Saint Seiya: Legend of Sanctuary: Well... It's Definitely a Different Take on the Series, I'll Give it That

Back in May of 2011, plus the end of that prior April, I reviewed the four non-canon movies made for Masami Kurumada's Saint Seiya during the run of the original TV anime, plus the fifth movie from early 2004 that was meant to lead into a proper continuation of the manga story, but wound up being made non-canon by Kurumada's eventual Saint Seiya Next Dimension manga. At that time, that's all there was when it came to movies based on that series, but in February of 2012 a "New Masami Kurumada Project" was announced, as the first "Masami Kurumada Project" from late 2010 was Ring ni Kakero 1: Sekai Taikai-hen. The only things known were that it was tentatively titled "Saint Seiya the Movie", would be directed by Keiichi Satou (Asura, Tiger & Bunny), & looked to an all-CG affair, similar to Shinji Aramaki's Harlock: Space Pirate that would come out a year later; both films were co-produced by Toei & Marza Animation Planet (Kingsglaive: Final Fantasy XV, next year's Sonic the Hedgehog movie). Following this, there was no new info whatsoever until October 2013, when it was revealed to be titled Saint Seiya: Legend of Sanctuary & later given a June 2014 premiere at the Annecy Animated Film Festival. It'd debut in Japanese theaters ten days later, followed by numerous showings around the world... Except for the United States & Canada, of course. Since then, the movie has yet to be given any sort of "North of Mexico" release, even though the Japanese Blu-Ray & DVD both have a perfectly fine English subtitle translation, likely the one used for Annecy.

So how is this sixth Saint Seiya movie, the one meant to celebrate Masami Kurumada's 40th Anniversary as a mangaka, & even featured Kurumada himself as an often-consulted "Chief Executive Producer"? Well... It's... "Interesting", to say the least.

Saori Kido is the adoptive granddaughter of the late Mitsumasa Kido, a rich mogul, & has special healing powers, but doesn't know why. On her 16th birthday, her butler Tatsumi says that her powers are that of "Cosmo", the inner strength inside all beings, and that she is actually the Greek goddess Athena. Mitsumasa & Tatsumi came across her as a baby 16 years ago in the Himalayas, when she was taken away from Sanctuary by a wounded "Saint", the guardians of Athena, named Sagittarius Aiolos, as he discovered that the Pope of Sanctuary wanted to kill her & install a fake in her place; in his last breath, he gave Saori & his Sagittarius Cloth to Mitsumasa. In turn, Mitsumasa searched for young boys who he then sent out around the world to train to become Saints who will protect the real Athena. Saori & Tatsumi are then attacked by assassins from Sanctuary, only to be rescued by Pegasus Seiya, Dragon Shiryu, Andromeda Shun, & Cygnus Hyoga, who were the boys that Tatsumi was taking Saori to meet at the airport. Saori has no time to come to terms with all of these revelations, though, as later that night she & the Bronzes all attacked by Leo Aiolia, Aiolos' younger brother, only for him to realize that Saori may actually be the real Athena, after all. Saori & the Bronzes decide to head to Sanctuary & put an end to all this confusion, especially when Saori is hit with an energy arrow by Sagitta Ptolemy, which allows the Pope to absorb Saori's Cosmo over time.

Legend of Sanctuary is a complete re-imagining of Saint Seiya, especially terms of the overall aesthetic & look of the series. Originally, Kurumada had some sense of realistic basis when it came to things like the Cloths that the Saints donned, how they transported them, & where exactly Sanctuary was located. Specifically, the Saints would have to carry around giant Cloth Boxes containing their armors, which were designed to logically transform between display & wearable forms, & Sanctuary was blatantly located in Greece. In this movie, though, everything carries with it a much more mystic & grandiose style to it, which is shown right at the start when you see Aiolos fighting off both Capricorn Shura & Gemini Saga to escape Sanctuary, and they're surrounded by images of stars, nebulae, & even planets. Yes, rather than be a location on Earth, Sanctuary here seems to be in some sort of extra-dimensional space, which in turn allows it to be easily at least 100x larger than it was in the source material. Similarly, Cloth Boxes still exist, but the Bronzes are shown to actually be able to house them within dog tags, which then summon out the Boxes & Cloths. Also, the Cloths themselves are much more versatile & adjustable than originally designed, with fully retractable helmets, which are usually the first things that get destroyed in the manga, & even full face covers. Just from a pure visual aesthetic, this movie gives Saint Seiya a completely new & interesting look, and it's one that actually does work extremely well, as it can attract those who are unfamiliar with the franchise, as well as give pre-existing fans something new to work with.

