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Review: Promare (プロメア) (2019)
Promare was AWESOME. Just an unhinged jam-packed action anime. I would definitely recommend this movie. It was really exciting.
Spoilers.
Story
The story for this movie was extremely simple and I could see it coming from a mile away. When Kray Foresight first appeared, I already knew he was going to be the final villain. He had for the look for it lol. Anyway, the story is as follows.
30 years ago, humans started spontaneously combusting. To combat these fires, the Burnish Rescue team was established. Through a series of scuffles, Galo and Lio become known to each other, Galo a member of the Burnish Rescue team, and Lio the leader of Mad Burnish, a Burnish extremist group.
It was revealed that Kray Foresight, a mentor figure to Galo and the governor of Promepolis, was conducting experiments on Burnish, using them as fuel to run a warp machine that would take humans to another planet, as the Burnish were causing the Earth to be unstable.
Galo and Lio find themselves in the facility run by the AI conscience of Deus Prometh, the scientist whom Kray had stolen research from. Deus revealed that the fire was actually species from another dimension called Promare and Burnish happened to be people who could resonate with those beings. Deus provided Galo and Lio with a suit to fight Kray. During the fight, it was revealed that Kray was also a Burnish.
In order to save the world, Galo and Lio had to let the world burn so that the Promare could burn to their satisfaction. At the same time, they enveloped the people with fire to protect them. After burning to their hearts’ content, the Promare left, leaving Earth as it was.
It was a very typical action storyline where the hero found out that someone they trusted was the villain, and then fought to save the world. Somehow, it didn’t bother me in this movie, and I think perhaps it was because the story was kept pretty simple.
The writing wasn’t the best but it did its job. What I mean by that was that there was a lot of exposition for the benefit of the audience. This would not be realistic, but it gave us information in the most effective way. We were also given title cards to introduce people and mecha suits, which I felt were more effective in an action anime.
There was also some fanservice but I’m glad it didn’t overtake the real point of the movie, which was the action. I kind of rolled my eyes when we first saw Aina in action because we saw her from a rear view shot. The motorcycle-like set up of her plane was solely so that the audience could see her bent over, let’s be real. As well, the first time we saw Lio trying to revive a Burnish, I just KNEW that mouth-to-mouth would come back and indeed it did. And in typical anime fashion, Galo made a huge deal about it. But overall I’m very pleased that this movie focused on the balls-to-the-wall action and visual style. More on that below.
Production
The style of this anime was very dynamic and exciting. Right from the beginning, we saw that the visual style was very unique and stylistic, using a lot of geometric shapes as opposed to softer more human lines, which makes sense considering that mecha is a huge theme of this movie. I also really enjoyed how the animation blended 2d and 3d features. A lot of the dynamic action scenes looked like both because of how smoothly it was animated, and it also helped to show us dynamic moving backdrops. There was also a bit of stop-motion-like pacing to the acting that really emphasized the impact of things when fighting, and that was really awesome.
I also want to shout out the voice acting, which was especially awesome in the action scenes. This was a movie where the voice acting really elevated the excitement.
I’m not a big mecha person, but I can very much appreciate the mecha designs. I will say I prefer Galo’s Matoi design the most because of its traditional influences, but I appreciate the various designs throughout the movie.
Characters
Galo Thymos
The hero of our movie, and very much a typical shonen jock. However, I appreciated that he was more…self aware? He knew that he was reckless, he acknowledged it when people called him an idiot, he understood that his brute force methods weren’t always the best, but he was confident in his own ways. I also got the sense that he knew he was kind of a nerd for wanting to look cool.
Aside from being a jock, Galo also took being a firefighter very seriously, which was what drove him through the story. He wanted to catch Mad Burnish, so they’d stop hurting people in fires, and he softened a bit when Lio explained that they intended only to send a message and not to hurt people. And of course it was his conviction about being a firefighter that drove him to save the world.
Pretty entertaining baka shonen protagonist, I must say.
