#111: Dai-Guard (1999-2000)

From https://66.media.tumblr.com/38626aab62333c1daaea
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Director: Seiji Mizushima

Screenplay: Fumihiko Shimo

Voice Cast: Akiko Hiramatsu as Ibuki Momoi; Kentaro Ito as Shunsuke Akagi; Shinichiro Miki as Keiichirou Aoyama; Chiharu Suzuka as Kamimura; Hiro Yuuki as Yosuke Sumida; Katsuyuki Konishi as Hirotaka Ijyuin; Kenichi Ono as Agent Shiro Shirota; Makoto Higo as Tomoru Taguchi; Marina Ono as Chiaki Nakahara; Masashi Hirose as Chief Haruo Osugi; Mayumi Shintani as Rika Domeki; Michiko Neya as Noriko Oyama; Rumi Kasahara as Shizuka Irie; Shoji Izumi as Tomoyoshi Ishizuka; Takaya Hashi as Okouchi; Yukari Tamura as Fuuka Tanigawa

Viewed in Japanese with English Subtitles

It immediately caught my interest as a premise - ordinary salary employees having to operate a giant robot, with all the concerns of protecting Tokyo from monsters with additional fears of red tape superseding everything. The further surprise was to discover the director of the series is Seiji Mizushima, he who would helm the 2003 adaptation of Full Metal Alchemist that become a monster hit in the West and the East. He is not a figure I have heard in a form of auteur status, a working director to this day who other most prominent role was helming Mobile Suit Gundam 00 (2007-2009), so it was inherently fascinating to see this obscure title from the perspective of where, a few years later, he'd acquire a monumental hit under his belt.

Dai-Guard is a giant robot that, being built to fight natural phenomenon called Heterodynes, was never deployed when they first appeared in 2018¹, twelve years later reduced to a mascot item for its owner and creator the 21st Century Defense Security Corporation, who developed the machine for the military but have now used it as an attraction to make up for the cost of building the machine. A Heterodyne, later in the series found to be created through earthquakes and tremors in fault lines, makes an appearance for the first time for so long and, in the chaos, an overeager salary man working for the corporation's group managing the machine, Public Relations Division 2, hastily gets into the "Dai-Guard". Said man, the headstrong Shunsuke Akagi, is tagged along with meek ladies man co-worker Keiichiro Aoyama, and their strong minded senior female co-worker Ibuki Momoi, and they manage to succeed in spite of the piss and venom upper management have immediately afterwards.

From there the show never becomes, until the last few episodes, a traditional giant robot show where you'd presume they would eventually fight escalating monsters and find the cause; the former happens, but a lot of the series tone is very down-to-earth, the story instead the lives of the three and their sector Public Relations Division 2 caught between political shenanigans with senior management and the military, a army officer Shirou Shirota  assigned to their office to improve them but with always the potential of them being replaced with the military who find their existence one with contempt.

Their own inexperience, the military, both Shirota being the tough military figure who becomes their de facto senior, and attempts to replace them with direct military control, is a lot of the narrative as a result, not exactly Salaryman Kintaro, a 2001 anime adaptation where a former motorbike gang leader brings his burning passion to the world of construction company and business melodrama, but thankfully Dai-Guard plays with the banality of the work, the long hours and paper work having to be rewritten because there are too many onomatopoeias in Shunsuke's reports to describe battles, a humble vision of this story. There is not a lot of spectacle as a result, despite a background of a major tragedy a decade or so earlier, for the most part of a small scale narrative instead. The Heterodynes aren't even sentient or even revealed to be of a greater threat, but a once unnatural phenomenon which has become a natural occurrence Public Relations Division 2 has to deal with alongside the likes of the military.

This is so much to the point I suspect Dai-Guard was actually a giant metaphor for Japan's history of natural disasters, pertinent as among its many motifs is a lot of sequences of the cast involved or helping with emergency shelters where the ordinary populous are afraid or in need of help in the midst of this chaos whenever it occurs. Throughout the series, emphasis is made on the moments as much before and after these incidents of Heterodyne attack, even the false alarms where Dai-Guard staff are stuck having to waste hours on stand-by part of a few episodes. Even when the show is frankly predictable, the plot trajectory going to its natural course for optimism, it proves a virtue whether the threat to the main characters are real or minimal that the circumstances around these incidents are the actual dramatic concern instead.

From https://www.clubdesmonstres.com/best
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Beyond this, the show is very simplistic and very family friendly, right down to the Q figure behind the robot's gadgets being an eccentric female teenage prodigy in exaggerated costume, so there's not a lot of necessary greater psychological depth barring one character, Ibuki Momoi. It is interesting that a major narrative threat for a few episodes is devoted to her - it unfortunately means that, as the main female character, she is the only figure to buckle under pressure behind the cockpit at some point, but that's not the fault of the show in the slightest, where her drama is actually quite an interesting and admirable direction, just an bad luck in terms of accidentally falling into the trope of only female characters having the psychological baggage of the anime I have seen recently up to this review. Excised from this context, it's probably one of the most interesting moments in the series how Ibuki's home life is built up and she becomes the most fleshed out character on the main team, whose biological father died in the 2018 incidents and wishing to be involved with the current ones in spite of her turbulent home life living with her mother and step father. Even the mild mannered way it concludes is actually a virtue alongside the fact she even has this unlike anyone else, merely a surprise that the show goes this way. More as the show's only moment of complexity is found in who is ostensibly the tough woman, a senior staff member but younger than the trio who gets to be to have the exaggerated moments of anger, (especially when sleep deprived), at Shunsuke Akagi being an idiot.

In terms of production, Dai-Guard was made in 1999 just as the transfer from hand drawn to digitally painted animation cells was taking place; thankfully, there are no glaring moments of anything looking obsolete, but it's a modest production which doesn't really stand out artistically. In its favour, barring the giant robot and monsters, the very low key tone is absolutely appropriate in the naturalism. Even in this world, where you have a super robot who acquires a drill attack halfway through, the rest of the show plays off with humour and a gentleness emphasised by the end credits, snapshots of life of these characters that could be from a slice of life show with a pop ballad about hurtling forward in life². It does contrast to Full Metal Alchemist greatly as that was clearly a major production that, over fifty plus episodes even with an abrupt ending, worked a lot to cater to a lot of audiences, whilst there's something even more charming in how sedate and mostly on a limited scale this earlier series is. A great example of this is the story arch in the snow covered city of Sapporo, Hokkaido that, even if it deals with a intercontinental tension with a neighbouring country, is still just the everyday life of the group sent there merely as a public exhibition alongside an ice carving festival and have themselves dealing with a Heterodyne that is difficult because it just happens to float in the air out of their robot's reach.

In fact probably the best episode of the whole show has no robot scenes at all, only the off day of the staff where two female co-workers, among a memorable cast of lovable figures in the office, try to create a documentary about why the Das-Guard exists, leading to a literal art film within the show where the ordinary life of Tokyo is enough to answer the question. Only the sense the ending is going to be obvious, with time running out and somewhat dampening the experience with its predictability, undercuts a surprisingly sweet and fascinating series lost in the annuals of early ADV Films releases³. Released very early in their DVD output for the UK from the copies I acquired, its existence for the director before he made Full Metal Alchemist is interesting in terms of comparison. The broad humour is shared between them, but in terms of comparison, there's a real surprise to be watching this very sedate show, one which begins the opening credits with a mock warning, though written as advice, to sit away from the television to not hurt one's eyes as a viewer. That sense of playfulness and calm for a giant robot show, alongside its interest tangents into business politics being a factor on the drama, is something to appreciate.

