Makyou Gaiden Le Deus

As we've seen through such titles as Baoh, M.D. Geist, The Humanoid and others, the Original Video Animation was a sub genre of anime that usually worked to promote a manga or to act as a vehicle for artists and vocalists alike, very often they were no more than one-offs that had enough budget to make for a decently-animated 40 minutes or more, which typically jeopardized story in many cases. OVAs were a bit like mini-movies in that regard, and were much more digestible than full-fledged anime series, they were good for the video crowd. Cybernetics Guardian left me wanting more, while The Humanoid simply embellished the fact some OVAs could have done with being much longer, let's see which of these the 1987 release Makyou Gaiden Le Deus/魔境外伝レ・ディウス falls into.

Opening to an abstract depiction of water ripples and a neon outline of a tree, we learn that we're looking into the Eye of Zalem, an ancient lens that has fallen into the hands of treasure hunter Riot and his two twin female companions, Spica and Seneca. This lens is needed for a treasure called Rido, that lies in Zalem, however, there's another Eye of Zalem, that someone in Zigoa is holding on to. Cue what must be the most simplistic title sequence ever, which is nothing but the Eye of Zalem spinning on its axis, at least the shading on it is utterly gorgeous, and it's set to a catchy song. Riot meets his target, a girl called Yuta la Caradeen, the granddaughter of a man called Randall, who he got the first Eye from. However, they are hounded by a group of demons known as the Demsters, who previously murdered Randall, and are the foot soldiers of Kaiser, a heavyset brute who wants to use the powers of the Rido treasure for evil (obviously). During a break at the beach, Riot tells Yuta that Rido is the treasure left behind by the Quall civilization, and it has the power to rejuvenate life. Riot is only searching for it so it doesn't fall into the hands of Kaiser and his Demsters, plus, he wants to use its powers to bring his sister out of suspended animation.

The next morning though as they arrive at the ruins of Zalem, they are ambushed by the Demsters and their giant robots, who successfully kidnap Yuta and steal the two Eyes of Zalem. With Yuta in the grasp of Kaiser, Riot makes it his mission to rescue her and to stop Kaiser from abusing the power of Rido as he gains access to it. However, he's too late, and Kaiser's damage is too much to be undone as the underground realm of the Zalem collapses in on itself, Spica and Seneca call for Riot's giant robot, Le Deus, to combat the last of the Demsters in their own giant robots.

Directed by Hiroshi Negishi (the same animation director who worked on Roots Search of all things) and penned by Hideki Sonoda, Le Deus is a decent little piece that is very characteristic of late 80s Japanese fantasy, but with a myriad of problems. Like with many OVAs, Le Deus suffers from a case of having too much in too little time; the world the title takes place in feels more deserving of a bigger exploration and the sci-fi elements feel tacked on to give this thing more advertising power, as the giant robots have only been added in to give this thing some fanservice for the mech crowd, the titular Le Deus robot not appearing until the final ten minutes, making it feel very useless. Additionally, this same robot appears to be docked inside of some kind of giant alien whale, without so much as a few words on why. Worst of all though is how the subplot with Riot's sister is completely painted over after it's mentioned, and Kaiser's unknown boss essentially has no reason for appearing at all. I'm all up for Riot's magical bandage though, which he can even turn into a sword. Characters themselves are derivative with Riot being the fiery and cocky young adventurer and Kaiser being bad for the sake of being bad (at least he's not Governor Proud of The Humanoid, who took the archetype to stupefying levels of badness), but that's not to say they're unlikable, though much like the sci-fi element, the Demsters are near-pointless additions, with the three most important ones not even being named.

Voice acting is all well and good with the casting containing among its ranks Norio Wakamoto as Kaiser because he was in just about EVERYTHING in the 80s, and Kazuki Yao as Riot who has quite a list to his name, as does Yuko Mizutani as Yuta (she was the Japanese dub voice for Buffy the Vampire Slayer). Like with just about every OVA, Le Deus feels more like a pilot that is a giant compressing of every idea that was meant to go into a longer series, it's not bad at all and it's frankly nice to watch with its brightly-coloured, decent artwork and animation, music is not outstanding but it does contain three good J-Pop songs. It has to be said though the cover is a bit of a lie, showing a naked Yuta, when there's no real in-your-face nudity at all. It should be noted that this title was only released in the UK in 1995 and was called "Ladius", same thing phonetically really. Recommended for lovers of 80s anime, there's far worse that's been done with OVAs.   

• Animation: 3/5   
• Artwork: 4/5
• 80s shading: 5/5

-James, 04 March 2010 (original date)

Review source: Japanese Laserdisc

Screenshot source: Japanese Laserdisc

Invasion U.S.A.

