Re-Review: Darkside Blues (1994)

 

Studio: J.C. Staff

Director: Nobuyasu Furukawa

Screenplay: Mayori Sekijima

Based on the manga by Hideyuki Kikuchi and Yuho Ashibe

Voice Cast: Akio Ohtsuka as Kenzou; Hideyuki Hori as Gren; Kotono Mitsuishi as Mai; Kouichi Yamadera as Enji; Masako Katsuki as Tamaki; Maya Okamoto as Selia; Natsuki Sakan as Darkside; Nozomu Sasaki as Katari; Shinichiro Miki as Chris; Yasunori Matsumoto as Tatsuya

Viewed in English Dub

 

In the opening scene, you do get a pretty gruesome set up to Darkside Blues, evoking that this will be another anime adaptation of the work by Hideyuki Kikuchi like the infamous Wicked City (1987), in which a female freedom fighter stripped to the waist about to be tortured by another. It is still nasty what happens, but sets up less a lurid anime shocker from the past, but a really curious hybrid of horror, science fiction dystopia and magic, in which the poor victim is slowly turned into gold whilst alive through a science-meets-alchemy pincher machine that sticks in both sides around her stomach. From that point onwards, nothing is as extreme, and instead these genre combinations take over instead. It is a really idiosyncratic world that we encounter, barely in some ways in less than nineties minutes, in which the villainess is part of the Persona Century Corporation who rules the world, their lair high above the planet Earth on a satellite with its own giant laser. In a world where they have almost bought everything, where science and magic have intermingled, there are finally forces after dethroning them, such as the youthful leader of the anti Persona group Messiah, Mai, and those who stand with her. The titular Darkside, named by where he first appears from a dimension of the darkness is their trump card, initially intermingling as a mere psionic healer but possesses absolute power of darkness and magic. He wishes to renew the world for the better from its bleak situation, and he will start to help those fighting for justice and freedom when asked to.

Set within a world where futuristic sci-fi is intertwined with mysticism, robots against magic welding mutant assassin, and enough horror aspects to really apply for the genre tag even if a tertiary one, it befits novelist and manga author Hideyuki Kikuchi as he has, alongside a prolific career, a habit of bleeding together genres into one work. His most famous franchise Vampire Hunter D, with the vital contributions of legendary illustrator Yoshitaka Amano, was a post apocalyptic sci-fi horror story which has western genre aesthetics least in the animated adaptations. Darkside Blues sadly didn't get an additional animated adaptation, knowing this source material only lasted for two manga, so there is the fact that, sadly, there wouldn't have been much left to adapt, leaving one with enough tantalising what-ifs of how to continue in this world. This is a shame as, throwing the viewer in media res in the midst of the world and not having a resolution that resolves the dystopian world it begins with, I still found so much to this supernaturally tinged sci-fi hybrid I really liked. This is an example where you see the really interesting side to Japanese animation where it allows story tropes and ideas to bleed together in really idiosyncratic ways, more so as this has style to burn against its pulpy story.

What you do get with Darkside Blues thankfully repays the patient viewer with pure atmosphere. This particular one is even different by itself because it is laced in a slow, deliberate mood and emphasises characters, surprising for a film merely eighty minutes long. Immediately made clear is also the sharp contrast between its dystopian story against gothic production design, a fascinating melding which works beautifully, depicting pure urban sprawl and a tale of a corporation in total control which (unfortunately) stays relevant thirty plus years later, all with the one slum that the villains haven't bought the centre of the heroes' activity. In spite of having some actions scenes and gore, this entire story is a deliberately moody work, intercutting moments of contemplation to contrast these pulpier scenes, to a spider in a room with red lace or silent contemplation against those aforementioned action scenes. Even if the characters don't get a lot of time onscreen, we see Mia forced to confront her own memories through dream therapy with Darkside, or see a surviving member of a freedom fighting group, a young man, and a female ex-nurse whose family was wiped out by the Persona satellite laser fall in love as she rediscovers her need to help fight for the cause.

As a theatrical production from J.C. Staff, a prolific animation studio who started in 1986 and thus wasn't that old to even endeavour on this production, they produced a mere snapshot of a larger world, which is depressing as the story has to be hastily wrapped up, but there is enough here to tantalise. The first time I saw this film, the first moment this won me over is when the first showdown between heroes and villains is scored to an honest-to-God blues song in the traditional of American ones with English vocals. With original lyrics evoking the musical genre and the story's own title, whilst fitting the world's themes of repression and rebellion, that was one of the first idiosyncratic touches that came throughout this that really caught interest.

Then there's Darkside himself, who despite being your typical anime trope of the dark and handsome stranger with unnatural powers from the void he came from, is intentionally passive. He feels like he's from the same template as D, Kikuchi's most famous creation in his quiet manner and elegance, but taken to a further extreme that he deliberately inert in his involvements. He will lash back when provoked, but deliberately stays off to the sides, intervening to heal other characters and stop the villains from harming people even by the finale. He spends most of his time throughout the film, in the most intriguing aspect of the world building, within a motel ran by an old woman where characters are pulled by a magic force to the room they want to go, where among his potential abilities (including maybe even extending the life further of the old woman's pet cat) is counselling of clients' memories and dreams, healing them and (even outside the hotel) using this ability to push the protagonists to major decisions, through pulling them into their traumas and memories to stop them from running from them. Literally, he's a counsellor to the real main characters, who just happens to be a quietly spoken man capable of horrifying dark void abilities if anyone was insane to push him.

In another twist, although it's sadly lost when it comes to the English dub which casts Matthew Harrington, is that a female voice actress named Natsuki Sakan voices Darkside rather than a man, which adds a unique dynamic for viewers. It's her sole acting role in the anime industry, which is just as mysterious. She sings the end theme, Paradise Lost, which presents the idea that this production was as meant to promote her, but with her singing voice a deeper and sombre one, it is a compelling idea to see that, to promote her, she voices the main male lead. This is actually more fleshed out when you learn that the character is credited to Ou Natsuki instead on other sites¹, and that she has a history in the Takarazuka Revue. The Revue, based in Takarazuka, Hyōgo Prefecture, Japan, started in 1913 and perform to this day elaborate all-female Broadway-style productions with the all-female cast playing both the male and female parts of their productions, Ou Natsuki playing many of the male roles in the shows she was involved with until her retirement^2,3. They have adapted everything from folktales to manga, and they have had a huge influence on anime and manga, be it the legendary Osamu Tezuka being inspired from growing up with their performances, to a legendary J.C. Staff animated production, the series Revolutionary Girl Utena (1997), being inspired by it too. I am not surprised that for one cast, an anime had an inspired idea to hire a former Takarazuka Revue performer to play a major male role when she would have done so in her career beforehand

