Bonus #13: Gonad the Barbarian & Search for Uranus (1986)

 

"Director": Arthur King

"Screenplay": Arthur King

Viewed in English Dub

 

What's an agent of A.S.S. doing on my toilet?

We would have to face the situation eventually - that of reviewing uncensored hentai (porn) anime - but to just add an odd layer to the proceedings, let us begin with a very curious release. This will require a couple of contexts first. 1) When OVAs started as a format in 1983-4, straight to video anime alongside the videotape industry in general, naturally erotic anime would appear. 2) Called ero anime in Japan, "hentai" is the term we coined for the genre in the West despite being the Japanese term for "pervert". 3) As I have seen with the censored titles they tried to sell in the British Isles, it is a a prolific genre but also one that you could barely see in the United Kingdom, simply because of the type of content that would be allowed to be passed even in the modern day, but also because we still have a lot of restrictions of where you can purchase pornography still; the internet has become freed a lot of restrictions, deliberately or people going against our country's rules, but continually with laws trying to be passed in our country in regards of this, the internet as a medium for erotica of all types is one of debate still.

In terms of anime itself, one of the most iconic hentai series, not connected to today's subjects, is the Cream Lemon series, which in its original run started in 1984. That series helped, over its many sequel series, had great animators cutting their teeth, and even help lead to the term "lemon" be used for erotic fan fiction in the West. But naturally, there would be other titles, and other brands, and these are such titles. And in a curious decision, predating when Akira (1988) really began anime's relationship in the West, we ended up with members of the adult film industry licensing hentai and redubbing it with porn actors.

Gonad the Barbarian was the title, though only under thirty minutes to my surprise, I was intrigued to see, appropriated by Arthur King, a writer on titles like Ten Little Maidens (1985) with Harry Reems and Ginger Lynn. Hence, this cannot count as a regular review, as the American script and dub is its own creation which drastically changed the material, taking liberties to an extreme. In a sci-fi future, the villainous group G.A.S., led by the "slimy twit" Gonad the Barbarian, looking more like a bald moustached man with half an android's visor on, is behind the nefarious kidnapping of women. "So begins this tale of erotic valour and evil decadence", and yes, the narrator is the MVP just for the quotes. G.A.S have kidnapped Pussy La'Mour, forcing the people behind A.S.S., with members like Dr. Jerkoff, to ask Princess Layme to come back into their fold to help. Alongside its name changes (her friend and possible lover Dick for example), and some really peculiar touches like this Earth having submarine races at the beach, the due is also "special". Actually, the animation already is not great either. It is definitely a Japanese production, as there is kanji visible in scenes, but it however looks like a poorly animated children's show if you added in porn, with the added touch that the English dub is ridiculous.

This show presents a curious meeting of cultures as a result, very American porn attitudes with Japanese niche content. For starts, it is amazing to think, considering how most Japanese media is still expensive to buy even decades later in that country, that you would have to pay so much just to have a thirty minute animation like this, not well made and only having a few scenes, really more of a sci-fi show that a promised cavalcade of erotica even if from the early days of the medium. Princess Layme is also clearly a schoolgirl, which is definitely uncomfortable, the actress voicing her clearly sounding like a star from an eighties porn film, but definitely someone befittign the role; Pussy La'Mour's actress in contrast definitely sounds older than her character design. Some of the content in terms of plot does translate - I can see a Star Wars parody having a Dildo Sword, the Weapon Research Department, in a legitimately funny joke for this version, creating it either as perverts or that they outsourced their work to a sex toy designer.

To be honest, whilst I would be morbidly curious to see this with the original Japanese language track, this is probably superior in this form. Since we are talking about actually sex being depicted too, the one thing you have in hentai as a genre as its main point, it is crudely depicted. This is the equivalent of shrugging my shoulders as, regardless of its plot, or it being definitely of the eighties due to the Casio keyboard track or the heroine wearing a red headband, this is still aesthetically unpleasing regardless of your sexuality. This is something to bear in mind as, alongside problematic content, hentai anime's other big issue is the lack of quality animation. It neither helps that, to be blunt, the sex here is non-consensual and thus the title is also problematic too. This will be a worse issue with Search for Uranus, but for all the comedic porn noises and characters named "Anus Andy", this from its shots of bound and captured women is deeply problematic even if terribly drawn, entirely built around the female characters being put through erotic Stockholm Syndrome by sexual torture.