From https://ilarge.lisimg.com/image/5412141/
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1) Yes, it's just become alternative reality, though for all we know one of the giant replica Gundam robots that are sometimes unveiled in Japan is actually operational...

2) Speaking of music, its curious how Kenji Kawai co-write the score for this series and Yoko Kanno helped on composing one of the songs, two very significant figures in their own rights in anime music and composition on this relatively obscure title.

3) It has, however, been included in the Super Robot Wars videogame franchise, an ongoing series that (unless it's the versions with original characters) has been able for Japanese anime fans to cross over robots from numerous franchises, from even major titles like Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995) to obscure cult choices like this. Hence, someone clearly loves this show and wants to keep its reputation up.

#110: Virtual-San Looking (2019)

From https://www.toxicer.com/storage/anime/visual_art_253n.jpg

Viewed in Japanese with English Subtitles

Virtual-San... has to be a real curiosity for anyone who's uncovered it on Crunchyroll. There's probably a lot of bafflement, but for someone like me, this is literally entering into alien territory, so much so it was.

One of the immediate interests about streaming that, whilst Crunchyroll and their ilk will never be able to guarantee their licenses with last or even get a Western release on physical media, they're access to the newest titles, streaming almost exactly the same time as the original Japanese broadcasts, for the most parts means they get everything. That means stuff that'll be forgotten soon after the season they started but it also means material like this that would've only been released in the past, if any, only in the USA when there was time almost everything got a DVD release, true died in the wool obscurities of fascination.

This is particular example existence is entirely based on an entirely Japanese pop cultural phenomenon, that of the virtual YouTuber. Imagine your usual garden variety YouTuber, who might have "Let's Plays" of videogames where you see their reactions in the midst of the games or opinion pieces, but with the figure using a digital avatar, voice acted and animated, usually as stereotypical anime girls; one of the earliest was Ami Yamato, and with Kizuna Ai the most famous. Virtual-San Looking feels like the wave is in their favour so, probably in the best metaphor to make on this loose and openly messy production, a group of some of the most popular got together and decided to put on a show.

The idea is that, yes, there are real figures behind these characters but the appearances are extensions of themselves, something this even emphasises with a reoccurring segment on fans of the show having their fifteen seconds as their Virtual personalities. In complete honesty, it's a show which can be accused for many short comings but, seeing it, I found it absolutely fascinating as a cultural artefact in the making of this niche, whether virtual YouTubers become a thing or vanish within the next few years. Whatever the case, even the moments of amateurism, for more extreme then some of the series I have covered, is charming as a seven girl group and a set of additional characters and cameos participate in sketch comedy and non-sequiturs. And these are some highly viewed figures - Mirai Akari (blonde, eccentric, one of the most popular of them all), Electric Girl Siro (blue hair, quietly spoken), Nekomiya Hinata (cat eared video game obsessive), Tanaka Hime (pink haired and over-the-top in exaggeration), Suzuki Hina (blonde, calmer minded), and Tsukino Mito (black hair, meek, politely spoken stereotype of a high school girl, has a joke from her YouTube page about eating grass return here as probably one of many references I didn't get). A lot of these hosts only came to be in 2018, so this is very much a series trying to promote them to a wider audience as much as entertain the fan base for " VTubers".

For the most part the series follows a rigid template. The early episodes follows the Game Club Project, a group in a giant spaceship who keep hatching (and botching) plans to take over the galaxy, even considering their female senior's terrible fresh baked cookies as a possible candidates for military supremacy. There's Virtual Grandmother, arguably the most rewarding and consistent segment as, rather than her lame end jokes, the real virtue here is how in her talks about growing up in the sixties, she opens up a lot about details of Japan from the era for the Western viewer of great interest. The main group always gets into a life threatening situation they are doomed within, their classroom having a bad tendency to teleport somewhere like outer space. There's Fuji Aoi Park, where another VTuber Aoi Fuji interacts with a politely spoekn gorilla who can make bananas randomly rain from the sky. Nekomiya Hinata, the avid gamer, thinks of game scenarios while walking to school and solutions to them; Electric Girl Siro, meant to be an android girl, runs a food stand (with superimposed real people in the background) where she provides nourishment through trivia than actual grub; Tsukino Mito also has a 3 pm class question with various guests, subjects varying from whether one would eat grass or something else, or whether to live being able to say some words over others. Then there's Virtual Sister, a nun who provides moral support.

From https://www.goodjobmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/
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The two most prominent segments are Kerin Slayer and Mirai Akari as an agony aunt. Kerin Slayer is a running story, (clearly parodying the controversial dark fantasy series Goblin Slayer (2018)) which is as much a piss take on bad animation as it is the cast, who are animated through motion capture technology throughout the series, to muck about with an elf able to summon missiles, various side cameos and projectile alcohol; its frankly silly and definitely feels the most amateurish of the whole series in terms of segments. The other, with Akari offering advice to listeners, is actually behind Virtual Grandmother as one of the most rewarding segments for me because a) she's inherently more interesting than everyone else, without prior knowledge that the figure is  one of the most popular of them all in this very niche subculture, for being the character who is soft spoken but has the weirdest (and even disturbing) thoughts; that b) her solutions to the questions are always over-the-top; and c) she has a literal demonic and angelic version of herself on each shoulder that argue when her thoughts wander off which adds to the comedy.

The animation is noticeably a step down from usual TV anime quality, but in a sense that it was clearly considered as much part of the humour and a form of verisimilitude, feeling from the beginning like a project put together by VTubers (including end credit cameos and characters like the titular Virtual-San, a blue suited man with a horse's head). The character designs of the main cast are good, if anything helping in my theory that even with the worst in anime, female characters get more personality just from their clothes and hairstyles, pertinent here as some of the main leads would've gotten lost in the shuffle of seven figures if they didn't have either their character designs and energised voice actresses. It also doesn't deny that how VTubers work, that they are literally actors motion captured in their movements, is a really incredible example of how advanced technology is becoming, as for all the incidents of "clipping" (a digital animation term where here long hair does and will indeed past through its owner) and crude background sets, you are arguably watching a curious modern form of rotoscoping with the added virtue that the ridiculous poses and movements come from the actors having to actually move about in such comical ways. Hell, whether staged or real, one scene of the agony aunt segment has the participants moving too much for the camera to keep track of, moments throughout the show where scenes are hastily cut down or signposted by the production as being slightly off in the improvised nature of the show. The rest of the show does in a way play off its animation style is ways more common for other shows in this mould; Kerin Slayer, in particular with the "Kerin", literally has 2D cut-out characters and stock images for statues that have a tendency to fall into the story hiding new characters. A reoccurring segment is also "Unity-Chan", a curry bouquet loving gamer who is animated with Unity and is far more fluid and better animated than the rest of the show in her segments than anyone else in the cast.

Watching Virtual-San Looking was felt entirely like an outsider, not in the least combing an entire culture's worth of in-jokes from this, numerous anime and otaku references likely lost to me through the twelve episodes. Also at times it does, but in a sympathetic way, come off as very lame, its humour corny and the show frankly silly in its hazy improvised feel, from the off-the-cuff attempts absurdity to the audible flubs in the acting. Even its epic, the bombastic opening with a giant robot and a mob of faceless figures, has a sense of the redundant in it being played out with actual dialogue halfway through the show. Sometimes to its credit it has whit, surprisingly in what turns out to be a streak of edutainment - Virtual Grandmother is always interesting as is Siro's trivia bar, the blue costumed robot girl offering the surprising fact that "ero manga" is both the term for porn manga but also "Erromango", an island in the Vanuatu archipelago that is pronounced "Eromangatou" but happens to come off as "Eromanga Island" in Japanese.

