XXXIV: "Tekken: The Motion Picture"

Tekken wasn't the first fighting game I played in my years growing up, but it was, and still is, one of my favorites. So, I was kinda thrilled when I first heard about Tekken: The Motion Picture. Boy, do I ever wish I recalled back those feelings. To be fair, it had the right idea, but execution just didn't sit well. This is perhaps one of the only few times I actually sympathize with other viewers and critics.

Tekken: TMP is as it says: an animated motion picture of the popular fighting game franchise by Namco, now known as Namco-Bandai Games. Loosely based of PSone game Tekken, and its sequel, Tekken 2, any Tekken fan should be able to recognize the many familiar faces that takes place. The storyline, albeit changed completely, sort of connects with a few elements of the storyline so far (though the storyline of the game itself its messed up at this point already.) The story begins as young kids, Kazuya Mishima and Jun Kazama, stand in front of a rabbit's death by a bobcat. Before Kazuya can proceed to reprimand the bobcat to cheer Jun up, his father, Heihachi Mishima, berates him for his compassion, scoffing it as his weakness. To find out if his son had what it takes to become stronger, Heihachi throws his own son off the cliff, with Jun watching astonishingly.

Sixteen years afterwards, Jun is now an officer of Interpol, looking into the illegal actions of Heihachi. Upon mentioning of the King of Iron Fist Tournament, she, along with fellow agent Lei Wulong, are sent to infiltrate the tournament. Elsewhere, while any normal person could have met their demise, Kazuya, alive and pissed, enters for his shot at revenge against the man that nearly killed him. Heihachi learns this, and is prepared to hand him the conglomerate when the time comes. This doesn't sit too well with his adopted son, Lee Chaolan. Wanting the Zaibatsu for his own, he hires and seduces the Irish assassin sisters, Nina and Anna Williams. Their mission to kill Kazuya is the same, but their emotions for Lee, who uses them, differ, causing conflicts between them. At this point, Kazuya is now host of the prominent Devil Gene. As I stated before, any Tekken fan should recognize the characters from the games, even those who either don't show up/stand out as much, or are left unnamed in the film.

Animation is rather poor, and the storyline, despite good intention, seemed lacking. I do thank it for incorporating the first two games in it though (with the precursor to the 3rd), but it didn't do it justice. In fact, even though there were damn good classics like the cartoon version of Marvel's X-Men and the original Tatsunoko-made Speed Racer, I disdainfully pair this movie with cheesy cartoons like Darkstalkers, based of one of Capcom's least recurring, yet popular fighting franchise under Street Fighter. I sit there wondering "How could a game-based movie do any worse?", much to my dismay that it has been done now. Tekken: TMP gets a 5 of 10. Not the WORST rendition of game to film/anime overall, but it could have used a lot of improvement.