FLCL

FLCL: Haruko Plush
$9.95
I really love the series alot and the plushie is so well made and looks exactly like the character too. I will most likely buy more of these plushies(from this anime and others/video games) soon.

FLCL FOOLY COOLY Tv Series Anime DVD Complete 6 Episode
$39.00
I loved Gainax anime such as 'Gunbuster', 'Evangelion' and 'Karekano', so was looking forward to watching this. But with 'FLCL' I think Gainax have finally let their ambition and eclecticism get the better of them. While previous Gainax titles had their fair share of experimentation, it never detracted from the story or (importantly) the characterisation. Here, all the focus is on trying to be as self-consciously "arty" as possible, with the result that the story and characters suffer terribly.

I'll say one thing, the animation style is interesting if nothing else. They take the experimental style of 'Karekano' to the extreme, shifting between regular, SD, manga-style, and Matrix-like 3-D almost at will. But even this doesn't really add much to the anime, because it's clear Gainax are doing this solely because they can. It actually becomes tiring after the first episode or so. While there are some potentially interesting characters, the very frenetic style of the anime doesn't give them much room to grow and develop. And the story looks suspiciously like they just threw together a bunch of ideas they thought sounded fun. A mecha growing from a horn in the hero's head? OK. A girl smashing people on the head with a bass guitar? Sure, why not. The giant iron thing that steamrolls the land? Yeah, throw that one in too. There's little coherence here, even allowing for the fact that it's deliberately fragmented and experimental. I sometimes wonder whether Gainax really did just cobble together some random stuff they thought up and tried to pass it off as "artistic"?

I don't think it's a matter of failing to "get" the anime, since I loved the stylistic flourishes of previous Gainax anime. I just feel that 'FLCL' has too much style and not enough substance. Perhaps the 6 episode OVA would have benefited from being more fully developed into a 12 or even 24 part series. As it stands, however, I can admire the ambition and creativity on display, but this is truly the first Gainax anime I do not love.

FLCL Volume 3
$10.99
This is a great addition to any FLCL fan. Explains many of the confusing aspects of the anime and introduces some new insights as well. New comers may be more confused than anything since they can not get a visual representation of what is going on. I would watch the anime first and then get this as a great supplement. I recommend all three of Yoji Enokido's interpretation's of the FLCL story.

FLCL (Fooly Cooly) - Vol. 3
$29.95
Please tell me you never expected a NORMAL ending to the weirdest anime in history, "FLCL." What does Fooly Cooly mean anyway?

Anyway, the already-freakish storylines of "FLCL" reach spectacular new heights in the third and final volume, in which we discover the plots of the Medical Mechanica, Haruko's true goals, and the looming threat to all of Earth! It's a bit like watching a sci-fi movie and a kids' cartoon, while ingesting large amounts of acid -- and then some.

After Kamon finds Haruko smooching Naota, he challenges his son to a duel -- resulting in a guerilla-style battle in a grassy field with air guns. In the meantime, Haruko dukes it out with the Department of Interstellar Immigration and Amarao (who seems to have had a prior relationship with her. And when Naota tries to act grown-up and manly around Mamimi, his head suddenly sprouts the largest robot yet -- a giant hand that doubles as a cloaked gunslinger!

Then it's time for the FoolyClimax -- after Haruko goes absent for awhile, Naota decides to escape his boring life and go on the road with her. Amarao is searching for the Terminal Core that will activate the giant hand, and gives Naota some odd advice about the selfish, strange girl he's traveling with. And Mamimi has a new pet -- a robot that she gleefully feeds with her enemies' cell phones and motorcycles.

When the Hand is finally activated, will Medical Mechanica's diabolical plans be fulfilled? What ARE their diabolical plans? Who is the great Space Pirate Atomsk, and what will be the final thing to spring from Naota's head?

It's hard to find an anime that is full of as much unadulterated crackiness and wackiness as "FLCL," and the last two (of six) episodes of the series may actually be the weirdest of this all-too-short series. Not many series could string together aliens, motorbikes, truck-swallowing robot cats and blatant South Park homages in a convoluted coming-of-age tale. All that, and it has crazy alien chicks who dress like Elvis.

The first of these two stories is a sort of slow buildup: we get the origins of the vast hand, and the long-running feud between Haruko and the freaky-browed Amarao. Then the final episode erupts like a volcano of surreal sci-fi, flinging Naota into a maelstrom of giant robots, interstellar conspiracies, and sexual symbolism (lookit that giant robot smashing between Mamami's feet!). And no series can have dialogue half as weird as this ("That's discriminatory language used against undeveloped planets!").

Admittedly it answers a few questions raised before, if you can call stuff about smoothing brain wrinkles an answer. But most of them are left flapping merrily in the breeze, and somehow you don't really care because it was too entertaining.

Despite all the kissing with older girls, Naota really becomes an adolescent here -- he's got the hormones and the intense romantic feelings, but he's also still recognizably a fragile kid. And we finally see why Haruko has been using Naota's head and what her ultimate goal is -- it turns out she's even weirder than we thought. And Amarao seems to have been her admirer in the past ("Where are your eyebrows? Why did you take them off?").

The grand slam finale of "FLCL" is a double dose of bizarre and a quadruple eruption of pure bizarrity -- and the biggest problem with it is that you don't want it to end. Ever. Fooly cooly!