Steven Egan Let me preface this by saying I don't watch a lot of anime, and when I do it's Howl's Moving Castle, or something along those lines. I think I came across Dead Leaves by googling for abstract or surreal movies or something like that, and the synopsis intrigued me so...why not?The good: inventively insane visuals, unusual but effective animation styleThe bad: everything else. Terrible, repetitive music. The plot is somewhere between flimsy and nonexistent. The characters are just vehicles for crude humor and gruesome violence, with no merit of their own.I watched with interest for about 20 minutes as things just got progressively weirder and weirder, but it eventually became clear that the movie was going to just be an endless stream of pointless violence and crude humor and that's all, so I turned it off. If you already know and are familiar with this type of anime then maybe it will work for you. If you're looking for any degree of substance, then keep looking.

Angels_Review This is a kind of rather wacky and out of control, kind of like FLCL and SuperJail. I will not have you watch this without a warning, this show is really over the top, packed with sex, poop, gore, and pretty much any type of joke around. Those who take offense to any of this or are young children should leave the room, as I will probably be talking about stuff like that in this review. Are they gone? Alright, back to the review.This show is, hard to actually review as it's that type of humor that you either get it or you don't. Its not something you can actually explain well or have a large discussion about because then it loses its humor. We all know (or at least any Otaku out there who watches anime can tell you) how strange and odd Japan is. Frankly, I believe it's partly because of how strict their country was on honor, morals, and codes of conduct. Those who did not have these standards had to hid or be killed. With that little bit of history, I can see why they have something like this. It's out of control including many scenes of sex and gore. Many different… should I really call them 'fetishes' are pronounced in here like tubes up the ass and all manner of gross images I can never unsee.The story has an interesting storyline, and YES, it does have one. They actually didn't just throw crap into it and try to make a show off of something that doesn't have consistency. It follows two main characters, Pandy and Retro as they call themselves, who one day wake up without any idea who they are or what they are doing naked near a futuristic Tokyo. They start on a crime spree and it takes no time for them to be caught and sent to the moon prison where they find that they and so many others are rejected clones. They try to free themselves and that's as far as I can go without spoiling anything more. If I read into it, and I have to review such a thing, I would consider this more of the dangers of mass cloning and those trying to figure out their place in life. I can only guess that because there is very little to work with. We got a bunch of rejected clones fighting to have their own life.The animation, lets face it, its god awful, not looking like the banner or cover at all. But yet, I have to say this is one of those shows that I really didn't care much. Similar to Panty and Stocking, it has its own interesting spin, although creepy. All the shadows are done in black, leaving rather jagged edges to even more jagged characters. Sometimes it's hard to pick out what are backgrounds and what's a character because the bodies elongate and squash depending on the scene, sometimes filling the whole screen to the point that they look more like a strange deformed background. It doesn't help that everything is a mass of oddly shaped colors pieced together like a puzzle. A lot of times when Pandy is pregnant, her belly changes shape, growing and shrinking from scene to scene.The aliens are actually rather creative, including an alien that has a dick that's a drill (Although I really freaken don't want to know more about him!).The English voices are actually pretty good, being dubbed to each character. Jaxon Lee and Amanda Winn-Lee do pretty good jobs as Retro and Pandy, playing off each others personalities as well as keep the characters interesting. Pandy is almost always in monotone, while Retro seems not able to hold himself back and has a tone of energy (think sort of like Naruto from Naruto and Haruko from FLCL had a kid). The music is pretty fast paced and retro sounding, almost like some old action adventure game, but with a lot of techno after tones that make it more sci-fi feeling.It's not something I would really watch again, but it was interesting none the less.

Nan00k I'm not an anime fan. I started to go in to why, but deleted it and decided to write about why I like Dead Leaves. How I am going to do that is by saying that even though I am not a fan of the genre, FLCL is one of my all time favorite viewing experiences. I fell in love with it the moment I saw it, and have owned various DVD releases of it and watched them many times, each viewing finding something new. Until tonight, I was disconsolate that no other anime would ever make me sit up and take notice.Now, Dead Leaves is not quite to FLCL's level, IMO; however, they are kindred spirits. First of all, it's a short, just over 3/4 of an hour, so it didn't have the time to develop its characters or plot as well, neither does it have the bittersweet, weird love story of FLCL, nor the coming of age subtext rife with adolescent realizations that makes FLCL so special, but then again, it doesn't want or need any of these. What it does have are tons of LOL, WTF and "AWESOME!" moments, packed in so tightly, this is something that will need to be watched again and again. It also shares FLCL's humor, twisted sensibility and style.Another comment indicates that the director of Dead Leaves also worked on FLCL, but I can't find confirmation of that here on IMDb; however, I would not be surprised in the slightest that that was the case.This short has given me hope that Japan hasn't only made one anime that I can appreciate. It is confirmed that it has now made at least two.

songmaster2005 When I first heard of this anime, I was a bit apprehensive about it. But the premise intrigued me. That and the fact that the director worked on "FLCL." The animation sort of reminds me of the style used in "INVADER ZIM" and "WORLD RECORD" from the ANIMATRIX. Rregardless, I am glad I decided to pick this up. The premise is: Pandy and Retro (a guy with a TV for a head) wake up naked with no memory. They proceed to then get some clothes, steal a car and lead the police on a wild, gun-blazing, high-speed chase which ends in their arrests. They are then sent to DEAD LEAVES, a prison on the moon. After engineering an escape, they have to contend with the twisted Triple 6, his hulkish brother Triple 7 and the enigmatic Warden. This anime is all over the place! There's guns, explosions, BIGGER guns, sex, penis drills (you have to watch to see)! If you like your anime no-hold's barred and just light years above regular orbit check this out!