Crayon Shin-chan: Blitzkrieg! Pig’s Hoof’s Secret Mission [Review]

Hello!
Today I’m reviewing this movie!

Contents

Story

I’m Shinnosuke Nohara, five years old. And Earth is in big trouble again!!
Present day. A secret organisation called Pig’s Hoof, bent on world domination, tricks the electronics genius Dr. Ofukuro and his assistant Angela Koume into building a terrifying computer virus. An agent of the secret justice organisation SML, codename “Oiroke,” gets wind of it, steals the case holding the password needed to run the machine, and escapes into the waters off Odaiba. The houseboat she scrambles aboard, looking for help, just happens to be hosting a full-blown party — the teachers and kids of Futaba Kindergarten, Shinnosuke among them! Aboard a giant airship, Oiroke and the whole Kasukabe Defense Force spring into action to protect the peace of the planet! Dad and Mum grab Himawari and stand up to rescue us too! Alright — dumb power, full blast!!
(C) Yoshito Usui / Futabasha, Shin-Ei Animation, TV Asahi, ADK 1998

https://www.amazon.co.jp/dp/B019A6NBY6

Thoughts & Review

Don’t write it off just because it’s Crayon Shin-chan

“It’s a cartoon, right?”

Fair enough — that’s the natural reaction. But being animated is exactly what lets this film use vehicles and weapons you could never film for real, move its characters however it likes, and set a scene anywhere it pleases without a location shoot. Don’t forget that!

The characters are great

Mouse

The leader of the secret society “Pig’s Hoof.” A shaven-headed man in glasses, dressed rather plainly for the boss of a giant evil organisation.
— Wikipedia

Mouse is the villain, out to rule the world through cyberterrorism.

And just look at him — he’s modelled on Steve Jobs lol

Oiroke

“Oiroke” is a codename; her real name is unknown. A female SML agent who wears nothing but a thin bodysuit. Early in the story she steals the disc containing the password that activates the secret weapon from Pig’s Hoof headquarters and flees to the houseboat carrying the kindergarten group. Pig’s Hoof’s airship catches up, seizes the houseboat whole, and she is captured along with Shinnosuke and the others who could not get away in time.
— Wikipedia

Kinniku

“Kinniku” is a codename; his real name is unknown. An SML agent, a large and heavily muscled man. He turns up at Hiroshi and Misae’s place to pump them for information about Shinnosuke, gets thoroughly out-manoeuvred by the pair, and ends up joining forces with them.
— Wikipedia

Dr. Ofukuro and Angela Koume

Dr. Ofukuro is an elderly authority on electronics, a graduate of the University of Tokyo, MIT and the New York Institute of Technology. He created the computer virus “Buriburizaemon”: back when he lived in Kasukabe, he saw one of Shinnosuke’s doodles that Misae had thrown out of the window and built the program around it. He and his assistant Angela Koume were later held by Pig’s Hoof — though in truth he had been helping them all along, out of a private desire to see his own research completed. He believes slippers to be humanity’s greatest invention and wears them everywhere he goes. He is fixated on backsides, and has no interest in any other part of a woman’s body.

Angela Koume is Dr. Ofukuro’s assistant. A middle-aged okama who says she realised who she was at twelve. Her facial outline looks a great deal like Shinnosuke’s, something she remarks on herself in the film.
— Wikipedia

There are three more enemy officers on top of that — specialists in guns, knives and hand-to-hand — and every one of them is tough.

It’s also very cool that one of the villains is voiced by Kōichi Yamadera.

Comedy and action

The film keeps all the series staples, the drag-queen gags and the rest, firmly in place.

And the villains are the real thing.

The guns, the knives, the violence — it’s heavy stuff, and they are genuinely out to kill.

The way they set out to pull off a serious act of cyberterrorism might remind you of Live Free or Die Hard.

And then the way it ends…

It got me. I cried.

The animation is astonishing

The gunfights and hand-to-hand combat are drawn with a pursuit of realism, and the film is known for its intense action sequences. Every firearm that appears is a real model, and the animation reference sheets were researched down to the shape of the muzzle flash and the magazine capacity. The unarmed fights drew on action films such as Police Story 3 (1992); in a pamphlet interview, director Hara said he “aimed for a slightly old-fashioned, nostalgic adventure-action film on the theme of fiery friendship.”
— Wikipedia

As that interview suggests, the close-quarters fighting and the weapons are rendered with real precision. Look closely at the animation and the way a gun moves as it fires is drawn almost exactly as it would look in live action. It’s remarkable.

Honestly, it’s incredible!!

The skill it takes to deform the human body like this and still land it inside Crayon Shin-chan’s art style!

Without a real understanding of the skeleton underneath, the perspective would fall apart — and it never does. That is genuinely impressive. A bit like Kishimoto on Naruto.

The firearms that appear are as follows.

• FAMAS F1 — the assault rifle used by Kinniku.
• Desert Eagle — the semi-automatic pistol used by Kinniku.
• H&K MP5KA2 — the submachine gun carried as the main weapon by rank-and-file Pig’s Hoof soldiers. This is also the one Oiroke takes off them.
• Beretta M92FS — the sidearm of the rank-and-file Pig’s Hoof soldiers.
• Colt Government — the semi-automatic pistol Barrel carries a pair of.

The theme was a good one

This came out in 1998, right around the time Apple shipped the original iMac.

Picking cyberterrorism as your subject in those early days of the information age — what taste!

It’s a well-worn theme now, but think about when this was made. And it’s a Japanese animated film, no less??

Isn’t that something?

On top of that, as I said, the care poured into the firearms and the close-quarters fighting is superb.

By the final act you’re into a virtual world — VR, in other words.

And the fact that the villains use an AI to carry out their cyberattack is ahead of its time as well.

Highly recommended!