Lio Fotia
Right from the moment we met Lio, I knew he was going to be shipped with Galo lol. Lio was the leader of Mad Burnish, and a powerful Burnish himself. He was just as determined as Galo with regards to his goal, which was to free the Burnish from the Foresight foundation and basically keep them safe. He just wanted justice for the Burnish, who were just humans.
Lio was captured by the Foresight Foundation and tried to break them out. He was successful at first, but they were captured again by the Freeze Force (working on behalf of Foresight), and only Lio escaped. Lio returned with a vengeance, and after a fight with Galo, they landed in Prometh’s lab where they found the Deus X Machina. Lio and Galo, with the power of their combined determination, fought Foresight, and then burned the world while protecting humans so that the Promare would leave.
Kray Foresight
Kray was the governor of Promepolis and the leader of Foresight Foundation, a research facility. When Galo was young, Kray saved from a burning house and that was how they began a mentor-mentee relationship.
Lio revealed that the Foresight Foundation was doing experiments on Burnish. When Kray later visited the facility, he saw that it was true, that Foresight was using Burnish as literal fuel for the warp machines to take humans off of this planet. It was then that we saw Foresight change his attitude to Galo, stating that he’d always found Galo a nuisance, and had him arrested.
Foresight selfishly wanted to build a ship to go to the nearest habitable planet, taking only 10,000 humans with him, and leaving the burning world behind. It would burn because of the combustion machines required to run the spaceship. Lio and Galo of course wanted to stop him.
In their eventual confrontation, Foresight revealed that he was a Burnish, and that he had accidentally set Galo’s house on fire, and turned the situation into ‘saving’ him to gain some positive publicity for himself and his political career. He had assigned Galo to be a firefighter because he wanted him to die off but Galo just kept coming back, which was why Foresight found him an eyesore.
At the end, after the Promare have left the planet, Foresight is seen not very happy with the fact that he wasn’t a Burnish anymore, calling it overkill. We don’t know what the repercussions of his crimes will be, but at least they’ll probably come to light.
Aina Ardebit
Aina was a member of the Burnish Rescue team, piloting the plane. She had a sister Heris who was a scientist at the Foresight Foundation. She constantly lived in Heris’ shadow as Heris was a prodigy. However, Aina retained that she loved Heris. Aina was also supposed to have a suggested romantic relationship with Galo. They had an almost-kiss but it didn’t happen (on the other hand, Galo did kiss Lio lol).
Aina was the one who took Galo and Lio to the lake where Prometh’s lab was. After they were off, Aina returned to the rescue team, and saved her sister as well as the people of Promepolis.
Remi Puguna
Remi was a member of the Burnish Rescue team, one of the mecha suit pilots. He was supposed to be more logical and calm. Also megane-kun.
Varys Truss
Varys was the other mecha suit pilot in the Burnish Rescue team. He apparently had super strength that was acknowledged in-universe, and I wonder if it meant that he was literally a supernatural being.
Lucia Fex
Lucia was a member of the Burnish Rescue team as the scientist and the tech person. She basically handled comms when Varys and Remi were off fighting. She was also an inventor, constantly upgrading the mecha suit for Galo. She picked up a pet mouse during the movie.
Ignis Ex
Ignis was the leader of the Burnish Rescue team. He was protective of his crew, and constantly got into conflicts with Vulcan from the Freeze Force over matters of jurisdiction.
Heris Ardebit
Heris was a prodigy scientist working with Foresight on researching the warp machines. To be honest, I felt that Heris got off easy. She was conducting these experiments knowingly hurting the Burnish, but that was swept under the rug because she “never wanted this to happen.” Heris also intended for Aina to join the spaceship that would leave Earth but Aina was busy saving Promepolis and couldn’t make it in time.
After Foresight’s crimes were revealed, Heris decided to overwork the combustion so that the spaceship would break. Then she was tracked down by the Freeze Force for defying Foresight, but Aina saved her.
Biar Colossus
Biar was Foresight’s assistant.