It would not pass still in the United Kingdom, where especially from the 2010s on, our film classificators have still a concern with sexual violent and non-consensual material even in fictional form, even rating regular films higher than in years pass if suggested or depicted. Thankfully as well, whilst also gross, they never have Gonad's friend Scotty involved; Scotty also happens to be a dog, if you were curious, and it is ugly that they tease that as a kink, even if it just means menacing, crude close ups to the dog and nothing else. The only real consolation prize in the original visual content, uncomfortable if merely absurd, is that, having designed the pervy equipment fostered on Princess Layme (even a device to track her using her underwear), Dr. Jerkoff is forced into being the first one to wear her skimpy work costume, giving us middle aged hairy legs as a result. As a result, whilst tacky and the adult actors not really voice performers, the work done by Arthur King, who is credited with producer/director/writer, probably saved Gonad the Barbarian from its poor quality and the discomfort around its content. Due to its humour and the participants turning it into a farce, it can be entertaining in the right context. It milks moments in the anime - those damn spaceship technicians handling the Dildo Sword and leaving it on the runway floor than putting it back in the ship - but adds so much silliness to soften the blow.

 

*****

Sadly that cannot be said for Search for Uranus, which in spite of its title is not actually science fiction, but a curious slice of ancient Greek iconography, including a lesbian Medusa, another trope that emphasises its era of origin in psychic powers, which were a craze for plots at the time, and a poor man's Urotsukidôji: Legend of the Overfiend (1989). With no context for this, not even realising Gonad the Barbarian was only under thirty minutes and Search for Uranus was not a subtitle, I thought I was in for more absurdity. Staring Princess Orgasma and Mark Starkiller, the narrator again won me over with lines like "we are specs of copulating dust..." or "...a fading rectal breeze", before leaving never to be heard again. If this had just been a Greek myth tinged tale of Espers (psychics) with added porn, it might have been compelling especially as the animation is a little better. The music, bouncy, vastly contrasts the actual material badly, and alongside mispronouncing "Medusa", in a female-female scene with music strangely reminiscent to a Sega Saturn game, there is something truly peculiar to porn actors trying to have elaborating anime exposition. But, the first scene involves a villain named Lord Uranus, a monstrosity who has more bound women around him and has tentacles. I had considered not writing about this anime, wishing to ignore it, as much due to whether anyone I knew or of importance would read this, thinking ill of me as a result when I could have just turned it off, but I decided to  still this part of the review.

All because I am a believer in freedom of art and speech, and whilst I would not say I was traumatised, it is probably better for me to write how, by pure accident, I witnessed my first uncensored scenes of tentacles in an anime and how uncomfortable it was even as crude doodles. Not because of the tentacles, which if a kink for someone, they have the right to have. Obviously, it is the non-consensual nature that is the issue, and this title would again not be allowed to be released in the United Kingdom unless butchered to barely a few minutes. Its cheese helps soften the blow, alongside the padding out of scenes by the end, but I cannot help but think of the apparent target audience for this title. Both because the porn scenes again feel crow barred in, and why this would have appear in the first place. It makes Call Me Tonight (1986) actually more poignant then I gave it credit for, another obscure OVA of only thirty or so minutes which parodied this material in the era, about a man who turned into a tentacle monster when he was aroused, making it more relevant and meaningful now with context of the material it was criticising.

And honestly, whilst I am even more wary about ever watching the uncut version of Urotsukidôji now as a result, that feels for more morally sound in comparison as the notion of transgressive and taboo subject matter similar to this was less the issue, even if it will be deemed offensive for most viewers, because it had an elaborate Lovecraftian horror narrative which was compelling even if grotesque. The gender discrepancy was always the issue with Urotsukidôji, where the women were always the victims of sexual violence, which understandably led to people calling it misogynistic. Something like Searching for Uranus in comparison however cannot be defended at all, because this is for someone's titillation let alone scraping the bottom of the barrel only. The Arthur King dialogue cannot hide this. It ends the review on a sour note, though we have the fascinating detail that this was not the last time Arthur King got the rights to anime erotica however: he was also involved with the titles Offenders of the Universe & Star Trap (1987), and Pandora... An Erotic Trilogy: The Dark Forest, the Black Widow and Living Shadows (1988), the later consisting of three titles together the most intriguing, though hopefully he chose wiser than this.