For myself, the larger issue on an artistic level is more that Virtual-San Looking doesn't challenge itself, a problem I am actually going to level to anime comedy in general, somewhat spoilt in my youth by the fact that Excel Saga (1999), the series so chaotic it infamously destroyed the vocals of the main English voice actress of the titular character and lead to her being replaced midway through, ended itself by literally throwing in a kitchen sink, a serious episode without any humour, and a post-apocalypse finale that actually had drama. (Oh, and the equally infamous bonus episode that went for as much offensive content as possible and got censored before screening). In lieu to such an example, and my general thoughts of comedy from any culture, I find comedy should try to escalate to more imaginative or crazed levels, even more bold directions if entirely stand up or word play based, which doesn't really happen with Virtual-San Looking. There is a sense that, for myself, I like my anime comedy to always be creative and at least try to end on the most inventive note possible; for all my issues with Pop Team Epic (2018) being too indulgent in the most niche of references, and being loud and obnoxious, it had more risk. Virtual-San instead feels like the shy, tentative coming out party, felt in actual truth in the final moments of the final episode where the cast address the audience hoping this is the first stepping out for Virtual YouTubbers on TV. It feels openly modest, without any cynicism like a Pop Team Epic or many micro series which feel half thought-out from those I've seen.

If anything, because of this, I have become a little obsessed with Virtual-San Looking, feeling like an anthropologist to this world and, in spite of its last episode being a complete anti-climax, wanting to revisit and explore this culture until Crunchyroll's license of the show ends. Sadly, a show like this is more than likely going to disappear in the ether of anime's prolific amount of material, felt with tragedy as I have a greater investment in wanting to explore this culture of Virtual YouTubbers. This is emphasised knowing YouTube isn't as popular in Japan as Nico Nico Douga and BiliBili as video streaming sites, making the VTubers themselves the one distinct feature to help bolster YouTube's reputation. Again, even they might vanish within a few years, with a limited lifespan, as someone with an interest with outsiders and niches I have to admit I have nothing but utter curiosity here, which brought a lot of entertainment from Virtual-San Looking alongside the moments which were legitimately funny and charming. That in itself is a success on the show's part in reeling someone with no idea on the subject into wanting to learn more.

From https://image.tmdb.org/t/p/original/
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#109: Mad Bull 34 (1990-2)

From https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/
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Director: Satoshi Dezaki

Screenplay: Kazumi Koide and Toshiaki Imaizumi

Based on the manga by Kazuo Koike and Noriyoshi Inoue

Voice Cast: Akio Ohtsuka as John "Sleepy" Estes (a.k.a. Mad Bull); Yasunori Matsumoto as Daizaburō "Eddie" Ban; Gara Takashima as Perine Valley; Takkou Ishimori as Captain Allen; Masako Katsuki as Cindy Murphy; Naoko Matsui as Jaqueline Moyert ; Mitsuo Senda as Nichol the Electrician

Viewed in Japanese with English Subtitles¹

It wasn't a good idea to revisit Mad Bull 34 in one sitting, over three hours for all four episodes, yet it feels befitting in a perverse way. One episode by itself is enough to melt the brain, mainlining the entirety of it is insane but the only right experience for a truly notorious OVA series. The fact that this is one of the first anime I ever knew of as a kid, from an advertisement for the first episode (as released by Manga Entertainment) was included in a gaming magazine I had, is sickly humorous if mortifying. It's the promotional image everyone knows for Mad Bull 34 if they know of it: the iconic image of a New York police car approaching the viewer, a burly policeman with a shotgun, woman (head unseen) merely wearing revealing underwear. Little do you know, from a manga by Kazuo Koike, that it wasn't really a suffice warning for the easily offended, as good God Mad Bull 34 isn't politically correct or even palatable for me at times, hardened on weird perversity, and wasn't really a warning for how, when it is at least entertaining rather than gross, it's as mad as a box of frogs and then some.

The late Koike is an acclaimed manga writer, not the illustrator to which Noriyoshi Inoue drew Mad Bull, and its known whilst he has a deserved legacy, from the likes of Lone Wolf and Cub (1970-76), Koike did belong to a type of extreme pulp that, forced on hard and short work schedules and having to top his previous work, meant he was using a lot of extreme content, which includes sexual violence which is problematic but not synonymous to only his work, or even anime and manga for that matter, nor just Japanese pop entertainment. Honestly the issue with Mad Bull 34 for me and likely many, in which Episode One follows new cop Daizaburō "Eddie" Ban on his first day with the worst cop to be placed with, a veteran named John "Sleepy" Estes known for "shot-first, ask-later" Dirty Harry tactics and working with sex workers for cash on the side, is the sexual violence and threat of rape through the first three episodes, worst as its depicted as titivating as it is lurid, always threatened to the female cast only and gross.

I don't view it as a damnation of Koike, director Satoshi Dezaki or anyone who worked on the OVA, especially aware that there are significantly worse examples in anime, (the uncensored version of Ichiro Itano's Violence Jack: Evil Town (1988), for example, is probably more deplorable by account), but unfortunately it became an easily plot point for rising escalation to have female characters threatened like this, that this was the only valid threat to a female character, and it was played for sexual as well as plot reasons. American exploitation is as duplicitous for this, and frankly even implied threats without any nudity or violence are a trope in multiple forms of storytelling, even D.W. Griffith with The Birth of a Nation (1915) effectively having this, when Lillian Gish's character is in peril, within a film with layers of other significant problems a viewer has to deal with.

As a result, you have to endure this material with Mad Bull 34. When it isn't this, or the incredible sexism, the OVA is batshit insane and memorable, where if those problematic details weren't there you would have plenty of ridiculous, cheap but memorable schlock to ingest. For, you see, Sleepy is actually shown to be a good guy, one who blows a masked roller-skating store thief's head off with a shotgun, but loves his community and, whilst having sex with all the sex workers he is with and steals their money, uses said money to help them and rape victims. Yes, this is all in bad taste, and even this as the first episode conclusion is enough to dismiss the OVA as utter tripe, but it all comes off as absurd, the material which has nothing to do with the problematic scenes having a tone so earnest inspite of their unintentional exaggeration that the only reflect even for the gore and prurient content is to laugh.

A pertinent idea to consider is how Mad Bull 34 feels like an interpretation of American exports of their television and cinema. Some have suggested the OVA is an extreme parody, whilst I wonder this is just what happened when Koike tried to make a story set in New York City, with an insane amount of detail (like his original manga) in terms of depicting the city, right down to the aesthetic of the cop cars and locations. But the material instead blended together all the worst clichés of American pop culture into this extreme distillation. Certainly, this is still New York City before Rudolph Giuliani, whose public image is that when he became major of New York City he cleaned up the cesspool it was at least depicted and exaggerated in American cinema, rife with crime and poverty, to the modern city we have now. Certainly, the material in this, even the more overt sci-fi details as we will get to with Episode Four, isn't that far off strange material that this had. 

From https://66.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_p7dh0rAY491um3c88_frame3.jpg

I forgot so much. That it spliced humour in at even deeply inappropriate moments. That Sleepy Eddie who is slowly being won over by his senior's beliefs, prevent a near rape of a female reporter whilst dressed up as women. That the first episode has, and I kid you not, a James Brown song even on the Discotek DVD release over the end credits, Brown someone who would've been horrified if he found out his song (against three pop songs over the other episodes) was used for an OVA where someone gets minced by a passing subway train for the first episode's finale.

