Fantasia Review: Sekiro brings bloody action (and haphazard storytelling) to the big screen in No Defeat

As superhero movies seem to be on the decline, a new source of IP is being more aggressively tapped: video games. With the recent success of movies based on Super Mario, Minecraft, and Five Nights at Freddy's, along with TV hits like Fallout and The Last of Us, the video game boom is perhaps only just getting started. It seems like a healthier source for stories, since there's naturally a wider variety of stories to tell, whereas superhero movies all end up feeling kind of the same: world-threatening being, superhero team-up destruction, bing bang boom.

Playing at Fantasia this year is a new anime film, Sekiro: No Defeat, which is based on the popular 2019 game Sekiro: Shadows Never Die. It's a game I haven't played, because I'm pretty sure it would be too hard for me. It's one of those timing-intensive action games that require precision and patience, both of which I have but probably not enough to make it through. (I played Elden Ring from the same developer, but had to tap out at around 60 hours because I reached the limits of my skill at that point.)

From what I can tell, the movie follows the plot of the game pretty closely, which could be good or bad for the viewer. For my part, being uninitiated, I found No Defeat a bit hard to follow. There's a lot of jargon being thrown around, many characters to keep track of, and a smattering of flashbacks. It's a movie that's aptly light on its feet, but maybe a bit too light, as I sometimes found myself on unstable footing, trying to piece together who was who, what they wanted, where they were going. 

I also kept feeling like I was missing something, or rather that the movie itself was missing something. From what I can find online, it seems like this might be a theatrical cut-down of a series. Per some Googling, it looks like Sekiro will be released as an eight-episode anime series on Crunchyroll at a to-be-determined date. If that's the case, it makes a lot of sense. The pacing of No Defeat is so haphazard that having this explanation as an excuse makes me look at it a bit more kindly. The story needs more room to breathe, and apparently will receive just that when it's released in its entirety as a series.

But, I'm not here to imagine the series, but rather talk about the movie. Which, despite these reservations, was still a pretty enjoyable watch.

Sekiro: No Defeat follows a shinobi known as Wolf, a stoic and devoted guard to his young master, a boy named Kuro who possesses magical blood which he can use to grant immortality. He's done just that for Wolf. Even after suffering fatal blows in battle, Wolf resurrects. Not all of his injuries can completely heal (the film begins with Wolf losing an arm, which is replaced with a badass prosthetic), but he always ends up back in fighting shape.

Which is lucky for Kuro, because his power makes him a prime target for various machinations. Throughout their journey, Wolf and Kuro butt heads with the villainous Genichiro, who craves immortality himself; the army of the Interior Ministry, who have their own plans for the region; and even Wolf's own adoptive father, Owl, a hulking beast of a man. It's almost comical how many characters there are in this movie that can't die due to various reasons. It feels right for a movie based on a video game, where players often get unlimited lives to burn through as they play.

The film has a lot going for it. The animation is beautiful, hand-drawn, full of lush detail. The action scenes are stunning, with effective fusions of static and hyper-dynamic shots capturing the calm before the storm, and then the flurry of attacks. Some of the game's voice actors have returned to take up their characters again, which is a cool detail, and sure to please the fans. They all do great work here.

The biggest issue, and one that all but hobbles the movie for me, is the narrative. Beyond being hard to follow and weirdly assembled, it also doesn't feel like it has much going on. The sort of big-picture problem our heroes are facing is that Kuro's powers are causing a disease to spread across the land. The only way to stop it is to use a mythical blade to end Kuro's life. Getting the blade ends up not being that much of an issue, and at that point, it isn't clear why Kuro doesn't just end it? He's apparently willing, everyone knows that's what needs to happen, but the characters kind of just tread water for the bulk of the movie waiting for...I'm not sure what. The whole time I was watching, I was trying to figure out what the point was, what the characters ultimately wanted, why the hold-up. Maybe it'll be clearer in an expanded episodic structure, but for a feature film, it proved a very frustrating and confusing story.

Sekiro: No Defeat doesn't have me suddenly drooling to try the game out, but I'm glad it at least gave me an idea of what this world is about, an introduction to the characters, and a sense of why the game is held in such high esteem. I can certainly see the appeal, even if the movie is a bit rickety.