It's the female characters for the most part too who are the most interesting. That's not to say there's some curious characterisations for the better, most if not all the characters even for the few minutes having unique details, such as the enforcer sent against Darkside having a heroic moment rescuing a woman from a group of men which complicates things, despite the fact he will turn an entire crowd of bystanders into stone which break to pieces (and presumably die if not already), deciding one of the henchmen for Persona, an artificially created hit man with monofilament wire, should look like a middle aged employee from an office in a polo shirt and slacks, wearing glasses and with balding hair, undercutting his menace in a really sick humoured way. But in terms of complex characters, Mai as the leader of the Messiah group, who holds a vaguely told back-story of trauma, is interesting as the strong willed but thoughtful leader, she and her motley crew finding themselves further against Persona especially when a militarised rebel escapes into their midst. Another character, the nurse named Selia I have already nodded to, is even more interesting and is the figure who gets the real ending of the adaptation; with even greater trauma in his life due to her family being victims of the giant space laser Persona own, she keeps her father's rifle as a traumatic memento, her progression from being a mere friend to Mai's cause onwards where the resolution of the film comes from.

Thankfully, this means Darkside Blues, unlike other anime, actually has an ending, unlike too many especially from the straight-to-video format of this time period which ended abruptly, but it's fascinating that this ending is a miniscule character drama set within a huge world left untouched. It is as if a fragment of what could've gone obviously for longer. Again, the slither of virtues is rewarding even if I wished this had lasted onwards to more. Production wise, it's gorgeous. This era of anime gladly lavished even the most lurid of stories with a distinct production design, and generally have a sense of flair both in background and character designs that stood out, details that could easily be ignored especially in some of the worst, less cared for OVAs from this same era. All that would've been as painstaking as everything else to include,  such as having the lead male villain wear a golden mask in public, deliberately designed to look robotic and faceless for ominous. The combination of Goth aesthetic with science fiction does stand out as do the moments where horror are felt, as whilst not really the genre this truly belongs too, it exists in the supernatural melding to the science fiction world, the moments of darkened mood or the lingering fear of one's' traumatic memories, let along the decision to depict Darkside as having a supernatural horse drawn carriage which can even fly, which is one of the coolest forms of transport ever to have whilst completely Gothic in image. It's distinctions stand out so much so that, yes, that it has no large scale resolution and never had any animated sequels or remakes which is disappointing, alongside the fact that original releases of this are now very old DVDs, and were never in the United Kingdom. This also includes the likelihood of finding the ADV Manga translation of the manga adaptation, which will probably only be found by readers through pure luck and an excavation through countless second hand dealer boxes and warehouses of stock for long dissolved companies. One has to gnash their teeth, as I have, when the material is as compelling as this and wish it had a lot more attention drawn to its virtues.

 

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1) MyAnimeList page for Ou, Natsuki.

2) Takawiki entry on Ou Natsuki.

3) Weblio page on Natsuki Ou. [Japanese language]

#263: Pet Shop of Horrors (1999)

 

Studio: Madhouse

Director: Toshio Hirata

Screenplay: Yasuhiro Imagawa

Based on the manga by Matsuri Akino

Voice Cast: Masaya Onosaka as Leon Orcot; Toshihiko Seki as Count D; Hiroshi Yanaka as Mr. Hayward; Kouji Tsujitani as Robin Hendrix; Miho Yamada as Q-Chan; Miki Itō as Louise; Mitsuaki Madono as Roger Stanford; Mitsuru Miyamoto as Kelly Vincent; Narumi Hidaka as Nancy; Ryūzaburō Ōtomo as the Kirin; Satsuki Yukino as Jill; Sayuri Yoshida as Alice; Sho Hayami as Jason Grey

Viewed in Japanese with English Subtitles

 

In Joe Dante’s Gremlins (1984), the younger buyer of a Mogwai is given a set of rules of how to take care of it, including the rule to not feed it after midnight, and if it is not followed then the seller is not accountable of the misery the results lead to. It is a perfect Western comparison to Pet Shop of Horrors, a four part anime mini-series adapted from a manga by Matsuri Akino, which follows the same idea but as morality tales.

Mortality tales are a vast part of human storytelling, and it finds itself fitting within the horror/supernatural genre very well regardless of nationality and medium. The old phrase “be careful for what you wish for” applies to many horror tales, especially with ones like Pet Shop of Horrors and its characters who may be far from innocent in the first place. Housed in Chinatown in Los Angeles is a pet store owned by the mysterious Count D, a soft spoken man with a sweet tooth and an elegant demeanour, who sells “dreams” to his customers as well as regular pets. The ‘dreams’ however bizarre creatures that require a strict contract of three rules to be signed to be allowed to own them, that cannot be broken by the client at any point. If the rules are broken, the pet store is blameless for what happens and something exceptionally gristly is bound to happen. Officer Orcot, a homicide detective, believes D is clearly behind the deaths after buying these pets, but the true nature of the customers is far more morally grey than one would immediately presume. Bear in mind that this mini-series is only four episodes long only, single stories that do not get deeper in terms of connecting plot as the manga may do.

Case in point is episode one, which sets up D as an unnatural figure who sells a grieving couple a rabbit which looks exactly as their recently passed daughter. Like many of these types of stories, inevitably, the rules will be broken, here to not feed her anything but vegetables and water, least you would get the least expected horror story with a happy conclusion. They are, however, morality tales about when people slip and make mistakes, or when their worst tendencies slip through and the unfortunate realities are revealed, such as the real Alice dying of a drug overdose and the complicity of the parents. Like some of the horror tales I have seen in anime and in manga, it is full of elaborate explanations after the events to explain them and the morals of the tales, which could be seen as off-putting for being over explanatory, but in mind to its tone as a morality tale, this makes sense. It became quite obvious with this work that this over-elaborate explaining, all from Count D himself and his philosophising, is the main meat of many of these tales alongside the gruesome conclusions involving the mystical creatures in this mini-series something in mind to how the first episode ends with a disturbing use of rabbits and how these ones reproduce.

Count D effectively becomes a one-man Greek Chorus and Crypt Keeper as well as the one who gives them the object (i.e. the pet) that causes the events to happen. The four episodes play off the conflicts of human emotions and their follies, the old chestnuts that are still great themes to tackle, but adds the additional fact that, like in many Japanese stories, the person involved may have willingly let themselves be damned. Why Hideo Nakata’s Ringu (1998) became such a legendary horror film as it has was probably both its premise of the cursed videotape, but also its theme of the complicity of people, in how the tape came to existent and that a victim, anyone of us viewers in reality too, could let this happen to us even if we knew going in that viewing the tape could kill us after seven day. Pet Shop of Horrors plays with this concept nicely in such short a space of time. Episode two is about a mermaid which looks like the recently deceased fiancée of a man which he becomes obsessed with, whilst episode three is more bittersweet, its lead of an actor trapped by the shadow of his first success, as a beautiful lead in a sci-fi movie, less a tale of a man with sin but tragically a man giving up which involves the tale of Medusa of Greek legend.