Animation wise, it's just better than many titles from this era, but also part of the notorious amounts of schlock from the late eighties and early nineties which was just competent, still with detail and style but not exactly the highest bar of this era. It's also made by Satoshi Dezaki - not, as presumed, legendary director Osamu Dezaki, but his older brother. The same who also directed They Were Eleven (1986), a great sci-fi story which is the polar opposite to this in its mood, a tale adapted from legendary female shōjo manga writer Moto Hagio, which (from a source originally for a young female audience) locks various alien space cadets in a dangerous situation and, with the creator's themes of gender politics within it, very feminist readings especially for a character whose world has the young choose their gender despite her initially being the sole woman in the crew, with all the biases for women on her planet a burden to the choice. How he also, by all accounts, made Mad Bull 34 raises more than an eyebrow. Screenwriter Kazumi Koide too, who wrote Episodes Two to Four of Mad Bull 34 but also They Were Eleven.

Episode two, introducing female officer Perine Valley who Eddie develops a crush on, does show the schism you do have to deal with. It's scuzzy, and with a mob boss with revenge desired on Perine for leaving him mostly robot stuck in a wheelchair, the desired revenge also unfortunately includes sexual violence of a leering, objectifying sort. Yet there's also the insane detail that, if by itself, would've developed the reputation Mad Bull 34 has but without the caveat of all the uncomfortable details. Like Sleepy bringing hand grenades to a stake out, hidden in his trousers tied to his pubic hair, or the challenge of picking the right canned coffee that isn't actually an explosive, introducing a fun side character who Sleepy can always pick out for his scent of urine and sugar, a homeless (yet dangerous) guy who will help the good guys later but still wants to be the guy who offs Sleepy in a perverse form of honour. Or the death bed wedding, which in itself represents the famous odd logic of Koike, even found in the live action adaptations where a Lone Wolf and Cub sequel had the titular Wolf having to kill various people to be lead to the target he is actually meant to be killing.

Arguably Episode Three is the same story repeated, as a result the weakest episode, following a female reporter chasing after a supposed rapist-murderer with a lot of power on his side, again the ongoing issue still there of that theme being too much of an obsession of the OVA. It does have a merciless (and openly suicidal) Chinese mercenary gang that, possibly offensive or just from the Crying Freeman school of intercontinental ridiculousness, at least offers something much more serious and a credible threat. It does also lead to their leader bursting into the finale with a tank. As evoked, the 1988-1992 anime adaptation of Crying Freeman, also a Koike manga originally, is felt as a comparison and honestly, whilst there is one plot threat later on which is offensive, Freeman despite being prurient and lurid feels like Mad Bull 34 if you felt less guilty for its uncomfortable content and instead was on the right side of lurid weirdness which you could feel less guilty about.

Thankfully, Episode Four, even if it has the questionable ender politics still, thankfully changed the pace and is arguably the most entertain episode, getting some actual atmosphere in the first night time city shots before a Predator wanders onscreen killing police officers. A literal one, as much as you could get away with for copyright reasons, just after Predator 2 (1990) had an actual one carved through future Los Angeles rather than a figure here in high tech armour attacking the New York Police force.  It becomes a convoluted and at times hilarious melodrama, in-between a challenge in Yankee Stadium with a power suit borrowed from Aliens (1986), and a finale of over ripened drama which involved a marriage-suicide, and as a result its naturally so much more compelling than repeating the grime of the previous episodes, even with all the strangeness with a love interest/enemy that borders into strange incestuous undertones adding to the oddness.

It thankfully also jettisons to nastiness of the previous three episodes, still utter trash but with its final shots of snow falling on the New York Streets set to synth pop ballad, it's the kind of compelling absurdity which, in honesty, is what Kazuo Koike at least in adaptation should be. It's this we should return to these infamous adaptations and as much why, whilst not a lot of his career is actually published in English, his manga should be revisiting, the heightened emotion and insanity of his male dominated stories which followed his belief that character, not plot, was of greater importance. It's not that bizarre in hindsight his apprentices can vary between Tetsuya Saruwatari, co-author of the original Riki-Oh manga (even more insane than the 1991 Hong Kong adaptation), and Rumiko Takahashi, the legendary and insanely successful authoress of the likes of Urusei Yatsura; maybe the gore and luridness might not apply to both, but distinct characters and escalation is likely what Koike drilled into his students' heads. Mad Bull 34 is NOT the best way to experience his work, for good reason, but let it be known the infamy of the OVA, whilst also for tasteless material we could live without, is also from a strain of hyper-storytelling whose ridiculousness is compelling to say the least.

From https://www.animeclick.it/images/serie/MadBull34/MadBull3423.jpg

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1) Adding to Mad Bull's notoriety is the infamous English dub by Manga Entertainment, in which British voice actors attempted playing their characters with New York accents. Honestly, the prospect wasn't a tempting one, so forgive my sin of not watching these OVA episodes in the way many have come to know and even love them through.

#108: Double Decker! Doug & Kirill (2018)

From https://i.ytimg.com/vi/KwuYDcQ6o-Q/maxresdefault.jpg

Director: Joji Furuta

Screenplay: Tomohiro Suzuki

Voice Cast: Kōhei Amasaki as Kirill Vrubel; Satoshi Mikami as Douglas "Doug" Bilingam; Atsumi Tanezaki as Yuri Fujishiro; Aya Endo as Sophie; Chika Anzai as Katherine "Kay" Rochefort; Daisuke Namikawa as Bamboo Man; Rikiya Koyama as Travis Murphy; Saori Hayami as Deana del Rio; Takuma Nagatsuka as Apple; Tesshō Genda as Brian Cooper; Tsuyoshi Koyama as Derick Ross; Yō Taichi as Maxine "Max" Silverstone; Yōji Ueda as the Narrator; Yuuki Fujiwara as Valery "Milla" Vrubel

Viewed in Japanese with English Subtitles

I wish I could like Double Decker much more, but what starts off with good humour and enough resources to work with does turn into an incredibly generic show by its ending, in thirteen episodes having a moment near the end where someone realised they wanted an ongoing story and hastily crowbarred a finale on rather than the funny sci-fi cop show that is Double Decker's better aspects. This is a shame as, from the creators of Tiger & Bunny (2011) and possibly set in the same world, Double Decker at its best feels like a piss take on American cop shows and films if Crockett and Tubbs were part of a special drugs section of the police where said drug, Anthem, if it doesn't kill you causes drastic mutation.

Undeniably, the show starts off on a good footing, a futuristic world which seems to have ingested British culture as there are pubs and cybernetic double decker buses on the roads, all set around the group Seven-0 who deal with Anthem cases. In the midst of this setting ordinary cop Kirill Vrubel, on his off-day looking for his landlady's cat, stumbles into an Anthem bust and, due to an embarrassing public display involving pretending to be from the future (completely naked as a result) to help a Seven-O officer named Doug Bilingam, gets fired from the police but does become a Seven-0 member on an invitation.

I can thankfully say Double Decker is on the side on giving its protagonists personalities alongside snazzy costumes, though the ones here are just as good. Double Decker has a lot to admire in terms of how, for its comedy and that the head of Seven-O, Travis Murphy, is portrayed as both an idiot and also a pig who tried to put together a group of "Angels" to match his "Charlie", the show has a predominately large cast of strong and memorable women set also male protagonists as goofballs, an ensemble of capable figure who yet have their quirks. Kirill, who is noble but an idiot, Doug as the laid back and at times an arse, insanely young tech head Dr. Apple, and the aforementioned Travis Murphy make up the male members of Seven-O. Then there is Maxine "Max" Silverstone, shaved head former boxer with a warm heart, partnered with Yuri Fujishiro, an actual robot who Kirill perceives he has to keep her secret for, Deana del Rio, the pink haired and fabulously dressed gun woman with a hair trigger temper, partnered with Katherine "Kay" Roshfall, meek and by the book but with the curious issue that she gets angry drunk on non-alcoholic beverages. Add Sophie Gainsbourg, Travis' mild mannered dispatcher who puts up with his lustings for her blankly, and you have legitimately entertaining figures to work from.

