Now for a weird ova series, not in the way you are thinking, all will be clear throughout.
The anime opens up with a Phil Collins track? as we witness the life of twin actors Cipher and Siva as they work in America and you start to paint a picture of what we can expect as more cheesy 80s pop songs play, most noticeably Vanessa Williams but there is something more worthy of note. All the dialogue is in English but this is no dub, it's on purpose making it a genuine anime in English and the voice acting is still terrible, how you can do that when it's not a dub is beyond me.
If I call this anime anything, it's a glorified music video.
Final Verdict: It's interesting from the perspective of how Japan viewed 80s Americana but it's impossible to overlook how terrible the voice acting is, authenticity or not, there's no excuse for poor voice acting even in English.
Taking a step out of this month's theme to review a rare title that few know was even licensed in the west. This is Ghost Talkers Daydream.
Saiki Misaki has always been able to see ghosts, so naturally to pay the bills, she takes jobs as a spirit medium alongside her normal job as an S&M mistress at a hostess club. (As you do)
After solving a mystery behind a killing of a mother and child, she's joined by a school girl named Ai, however the less than thrilled Misaki already works for a pervy employer and a photo enthusiast who always seems to get the most embarrassing shots of her.
This one has a bizarre combination to it of being no where near hentai enough and yet being a little too bizarre for it's heavy themes around suicide and child murder. What it does well is setting a mindset into what these spirits see before their horrific demise but then you get the type of shtick you find in your average ecchi anime often showcased by Misaki herself who couldn't care less half the time.
So where do I sit on this anime?
I feel invested and Misaki is quite the fun character but it definitely couldn't last much more than 13 episodes at best and this only had four.
Dub isn't that bad although one actor appeared to do all the male characters which is a little distracting.
Final Verdict: if you can find it, I'd give it a watch. It's certainly worth finding if you don't feel too emotionally weighed down by the themes or distracted by the fact that Misaki is basically Bayonetta's spirit medium cousin. (Yeah that magic whip of hers is hair, see where it comes from and work it out)
Back to our creator special and next on the creation list is Hirohiko Araki and the anime Baoh.
Ikurou was a normal boy until he was abducted by evil scientists and injected with a parasite named Baoh that gives the host super powers but after a chance encounter with a psychic girl, Ikurou escapes.
The scientists led by Dr Kasuminome must destroy Baoh in order not to reveal to the world that they created a super soldier.
Baoh is ultra violent, the type that works alongside the likes of Fist of the North Star of which Baoh is heavily inspired by. So don't expect anything intelligent as all you'll get is good old cheesy violent action but perhaps what this anime is better known for is it's laughably terrible dub, which consists mostly of stating the bloody obvious all the time mixed with some god awful voicework, it's definitely on the so bad, it's good scale.
So who is Hirohiko Araki? You may know him as the creator of Jojo's Bizarre Adventure, although that work has been his continuous work for three decades you can definitely see inspirations for some of the Stand designs later seen in Stardust Crusaders in Baoh.
Final Verdict: So bad, it's good if only for it's infamously horrible dub, without it, it just looks like an incompetent action show with over the top violence.
Finding creators who have done a range of work that includes their best and least known works is harder than you might think so to give me more research time I decided to look into two mini ovas, the first one is Twinkle Heart.
God is after the legendary lost treasure of Heaven which he has tasked his two daughters along with their Guardian to search for, much to his own reluctance to do so.
The trio are as follows.
Cherry - A feisty red head with an Annie haircut and a short temper.
Berry - A dreamer who keeps forgetting to do her job.
Lemon - An easily distracted romantic who chases after boys.
Today's mission is on a mysterious planet of killer stuffed toys brought to life by the life essence created by the appropriately named Geppetto but it gets used for nefarious purposes so the girls have to stop a notorious bounty hunter from seizing the life essence.
It's simple dumb fun, it has potential but I'm less keen on some of the design choices along with the fact that the series seems to think that we know all these characters already which is fine in Japan, but not in the west on YouTube.
Also while we find out later that Winkies is basically Mcdonalds. Without any context to tell us, it just comes off as dirty innuendo.
Final Verdict: it's okay, it's at least watchable.
This month I'll be looking at creators before they were famous, seeing what they made in the past to put food on the table before they became famous for their creation. So try and figure out who was responsible for this.
Shinzo or Mushrambo in Japan tells the events of Journey to the West through a post apocalyptic setting as Yakumo the last human in existence must find the hidden sanctuary of Shinzo hoping to save the remnants of the human race, joining her is a band of Enterrans, genetically engineered beings made to survive the extinction of the event that killed off humanity, join Yakumo in her journey to Shinzo.
Our band of heroes is Mushra, Sago and Kutal who can fuse into the hero Mushrambo along with a group of kittens and Hakuba a robotic horse.
If you were to gauge the time period with all the kids anime like Digimon, Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh, you'd forgive Foxkids for looking for a show that pretty much combines it all, yes even cards, but this show is a bigger mess for it.
It's easy to lose your marbles watching this as much of the cast feels pretty useless especially when Mushrambo gets summoned which is a shame as they are fairly interesting characters; as for Yakumo, her bad case of damsel in distress gets tiring after the first few episodes, I realize she's a target and supposedly she has fabulous secret powers but it's difficult to support a female character who can't do anything and constantly makes the same bad judgements.
The other issue is the story and how it ends as both differ dramatically between manga, anime and even translation meaning it's hard to conclude which one is superior.
Dub is passable for a FoxKids anime.
So who made this? Izumi Todo, the creator of the Precure franchise, the most popular magical girl series in Japan.
Although I find it ironic that her female characters went from useless damsel to magical girls who could fight saiyans given the chance.
Final Verdict: It's not terrible per say but the story easily derails the series and established characters in the grand scheme of things are actually pretty useless.
