Does anyone know where this planet is plugged into the wall? You can tell me. It's okay. All I want to do is find the plug and yank it out of the socket so our entire species can die in the freezing darkness. Why am I feeling cranky? Is it the global warming? Man's inhumanity to man? The continued existence of Vanity Fair? Is it the blues? Because is there really anything so bad that our entire species needs to die?

Yes, there is.

It's called:

CELL PHONE DETECTIVES

Gah! Just look at those horrible things.

Not since the Manhattan Project have so many talented people been involved in a project so morally bankrupt. Takashi Miike, Shusuke Kaneko and Mamoru Oshii are getting together to direct a 51 episode TV series. I can't bring myself to even type up the series description, so here's Variety's take:

"The stories revolve around detectives who probe digital-network-related crimes and a teenager (Masataka Kubota) who helps them with the aid of his trusty, "Transformers"-like cell phone."

Digital Network Related Crimes? The dreaded DNRCs? Thank goodness there's finally a department to deal with all those people who steal the minutes from my monthly plan. And the "Transformers"-like cell phone has a name. Would you like to know it? It's "Phonebraver 7." The series premieres on April 2 at about the same time that Softbank is starting to sell Phonebraver 7 cell phones.

Commercial interests have always been a part of the entertainment industry. I'll even grant you that commercial interests are the driving force behind the entertainment industry. But, dear god in heaven, do we have to be so blunt about it? Why not just let Miike and the rest of them direct Softbank ads? Why hide it in a TV show? And if you want to argue with me that this show could possibly be good, then I'd like to draw your attention to this photo from the recent press conference, courtesy of NipponCinema:

A schoolgirl, a detective wearing dark glasses and a trench coat, Kubota holding up Phonebraver 7 while making Serious Face and Miike smirking. If recipes were written with pictures instead of words then this picture would be the recipe for disaster.

Part of my distress comes from the fact that along with the rest of Subway Cinema I've spent the last three months programming this year's New York Asian Film Festival and I think I've hit my limit on low to medium budget horror, fantasy and sci-fi films. Few of them feel original, and for the most part they're crafted with all the care and imagination you'd expect from a bunch of anonymous flicks designed to be rushed out for a quick sale at AFM or Cannes.

That's not to say there aren't some entertaining films in there, but too often you get a kick-butt opening scene, followed by an hour and twenty minutes of watching the film crawl up its own bottom until it implodes in a supernova of "who cares?" spraying "why bother?" schrapnel into my eyes. And it hurts me, sometimes.

(Variety's coverage)

(NipponCinema's coverage)

(Official site for the series)

(Thanks to logboy for links to the more gruesome photos)