Æon Flux

Peter Chung is definitely one of the most creative minds in animation today. This is his groundbreaking work he is best known for.

Originally a recurring short for MTV's Liquid Television, Aeon Flux combined the flash of the sexy heroine and action movie violence with extremely surreal and bizarre scenarios. MTV later commissioned 10 half-hour episodes. Obviously the more high profile placement of a scheduled program lead to more network restrictions. Not quite the same surreal vision as the original shorts but definitely interesting in themselves.

A lot of people saw it as some kind of anime rip off. It's nothing of the sort. While without a doubt drawing influence from Japanese animation the more apparent influences are European fantasy illustrators like moebius.

I bought the TV episodes and shorts on a VHS several years ago. I'm not sure if it has made it to DVD. There's a live action movie based on the characters of the animation series coming out this winter. It's extremely doubtful they'll be able to pull off any of the weird stuff. It will probably be just another boringly ordinary Hollywood sci-fi/action movie. One of Peter Chung's ideas with his animation is to create something you can't do in live action.