User Reviews

This short blew us out of the water! It is twisted, hyper-kinetic, and sexy as hell. Plus I've never seen animation like this before. It almost looks like it is filmed first then layered over with different forms of CGI visuals... ending up with a VERY real looking landscape and characters. Highest recommendations.

When people think cyberpunk, this is the sort of city they might imagine: Impossibly dense buildings, stretching off the top of each frame to imbue them with a sense of immense height and scale and leave the sky nothing more than an impossibly distant symbol of ephemeral freedom.

Then there are the litter strewn streets festooned a menagerie of cryptic advertising in different languages, crushed together into a maddening mixture of culture: the classic melting pot of dystopian futures past.

Within this Future Hong Kong-like, Chung King Express inspired city we meet our protagonist, an incredibly beautifully animated lady on the run for witnessing an apparent crime. And the story starts its nonstop, bulletlike rollercoaster ride towards its unorthodox and yet amazingly foregone conclusion.

The animation quality was literally otherworldly, at times I found myself replaying scenes, wondering if it was overlaid on actual footage. I have never seen animation of this visceral quality before. The tiny details, the use of comic-like interjections to indicate surprise and suddenness and the technical brilliance of the entire presentation make this short a visual feast and sensual cacophony of stimulation.

Sexy, seedy, sordid and sleazy are all words you could use to describe this episode and you would not be wrong. But I would also add sumptuously drawn city scenes, surreal storyline and a rather satisfying conclusion.

More, please.

The ambience and style of this episode is really near to the utopian futuristic japan series someone should create.

In the words of the director on his Instagram profile page:

"NO Mocap, NO rotoscope, why would we do that?. Dave Pate , Adrian Millington and their animators team did all KEY animation. Is the style / technique we like and love to preserve. They are the finest animation artist out there. Nothing compares. And yes MAYA."

This gives an aditional remark on how awesome this little piece of magic turned to be.

I've never seen anything like it and could watch it FOREVER! This is wonderful. And the story, acting. Everything is amazing.

So after reading ALL the reviews; from what I can tell, all the people, you see in this episode, are not real people overlaid with CGI but totally all some form of CGI? All the actors say voiced by? Like I find it totally unbelievable that the main woman and the rest are not REAL. If this is the case, WOW amazing work. Just totally amazing work.

By no means a masterpiece, 'The Witness' is still my favourite episode of this series so far. The animation is even better than that of its beautifully animated predecessors, the story is so simple that it's perfect for the short format, and the anxious atmosphere is conveyed compellingly through the episode's extraordinary visuals. It's also a surreal trip with gratuitous sexual content that is at once uncomfortable and erotic. There's not much substance here, but the style is a whole lot of fun and it's a visual spectacle!

What do you do when you are chased? Do you flee to safety like a deer or mimic the leopard that hunts you? This episode is a amalgamation of futuristic tech, human cognition and hasty decisions.

I love that the animation is similar to Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. It doesn't have much of a story but it has a great ending.

Stunning visuals and animation add to a brilliant plot, about someone witnessing a murder through a window from one building to another. A sensational plot twist at the very end leaves the viewer to wonder: what next?

'The Witness (2019)' wraps up with a twist intrinsic to its narrative, a satisfying and attention-rewarding final beat that feels wholly necessary. The rest of it is propulsive and pacy, an extended chase that's as exciting as it is suspenseful. Its distinct, 'Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse (2018'-esque aesthetic is energetic and visually stunning. It sets the short apart as perhaps the best looking in 'Love, Death + Robots (2019)'. The short does have its issues, though. The most major is the fact that it feels oddly sexualised throughout its duration, which is uncomfortable and unnecessary. The constant threat of violence makes its overt nudity quite creepy, an unfortunate blend of tantalisation and terror. Perhaps this juxtaposition is the point, but it isn't successful and just feels plain weird. Another less impactful problem is its baggy, even slow, mid-section. Perhaps it isn't a coincidence that it takes place in an explicit underground sex club; it's an unneeded detour that serves only to overtly satisfy the male gaze and, in fact, seems quite immature. The affair's issues don't totally ruin its effect, though. It's still an engaging and enjoyable piece, even if it is marred slightly by some misjudged elements. 7/10

Deeply submerged in hedonism for no reason like most episodes in this series. Why not make porn at this point? Decent world building, yet tonaly misleading; comical effects on a horror chase?? Jumbled message; victimhood or revenge?

