BCDB: Cartoon Reviews: Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within

This movie contains the most realistic computer animation ever produced for a feature film to date. Some test audiences thought they were watching real people filmed through some kind of filtered camera. Every penny they spent on production was well worth it, and as a visual production this is simply amazing.
However, the story left much to be desired, I'll summarize my impressions here.
Does anyone else remember that episode of Sesame Street where Bert and Ernie are asleep in their room and the "yub-yub" aliens materialize though the walls, and only Ernie sees them, and he freaks out but as soon as he wakes Bert up, the yub-yubs have floated back out, and of course Bert doesn't beleive him, etc?
I had nightmares about that as a kid.
Now imagine some psychotic japanese animator (you know, the ones who make hentai of disemboweled transexuals and whatnot) takes that rather basic plot and spends millions making a feature film, where the benign yub-yubs are now glowing genocidal monstrosities, and Ernie's part is rewritten as a fetching young asian scientist and Bert is now a militaristic Death Star enthusiast. That might just be this movie here.

So a few things for all the nitpicker's out there:
1. Outer space accomodations have aparently come along way in the 65 years between our time and the setting of this movie. If legions of lethal phantoms are anihilating the human race, why dont they just go settle mars or something?

2. So the only thing the humans have going for them is their barrier fence things, which are impenetrable to phantoms, provided no moron politicians semi-accidently sabotage them. We also know that phantoms can actually be killed if you shoot them enough. In that case why don't they make tanks with the shield material and go around blasting phantoms all day? Itd be shooting fish in a barrel! Then when you've done the pest control routine for a few months and cleansed most of the surface area, you go build a barrier dome over the crater where they spawn out of, and your problem's solved.

3. The ending made no sense. One minute theyre going to win, theyve got the 8th spirit thing, the red uber-blob turns green, then the laser hits, everything goes red, then Aki figures somehow that no, her heart worms are the 8th spirit, everything goes green, then more lasers or something, red and nasty, then poof, its green once again for final victory. What the hell?
And they should have slowed down the phantoms killing rate in the city, to add to the tension, i.e. if they do this fast they save some or most of the city's population. The final shot should have been all the phantom's disolving right as theyre about to close in on a big crowd, as soon as Aki completes her mission.

I was rooting for the general. His plan made much more sense then Donald Sutherland's wackjob Gaia story.

This film has some amazing animation. I enjoyed it , yet i feel the whole storyline was a little weak at times. Really wish that it had a better ending as well. This movie really shows you how far along we are in animation today, as far as its stunning art goes.