There is levity here. Orcot is out of his depth with a man as eloquent and mysterious as Count D, and despite all the strange goings-on never questions why the mysterious pet seller has a strange magical creature, a cute mouse-bat critter, flying around him that would immediately break reality. Count D, even if it means providing the mayor with a cute penguin as a pet, also has powerful connections despite the fact, for all his demonic side, his moral code is more letting people suffer their own failings and merely providing the tools for them. It is also really apparent that there is a streak of platonic romance between the men hinted at, least a flirtation toyed with in the premise of two very different types of masculine beauty, the almost androgynous D against a rough and hard-headed cop. Even if not an ounce of romance was ever hinted at in Matsuri Akino's source manga, it feels subtextually here in their combative chemistry. It is still rich in atmosphere, with its occult leanings and also the score by Kazuhisa Yamaguchi, which is of its era but is a sumptuous mix of drum and bass with jazz. Tragically, he did not continue at all in the anime industry where his style of music would have been great for many works in this genre we would be getting in the Millennium.

If there is an issue with the mini-series in production, it is that, despite being hand drawn animation before the use of computers after the Millennium that became standard in anime production, it is not the best it could have been even for television. Despite the fact this is a Madhouse production, who are kings of great productions like Millennium Actress (2001), this feels like it could have had more flair in appearance than the snippets we do get; even for television, their full series Boogiepop Phantom (2000), whilst working with a budget, was brimming in far more style. The first episode, which I read in some form in a sample catalogue of manga, is naturally going to be superior in most exceptions on page, but the tale could have done with a bit more visual punch to add to the strength of the stories.

Episode four, the last, is the most idiosyncratic, in how it deals with the kirin, a mythological animal in East Asia of great reverence, almost-deities taken from Chinese mythology only owned by figures of great benevolent people and leaders. Here, there is the touch that, in this world, it suggests in a flashback in World War II Harry S. Truman, the 33rd president of the United States, had a kirin, and here the tale is about a young congress man whose male assistant is the one really pulling the strings. This assistant wants to push him to become the great young President in the White House, despite the fact his wife Nancy wants a simpler life and he himself is falling in love with her, and even for a short tale, it stands out with its conclusion for these one tale characters, from how this issue is resolved in its own bittersweet way, a great example of how these moral tales can use horror to their advantage. The obvious disappointment is that this is only four episodes long. The manga, starting in 1995, lasted until 1998, followed by Shin Petshop of Horrors which started in 2005, during the boom of TokyoPop, the American manga distributor who licensed the series, and ended in 2012, which by that time was when the bubble for TokyoPop had long burst from their 2008 restructuring onwards, leaving a huge amount of stories (and the growing back-story of who D is and how Leon Orcot becomes closer to him) on the table. That does not even factor in that the original author returned to the world further times with Pet Shop of Horrors: Passage-Hen (2013-2017) and in 2018 with Pet Shop of Horrors: Ark Adrift. It is a shame, but by itself as a one-shot, Pet Shop of Horrors is a solid ninety minute DVD not allowed to fully form into something special. Considering this was a television broadcast rather than a straight-to-video production as I had presumed it to be makes this lack of a full thirteen episode series, let alone longer, stranger with hindsight and bittersweet as you see here four good episodes for a one-shot which would have made a great beginning to a longer production.

#262: Doomed Megalopolis (1991-2)

 

Studio: Madhouse

Director: Rintaro

Screenplay: Akinori Endō, Masayuki and Rintaro

Based on the novel Teito Monogatari by Hiroshi Aramata

Voice Cast: Masaaki Okabe as the Narrator, Kouichi Yamadera as Jun'ichi Narutaki, Kyuusaku Shimada as Yasunori Kato, Gorou Naya as Yasumasa Hirai, Kan Tokumaru as Dr. Makoto Nishimura, Kaneto Shiozawa as Youichirou Tatsumiya, Keiko Han as Yukari Tatsumiya, Ken Yamaguchi as Kamo, Kenichi Ogata as Shigemaru Kuroda, Kouichi Kitamura as Junkichi Amano, Naoki Tatsuta as Torahiko Terada, Osamu Saka as Viscount Eiichi Shibusawa, Takaya Hashi as Noritsugu Hayakawa, Youko Asagami as Keiko Tatsumiya, Yuusaku Yara as Shigeyuki "Rohan Kouda" Kouda

Viewed in Japanese with English Subtitles

 

Before this adaptation, there were two live action films adapting Hiroshi Aramata's book series, Teito Monogatari, a single narrative across Japan in the 20^th century broken up into volumes in its various publication forms. The first was the 1988 Tokyo: The Last Megalopolis, which with Doomed Megalopolis adapts the earlier parts of Hiroshi Aramata's story, whilst Tokyo: The Last War (1989) adapts the volumes dealing with the final days of the Pacific War. With Doomed Megalopolis, animation director Rintaro, who started in the beginning of the modern anime industry in the early sixties, came to this adaptation with great interest in the source material¹, and took interest in depicting the more fantastical nature of its premise¹, in which an alternative Japanese history of the 20th century involves immortal magician Yasunori Katō, a figure who wishes to destroy the city of Tokyo with his craft. Contextually it is important to realise its source author Hiroshi Aramata, a polymath and natural history researcher, whose career varied between translating classic Western fantasy literature to bringing Western natural historical texts to Japan, used this multi-volume work that cemented a legacy to focus on both Japanese history and real Asian occultism, the central theme of three of these episodes being Kato's desire to reawaken Taira no Masakado, until March 25, 940 when he was betrayed and decapitated. His head, with stories of it still being alert after assassination, was buried in Edo, the future Tokyo, where in real life, stories have suggested a curse that has lasted over decades to the point that, even in the modern day, his shrine in Tokyo is still held with great respect.

In Doomed Megalopolis, Kato wishes to awaken him even when Masakado himself wishes to be allowed to rest in his grave. He will even call forth a shrine maiden, Keiko, to represent him in episode three to get Kato to leave him alone, instead becoming almost a duality of Kato representing the real figure's rage of authority, wishing to level Tokyo fully, something which the film Tokyo: The Last War emphasised as him being thousands of years of slain and dead peoples' angers coming together to bring him back in 1945. Doomed Megalopolis' narrative begins in 1908, and in both the first live action film and this anime, all three adaptations include Kyuusaku Shimada, whose first film role was Kato, playing this figure at the end of the Meiji era going into the Taisho era of emperors beginning this quest to destroy Tokyo, connected to the real 1923 Kanto earthquake in both adaptations.

