical battles, the bizarre nature of the Ideon, neither side willing to negotiate after failed attempts to do so... The movie rendeemd all of the TV show's faults and goes far beyond its original scope. It's hard to believe this was originaly intended to be a bunch of episodes as the flow of the entire film is quite smooth. The score definitely helps in this case; we go from typical campy and upbeat songs you'd expect from an old-school anime to a proper orchesrta adding their colourful and rich sound to the events that unfold. All ofthe character deaths, monologues and fights were much more impactful this time around and I was genuinely moved the entire time. The ending in particular had me in tears; it was cathartic an paradoxically hopeful, despite all the destruction that took place. However, Tomino finally had the chance to focus on Ide, the mystery behind it and the meaning behind the constant fighting.. In the end... There simply is no meaning! Ideon was Tomino's call to love life itself and to cherish the people and the world around you. Having a selfish and single-minded kind of thinking will ruin not only you and the ones around you, but all of us as a species. To deny that this is how we got here would simply be delusional; especially if one were to examine humanity's course after the Industrial Revolution. However, wether or not that was inevitable is a completely different discussion And yet Tomino showed all that nearly 20 years before Turn A Gundam too! Ideon is often cited as an inspiration to Neon Genesis Evangelion and having seen both, I can definitely see the similarities; although if you come from EVA first (probably like most people), it will take some time before the similarities can manifest. Howver, by the end of both shows (and their respective "The End of" movies) EVA's Human Instrumentality Project and the Ide's power as well as the motivations behind each one will not seem very different. Both however draw heavily from Arthur C. Clarke's 1962 novel "Childhood's End" or "The Overlords: The End of Childhood" as it was printed in Greece in the mid 70s. Man, what an experience this was. Good art can make you feel so powerful and energetic. You can of course make the arguement that all art is a product, but that is a completely different discussion... I for one belive that there is in fact a complex distinction between a piece of art and a product. Space! Runaway!!

The Ideon: Be Invoked it's the second and last movie of a compilation of the series Space Runaway Ideon created by the infamous Yoshiyuki (Kill'em all) Tomino. Story 10/10 the story is very appealing and well developed at least in this second movie, there's a lot of tragedy, a lot of killing, all of them caused because the two enemy factions are unable to understand each other and they make their small diferences bigger then their really are. At the end of it all the hatred, the pride, the desire for vengeance and the willing to live, merge in one of the most epicand tragic ending you could see Art 10/10 the art is outstanding especially for the time it was made Sound 10/10 it manages to create an great atmosphere Character 5/10 completely underdeveloped, never get to know any of the characters past, motivations, or distinctive personalities, somehow the spectator can feel for them, but it's unable to relate to them.