Vulcan Haestus
Vulcan was the head of the Freeze Force and he often swooped in right after the Burnish Rescue team finished their work to take the credit. That often involved apprehending Mad Burnish members when Burnish Rescue had done the actual work in arresting them. As well, Vulcan had also wanted to arrest Galo for engaging with terrorists as it was against the law, which was ridiculous.
We saw that Vulcan and the Freeze Force worked more like the military branch of the Foresight Foundation, tracking down Burnish for the Foresight Foundation experiments, and tracking down people on Foresight’s personal commands.
Gueira & Meis
Gueira and Meis were two members of Mad Burnish who were loyal to Lio.
Deus Prometh
Deus was a scientist researching anti-Burnish methods. Foresight murdered him and stole the credit for his work. Deus had uploaded his conscience to a machine to keep his memories and legacy. Lio, Galo, and Aina fell into his facility by chance and it was there that Deus explained what Promare were to them. Deus also decked out Lio and Galo with the Deus X Machina to help them defeat Foresight. It was also Deus’ footage that was broadcast to the Foresight foundation members so they would know of Foresight’s crimes.
Themes
Discrimination was the biggest and most prominent theme in this movie. Burnish were characterized by the authorities as arsonists who enjoyed harming people. After getting to know Lio, Galo understood that Burnish were people who had been mistreated and villainized by Foresight so that they could be used for his cruel experiments. Mad Burnish as an extremist organization only wished to draw attention to the injustices of their people, and Lio emphasized that its members always gave people a way out and that humans were not the targets.
It was revealed that Kray was also a Burnish, but he looked down on other Burnish and saw himself as superior because he did not let the first control him. He also wished to exploit Burnish despite being one of them, which was hypocritical and cruel.
At the end of the movie, nobody was a Burnish anymore, everybody was just human. By levelling the playing field again, people would all understand that everyone is just a human, trying to live.
Overall
Awesome movie because of its action. In the first rescue scene, I realized that this was going to be a movie that I had to be seated and focused on because the visuals were amazing. The story was fine, it was simple and I liked that it didn’t try to get too complicated. Highly recommend this movie!
Spoilers.
Story
The story for this movie was extremely simple and I could see it coming from a mile away. When Kray Foresight first appeared, I already knew he was going to be the final villain. He had for the look for it lol. Anyway, the story is as follows.
30 years ago, humans started spontaneously combusting. To combat these fires, the Burnish Rescue team was established. Through a series of scuffles, Galo and Lio become known to each other, Galo a member of the Burnish Rescue team, and Lio the leader of Mad Burnish, a Burnish extremist group.
It was revealed that Kray Foresight, a mentor figure to Galo and the governor of Promepolis, was conducting experiments on Burnish, using them as fuel to run a warp machine that would take humans to another planet, as the Burnish were causing the Earth to be unstable.
Galo and Lio find themselves in the facility run by the AI conscience of Deus Prometh, the scientist whom Kray had stolen research from. Deus revealed that the fire was actually species from another dimension called Promare and Burnish happened to be people who could resonate with those beings. Deus provided Galo and Lio with a suit to fight Kray. During the fight, it was revealed that Kray was also a Burnish.
In order to save the world, Galo and Lio had to let the world burn so that the Promare could burn to their satisfaction. At the same time, they enveloped the people with fire to protect them. After burning to their hearts’ content, the Promare left, leaving Earth as it was.
It was a very typical action storyline where the hero found out that someone they trusted was the villain, and then fought to save the world. Somehow, it didn’t bother me in this movie, and I think perhaps it was because the story was kept pretty simple.
The writing wasn’t the best but it did its job. What I mean by that was that there was a lot of exposition for the benefit of the audience. This would not be realistic, but it gave us information in the most effective way. We were also given title cards to introduce people and mecha suits, which I felt were more effective in an action anime.