Whichever way you look at it, there were two things in the 1980's that when fused together made possibly the greatest cinematic concoction known to mankind: Chuck Norris and Cannon Films.The latter created some of the biggest guilty pleasures of my childhood from the ultra rare Robotech: The Movie to the gleefully dumb American Ninja series. Chuck Norris on the other hand is... well you know the drill. Invasion U.S.A. is the culmination of every Reaganite action movie cliche complete with a low budget, ridiculous body count and of course the Chuckernator complete with bombastic musical score. If that isn't enough to make you want to track down this neglected classic already, prepare to be enlightened.

We begin this Cold War era odyssey with a rickety little ship carrying Cuban immigrants, wandering through the waves hoping to reach America. After one of the kids moans for a bit about how great the whole place is, a patrol boat sporting the US flag drifts along seemingly ready with open arms for the desperate refugees. All is not well though, as soon as the haggered civilians step on board they are immediately massacred by our main antagonist Rostov (Richard Lynch). You can tell he is evil thanks to the subtle traits he has including being a little weedy as well as being Russian, figures. After one of his lackeys raids the boat for cocaine, we abruptly are smacked in the face with the manliest title card ever written with Jay Chattaway's roaring wails of trumpets inspiring our audience to kill 'dem Commies.

But to ensure the audience gets their daily supply of chinbeard, Chuck arrives on the scene in no doubt the single most awe inspiring vehicle ever driven... an airboat. Do these things still exist? What makes these credits so freaking epic is the fact that not only is Chuck riding a vehicle I have never seen in real life, but he is wearing an open denim jacket as his facial hair blows in the wind. Even a bird can be seen desperately trying to get away from the ungodly levels of testosterone, now that's an achievement. We cut to two cops assigned to investigate a docked US patrol boat which is conveniently stockpiled with a ton of corpses weirdly all dressed now in white briefs. Don't ask. A lone female reporter complete with no name and a hell of an 80's haircut (I shall name her Frizz) approaches the cops, pestering them for evidence. Naturally because this is probably the only female character with any semblance of development in this patriarchal epic, she is ignored by everybody.

Now you are probably wondering what kind of character Chuck Norris plays, a CIA agent named Matt Hunter who just so happens to be good at martial arts. Basically himself. We see him with a tanned wrinkly dude named John Eagle trying to trap an alligator, no reason really other than to show Chuck is a true man. Grrr. As if the structure of this movie wasn't already a little dodgy we follow Rostov handing over a stash of drugs to Billy Drago in his early days before Delta Force 2. After signing the deal as well as securing enough guns to make John Woo blush, Rostov jams a snorting tube up a hooker and chucks her out of a window in one hell of a spontaneous killing. Hell, he even gives Drago the worst ball busting imaginable before buggering off elsewhere.

After another brief scene of Chuck expressing his distaste for frogs (no terrible racial pun intended), we see a beady-eyed CIA agent travel to Chuck's remote house in alligator country not via helicopter but by a wooden boat with paddles. Chuck apparently also attended the acting school of Michael Myers as he gives the agent a jump scare complete with string movement; the lackey informs Chuck that Rostov is back and requests for his fists of justice. He refuses stating that 'now he's your problem.'

    

Rostov meanwhile flashbacks to the last time he met Chuck,  while taking aim at a random group of diplomats our hero promptly appears to kick the guy in the face while declaring 'it's time to die'. He wakes up covered in sweat as his counterpart Nico enters the room reassuring him that their diabolical plan (if you don't know, read the title of the movie again) will go unscathed; this displeases our leader as he orders for an airboat patrol (two words that in any normal person should induce giggling fits) to be sent to eliminate our grizzled hero as he chainsaws his way threw some logs and grins at his pet armadillo (?). The villains 'conspicuously' move towards the house, but just before they blow the house to hell John Eagle stumbles upon the team and takes out one with a double barreled shotgun but his victory is short lived. Chuck however is psychic and jumps through a nearby window as the house is razed to the ground by a hail of gunfire. Now the only honourable thing for Chuck to do is REVENGE, so he sets his friend's body on fire in the house and drives off in his pickup truck for great justice. Rostov and Niko are seen sitting in a bar on the beach whispering in front of hundreds of people (did I mention this film is based at Christmas?) reciting their plan for Western domination, which promptly edits to a frolicking young couple getting murdered by Niko for the hell of it. Then suddenly all credibility disappears as thousands of terrorists sprint from D-day landing craft to a convoy of armoured trucks. No, seriously this is what happens and it's meant to be taken seriously. What makes this even more stupendously retarded is that Rostov states that '18 hours from now... America will be a very different place.' This movie already makes Rambo as sophisticated as the average Tom Clancy novel.