Hardcore references are there too but don't consist of the whole point of the show, merely that if you get them already funny jokes are funnier. The exception is that the show does reference famous album covers and band aesthetics for visual gags which don't make up the whole show (i.e. framing a visual piece of exposition around the look of the Sex Pistols' famous Never Mind the Bollocks album); the rest are about cop shows and American action cinema, which still work in that in this world, everything is over the top but the usual cop show plot points usually get punctured at the same time. An example I won't spoil, but the best example of this streak of humour, is the cliché surrounding Doug's former partner, playing up to this trope for the first few episodes only to gleefully deflate it when the truth is blithely revealed.

The show even when you don't get these references manages to spin a lot of fun from them, the best for me being Episode Six whose first half if a parody of American reality shows like Cops (1989-), with blurred faces and the look of a TV show as Seven-0 members are recorded for television dealing with a drunk, inter-spliced as part of a major plot point for one character for a clever and fluid sense of plotting. There is a larger plot, that Seven-0 are against a major Anthem smuggling group named Esperanto, and there are serious stories, like Episode Ten being about terminally ill patients suddenly becoming healthy or dying violently, but the real virtue of Double Decker is that its mainly a farcical cop action with characters who you sincerely like. The best moments of the actual show thankfully do work; it takes itself seriously when needed, but I found the most rewarding moments being those which completely undercut clichés with the slow agony of a deflating balloon. The narrator also has to be mentioned as, rather than a bipartisan figure, he will contribute his thoughts, having to constantly undercut comments onscreen and including details like Doug being an "asshole" at times without hesitance.

Which makes the fact that three episodes that should've been part of the main show came afterwards as bonus OVA episodes a bit of a creative failure; one of them, the doldrums of Seven-0's dull days with the backgrounds of the female cast revealed, should've been included, and the hot springs episode furthers the main takes a notorious cliché of an episode for an anime and least gives it some added humour as, as is becoming a peculiar discover for me, apparently murder mysteries set in hot spring resorts is a trope I have seen anime shows within the last few years. Usually to take the piss out of as it also requires dramatic exposition having to be told at a cliff side, even driving to one just to do so.

Double Decker has also been put through the ringer for how it's handled transgender politics. This segment needs SPOILER WARNINGS to discuss properly, in which the problem surrounds the plot point of Kirill having an older sister who has returned back into his life, only with the caveat that she is soon revelled to actually be his older brother, never explicitly stated as being transgender which is a detail that does have to be based in mind, more of a case here that she prefers dressing and acting as a woman in public rather than desiring to be a trans woman. The bigger issue with Double Decker is that it putts its foot in its mouth in some ill advised and tasteless jokes, plot points (like the hot springs episode) which play upon characters potentially reacting badly if they find out the woman they have a crush for is revealed to be a cis-man, and the concept of "Deadnaming" (referring to a trans person's original gendered name) which I have to be presume is more of a taboo in the West than apparently in Japan. There is a clearly an issue with cultural differences at hand; for all the progressive moments in anime and manga to do with LGBT issues, there are moments where Japan clearly has issues it still needs to go through, attested to known issues of LGBT discrimination still in the country, and with a sense that for the moments where Double Decker tries its best it also stumbles miserably.

As someone with close family who are transgender, this issue is now more pertinent for me to be aware of in art, and here its more the case that the "gay panic" jokes just come off as dumb and un-needed. Pertinently again this is an issue as the show does show when it does it well, as in an episode about Max's teenage years, where she is revelled to have been once a shy glasses wearing and long haired schoolgirl in high school who got her modern look through a far more progressive and sincere plot nuisance - that the guy she had a crush on was actually either transgendered and was someone who preferred to dress as a woman and, even if they were rejected from the school prom, went to that event with her dressed in her shaved haired masculine dressed self for the first time whilst he went as a woman in prom dress, all part of cementing her hatred of them in an episode where a school prom becomes a hot bed for potential prom Queens being deliberately attacked. It's a tender moment which shows, if the production didn't fall back on content which has become less defendable for Western anime fans, the show could've avoided this entire controversy and show this better moment of heart¹.

For myself the bigger issue in terms of Double Decker in terms of quality, beyond this controversy which has undercut the view of the series for many when it premiered on Crunchroll, is that it spends half its length with its breezy mix of drama and humour that only to believe it needs to tie itself up but doing it badly, rushing forth only in the last few episodes with a plot trajectory that is completely predictable not matter how much it tried to even subvert it. Considering how slickly made the show is², it almost felt rushed how it lead to its conclusion, an example of a show that might've actually benefitting from being over twenty four to six episodes like was a common occurrence in the past. Entering anime fandom in the 2000s, twenty plus episode long series were more common, even to the point (ironically) there were cases of shows that should've been half their length, but this is a curious case that that length of time, even if the middle episodes between episode ten to fifteen (as usually was the case) might've procrastinated with tangents, would've actually benefitted this style of show, which feels like its emphasising the comedy and character more for three-quarters of its length and leaves the Esperanto plot undernourished.  

Also, Double Decker makes a terrible decision in dropping in a plot point about another planet, and characters from it, which is distracting and obfuscates from the point of the show being about cops. Even if it leads to why Anthem exists in background narrative, it'd far and away less interesting than leaving Anthem an unknown McGuffin and letting the cop parody be taken further than it did. It also makes a problematic issue that show has been challenged about already actually more of an ill conceived creative decision the longer you think about where the plot point transpired from.

As a result, the show's an unfortunate disappointment, leaving my mind in memory in complete honesty as time passes, all with a sense that it squandered its best aspects. Even if the OVAs do temper this with a nicely needed return to the comedy, you still have the issue that, alongside containing as much of the issues the show has been accused about in the main series, they are just extra material that can't really compensate for the mistake of the finale.

From https://img1.ak.crunchyroll.com/i/spire1-tmb/
3e6324831513287cd802d554f82a07c61540112281_fwide.jpg

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1) There's also a potential issue of teasing characters as gay which doesn't get followed up, just for an emotional titillation, suggesting that Max is also possibly in a romantic situation with her partner Yuri, , in how their end credit moment is the pair about to embrace for a kiss. Admittedly, if the pair is meant to be romantically connected, it makes the interaction, both in a major event later on and, living together, how Max and Yuri's non work life plays out, very intriguing, between a potential romance (or at least a platonic love) regardless of one of them being a robot and that it does add layers, alongside the fact that Max the fighter is still with a flower filled home with home brewed tea, the nerdy teenager we saw in flashback becoming a brawler and providing a lot more nuisanced characterisation.

2) I admit I found the fact the character designs were in 3D dimensioned models, when I noticed it, was frankly disconcerting even if Double Decker altogether is a higher quality production. This is a more common technique but I will still have to adapt to it especially in moments like this which are very noticeable.

#1 to #100 Retrospective: Best Film/TV Series/OVA and ONA & Other

Finally we get to the finale of this retrospective of the first hundred anime covered, which will lead to a list of all the anime covered on this blog being set up as well. For the rest of the segments, follow the links here: Part A, Part B, Part C, Part D and Part E.

With this, the last, we get to the best of the best of various formats, as anime's history and one of its best virtues is that it comes in many shapes and sizes. 

I will admit that, in lieu to the previous retrospective posts, there will be some titles here I haven't mentioned in the slightest, which is odd to think about, but not without saying these are still exceptional and worth your time. 