When I had heard of Doomed Megalopolis, it had a notoriety for being lurid, and in comparison to Akio Jissoji's adaptation of the 1988 live action film as a director, Rintaro's take here with studio Madhouse is a lot more explicit in both the horror content as much as gore and transgressive sexual content, though Tokyo: The Last War, bringing in legendary practical effects artist Screaming Mad George (Joji Tani for his birth name), had already brought in more overtly gory content itself to the adaptations. I also have to admit that, whilst I admire the 1988 feature film, and both adaptations have their virtues, Doomed Megalopolis has a huge advantage with its fantastical content as animation, a freedom to be vivid and vibrant with its phantasmagorical content fully. From the get-go, you have a work oozing in style, be it the idiosyncratic use of colour and framing scenes, to actually depicting the supernatural elements, such as the fact, when introduced, one of the initial leads by the name of Yukari, a maiden, is able to see the future, a target of Kato's goals whose visions and nightmares over the first two episodes would not be possible to depict in the live action film as vividly as this.

The Last Megalopolis to its credit used practical effects, including stop motion, but here you can have the horror grow and be fluidly animated, be it shadow demons formed of eyes and mouths in wrong places, like ink well creatures, to one of the more infamous moments I had heard about with this mini-series, the openly phallic stomach worm being vomited out of a victim's mouth which has an appropriately horrifying execution due to the animation quality. The work is more tonally appropriate for its medium - more action based - and not as entirely focused on the smaller details other adaptations did. The Last Megalopolis really made a deal of a key plot point, that this is a time when there is an attempt in the government to make Tokyo a capital city influential even outside the country, whilst here there is a lot more emphasis on the horror as well as more psycho dramatic plot turns for characters you never got in the live action film. There is significantly more rock guitar solos from Kazuhiko Toyama here in the score, but I will not complain about one of the anime's best aspects, that score, for this.

Moments are more explicit, but never feel tasteless for the sake of it. Probably the most extreme aspect is a subplot entirely jettisoned from their live action counterparts in Yukari and her brother, which becomes explicitly incestuous on his side in a bleak narrative stroke, one despite the luridness of the content becoming more the tragedy of how her character, bright and charismatic when introduced, is psychologically broken between Kato and her own brother, her daughter inheriting a greater weight of power and struggle as a result in this perverse psychodrama between brother and sister. Even this violent overtone never feels tasteless as, by episode two when we skip to 1923, this is allowed to breathe as a narrative in a way The Last Megalopolis was not able to, able to have greater emphasis on characterisation in ways that The Last Megalopolis could not even if that adaptation has touches of its own more fleshed out.

There are differences between both adaptations, which mean both have their virtues. By episode three, the character of Keiko here is a much more significant character than in the film, but in contrasted by how her introduction in the episode is a much abbreviated take on what becomes the finale of the film, including far less emphasis sadly on Gakutensoku, a real life robot, the first built in the East of the globe,  who is far more elaborated on in this fictional context in connection to the building of the first subway in Tokyo, shown here even with actual photos and designs from it but less focused on as a narrative concern in the anime adaptation.

This still however feels like its source, taking real spiritual and occultist beliefs, and melding them with history, even if details like a giant flying manta ray was not expected at all in context. You can argue that in terms of telling the history of Japan itself, Tokyo: The Last Megalopolis was doing more, especially as episode three here feels significantly more expanded in the live action film where it made the perfect conclusion for that story. There is however the fact this adaptation has additional content that continues after this for episode four, where never was mathematical sums and equations made more menacing as we enter alien territory, narrative beyond the film in which Lagrange’s equation of motion is brought in and you would have struggled with depicting its plot even with practical stop motion effects with where it goes. Here, Kato figures out that his solution is to move the Moon closer to the Earth and literally cause it to awaken a spiritual dragon, something even a big budget film from the Japanese movie industry would have had a hard time depicting but animation can. It definitely ends the animation at its most phantasmagoric and certainly with a left turn to conclude the mini-series, as unexpectedly love defeats the monster, something which with credit to a production adds a weight to it. For what is the most extreme in content from the three Teito Monogatari adaptations that came first, there is emphasis throughout on how, if you viewed these stories from afar, Yasunori Kato is a figure who will never succeed, in any other context a weak villain but in context to this adaptation by himself someone more symbolically complex in how he is inevitable, more a force that comes and will always fight with Tokyo itself as a symbol of the unrest that built the capital of Japan over a turbulent century.

Doomed Megalopolis was a surprise, a gravitas even among brethren in the more lurid horror anime coming out straight-to-video at this time, and won me over. Certainly next to the other live action films, this feels an entirely different take in terms of tone despite all that is clearly carried over from the original films, Kyuusaku Shimada notwithstanding, the pulpier take which however inherited the weight of the others’ taking on Japanese history and esotericism with an admirable attitude in depicting them. It is out of the three a striking work as pure horror anime too, with sights like a woman splitting open into a giant insect creature to a nightmare sequence involving a cat monster, something which when these titles have questionable content still retain incredible artistic flourishes and mood to the productions to admire in this genre.

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1) For the 2021 Blu-Ray release from Media Blasters, a small anime and live action distributor in the USA who have managed to continue over decades of changes in the US anime distribution industry, it includes fascinating short documentaries made for the Japanese audience, three of them about locations around Tokyo with spiritual and esoteric lore around them, whilst the forth contains promo interviews with actor Kyuusaku Shimada and briefly with Rintaro, though it is clear how the director came to this with admiration for the source novel and wishing to bring what was possible in animation against the two live action films already released by that point.

#260: Nyanpire - The Animation (2011)

 

Studio: GONZO

Director: Takahiro Yoshimatsu

Screenplay: Natsuko Takahashi

Based on the manga by yukiusa

Voice Cast: Ami Koshimizu as Nyanpire; Jun Fukuyama as Nyantenshi; Noriaki Sugiyama as Masamunya Dokuganryū; Yuko Goto as Chachamaru; Nozomi Maeda as Komori-kun / Mōri-kun; Shinnosuke Tachibana as the Vampire; Shion Hirota as Misaki-chan; Shion Hirota as the Narrator / Katsuo

Viewed in Japanese with English Subtitles

 

To be continued, meow.

Nyanpire is tragically slight, a cute premise for a longer series which is only four minutes long per twelve episodes, not allowing it to stand out let alone burn out a silly premise to the point it does not work. A kitten, as explained in the pre-credit prologue, was left abandoned and hungry, only for a male vampire to show empathy and save it from death by giving them eternal life, thus creating a "Nyanpire". Thankfully a human girl Misaki took him in and is aware of his need for blood, as she is able to talk to him, one who is precocious and can find, whilst not a suitable substitute, that ketchup is delicious even if Tabasco sauce is to be approached with caution. Baring the final episode playing on a sad idea, Nyanpire considering his friends' mortality against his immortality, this is a fluffy show which plays on skits involving our undead cat lord in his misadventures with mostly cat friends. It is absolutely as silly a premise as it sounds too if adorable.

