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DOG SOLDIER: SHADOWS OF THE PAST (1989) is a one-shot 44-minute anime OAV (original animated video) that tells a rather convoluted tale of a Japanese-American ex-Green beret who gets caught up in deadly military operations and government intrigue involving a stolen secret and finds his two childhood friends now on the opposite side. The character of John Kyosuke Hiba is clearly inspired by Rambo and he performs the same kind of outlandish superhuman combat action that Rambo was famous for. The action shifts from Japan to an unnamed island with Mayan-style pyramids and flashbacks to John's youth in Los Angeles. The idea of the hero's having to face off against his childhood buddy Makoto, now a powerful crimelord/terrorist, with their former playmate Catherine Mackley, now a government operative of some sort, caught in the middle is kind of intriguing but it's not handled with much depth or finesse here. There's a lot of action but it's too far-fetched, even by anime standards, to be suspenseful and the violence is kept to PG limits so there's not much in the way of gore or bloodshed to keep viewers' attention.

The whole thing is too crudely animated and designed to make this one even remotely watchable. And the English dubbing on the U.S. video release is very badly done. Also, there's so little music on the soundtrack that the frequent spots of "dead air" make a mercifully short running time seem much longer than it should. The script is filled with all kinds of conspiracy thriller clichés and flashbacks to trumped-up American military operations (e.g. a raid on a village in El Salvador) that are designed to show the U.S. military and government in the worst possible light.

The inspiration drawn from Rambo can't be questioned, as I couldn't shake the feeling from just staring at poster artwork, and whenever the protagonist ex-Green beret John Kyosuke all decked out in military gear along with the red headband shows up on screen. But then all that would be spoiled by awful voice acting and some minor tonal shifts of goofy animated grimaces, which took me right out of it.

Dog Soldier: Shadow of the Past is a crudely animated, flatly projected and intricately plotted OVA, which seems to be all about the pedestrian character beats and conspiracy twists. There's nothing wrong in trying to humanise the story, yet it's too contrived and tediously put together. Deep rooted in inner turmoil and at every chance rushing through background exposition only disrupt the rhythm, as the action scenes in between were far from memorable and had little to no impact due to how quickly it moved through each set-up. Only one moment stood out - a scarring death sequence leading to the finale's theatrical knife fight (yep, it included the iconic survival knife) between foes, who once were brothers, in a literal sense as they depended on each other growing up on the streets. I guess the conflictive family angle is suppose to come as a surprise, but really the twists are thrown out there without any sort of lead up to them. It's rather sudden, and confounded. So chuck in the drama intertwined with the usual devious military/government plotting and you get an overly padded out plot of cliched scenarios.

Honestly, watch the Saturday morning cartoon;Rambo: The Force of Freedom if you want to be entertained, as Dog Soldier falls way short with its stale, convoluted story threads and limp action.