Best ONA/ Micro-Series/Other

5. Space Patrol Luluco (2016) [REVIEW]

I will admit that, from Hiroyuki Imaishi as a victory lap for Studio Trigger, Space Patrol Luluco is the weakest anime he has helmed, with hope that with Promare (2019) he is back to his innovative and energised style. Nonetheless, that doesn't mean Luluco isn't a failure, way too charming, too full of his madcap style to not dismiss. 

4. Tonari no Seki-kun, The Master of Killing Time (2014) [REVIEW]

A huge surprise, as I only heard of this micro-series on a list of the strangest made and was immediately taken in by its premise. The Master of Killing Time is a great example of how anime can take any premise and breath into it life, especially as (much documented in reviews and even these retrospective posts) not all micro-series were made equal, a lot feeling flimsy to a detriment. This one, in vast contrast, managed to make a silly premise and ring as much joy from it as possible.

3. A Branch of a Pine Is Tied Up (2017) [REVIEW]

The sole short, and a stop motion one at that, but sadly there is a sad note that, due to the fact I was able to only see this through MUBI's limited time streaming of festival films, I have no idea how to ever see this incredibly poignant metaphor for the 2011 earthquake and tsunami, which made the review itself one out of guilt realizing this. Nonetheless, crafted within an inch of its life with care, I can only hope Tomoyasu Murata's work in general from what is available becomes more readily in access and that he gets to make a lot more work from this. Maybe one day, touch wood, a full feature or big project in lieu to the many legendary stop motion directors around the world like Jan Svankmajer I admire, as already he's shown his own unique style. 

2. The Flying Luna Clipper (1987) [REVIEW]

A real oddity, made on a computer game console, and only learnt of due to amateur digital preservation, which means that's a potential danger of this production being lost in the future. That's a fate I hope will be avoided, even though the reality lies upon a tiny minority of people who know about the film, because this wonderful strange feature is absolutely beautiful and weird. Apparently a sequel came out in 2004, unknown whether to be true but one I wish is true and leads to said title being dug up too.

1. gdgd Fairies (2011/2013) [REVIEW]

Yet out of everything, only one work could win this, one of the only shows I covered with more than one season, and one that thankfully used this to get even funnier and better. Somehow you could take the most insanely cheap looking animation, with pre-existing props, and merely three voice actresses at first and make something impressive, just because especially into season 2 it was clear the production wanted to make legitimately funny and surreal material, rather than mere otaku references, and because the voice actresses themselves were utterly charismatic. A spin-off, entirely with male voice actors, exists siince 2018 and of course the creators of this, who split ways after the first season, went on to other projects, some of which can be found. There was, however, also a theatrical gdgd Fairies film in 2014 that, again, I wish was dug up for the West as I'd gladly cover it. 

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Best OVA

5. Twilight of the Dark Master (1997) [REVIEW]

Early into his career, popular anime director Akiyuki Simbo was still a working creator, but even with this 1997 Saki Okuse adaptation you can tell that, at least in style and mood, he'd eventually become the idiosyncratic stylist of the likes of Puella Magi Madoka Magica (2011). As dark horror anime from the OVA era, its sadly brief with little backstory, but you are left wanting more in its dark moodiness.

4. Dragon Half (1993) [REVIEW]

The one OVA which tragically should've been longer but only got two thirty minute episodes, particularly as what you got was this gleefully mad high fantasy parody which even throws the kitchen sink in. A silly, over-the-top work where characters exist in rubber physics and even a fantasy setting can have cyborgsm its a series which still has love in the modern day as, thankfully, the original manga was getting released in the West in the late 2010s, a moment of applause for the OVA in its own way a long time coming.

3. Cyber City Oedo 808 (1990) [REVIEW]

I am surprised I haven't talked about Oedo more, let alone Yoshiaki Kawajiri, but the little I have covered has been a fascinating trajectory. His debut, the notorious adaptation of E.E. Smith's Lensman novels in 1984, co-directed with Kazuyuki Hirokawa, felt nothing like his later work and didn't impress the estate when it was turned into Star Wars, likely the reason the theatrical film has never been re-released. But Oedo is an underrated OVA which is utterly ridiculous but in the right ways. Effectively three different stories set within the same premise, it gives you a great taste of Kawajiri which emphasised that, in actuality, his notoriety for sexually transgressive and violent anime is only down to Wicked City (1988) and Ninja Scroll (1993), when it just violence and style which is his usual interests. Alongside arguably his best work, Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust (2000), Oedo was a gem to nicely put besides it for the first hundred reviews.

2. Dead Leaves (2004) [REVIEW]

Again, one I'm surprised I didn't cover earlier, and it says something that even on the list of strangest anime covered this oddity never even got to the bottom of that list due to all the bizarre titles I went through. But let's not ignore Dead Leaves whilst I can finally talk about it; what was once a divisive debut for Hiroyuki Imaishi as a director, with time having past, is now a wonderfully tasteless and over-the-top test run for his later style, openly in-debuted to Western pop culture as much his whims, utterely insane for its length under an hour. 

1. Gunbuster (1988-89) [REVIEW]

We end this section with one of Gainax's biggest yet (in physical release) most elusive titles nowadays, the episode producing Gunbuster almost as cursed as director Hideaki Anno's other title Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995) in how, yes, Gunbuster among its virtues famously ends on an episode mostly animated in black and white due to budget restrictions. Gunbuster nonetheless, flaws and all, is another huge title I am glad to have seen, a very idiosyncratic space opera which eventually scores the emotional victory in terms of even its technical issues being used for artistic success. Its lack of release, not helped by the fact only a compilation feature is available in high definition, is baffling and a hold over whose history has to be considered. As of 2019, one of Gainax's hugest releases by the name of Neon Genesis Evangelion, that title I just mentioned, is streaming off Netflix and going to get a lot of buzz. It'd be interesting, alongside the divisive "sequel" from the 2000s, what happens to Gunbuster in lieu to this.

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Best Series: 

Honorable Mention:

Ghost Hunt (2006) was just a pleasure. Utterly cheesy at points and, for all its horror and darkness, without any sense of actual scariness, but I found so much entertaining in the series just for building (wisely) on narrative arcs of multiple episodes and also for the cast, stereotypes but likable ones, made more fascinating as without any contradiction individuals of numerous religious faiths alongside paranormal investigators, even a Catholic priest, team together to deal with hauntings throughout the shows as friends. Without any consideration whether this'd be good or not, I'm delighted how much I enjoyed myself. 

Far more darker, but also ironically another horror series about a group that deal with supernatural entities,  Requiem From The Darkness (2003) instead follows what are effectively villains (baring one innocent mortal writer who ends up with them) who offer moral punishment to those who have committed foal deeds, a series who unconventional aesthetic is matched by its unsettling content with poignant effect.

10. Samurai Flamenco (2013-14) [REVIEW]

Taking the first spot on the list, however, is a series whose reputation is surprisingly not as high as I'd thought it'd be, probably because of a) it unfortunately suffered from some terrible animation as a result of the hectic reality of televised animation, that had to be cleaned up for the physical releases, and b) it does all hedge on a plot twist which completely takes the initial premise, a male fashion model who decides to become a crime fighter, and turns the reality we start off with upside down. If you can deal with this, Samurai Flamenco as for me is an exceptional series which finds new ways, including emotional dynamics, to keep topping its spectacle over and over.

9. Kill La Kill (2013-14) [REVIEW]

In terms of spectacle and bombast, it'd be insane not to mention Kill La Kill, Hiroyuki Imaishi's giant hit and why, as their first production, Studio Trigger came out of the starting line like a King. Insanely ridiculous, with its premise of clothing as literally fascistic, with style to drown oneself in.

8. Mononoke (2007) [REVIEW]

More horror, another period horror series to be precise, whose idiosyncratic aesthetic style is thankfully matched by the content within the show that is just as distinct.