That being said, however, it can be argued that the movie sometimes go really overboard with the aesthetic changes, which is where the movie starts becoming "interesting"... And I mean that in as many ways as you can think. First up is the fact that every single character has been heavily redesigned, though old fans can still tell who's who. Some characters get changes that actually work just fine, like Aries Mu now wearing glasses & looking a little bookish, or Cancer Deathmask having a beard & looking more Mediterranean (which makes sense, since the character is meant to be Italian), while others are given extra details that don't really make much of a difference & feel a little pointless, like giving Aiolia a lip ring & some facial hair. In fact, speaking of Deathmask, he's even given a full-on musical number when he's properly introduced; it comes completely out of left field, & makes no real sense! Easily the most radical of these changes, though, is with Scorpio Milo, who has been turned into a woman; this is technically a spoiler, but it's easily found out by looking online. Apparently, this was originally a running gag from the staff as they were thinking of how to re-imagine the character, but couldn't come up with anything better, which resulted in them asking for Kurumada's approval for the gender bend, which he gave. To be perfectly honest, though, female Milo works extremely well in this movie, as she's portrayed as one of the most dangerous of the Gold Saints, and the fact that she's a woman isn't used for any shock value; Milo's just a tough-as-nails woman in this movie.

Another "interesting" choice, but in a definitely lesser way, is the pacing the movie has. Simply put, the Sanctuary Chapter is a long haul of a story arc, even if you just leave it to the Twelve Temples portion, and translating that into just 93 minutes is a tall order. Of course, since this is a full-on re-imagining, the movie has to properly introduce itself, and while definitely a bit rushed, especially when Tatsumi literally just tells Saori the truth about herself while driving to the airport at the very beginning, before they're attacked by the assassins, the movie does a fair enough of a job making sure newcomers at least understand the basic concept of what's going on. Unfortunately, all of this introduction happens across the first 30 minutes or so of the movie, literally the first third of the total runtime, which leaves only about an hour for the actual Twelve Temples content. The end result is that the movie simply blazes through each of the temples extremely fast, as you'd be averaging about 5 minutes for every temple (actually less, since there's also the Temple of Athena at the very top), but after the Leo Temple, which is only the fifth one, the movie more or less gives up on trying to actually adapt the original story. In fact, the movie skips over the Gemini Temple completely, and even adapts some stuff, like Hyoga's fight with Aquarius Camus, out of order. After the Leo Temple, the remaining Bronze & Gold Saints effectively converge at the Sagittarius Temple (the ninth temple), & the movie enters its own original climax, almost as if the staff suddenly realized that they didn't have enough time to properly cover the story arc in its entirety. At this point, the final battle happens, and we get the most amusing call back of all: Seiya donning the Sagittarius Cloth. As I eventually pointed out in my reviews of the original five Seiya movies, all but the fifth see Seiya wear that Gold Cloth to defeat the villain, which in turn results in Sagittarius Seiya appearing more often in the movies than he does in the original manga! Well, I guess it's nice to see Legend of Sanctuary uphold that seeming tradition, alongside Shun being useless & needing the help of his brother, Phoenix Ikki... Except that Ikki is pretty much useless here, too.

Yeah, the movie changes things up in the last half hour, giving viewers fights that never happened in the original story, like Ikki vs. Capricorn Shura, but by then the story is moving at such a fast clip that you barely get anything from it. The end result of it all is just a really weird movie, one that I could easily nitpick to no end... But, oddly enough, I still find this movie really endearing, and that's because, for all of its flaws & oddities, it feels like a big-budget, full-CG Saint Seiya movie. The fights are hyper-kinetic yet easy to follow visually, the special attacks all look larger than life, and the characters are all either pretty accurate to their original versions, or are re-imagined in really neat ways. There's a grandiose spectacle to it all that matches the general feel of what Kurumada originally created back in 1986, and it's the first film since The Legend of the Crimson Youth to properly capture that feeling in a way that really screams "cinematic". Of course, it also helps greatly that Legend of Sanctuary just looks absolutely gorgeous, no doubt due to Marza Animation Planet's talent with CG. The CG here aims to be more "realistic" than your usual full-CG anime, but not to the point where it enters Uncanny Valley territory; the characters do still have an air of "anime" to them. Not just that, but the facial reactions here are simply mind-blowing, especially with Seiya & Saori. In the manga, Seiya was a bit more playful & effectively the comic relief, which tended to get downplayed as the story went on, and in this movie Seiya is essentially doubling down on that emotive nature, with all manners of face contortions, both in the comical & serious. Saori, in turn, really has the face of a high school girl, and her various emotions (confusion, sadness, determination, etc.) are all given a wide variety of visual inflections; this may, arguably, be the best interpretation of Saori, because she's fully relatable.

As mentioned at the start, this movie was directed by Keiichi Satou, and from a general feeling of flow & visuals, his ability to lead results in a overall good performance. Really, the biggest flaws with the movie lie at the hands of the screenwriter, Tomohiro Suzuki (One Punch Man, Tiger & Bunny). I've mentioned the feeling that the story feels a bit rushed at the end, but there are also just some awkward moments all throughout the movie, mainly in terms of establishing character relationships. There's the massive info dump Tatsumi delivers to Saori at the very beginning, but there are also other "tell, don't show" moments, especially when it comes to Shiryu, amusingly enough. When Aires Mu is introduced, Shiryu already knows him, explaining that his master (who's never shown) & Mu are friends, and when Deathmask debuts, Shiryu knows who he is for no reason whatsoever (it's because the movie has no time to show how the two actually first met in the manga). Then there's Hyoga vs. Camus, in which Hyoga refers to him as "Master", which Camus is to Hyoga, but the movie never alluded to Camus whatsoever before this moment, so the impact of Hyoga having to fight his master has no edge to it. Finally, some of the Gold Saints, like Virgo Shaka & Pisces Aphrodite, are really nothing more than glorified cameos, which is sad. Still, the writing itself (as in what the characters actually say) is really good, and if the movie had been at least two hours long, a lot of the flaws with the plotting could have been improved, if not outright fixed. As mentioned earlier, the re-imagined character designs by Hiroshi Miyamoto, generally a CG designer for Toei, are very well done, though one could argue that they make the movie look more like "Saint Seiya by way of Final Fantasy XV", but that could also just be Marza's influence more than anything.