Chuck finally succumbs to the CIA agents request for help in defeating Rostov, after learning along with the cops about the beachhead landing the night before. The police at this moment in time are of course, fairly nonchalant that several thousand terrorists have just decided to up and start committing mass murder. Hell even Frizz looks past all this to refer to the stoic Chuck as 'cowboy', I guess she is good at making jokes for me. Rostov finally begins his own journey of blowing random shit up by stopping by a nearby suburb as kids are placing stars on Christmas trees and jocks shag gender-ambiguous looking chicks. Naturally all this kitschy happiness makes his blood boil so he cleans up the place with a rocket launcher, firing six times without even having to reload. Some solemn music then plays out to... hey a party full of vaguely foreign people. Yep, naturally Rostov hates Hispanics and Mexicans too so he sends two guys in cop disguises to blow them away; those that survive including Frizz decide to take their subtitled range out on other cops. Oh noes anarchy! Chuck cruises in his pickup truck sampling the many delights of the city's nightlife including hookers screaming 'fuck you!', pimps in white pajamas and thugs with Motley Crue haircuts jumping on the bonnet. Stopping off at a bar to break a bottle in a random guy's hands (you know because it is not obvious to the audience already that Chuck is manly yet), he meets an old friend and gets a lead on Rostov and his men. As being the world's most dickish terrorist is just SO tiring, Rostov along with Nico relax at the beach marveling at their crimes. A wrapped present is given to one of Rostov's thugs could it be... a bomb?! Another of Rostov's men who looks like the late Richard Pryor with the face of a chipmunk, swaggers through a strip bar looking for hookers. After acquiring one and chucking her onto the bed, Chuck springs from the void between space and time (literally, I have no idea where he came from) promptly impaling the guy's left hand with a knife. After threatening two inflated musclemen about 'hitting you with so many rights you will be asking for a left', Chuck leaves the guy with a grenade to tell Rostov that it's time to die. Rostov learns of Chuck's appearance and gives his bewildered cohort a ball busting, his partner Nico desperately trying to reassure him that the plan will succeed without further problems.

Remember that present bomb from earlier? well the Hugh Laurie lookalike terrorist brings it into a nearby mall full of what else? Innocents doing their Christmas shopping of course, several of them are blown up and gunned down in slow-mo just to make the audience gasp in horror at the Commie atrocities. Anyway, Chuck bursts through with his pickup truck Uzis blazing even nailing one terrorist standing conveniently still for his truck to run him down. Soon after, evil Hugh Laurie grabs the brand new Nissan pickup truck conveniently placed in the mall and drives off with a female hostage. Chuck races after them with Frizzy who popped out of nowhere (everyone seems omnipresent in this movie and just steps in when they fell like it) along for the ride. Cue such exciting set pieces including driving past a football game and will the hostage's panties tear as Frizz tries to grab her? Naturally the villains car tumbles and explodes thanks to a well placed grenade.
Seeing as how most of this movie at this moment in time follows a pattern of 'Terrorists do stuff and Chuck makes them pay', I will sum up the next few scenes for you:

*  National Guard is summoned to deal with terrorist threat set to loud patriotic music, naturally some of them are disguised terrorists and Chuck blows them away learning more about Rostov's whereabouts.
*  Rostov tries to blow up a church in the middle of prayer with a briefcase bomb, Chuck disarms it flinging it back at them and making it go boom.
* Frizzy is attacked by Nico's disguised National Guard squad. Chuck sneaks behind Nico and for whatever reason makes him shoot himself by just grabbing the top of his gun. Frizzy is not too grateful throwing a bin lid at his head and labeling him a 'creep'.
* Chuck stops a few goons from blowing up a school bus full of children with timed C4, he chucks the explosive right back at them. Note that just as the car explodes, nobody is in it indicating that Chuck did not only kill them, but sent them to the magical dimension known as continuity screw-ups.
* The manliness level reaches fever point as Chuck finds a ruined fairground where some terrorists actually managed to kill some kids set to some sorrowful trumpet wails. The CIA agent from earlier warns him of the risk of his vendetta against Rostov to which he replies: 'Think of the stakes.' Yum.
*  Chuck is promptly arrested by the police charged with being a vigilante and that 'nobody is beyond the law.' Audience groans.

