Archive for the English Anime Category


Yuri Anime: Project A-ko

February 14th, 2007

Here’s why, until recently, I had never seen Project A-ko. ^_^

In the dawn of time, MTV was carrying extremely late night anime, (they were dubbed, and mostly old-school. This was long enough ago now that the current anime/manga boom could not have even been predicted as a possibility,) and I was working three jobs: a full-time day job, teaching martial arts at night, and on the weekends, selling swords at a RenFaire. I’d get home Saturday night at about midnight and be completely fried. The wife was working two jobs (day job, and doing henna in Soho in NYC on the weekends) and while waiting for her to come home, I’d stare at TV.

I watched Urusei Yatsura: Beautiful Dreamer, which was so screwed up it put me off the series for years, until I watched some of the TV series for review purposes years later, which put me off it forever.

And I saw one teeny, tiny, wee bit of Project A-ko. The dub voices sliced through my exhausted nerve endings, leaving me shaking. I turned off the TV and never again even tried to watch A-ko. I should have tried again, of course. I mean, history, and all that. But the dub left such an unpleasant impression, that I’ve just sort of skirted the issue all these years.

And that’s where it might have stayed, except for a recent barrage of cajoling and wheedling by members of the Yuricon Mailing List, which culminated in Jen hoisting me with a quote of my own, from my Kekkou Kamen anime review, praising the voice acting skills of Shinohara Emi. Well, Jen won. I caved. I watched.

It is an apparently well known fact that A-ko was originally supposed to be part of the Cream Lemon hentai series, but was not, in the end, included. It has much of the same kind of art, and a great deal of fanservice. It also has a strange edginess that I find hard to explain. It’s not desperation, it’s almost…like the voice actresses found the story so bizarre and laughable that they just decided to go ahead and do it as over-the-top as they could.

I’m kind of glad I watched it when I did, because I was sick and heavily medicated, which made it more enjoyable, I’m sure. ^_^ Seriously, it was…inexpressibly bad, in that totally kitschy funny way. The writers clearly knew what they were spoofing, and why, and did it in a way that *just* rode the line between being godawful and hysterically funny.

B-ko, voiced by Shinohara Emi is, as many people pointed out to me in their campaign to entice me to watch it, a very Evil, very Psychotic Lesbian. As EPLs go, B-ko provides an exquisite example for the young EPLs-in training of the world, like Miu from Ichigo Mashimaro – except for her execrable taste in women, as C-ko is quite possibly the most annoying creature to ever grace any anime ever.

A-ko, ironically, was voiced by a young Itou Miki. She and Shinohara Emi have recently been working together again as part of an anime you may have heard of – Maria-sama ga Miteru.  Is there a less likely pairing for Youko and Sachiko’s voices than B-ko and A-ko? It’s almost surreal to imagine.

Which leads me to this comment I made on the YCML, “My last thought was that the dub must have been pretty good, since the level of nerve shredding in the voice acting was consistent with what I remembered from that aborted late-night attempt at watching it.”  How’s *that* for a compliment? ^_^

The music is also quite excruciating, even surpassing the oh-so-80s music from the original Bubblegum Crisis for cringe making.

If you already are a fan and don’t already own it, the box set, pictured and linked above, is a genuinely good deal (2022 Update: The new link goes to the Diskotek Perfect Edition with remastered animation and extras. The edition I reviewed here is long out of print.).

Ratings:

Art – 4
Story – 4 realistically, but 7 for crackheadeness
Characters – B-ko – 8, everyone else – 6, C-ko owes me points
Yuri – 6
Service – 8

Overall – can you even do an overall for this kind of crap? Let’s say 6

You know, A-ko wrong in so many ways, that we had to show it at Yuricon’s 2007 “Yurisai” event. ^_^





Silent Mobius Anime Volume 1 (English)

November 6th, 2006

I was asked a while back to review the Silent Mobius series and, as I needed to re-watch and read it anyway for that winning story for the “Worldshaking” Fanfic contest, this was as good a time as any other. :-) I was lucky to get the box set of the anime for a really good price, which will allow me to clear out some precious shelf space. I recommend the box set – it’s a good deal – about a buck an episode. Of course I’ve linked to it above. lol

To begin with, Silent Mobius is set in a future dystopia in which two worlds, that of humans and a parallel universe full of demony things called “Lucifer Hawks” have collided. Lucifer Hawks feed on, slaughter and breed with humans like the inhuman creatures of the night that they are.

