Neo Tokyo · reception & legacy

How Neo Tokyo has been received, argued over, and remembered.

The arc

A festival curio in 1987 Japan (as *Manie-Manie: Labyrinth Tales*), it reached the West in dubbed form via Streamline and was mostly a video-store obscurity; it's since been reappraised as a time capsule of three anime auteurs caught mid-ascent — Otomo on the eve of *Akira*, Kawajiri just before *Wicked City*.

What's debated

The perennial anthology fight: is Kawajiri's slick, MTV-famous 'Running Man' the keeper, or is Otomo's deadpan satirical closer the real masterpiece, with Rintaro's dreamy framing story caught in between?

Its footprint

Kawajiri's 'Running Man' segment aired on MTV's *Liquid Television* in the early '90s, beaming psychedelic death-race anime into American living rooms alongside *Æon Flux*; the US title 'Neo Tokyo' itself was a marketing move to ride *Akira*'s coattails.

Where it stands

A cult completist's stop on the Otomo/Kawajiri pilgrimage — the anthology anime heads tell each other they 'have to see', filed alongside *Robot Carnival* and *Memories*.