There was also some fanservice but I’m glad it didn’t overtake the real point of the movie, which was the action. I kind of rolled my eyes when we first saw Aina in action because we saw her from a rear view shot. The motorcycle-like set up of her plane was solely so that the audience could see her bent over, let’s be real. As well, the first time we saw Lio trying to revive a Burnish, I just KNEW that mouth-to-mouth would come back and indeed it did. And in typical anime fashion, Galo made a huge deal about it. But overall I’m very pleased that this movie focused on the balls-to-the-wall action and visual style. More on that below.
Production
The style of this anime was very dynamic and exciting. Right from the beginning, we saw that the visual style was very unique and stylistic, using a lot of geometric shapes as opposed to softer more human lines, which makes sense considering that mecha is a huge theme of this movie. I also really enjoyed how the animation blended 2d and 3d features. A lot of the dynamic action scenes looked like both because of how smoothly it was animated, and it also helped to show us dynamic moving backdrops. There was also a bit of stop-motion-like pacing to the acting that really emphasized the impact of things when fighting, and that was really awesome.
I also want to shout out the voice acting, which was especially awesome in the action scenes. This was a movie where the voice acting really elevated the excitement.
I’m not a big mecha person, but I can very much appreciate the mecha designs. I will say I prefer Galo’s Matoi design the most because of its traditional influences, but I appreciate the various designs throughout the movie.
Characters
Galo Thymos
The hero of our movie, and very much a typical shonen jock. However, I appreciated that he was more…self aware? He knew that he was reckless, he acknowledged it when people called him an idiot, he understood that his brute force methods weren’t always the best, but he was confident in his own ways. I also got the sense that he knew he was kind of a nerd for wanting to look cool.
Aside from being a jock, Galo also took being a firefighter very seriously, which was what drove him through the story. He wanted to catch Mad Burnish, so they’d stop hurting people in fires, and he softened a bit when Lio explained that they intended only to send a message and not to hurt people. And of course it was his conviction about being a firefighter that drove him to save the world.
Pretty entertaining baka shonen protagonist, I must say.
Lio Fotia
Right from the moment we met Lio, I knew he was going to be shipped with Galo lol. Lio was the leader of Mad Burnish, and a powerful Burnish himself. He was just as determined as Galo with regards to his goal, which was to free the Burnish from the Foresight foundation and basically keep them safe. He just wanted justice for the Burnish, who were just humans.
Lio was captured by the Foresight Foundation and tried to break them out. He was successful at first, but they were captured again by the Freeze Force (working on behalf of Foresight), and only Lio escaped. Lio returned with a vengeance, and after a fight with Galo, they landed in Prometh’s lab where they found the Deus X Machina. Lio and Galo, with the power of their combined determination, fought Foresight, and then burned the world while protecting humans so that the Promare would leave.
Kray Foresight
Kray was the governor of Promepolis and the leader of Foresight Foundation, a research facility. When Galo was young, Kray saved from a burning house and that was how they began a mentor-mentee relationship.
Lio revealed that the Foresight Foundation was doing experiments on Burnish. When Kray later visited the facility, he saw that it was true, that Foresight was using Burnish as literal fuel for the warp machines to take humans off of this planet. It was then that we saw Foresight change his attitude to Galo, stating that he’d always found Galo a nuisance, and had him arrested.
Foresight selfishly wanted to build a ship to go to the nearest habitable planet, taking only 10,000 humans with him, and leaving the burning world behind. It would burn because of the combustion machines required to run the spaceship. Lio and Galo of course wanted to stop him.
In their eventual confrontation, Foresight revealed that he was a Burnish, and that he had accidentally set Galo’s house on fire, and turned the situation into ‘saving’ him to gain some positive publicity for himself and his political career. He had assigned Galo to be a firefighter because he wanted him to die off but Galo just kept coming back, which was why Foresight found him an eyesore.
At the end, after the Promare have left the planet, Foresight is seen not very happy with the fact that he wasn’t a Burnish anymore, calling it overkill. We don’t know what the repercussions of his crimes will be, but at least they’ll probably come to light.
