Bubblegum Crash

As a sequel to the very popular Bubblegum Crisis OAV series, Bubblegum Crash had lots to live up to, and didn't quite succeed. BG Crisis fans generally have little sympathy for the Crash videos, calling it toned-down and even "alternate universe". Is it really that much of an unrecogniseably mauled travesty, though? Nope, it's actually quite good fun, but anyone expecting a coherent, proper sequel that ties up all the loose ends left by BG Crisis will be disappointed.

The "alternate universe" label is actually quite fitting, as Crash completely alters some major plot elements of Crisis, without any logical explanation to speak of. GENOM has apparently vanished overnight, and Boomer technology has taken a big step backwards. While it was commonplace in BG Crisis to have fully intelligent and even sentient Boomers (cyborgs, to put it simply) that looked and behaved exactly like humans, the Boomers are little more than blocky-looking stupid labor robots in the Crash storyline. Tefal toasters that talk. In the second Crash episode, everyone even gets dead excited about a Boomer that's so advanced it "would sound like a human if you talked to it on the phone!". It's as if Sylvie, Largo and all the others never existed (except that Largo -does- have a role in the Crash tapes). Besides, I don't suppose many people would have telephone conversations with something that looks like the child of C-3PO and Sonic the Hedgehog, but let that pass. There are some other minor points that don't gel with the events of BG Crisis (the state of Priss' singing career, for instance), and the overall tone of the Crash episodes is more light and action-oriented than it was in Crisis.

In fact, compared to somewhat deep plots of Crisis, Crash is little more than a fluffy action romp, with lots of running, shouting and nasties to blow apart. The plots are indeed lightweight, with even some holes here and there (such as Sylia luring the dopey baddies into a trap with "some phoney information I've put out on the net". Brilliant, Sylia). Little more than an excuse for the fight scenes, with the odd musings about advanced robots being nothing we haven't seen before. They do try to tie up that whole Sylia-Largo thing in the last episode, which makes for the only deep moments of Crash, but even those aren't revolutionnary, and even somewhat cheesy. Those who think of Crash as a cyberpunk Sailor Moon are very much on the right track.

But the bright side is that the cyberpunk Sailor Moon formula turns out to be quite good fun. Amusing scenes of the character's daily life build up to some slick, fast fight scenes where dramatic poses and funky weapons are the order of the day. Backed by a very vivid music score, plus cool new armor designs and techniques for our heroines to use (Nene can actually put up a decent fight now), it gets the feel of speed and adventure just right. The third episode goes into particularly strong dramatic overdrive, with a token cheesy over-villain and his melodramatic plot to blow up all of Mega-Tokyo in the most showy way possible. The Crash series sometimes feels as if the Bubblegum Crisis gang got together to re-cap their adventures in a glitzy and somewhat corny Hollywood flick; dumbed down but sped up. If your kid sister didn't like BG Crisis too much, chances are high that she'll get a big kick out of Crash (with that nifty ka-pang sound the Knight Saber's shoes make when they jump), and you very probably will too, providing you can switch off your brain, and your upset pride as a die-hard BG Crisis fan. If you can forget that this is not what you expected as a BG Crisis lover, there's a good deal of fast, harmless fun to enjoy in there. The many good close-ups of Daley that we're treated to in BG Crash are enough for me to enjoy it already ^.^

I came into this OVA thorougly worn down from my frustration with the plot of the first. I had a little more hope for this, due to hearing that it was more action oriented than "Bubblegum Crash", to the chagrin of series fans. It is further alienated from the fanbase by being accused of not only being an ill attempt to tie up the series, but straight up non cannon. How could this be?

That brings us to our first problem, why make a conclusion to the original series if you're going to retcon a massive portion of the plot? In this OVA, the robot "boomers" are portrayed as not being sentient or even human passing. This is directly contradictory of MANY characters in the original series. This decision is made even stranger by the fact that while it's a key plot point, it is not at all necessary to the stories conclusion.

Forgoing all of that and a weak first act, I quite enjoyed this. My suspicions were confirmed in shifting the focus to action: this was a justifiable shift in focus away from plot and character development. In my opinion, this was always the weakest part of the show. The writing ranged from bland and cliche to laughable. In the last two acts especially, I found myself enjoying the simplistic characters and story more because it wasn't trying to fumble a narrative and it just let itself be as fun as the best parts of the original run.

I generously rounded my score up to a seven, because I absolutely would conditionally recommend this to fans of the original 8-episode installment. Take my word with a grain of salt, though. Because people who liked the original for reasons that I didn't seemed to hate this one.

Still, this never really ascends past an adult Saturday morning cartoon with unusually fantastic art and style. Watch it with your breakfast and coffee.