Surprisingly for me, this is a production by studio GONZO, made after a time when they were a huge producer of titles as I was getting into anime into the 2000s. They still exist, producing titles throughout the 2010s from this, but by 2008 and 2009, they had huge financial issues which lead them to be absorbed into their parent company, GDH K.K., in 2009. There is a brief melancholia to Nyanpire because of this, despite its cuteness and GONZO's sporadic track record in quality, in how they are making this micro-series under the shadow of those events, a company who seemed to be everywhere prominently in their releases from ADV Films when I was getting into anime, even making a music video for Linkin Park, only to be less prominent in their status as an animation studio. Beyond this however, there is a sense the production was made with fun and that history means little barring the recognition of their name on the end credits, one which went out of its way to be a full live action band musical number with cat puppets, Gothic Lolita costumes and a blood I.V.

The shortness of the show, like many micro-series, leave a lot on the table for a Halloween appropriate series, Garfield for the Goths, in how this is a motley crew of characters surrounding an impulsive but adorable lead. This breaks from a lot of vampire traditions, like the fact he can go in the sun, but many are for jokes, like his love of garlic ramen, or how there is a theory the vampire that turned him may be an obsessive collector of cats who keeps them in a void in his person. It is a fun cast around him too, beginning with an ex-angel cat, kicked out of heaven and a little cad, making up stories of being thrown out for loving a female angel, to the adopted and more sensible little brother to Nyanpire. Two bats, more like trolls in their behaviour, make up non-feline figures, but the character of interest is Masamunya Dokuganryū. Likely a parody of Date Masamune, he is an unexpected joke to include if for a figure even played by Ken Watanabe in the 1987 historical television series Dokuganryū Masamune among many other appearances in Japanese popular culture: Masamune in reality was a magistrate, tactician and a regional ruler of Japan's Azuchi–Momoyama period through early Edo period who was known for his missing eye, dubbed the "One-Eyed Dragon of Ōshū". It may be a stretch, but considering Masamunya is a cat with an eye patch too, I would not be surprise if the joke is revolving around a real Japanese historical figure of a similar type. More unexpected is that the samurai cat is initially introduced trying to banish Nyanpire, only to end up with a smitten crush and realises he is gay when he learns Nyanpire is actually male. I was not expecting, on the bingo card of anime, a positive gay character within a show about a cartoon cat vampire, but with Nyanpire, here we go, and whilst Masamunya is the butt of jokes, the only ones in regards to this is Masamunya struggling with trying to express his love to Nyanpire, who is oblivious and his jealously that the angel cat does feel any harm if Nyanpire bites him for blood.

Micro-series, unless we are talking about gdgd Fairies (2011-2013) or Teekyu (2012-17), which got many series, unfortunately feel like the equivalent of old school forty minute OVAs, enticing little snippets of a premise which, in the most rewarding, at least present something interesting with a personality of its own. Even something more questionable in its production quality, like Sparrow's Hotel (2013), a micro-series about a female staff who uses her ninja skills to keep a hotel at five stars in quality ratings, can still entice with a ludicrous premise. Personality is something I can attest to for Nyanpire. Nearly forty minutes, the equivalent of an old straight-to-video project, this shows enough to appreciate the content but also leaves me wishing it had more to the project, both a real positive, but sad in that as a 2011 project, this never had a follow up throughout the 2010s.

#256: Campus Special Investigator Hikaruon (1987)

 

Studio: AIC

Director: Kazuhiro Ochi

Screenplay: Kazuhiro Ochi

Voice Cast: Mika Doi as Adzumi Hadzuki; Toshihiko Seki as Hikaru Shihodo; Kazuyuki Sogabe as Shirou Amakusa; Miina Tominaga as Yayoi Shiina; Shōzō Iizuka as Demonic Beast; Tesshō Genda as Kyousuke Gomi

Viewed in Japanese with English Subtitles

 

Continuing into the catalogue of obscure eighties OVAs, this is the last of the "Pink Shock" trilogy which I have seen all of. Produced by AIC, it was a brief series which came with no real consitent aspect to them barring some eroticism. One was Maryū Senki (1987-9), a three part horror-action release of interest in that genre. The other Call Me Tonight (1986) is one some viewers may have learnt of as it has gained interest in the internet age, a fascinating short predating the notorious Urotsukidôji anime adaptations by parodying it, by way of a lead male character who turns into a tentacle monster when horny and the female phone sex employee who can tame his heart, all in a work that is more progressive for the time then you release. Campus Special Investigator Hikaruon, in vast contrast, feels like a pilot to a show that could have been, a tribute to the likes of live action tokusatsu "Metal Hero" shows like Space Sheriff Gavan (1982-3) only with a darker slant.

At a school an alarming number of suicides are transpiring, and a young male hero, able to turn into an armoured battler, has snuck in as a new transfer student with his female colleague there already as a teacher. There is a female student pulled into the secret force harming the students, and the sense of this feeling like one episode to a longer work than never came to be is felt. The more adult tone is that this entity, masquerading in the school, drives people to suicide or to be devoured by a supernatural force. There is a sense of style to this anime too; the opening, set in a train station almost white with just outlines, the patrons all blank faced, has the one character in colour and fully drawn jumping in front of a train, an inspired opening for any production which emphasises the shock of the scene as a set up. There is also my favourite trope of the older era of anime, maybe still into the modern day if I ever encounter it, of characters being transported to an alien realm, here a surreal chess motif of black and white tiles, and gravity defying steps against a crimson sky. Add to this that the villain is at first a harlequin Pied Piper in appearance, tempting a new victim with wine of her demise. The best of these sequences cross into another of my passions as, with the best of these older anime of strange alternative realms, you could imagine them as the art appearing the front of a metal or prog rock LP.

Hikaruon also has an uncomfortable of victimising the female characters sadly. The other Pink Shock titles as mentioned had an eroticism, and here this is sadly an implicit threat of sexual violence, be it a group of bullies targeting the female student, or how the female heroine, when the number of goons in a bar are too many to fight, is left with clothes shredded and on the floor implicitly suggesting a rape scene to transpire. She is brainwashed to fight the hero thankfully, in another cool aesthetic choice in a paper walled pastiche of samurai combat, wearing an omi demon mask, but that hint is tonally out of place. The hero also sexually harasses her, such as groping her behind, as humour which definitely has not aged well at all. Out of the three Pink Shock entries, this feels like a contractual requirement and out of place, as this feels like a tribute to this genre it is recreating, and only is darker in the villains' plans, not the special abilities or how the episode finishes with fighting a monster.