Aina Ardebit
Aina was a member of the Burnish Rescue team, piloting the plane. She had a sister Heris who was a scientist at the Foresight Foundation. She constantly lived in Heris’ shadow as Heris was a prodigy. However, Aina retained that she loved Heris. Aina was also supposed to have a suggested romantic relationship with Galo. They had an almost-kiss but it didn’t happen (on the other hand, Galo did kiss Lio lol).
Aina was the one who took Galo and Lio to the lake where Prometh’s lab was. After they were off, Aina returned to the rescue team, and saved her sister as well as the people of Promepolis.
Remi Puguna
Remi was a member of the Burnish Rescue team, one of the mecha suit pilots. He was supposed to be more logical and calm. Also megane-kun.
Varys Truss
Varys was the other mecha suit pilot in the Burnish Rescue team. He apparently had super strength that was acknowledged in-universe, and I wonder if it meant that he was literally a supernatural being.
Lucia Fex
Lucia was a member of the Burnish Rescue team as the scientist and the tech person. She basically handled comms when Varys and Remi were off fighting. She was also an inventor, constantly upgrading the mecha suit for Galo. She picked up a pet mouse during the movie.
Ignis Ex
Ignis was the leader of the Burnish Rescue team. He was protective of his crew, and constantly got into conflicts with Vulcan from the Freeze Force over matters of jurisdiction.
Heris Ardebit
Heris was a prodigy scientist working with Foresight on researching the warp machines. To be honest, I felt that Heris got off easy. She was conducting these experiments knowingly hurting the Burnish, but that was swept under the rug because she “never wanted this to happen.” Heris also intended for Aina to join the spaceship that would leave Earth but Aina was busy saving Promepolis and couldn’t make it in time.
After Foresight’s crimes were revealed, Heris decided to overwork the combustion so that the spaceship would break. Then she was tracked down by the Freeze Force for defying Foresight, but Aina saved her.
Biar Colossus
Biar was Foresight’s assistant.
Vulcan Haestus
Vulcan was the head of the Freeze Force and he often swooped in right after the Burnish Rescue team finished their work to take the credit. That often involved apprehending Mad Burnish members when Burnish Rescue had done the actual work in arresting them. As well, Vulcan had also wanted to arrest Galo for engaging with terrorists as it was against the law, which was ridiculous.
We saw that Vulcan and the Freeze Force worked more like the military branch of the Foresight Foundation, tracking down Burnish for the Foresight Foundation experiments, and tracking down people on Foresight’s personal commands.
Gueira & Meis
Gueira and Meis were two members of Mad Burnish who were loyal to Lio.
Deus Prometh
Deus was a scientist researching anti-Burnish methods. Foresight murdered him and stole the credit for his work. Deus had uploaded his conscience to a machine to keep his memories and legacy. Lio, Galo, and Aina fell into his facility by chance and it was there that Deus explained what Promare were to them. Deus also decked out Lio and Galo with the Deus X Machina to help them defeat Foresight. It was also Deus’ footage that was broadcast to the Foresight foundation members so they would know of Foresight’s crimes.
Themes
Discrimination was the biggest and most prominent theme in this movie. Burnish were characterized by the authorities as arsonists who enjoyed harming people. After getting to know Lio, Galo understood that Burnish were people who had been mistreated and villainized by Foresight so that they could be used for his cruel experiments. Mad Burnish as an extremist organization only wished to draw attention to the injustices of their people, and Lio emphasized that its members always gave people a way out and that humans were not the targets.
It was revealed that Kray was also a Burnish, but he looked down on other Burnish and saw himself as superior because he did not let the first control him. He also wished to exploit Burnish despite being one of them, which was hypocritical and cruel.
At the end of the movie, nobody was a Burnish anymore, everybody was just human. By levelling the playing field again, people would all understand that everyone is just a human, trying to live.
Overall
Awesome movie because of its action. In the first rescue scene, I realized that this was going to be a movie that I had to be seated and focused on because the visuals were amazing. The story was fine, it was simple and I liked that it didn’t try to get too complicated. Highly recommend this movie!