After being escorted to the National Guard HQ (I guess), Frizz gives some uplifting pep talk to Chuck and promptly disappears from the movie completely. Rostov watching the news on three separate televisions marveling at his handiwork stumbles on a live interview with Chuck relaying the news: 'It will be time to die.' Rostov in yet another fit of rage smashes the TV and orders his troops to make the final push against Chuck. Nailing a few bumbling cops, Rostov steals AN ENTIRE DEPOT of armoured trucks. He succeeds in navigating to the National Guard HQ roof in a chopper as his ground forces drive through the incredibly wide open barriers. The raid begins as the terrorists shoot in a fit of rage at everything they see: papers, fish tanks, water canisters, paintings, they don't care as long as stuff sparkles and their grins are garishly comical. Rostov after around five minutes realises that this is a set up and promptly orders a retreat.

Too bad though that the National Guard has turned up right on their doorstop with several hundred troopers complete with M-60s and tanks. The odds aren't good for our ambitious Russian moron. Suddenly because the plot says so with no explanation as to how he escaped capture, Chuck has followed Rostov to the building decimating his copter ride and massacres the rest of his troops with his trademark Uzis and kicks to the face. In one hilarious scene, two baddies hunker behind the walls of a room as Chuck arms an M4 with grenade launcher. Knowing that there are two guys there, Chuck fires but through the powers of 'I don't know how physics work' he makes gaping holes in the wall defeating them. Last time I recall, I am sure grenades are supposed to BLOW UP rather than leave just holes. But I digress, Rostov completely loses it and starts spraying the room where Chuck is like a ten year old on his first game of Call of Duty. All the while our hunk of manbeard taunts him to the edge of a window as he runs out of ammo and switches to a rocket launcher knowing full well that his plan is doomed. After a long display of fireworks and people falling over, the terrorists surrender and the soldiers holler in victory. But now for Chuck it's redemption time, pulling a rocket launcher out of his ass (may as well be) he aims at Rostov. The clicking sound of the launcher freezing Rostov in his place. 'It's time.' Chuck's words activate Rostov's last defence mechanism: a scream that sounds like a cat being run over. He aims his rocket launcher but is too late as Chuck fires in the nick of time, incinerating his foe as a slow-mo shot shows his innards fly out the window. Our grizzled hero throws down the empty weapon as the booming trumpets lead us into the credits. Invasion U.S.A. is a movie that for me defines trashy American 80's action movies and therefore much of my early teenhood. The plotline is so patriotic and jingoistic you could have mistaken it for one of John Wayne's 'yellow peril' movies. Much of the story is so inconsequential that much of the film feels like a partly stringed together series of vignettes featuring Chuck Norris being a badass. The acting naturally for the most part is either stoic (Chuck), hokey (Frizzy) or just downright bonkers (Rostov) not exactly helped by a script partly written by Chuck himself. Because of the laughably nonexistent Reaganite plotting, the hammy action is almost non-stop with a body count easily rivaling the later Rambo films and maybe even some of John Woo's work. In my eyes, Invasion U.S.A. is the film that beer and pizza was made for. Don't listen to critics, this film is a bonafide trash masterpiece.

• Levels of manliness: The equivalent of Charles Bronson hurling a t-shirt into space.
• Levels of Reaganite politics: Enough to make a redneck squeal in delight.
• Do I regret enjoying this movie? Nope.

-Oli, 12 March 2010 (original date)

Review source: UK DVD

Screenshot source: UK DVD

Skelter Heaven

Like with lots of critics, we often seem to find things we brand "the worst ever", for us, that usually seems to be anime. So far we have routinely topped what we've last said about something: Roots Search has always been a good contender, Dog Soldier has quite a few problems but actually isn't all that awful in some cases, The Humanoid was flat-out terrible and so far, the one title to truly annoy me with absolutely NO redeeming qualities is 2004's Mars of Destruction, and already it seems like this title is ready to be topped, but technically, this title and Mars of Destruction are on in the same. 

Meet Tenkuu Danzato Skelter+Heaven/ 天空断罪スケルターヘブン, does "Skelter Heaven" make you think of The Beatles? Will that name ever make sense within in the context of the show? Of course not, this thing would prefer to come from the school of Roots Search and have a title that leaves you outright baffled. Much like Mars of Destruction, this dismal 19-minute OVA is nothing more than an unmoving promotional vehicle for a low budget PS2 game that thankfully stayed in Japan. You know what? If you didn't see this coming already, then I'll put it to you directly: Skelter+Heaven is by the same team who gave us Mars of Destruction. This is most definitely a seal of quality, a putrid level of quality, right off the bat there is not a single thing to look forward to from this foreseen travesty.