Maryū Senki has sexually crossing with the grotesque which could be accused as offensive, and out of place for something meant to be erotic, but felt more befitting as ero-guro, a horror story where the sexuality is more for the horror edge than meant to be sexy, whilst Call Me Tonight as mentioned is surprising for what themes it covered in less than thirty minutes. Hikaruon, whilst entertaining, is a disappointment in how I do need to advise a trigger warning for those watching this, and how it really is undercut by this undefendable, and arguably pointless, way to still sell eroticism like the other Pink Shock titles did. It does not even, if the eroticism was not problematic, seem a fit, where it would been more appropriate if this had been a more explicitly erotic pastiche or take on the tokusatsu genre. Considering the opening credits is a sincere animation of the show it could have been, like the pilot of a longer production, shows it is an odd production in some of the creative choices. It becomes, out of the Pink Shock series, the weakest of the trio for the reason it feels like a pilot for a show we never got the whole of.

#253: Karas - The Prophecy and The Revelation (2005-2007)

 

Studio: Tatsunoko VCR

Director: Keiichi Sato

Screenplay: Shin Yoshida

Voice Cast: Asuka Shibuya as Hinaru; Kasumi Suzuki as Yurine; Keiji Fujiwara as Nue; Toshihiro Wada as Otoha; Hiroto Torihata as Kure Narumi; Hitomi Nabatame as Homura; Kiyoyuki Yanada as Suiko ; Mai Nakahara as Chizuru / Mery ; Rokurō Naya as the Chief; Saeko Chiba as Sagizaka Yoshiko; Takahiro Sakurai as Houshun'in Ekou; Tetsuo Goto as Minoru Sagisaka

Viewed in Japanese with English Subtitles

 

Created to commemorate the 40th anniversary of Tatsunoko studios, the best way to describe Karas is an ambitious and very interesting premise but one, including the notable delay in between releases of all six episodes, which needed time to breath, rushing with all the ambition of a debut of a man, Keiichi Sato, who started out as a character and mecha designer who finally got to direct a production. It is a simple premise at its heart combining Tatsunoko's history of superhero characters in their animation like Gatchaman or Yatterman, with horror and Japanese folklore, and then-modern CGI animation which is meant for style for the sake of style even if the premise is elaborate in lore. Considering this has sword welding armoured figures fighting in the sky of Shinjuku at Christmas at the beginning of the first episode, the style is there, as is the director Keiichi Sato spelling his own name out in episode one with ants.

Karas is absolutely of its era, very much of the 2000s in style with the CGI and looking as expensive as possible, alongside the emphasis on a more muted art style. Voice casting for the English dub, which brought in Matthew Lillard and Jay Hernandez for key roles, definitely evokes how by the mid 2000s there was a push for making anime more mainstream, and as a straight-to-video project licensed by Manga Entertainment, this is also of the time. Whilst there were a few prominent ones at the time like this, that format was losing traction for these types of projects and TV series were easier to access on DVD finally at that point, Manga Entertainment eventually becoming less prominent as a British and US distributor, and more British one who releases mostly television series and some key films in the decade onwards. Karas however to its credit has a fascinating premise - in Shinjuku a mysterious figure known as Karas, a denoted figure meant to protect the city on behalf of the demons and the yōkai of the city from evil doers, stops demons from killing the humans and consuming their blood. The current one is Otoha, a man in a coma for the first three episodes who spends his time as a doctor for the yōkai in their world. A demon hunter about to stop time, he is under the watch of Yurine, the woman behind our lead who a) is an unexpected catgirl, and b) exists as a concept, more than one Yurine in existence as part of this lore using both Japanese mythology and various Asian disciplines of spirituality as its influence, Yurine existing for all the Karas and all looking the same, including for Eko, the former Karas of Tokyo who, having become disillusioned to its corruption, seeks to annihilate all humans there with what is effectively a plan to turn everyone into his own personal tap of human blood to be able to power his ultimate form.

The style, even under all the CGI, which is used for Karas and his opponents, mechanically altered supernatural demons, is inspired, running both with this idiosyncratic style but also melding it with ancient Japanese folklore.  The first monster emphasises this, whilst pulling no punches even if the later episodes are much gorier, with a water demon draining human blood from victims in a specific public bathroom near the subway, introducing us too to Narumi, a new police officer assigned to the one man behind their paranormal department, with his own concerns with his daughter in a mental asylum for seeing her whole classroom massacre by a demon. You however also see that Karas' first episode is arguably stylish to the point you cannot understand half of it, and also rushing through a premise which had legs for longer episodes than the thirty each gets. Effectively taking horror monsters, and having them as life draining robot ones, tackled by a doctor for good yōkai, a huma, who returns to his world to slay evil ones from a former Karas, we have a premise that is rewarding, but this show really needed to have been longer even if it was forty minute episodes. The first three episodes known as The Prophecy for Western release from Manga Entertainment feels like it is bolting through so much without explaining enough, including a demon in human disguise named Nue, after Eko and his monsters too. There are aspects you have to expect are there for the creativity of the production, like all Karas being able to turn into fighter planes for combat, but it is telling, alongside there being too many characters, that The Revelation as the last three episodes are called, all released two years after in 2007, has to start episode four with a huge amount of exposition to explain itself. Characters who barely get detail on them, like a female female Karas and her Yurine watching on as a preppy girl, get more to do, and it explains key lore points alongside Otaha's back story as a mob enforcer.

As quickly as his tortured history is disposed of, even if it means quickly getting past his crime father and an unexpected bromance that dies a quick death, The Revelation however has to quickly deal with ending the show, so even this is rushed despite explaining the premise. The rush undercuts Karas so much as by those three episodes, we are already into an apocalypse scenario where, with the notable shift in more gore and limb severing, we are in a far more violent doomsday tendril situation. As a result of the rush, even this, which is a scary and gruesome scenario, actually gets into something I have I have always hated in anime - just killing random bystanders off in vast amounts in elaborately gory scenarios as we see here. It is odd but, even with the trashiest of horror anime I have seen that are bad, they seem more justifiable even with an archetype once you known them a little, even one dimensional stereotypes, to be able to exist as a singular figure with their own existences for how long the tale is. Focusing on having their death as one person than merely part of a mass, no matter how gruesome especially with the eighties straight to video era, takes it into an exclamation mark to the scene that works. Here because you do not have enough time to digest the stakes, sadly Karas despite its moody nature even ups with randomly drawn bystanders getting horrifying ends which feels like shock value. This even makes the ending of the notorious Urotsukidôji: The Legend of the Overfiend (1989), its own world ending scenario, powerful ina horrifying way because we had more build up and warning of the threat at stake in that film in spite of its own problematic nature.