7. Puella Magi Madoka Magica (2011) [REVIEW]

I.e. the series that, even to this day, is talked about with controversial theatrical sequels which rewrite the ending (which I will have to cover one day won't I?), video games and merchandise involved, all in lieu to what is until School Days (2007) challenged it, the anime I covered that I should've described as being constantly punched in the stomach. Long after its gained its reputation, let's not forget Akiyuki Simbo's deconstruction of the magical girl genre, an increasing sub-sub-genre, was pretty much a stand out for how dark it got and how emotional it became.

6. Elfen Lied (2004) [REVIEW]

Speaking of dark material, the divisive and flawed adaptation of a Lynn Okamoto manga is still held with high regard to this day regardless of its visibly mistakes. Mainly because it touched a nerve, a juxtaposition of emotional drama from a large female cast with gristly hyper violence, the kind of show that for all its adult content, the kind that you don't even get a lot of in anime still and was somehow passed for fifteen year olds to watch in the United Kingdom, also had more in its mind and heart than the surface let on. 

5. Boogiepop Phantom (2000) [REVIEW]

A show I saw early into my interest with anime, which obviously meant that I dismissed it back then sadly, only for my maturer self who prefers more idiosyncratic work to immediately admire and adore this experimental one-off over a decade later. As emphasized before in previous segments of this retrospective, I hope the reboot of this story doesn't remove this one from existence. Thankfully, dating this comment a little in that of June 2019 Funimation has picked it up for streaming for their site, the 2000 Phantom will still get attention.

4. Paranoia Agent (2004) [REVIEW]

Another show, whilst more linear in structure, which took some ambitious routes would be sadly the sole television series from Satoshi Kon. His abrupt death due to pancreatic cancer in 2010 was a tragedy in general, but it was amazing to think that from a mere desire to use existing ideas he showed himself as adapt to a longer format than a theatrical film too, suggesting so many possibilities lost. Thankfully, as many of the shows on this list attest to, there was a wonderful boom still to this day of idiosyncratic television.

3. Princess Tutu (2002-3) [REVIEW]

The dark swan of the list, as barring the US releases this title is an obscurity, an absolute shame as, in lieu to the previous post, this is an idiosyncratic and experimental work but with the added challenge that its also meant to be for small children as much as adults. What happened is fascinating and glorious, effectively two series in one - the first a normal thirteen episodes which leads to what could be a good ending itself, the second (originally fifteen minute chunks) leading to an even greater ending. Channeling a love for ballet, music and fairy tales into very emotionally rich stories, its a lovely series, as appropriate a term to use as any.

2. Yurikama Arashi (2015) [REVIEW]

Also "lovely" but "surreal" and "subversive", not surprisingly Kunihiko Ikuhara is as idiosyncratic as you could get. I confess I have only been able to track of his career since Mawaru Penguindrum (2011), as still to this day Revolutionary Girl Utena (1997) has never had a proper UK release*, but he's been two for two in success, and it looks like Sarazanmai (2019) could make this a hat-trick. It has a lot to follow though, as (yet to cover it) Penguindrum was eventually an emotionally deep work, whilst Arashi was deliberately and brazenly meant to challenge depictions of lesbian (yuri) characters in Japanese culture by way of his pop-surreal eccentricity. From the blatant - where he frankly made flower symbolism for sex pointless by just being as explicit about it as he could get away with - to the sweet and devastating, his work is a one-off too, and absolutely magnificent.

1. Haibane Renmei (2002) [REVIEW]

Yet our winner is a series I've yet to cover on this retrospective, which I fell sad about. Thankfully I can now, a title that has thankfully had some reputation at least in the United Kingdom because MVM, possibly the unsung heroes of idiosyncratic licenses, have released this thirteen episode twice now on DVD. Haibane Renmei, from a dōjinshi manga by Yoshitoshi ABe, has been painted as a slice of (after)life, a completely unconventional fantasy tale which is entirely rooted in ordinary banalities, the small pleasures in life, but with explicit hints at a spiritual edge as our characters, including the lead, are born from eggs with angel's wings, characters who, living alongside the regular community following set rules of living, eventually travel over the wall of the town they are in as long as they recognise a past in another life. With themes uttered in lieu to this series like being about the afterlife, and suicide, it sounds difficult and convoluted, but is instead as slow burn and serene as you can get. Its a title that emphasizes how unique anime (and manga) is for these titles and how even a work like Haibane Renmei got commissioned for television, one which is thankfully still accessible and deserves it. 

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Best Film:

Honorable Mention: 

Whilst it is a very odd film in the Lupin 3rd franchise, especially if you presumed the character was family friendly and found yourself witnessing the complete 180 degree opposite, Lupin The Third: The Mystery of Mamo (1978) is definitely a memorable one. Dark and weird, sexually explicit and completely silly at times, Mamo was meant to be a call back to the original Monkey Punch manga, and with the quality of said production being as good as it is, it definitely was a tribute to that source that has to be admired.

Your Name. (2016) is a title many will recognize and, yes, its great. Probably the best aspect is that, like how Masaaki Yuasa has suddenly become so popular over the 2010s, the director is Makoto Shinkai, who started back in 2002 with Voices of a Distant Star, an animated short made entirely by himself as an outsider of the anime industry, and has built a steady reputation as a dramatic auteur only to suddenly create the highest-grossing anime film of all time at the time of release, and one of the most recognisable anime outside of anime fandom probably around the world, all whilst not sacrificing his auteurist obsession with the communication between people in the slightest. That's impressive and deserved success.

One title that sadly didn't get even an ounce of that film's praise, but thankfully is highly regarded still, is period samurai action film Sword of the Stranger (2007), which is a success not just for being incredibly animated with impressing action scenes but, even with pulp storytelling, making sure you care about characters even on the side meant to be the villains so that, when someone does get killed in battle, you wince for these mere drawings and have emotional engagement. That again deserves applause.

Finally, whilst I have banged on about Masaaki Yuasa's Night is Short, Walk on Girl (2017) throughout the retrospective, its not in the top ten but only because there was a lot of a other titles to mention. Its still a great film.  

10. Robot Carnival (1987) [REVIEW]

Speaking of a great film, by way of smaller segments, anthology anime Robot Carnival is a testament to the incredible talents who were creating animation in the eighties as even the cheesiest of moments in this film, based around tales involving robots but with full creativity allowed, look stunning and are memorable. From legitimate drama, from the director of Kite (1998) of all people, to eighties sci-fi action and period set slapstick, there's never a dull moment and like a great anthology plenty of choice to choose from. 

9. Midori (1992) [REVIEW]

On of the opposite end of the eighties, though taking years until an early nineties release, Hiroshi Harada quit the animation industry to work by himself, eventually after many years creating this controversial but admired piece of art. Its not for the faint hearted though as, based on the work of Suehiro Maruo, its a disturbing ero-guro tale with a feel bad ending, the reputation confounded (despite a French DVD release and being accessible on the internet) by the fact Harada  only allows Midori to be screened in his homeland as part of an elaborate carnival. It is however, if you can stomach it, a remarkable animation achievement. 

8a/b. Vampire Hunter D (1985)/Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust (2000) [REVIEW/REVIEW B]

A joint entry as, whilst drastically different in aesthetic, Vampire Hunter D as an adapted franchise (despite only two anime existing so far) has been treated well. Hence I hold the 1985 adaptation, including its more cartoonish visuals, as still being a good anime sci-fi horror tale; its just that, with Yoshiaki Kawajiri and the last hurrah of hand drawn animation, Bloodlust is an incredible piece of pop art, but the pair don't undermine each others' existences in the slightest.