...And then the OVA happily confirms this, by opening to a horribly done digital sequence of nothing really happening, other than some stars in the background shaking about as the camera zooms in on the earth. The person with the creative input on this part must have had no knowledge about establishing scene or location, or they were just trying to fill up the minimal time duration, my money is on both. Through the method of expository time-wasting, it's revealed that Tokyo has apparently been attacked by a giant monster and humans have fled of course, all this anchored by several slow pans of buildings that don't appear to be suffering any damage from this alien threat.

Are any videogamers reading this? Specifically Megaman fans? Guess what, X5's opening has more animation than this OVA's intro, and if you've never seen the opening to Megaman X5, do it now to get an idea (I'd prefer it if you looked up the American version as it has better music). To rub salt into the wound, this opening is geared with a completely forgettable sugary J-Pop song while showing off its characters and their unremarkable designs. I have to mention that I am watching this as I write and the singer's vocals, squawking uninspired lyrics that have been heard before in 100+ other anime openings, are really getting on my nerves.  

With that out the way, we open to a looped news reporter talking about how the "mysterious object" has begun to move over Tokyo, the mysterious object in question is a giant floating CGI squid that has barely been textured let alone animated. We're seemingly introduced to our limited characters, but there's honestly not much to say, other than how one guy, Funagai, appears to be huge. We cut to a mansion to show off some of the female charactes, oh god, UGH, the voice acting! The voice actresses appear to have gone for a painfully cute route by giving high-pitched, squeaky performances, much to the chagrin of my ears. More hideous CGI abounds as two girls spar in some extremely unimpressive power suits. This whole scene seems to be a very confused backstory as the main girl (no I don't know her name, I don't recall being told it) remarks about how she can't believe five years has already passed while standing in the shower (since what is never established), it then fades to... some ungodly kind of training sequence showing two of the girls strapped down to some machine as it pumps them up and down, and then it cuts to the main girl having her shoulder grabbed by Funagi, and then cuts to all of them being at the control room... I don't have a fucking clue. 
Their commander gives the most bombastic briefing ever, that essentially boils down to him just telling them they may as well be aiming for the weak point of a Boss in a shoot-'em-up game; "there will be two steps to defeating this enemy - understanding its weak point, and destroying it", informative. Oh we finally learn the name of the main female, Ichikawa Lin, not like it'll make much of a difference. On their way to suit up in their mechs, some girl called Misaki argues with Funagai because of how Ichikawa has elected to be the main player in this mission, it's bullshit really. Misaki, in her utterly inanimate CG shit-brick of a mech, lands on the surface of the giant squid that isn't attacking for whatever reason. Oh wait, it's attacking now, very slowly knocking the girls away with its tentacles.

Funagai's jet is taken down by the squid and Ichikawa tries to rescue him, it then abruptly cuts to a flashback with the nameless commander talking about how Ichikawa is basically an artificial creation. It then jumps to Ichikawa being in a classroom talking about her lifespan because she's artificial, honestly, all of this stuff is so poor it doesn't qualify as being development. It then finally cuts back to the squid with Ichikawa and Funagai being back in the fight, Funagai tries to kamikaze, but Ichikawa announces her love for him out of the blue, so the girls just all attack in unison. Ichikawa somehow ends up inside the squid and floats about while delivering some pap that I suppose is meant to sound philosophical before shooting at the core. From the outside, the squid lets out a grey blotch of smoke and then stiffly falls down, absolutely pathetic. Cut to a year later, and the same looped news reporter from earlier casually talks about how more squids have appeared over Tokyo.
Yeah, I really don't know what to say.

This abomination just barely has a narrative, with exposition being injected at every turn and being terribly told in general, Mars of Destruction's narrative is only marginally delivered better, solely because it does not keep moving backwards and side to side. I really shouldn't have to embellish this any further, but this is a really bad anime, the artwork thrives on its blandness and the animation borders along non-existent, music is unnoticeable and the voice acting is awful. I never thought I'd say this but, both Mars of Destruction and this make Roots Search look good. BAD films and shows normally have something that makes them enjoyable, but these two titles have features that hardly break into being 'good', I would call these factually two of the worst pieces of animation ever, they have nothing going for them, and I'm putting them both together because of how they're by the same team. Power DoLLS proved you can make decent to good promotional OVAs with limited funds, but I highly doubt the game this OVA is promoting is much good anyway.
If anyone ever says such-and-such is the worst anime ever, slap this in their face.
Skelter+Heaven doesn't even deserve a joke rating.

