The older I get the more I realize it doesn't even have a functional PLOT. It jumps from Mewtwo's oath to his having a castle to "Well the movie's not over yet so here's a bunch of Pokemon looking beautiful!" to a resolution. It opens with world, but can't do that, so it shrinks into this very specific encounter that changes meaning entirely halfway through, even moreso in the Japanese version. I don't think Mewtwo has a natural conversation in the entire movie, he is either reacting or projecting with no real care if anyone is listening. I want to call it training wheels but it is even worse than that. I guess Pokemon shock throwing the Japanese airing orders out of whack struck that hard- Shudo said we only got the Mewtwo intro sequence we did because the anime did not get to introduce him prior, but the movie would have been even worse without it!
For all that, I admire its ill-fated ambition making Mewtwo's being a clone and what that means the moral center of the movie, and uncharacteristically melancholic tone in its pursuit of that and occasional quiet moments. That shows a lot more thought being put into the movie than was either necessary or expected.
>>37291983https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2WZsZReahfgI am nowhere deep enough into the anime to have soundtrack debates, but I do appreciate the early movies replacement music.
>>37292474Simplification: It gives him a motive that functions properly within the scope of the movie. Shudotwo dug too close to rending the franchise's raison d'etre, which was never going to get a satisfactory resolution in the anime.