A lot of Karas'  fault is that, with this premise, Karas is an imaginative and vivid production which had so much work and production preparation clearly placed into it, but was really rushed to a scenario that, even in another slightly longer OVA work, would have needed slightly longer to reach what is this extreme an end. It is also a conventional superhero plot at its heart, despite the gore, that made a bad decision to not get the exposition out of the way or having time to slow down and let its lore sink in even if the production wanted to avoiding too much talking. What stands out in its tone, its horror-occult premise, is pushed to the backburner, which becomes its biggest sin. Particularly with how the designs are so elaborate and idiosyncratic even with clichés - there is requisite spider woman on the evil side, but her monster form and how she drains the blood for humans by hundreds of tiny spiders is entirely idiosyncratic here - it feels gauche to rush through a premise which has at its heart the additional subtext of modernisation conflicting with Japan's past. Details I can expect most will miss, such as how to activate the Karas form, Yurine chants a Shinto mantra, but there is an elaborate metaphor here that anime has tackled a lot and is worth doing so over and over, modernisation and Japan's past in conflict, the old traditions and the modernisation clashing as the demons of yore are forgotten and humanity in the city sinks into crime and corruption. Details like the mayor of Tokyo betraying humanity due to his hatred for all the crime, in another adaptation, would have become more loaded if allowed to breathe.

You can see the production value onscreen, not just in the computer effects, but costume design touches, like the Yurine all having goggles with idiosyncratic and cute markings for eyes on them, or that people cared for this work's lore, that in this world cities are still alive with the unnatural, the crows to the stray cats part of the spirits living in them that denote a human to become a Karas and keep all under control. As a result, this does have the disappointment of what could have been. For me this was always a title from this era getting into anime I wished to get around to, but never did. I am glad to see there was so much passion to the production as an original premise, which I have to admire now I have seen Karas and realised more was on its mind than presumed, but it is with the cost that, unfortunately, it missed the mark. This premise with the cost of its style clearly put on the production in time and effort did not get to the stage it needed to in being fully fleshed out, and it also needed to have been worked on more carefully before it came out. Thankfully, the epilogue of this production is that someone like Keiichi Sato, with this debut as a director, would go on to make helm more productions into the modern day, such as the first series of Tiger & Bunny (2011), so this ambition would lead onwards into other productions.

#252: Mugen Shinshi - Bōken Katsugeki Hen (1987)

 

a.k.a Dream Dimension Gentleman

Studio: Gallop / JVCKenwood Victor Entertainment

Director: Hatsuki Tsuji

Screenplay: Izô Hashimoto

Based on the manga by Yosuke Takahashi

Voice Cast: Keiko Toda as Mamiya Mugen; Hiroko Emori as Atsuko "Akko" Fukune; Banjou Ginga as Alucard; Ichirō Nagai as Dr. Jutarō Tomino; Jouji Yanami as Doctor Lao; Junpei Takiguchi as Inspector Edogawa; Kouji Totani as Koho

Viewed in Japanese with English Subtitles

 

Among the many ultra obscure straight-to-video titles from the eighties, Mugen Shinshi is a distinct one I wish would have been a longer franchise, even if at first you are caught off-guard by the protagonist, a young man named Mamiya Mugen, a detective who when we are introduced to him looks like a kid but is a good sharpshooter practicing in his office. Without time to breathe, a fifty or so minute production, a young woman who we will learn is an exotic dancer runs in on him and his servant Alardo/Alucard, in the midst of being pursued by Egyptian crocodile headed behemoths.

This, the only adaptation in anime, is sadly a really tantalizing image of the source material of Yosuke Takahashi. The art style is a cartoonish style close to “chibi” in how, a style usually meant to depict tiny and cute figures in anime/manga, the cast includes a lot of fresh faced and young figures despite being clearly adults, but this is a work of a prolific pulp and horror manga author. He is capable of creating grotesque sounding (and looking) work like Man Eater (1997), a horror short story collection, but here with Mugen Shinshi, he was clearly tapping into Japan’s history of mystery story telling, especially clear as the comedic side character, a bumbling detective for the police, is named Inspector Edogawa. He is named after the legendary author Edogawa Ranpo who, whilst known for creepy and twisted tales like “The Human Chair”, was also writing detective stories for adults and children. Mamiya Mugen could have easily found himself a detective character in the centre of The Black Lizard (1934), a tale in which a mysterious femme fatale kidnapping women and turning them into statues to preserve their beauty, which sets the tone for this adaptation perfectly even if at times, like a plane versus hot air blimp battle with dynamite, you can even see a touch of early Hayao Miyazaki in the tone too.

Mugen himself is in a pretty diabolical tale of his own, the tone set in how this is also set in the Showa era after 1926, where the exotic dancer Atsuko Fukune, a key character in the manga, is one of six women of notability to be kidnapped and sacrificed in a melding of Egyptian occultism and science, all to resurrect the secret underground leader of Japan. The production is a one off, but it would have been a perfect pilot to a larger work with enough characters to work from, not only with Edogawa, but Atsuko, who come off as the antagonistic love-hate love interesting to Mugen, and Alardo as I had him in the subtitles, the giant manservant who in the manga is Alucard, a vampire who we see here is a gentle man who yet, when needs to, can turn into his more monstrous form for subhuman strength. Its heightened, slapstick tone is also, with all the humour, fun to experience; even the villains behind the kidnapping of women of all fields of talent, one and his bumbling assistant, are as put upon especially when their staff have gone on strike for having to look after the kidnap victims for too long. It is a shame we only have this, as right away, this could have been an extended episode pilot for a very good series, or an OVA one which had the world of possibilities to it. There is intrigue with Mugen as a very good detective, even able to disguise himself as one of the female kidnap victims, who has quests can vary between the supernatural and world politics, as here you have the German, the French, the British and even Japanese armies staging a blow for blow gun battle in a pyramid over this arcane resurrection secret eventually. The horror is also there too in touches like the crocodile headed thugs. Sadly this never got more than this, adapting one of the many different retellings of the characters in manga form by his creator, and we never got it in the West either, one resurrected through the power of the internet and fan archiving for a secret gem.