Power DoLLS 2

It appears that there was a trend with OVAs; just as they spawned a sequel that seemed as though it was going to carry the story on with another sequel, the title stopped just before it could really take off. This could be for a number of reasons, be it lack of popularity or the possibility that a sequel may have been so bad it killed all chance of further OVAs for that series (I largely think this was the case with the second Riki-Oh OVA). The same could also be theorized for that of the Violence Jack OVAs; in 1986, this title saw its first anime incarnation in the form of an OVA, loosely based on part of the manga's story. It was an irredeemably bad OVA and the series would not return in anime form until three years later with the considerably bigger budget (and better quality) Evil Town and Hell's Wind; chronologically these took place before the events of the first OVA, but the ending of Hell's Wind hints toward a possible reboot of the first OVA, of course it never came to be. The first episode of Power DoLLS was mediocre at best, the second episode however, is damn near excellent with much better production values. So it should as well, coming out two years after the original episode.  

Power DoLLS is about how the colony world Omni has declared war on the oppressive Earth Government for their fascistic regime. The Omni Forces elite squad of mecha pilots were all female, known as the "DoLLS", Detachment of Limited Line Service, who piloted labour machines that had been converted into combat units, called Power Loaders. First taking place in the final months of 2540 A.D., Commander Fei Yao and her squad of DoLLS encounter a formidable new ally Loader piloted by a woman called Kelly, someone who Yao knew in Naval Academy. What Kelly was piloting was a product of Project Alpha, however, shortly after its deployment in that battle, a peace treaty granted Omni its independence and the war on Earth came to a close, thus retiring the DoLLS, and Project Alpha's Loader would never be seen again. Four years later though, a civil war has broken out, led by rebels known as the Jiasu, so the DoLLS have been called back into action. The DoLLS' mission is to destroy a Power Loader research facility that belongs to the Jiasu rebels, however, their informant has reported that the facility's defenses are made up of only one unit, which has seemingly wiped out previous Omni forces sent into the facility. There is a bit of governmental dirt at work here though, as whether the DoLLS fail or succeed, the mission will be covered up.

As the DoLLS infiltrate the facility, they learn the enemy's Power Loader is the same one from Project Alpha that appeared at the end of the war four years ago, except that back then it was on their side. Yao's girls catch up with their severely wounded informant, who is revealed to be Debra Hughes, the head of Project Alpha. She has bad news though; the Alpha Loader that appeared at the end of the war was only its ninth model, it's now up to its eleventh, all because her ambition got the better of her, worse, Kelly is still the pilot, but now without any of her humanity as she controls two additional units neurally. Hughes sees her butchery of a human test pilot as her greatest sin, and wants this information to be made public, so that it never happens again. However, she is quickly butchered by Kelly's Alpha unit, leaving it up to Yao to finish off Kelly's machines. At the end of the battle, Kelly is brought back despite pretty much being in a vegetated state.   

The story might be nothing new at all, but it's something I would like to see expanded upon (probably happened in the games, but as if I'll ever see those) as it's handled very well for something that's only 27 minutes long; it keeps things pretty concise, and while the people upstairs in it have the ignorant white-wash attitude that's quite typical, it's presented fairly well. You can't really feel for the characters at all given how short this is, but even if it was longer by about another 20 minutes, it'd probably deliver just the same.
Unlike the first  episode, which was a decent stab at characterization, this one is action-dedicated while serving up some good dialogue-driven scenes (few as they are in the short entirety of this thing's run), they aren't terrible at all but aren't trailblazers either, though that's to be expected.

Where this OVA excels is in its artwork and animation, both areas have seen a GREAT improvement since the previous episode that I can recommend this episode on animation alone: it's incredibly sleek and smooth, another good reason this is only 27 minutes long. Seeing as how this episode takes place four years after the first, it's good to see the characters look like they have aged a little. Even the music is a lot better this time, with the exception of the opening song, which a little ear-grating, but isn't horrible. Among all the impressive and smoothly-done mech action, there is only one instance of gore that's not in your face, but they do manage to make it seem quite strong by not focusing on it at all. In fact, the only thing that even slightly holds this OVA back is the poor CGI, but sparingly it's not on screen much at all. Like the first one, the dub is much more enjoyable than the Japanese audio track with some decent voice acting.

While the first one was a bit difficult to recommend, this one I can do more easily, it's a genuinely good OVA with some delectable action and should definitely get you interested in the games, too bad they're not very easy to find. Returning to what I said initially though, it's a shame OVA titles seemed to stop just as they got good, it would have been nice to have seen a third Power DoLLS as good as this one. 

