Title: Persona 3 The Movie: #2 Midsummer Knight’s Dream (Gekijoban Perusona 3 dai ni sho)
Format: movie
Genre: video game adaption, action, drama, mystery, supernatural
Series Creator: Altus
Series Director: Tomohisa Taguchi
Studio: A-1 Pictures
Original screening date: June 7, 2014 (Japan)
Reviewed format: high def download with fan subs
Synopsis:
Immediately following the events of the last film, Yuki Makoto and the rest of SEES team are making headway in their battle against the Shadows & the Dark Hour but 3 strangers with similar powers confront them, making them question whether or not they want to truly destroy the Dark Hour & give up all that makes them special.
Critique:
In my critique of the first film, I recall that I was fairly harsh with it because it lacked any proper development of scenario & characters, wasted potential, threw in too many aside references to the original games, et cetera. Well, the 2nd game pretty much does that but also adds in a ton more sexualised Fan Service for good measure.
That is being a little unfair, because the 2nd film does have more character development -especially for the Tabula rasa protagonist Yuki Makoto- as well as bringing other characters into the fold -such as the reluctant & angry Shinji & the broken young boy, Amada Ken. More importantly it introduced the protagonists of the 1st arc, Strega, to set up a sense of tension. It also brings in the other Tabula Rasa character, the combat gynoid Aegis, who’s raison d’etre is to be close to & protect Makoto, yet no one does not understand why.
Raison d’etre becomes the key theme for this film.
Why characters do what they do, what do they fight for, do they have any other meaning to their lives aside from wielding their Persona against the Shadows & so on & so forth.
Raison d’etre should not encapsulate a character as a whole but should form the basis from which they grow & change over the course of the story. They should question it; reflect upon it; fight those who challenge it; any number of things but all within the context of “why?” & “how?”.
Unfortunately, this is where the movie -like it’s predecessor- fails.
It sets up a few characters’ raison d’etre but it does not challenge or evolve them. It gets stuck at the stage of questioning reasons & motivations but it never moves passed them.
A less cynical critic might say that this is so they can push the character development in the next film but a cynic such as I will just say it’s a waste of potential.
This is because the movie already wastes so much potential & screen time by sticking the date formula & showing Makoto doing his Social Links in montage, when it could’ve been using the same amount of time actually developing the bonds & relationships between the characters & establishing their individual motivations -more so for Aegis & Makoto, who are hollow reflections of each other. You get some token development from Fuka, saying that hunting Shadows is all that she really has because her parents only care about her academically & you get a little from Junpei as he seeks to grow from being an idiot. Yukari also gets a brief moment on centre stage, as she comes to terms with her personal connection with the disaster which created the Dark Hour but all of those moments are rushed over for the sake of fitting into the time limit.
My main complaint & critique from the 1st film carries over in: in that these movies really should’ve been a 25 episode TV series. This meant you could stick to the rigid video game date formula but you also get character development.
Most of the development in this movie is for the newly introduced character of Amada Ken, the orphan boy who found that he can wander around the Dark Hour. His exploration is done in relation with & contrast to Shinji, who made an appearance in the 1st film as a former SEES member trying to escape his past. Ken & Shinji’s fates are intertwined because of the events that orphaned Ken & caused Shinji to leave the SEES but they really aren’t developed enough to have the emotional impact that the director seems to have been aiming for. Again: this is an issue with the format & trying to cram two entire character arc into a space of 50 or so minutes (the time the characters have in the film, not the total running time of it) instead of spreading it over 4 or 5 22-minute episodes.
That, in a nutshell, is still my greatest gripe about the film series as a whole. Since they stick to the game formula of following events & day, you either lose too much or connections & development just doesn’t happen. Makoto is still case in point although he has progressed more along then in the previous film, he still is a character who basically does nothing but everyone puts faith in. He’s the opposite of what Yu from Persona 4: The Animation became. Makoto still exists only as a player character but since we aren’t controlling him, we can’t invest ourselves in his struggle to understand his motivations & why he’d destroy the only thing that gives him a sense of connection to those around him. If you don’t give the audience something to understand & invest in, they won’t. Adding another blank character like Aegis doesn’t help because Makoto doesn’t use her as a reflection as should be the case.
The animation in this film is a touch better than the last but it’s still very murky & mucky to look at. This is partially because the majority of the action takes place either at night or during the Dark Hour -which twists things, giving them a festering alien feel to it. But it’s all for naughty if you can’t really see what’s going on. When you have something with scenes that dark, you need to have bright open scenes to perfect the juxtaposition of them, enhancing both. This is yet another critical failing of film. Of equal fail is the lack of clarity in the action scenes, where the combat becomes a bit of a mess. There are some nice individual battles, such as Aegis stepping in to save Makoto & Yukari from some Shadows but any group combat fails to look in any way good.
In the end, this second of I think 4 films makes so many missteps on top of failing to address the ones that it made with the previous film. It’s a huge let down for all but the most devoted fan but even they might find it a little disappointing after the bright, vivid glory of two Persona 4 anime series. It’s not a bad watch but terrible if you have any expectations for it what-so-ever.
And The Geek Shall (Inherit the Earth) 
I think P3 would work better as a series too. That said I believe they are releasing five movies, which is a similar running time to twentyish episodes.
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I don’t think I could stand 3 more films but the game did have some twists which gave it more play time beyond the original scope of the plot.
but it would definitely be better as a series, that way Makoto could be seen with the social link characters to actually develop & have depth.
Maybe one day. Still wonder why they went with movies & not series, since P4tA was popular enough to make another lesser series.
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