5. Paprika (2006) [REVIEW]

Satoshi Kon's last completed project, his most well known film, has been a slow burner in appreciating it for me, but now I have grown fonder of his adaptation of a Yasutaka Tsutsui novel, I find as well a bitter sweet experience of his last project ending in a glorious spectacle of dream logic.

4. Roujin Z (1991) [REVIEW]

An underappreciated gem - in which Katsuhiro Otomo, post-Akira, teams up with director Hiroyuki Kitakubo to tackle the still-pertinent issue of Japan's growing elderly population, where in another time a method for care of said elderly is a nuclear powered Swiss Army Knife of a bed/living space with artificial intelligence, naturally going amuck in this light hearted action farce. It still works as satire, still works emotionally, and is as that sounds wonderfully animated and utterly fun.  

3. The Girl Who Leapt Through Time (2006) [REVIEW]

As Mamoru Hosoda's reputation grows, its nice to look at his first big spike in attention, another adaptation of a Yasutaka Tsutsui novel, and see how he takes the unnatural (a girl who finds she can travel through time by jumping from a large height) and creates an accomplished drama from it. Even the third act, which originally ruined the film for me, has grown as an appropriate and emotionally fulfilling one; and of course, this is also a beautifully made theatrical film which looks like it was made with love.

2. Belladonna of Sadness (1973) [REVIEW]

Made with a sense, as the studio (Mushi Productions) was a capsizing ship about to close, of finishing a studio that under legend Osamu Tezuka helped create modern anime with something truely innovative, Belladonna of Sadness has gone from an obscurity only anime fans knew of to, in complete irony, a one-off probably talked about more at points in the 2010s by cult and art house cinema fans who may not watch as much anime as the anime fans to. Its not a discredit, only to thank Cinelicious (now Arbelos) for choosing to restore this film's negative, when they are more known for art house cinema, and pushing it into the public consciousness, befitting a truly radical work that for all its uncomfortable content has also gained a lot of traction for its ideas of gender politics and incredible production. Thankfully as well, in a wonderful moment, the United Kingdom got the two films that predated Belladonna of Sadness in an informal trilogy (A Thousand and One Nights (1969) and Cleopatra (1970)) on Blu Ray and DVD, their easier access meaning that with fingers crossed they will be covered soon...

1. Royal Space Force – The Wings Of Honneamise (1987) [REVIEW]

Finally thought is a film which has become divisive, all for one single scene which is dramatically complicated and with careful moral thought to it but is disturbing and capable of completely ripping a viewer out of engagement with the material. Said film is also, as Studio Gainax's first major production, an awe inspiring achievement in creating an alien world, wrangling serious existential drama in science fiction where, whether it was the right way to depict a character's disconnect with the events around them or not, even that notorious scene was meant to deal with the follies and achievement of humankind, metaphorically shown through a humanoid race that may finally get a man up in space but, alongside tensions between warring countries and poverty on the streets, the chance that person will die from its failure. Sci-fi is usually nowadays consigned to spaceships exploding, even Star Trek never something I held any interest to engage with (despite growing up with it in childhood) as it never caught me on an emotional and artistic level. This aesthetically gorgeous, aesthetically unique, and dramatically complex and even spiritual attempt at big questions shows what science fiction can achieve, and its stayed with me the most of even all these incredible films I've covered.

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Conclusion

Hopefully however this is not the end of such gems covered though, as this self indulgent retrospective concludes. Hopefully there are more great anime, more weird anime, more curious oddities too.

Whilst I have though how pointless a retrospective is for such a tiny personal blog, it helps remind me what anime I should return to, actually purchase and love. To find out what I like in anime, and also see what is ahead to still look into for number #100 to number #200.

There is still issues, in the time between 2015 to 2019, in terms of accessing anime in the United Kingdom as it has grown to an advantage. Streaming is a virtue for so much anime to see, but with Funimation taking its ball from Crunchyroll to start their own site, and Netflix grabbing even the Neon Genesis Evangelion franchise, the cost to access all these subscriptions is going to hurt people's wallets to a potential detriment for the industry. I also find, sadly, that the UK physical media market is incredibly weak, Anime Limited having to take a while between their titles despite their licenses exiting fans, MVM thankfully plodding along but only one company, and Manga Entertainment the only other major group who may benefit from their acquisition by Funimation but before lost their personality for me personally since the late 2000s. Whilst the US has an incredible physical media market, not just Discotek but others, importation of anime titles from the US is surprisingly more cumbersome as well as my own issues with Blu Rays having region codes or not. 

In terms of what is out there however, to be positive, there's so much on Crunchyroll alone, still a bit to access on DVD/Blu-Ray, and a lot of old out-of-stock work from the early years of UK DVDs, from ADV Visions' history to curiosities, to abruptly find in a second hand store.

In terms of titles, I haven't even covered a Studio Ghibli film and there are major figures I have barely touched upon. Titles from the sixties, seventies and eighties may hopefully be found and accessed, and anime from even before the modern era of the sixties have slowly appeared. In terms of genre, sports anime is an area I haven't touched at all. Family friendly anime is a large area. There's the yaoi genre, of male-male romantic relationships, which have had a few titles available, and a growing catalog of yuri (lesbian) storytelling growing since these few years. There's the vast mecha and giant robot genre, let alone the Gundam franchise to deal with now I have covered one title from the franchise**. There's the divisive but still vast genres like echii and harem anime that eventually have to be explored, as there is romance and slice of life anime. There's, if I dare to and with Britain's terrible history of puritanism we're finally trying to shrug off, hentai (porn anime) could be covered but with knowledge most of it I probably wouldn't touch even with a ten foot pole.

There's also plenty of odd and bizarre creations about premises as banal as bartending to competitive bread making that, in this day and age, could easily appear on a streaming site as a new season's programming or even an older title being released; and a lot of mediums like music videos to multi-media, which I have dipped my toe in, can be traveled further within, let alone the world of experimental and avant-garde Japanese animation, or stop motion and puppetry including the legendary figure Kihachirō Kawamoto. And of course, titles as know as Cowboy Bebop (1998) which I haven't even watched in my youth to finally get around to, let alone rewatch the anime that is in my DVD collection and covering it. 

And of course bonus reviews, which comes to mind with Battle Angel Alita premiering in 2019, a case of pigs literally growing wings and flying as, even if he's only the producer, James Cameron finally got a project he has been obsessed with since the nineties off the ground and in cinemas. The madman I am I might cover Dragonball Evolution (2009); hell, maybe I can watch Dragonball the anime for the first time since my youth, as I haven't properly covered an anime which has had more than two seasons, an entire land of shonen and long form anime to dare touch. That's not including, having touched South Korean animation twice, my interest in non-Japanese Asian animation and co-productions. I mean, there are moral as well as creative decisions of issue to consider, but there is a Chinese web series now involving a young and sexy Karl Marx of interest...

Whatever I cover, and I have started covering titles in-between this retrospective, I hope at least to still have fun, still find gems, finally get to major titles in the history of anime, and hopefully learn beyond this as, so far as I look into the lives of those who create in this medium, I have learnt about  many new details. Of the musicians who create the music, slowly become more in-tuned to voice acting's importance (and even for English voice acting with the curious case of Ghost Stories (2000-1) and its two varying dubs), thinking about even key animators and character designers more alongside directors, and just learning to appreciate even Japanese culture as its depicted through this material. 

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* As of 2019, we're waiting for Anime Limited to follow on from their announcement of licensing the series, but hell knows what is happening. 

** And, with the knowledge Harmony Gold's license for Macross has been extended, crushing the souls of anime fans, that elusive franchise, where even the titles that aren't part of the deal exist in an as-of-yet undecided limbo, will there ever be Macross coverage on this blog in the near future?