The AMP, “Attacked Mystification Police” force is an all-female squad assigned to the single job of dealing with Lucifer Hawks. Who the members are, and why they, particularly, are chosen, are the subject of many of the first half of the series’ episodes. I will say this – I remember much of these character stories – they were very, very good.

Also good are the relationships between the women, and between them and characters outside the group. Everyone seems very human, very real – far more real than many current series ever get close to – with far fewer inexplicable hand-waves and plot holes. This story is quite seriously, well written and conceived.

Like You’re Under Arrest, Silent Mobius is an extremely straight story, but because of the nature of fandom, people just aren’t willing to settle for that, dammit, and go through all sorts of hoops to make couples of the women of AMP.

Frankly, I’d forgotton how much I like Kiddy and Ralph together. LOL And Roy and Katsumi are kind of sweet, too, even though I know that they are doomed. ;-)

Yuki, if the story were redone now, would be drawn as a 12-year old goth-loli and Nami’s the female equivalent of a eunuch. Lebia Maverick gets my vote as “character most likely to prefer sex with herself”. ^_^

Which leaves us with the only two characters who ping *my* Yuri-dar….Mana and Rally.

But I get ahead of myself. In this volume we have no more to ID them than exceedingly severe shoulder pads and a ball-buster attitude. (One day, many years ago, I went to work in a suit jacket, tie and long skirt. At least three guys told me that I looked “severe” or like a “ball buster”…I never really thought about it until I re-watched this DVD. I see what they mean!)

There is of course, Rosa, who with her S&M dom look and sister complex gets some people’s blood going. Not mine. And she hasn’t shown up yet, anyway. ^_^

Volume 1 is pretty much just a intro to the story. There are a few differences from the manga, the most notable of which is that Mana is already with AMP, and that it is told chronologically from Katsumi’s arrival in Japan. I think I prefer the manga, but that’s probably just me. There’s nothing wrong with the anime.

“Kindan no Pensee” is a really good opening theme, too – it was the first MP3 I ever downloaded to play on my computer. Ah, nostalgia…

Yuri? Not in Volume 1, but this story is more about good action, and solid characters than it is about Yuri. I’m surprised how well it holds up – even if the clothes look awfully 80’s “vision of the future.” ^_^

Ratings:

Art – 7 (The Lucifer Hawk had to be severely simplified for animation, which makes it easier to see them and what they do)
Story- 7
Characters – 8
Yuri – 0
Service – 1

Overall – 7

A strong action/magic/scifi/ball-busting severe woman/future dystopian/romance of a story.

With big shoulder pads.





Yuri Anime: Madlax DVD Volume 4

December 1st, 2005

Every time I watch the fourth DVD of Madlax, I think, “This is probably the best work Bee Train will ever do.”

The story doesn’t yet make sense (and doesn’t ever make *complete* sense, but that’s okay) and the characters aren’t resolved (nor do they ever fully resolve) or even developed, but the sense of hanging tension and anticipation is what I think they are trying to do – the later development and resolution of characters and plot is almost anticlimactic. The questions are the point, not the answers. But, where in Noir the questions never get anything like real answers, in Madlax they do – even if they are a bit fantastic. Which is why I say that this volume is pretty much the pinnacle of Bee Train’s work, as I understand it.

What *does* happen in this volume? Well, the link between Margaret and Madlax is drummed into our head in three refrains: hot drinks; red shoes; pasta.

Madlax stares into the eye of Enfant and find her brain leaking out her ears from the mystical words of the book Firstari. Twice. And twice Vanessa saves her sorry possessed ass.

Vanessa and Madlax get all touchy-feely.

Carlossur Dawn realizes that he’s going to have to choose soon, between the truth and his job.