The music by Yoshihiro Ike (Tiger & Bunny, Rage of Bahamut) is perfectly orchestral, helping deliver the grandiosity that the visuals set up; the leitmotif-style main theme is excellent, in particular. In terms of vocal themes, the movie actually has two. The first is the insert song "Mr. Deathmask", which is appropriately off tune & absurd, though it does kind of take a bit of the edge off of Deathmask, making him look more silly than threatening. The other is the end credits theme, "HERO" by Violet UK, a "music project" by X Japan's Yoshiki featuring all-English vocals by Katie Fitzgerald, and it's simply beautiful. Yoshiki's composition, featuring primarily a piano, is excellent, & Fitzgerald's voice is exquisite; it's easily one of the best themes Saint Seiya has had. As for the voice cast, even though there are a ton of characters here, only a handful really get time enough to really shine. Leading everyone is Kaito Ishikawa (Tenya Iida in My Hero Academia, Kageyama in Haikyu!!) & Ayaka Sasaki from idol group Momoiro Clover Z, who play Seiya & Saori, respectively. Ishikawa's a massive bundle of energy & delivers an excellent Seiya, one that doesn't try to mimic Tohru Furuya at first, while Sasaki does a good job with the always-caring reincarnation of Athena; she sounds completely believable in the role. Beyond them, the most notable performances I'd say are Kenji Akabane's Shiryu, in which he effectively plays the straight man to the other Bronze's habits of being more prone to humor; Go Inoue's Aiolia, which is appropriately stern but compassionate; Koichi Yamadera's Saga, which balances being both imposing & slightly insane; Hiroaki Hirata's Deathmask, which is fittingly psychotic; & Kurumada anime regular (literally, he's in every single Kurumada manga-based anime in some form!) Bin Shimada's Tatsumi, which is pitch perfect for the way he was reinterpreted. Beyond that the rest of the cast is just fine, but with so much going on, especially once the actual "Temple Run" (pun intended) begins, everyone else kind of blends together.

So after all of this, let me try to explain Saint Seiya: Legend of Sanctuary's conundrum in a simple manner: Saint Seiya, like Masami Kurumada in general, thinks big. The Sanctuary Chapter in particular constantly builds up the stakes & opposition, going from the Galaxian Wars to Ikki & the Black Saints to the Silver Saints to the Gold Saints, and the last part in particular features 10 potential foes for the Bronze Saints to take on, all of which are given some sort of focus & attention for a period of time. During all of this, character relationships are established, some of which climax with battles against specific Gold Saints. This movie, in comparison, immediately wants to move on the "main attraction", which requires changing things up in order to newly establish the plot that's required. Because of that, though, the actual battles with the Gold Saints blaze on by at a fever pitch, and even then the plot decides to skip ahead to the finale after a point, because there's just not enough time to give all twelve temples time to shine; this really should have been closer to two hours long, like the Harlock movie was. Still, I must admit that this movie feels like an honest-to-Zeus Saint Seiya movie when it comes to the spectacle of it all, & the visuals are absolutely stunning, so I kind of have a fondness for it, even with all of its weird, odd, & "interesting" choices. It's not the best of these movies by any means, I'd personally still put Legend of the Crimson Youth & even Evil Goddess Eris above it, but at least it's an overall better end product than the last movie that came out, Heaven Chapter ~ Overture, simply by the merit of it actually telling a complete story.

In fact, when word first started getting spread that there would be a new CG Seiya production, I honestly was hoping for a "Legend of Poseidon" movie, because I was curious about how that arc could be re-interpreted in this new style; at least with all of the introductions out that way, it could have moved on to relevant plot immediately. Oh well, at least we're finally getting a reboot series, which is something I've felt this franchise has desperately needed for years, if it ever wants to properly attract a new generation of fans... Which reminds me of the first time Saint Seiya ever came to "North of Mexico".

Yes, it's time to finally remove Athena's seal from THAT apparent monstrosity, because before Netflix's Knights of the Zodiac, there was DiC's Knights of the Zodiac!

Anime © 2014 Masami Kurumada/Saint Seiya: Legend of Sanctuary Production Committee (Toei Animation, Bandai Namco Games, Bandai, Sanyo Bussan, Banpresto, NEXTWING, Toei, Kinoshita Group, Toei Video, ADK)