#243: Ninja Gaiden (1991)

 

Studio: Studio Junio

Director: Mamoru Kanbe

Screenplay: Tomofumi Nobe

Based on the video game by Tecmo

Voice Cast: Keiichi Nanba as Ryū Hayabusa; Norio Wakamoto as Robert T. Sturgeon; Yumi Touma as Irene Lew; Daisuke Gouri as Jeffrey Hammond; Saori Suzuki as Katherine Friedman; Shinji Ogawa as Prof. Bucky Wise; Unshō Ishizuka as Dr. Ned Friedman; Yoshiko Sakakibara as Sarah

Viewed in Japanese with English Subtitles

 

An eighties straight-to-video title at heart, though finding itself published in the early nineties, this is an obscure anime adaptation of a video game. This particular one has a fascinating history, as many may know this video game franchise first through a reboot series from Team Ninja, which were released entirely for Microsoft's consoles, part of their history of attempting to make the Xbox successful in Japan against stiff competition, starting with Ninja Gaiden (2004). This is adapting from the first era, of the Nintendo NES/Famicon era though with the original game a 1988 arcade cabinet. This anime was released at the time between Ninja Gaiden II: The Dark Sword of Chaos (1990) and Ninja Gaiden III: The Ancient Ship of Doom (1991), a franchise which had already established Ryū Hayabusa, a figure you may also know from the Dead or Alive beat em up game franchise, as Team Ninja developed those games and brought him from his own franchise to become a key member for that one, which is interesting as a rare case of someone not being a cameo character. It is also in knowledge that game series got a live action adaptation, DOA: Dead or Alive (2006), which means Hayabusa has also been played by Kane Kosugi, son of Japanese martial arts film star Sho Kosugi, a huge figure of the ninja boom of pop culture in the eighties which lead to Ninja Gaiden and Sega's Shinobi video game franchise existing, which is a deliciously intricate web of influences and crossovers.

The story here is very simple off the back of this franchise, good ninja versus an evil group in a forty plus minute anime, connecting to a previous demonic villain being defeated and the aftermath with the threat of their return transpiring. The feeling of this being an eighties anime in tone was a legitimate mistake, not realising until later this was released in the nineties, as it feels from the get-go from the same lineage of eighties straight-to-video titles, even the lower budget ones, which still had a style to them. It begins here with a shot, set in New York City, at night in the fog covered streets where our lead finds him being accosted by two masked assassins in suits and arm hidden blades, which shows there is some creativity that sparkles at times throughout. This is still the era you could get away with recreating the exact poster to Les Misérables, the 1980 musical version of Victor Hugo's novel, in the background to establish the location where Ryu the ninja is drawn closer to the Friedman Corporation, up to no good as with other corporations, with their head Professor Ned Friedman behind diabolic human experiments of a biotechnical kind. The gore in the work as well, and the weird monsters thrown about, regardless of the era it was actually made in feels distinct to at least the time when straight-to-video anime from these decades.

Anime straight-to-video titles were once so prolific that numerous ones like this existed, likely never had a Western release anywhere, and were entirely unknown of once time had passed. It is a generic story with only some drama in Ryu's love for a woman, working in a store with him, who forces him to confront the duality of his life, but this is an action work with a slant into horror first-and-foremost. It does evoke the most curious and enticing video game from this period you wish you could play with this horror slant, inexplicably evoking Castlevania if with ninjas, when you will have freakish white fish men or goons who have skinless faces with just eyes under their masks as antagonists, casually introduced in the character designs for a scene never to be seen again. (Let alone the human headed wolf in a motley crew of them in the final skirmish at the Friedman Corporation). It justifies the idea of how much creativity was burnt up even on a moderately interesting title like this one from the time, let alone one of the future classics of this medium of anime.

Studio Junio is a more obscure studio, one which has collaborated with other studios in areas like in-between animation. Their own work is a curious mix, from Amada Anime Series: Super Mario Brothers (1989), an obscure Mario tie-in in which the Nintendo characters reinterpret fairy tales, to Saber Marionette J (1996-7), likely their biggest title in terms of how it developed sequels and was once a huge title in the nineties. Founded in 1970 by Takao Kozai, their last title in animation was the 1999 film Gundress. Infamously an "unfinished" version had a theatrical premiere in Japan, this work based on the work of Masamune Shirow involved test animation and animatics being used for the ninety minute length in a story¹. It was infamous for how customers were greeted with an apology note from the producers ("This film isn't finished at all") and a form to be sent a free finished VHS copy upon its release². Tragically, this was how Studio Junio finished in the animation industry.

 Ninja Gaiden itself is not something to convert people to, one of the virtues also a flaw to these many OVAs from the past that so many of them were made, to the point that you will encounter ones like this that can have moments of virtue but also may not entirely be the best of its genre. What this is a generic story about guys with the tropes its small plot usually have,  one which eventually becomes macho, with a band of male soldiers who, unfortunately, when their female reporter friend wishes to help in the last raid, tie her at the base on a chair for a joke scene. Admittedly, there is also the moment where one of them named Jeff, mid-gun battle, talks of how military man like men as much as women and alcohol, so I also give credit for unexpected progressiveness in this anime too.

Beautifully as well, this slight work still introduces director Mamoru Kanbe back in my writings, who I knew original for the notorious Elfen Lied (2004), a television series whose flaws cannot undercut, for its lurid and transgressive content, the ideas which did stick out for me. He went on with The Promised Neverland (2019), the first season at least acclaimed at the time, and it is cool to stumble on this early production he directed without realising it; there is nothing here which could suggest a trademark, but when he was not directing comedy like Robonimal Panda-Z: The Robonimation (2004), which is literally about a giant panda robot, Kanbe throughout his career lent into horror and you can see it even here, a genre he would return to or be the right person to bring in for the likes of The Promised Neverland to a Go Nagai adaptation Demon Prince Enma (2006) which took the source into a much more adult version. He is becoming the unsung person I admire the more I find his work, and whilst the screenwriter only has a few credits, and the studio had a tragic ending, this also an obscure title for its animation director and character designer Osamu Horiuchi. Horiuchi would go on with a healthy career from this with the likes of the Full Metal Panic franchise in similar roles, making them a figure of note to pick out too if not a more prominent one. Figures already working in the industry at the time, and those who would be working into the 2000s on, crossed paths on this obscurity in a variety of roles, and yes, the fact that Ninja Gaiden would get a significant reboot in the original video games cannot be ignored either. That franchise would struggle into Ninja Gaiden 3 (2012) which adds its own tale-within-a-tale here too; with the controversial figurehead of Tomonobu Itagaki leaving, those in Team Ninja attempted to take a franchise into a more accessible form, originally designed to be hardcore difficult in gameplay, leading to a divisive inclusion. Alongside the Dead or Alive franchise slipping alone in later sequels, Ryū Hayabusa has found himself in a fascinating number of tales, even when they have been disasters or part of the unfortunate nature of any industry where your next title can fail or be released unfinished in the cinemas. This anime is one of the minor tales from his career, be it commerce or evil demon warriors, but it is an enticing curiosity which, at forty minutes, is too short and with enough within it to not watch.

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1) Shirow's Kids, part of The Mike Toole Show series of articles, written by Mike Toole and published for Anime News Network on July 3rd 2011.

2) Do Movies Experience "Production Crunch" Like TV Series Do?, written by Justin Sevakis and published by Anime News Network on June 12th 2019.