• Animation: 4/5
• Mechanical designs: 4/5
• Being a sequel that bests its predecessor in every area: 5/5

-James, 06 February 2010 (original date)

Review source: US DVD

Screenshot source: US DVD

Power DoLLS

Power DoLLS: Detachment of Limited Line Service (パワードール) is a Japan-only series of turn-based tactics videogames released for PCs, the last sequel was released in 2004 while the first game came out in 1994, given how it's already enjoyed ten years of sequels, it can be assumed that the series is now dead. As with lots of videogames in the 90s, there were anime spin-offs made to promote them in the form of OVAs, usually the best of these OVAs were only just good, while the rest were typically bad. As I've never played a Power DoLLS game in my life, I can't really judge this two-episode OVA in similar contexts as I would with its games, as I have no familiarity with the characters, story or representation. With that out the way, let's see if there's anything good we can say about this.

As our text prologue states, in 2535 AD the Earth Government has been declared war upon by the colony world Omni because of their oppressive immigration regime. Omni converted their Power Loader work labour machines into combat units for use in the war, these adapted weapons would be picked up in 2540 AD by the elite all-female task force, DoLLS (in case you didn't notice earlier, it stands for "Detachment of Limited Line Service). This 27-minute episode primarily follows one of the DoLLS, Commander Yao Pei Lui, who rescues two kids from enemy territory because of her bleeding heart ways, despite the by-the-book ideals of her ally Phan. While this OVA by no means reaches any deep cinematic level, it pays a fair bit of attention to the opposite attitudes of these two characters, and we learn that Yao's empathy for the war orphans stems from how she grew up in an orphanage herself before going straight into the military.

After being behind enemy lines, Yao and the DoLLS are given their next mission; the recapture of Bukaju City from Earth Forces, which are using it to manufacture weapons. However, Phan's tactic does not involve going near the city, instead her plan is to explode a nearby dam to cut off all power to the city. However, in the path of the dam and its river is the evacuated Chateau Village, where Yao grew up. The DoLLS are ordered to launch their operation at midnight and drop into an enemy area to clean up and secure the dam, before going into the hot zone, Yao recalls back to how her father died in the construction of the dam after promising it'd keep them both safe. Phan teases her over how her kindess is likely to get her killed in combat, what a nice friend.

As they touch down in a small town, Yao's Power Loader crashes and loses mobility, but insists they continue the operation while she makes a break for it, leaving a present for the encroaching enemy forces. As the rest of the DoLLS go to detonate the dam, Yao finds her old to reminisce on the good times. Thinking she's an awful daughter, Yao decides to stay in the cabin to let the flood from the dam take her away. Her commander however, saw this mission as a good opportunity for Yao to put her personal problems aside, and knows where she is, instead of being at the rendezvous point. Just as the dam explodes, the DoLLS pick Yao up from her father's cabin and head back home.

This first episode actually isn't too bad, for what its worth with its short run time and limited cast, it squeezes in some decent characterization; Phan is not as cold as she first comes off and shows some real concern and warmth to Yao, and the commander (Captain Hardy) isn't a bad character herself. We don't see much of the other characters, they were probably just stuck in to please fans of the games with cameos essentially, but Yao is a decent focus character. However, the artwork falters a bit at times but isn't ugly, though the animation is fairly average and slightly awful at times. The music is nothing special either, but the dub is actually quite good, featuring dialogue that's better than the original Japanese script as well as including a few slightly funny moments (I like how the Power Loader's computer says "goodbye" just before it self-destructs, I also like the surreal nod to Arnold Schwarzenegger, which I'm not sure as to whether it makes this thing feel a bit more reality-grounded or whether it takes it out of its own world). For an anime with an all-female cast, I like how it doesn't go down the pathetic route of forcing fanservice down your throat; a bit of a disappointment for those into that, but it certainly helps the overall quality of this thing. 

The mecha and character designs aren't bad but probably aren't best depicted here and probably look better with the games' artwork, this is not a must-see. If you do watch it, make sure to watch it dubbed, it will make it more enjoyable.

• Art: 3/5
• Mechanical design: 3/5
• Action: 2/5

I would make the ratings for this one humorous, but there's not much to say...

-James, 26 January 2010 (original date)

Review source: US DVD
Screenshot source: US DVD

Mars of Destruction

In our quest to disprove M.D. Geist as the worst anime ever like the biased fans we are, we have been looking for some of the truly worst that Japan has to offer for their animation medium. Among Roots Search and The Humanoid, as well as a number of others we are yet to review, we have another addition to the list; the blinkingly short 20-minute Mars of Destruction/破滅のマルス. At the very least, our aforementioned examples of brain-achingly bad anime at least had production values, Mars of Destruction on the other hand? It's not 20-minutes long for nothing you know.