Vanessa gets to play the prince to Madlax’s lost princess, but is way glad when Madlax takes the role back.

Margaret doesn’t have enough brains left to be affected by her own book, Secondary.

Eleanor is still a really strange maid. ^_^

Rimelda is on the cusp of realizing that her life is meaningless without Madlax in it.

Vanessa and Madlax visit the place where it all began, and Margaret knows it, somehow.

Naharu walks around looking mysterious and cool, but adds nothing appreciably to plot or character.

Did I mention Vanessa and Madlax snuggling?

The music in this particular set of episodes is pretty much the same three songs you keep hearing over and over, but at this point they become symbolic, as well as decorative. In fact, Madlax’s own theme becomes so crucial to the plot, Japanese fans apparently joked that the word “Yamaani” which is the repeated opening word of her song, gave Madlax superhuman powers. ^_^

Sometimes a story takes too long to get to the point. To be honest, I don’t really care if there ever is a point in this anime – it’s a fun ride, full of gunfire and other people’s misery and deeply mystical, occult symbolism that means nothing to me. ^_^

My only complaints? Friday Monday is STILL the worst name EVER for a bad guy…and…Firstari? Oh, come *on*! Primary. The word is P-r-i-m-a-ry.

When they use Thirdari, I just start to cry.

There’s no overt Yuri. Vanessa and Madlax snuggle in a comfy, friendly way, but I’m not opposed to the idea that it went further somewhere along the line. Nonetheless, I hold in my heart Madlax x Rimelda and Vanessa x Eleanor.

Ratings:

Art – 7
Story – 8
Characters – 7
Music – 8
Yuri – 6

Overall – 7.5

A strong action story, with a little light magic thrown in.





Yuri Anime: Stellvia. Volume 5

September 16th, 2005

The reason this review took so long to get to was simply that I had a really hard time finding this volume! Amazon had it on backorder and at Otakon, not a single vendor had a copy by the time I got to go shopping. It was really irksome. (Amusingly, at the Geneon booth, the sales guy tried to sell me Vol.6, but I kept saying I wouldn’t get it until after I had Volume 5. He was like, “But you’ll need it eventually.” ^_^)

Let’s get right to it, shall we? This volume has a lot of good things, but I’m about to start with the bad.

The art. Where do noses go when they aren’t on faces? Is there a graveyard of lost anime noses? The art is *so* inconsistant in this volume. The older characters are fairly treated, but the main characters…ecch. It definitely looks like we had more than one group doing the art – and one of them sucked. Specifically the group handling Shima and Arisa.

There’s a scene in the second episode (which otherwise has better art than the first) on the volume where the girls are teasing Shima about Kouta. Shima and Arisa are all over the room, while the background characters are all stock still for nearly the entire scene, with fixed faces. Obviously, they didn’t bother animating anyone who wasn’t absolutely necessary. And it looks it. Awful, awful, awful.

The other major bad thing is Kouta. He’s heading into major idiot savant mode and from this point on, I really don’t like him. He’s so…removed…about people, and about Shima in particular. So while she’s growing, and trying harder and harder to reach him, he’s just being a nothing. But he’s a main character, so we have to watch him being a nothing all the freakin’ time! It’s downright distressing.

But that’s about it for really, really bad.

On the good side, all the little relationships are starting to mature – there’s a fair amount of time given over to taciturn Akira and runty Jojo. The volume starts them off on a rough foot, but they really get to spend some quality time onscreen. And along the way, they have a couple of short, but quite meaningful and interesting, scenes. With really good dialogue and everything.

There are some moments in this volume that approach excellent – particularly the political fragmenting of the humans involved in the different aspects of this “war.” People who feel its necessary vs people who feel its a plot by the military, vs people who think its a hoax, vs people who think war would be fun. With our current situation here in the US, it reads as quite realistic.

The most well-executed scene is towards the very end, when the war becomes a reality for our young characters. Seeing a battle, in which “our” forces take a thorough and fatal beating, through Shima’s eyes is quite painful, even as it is exceptionally well-executed.

