Bubblegum Crisis

Following the Knight Sabers, a highly elite group of female mercenaries living in a futuristic cyberpunk Tokyo, where they take down machines known as Boomers, many created by the evil mega-corp Genom. This whole series screams 80s anime and I loved it. The original series is only 8 episodes released over multiple years, produced more as OVAs (Original Video Animations) rather than a series, meaning each episode tends to be longer, typically at 44 minutes, and is considerably higher budget than the traditional 26 episode 22 minute standard we often see. This also means each storyline, while generally disjoint from other episodes, is a bit more involved or complex than other anime shows of the time, and I was quite impressed by its visuals. The art and aesthetic is perfect though and through. If you're one to have nostalgia from any of that sci-fi anime future punk era: Akira, Mobile Suit, Robotech, etc, you're going to love this. Definitely adult, there is nudity, violence, and swearing, the plots are generally good, again with each narrative being self contained per episode and each slowly clueing us in on the futuristic city, its technology, and how society now functions. Its not all great, plot-wise we never really get as much explained as we'd like, characters don't really develop, and with transforming vigilante heroes a la Charlie's Angels meets Power Rangers, there's a lot of tropes presented, some great, some not the best. I don't know enough anime history to say which if these tropes the series pioneered vs simply reenforced, but overall I did constantly have fun and felt vested in the characters. Unfortunately the english dub of this series is also not the best, with a lot of line delivery being very questionable if not laughable, but if you're like me it somehow only added to the charm and nostalgia. Also something not an issue if you watch the original subbed, so I can't fault it for that anyway. Fortunately for those wanting more there's multiple other spin-offs and reboots since this original, and for all this series was it deserves them, I'd already consider this a classic.

I have listed my brief thoughts and score with a rating on every episode. I then averaged them to receive the score above. It's accurate. I liked it mostly, but I wouldn't recommend it to anyone, unless you are a hardcore cyberpunk completionist.

PROS

+ Beautiful still artwork. Constantly thinking how great certain ones would be for gifs or wallpapers. + Great action. Not too over the top, and always fun. + Kick-ass music. Lends itself to an 80's cyberpunk action setting perfectly. I believe all the soundtrack was original. Worth a listen! + Good for watching idle. It has a Saturday morning cartoon (but for adults) feel. worth watching with your breakfast and coffee.

CONS

+Terrible Writing. Plots are often contrived and events and actions frequently make no sense. +Horrible dialogue. The amount of exposition is so high and so unnatural feeling that every character may as well just look at the viewer and break the fourth wall directly. +Predictable. Each episode is very formulaic. You have your relevant side plot and your ending action sequence. +Story never truly advances. The first episode tells us about the AD Police, Knight Sabers, and the Boomers. After that, they are all in perpetual war, same s**t different episode. Each episode the boomer is more "powerful", but this never truly makes a difference. Once in awhile a character gets new equipment that is "better" despite being visually equivalent to the previous. One wonders how this was a sustainable long term plot model.

If you want plot, look somewhere else. If you want action, there's better anime to scratch that itch. I really wanted to like it. I came out just not hating it.

Music still kicks ass, though.

I like Scots. Hell, I am a Scot. But the guy above me is nuts. We all know that you can't just jump in the middle of a series. It's a cardinal sin of animé-watching, and something that will get you mocked mercilessly. And he did this.

The ep he's referring to is 'Revenge Road', and relies on you knowing who Priss, Linna, Nene, and Sylia are. Want to get a better picture of this animé without watching all eight episodes? Watch 5 and 6, 'Moonlight Rambler' and 'Red Eyes', respectively. You'll see some of the best drama, action, and plot to come out of animé ever.

/rant over.

Anyway, this is definitely worth a view. The premere babes-in-battlesuits animé, and home of the Knight Sabers (the most ass-kickin' group of mercs in animé.)

In a "Blade Runner" like future, four vigilante women - the Knight Sabers - assist the AD Police in fighting boomers, living machines not unlike the Replicants from "Blade Runner". The Knight Saber ring leader is Sylia Stingray, a rich, mysterious brunette who is the daughter of the man who created the boomers and whom might actually be a boomer herself. The others include rebellious biker girl Priss Asagiri, aerobics instructor Linna Yamazki and ADP computer hacker Nene. Other characters include ADP man Leon McNichol, a Brad Pitt like pretty boy with high ideals and a jerky attitude as well as a thing for Priss and with Leon is his hilarious partner Daley Wong. Oh and Sylia has a pervert whiz kid for a brother by name of Mackey. The villains include Quincy, chairman of GENOM, the company that produces the boomers, his right hand man Brian J. Mason (killed off too soon) and an obnoxious boomer man named Largo.

A good series overall, but being dated is the least of its problems. Originally slated for 13 episodes, it was cut short at episode 8, leaving many series plot threads unresolved. A sequel series, Bubblegum Crash, was concocted to solve this problem but it didn't help. Also the characters are never as well developed as you would like them to be. The most interesting character, the Knight Saber ringleader Sylia, is never completely explored. Linna had potential, but her subplot involving a friend who was apart of a mafia family was never resolved and most of the time Linna was just ignored. Nene was cute and funny but only had one episode to call her own, the last one. Sadly, most of the series attention was centered on Priss, who somehow became the most popular character of the series, so much in fact that although she was originally suppose to die, a fan backlash saved her; I think this was due partly to the fact that she was voiced by a then popular Japanese singer. But Priss herself was not that interesting of a character: all her episodes basically revolve around her seeking revenge for a minor character friend that we the audience sometimes didn't even get to know in depth. Priss became repetitive and dull after a certain point. I could never quite figure out what Leon saw in her.

But the series itself is not inherently bad. Animation is still pretty good in most of the eps (excluding the first one, which is a bit herky jerky, and the last one, in which the characters are drawn much too thinly) and it had an interesting theme on humanity VS technology.

Remade for TV as "Bubblegum Crisis Tokyo 2040" in 1999. Hate to say it, but 2040 was superior in many ways, though not completely perfect in and of itself.

The DVD set of this series is excellent. The sound is great, and the picture quality is perfect, even surpassing the laserdisc release. The ability to watch it in the original Japanese without subtitles covering the picture is nice, also. All 8 episodes are in the set, which is a steal at about $50 (compared to about $120 for the tapes, or around $100 for the laserdiscs, if you can even find them). My only complaint is that the music videos are compressed really badly, giving them an M-PEG look, and compared to how the actual episodes look in this set, that low quality is unacceptable. Still, that one complaint aside, this set is more than worth the money if you like this series even a little.