Anime as a documentary is the rarest and most unpopular genre there is out there you can try and argue this but it wont change the fact that no streaming service that I know of features the tag and google shows really fucking badhttps://www..com/watch?v=VRyP5pvMAXM documentaries about anime when trying to look them up. As such I was really intrigued when this thing materialized on my plan to watch list and I quickly found myself laughing at the outdated nonsense being presented as facts not really all that different from alien documentaries you will find on TV today. Hell given the production value of this thing I actually got a weird YouTubelike vibe from guys that present documentaries and nighttime stories using still images. Here is one thing that I didnt expect though: ITS NOT AWFUL The documentary is perfectly watchable if you like low budget documentaries but dont get me wrong the low score youll find for it everywhere is well deserved. Its really inconsistent across the board on every department: the transitions between topics are really sudden the animation is sometimes great for the era sometimes its standard 1970s jank and the art is constantly switching between badly doctored stock images pulled from a folder drawings from a Crayola advert and really nice looking cels that you could probably set as a poster in a caf and they wouldnt look out of place. 250https://i.ur.com/ZiOruUa.png 250https://i.ur.com/CQzIols.png 250https://i.ur.com/huUBTOI.png All three of these images come from the same show The thing that strikes me the most however are the aforementioned transitions. The documentary covers 4 anecdotes the possible appearance of aliens discusses the different shapes of registered UFOs and talks about ancient aliens Not even in 1970s anime one can escape that show. All of this in a runtime of 17 minutes which makes the whole documentary feel all over the place. Here is a theory of mine on why this show turned up the way it did that honestly interested me more than the documentary itself and led me through some really weird rabbit holes. 220https://i.ur.com/7JTrqjE.png Animation is expensive as such it was absurdly common in the period between the 60s and 80s to avoid scrapping entire projects and instead use the leftover cels for other productions. My theory here is that this show is a bunch of pilots that were originally made for a TV series put together into a documentary with little care or thought put into it which although it would explain most If not all of the documentarys problems it stills leaves a lot of questions unanswered that I couldnt find the answers for anywhere such as: Did they get permission to use the anecdotes from the people portrayed in the film and if not was there any legal trouble in the production that led to the show being cancelled and turned into a movie? Who greenlit the show in the first place Why did it get greenlit in the first place Is this solely made by Toei? Why does everything looks as inconsistent as other shows that were partially outsourced in the 70s? Who did they hire as a consultant? Why did they hit the breaks and turn this into a compilation movie? Was there some sort of Alien boom in 1970s Japan that was big enough to convince Toei of all corporations to support this? Why 400https://i.ur.com/b9QZN9v.jpg