For our Yuri couple, Yayoi and Ayaka, there is only one scene towards the beginning – but it’s a good one. ;-) With a short, fanservicey, flashback to when they originally met, we get a tearful and emotional reunion between them. Otherwise they are never seen together…but later when Arisa teases Yayoi about Pierre (who has a openly-acknowledged crush on her) Yayoi basically says that he has no chance. Everyone laughs and moves on. They know he has no chance – they just think it’s cause he’s a doofus and Yayoi is a lady.

Ratings:
Art – yucky to not too bad
Story – fun, interesting, emo
Characters – real
Music – doo-doo-doo

Overall – just watch it

In general, this volume is good, solid space opera fare. The aliens are bugs, humans are torn over what to do, and the kids…are kids. All in all, a good story that stays good with ocassional moments of excellent and awful.





Yuri Anime: Madlax, Volume 3

September 12th, 2005

Madlax, Volume 3 Sometimes you get a craving and nothing but sociopathic women with guns can fill it.

Volume 3 of Madlax is both wonderful…and frustrating. Wonderful, because all the connections start coming together, leading you forward towards who knows what. It’s also frustrating for the exact same reasons – you keep feeling like everything is going *somewhere* but you’re just not getting quite enough info to piece it all together.

For me, the volume is very satisfying, as it focuses primarily on the character of Vanessa Rene, whose efforts to find out exactly what’s going on bring her into contact with Madlax, and with Enfan, thus knitting together the three great variables in the story: Who is Madlax, and how did she get those mad assassinatin’ skillz; what on earth is Enfan’s relationship to the civil war in Gazth-Sonika; what does Margaret have to do with any of this?

None of these questions is answered, of course – but Vanessa actually articulates the first two – and the third is implicit in the storyline. Bee Train isn’t giving anything away in this anime, we’re going to have to work for our payoff here. When I watched this part the first time around, I was skeptical that we would get *any* payoff, but now I know we will, and I’m content to let the story play itself out.

In writing the above, I just realized that watching Madlax is a bit like watching a play by Chekhov – you have to let the characters repeat their particular bete noir over and over until the threads all ravel and it begins to make sense. You can’t rush it, or guess what will happened/has happened. You just have to wait.

On the yuri side, I love this volume for what it doesn’t say. There’s still the weird vibe between Vanessa and Eleanor, which makes me think that they slept together, but don’t have a “relationship” per se. Eleanor would be hard work – her focus is so single-minded, that to make her notice her existence, Vanessa would have to do something irrevocable and awful. Vanessa ain’t no dummmy – she lets whatever is between them stay as whatever Eleanor makes it.

When she meets Madlax, its obvious that Vanessa is resonating to something within her – there’s an obvious desire to connect with this mysterious girl, and maybe protect (or perhaps treasure) her a little. There’s a very, very slight yuri feel there, but I think that’s because they are strangers and Vanessa doesn’t yet know who/what Madlax is or how to approach her. I don’t have any difficulty in believing that Vanessa would sleep with Madlax, if she thought that would be a good idea for them both. We know, with 20/20 hindsight, what the thing she feels in Madlax is, but as she doesn’t know herself – and never does learn – it leaves an interesting edginess between them.

As for Madlax, she clearly sees the relationship between her and Vanessa as a mirror image of Vanessa’s interpretaton: she’s the prince protecting Vanessa, the princess. We’ve already seen that Madlax isn’t afraid of sex and, once again, I think Madlax could well sleep with Vanessa, if she felt that it was the thing to do.

Will they, do they? I don’t think so. But that edge between them is fascinating and titilating.

And there’s Rimelda. This volume could be entitled “The birth of an obsession” and I think it’s a beautiful thing. ^_^ I’m not usually fond of obsessive relationships, but again, I know what’s coming and this one works for me.

Ratings:
Art – 5. It’s very inconsistent, with that BT tendency to have really bad people on top of really lovely backgrounds
Story – 8
Characters – 8
Music – 8
Yuri – 6, with loads of possibility

Overall – 8.

Madlax is a story that remains intriguing and fun, as long as you don’t need it to “make sense.”