WXIII: Patlabor the Movie 3

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to: navigation, search
WXIII: Patlabor the Movie 3

Region 2 L.E. DVD Cover art
Kana WXIII 機動警察パトレイバー
Rōmaji Weisuteddo Sātīn Kidō Keisatsu Patoreibā
Directed by Takuji Endō
Fumihiko Takayama (chief)
Produced by Masahiro Fukushima
Tsutomu Sugita
Screenplay by Miki Tori
Story by Headgear
Starring Katsuhiko Watabiki
Hiroaki Hirata
Atsuko Tanaka
Masaru Ikeda
Junpei Morita
Takanobu Hozumi
Shingo Hiromori
Miina Tominaga
Ryūsuke Ōbayashi
Music by Kenji Kawai
Cinematography Hisao Shirai
Editing by Kyoko Mizuta
Takeshi Seyama
Mutsumi Takemiya
Megumi Uchida
Studio Madhouse
Distributed by Shochiku
Release date(s) December 10, 2001 (2001-12-10) (Tokyo)
March 30, 2002 (2002-03-30)
Running time 107 minutes
Country Japan
Language Japanese

WXIII: Patlabor the Movie 3 (WXIII 機動警察パトレイバー Weisuteddo Sātīn Kidō Keisatsu Patoreibā?) is a 2001 Japanese animated science-fiction/thriller film chief directed and storyboarded by Fumihiko Takayama, directed by Takuji Endō, written by Miki Tori based on the concept by Headgear, animated by Madhouse and produced by Bandai Visual and Tohokushinsha.

The movie is a side story to the Patlabor series, and takes place in between Patlabor: The Movie and Patlabor: The Movie 2. It is based on a part of the manga and has a similar premise to a story in the original OVA series. WXIII premiered out of competition during the Tokyo International Fantastic Film Festival, which had special screening on December 10, 2001. WXIII's Japanese theatrical release took place on March 30, 2002 to coincide with the release of Minipato. Geneon Entertainment licensed WXIII for its North American release on January 10, 2003, which was eventually followed by later DVD releases to Europe and Oceania.

Contents

[edit] Plot

In 2000, a series of unknown attacks on Labors have made two police detectives, Shinichiro Hata and Takeshi Kusumi, investigate these string of events alongside members of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department's SV2 unit in solving the case in which the labors that were attacked belong to Schaft Industries.

As they begin to unravel the reason behind the attacks, the two detectives find out that the attacks may have something to do with the American military stationed in Japan, as well as elements of the Japanese Ground Self-Defense Forces, coupled with a female scientist involved in a biological weapons program known as Wasted XIII.

[edit] Characters

The following only appeared in the WXIII movie, although they did appear at one point in the manga series with the exception of Detectives Kusumi and Hata.[1]

A veteran police detective based from the Jounan Police Precient, Kusumi is partnered up with Hata in investigating the mysterious attacks against Schaft-made Labors. He has a leg injury sustained before the case and uses a crutch, which hampers his physical abilities in conducting his investigation. He is known not to be a versatile user of modern technology (e.g. using Music CDs) and prefers to use analog records for his entertainment or let Hata do the computer work. It's not known what happened to his family, but it's assumed that he had been estranged from them for a long time.[2]
A police detective and baseball player assigned to the Jounan Police Precinct, Hata is partnered up with Kusumi in solving the attacks on Schaft-made Labors. During his investigation, Hata begins to have a relationship with Saeko Misaki before realizing the extent of her involvement in his case. After the events of WXIII have ended, an epilogue depicts an imageboard thread discussing the cover-up and a suppressed web document revealing the truth about the 'terrorists' really being a monster; during the investigation, Hata twice says he will ask for help from some 'websites', implying that Hata was the leaker.[3]
A widow, Saeko works as a researcher at the Toto Bio-Medical Laboratory and a part time biology professor at a university. Her full name is Saeko Nishiwaki Misaki.[4] After her daughter, Hitomi, dies from cancer, Saeko becomes obsessed with her loss to the point that she cultivates Hitomi's cancerous cells into a biological mutant creature named Wasted 13 in the Toto Bio-Medical Laboratory. Saeko commits suicide after seeing the monster she considers to be her daughter killed by Flamethrower-wielding JGSDF soldiers of the Chemical Weapons Division. Hata grabs her hand to try to save her from falling to her death but he loses his grip due to the rain.
The head of the Toto Bio-Medical Laboratory, Kurisu secretly works with the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force in conducting the Wasted series biological weapons program before Saeko went rogue and cultivated cancer cells from Hitomi's corpse onto the Wasted 13 creature. He was also responsible for ordering the creation of a virus that would weaken Wasted 13. He is believed to be hiding overseas to avoid being prosecuted for secretly doing biological weapons with his consent after Colonel Ishihara had assisted him to facilitate his departure from Japan.[5]
A scientist in the Toto-Bio Medical Laboratory and the personal aide to Kurusu, he is responsible for the creation the vaccine that weakened and killed Wasted 13.
An officer in the JGSDF's Chemical Weapons Division with the rank of Colonel, he is responsible for overseeing the capture and killing of Wasted 13 alongside Goto and Kusumi in a recently constructed stadium in the outskirts of Tokyo after getting the cooperation of Special Vehicles 2 Unit in weakening the beast before calling in Flamethrower-wielding JGSDF soldiers to incinerate it.[6] According to the Wasted XIII Booklet included in the Limited Edition DVDs, it is said that Goro had ties to United States Forces Japan units stationed in the Japanese archipelago under means of cooperation in eradicating Wasted 13.
The only daughter of Misaki, who died of cancer before the events of Wasted XIII. It was only due to her unfortunate death from cancer that Saeko is obsessed in wanting to see her daughter alive again after using Hitomi's cancer cells with Wasted 13's own cells, fusing human and monster DNA in it.[7] Despite being called a monster and a biological weapon, Saeko still thinks of it as her own daughter.[8]

[edit] References

  1. ^ WXIII Patlabor the movie 3 review. Schaft Enterprises. Retrieved on August 20, 2007.
  2. ^ Shinichiro: "Shall I post one for you, Mr. Kusumi? I'm looking for the family that left me." (Bandai, English)
  3. ^ Forum Post: "Whoever leaked the Japanese original is said to be a policeman in active service and he was at the scene. But it's just a rumor." (Bandai, English)
  4. ^ Takashi: "I ran her license through the Traffic Department. Her name is Saeko Misaki. She's a Nishiwaki." (Bandai, English)
  5. ^ Goro: "I made an arrangement for your departure at 6 PM tomorrow evening."
    Toshiro: "Colonel Ishihara!"
    Goro: "A series of stress must be hard on your body. Why don't you get some rest in Florida or somewhere?" (Bandai, English)
  6. ^ Goto: "You planned to burn it to death from the very beginning?"
    Goro: "It was already approved by your superiors. Apparently, they never told you about it." (Bandai, English)
  7. ^ Saeko: "But I asked the doctor to leave me some samples of her cells. Those samples contained my little girl's cancer cells. I combined them with Nishiwaki cells. And then an organism that was strong enough to survive started to grow. It was magical. That's right. My little girl was reborn."
    Shinichiro: "It was not your child that was reborn. But a monster, Saeko."
  8. ^ Saeko: "The monster. Baker's Dozen. And Wasted 13. She's been called a lot of different names. But to me, she only has one real name." (Bandai, English)

[edit] External links

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=WXIII:_Patlabor_the_Movie_3&oldid=444249294"
Personal tools
Namespaces

Variants
Actions
Navigation
Interaction
Toolbox
Print/export
Languages