Wow! What an amazing story, supported by stunning visuals. Definitely a must-see! The animation in this short is spectacular!

Watching this makes seconds feel like minutes drowning you in a good kind of way. The style of animation makes the level of intensity outrageous, and glued my mind to the borderline-like pictures in a compact Cyberpunk-esque package. It left me with the impression that this surreal world takes place somewhere between the not so distant future and the Black Mirror present day of tomorrow.

I looked up more about it and turns out the director Alberto Mielgo also worked on Spiderman:Into the Spiderverse which also had stunning animation and style.

I've watched this several times now and I like it more every time I see it. That rarely happens to me. It's raw and visceral and on many levels you experience it beyond just the sights and the sounds. If they didn't intend to control your heart through the screen then it was an amazing accident.

Gorgeous.

The animation style is amazing and I give so many props to the team for the visuals, but there was absolutely no need for her to work at a sex club to tell this story or for her to leave her robe undone the entire time, meaning the nudity was completely gratuitous. I'm all for adult entertainment when it makes sense, including sex and nudity, but this short crossed a line into straight up objectification by showing all of that nudity without a reason.

The beginning of this starts off as interesting as the futuristic cyber punkish animation style with a splash of some classic onomatopoeia. Your thrusted into a situation contrasting between everyday life and a vigorous fight for life.

And then it begins just as you get the answer as to what is about to happen your drawn right back in, full tilt. With clever use of some onomatopoeia and interesting yet suspenseful camera shot choices this episodes delivers for the 11 minutes it's running...

Like a sexy acid trip from hell, your made as though to feel like our main character with subtle details picked out from the backdound. Epmty streets but massive buildings, An operator who has heard the same thing a thousand times, or even the fact that you don't even see the cab driver.

This episode was very thrilling to watch. It was a rollercoaster of settling down and winding back up. The details were all but what brought this whole episode together definitely a must watch of the series.

The story is pretty good but the thing that i hate about this hole series is the nudity. In my opinion I didn't liked it. I watched this show bc of horror and gore but not this. But besides that. Its pretty good.

I've decided to review each of the short films that make up this series individually.

This is a trippy story in which a girl (voiced by Emily O Brien) inadvertently sees what she thinks is a murder committed by a man (voiced by Ben Sullivan) in hotel block opposite her apartment. The two become embroiled in a chase across town, but is the situation really as it seems.

As a technical exercise, this was another top notch piece of work. I really liked the mixture of "realistic" animation, with a more cartoony sound effects and the heighted surreality created by occasionally dipping into a more traditional animation at the heights of the action. I'd be interested to know if any of this was rotoscoped, (which I can see from the other reviews is denied by the creators) as there is a clear real world detail available, particularly in things like backgrounds. If that is the case, it's a truly phenomenal demonstration of what these graphics teams are capable of.

Where it falls down, is with the story. Without wishing to spoil the ending, it's a bit of an anti-climax and doesn't really make much sense. It's occasionally a bit tiring getting there to, the trip to the sex club, as with the first episode, feels like a childish and unnecessary diversion.

As a demo of technical prowess, it's outstanding but as an engaging short film, it's a little lacking.

From a technical perspective, this is next level - or rather, previous level taken to an artform. Apparently all hand keyed without motion capture (press X to doubt though), it's marvellously stylish and distinctive, switching from very-nearly post-uncanny-valley to deliberately cartoonish and right back again from one frame to the next.

However, the animation is the entire point, and the plot, such as it is, is just a shaggy dog story to get shaggy pussies and perky bouncing boobs on screen for as much of the runtime as possible.

It's a narrative that eats its own tail in a fashion beloved of sophomoric writers, and really, that's all the whole production is: sufficient technology to present an adolescent male fantasy.

I found it tawdry and unpleasant. If you do want to watch sexualised violence, you don't have to resort to animation.

The animation in this short episode blew my mind. It seems so pleasant and the story even though it doesn't involve many talking is brilliant. The twist, the sexy parts and every unique aspect of this episode are stunning. It's a must watch for sure.

Mind blowing, top quality animation. Perfect futuristic cyberpunk landscape. The story was a bit predictable but it's definitely worth watching for the visuals alone.