Taking place in the far distant year of... 2010 (wow it feels weird when you're reviewing something like that now), we're treated to a static shot of a shapeless space ship re-entering the earth's atmosphere. Of course it doesn't really move, it just seems to hover above the earth as the pilots chat about unimportant things. Apparently this ship is the Mars Exploration Vessel (if Koichi Ohata was behind this in his 80s mindset it'd probably be called "MARS PENETRATOR"), they're apparently taking some artefact back to earth because it holds secrets, somehow. Unfortunately, their ship burns to a crisp unspectacularly.

A text crawl reveals to us that several months have passed since the debris of the ship fell to earth and strange incidents have been happening in Tokyo, it then cuts to three VERY badly-drawn girls in unimaginative uniforms pointing guns at two creatures covered in black with red glowy bits, they're apparently called "Ancients". Why? This anime is too half-assed to give a reason. The Ancients fire yellow energy beams, and take one of the girls' heads clean off, but it's just a hilarious-looking geyser of static blood shooting upward; anime often gets a lot of shit for its highly-unreleastic depictions of the human body spurting too much blood, but this one just takes the cake, the fucking thing doesn't even arc out or rain down, it just keeps shooting up! But enough attention to pathetic detail, the two remaining girls take on the Ancients in a pretty un-stunning fight thanks to how the limited animation makes M.D. Geist 2: Death Force look big budget. Suddenly, an armoured being called Takeru appears to try his hand at dispatching the Ancients (the muffled voice of Takeru inside the armour sounds really pathetic).

He's wounded and taken into the hospital, as is the girl who just had her head blown off, to which the doctor says "this one is totally gone" and puts a blanket over her, gee I never would have guessed that a beheaded person could still be alive. The anime takes this opportunity to give us some expository farting around and reveals that the armour Takeru was wearing was called "The MARS" (as ordered by his dad, but this is never referred back to), it's never mentioned why it's all in capitals by the way (another parenthesized mention is that Takeru's unseen dad apparently hits him in his flashback but we only hear the sound of his arm swinging, no connection, and he still feels pain it seems). Takeru and the girls work for AAST, the "Anti-unidentified Ancients Special Team" (because that rolls right off the tongue and makes perfect sense right?), which is made up of various police organizations (so I guess in 2010, police forces are made up of teenage girls), this extra bit of sloppy exposition still doesn't tell us why the monsters are called Ancients, instead it just shows more embarrassingly-dull clips of the girls trying out different weapons. Takeru is mentioned that he used to be a "typical high student" (I'm groaning just at how lazily this is written) before he joined ASSED, but for some reason, no one knows why he wears MARS or why he fights with them, because when you're in a special task force, you don't keep note of your squad mates, correct?

ASSED have to escort the remains of the ship or something, we get a solid minute of filler until one of the police cars is blown up by an Ancient's laser. Takeru steps into some crucifix-shaped chamber (because I bet that totally represents something relevant to the story) to get suited up in the MARS armour and is dispatched while some cop is torn up by the Ancients. Their leader is with them, and so joins in on the fun of killing characters as nameless and as faceless as they are. Takeru joins in at failing to do anything against the enemy, until it's defeated thanks to a gun being pulled out of the big hole of Deus ex Machina. Elsewhere in America presumably, some doctor with a crazy hairdo and a wrinkled guy talk about how humanity's development was influenced by the DNA of the homo sapiens that originally lived on Mars, the wrinkled guy says something about humans originating from Japan, I have no idea. Meawnhile, the alien leader gets up and tells Takeru that "no Takeru, YOU are the invaders", because he was one of the original earthlings released by the virus that wiped out the martians (it's not specified, I don't know what you should expect). He's shot to shit by the other girls, which makes his top half explode, and it ends.

In all fairness, this OVA was made to promote an equally low-budget PS2 game that never left Japan, but if you're going to make something so risible and uninteresting, why bother? Unless I have a dire need to learn about the terribly dull and air-thin characters, this thing would not persuade me to pick up the game, nor does it intrigue me about the mystery of the enemy. The animation is only a step away from being entirely static and acting as a slideshow, with much of the visuals being made up by garish digital effects that just make it even more of an eyesore. The character designs are the epitome of generically done anime characters and have to be the most un-fascinating pieces of artwork ever, with each female character lacking any real charm other than how they're just a lazy stab at trying to appeal to the crowd who like 'cute' 2D girls while Takeru himself even looks like a girl. The music is unnoticeable except for a few (a few is the entire soundtrack) that are just MIDI versions of classical pieces and the voice-acting is plainly bad.

• Animation: -1/5
• Sound: 0/5
• LOOK IT'S FUCKING BAD OKAY?

-James, 20 January 2010 (original date)

Review source: Fan-subtitled Japanese DVD
Screenshot source: Fan-subtitled Japanese DVD